Erick Blasco

I wonder how the Beasley apologists are going to spin his poor play this season...

Then mark it down, the Rockets will play the Heat in the Finals this year!!!

Did he really say the Rockets will upset the Lakers in the WCF this year? I didn't watch the Heat-Magic game so I missed his commentary, but I strongly doubt JVG would say something like that unless he was in blatant homer mode. Did he say the Rockets CAN upset the Lakers? Of the games you're mentioning, Denver was a championship caliber team based on how they closed 2009 and opened last season. Once Denver lost their coach, and once Artest got integrated in LA (plus the regressions by so many key players), the Nuggets became a implosion waiting to happen. Phoenix was never a real title contender, and Cleveland had the talent and discipline to win a title, but lacked the heart. This Magic team lacks wing creativity. Good defenses can muddle up execution and then it comes down to can a player make a play. Nelson's a bit too slow, and isn't a great passer. Carter is as soft as it comes. That's a real problem against healthy Heat, Celtics, and Lakers teams. I don't even think the Magic can beat a healthy Celtics team for the same reasons I listed above.

I wish people would listen to Jeff Van Gundy more. He said that the Magic were not one of the championship contenders this year. Steve Kerr got word of that and basically said "What is JVG talking about, of course the Magic are a contender." Then the Magic get drilled by the Heat. Even Stan Van Gundy said after the game that his team doesn't have the great one-on-one players that the contenders have, and that his team isn't a great passing team (being a team that generates assists is a lot different than being a great passing team). Orlando is a very, very good team, but they're a solid notch below Miami and Boston.

Don't worry. I'm still around to remind everyone of Andre Miller's cleverness, tricks, and arcane skills.

Let me just say that the game would've been a lot different if, say, the Wizards did anything well, or managed to compete. Then the Wizards would've resembled an NBA team. Then I'd be writing an article on how the Wizards are respectable, as opposed to how bad they are. That is all. One more thing, John Wall only scored two points from the line. I waited for a game where his soft attempts of finishing at the rim weren't excused by an opponent.

That's his new nickname. Paul George, the fake real deal.

In fairness to Melo, the only consistent winning-type players he's ever really played with are Eduardo Najera, Andre Miller and Chauncey Billups. That whole organization has been flooded with me-first, showboating, self-aggrandizers.

Does that mean that George is the fake deal?

I wasn't watching too closely, but Bogans looked like he held his own against the Thunder. None of these guys can create their own shot, so Bogans is the safest as a starter, with the rest getting more minutes based on situations.

Ersan Illyasova for his work ethic and Corey Maggette for his nickname---uh-oh...Maggetteohs!

Are the Washington Wizards really as bad as they looked during their dreadful 112-83 opening game loss to the Orlando Magic? After inspecting their roster, it turns out that they might be. The Wizards’ defensive rotations were horrendous against the Magic—and JaVale McGee, Andray Blatche, Hilton Armstrong, and Yi Jianlian have all been disastrously bad individual and team defenders over the course of their short careers. No wonder they offered no resistance to Dwight Howard, or anyone else on the Magic’s roster. This complete lack of defense extends down to the wings, where Al Thornton and Nick Young were eviscerated by Vince Carter, and were habitually absent in their rotations. John Wall’s idea of defense strictly involves his hands and not his feet. Cartier Martin had an up-and-down defensive game, but may have made the only adequate defensive rotation—and wound up stuffing Dwight Howard at the rim for a highlight reel block because of it. The only Wizard who played acceptable defense on the whole was Kirk Hinrich, but with his teammates botching help assignment after help assignment, his efforts had little impact. Yes, the Wizards were operating without the services of Gilbert Arenas and Josh Howard, but while Howard is at least an average individual defender, he’s a mistake-prone team defender, while Arenas’ idea of playing defense is to outscore his opponent. The fact is that the Wizards are constructed to be an inept defensive team, and unless the team—McGee and Blatche particularly—undergoes a communal epiphany, the Wizards will be carved up by the better offenses in the league. The Wizards’ offense isn’t much better than their defense. John Wall—6-19 FG, 9 AST, 3 TO—already may be one of the five fastest players (the fastest?) in the game with the ball in his hands, and he was lethal finishing on the break. If the Wizards can play any defense at all, Wall will torture opponents with transition baskets and assists. However, Wall’s jump shot is broken—3-11 on shots outside the paint. He also tends to overpenetrate, and he didn’t show much creativity in finishing around the basket, allowing his shot to get swatted by Howard three times by going up soft. His assists mostly came in garbage time, or on simple drive-and kicks in early offense with the Magic comfortably ahead. In other words, Wall has talent but is still a work in progress. Andray Blatche is a center who thinks he’s a guard, and as such commits horrendous turnovers, like trying to cross over along the baseline and dribbling the ball out of bounds. He’s skilled enough to dominate games against inferior teams if he develops an early rhythm, but the Magic, knowing this, doubled him throughout the first quarter. Blatche originally responded okay—he was comfortable scanning the double team and making the appropriate cross-court pass to the open player. As the game went on though, and Blatche got more and more frustrated, he launched a number of ill-advised force jobs that had nary a prayer of going in. For the game, Blatche was a quiet 2-9 for six points, with at least four bad shots taken and missed. Al Thornton has athleticism—4-9 FG, 9 PTS—but he’s a ball stopper with limited range—1 AST, 0 TO, 0-3 3FG. JaVale McGee runs and jumps like a gazelle but has no idea why he’s supposed to do anything on the court. Hilton Armstrong would make an excellent fourth string center—0-0 FG, 2 REB, 2 TO, 5 PF. Yi Jianlian is totally soft and unremarkable in creating his own offense. He needs to shoot well to be a factor, but hasn’t shown any reliability over his career. He can’t handle, or rebound, or pass, so when he performs like he does against the Magic—2-6 FG, 0-1 3FG, 2-6 FT, 6 PTS, he’s totally useless. Nick Young is another moderately talented wing with poor court vision and a penchant for taking bad shots—1-5 FG, 5 PTS. Only Hinrich—4-9 FG, 3-6 3FG, 2 AST, 1 TO—and Martin—5-9 FG, 6-6 FT, 17 PTS—performed well on offense. As a team, the Wizards bigs showed screens and then fanned out looking for long jumpers. None of Washington’s stable of bigs set screens with any degree of sturdiness. Ball reversal and ball movement were ancient myths. The extra pass was eschewed in favor of awkward pull-up jumpers. In essence, the Wizards put on a clinic of bad basketball. This is damning in the sense that the return of Gilbert Arenas and Josh Howard won’t solve these problems. Arenas would give Washington a bit more scoring punch, but his presence and need to have the ball in his hands would only hinder the development of Wall. More importantly, sturdy screens, ball movement, playing with eyes up instead of a head down, none of these would be improved by Arenas or Howard. What the Wizards don’t need is more athleticism, or more talent. They need role players and defenders at every position. Without those components, Washington’s development will be stalled by a brick wall.

lol, also not until December at the earliest. If I hit my schedule right, it's the Wizards tonight, the Bobcats next Wednesday, and the Clippers next Friday next. I have 15 teams preliminarily scheduled until December 3rd, but I usually miss two or three of those games for various reasons.

My preliminary schedule doesn't have me looking at the Nuggets until December at the earliest due to scheduling reasons.

In two of those games, Garnett didn't play....research, research, research... The game he did play, the Raptors got blown out in the second half, and had a 15-25 ast/to ratio. Bosh played pretty well though. The season prior, Bosh went: 3-8, 9 points, 11% rebounding percentage 7-14, 24 points, 10% rebounding percentage 5-16, 15 points, 16 % rebounding percentage 6-11, 18 points, 16% rebounding percentage I would be extremely surprised if Bosh went an entire season shooting 40%, but I would not be surprised if Bosh went a playoff series against Boston shooting 40% And yes, it's the coaches/team's fault for Bosh's inability to play on the block and need to pound the ball at the elbow for 15 seconds.

Mad. Truth. I don't disagree, and a lot of times, how a team plays in the first game IS indicative of how they'll play in the playoffs. Remember the last two season-openers between Boston and Cleveland? The Celtics would always school the Cavs, then Cleveland would get the best of the Celtics later in the season, but the same problems Cleveland would show during the opening game is exactly what their problems would be during the postseason. I'd like to see Miami after a month. They'll have some time to play together and to gel a little bit, let's see if they can start putting things together.

Oh okay, I thought I forgot to press enter or something, and I felt really stupid.

I'm bummed I forgot to post this earlier...

The Boston Celtics’ 88-80 victory over the Miami Heat on opening night was a case of a team beating a collection of individuals. Whereas the Celtics are familiar with five-man offensive principals, the Heat simply are not.Boston runs offensive sets involving all five players contributing meaningful action on each play, while against the Celtics, Miami often ran simple isolations or high screen/rolls with little movement elsewhere.Boston frequently runs weak-side action for profit, while the most weak-side action the Heat would run would be simple wing brush screens for Eddie House when Dwyane Wade or LeBron James would operate at the top.Boston frequently zipped the basketball along—25 assists to 32 made baskets—while the Heat had the ball stick way too often—15 assists to 27 made hoops.Boston’s core has played together for so long that naturally, the Celtics would be better at anticipating each other’s cuts and movements—though the Celtics did suffer from miscommunications. Miami, however, looked comprised of assorted streetballers selected for a pickup game.Boston frequently reversed the ball, while the Heat were content to stay on one side, allowing the Celtics to set their strong-side defense.The Celtics balance was on display in the shot attempts of their top six players in terms of minutes—seven, seven, seven, nine, 13, and 11 attempts for Boston’s starting unit, plus Glen Davis. For the Heat, LeBron and Wade attempted half of Miami’s field goal attemptsWith the Celtics fully indoctrinated in the cult of winning basketball, clever play calling willfully executed was the norm. The Heat’s three stars, though, have long played in systems where pounding the ball and having an offense catered to them was the modus operandi. No wonder neither of the Big Three accomplished very much when the ball wasn’t in their hands.Miami’s defense was frequently stretched thin by Boston’s play calling. Because all five players were involved and continuity flowed from each set, Miami couldn’t load up on stopping individual plays. The lowlight for Miami was a series of Ray Allen baseline screens that flummoxed Dwyane Wade so much, he ran into Joel Anthony, lifted his head in the air in exasperation, and trudged his way down the court—before Allen’s three went through the net.In short, the Celtics trusted each other and trusted the offense—traits that Miami hasn’t acquired. On an individual basis, Wade looked as though he hadn’t played basketball in several years. He committed uncharacteristically clumsy turnovers, like dribbling a ball straight off his foot out of bounds, and also uncharacteristically careless turnovers—like lobbing a crosscourt pass in transition that was easily intercepted by Garnett. He missed five layups, committed six turnovers, and forced innumerable off-balanced shots that were attempted strictly because he’s Dwyane Wade. It was if he carried instinctual memories of his past individual brilliance but having unlearned all the fundamentals of the game. The result was an awkward, contrived performance that was easily dismissed by the Celtics—4-16 FG, 6 AST, 6 TO, 13 PTS. Aside from a brief stretch late in the third quarter into the fourth, LeBron James had a quiet 31 points. He committed eight turnovers, some on miscommunications with his teammates, some when he tried to force his unselfishness on plays that never developed, and some on awful basketball decisions. Not surprisingly, LeBron only played reasonably well when the Heat ran quick-hitting high screen/rolls for him while his teammates stood around and watched along the perimeter. LeBron did knock down an early catch-and shoot jumper when he bumped to the corner off a screen, and he did knock down some shots as a standstill target for Wade’s penetrations, but the Heat did precious little for LeBron off the ball. They tried a few cross-screens to get him deep post position, but Paul Pierce was able to push him out to the wing. The two times LeBron did post, he overwhelmed Pierce with his physicality, but missed a subsequent short turnaround, and a timid pump, pivot, then fadeaway jumper. Chris Bosh played exactly as he did with the Raptors—stopping the ball, operating outside of the paint, and having zero physical presence in the game—3-11 FG, 2-2 FT, 8 REB, 8 PTS. Aside from a few times he was able to go by Garnett when KG crowded him, and a dunked-in lob after Garnett fronted Bosh coming out to set a screen giving up the entire back side, Bosh simply stationed himself at either elbow, faced up the defense, held the ball, and either launched a rhythmless jumper, or forced a drive that led to an ugly shot. Aside from a halfway decent job by James on Pierce, some patented open court shot-altering defense by James, and a Wade gamble and steal on a wing entry pass, neither of the big three played any defense. The only consistent offense Miami received was on the aforementioned high screen/roll action with James, a handful of drive-and-kicks by Wade, and some sharp shooting by Eddie House. Joel Anthony couldn’t provide any offense—he’s a garbage man and the Celtics never took out their trash. Worse, Anthony was too small to slow down Shaquille O’Neal Carlos Arroyo couldn’t penetrate, hit open shots, defend, or prove that he isn’t totally useless against an elite team like the Celtics. Botched high screen/roll defense by Arroyo and Bosh allowed Rajon Rondo to get going early. James Jones hit two of his seven open jumpers, a percentage that is much too low. He also committed too many mental defensive mistakes, from fouling Pierce on a three, to giving him too much room in transition, to not rotating effectively. Eddie House couldn’t stay in front of anyone, hit several big shots, and performed his role reasonably well, mainly popping over wing brush screens, catching, then shooting. Zydrunas Ilgauskas set several effective moving screens that weren’t called, and several ineffective moving screens that were whistled. Udonis Haslem hit a few leftover shots, did a terrific job of rebounding in pulling down 11 boards, and tossed several terrific outlet passes that led to a few stolen points. The Celtics meanwhile ran their gameplan to full effect. The Celtics funneled screens into help, and away from the middle of the floor. Boston limited ball reversal and forced the Heat to play one-side-of-the-court basketball. Because Miami’s offense was simple and the Celtics prepare so well defensively, their rotations were on-time and on-point. Shaq’s mass altered a great many shots at the rim, and if Shaq couldn’t change a shot, he’d give a hard foul changing a player’s mind about trying to drive. If he missed his cookies at the rim, and most of his free throws, he was able to throw around Anthony near the basket, and he set earth-shattering screens. Paul Pierce played LeBron as well as could be expected, even committing two blocking fouls that clearly should’ve been charges after guessing right on LeBron’s moves to the rim. Pierce couldn’t shake free of LeBron’s strong-armed defense, but the Celtics didn’t force him to. Pierce mostly operated within the confines of the offense, hitting big threes in early offense, and getting to the line in transition. Ray Allen frustrated Dwyane Wade with his perpetual motion around screens—7-13 FG, 5-8 3FG. The most encouraging sign for Allen wasn’t his shooting or his solid defense, but the two tough layups he converted at the basket. Kevin Garnett telegraphed reverse passes, had trouble finishing around the rim, and was beaten to a number of rebounds, but his screen defense, and his overall defensive range were awesome. Garnett’s ability to show and recover on screens sets the tone for the Celtics defense, taking away a staple of most team’s offenses. Glen Davis sacrificed his body to draw several charges that will endear himself to Doc Rivers. Davis—6-7 FG, 13 PTS—was also effective both in knocking down mid-range jumpers, and in creating his own offense in the post with a nifty turnaround step back jumper over Zydrunas Ilgauskas. Jermaine O’Neal blocked a shot, missed a pair of rotations, and was a general non-entity. Nate Robinson was likewise a non-factor. Marquise Daniels posted Dwyane Wade for profit among his eight points. Plus, while he’s not as good a defender as Tony Allen, he did a respectable job defending James. However, as usual, Boston’s performance was predicated on Rajon Rondo. When Rondo was pushing the pace, attacking the paint, and looking for quick-hitting offense, the Celtics were unstoppable. Despite only having four points, Rondo’s court vision and decision making fueled Boston’s offense with 17 assists (17!). However, Rondo missed both his shots outside the paint, and still walks the ball up when his team is struggling to score, taking too long to get into the Celtics offense. Boston’s offense tends to stall at times because the Celtics no longer have a dominant scorer, and don’t have much of a post threat when Shaq isn’t on the court. In these situations, the Celtics need Rondo to push the ball and create opportunities in early offense, but he would rather walk it up and call out a play. This overabundance of trust in running the correct offensive play takes away from Rondo’s strength as a playmaker. It also allows good defenses time to set up for Boston’s offense, while early-offense and transition offense are much more difficult to stop because defenses aren’t set. In these situations, the correct offensive play is to push the ball to generate easier scores. What we saw from Rondo, though, and what we saw from the Celtics, is the trust to run complex basketball plays because he knew his team could handle it. What we saw from Miami was a lack of trust, though in fairness, the fact that the Heat played so few minutes together in the preseason does contribute somewhat to Miami’s self-centered gameplan. What the contest ultimately told viewers is that the Celtics still have a ton of pride, they still gameplan extremely well (even without defensive guru Tom Thibodeau), and they still know how to stonewall one or two-dimensional offenses. And they’ve proven that whatever happens in the regular season, they’ll know how to turn it on come the playoffs. Miami hasn’t proven anything other than they have the talent to win a ton of regular season games. The Heat’s core of isolation and screen/roll oriented scorers haven’t proven in the past, and they sure didn’t prove against the Celtics that they can play any kind of complicated team offense that would put pressure on an elite defense. And that isn’t going to change until they face a playoff team that’s packed with talent and has been given time to scout and prepare for the Heat on a game-by-game basis. The Heat will play better by default, but they’re miles away from being ready to knock off championship competition like the Lakers and Celtics. Sure the Heat have talent, but talent isn’t enough when matched up with another talented team that plays with discipline, intelligence, awareness, creativity, and trust. The Celtics are already a championship-caliber team. The Heat, as of now, are simply a talented collection of individuals.

Thanks for the props. When I say mistake player, I don't necessarily mean that it's a mistake to have him on the team, or a mistake to have drafted him, or that sort of thing. What I mean is that he makes a lot of mistakes on the court, usually because of a low basketball IQ. DeRozan has some good athleticism and a good work ethic, but he zigs when he should zag, and he takes bad shots, that sort of thing. This will be his second season, let's see if he's learned from his rookie year and improved his understanding somewhat.

I don't have a set top box so I bought the tuner, and right now everything looks amazing! Thanks everyone for your help, and especially LKR!

Sound advice.

There's a 24 hour best buy an hour away from me by Subway. I need the tuner by tuesday afternoon. I can wake up super early tomorrow and pick it up before I go to work! It all comes down to time. The NBA season starts on Tuesday and I want to see how Boston and Miami attack each other. I can't wait!!!!!

I think I'm going to use the TV tuner, but I seriously appreciate your help man.

Wow, thank you so much, this is exactly what I need! Your kindness will not go unrewarded. Final question, is this something I can pick up at Best Buy? I see this at Best Buy, this would be fine? http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Hauppauge+-+TV+HD+Stick+USB+2.0+TV+Tuner+with+PVR/9234205.p?skuId=9234205&ci_src=14110944&ci_sku=9234205&ref=06&loc=01&id=1218064151279