The other playoff games thread

All I have to say is this Orlando team=Choke City.


It reminds me completely of when Shaq was in Orlando, and Anfernee Hardaway and Nick Anderson thought their shots were more important than Shaq getting his, all the way until he left. Over and over they repeat the same mistakes. They don't establish Howard early, and then they expect him to do something once their 3's aren't falling after he hasn't touched the ball for 3 quarters, and pull their ass out of the fire.

 

It's not a great comparison, IMO. Howard still doesn't have anything close to the offensive game Shaq had even as a rookie. Howard is a better leaper, but Shaq was just so much bigger and stronger than anyone else that you had to doubleteam him or it was points. Howard throws up ugly Oden-esque hook shots in single coverage.

If I were Orlando, I'd jack a lot of threes too. The primary weapon of their best offensive players is the three ball.

 

I wasn't comparing Howard to Shaq. I was comparing the teams making the same mistakes of not getting their big established early. In other words, playing live by the 3, die by the 3 ball.

 

Yeah, but if by "establishing your big" you mean giving the ball to Howard in the first quarter so he can miss a variety of ugly hook shots, maybe they are better off not establishing him.

I'd be inclined to agree with you more if they had a PG who could set Howard up for easy dunks like Nash always did for Amare. But they really don't have that guy, so you have Howard trying to pretend he's Yao Ming as they dump the ball in the post. And it's kind of ugly. The players realize that, so they jack up threes until they start missing. Then they give it to him because there aren't any other options.

It's just not a really good team. If Portland were in the East, we'd beat either Boston or Orlando in 5 or 6 games.

 

Are you fucking high? Howard is scoring at a .615 clip so far in the playoffs. When a guy is scoring at that high of a rate, you feed him the ball.

 

I dunno. I watch the game and it seems like he's fantastic at garbage points, but if you expect him to score in a traditional post up situation like Duncan and you feed him 15-20 shots a night, it just isn't going to be that pretty.

I've only seen five or six Orlando games this year, though, so maybe I'm just seeing the wrong games.

I will say this, though--he has a chance at being known as the greatest rebounder of all time. 16 boards a game in the playoffs is insane. And he's what--24?

 

Howard doesn't have a lot of refined offensive game. Which actually goes to show that Oden can be a superstar even if he never develops a fantastic post game. Howard gets a lot of points from overwhelming smaller defenders and cleaning up on the boards. He's a fantastic rebounder and defender.

Oden was a fantastic rebounder as a rookie and showed the potential to be the defensive monster that he's always been expected to be. Even without a great offensive game, he can become a Dwight Howard. If he does develop a nice offensive game, which I believe he can, he'll be something even more special.

 

Not to discount what Denver has done, but who else thinks we could really be in the WCF if our first two matchups were New Orleans and Dallas? Dammit..

 

New Orleans yes Dallas maybe... They were a tough match up for us

 

Rondo has 15 rebounds and it's still the third quarter.

 

another game 7 for the Celtics. 40th playoff game in 13 months. Amazing.

 

Man, Ray Allen 0-7 from downtown. Sometimes, he really sucks.

 

Rockets 13, Lakers 1

 

How the hell does a PG get 16 boards with Dwight Howard on the floor!?!?!? When is the last time that happened?

Rondo is ridiculously good. Best PG in the Playoffs?

 

Looking like a Rockets victory tonight, to force a game 7. Blazers are looking better and better!

 

He's pretty good.

 

Dwight Howard will never be the featured player on a championship team
he better start developing some post moves soon, because he is getting by 100% on athleticism and that won't be there for many more years.
really poor free throw shooter too, makes it hard to go to him in the clutch.

 

Wafer scored 5 points in 0 minutes:

http://scores.espn.go.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=290514010

 

Actually I think it's more like the Lakers are looking pretty gutless ...