Houston shutting Yao down for last 2 games?

Someone said they have inside info on realgm, and it wouldn't surprise me if true...thats good, because we need them to lose at least once

 

Why again do they need to lose? I thought a three way tie with US, SA and Houston, puts us in 5th. What does a 4 way tie do?

 

4 way puts us in 5th too, they should lose at dallas on wednesday hopefully

 

OK I am a little slow tonight. I still don't get why we need them to lose. We want them to win their division so we have homecourt against SA. Why do they need to lose at least one

 

i agree with this, i think we should just stay where we are and play SA in round 1, and LAL in round 2. stay as far away from dallas as possible

 

Would they really just give up home court like that? They can't fall further than 5th. Maybe they really would rather play Portland in the first round without home court advantage than face Mavericks/Hornets with home court advantage.

 

Wouldn't it be better if both Houston and SA lose at least another game and us win out?

Therefore it'd be...

1) Lakers
2) Nuggets
3) Blazers
4) Whoever wins that division

If we can finish better than both of them, we would get the 3rd seed correct? The division champion only guarantees at least a 4th seed.

 

Yup. But it takes both of them losing a game. If Houston wins out, tying Portland in record, then they'd win the head to head tie-breaker and get the higher seed. If San Antonio wins out, tying Portland in record, they'd get the higher seed (but not HCA if they ever face Portland) due to being a division winner.

 

Wouldn't that be something if we climbed up to 3rd seed, and our reward was facing Dallas? A team we can't beat.

 

Houston has New Orleans and @ Dallas. I'd give them a 33% chance at going 2-0. One home and one away against two playoff teams.

SA has @ Sac and @ GS and vs New Orleans. I'd give them a 40% at going 3-0. Sac should be easy, but Golden State might give them trouble due to it being young vs. old, and the Hornets are good enough to win against anyone any given night.

Blazers have OKC and Nuggets. Both of them are at home. OKC should probably be tanking for a lottery pick, not that they'd put up much a fight regardless, and Blazers vs. Nugs is usually a home court series, and we conveniently have that advantage this time. I'll give them a 85%.

 

I'm really scared of playing Dallas. I'd like to grab the 2 seed and play New Orleans.

 

Right now it shows the 2 seed would play Dallas and the 3 seed would play NO.

 

we want Houston to keep winning.

 

Yeah, I agree that Dallas would be a worst case scenario for us. We just don't play well against that team. I would take anyone over Dallas. Right now I think the Spurs are our best option, with NOR being second, and Utah being third. I hate to admit that we are scared of Dallas, but we are and we should be. That team has our number.

 

I'd rather take home court against Dallas than have to face Houston on the road. Yeah, they've had our number all three games this season but do you think the Blazers are scared of them? Heck no. They're going to win as many games as they can, and if they have to face the Mavs, then that's who they'll face. In 2006, Cleveland swept the season series with the Spurs but in the NBA Finals, the Spurs swept them 4-0.

My point is, the Blazers should not go out of their way to avoid Dallas.

 

Us and Houston have the same record right now. If Houston loses one game, they slide to 5th if SA and we win out. We would own the tie breaker vs SA and get 3rd place, which would have us play NO or Dallas (not horrid) but the best part woul dbe we'd be out of the Lakers bracket... and I really don't fear Denver in the 2nd round.

Did I get this right?

 

That's how I see it.....and agree with your thinking on the matter.

 

So i'm pretty much rooting my ass off for Houston to lose 1 game (and New Orleans to beat Dallas, lol).

 

I think in that case, SA would own the tie breaker by virtue of being a division winner (because HOU lost). I could be wrong, but I think the scenario in which we would take the 3-seed is if both HOU and SA lose a game.

 

Not necessarily.

http://www.nba.com/features/seedingprimer07.html