SSBA

And finally, ending the season long drought of low quality articles, here's a view on the upcoming playoffs and who will get where:

In part one, let's look at the East:

#1 Nets vs. #8 Pacers
If there's one team the Nets match up with it's the Pacers (as evident by sweeping the season series with an average margin of victory of 27 pts). So what happened to the former contender from Indianapolis? Hard to tell: JO & Artest get the same numbers as in past years, Melo even had a career year. Their big men got old, sure, so they gave up more boards and points, but in the end it seems like their bench play was the main reason. So far, new C Magloire hasn't been able to provide more energy (as they still allow better opponents to shoot around 50%), and time is running out this year ...
Injuries: nada
Outlook: Nets in 5

#4 Bulls vs. #5 Raptors
Is this a deja vu for the Bulls? AGAIN there comes a team rolling into the playoffs red hot and grabbing the 5th spot after looking out of contention for most of the season (after the Celtics last year ended the year 20-3, now the Raptors won 19 of 29 after the Hoffa trade). On paper a matchup crying for upset. No Bull can stop Yao and the rest of the Reptiles are just good enough defensively to hold down the other positions. So i'd expect ... a sweep. From the Bulls. They simply have too much quality - and the better starters from 1 to 4 - to go down in the first round again ...
Injuries: nope
Outlook: Bulls in 4

#2 Hornets vs. #7 Magic
I don't see any team beating the Hornets at all so why even start analyzing matchups here? They proved they can win the grind-out affairs and the shootouts. They win by holding the opponents down and about the only way to have any chance is to constantly attack them, get them into foul trouble. And I don't see the Magic have that ability. A single win would be the highest i see them going for and even for that everything must click in a single game ...
Injuries: Kidd (Magic) misses first 2 games
Outlook: Hornets in 5

#3 Celtics vs. #6 Cavs
The mighty Cavs took a fall lately losing 13 of 22 to finish the season and slipping from 4th to 6th in the process. This while All Star VC is putting up career numbers and the other Vince proving his ROY campaign last year wasn't a fluke. But it's not the offensive end that causes troubles for the Cavaliers, they are giving up 102ppg and a league leading 54 boards. Now with the New Englanders bolstering their frontline rebounding even more adding Etan Thomas there will be even more pressure on the Cavs backcourt to outperform their counterparts ...
Injuries: Billups (Celts) misses first 3 games
Outlook: Celtics in 7


Tomorrow: part two of our playoff preview, trying to answer "How the West can be won". So stay tuned ...
 8)

I don't think so. Not with Yao has red-hot as he is. Not with the fact that I won the season series 3-1.

thanks for the preview Celts, it was a good read  :)

Hoping for the best. I actually think my team has a good chance in this one, but sure it could go either way. I'm looking forward to it...

i like the way how you analyse the matchups..
i agree the nets are tough to beat and there is no way i can stop pettit
maybe i can win some games (4 would be enough  :wink: )

what many people (GMs) don't understand is that regular season record means nothing in the playoffs (other than providing the first 2 games at home).

And to a lesser extent even the season series is useless for predicting series. First, nobody takes individual matchups into account for DCs during a regular season sim, and second, if anything, it helps the LOSING team to find out what does NOT work.

So i wouldn't call any series anytime a given ...
 :shock:

And that, Celtics, is why I have the idea about making the playoff period longer. It would be very interesting to split every series into 2 or 3 parts. Thats when you really find out about matchups. What do you guys think?

MAybe not for the first round but for the rest I think it could be a good idea to run the same as the finals.

I 100% agree.