I think Houston is actually stronger w/o TMAC...permanently. They are far better defensively, especially with Battier back, and they now have enough firepower with Brooks and others to compensate for TMAC. Just my opinion...Houston gets out of the 1st round I say...
There is an interesting paper on the topic of streaks and "momentum" available here. The basic gist of it is that even though fans and athletes tend to subscribe to the idea of wins producing wins and losses producing more losses, there is no statistical evidence for this kind of magic streakiness. The number and duration of streaks in any given season are generally pretty close to those that would come about from a random distribution. It's a bit heavy on the statistics lingo unless you are comfortable with that kind of thing, but here's part of their key conclusion on page 8: Sportscasters are particularly bad at perpetuating this kind of mythology. I wince every time Wheels or Antonio make some reference to "the law of averages catching up" to some player who has hit more free throws than they usually do -- as if those previous made attempts would somehow make them less likely to hit their next one. The simple truth is that we humans are exceptionally good at recognizing streaks and patterns, and notoriously bad at understanding their significance (or lack thereof).
of course golden state is a much better team at home than they are on the road and oden/aldridge were basically taken out of the game by multiple flops.
