I would think Portland would wanna dump Darius Miles when trading Zach Randolph, though it's hard to imagine many teams wanting to give much for that.

Zach Randolph would be a nice inside presence, but I wouldn't want to give up Chauncey, Rip, Rasheed, or Tayshaun to get him. I'd give them Webber, but I don't think that's an option the Pistons have, as Webber pretty much controls his own destiny.

If I were running the Pistons, I'd largely keep the team as it is, other than a few minor trades (get rid of Nazr Muhammed or Dale Davis). I only think you need a change in the way they are coached. During the regular season they need to give their developing talent a TON more playing time and their starters a lot less. They;ve got two first round draft picks this year. They certainly can develop the youth needed from what they have already, without trading the core 4 starters.

I'm still sort of in the Kevin Durant camp, but I'm starting to come around to Oden. If we do get Oden, I'd like to see us make a move for a scoring swing man with Randolph/Miles as bait. A sign-and-trade for Rashard Lewis sounds pretty nice. That would give us a crunch time lineup of Jack, Roy, Lewis, Alderidge, and Oden. I'd take that.

I'm really starting to wonder what everyone is thinking? I everyone going insane?

Cleveland has little to no shot. San Antonio is gonna walk over them, in either 4 or 5 games. No more.

This is actually the first thing I agreed with you in this whole thread.

:-)

Spurs are playing lovely.

This game makes me wanna blow my brains out.

Easy solution. Don't watch it.

As a fan of basketball and the NBA it's my duty to watch it.

I've been watching bits and pieces, but so far am having trouble getting into either team. I hope that Cleveland wins, so that I can say in my head that Detroit wasn't *that* bad, but I just don't like Cleveland... or SA.

So far my favorite part of the show was the piece that showed Popovich and a half naked Timmy sitting on the beach. It looked very romantic and I understand their relationship a little more than I wanted to.

I can handle the Spurs, Cavs, Pistons when they have an entertainment team carrying them

But when they play each other... ah.

I wish Bron Bron took shots in the first half of games

Well LeBron did take the most shots out of every Cavs player in the first

just ignoring how bad this is I got a question. Why doesn't Ginobili start? I don't understand this.

Duncan and Parker dominated, and Lebron had a bad shooting night against Spurs' defense, pretty much what most expected.

You know, I don't like watching the Spurs, but I can't help but love Greg Popovich... he's probably one of the smartest and best overall coaches of all time thinking about it, I can't really think of many teams that have played as strategically apt as San Antonio has in their reign. A probable 5 or 6 championships before he's done puts him right up there.

kill - I didn't notice Lebron had missed a lot of shots when I made that comment, it seemed like he wasn't touching the ball much from what I watched and I assumed his lack of points meant he just wasn't shooting like he commonly does early on in games. SA just shut him down I guess.

flav'd - The Spurs just do better with Ginobli off the bench. The first half of the year had him starting and they looked shaky, they put him on the bench and from there SA went on a 25-3 run or something around that area, so I guess it sticks. It has a lot to do with Parker/Ginobli balance and Finley getting more exposure if I've interpreted it right.

I agree about the system, but the Spurs are too good to let that happen. They'll win at least one game in Cleveland.

Still saying Spurs in 5/4

What's wrong with the system? I like it better than the 2-2-1-1-1 one in hockey. Of course, there used to be the 2-3-2 system in hockey, until the Oilers conquered it during their dynasty and the NHL quickly changed it. One thing you can always count on in the NHL is for the league to keep the Canadian teams down.

The one thing that is wrong with the system is that at some point the inferior team will have had more home games than the better team. At game #5, the worst team will have had 3 home games to the better team's 2. When it only takes 4 games to win a series that could be huge. With a 2-2-1-1-1 spacing, the better team is never behind in home games. The bitch of that is that there is a lot of travel time in those 1-1-1 games.

As for tonight's game, I was at least happy Cleveland closed the lead a little at the end. And WTF is up with them scoring 76 points for the 3rd time in the last 7 games?

you see how lebron attacks the onyl the 4th quarter? he needs to do that the entire game.

1 down, 3 to go.

Also, I'm sure everyone will once again go "LeBron is over-rated, blah blah blah" and then LeBron will have one amazing game, and people will say "The king is here!!! WOO! He's so amazing"

And I will be sitting here, shaking my head, because I KNOW that LeBron is over-rated, every single game, no matter what he does.

Why so much hate for Lebron? He's not my favorite, I don't like Cleveland, and I picked SA to win in 4, but Lebron is far from overrated. Without him this team of misfits wouldn't even be in the playoffs, let alone the finals. It's not like he just has one good game every few weeks... his numbers are astounding and support the love he gets. His points, assist, and rebound average over the last three years has only been matched by one other person in the entire history of the NBA (Oscar Robinson).

Again, he's far from my favorite, but if you know anything about basketball, you know Lebron is not overrated. The most amazing thing is that he is only 22 years old... he'll have at least 10 years more of playing at this level or better. If Cleveland gets some better pieces around him, we could see a Jodan-esque Chicago Bulls type dynasty.

i have to wonder is mj ever had this kind of doubt.

lebron is nasty. at 22 he is one of the best in the game, at 25 hell be the best in the game, by 30 hell be the best there ever was in the game. simple, undeniable, inevitable facts.

I don't recall MJ ever having this much doubt, but at the same time I don't recall him having the same expectations. It's important to remember that MJ got his ass handed to him in the playoffs by the Pistons for 3 or 4 years in a row before he finally broke through. He didn't really attain his lofty status until he won some championships. But this is why I think the criticism of Lebron is a little harsh this early... it's not unusual for even the brightest basketball stars to take some lumps and build their confidence.

But, I it's just far too early to annoint Lebron as the greatest basketball player ever, or an overrated hack. Time will tell the rest of this story. So far he looks great and has a lot of promise, but it could go many different ways from here. If he goes on to win 3 or 4 championships, he'll likely attain much acclaim. If he never reaches the finals again and/or has a nasty injury that hampers him for the rest of his career (think Grant Hill), then he'll be a decent player that was a disappointment.