You must hate everything that has quality, don't you?

[font=century gothic]Holy shit. The Celtics won a game without Paul Pierce. They were on a six game losing streak coming in and "improve" to 11-19. With the win they're now only 1.5 games back in the Atlantic Division.[/font]

nice, the cavs are on a roll. this is a perfect time for it too. they start a 7 game road trip next and have won 4 straight and are playing great team basketball headed into it.

Watching the Pistons this year is a like a roller coaster ride... they win 8 or 10 in a row, win some big games against great opponents, and follow it up by losing 4 or 5 against bottom dwellers in the league.

I'm also beginning to think Flip Saunders is a bad coach. The team seems to have lost a lot of chemistry since he took over, and now he's got Rasheed Wallace coming off the bench for the last 2 games. Brilliant move... "Chauncey Billups is out hurt, so let's bench Rasheed too!".

oy, the cavs winning streak is coming crashing down in a big way. i had a feeling they'd get smoked up by the suns tonight.

Chris Webber is going to the Pistons.

well, the cavs bounced back nicely from that ugly loss to the suns by beating a good clippers team on the road to go to 2-1 so far on their 7 game road trip.

Sure sounds like a done deal the way most are talking. I'm not the biggest Webber fan (never have been), but it can't be bad for the Pistons if they snag him... they wouldn't be sinking a lot of money or a long contract in him... I think I heard they'd only be able to pay him $1.2 million and he's a free agent at the end of the year.

WHOA!!! Chris Mullin actually did something right, Murphy and Dunleavy are off to Indiana which also means goodbye huge contracts for mediocre players and Warriors get Harrington and Jackson

Only thing is that we also dumped Ike Diogu for a few Indy scrubs who will one day be a very significant player, just not with what the Warriors are doing.

Raptors are starting to prove themselves, they're beating up on weak times easily... Even came 1 point short of defeating Dallas, they were winning that entire game and just got heartbroken on the last shot. They're going to the playoffs.

GSW got the better end of that deal, IMO. As long as Jackson can keep himself from shooting some strippers while smoking crack, he may do some good for GS.

Raptors are over the .500 mark for the first time in like 4 years... and going strong. Second time recently Boston put up a much bigger fight than the should've, without Pierce and Wally they're amateurs, but you can't say they aren't trying.

But honestly, I think this is looking like the best group of players Toronto has ever produced. If Bargnani turns into a 20 point+ player in the next couple seasons, with Bosh, Ford/Calderon still growing, and Mitchell coaching, they could potentially be one of the East's best teams. Hell, they'll probably be opening up a solid division lead this year, with Jersey injured, and shouldn't be looked over as a under the radar playoff threat. I'll be interested in the Wizards game this weekend, lately the opponents have been easy, it'll be interesting to go against a fairly solid team with this winning groove.

Winning Streaks

Phoenix 35-8
15 games
16 games (current streak)


Dallas 35-9
12 games
13 games
8 games

I hope they make it to the Western Conference Finals. Should be EPIC!!

Rockets are now 11 games over .500. They had double-digit leads against both Mavs and Suns last week without Yao before losing. Could have easily been 32-11 with all the close games they have had without one or both of their stars. Love to see them playing at full strength against those guys in the playoff.

The Suns could have a 33 game winning streak going if it wasn't for last second shots by Dirk and Arenas in their respective wins.

Knicks have the most interesting games in whole NBA. Yesterday Crawford with 16 field goals made in a row...jeez.

What do we all think about the all-star starters? Who should replace the injured Yao Ming?

Nowitzki. He's been playing center as well...

Yeah, either that or put Nash in and move everybody up a position (McGrady small forward, Garnett power forward, and Duncan center).

I was expecting the Raptors to put up a good game against the Wizards, I didn't imagine they'd blow them out. Calderon exploded... he's almost good enough to be a #1 guy, Ford could be trade-able for a good center in the future. Bosh has been averaging like 30 points per game over the last couple recently, he's stepped it up.

Knicks on the other hand are pathetic.

And then on some nights, great.

Bleh!

With Spurs stumbling a bit and Jazz losing Boozer for at least a month, the Rockets can actually get that No. 3 seed. JVG is doing a pretty good job this season.

^

I agree, Houston has been looking pretty strong down the stretch. With Yao and McGrady healthy, in the next few years they could become one of those top tier teams, though I don't see anyone in the West challenging Phoenix or Dallas in this year's playoffs.

Raptors over .500 for the first time since 01-02... niccceee. I hope they don't do anything this trade deadline, everything is just going perfectly right now. Possible darkhorse for the playoffs considering how weak the East is. Not even that many games behind Detroit/Cleveland/Washington right now, just 4-5 I believe.

Even though the East kind of sucks, I think it's kind of interesting how tight things are... the top 7 seeds are all within 3.5 games of each other, and Miami as the 8th team I'd bet on making a run up the rankings eventually too. Will be fun to track down the stretch.

Has anybody read Arenas's blog?

http://www.nba.com/blog/gilbert_arenas.html

I'm not sure if I love him or hate him.

Bosh has been getting MVP chants for a couple nights now... He's been putting up 30 points 10 boards a game for a couple weeks now, but the surge has began too late to beat Nash/Nowitzki... if he plays those numbers all next year though he'll be right there.