your playoffs stink

my nba fandom is seriously in the at-risk category. if my fandom were a species it would be: endangered.

the warriors getting bounced was bad enough, although i can kind of rest easier at night knowing that they were done in by a team captained by the kind of hard-nosed visionary that deserves to have won more than zero championships in his career. i'm even willing to look the other way as every single replay showed carlos boozer shoving warriors in the back as he went for rebounds.

THAT'S OK BY ME.

as long as the players themselves are deciding the series, shit i can tolerate the disney-movie-villainy that the jazz call playoff basketball. the warriors WERE like an all-black disney movie, with matt barnes being the prodigy that nellie must save from himself. etc. i'm pretty disappointed in myself that i never saw the parallel sooner but c'est la vie.

on the other hand, the suns were done in by stupidity in the league office. yes, i'm aware that leaving the bench mandates a one-game suspension but jesus h: it's the playoffs. if anything, suspend them for the first game of the regular season or fine the shit out of them but don't take amare stoudemire out of the biggest series of the playoffs. STAT could have saved us from this hellish fate: four teams we can't help but rooting against battling it out for eventual supremacy.

i guess i have to root for the jazz and cavs, but in all probability we're looking at detroit and san antonio taking turns hosting the nba finals. just shoot me.

you warriors don't show me nothin'

let the air out of me like a deflated tire. i have to admit that these warriors have turned me into a slavering fanboy like i'm dressing up to see george takei speak.

baron's bullet fedora, nellie coming to a press conference beer in hand, matt barnes' copious tatoos, i love pretty much everything about the warriors. and now, they teeter on the brink of collapse.

in every series, and i said this last time, there is a turning point. it happened last year when the lakers could have closed out the suns, but didn't. now the warriors need need need to seal the deal when it gets back to oaktown or shit could get ugly. but the warriors have the best fans in the game, and draw the most people ever to basketball games. there's strength in numbers like CAN YOU COUNT, SUCKAS? and it seems to me that if any team can close out a superior team at home, these warriors are the ones to do it.

even touched but i'm also concerned: the mavericks survived a sick shooting night by those warriors and won a pretty emotional game. don't even get me started on the refereeing, which included some monstrously shady calls at the end of the game. i think the whistle blew before barrrrrrrrondevean george, and that shit was NOT a foul, no matter the definition. that that was his sixth is pure garbage and the referees should be ashamed that they took away golden state's shot at victory because they were quick with a whistle. yes, i know that it was an intentional foul situation, but they have to know that baron has 5, and that he's not going to foul someone. refereeing is a tough job, BUT GET SOME KNOWLEDGE OF THE GAME.

i'm not even bothering with writing about the east: it seems like it should be exciting, but really the only thing kind of holding my attention is sam mitchell's fashion choices. it just feels like he's a moslem/black panther coaching an nba team from the sidelines. i bet that makes lawrence frank nervous.

oh warriors, come out and pla-ay

i'm in a glass case of emotion. the bad man just punted baxter.

the warriors took it to the mavericks on some serious WHO'S THE ONE SEED NOW, BITCH? shit. seriously, the mavericks looked RATTLED to even be on the court with the warriors.

observe: stackhouse airballing 3s!
see: jason terry getting stripped then falling on his ass!
watch: mickael pietrus going apeshit, and almost putting stackhouse on what would have been the guaranteed poster of the playoffs!

this series is a serious referendum on the state of basketball. if you didn't already stand up and take notice when the warriors finished the season streaking like frank the tank, it's about damn time you did.

first they take 1 in dallas, then self-destruct in game 2, take game 3 in a rocking home gym, and game 4 made all that shit look silly. in every series there is a turning point. for the mavs it probably came when avery johnson decided to start dirk at center in game 1. he made the mistake of bending to the will of the warriors. you have to understand that as soon as you play the uptempo game with a team designed to play uptempo, YOU HAVE NO CHANCE OF WINNING.

that's how the lakers were able to take the suns to 7 last year, that's why they're getting effectively swept this year. the playoffs are all about will imposition. a team simply cannot win if it plays to it's competition: the heat beat the pistons in part last year because detroit tried to run its offense through tay because he had d-wade on him. ride with the horse that brung ya should be the mantra of every succesful playoff coach.

another reason the warriors are winning is they have some serious interchangability. it seriously matters not who is guarding whom when the warriors play defense. everyone is between 6-4 and 6-7 and quick as fuuuu, so the mavs simply cannot break people down off the dribble. their best player is a slow-footed, 84-inch jumpshooter who relies on drives, dishes, and single coverage to make his living. well guess what dirk? they have an intimidating-looking russian and are totally prepared to double team you whenever you have the ball.

in all of this talk about how cleon's crew is neutralizing the mavericks defensively, let's not forget their sick break, lead by barrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrron! (everyone get on your jim jones hats and do the fadeaway) davis. seriously when this dude decides to get down to serious b-ballin, shot-callin there is not a more unstoppable scorer from the pg position. nash comes close, but he doesn't quite have the competitive fury that davis conjures. when nash gets upset, it's cute, but when baron gets mad, hit the deck because shots might be fired. legit the entire warriors team could be packing gats in their warmups and no-one would be suprised.

let's see you handle that, mavs.

that horse on your chest might as well be a target

okay let's all be honest. who REALLY picked the warriors to pimp slap the mavs in game one of their soon-to-be seminal first round playoff matchup. no, you didn't pick them and stop lying and saying you did.

now the mavs were last seasons great white hope to some degree, proof that nubasketball (which is really just old basketball from the 1980s before pat riley wrecked it in the mid-90s) could exist and a win a championship for god's sake. now, they're something more along the lines of a semi-dynasty. good every year, with a fiery coach who preaches discipline and defense and a big german superstar whose game is based more on frost efficiency than any kind of otherworldly talent. (dirk is the anti-kobe. you heard it here first.)

so what, i'm supposed to care about these people? they aren't compelling--even their x-factors are proven commodities. i don't think josh howards YESSUH BOSS I'LL DO ANYTHING TO PLAY game has any kind of real appeal except to those who prefer the pliant submission of college ball. that's my main problem with the mavericks. they're far too pliant for their own good. ever anouncer makes a big deal about how they can "play any style" but blah blah blah. isn't the point of being good making teams bow down and respect what you're about to do?

that is why i less than three the warriors. they, and by they i mean nellie, force you to play their way by trotting out big al harrington as center and crazy stephen jackson as pf. it's also worth noting that the blackest coach in the league, well the coach with the team that plays the blackest, is a jowly white guy with a old-timey haircut. i'm lovin it.

the warriors make you play like they want to play, and if you don't do that, then they'll run you off the court. it is that imposition of will that makes them a dangerous team. for that reason also, the mavericks will never win a championship. you can't be the definining team of a season if you yourself have no definition.

meet the new boss (same as the old boss)

d'antoni hath spawned hisself an army. whether it's the gs warriors runnin with nelly like DRAMA I'M BACK or the crazed dungeon-family-exuberance of the melo-iverson nuggets or the raptors tryna front like they know whats up, there is a serious revolution, or i guess devolution technically happening in the league today.

everywhere you look teams trying to get smaller, quicker, better shooting. that ain't bad, in fact it's pretty dern sweet when you think about it. it makes the league on the whole more watchable; when even the shit teams are playing a breakneck speed and killing themselves just to stay alive.

take the warriors for example. what they have is a roster full of tweeners-- matt barnes, monta ellis (stuck between point and shooting guards), mickael pietrus, and basically a host of others my sloth is preventing me from looking up. but the point is that they survive in a way that same roster never could have 5 or 10 years ago. when shaq was still in full effect, and guys like akeem and the admiral were patrolling the paint, no way do you get away with "hey, andris biedrins is my center is that ok?" but in this new-old nba where clutching and grasping is illegal, and any contact is looked upon with an audible intake of breath and a whistle quicker than you can say "that's not really a foul but they will probably call it one anyways" those teams can and do succeed.

they are not the suns because no-one but the suns can be the suns. their talent is off the charts not only in terms of personnel but also in terms of coaching. i guess this will sound kind of like a love letter, but they are probably the most or second most talented team in the league depending on where you put the mavericks. i mean nash is nash, matrix is matrix, amare is a beastly god, and even diaw is sensational in his own french way. it is that collection of talent along with the roll-the-ball-out-and-see-what-steve-does style d'antoni is so comfortable adopting that makes the suns the team that gets me out of my seat, hootin and hollerin like a fool the most out of any team besides kobe. yes, i just said kobe was a team DEAL WIT IT. nash to amare on the screen roll is pure floetry, especially when amare brings the thunder. and no matter how predictable it is that he's going to flush it like "i make it rain on them hoes" i still got my hyphie (original spelling courtesy keak da sneak) shoes on.

but the newbies also bring it like nobodies business. basically the nuggets are the blackest team in the league, and also the best fighting team now that ivey joined their hallowed ranks. they're also seriously putting shit together too. peep iverson and melo both deferring to each other and stepping up simultaneously. if it continues to work, it could form the single most bizarre symbiosis this league has ever ever ever seen. the most comparable people are kobe and shaq, but that doesn't even do this shit justice. basically the 2nd and 3rd most talented pure scorers in the league are playing on the same squad. and this somehow works. FURIOS GEORGE REPPIN IT OLD SCHOOL.

nellyball ain't too shabby neither. he's even got bd, who's usually vd (yeah, punning in this bitch) to chances of winning shit, buying into his scheme. not knocking fools down with statistical output, but at the same time giving it all his creaky frame will allow him. with baron, it ain't about stats young gun. maybe he's starting to recognize that, but that's seriously good. we see him move from HMM I'M OVER HALF COURT TIME FOR A 3 LATE to cool down monta, we setting this bitch up, run a play before our very eyes and we should drop jaws in wonder. he's basically mirroring the evolution of the league with his play. before he was a 3 jacking dunk dropping swag machine, now he's, as i said before, a serious dude willing to put serious time into making this team shit work.

Stand up and give thanks

Lamar Blogom celebrates its first Thanksgiving with a feast fit for a king. The seazon has so far yielded bountiful treasures with the promise of many more to come. So, we list 24 things that we are thankful for:

1. Andrew Bynum becoming Big Pussy and flashing strands of future greatness.
2. ATLanta proving that you can win games with a roster of only people 6'7" or 6'8".
3. The Heat collapsing in on themselves like some kind of aging supernova.
4. Starbury's Starburies.
5. Nate Robinson swatting Yao Ming.
6. Yao Ming, best center in the league.
7. Kevin Garnett, tortured soul in search of absolution.
8. Amare's return.
9. Josh Smith.
10. Gerald Wallace.
11. Brendan Haywood's favorite movie is Coming to America.
12. CP3 and Weezy F. Baby bringing back the N.O.
13. Chris Bosh making game winning 3s.
14. Don Nelson taking over the Yay Area.
15. Monta Ellis.
16. Jerry Sloan fashioning a sleek new version of Old School.
17. Kaveman's hair.
18. TMac is healthy.
19. Darko (almost) dominant.
20. Grant Hill's ankles are intact.
21. Mamba's newfound efficiency.
22. JR Smith, NBA starter.
23. Ron Ron is still playing.
    
24. Lamar Odom beginning to fathom his own depths.