Against the dubs. In my humble, often wrong yet passionate opinion? Denver- 15% chance. Portland- 35% chance. Silly to ponder with a important issue to take care of first.
It's up to us fans! We'll find out where the staying and then we'll fill the block with our cars at 3 am. Then we all set off our car alarms. Then shut them off for 15 mins, the turn them all on again. Rinse and repeat until about 5 am.
I actually think whichever one of us advances--Denver or Portland--they stand a good chance at taking Game 1. A nice break before playing gives you some spring in your legs, but you lose a bit of aggressiveness. Look at Game 1 for us. We were rested, we had played better than Denver in the first round, but they had an intensity in Game 1 we just couldn't match. If homecourt is taken away from them, it may not be relinquished.
The whole season matters and starting off the season terribly is on them. Blazers are better than Rockets.
Golden Showers luck: -Get Denver in WCF, smoke Jokic in endless pick and rolls, no one can guard KD. -The Bucks get Philly, but can't handle Embiid and Philly goes to the finals. -Embiid gets injured in game 2, Golden Showers in 5.
All I can say is... if the Clippers can steal two off the Warriors and the Rockets can steal two. Why can’t we steal 2-3?(if we do move on to the WCF) The Blazers and Lillard know how to close games unlike anyone on the Rockets or Clippers.
Sure, for a full season, the Blazers were slightly better. At the start of the playoffs, the Rockets were the better team, IMO. Things change over time.
I have to agree with the talking heads that the warriors would be heavily favored in any scenario. They have the superior talent. They have the experience. They will always get the benifit of the 50/50 calls from the refs. The deck is just stacked against whoever they will be playing. But with that being said i think we match up well against them and have a snowballs chance in hell of winning 1-2 games but winning 4 just seems like an insurmountable task as much as i love my blazers. But if we can pull it off man oh man there had better be a feel good sports movie in the works along the lines of Hoosiers or Rudy.