Hypocrisy, stubbornness, and
regular season meaninglessness. Those are my thoughts during this series. All
four teams tie into these concepts. Here, let me explain.
I see a lack of
logical thinking in so many instances and examples. For example, the Rudy Gay trade. When it
happened, most of the people I know and watch basketball with cheered. It gave
Toronto a solid player to finally build around who could be unleashed and
played at the small ball stretch four, where he belongs. The Grizzlies were a
rough and tough team that just needed a 3 who could defend and shoot the long
ball. Prince isn’t perfectly that, but he’s better than Rudy. More importantly,
Pondexter is perfect for this role. Memphis would be smart to move Prince along
and let Quincy play more.
The thing that gets me is
how so many basketball people lamented the trade. Magic, Shaq, Kenny, Wilbon,
and so many more talking heads at Bristol said you couldn’t “win without the
star” and they were “trading a dollar for 65 cents”. Normally that’s right, but
the truth was Rudy wasn’t a star anymore. I watched Bill Simmons for weeks try
to talk sense into his coworkers about how Rudy and his inefficient game being
gone was actually good for the Grizzlies, especially when calculating in his
salary savings and his horrendous shooting from 18 feet and out. They ignored him. But when it came to the playoffs and the
Grizzlies got going and blasted their way into the Western Finals, they weren’t
reversing course. You could tell several times they wanted no part of talking
about this trade again because of how wrong they were. And I think Simmons was holding back from gloating. I know,
the Grizzlies have exited already. But it wasn’t because they didn’t have Rudy Gay. He
would have sunk them more. I am cringing from all the long terrible threes
Leonard would have suckered him into.
If you will, please joing me in examining the Pacers and
the logic inadequately applied to them this year. All season, they were derided because
their bench is terrible, especially at the 1 and 5. But then we also hear that
the bench matters far less in the playoffs, because the starters frequently
play so many more minutes. So why are we surprised that the Pacers have again
had a solid playoffs? Those starters have carried them. Has the bench let them
down, and potentially cost them a win or two? Absolutely. But on the whole,
Indiana has done well and still could win this series. Mainly because Paul
George and Roy Hibbert aren’t playing 33 minutes. They are playing 43, so the
inferior bench matters far less. And oh by the way? Those 5 Indy starters know
each other really well. Of course, Granger being there would be nice and would
let Lance “I think I’m Jamal Crawford” Stevenson not play so many important minutes. But overall, the logic remains true.
Okay, I love basketball. But during
the regular season, I don’t freak out about catching every game. I like watching, but I don’t count the stats or the wins until late in the year. I also
don’t particularly care about home court or seedings to be honest. Ellis and
LARRY SANDERS! had to be separated in the locker room during a playoff game. I
think the Bucks were losing the first round regardless of the matchups. I didn’t
really care about the Lakers record (cmon, they were at least getting into the
playoffs), the Celtics record immediately following Rondo’s injury (it didn’t
matter, the eye test said they couldn’t be as good in the long run), or
especially the HEATs streak (statistical anomaly, and inherently meaningless).
Would you rather win 20 straight games by 8 points per game, or 18 of 20 by 9.5
points per game? That should be an easy answer, yet I’ll bet most people get it
wrong. If those are regular season games, the second scenario tells you more
about your team and better indicates overall skill level. What the HEAT were in
the regular season was impressive if all of their wins had come in a row or
distributed how they were.
We put too much pressure on
the regular season. Granger tried to come back too early, then pushed it. We don’t
know if he had taken a long recovery whether he’d be playing now but it is possible.
Roy Hibbert signed a big last offseason then had a “bad” regular season. People
derided him and his new deal. Guess what? I would argue he didn’t have such a
bad season. He produced about the same points per minute as he has for three
years. He upped his blocks from 2 to 2.6 while playing less minutes per game.
His PER was still a solid 17.35. But the biggest deal is he saved energy and
minutes for the post season, where it matters. And he went from solid to
dominant since they tipped it off with Atlanta in round one. The regular season
was his warmup, and chance to adjust to playing with Paul George.
One could also say that about
the Spurs and Duncan. Pop figured out some
things that could work. They keep the ball movement/active shooter/Parker
centric offense that has been so great for them 3 years running but used the
regular season to figure out how to play Splitter and Duncan together while
still doing all of that. Meanwhile, they let Manu and Diaw play fewer minutes
and skip games frequently due to age and injuries, and Duncan played one of his
most efficient seasons ever. The Spurs were derided for this, and fined by
Stern and the NBA (probably more times than we know). But guess what? THEY WERE
RIGHT! They are in the Finals. And they have all that accumulated rest from the
year and these ten days of a break to prepare for the HEAT or Pacers coming up
June 6th. The Spurs have used the regular season as a test tube, and
shook it enough times to make sure they knew what their end product would be.
One of the reasons I think
the Spurs have a solid shot of beating either team in the Finals is because of
another regular season casualty: Dwyane Wade. Wade is a top 5 all time shooting
guard. His performance during the 06 Finals, aided by corrupt reffing or not,
is an all time mark. But that guy is gone. This is a broken down, old,
inconsistent player. The transformation of the HEAT from a two man offensive
game plan with Bosh pick & roles and tough defense to a Lebron-centric
offense with Bosh clearing the rim and 3 shooters on the arc has hidden how bad
Wade really has become. This is all comparative of course: a “terrible” D Wade
is still better than Bayless or Jason Terry. But he can’t do many things
anymore, and many of the things he can do are produced randomly and without any
consistency. Jacoby said on the BS Report the other day: “he looks like DWade
for stretches and seems fine, but you look up in the 4th quarter and
he has 14 points on 6 of 17 shooting.” And Simmons makes the most astute
comment: he attempts under 5 FTs a game now.
The HEAT played Wade 35
minutes a game in the regular season through 69 games this year. He was
efficient yes, but Wade didn’t
create points as much as he many times received them. There is a big difference there. He played strong minutes
during the aforementioned winning streak that inherently means nothing now.
Ginobili, who is four years older than Wade but has played 5000 less minutes
(roughly 29000 for Wade, 24500 for Ginobili) played 23 minutes a game over 60
games. That is a 1000 net minute difference this year alone. Wade is more
important to his team, but not by that much. If the HEAT wanted to maximize
this year and the next (we know Bron is out after that), then Wade should have
been sitting far more and asked to do less. I don't know who that reflects on more: Riley, Spo, Wade himself, agents, marketing, the trainers, or some combinations of everyone. Likewise, money, pride, stubborness, or short sighted thinking could be most to blame. Wade hasn’t touched twenty points in
a game for a while, and this is a player who AVERAGED 30 PPG only four years ago. Manu should be ready to
go. While Wade is better than Manu, even now, the rest and prep may equalize
them.
Maybe it won’t matter. The HEAT
may very well still win the title this year, and I wouldn’t be surprised. But
Lebron will have score 30, assist 8, and play 46 minutes minimum to do that. Or
Wade will have to show something that he has been holding in reserve, and I
just don’t see how he has that. He used it beating Charlotte and Orlando for a regular
season game winning streak. That is something I just don't understand.
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