I'll make this quick:
FIRST ROUND OF WESTERN CONFERENCE:
All predictions have to be based on the fact that playoffs are a 7 game series. And in a 7 game series, it's the sustainable defense that will win the series. So, let's get started.
The SUNS lost too many key players that Durant, as marvelous as he is, can't make up for. Both Durant and Paul are a little long in the tooth over 7 games. They will miss the wing defense of Mikael Bridges tha most. Cam Johnson's 3 pts shootting stretching the floor, also will be missed. And there will be no Crowder like toughness as a point of attack defender.. First Round: The Suns will defeat the Clips
NUGGES: All things being equal, the Denver Nuggets have the all their their starters'positions covered and in place: power forwards, stretch 3's perimeter shooters and solid point guard. However, their bench is weak. With Jokic and a solid 4 make Devner the favorite. But not a shoo-in. Teams that can keep Jokic from triple double games has a chance, First Round: Denver defeats the TWolves.
The CLIPPERS can't do it without Paul George. Remember, this is a 7 game series. Lose to Suns in the first round.
The GRIZZLIES have injuries to two of their importand Bigs and Jalen Jackson is foul prone. This make them primarily a small ball team. Bigs get very important in the playoffs. If Jackson can stay out of foul trouble, they will be touugh. However, and here I'm speculating: I don't like the FEEL of the team this season: Morant and Brooks have created some bad ju ju. First Round, upset by Lakers. AD and LeBron play like they're 25 years old.
SACRAMENTO KINGS. Hurrah to see the Kings in the 3 spot in the conference. Mike Brown has doen's great job. If tthe game was all about scoring, I'd say they could win the West. But we know that is not the case in the playoffs. I don't believe the Kings can defend the Warriors. First Round: Sorry Sacto fans.
SECOND ROUND:
Denver vs LA. Denver wins
Warriors vs Suns. Warriors win.
THIRD ROUND;
Warriors win in 7 games. Wiggins, Patton Dos and DiV & Green are the difference. Remember this is a 7 game series its outcome very much dependant on the strongest Defense. Against Denver if you contain Murry and Harper Jr, and maintain against the Joker, you can win. I say they will.
NBA CHAMPIONSHIP?
GOLDENSTATE WARRIORS vs BOSTON CELTICS
You heard it here first.
Woke up to beautiful weather that meant soon our tennis courts will be filled with players. I should have included a poem about bassketball, but decided on tennis. Here's one I wrote about playing against my good friend Peter Sears, one of the trickiest players I ever faced.
For Peter Sears
His first serve slices pencil thin
over the net and drops like a broken elbow,
skittering to the side out of reach,
and after his next serve curves like a new moon
to my forehand, then changes direction
like a scythe to my back-hand, I know
I’m in trouble. Forty-love, the first game
his, won on a squirrelly shot that, were it not
a ball, might well have been a squirrel.
My service, a hard one with top-spin
comes just in time to save me from disgrace,
or so I think. In the split second I see it
catch the corner, a certain winner, it returns
to me as a butterfly attaching itself to the silk
thread of the net, as delicate as a brushstroke,
before fluttering off where I can’t touch it.
I’m thinking this is not tennis but an ancient
form of art, disguised as tennis for the purpose
of torture, invented in the court of the Sung
Dynasty, and it is the sly Emperor Hui-Tang
himself on the other side of the net.
He is staring at me, crouched, his whites
gleaming in the sun, racket spinning in his hand,
waiting for me to decide how to paint
the rising peacock. Will I paint the left leg
or the right leg first? Meanwhile I’ve two balls
in my hand, confused, wondering which one
to serve and which one to place in my pocket.
