It's almost time for the playoffs, but for teams it seems that the playoffs have already begun. In the #8 seeds, the Indiana Pacers and the Charlotte Bobcats are in a fierce battle in the East, and the Memphis Grizzlies and Houston Rockets are duking it out-out West. There's a few contested seeds in both conferences, which will determine which team faces whom during the first round. This is critically important because upsets almost always happen and there's more than a few teams in both conferences who look very ready to Cinderellas in the first round.
But the biggest stories for the beginning of the playoff push are the Spurs, Lakers, Mavericks, Celtics, and Heat. The Spurs have suffered two injuries in a row, to Tim Duncan and then Manu Ginobili which garnered them an extremely unimpressive 5 game losing streak, causing them to only be ahead of the Lakers by 2 1/2 games now, caused lately by a very unimpressive loss to the Boston Celtics.
The Lakers have been absolutely steamrolling their competition, only losing once to the Miami Heat since the All-Star Break. Last night, the Lakers and Mavericks battled for the #2 spot in a game that has been widely viewed as the deciding game for the #2 and #3 seeds out West. The game wasn't even close; the Lakers won by 28 points and even exposed the Mavericks for being an incredibly soft team with zero physicality. The Lakers proved with their latest game that no team can defeat them in a 7-game series and they are almost guaranteed at this point to win a 3rd straight championship.
Although the Mavericks have been the most consistent team of the decade in the regular season, they're once again showing their true colors and will likely choke in the playoffs again. After their loss to the Lakers last night, Chris Webber called out the Mavericks for being incredibly soft and having no physicality for the cheap shot Jason Terry took on Steve Blake. Although Webber was a fan of the foul in essence, he did not agree with shoving a player when you're losing a game by 20+ points and have had an absolutely atrocious shooting night. This sent the message to everyone that Terry has a short fuse when he does badly and also that the 6th man (a Guard at that) rather than a team leader had to instigate something. Webber went on to say that this was the game for the Mavericks to prove they were the real deal and shove it in the Lakers' faces, but the opposite happened and now everyone is writing off the Mavericks since now everyone knows it will be impossible for the Mavericks to defeat the Lakers in a 7-game series.
The Celtics have been on a downward spiral since the OKC trade, and it's only gotten worse with Nenad Krstic out with a possibly long-term injury, while Kendrick Perkins is playing for the Thunder. This trade with OKC has been disastrous for the Celtics in multiple ways and Danny Ainge will most definitely be fired if the Celtics fail to reach the NBA Finals. Lastly, the Miami Heat have been fairly average compared to their season, but two games stand out in particular. Miami needed an overtime to beat the 76ers, the team they are likely to face in the playoffs, and the Cleveland Cavaliers finally managed to beat the Heat by double digits, the first time this entire season the Cavaliers have won by 10+ points. The Cavaliers may have crafted a blueprint of success for teams facing the Heat, as it allowed the worst team in the NBA to beat a team known for demolishing all the bad teams.
The NBA Playoffs begin 2 weeks from now.
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