ill bet 1000 bucks the Joey Crawfords crew refs Clev/Orl 2nd game

I think the Cavs are just shocked that they finally faced a team that didn't roll over and die once they went ahead by 15+

Wow, huge win for Orlando, imagine if the finals end up Orlando-Denver

I was thinking that as well. :D

Now that was kind of fun, great game. Both teams really went at each other. Lebron was a monster despite the loss, that was seriously not on him at all. The last shot situation imo was a good read by Lebron. Sure he could have forced sth up (and i´m sure he will next time now) but as far as i am concerned that was an excellent look for West and a good play by James. Just good Defender by Orlando rotating and forcing the ball out of James´s hands there.
I´m not James´s biggest fan because of his demeanor on the court, but tonight wasn´t on him.

For Orlando Howard ran circles around Ilgauskas and overpowered Wallace, really good effort to make himself available for close shots and dunks tonight.
Overall their offense was terrific. 55% shooting ? 9-20 from three ? 32 assists?
Turkoglu with 14 asists !
Lewis was big in the 4th and their bench was solid and much better than the Cavs bench.

Hell no, they're going to save him for the Lakers series ;)

SI

That is the single biggest reason I think officiating in the NBA and college is a joke. There is no way on God's green earth that should ever be a foul (and if the rules say it is the rules need to be changed), but it's called all the time. With the way guys are allowed to palm the ball when they dribble and take 4 steps before shooting, it's a complete farce.

Is it just me or does Brown always look totally baffled (when he's not ranting like a mad man anyway). Every close up they show of him he's just like staring off into space. Anyhow...

What do you mean killed the ability to build an interesting team? Boston's not interesting with Pierce/Allen/Garnett? Lakers with Kobe/Gasol/Bynum/Odom not interesting? If you mean there are no teams like Magic/Cooper/Worthy/Green/Kareem then yes, you are right but blame expansion for that, not the salary cap.

I think the salary setup actually helps build interesting franchises because teams can go over the cap to sign their own veteran players. If you draft a guy and keep him for his entire rookie contract then there will never be a team in the league that can cap wise offer him more money than you can unlike baseball where if you're a small market team and you find a gem you know New York or Boston or LA will be there with the big checkbook first chance they get or in the NFL with the hard cap that forces teams to get rid of players they might otherwise keep.

You guys have a different definition of "straight up" than I do. Howard's arms were leaning over into LeBron's space on the foul call. That's not "straight up". Didn't end up mattering.

Brown's a moron, I've been ranting on him for like 3 years now. I don't think he's qualified to pick a side dish with a McDonalds extra value meal. Anyways, I'm in the car and screaming at the radio cause their lead is getting destroyed in the 3rd quarter and the moron refuses to call a timeout.

But it's Mike Brown, decision making is not his forte.

if the lakers lost game 1 then i would wager my soul Crawford would ref the 2nd game, but they now need him to "ref" the 2nd game in cleveland to try and preserve thier lebron/kobe finals

Some thoughts:

1) there is no way in hell that was a foul on Howard. Just a horrible call.

2) James is damned if he does, damned if he doesn't. The Cavs have won all year by James trusting his teammates and them hitting open threes. (and they were only in the position they were because of huge threes by both Williams and West just a minute or two earlier) On the other hand, how does the guy who is 20-30 NOT take the final shot.

3) I've been amazed at how few people had given Orlando a shot in this series. Even a shot to make it competitive. Orlando matches up VERY well with Cleveland, and this game is about matchups. In the two regular season matchups played with Alsten and not Nelson, the Magic played very well against Cleveland. They lost 97-93 in Cleveland in a game the Cavs had to come back to win. In that game they shot 46% despite Lewis going 3-15. Lebron didn't have an off night either, he went 15-27 for 43 points. Then in Orlando, the Cavs were simply blitzed. The Magic pose serious matchup problems for the Cavs. Z cannot stay with Howard inside. The fact that they have multiple three point shooters makes it tough on the Cavs defense. They can stop one or two as well as anyone in the league, but 4? Not so much. (it means James can't roam as freely as he does and it impacts their defensive rebounding with Varejo out on the three point line as opposed to helping big Z underneath) I'm not saying the Magic win this series (though I think they have a shot), but I never thought of this series as a 5 or 6 game series. This looks like 7 to me from the word go.

4) Game 2 in LA tonight. The Nuggets have to get the split here or they are in deep doo doo. JR must play better (and if he's hurt badly, the series was over before I even typed this) and Melo needs some help. We must stop doubling Kobe and leaving three point shooters open. Let him have his points, don't give up open threes. Those are simply daggers we can't afford to give up.

This really is an interesting matchup because Orlando has four guys on the floor who can hit it from three which like Troy said means Varejao has to defend a perimeter player - if Cleveland doesn't help down on Howard he'll go by Z all day down there. If they do help they leave a three open. They could go smaller but that takes away an advantage they have offensively. With Z being able to hit jump shots he can pull Howard away from the bucket leaving nobody in there who's going to be able to get in the way of James plus still have a post player with Varejao or Smith and Howard can't simply just defend that guy because Z would have a field day posting Lewis.

Cleveland has to find a way to make Alston, Lee and Pietrus beat them from the outside. Alston is a terrible shooter (42% overall - 33% for 3), Lee's a rookie and Pietrus is just a decent shooter (36% for 3). If they go to double Howard the double either has to come from whoever is defending those three or those guys need to rotate immediately in anticipation of the kick back to Lewis or Turkoglu. Either that or they've got to overplay the three and force Orlando to go to the basket. 80% of Lewis' shots are jumpers and 70% of Turkoglu's shots are jumpers. They did this properly one possession near the end - they forced Hedo to put the ball on the floor and his shovel/lob to Howard got stolen by Lebron. Then again they forced him to put it on the floor again after that and nobody moved in to help and he scored a tough layup. The last thing they can do though is let Orlando shoot (and shoot over them).

How Lewis got an open look for that 3 is beyond me. You're up two, you are at home, their star player and only real inside force is fouled out and you know 9 times out of 10 the refs will bail Lebron out on the other end anyways especially without Howard in there to stop him...how in the world do you not attack Lewis and make him put it back on the floor? So what if he drives past you and hits a pull up jumper to tie it. Terrible coaching and terrible execution by the Cavs on that possession and it cost them home court now.

Dhantay Jones, 4 fouls in the first six minutes of game 2.

Why wouldn't they sit him after his 2nd?

Well. JR Smith with his 2nd foul of the 1st quarter.

Kobe is just great at getting contact.

Yes, as with every superstar in the NBA. :D

Andrew Bynum, welcome back.

Foul trouble for Smith and Jones could be a blessing in disguise. Kleiza is vastly underrated IMO.

Very true.

Basketball Fundamentals 101: Why You Don't Turn Your Back on the Player Inbounding the Ball Under the Basket

Hard fall by Ariza, but incidental contact just at an odd time in his jump.

I don't tend to watch a lot of NBA, but rather mostly NCAA basketball until the NBA gets to the Conference Finals.

My god is this league flop-city.

An awesome finish. Hopefully, Denver can hold on here.

This has been a pretty good game. Terrible 3 attempt by Fish. Kobe, Melo, and Chauncey should be the only ones shooting unless they pass it to a wide open player.

That blown call and fail by Ariza should do it. This should be a great series and I'm glad Denver won this to keep it interesting.

Well I guess that blown call in under 20 seconds will likely do the Lakers in this time

They better foul and not let Kobe drain this 3.

Good win for the Nuggets

Bad loss by the Lakers. While I think they are the best team in the league this year, they do not have a killer instinct. Still, I am getting fed up with refs again, the Lakers did not lose just because of the blown call, but that was still big in the outcome of the game.

LAKERS FAIL! LAKERS FAIL! LAKERS FAIL!!!!

Epic Win for Denver.

Yeah, because there were no horrible fouls the other way, like Nene's 5th for example. You just can't have out of shape 60+ year old guys reffing the NBA. It's beyond absurd.

If anything, Denver won because they hit their FT's and LA didn't down the stretch.

Never said anything that disagreed with this. But it was a huge call to blow. It would be like letting someone take 8 seconds to inbound the ball or not blowing the whistle on a shot clock violation. Arbitary calls are one thing. Missing an OOB step or this play is another.

But yes, the Lakers had numerous chances to put away the game and they didn't. Good win for the Nuggets. That one play didnt cost them the game

I'd have to agree about the Lakers lacking a killer instinct. Perhaps even a lack of heart. Their talent, alone, cannot win them the title... and as long as they don't have heart, they aren't going to be able to win the title.

Do me a favor and replay the jump ball at the end of game 1 between Odom and Birdman. Ya know, the one where Odom clearly stole the tip.

Honestly? It was a violation by JR. On the other hand, what the hell is Ariza doing? JR never made contact with Ariza or the ball. Ariza just fell to the ground and threw it away. Really, really stupid foul.

This was just a reverse of game 1. One team is dominating the other, the other team is just trying to survive. Then a huge run at the end of the first half gets someone back in the game. Close game at the end, some dumb decisions by both teams and some horrible calls by the zebras both ways. (Nene's 5th was truly a rich call, but there were others that went the Lakers way and others that went the Nuggets way) One team figures it out, the other doesn't. Game over.

For my money, the Nuggets won this game because of two main reasons:

1) When the Lakers looked like they were going to blow the thing out in the middle of the second quarter, Melo kept scoring. 10 straight Nugget points. It didn't cut into the lead at the time (the Lakers kept it above 10 until that late run), but it did keep the Lakers in touch and didn't let it get out of hand.

2) LK stepping up for JR. JR was bad (I don't know if it's the injury or just great defense, but JR has struggled so far in the series) LK has had a horrible playoff run, it was great to see him hit some threes.

Now onto Denver. The series now has officially started. :)

JR is looking a lot like the JR that got benched by Karl in 2007. Kleiza deserves more minutes.

It's easy to say that after tonight, but you have to understand something: LK had scored 11 points in his previous 54 minutes of basketball entering tonights game. He's been struggling horribly.

As for JR, he played poorly, but he didn't force a lot of shots. He just didn't hit them. Last years JR shoots 12 shots in 25 minutes, no matter how he was shooting. This years JR stops taking dumb shots and ends up with only 6 shots in 25 minutes. JR will get his time no matter what. We need him to play D on Kobe when Jones is out until the fourth quarter. (no way you want Melo wearing himself out by putting him on Kobe all game)

The guy who Linus will take minutes away from is Anthony Carter. And that's not a bad thing. . . if LK is hitting his shots and playing like he did tonight. Fans who haven't watched the entire playoffs haven't seen the real JR yet in this series. He scored 15 or more points in 7 of the 10 playoff games before this series. You don't give up on him because of a couple of bad games. As long as he isn't shooting you out of the game, he's earned the right to play through this little slump.

I think I may have said this before, but I'll say it again: TroyF knows his shit about the NBA. +1 to you.

I was sitting there during the highlights and ESPN kept saying the name Linas Kleiza and I couldn't place it for about a minute. Then the light bulb went on from where I knew the name. I didn't think there was any way he was going to do something in the NBA- hell I didn't even know he was a draft prospect at Mizzou until he got drafted. But it looked like he hit some important shots last night.

SI

LK has played 301 games in his NBA career not counting the playoffs. (I think you can add another 24 or so to that total there)

I've probably watched 285 of those games. (Yes, I'm a die hard Nuggets fan. The 4 games I missed on my honeymoon was the first time I've missed that many games in a row in years. Hell, I even watched virtually every game of our 17 win season)

Here is what I can tell you about LK:

He's Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde. When he plays well, he plays REALLY well. In October, November and December he hit 39% of his threes. He averaged about 12 points a game in just 20 or so minutes a night. He was fantastic.

When he's not playing well, he's playing horribly. It's not because of effort, he just goes through long, drawn out slumps where as a fan you cover your eyes when he shoots it. The last three months of the season, he hit 23% of his three point attempts. He continued shooting like that in the playoffs.

Last night we saw the good doctor and if he continues to play that well (and if JR can return to form), the Nuggets just got a gigantic X factor in this series.

One other note about Kleiza - you MUST make him go left. He loves to drive right. He'll go that way every single time. If you force him left, just wait for him to dribble the ball off his foot. If you allow him to get a step right, he's actually a fairly explosive finisher. He'll power down the lane like a bowling ball drawing fouls and having the strength to finish at the rim. Teams usually do a good job of forcing him left unless the Nuggets are in transition or there is some sort of a scramble for the ball and the defensive integrity is lost. I think I might have seen LK drive left and finish at the rim about 5 times in his career.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
After watching the jump ball again, I don't think it is as nearly clear cut as people made it out to be. Odom actually stepped into the circle first, beleive it or not. JR's first step wasn't in the circle, his second was. That came after both guys had tried for the ball. (they missed, which caused Odom to take a step in the circle) Ariza ddn't get hit by Melo, he actually landed on a teammates foot and lost his balance. He was never touched by Melo or JR. Instead of just falling and taking a TO, he chose to throw the ball away. I initially thought the call was wrong, wrong, wrong. But after looking at the replay, I'm not so sure it was wrong or obvious at all.

One other quick thing:

I'm critical about NBA refs. VERY critical. I think on the whole, they suck horribly. They have this series too. Some horrible, inconsistent officiating in both games that hurt/helped both teams.

When I really get pissed off, it's because I see one team getting every call. It was a serious worry for me coming into this series and it is still a worry going forward. But. . . for the first two games, they may have sucked, but the Nuggets got a fair shake. The Lakers didn't take 85 FT to the Nuggets 5. The Lakers didn't take 27 FT in the final quarter of a game. (Sacramento, game 6, one of the greatest travesties in the history of sports)

I don't think the officiating decided either game. If this is the whistle the Nuggets get for the series, I'll have to hand it to the NBA for doing the right thing. Good job so far.

ORL@CLE Game 2 Underway.

Mo Williams such a little bitch throwing the ball at Dwight. No technical foul because Orlando won game one I guess.

and here come the magic again... I guess we'll see if they can pull off another stunner in Cleveland. Down by 6 , start of the 4th Q.

The ref was staring right at it when it happened too.

I think having Williams around is better for Orlando than Cleveland.

Back to back charging calls on Lebron, I never thought I'd see it. Even that whiny fuck doesn't have the cheek to complain about this one.

LOL @ whiny fuck. thats funny.

2 point game though.

Or Tied!

david stern is sweating right now, this is what happens when he doesnt put the crawford crew in to ref ;)