Finals Game 3

by tomasito on Jun 11, 2008 7:20 AM CDT

I happened to catch this game as well (my wife was watching the Batchelorette on DVR in one room, so I watched the game in the other room). Surprise! The Lakers shot a whole bunch more foul shots in Los Angeles than they did in Boston.

I thought two sequences in the first half were particularly emblematic. The first was Formerly Homeless Second Round Pick Leon Powe threw up a crazy shot midway through the second quarter. There was plenty of contact, but no foul. I didn't think it should have been a foul, but this was EXACTLY the kind of call he was getting in Boston. The second was Kobe's drive to the basket with a few seconds left in the half. There was some very minor contact, but he was awarded two FTs, which he missed. Again, he was not getting this call in Boston.

After the half, in his interview with Michele Tafoya, he was asked what they were doing differently to get more FTs, and he said "we're playing the same way [as we did in Boston]" and kind of smirked.

KG in the Paint?

The Lakers seemed constantly on the verge of blowing out the Celtics, but just couldn't put them away, mainly due to hot shooting from Nancyboy Allen in the third quarter. The Celtics went to a post up strategy, with KG and Kendrick Perkins (???), and were kicking it out to open shooters. This seemed to take LA off guard (perhaps they were confused by seeing KG in the paint), and Boston made a run. As soon as they cooled off from the perimeter, the Lakers retook the lead. Hot perimeter shooting is like Fool's Gold; you think you're playing well, but really you're just shooting well. As soon as the shots stop dropping, which they will, you'll be in trouble. Meanwhile, the Lakers were able to keep driving to the basket and keep going to the line.

Other Comments:

Curt Schilling's Blog

I talked about Schilling's comments yesterday

http://38pitches.com/2008/06/09/manny-jd-papi-lester-and-the-nba-finals/#more-178

but I can't believe I missed this:

(talking about FT disparity) Phil Jackson knew it. Early in the game, Farmar comes to the bench during Celts free throws and asks about the next series, Jackson says “One thing I do know is we’ve got to stop !@#$&@#%$#&*()@ fouling these guys” Farmar asks what he says and he repeats the line.

Farmar didn't hear what Phil Jackson said? How is that even possible? There was a play where Farmar took a charge from Paul Pierce, and I'm sure he was able to get into position because he heard Pierce THINK that he was going to his left.

Donaghy Turns State's Evidence

Wow. Wow. Wow. Among other things, Donaghy basically said that the fix was in for the Lakers-Kings series in 2002. They said on air that Donaghy had no credibility. You know who else has no credibility? Jose Canseco, and he turned out to be 90% right on all the steroids in baseball. We'll see where this goes.

Blind Jackass in Miller Lite Commercial and weird Heineken ad

They keep running this Miller Lite commercial where this blind guy can identify the year and make of vehicles driving by with his incredible Daredevil heightened senses. Then someone opens a beer and he identifies it as a Miller Lite. My reaction is, "what a douchebag!" I mean, I'm sorry that you are (pretending to be) blind, but if my two year old acted like that, I'd put him in timeout.

Speaking of creepy commercials, how about that weird Heineken commercial where people bring random other people a bottle of Heineken? The weirdest part is where a girl brings a beer into a sauna full of what appear to be Russian Mafia, and they react like "Da, Komrade, here is that American Hooker!" Then the scariest one, who looks just like the Russian from the episode of the Sopranos where they get lost in Pine Barrens, puts on his mob track suit and walks through a club straight to the DJ, looking for all the world like he's going to shoot her when he gets there.

Larry Bird/Magic Johnson There Can Be Only One Commercial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWHEv5yH2qU

Oh. My. God. This is seriously disturbing. Words can't do it justice. Just watch it. Or don't, if you don't want to have nightmares for two weeks.

Game 4 Prediction

Honestly, to this point the Celtics look like the better team. I agree with Nix that they'll probably get at least one in LA. I think Boston's found something they can exploit with KG posting up Smeagasol, and you have to think Paul Pierce is going to play better. Kobe might not get quite so many calls in Game 4, and Odom may stay disappeared. We'll see.

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Odom/Gasol/Fisher

Talk about disappearing. Wow. Why did this not happen in the Spurs series? Oh wait, it did in Game 1 and the Spurs were too tired to take advantage.

Odom looks like trash. Kendrick Perkins and whatever other big body they stick on him is taking him out of his game. Too bad it took Pop 4 games to realize that KT (a banger) was the answer in that matchup and not a soft Horry. Gasol looks weak and lost. The shots he made last night were lucky, imo, and he seems to have no rhythm going, which is really his game in the post. Fisher’s only plays were coming down the floor full speed, passing to no one, and ramming into a couple of people for the foul call. Fisher = human cannonball? Fisher is being relegated to JV status!

All that being said, the Lakers have been playing out of chaacter, the Celts have a good defensive scheme going with active bodies to rotate, and the foul line was the difference.
BY THE WAY, I loved Doc’s post game comment: “I’m surprised Phil didn’t come in here and whine about the officiating.” Boo-ya. I’ve always wanted Pop to do that.

Surprisingly good series. I think the Celts take the next one. KG and Pierce are too good not to rebound from Game 3. Gasol and Odom? Uh…

Allez Spurs!

by JustinBK on Jun 11, 2008 9:57 AM CDT reply actions

Yeah, I think the same way

The Celts are playing rediculous D yes, but I had asked Amazing_Happens in the Game 2 thread about Odom and Gasol. Basically it was like this :

3) Speaking of Gasol/Odom….why does it seem that if you have 1 good post defender (Duncan, Garnett, Yao, Dwight Howard-when he wants to-, Boozer (last year’s version)...you can take out BOTH Gasol and Odom? Odom seems to feed off Gasol, and when Gasol sucks, so does Odom. Why is LA the only team that seems to have this problem? Take our Spurs for example…Ginobili’s off night (when not injured) is like 15-18 pts, 5 assists, 3 rebs….Parkers is like a "quiet" 15-20 pts., 4 assists….Duncan is like 18 pts., 15 rebs, 2 assists. Then LA’s off-nights, Kobe’s is like 25-30 pts, 3 assists, Gasol’s goes from about 20/15 to 8/12 (!!!!) and Odom goes from like 18-7 to 4/2 ???

For all of LA’s vaunted strength, it seems that if Kobe has 1 off-night, the Lakers are doomed. If say, one of the Spurs’ Big 3 have an off-night, the Spurs can still win and it won’t take a herculean effort by 1 player. Now if the Spurs get a reliable bench…look out! :D

What I grow really tired of right now is 1) the media love-fest with LA. Boston wins Game 1, and they are like “LA was in it till the end! Just one basket and they would have won! Boston got lucky! ....Boston wins Game 2, and it’s like “LA would have won if not for the FT disparity!!” (What they fail to see—and Hollinger of all people ACTUALLY sees, is that LA was taking tons and tons of mid-range to long jumpers. TONS. You don’t get foul calls to go to the stripe when you are doing that. Otherwise, the fouls were acutally quite even. Boston just got the fouls as they were driving to the hoop.) Now LA wins Game 3, and it’s all about Kobe Kobe Kobe, and more Kobe!!! They forget that Boston actually went into the 4th with the lead!!

2) Phil Jackson’s “style of coaching.” Usually you have Jackson “coach” a team by basically leaving it out there to dry. Yes, I understand that when he doesn’t call a TO when his team is rapidly sinking from an 8 pt deficit to a 20 pt deficit, it’s “letting his players mature”....but I see it honestly as a “well crap, my star players aren’t winning…what do I do?” moment. Jackson has NEVER won anything (not even 1 playoff series) with no less than 2 superstar players that are amoung the NBA’s 10 best. Pop did it in 99…Robinson was far from the 10 best players in the NBA at that time, and again in 03, with Duncan being just the beast that he is. Auerbach did it with just Russell. Riley did it with just D-Wade, Shaq sucked balls that year. And after Jacksons’ team loses, the first thing he starts on about is how “the other team got more FT’s than us!!!” as if it is his teams’ god-given right to be the ones with more FT’s. Good grief. Pop said something about the reffing ONE time ….ONE time (after Game 5 of NO…the 1st “Crawford game”. People went ape-snot about how Pop FINALLY said something about the reffing of a game.

I guarantee you if Parker/insert Spur here would have jumped into Fisher or Radmonovic/Vujacic and no foul was called, the entire Lakers team would have been down on thier knees going “WHAT?!” and Jackson would have taken the 2 days (and all the press conference afterwards) to blast the reffing. Heck, he did it mid-game in Game 3 and 4, why not??

It’s only a good series because the NBA can ill-afford the Celtics to sweet the Lakers. Lakers did EVERYTHING they could to win Game 3, and did it just barely. I agree, Pierce/KG won’t have a similar crap-game. Same can’t be said about Gasol/Odom.

"This team is like a bunch of cockroaches. They just don't die!" -Charles Barkley, after Game 7 vs. the NOOCH.
The "I'm gonna rip the eyes out of your head and piss into your dead skull! You f***ed with the wrong Marine!" face. Because Popovich can be kinda scary.

by Nixiack on Jun 11, 2008 1:47 PM CDT up reply actions

The first three Finals games have made me realize just how much we missed a healthy Manu. I wasn’t the only one who observed that, if Manu wasn’t injured, we dominate the Lakers. He managed to gather himself back to his usual form for one game, and the Spurs blew the Lakers out. Outside of Kobe, they are so inconsistent I’m a little surprised they got past Utah. Well… not that surprised. Utah spends all game fouling like they’re down 2 with 15 seconds left.

And it pisses me off at Pop. He squandered Manu’s best season yet. By now, he HAS to know that Manu’s main weakness is how he fades when he’s been overplayed. In the interest of keeping him both healthy and prepared for the playoffs, he should have been playing 20-25 minutes a game regular season, (30 if it was a close, critical game) and he’d be good for 30-35 postseason. I spent the start of the season looking at Manu’s playing time thinking “5 minutes too much”... then I spent the last 2 months of the season thinking “15 minutes too much”. I realize that our only other option was Michael FInley, but again, that’s Popovich’s fault. We’d have been better off with the eighth seed and a healthy Manu.

chaos... panic... pandemonium... my work here is done.

by rick2g on Jun 11, 2008 12:18 PM CDT reply actions

Too right

We all know now that if Manu was healthy, the Spurs would be in the Finals. LA basically has the luckiest streak I’ve ever seen a team get-Rookie gets good, they win. Rookie gets hurt, crap…oh look, we’ll just ditch our bottom bench for an all-star!-Kobe goes from “get me out get me out” to actually trying to win-LA gets the 1st seed by ONE game-Enver doesn’t do D, the Jazz (you’re right) foul way too much, and they caught the Spurs RIGHT after a slugfest Game 7 with plane issues and an injured Manu, and we had yet another “Fisher Moment” in SA. Now they are facing a team that is completely healthy (Pierce sure looks like it) and is taking it to them.

As much as the LA guys are like “wait till next year when we get Bynum!! LA will win the next 5 titles!!!” They are forgetting the “oh we have Manu, and we know our bench sucks so we’ll get better” Spurs, the Chris Paul show, the Rockets if they can string together a healthy season from McGrady and Yao, the Blazers, the Mavs (maybe), the Celts, Pistons, Magic, Cavs, Jazz, etc. etc. etc…....

by Nixiack on Jun 11, 2008 1:08 PM CDT up reply actions

Semi-non-official Conpiracy Theory Thread

Yes, I know I misspelled Conspiracy. It wasn’t intentional, but for some reason, I think it fits, and I’m not fixing it.

Anyway, my conspiracy-minded predictions for tonight (Yes, please post your own):
0. Yes, Lakers will win.
1. Kobe free throws: 15 (6/3)
2. Laker’s FT advantage: 7 (+5/-0)
3. Laker’s biggest deficit: 10 (+5/-0)
4. Laker’s margin of victory: 5 (/ 2)
5. Doc Rivers, PP, and/or KG get called for a combined minimum of 2 techs.
6. Ray Allen gets his first period midway through the second quarter.

chaos... panic... pandemonium... my work here is done.

by rick2g on Jun 11, 2008 12:26 PM CDT reply actions

Tomasito, awesome post dude. I agree with on everything, especially your comment regarding the Magic/Bird commercial. Yikes, I never want to see that commercial again. Also, I think Odom will not show up at all this series, neither will Gasol.

I never met anybody who said when they were a kid, "I wanna grow up and be a critic." - Richard Pryor

by DennardC on Jun 11, 2008 2:17 PM CDT reply actions

They won this one because I predicted Lakers in five and didn’t want me to look that bad.

by LatinD on Jun 12, 2008 9:23 PM CDT reply actions

Just sitting here catching the last 5 minutes of game 4, and found it hilarious on one sequence when Kobe bumped a driving Pierce and got a whistle. The announcers raved about how Pierce “sold it a little bit, though there WAS contact.”

Found myself thinking…..if Manu were driving, wouldn’t that be “a disgusting flop” or “a cheap and shameful display” or “an Oscar-worthy performance?!!” Yeah, there’s no bias.

I love being a fan of the San Antonio SPURS.

by SgtinManusArmy on Jun 12, 2008 11:10 PM CDT reply actions

You and me both SiMA

And now the Lakers know what it feels like to be up giant and still lose :) No need of a recap of Game 4, just watch Game 1 or 5 of the WCF, and you’ll get the pic.

Depends on who is doing the announcing. If it was Van Gundy, I’ve heard him have a Manu-Love-Fest going on, he would have yelled that he “suckered Kobe into having to foul” or something…..but I agree, I love being a SPURS fan :)

I’d say Boston in 6 still, but after tonight I wouldn’t be suprised if it doesn’t come back to Boston, and all those LA “OMG!!?? LAKERS IN 5 BECAUSE WE ARE GENEROUS AND WILL GIVE ONE GAME AWAY!!” .... “fans” (aside from pslaker) will finally get thier come-uppance.

One only knows what kind of a series the Spurs would have put up if healthy. Probably a lot better than LA, that’s for sure.

by Nixiack on Jun 13, 2008 12:58 AM CDT reply actions