(This is another in a series of 30 guest columns that will run in October, when optimism reigns supreme across the NBA. The theme will be “Five Reasons to Feel Positive About … ” We encourage you to follow the authors on Twitter and visit their sites. – CS) Heading into the 2012-13 season, the Clippers find themselves in unfamiliar territory: coming off a playoff appearance and a first-round series victory, with high expectations. After just five trips to the playoffs
(This is another in a series of 30 guest columns that will run in October, when optimism reigns supreme across the NBA. The theme will be “Five Reasons to Feel Positive About … ” We encourage you to follow the authors on Twitter and visit their sites. – CS) Basketball analytics in their current state have become quite hypocritical, and while that’s a bit of a random statement off the top, it works hand-in-hand with the present perception of the Houston Rockets. The
(This is another in a series of 30 guest columns that will run in October, when optimism reigns supreme across the NBA. The theme will be “Five Reasons to Feel Positive About … ” We encourage you to follow the authors on Twitter and visit their sites. – CS) The Oklahoma City Thunder were one of the league’s most talked-about teams last season, and it seemed that they were destined to meet with the Miami Heat in the NBA Finals. It
(This is another in a series of 30 guest columns that will run in October, when optimism reigns supreme across the NBA. The theme will be “Five Reasons to Feel Positive About … ” We encourage you to follow the authors on Twitter and visit their sites. – CS) Two seasons back, the Grizzlies were a Game 7 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder away from making it to the Western Conference finals. To that, they entered the 2011-12 season with
In what comes as no surprise at all, the defending champion Miami Heat and the loaded Los Angeles Lakers are favored to reach the NBA Finals. Gaming site Bovada.lv released its odds for winning the championship and has the Heat at 11-5 and the Lakers slightly higher at 5-2. Miami has reached the Finals each of the last two years, defeating the Oklahoma City Thunder in five games last season. Los Angeles has not reached the conference finals since it last won
Think your team is making the playoffs in the West this season? If you don’t live in L.A., you sure about that? If your team is the Dallas Mavericks or Utah Jazz, you shouldn’t be so sure. The Western Conference has six teams that are postseason certainties and four teams that are locks for the lottery. That leaves five teams vying for two spots. The Oklahoma City Thunder, Los Angeles Lakers, San Antonio Spurs, Los Angeles Clippers, Memphis Grizzlies and Denver Nuggets are in. Each
Having trumped up, er, written more intracity rivalry stories than I care to remember, there are three things I know. 1. They’re really no big deal. So what if the Clippers don’t like the Lakers, who don’t deign to notice the Clippers? The Clips don’t dislike the Lakes any more than the Suns or Warriors do, to say nothing of the Celtics. This isn’t high school. It’s not even USC-UCLA. This is the NBA, where only the Clips would remember if they swept the Lakers,
The Oklahoma City Thunder were facing a postseason ultimatum: Figure out a way to slow down the red-hot San Antonio Spurs, or meekly bow out of the Western Conference finals for the second straight year, well short of the stated, realistic goal of winning a championship. Through the first two games in San Antonio, Oklahoma City had very few answers, surrendering more than 110 points per game while losing twice. A 3-0 deficit to a team that had not lost in