Just got back from a long fishing vacation in northern Manitoba and I must say I'm disappointed. First there's the fact that Cleveland apparently choked it off and Lebron got no help. Second, Orlando apparently offered no resistance in the second half of game one. Third, tonights game was simply not played well. Howard showed that he has more than one step to take to truly be a great player. Neither team played particularly smart basketball and whined incessantly.
Finally, as a bit of a side note, I am disturbed by the NBA as cultural destroyer. I was far, far into Canada. 15 hours north of Mpls to be precise, staying at a friends cabin. Everything was properly Canadian. It was absurdly cold, (damn near got trapped in one section of the lake by ice floes) everyone said "eh", I was sucking down Labatt's and Kokenee, Rush was playing on the radio in the gas station when we bought our licenses. Then, when we stopped in to settle the bill at the resort where we bought gas for the boats, my buddy and I stopped in the lounge to check the TV and watch a bit of the Penguins/Red Wings game. Instead, it' the Lakers/Magic!! That is just plain WRONG!!!!!!!
NBA OOT OF CANADA EH!!!!!!
I was gone to Europe for three and a half weeks, only to come back to this. Did not hear anything at all about basketball until two days before returning.
Turns out, I did not miss much. The NBA is still what it always has been and therefore not very interesting:
- The Lakers are in the finals. Boring
- The Caveliers are still on the edge. Still boring.
- The Magic/Lakers are playing in the finals. Semi-boring.
- The Kings got the absolute worst outcome from the lottery they could possibly get. Super boring. But at least when whomever the Kings pick turns out to be a lower rung NBA talent in a few years, they won't have to go through the Pervis Ellison problem again. Far more interesting will be who we pick at 23 and 31. Petrie has a good road record in finding that lower rung NBA talent that 'experts' tend to label as 'finds of the late first round'.
- The Kings' #1 pick for their next coach is Kurt Rambis. Not boring, but also not likely to happen. Jackson may consider retiring after this season if the Lakers win again and his choice as his replacement likely will be Rambis. Since the Kings are going cheap on their next coach, I would hope Kurt is not seriously considering moving north until Phil makes up his mind. That leaves us with Paul Westphal, who has already agreed to work for 3 million and a two year contract (TWO YEARS?
!!!! That should work!!), or the unproven but defensive assistant coach from the Celtics, Tom Thibodeau. That is called 'settling', as neither one is going to generate a lot of hope for the upcoming year. Rambis, for that matter, won't be able to do that, but it would at least be more interesting to see what he tries to do.
