NBA Season 2014-2015

[Sideboob Bob]

1st round:

East:
Hawks will beat nets, pretty straight forward. Dat ball movement.
Raps wizards real tough. Ive got the raps because of their depth but wouldn't be surprised if the wiz win.
Cavs celts speaks for itself.. Although the celtics are a better team than they get credit for... they're zero chance.
Bulls bucks interesting matchup also but bulls too good.

West:
Warriors easily win pels (davis always a wildcard could win a couple games with gsw having no answer, not even bogut)
Blazers are far too injured, I say they get swept. Grizzlies grindhouse too much.
Rockets mavs interesting... surely hardens shoulders are starting to get sore....
Spurs are the 2nd best team in the league and should beat the clips (clips 2nd unit is rubbish, except for jamal). Like i said above though (or actually didnt say correctly....) the 2nd and 3rd best teams in the west shouldnt meet in the first round and the clips are always a chance with CP3 and BG.

2nd round

East:
Raptors could upset the hawks, i think raps are underrated. but ive still got hawks
Bulls good.... not cavs good.

West:
Warriors historically good team speaks for itself.
Spurs movement wayyyyy too much for mavs or rockets.

3rd round

East
Cavs. again. Lebron james, kyrie irving, kevin love, mozgov, JR, shump, delly, marion, miller.... too.much.for.the.east.

West
Warriors are a filthy team. but so are the spurs... could go either way.... chef curry gonna be cooking something real special up.

THE BIG ONE

This one is bloody tough. Warriors vs Cavs... I still think the warriors are just too much for any team. The best regular season team in  nearly 20 years..... how can they not win....?

Lebron james is a decent answer. still expect the warriors to take it all.

[Sideboob Bob]

Handy Link for Playoffs

http://www.nba.com/playoffs/?ls=iref:nba:serieshubs:top:bracket

Link doesn't seem to take me anywhere mate.. not sure if my bad

[Sideboob Bob]

GSW ;D  my boy Curry and the giant Aussie! It's their year ;)

8) 8) 8) The chef cookin

[Jay]

Jay's 2014-15 NBA Season Awards Ballot

Coach Of The Year

3rd place: Gregg Popovich
Every year he has to be placed on this list, he's one of the all-time great coaches and this year nothing changed. Parker and Leonard only played 68 and 64 games respectively, yet they still ended up with 55 wins in a loaded western conference. He continues to get the best out of average NBA players, the Spurs were 2nd in the league in bench points. You can just plug anyone into their system and they're effective. What's most impressive is how he manages his star players. Kawhi Leonard is the only Spur who averaged over 30 minutes a game. Danny Green who led the Spurs in total minutes played with 2312, ranked only 57th in the league for minutes. He keeps his guys fresh for the post-season whilst racking up 55+ wins every season. I don't know how he does it.

2nd place: Steve Kerr
He took over a good team and turned it into an all-time great team. The Warriors went from being a 51 win team under Mark Jackson to 67 under Steve Kerr. And simply looking at that 16 win increase doesn't do it justice - you have to realise how hard it is to make the jump from good team to great team. To demonstrate that, 288 teams in NBA history have won 51+ games in a season, yet only ten teams have ever won 67 or more times in a season. The roster is basically the same as last year, so the majority of credit has to go to Kerr. He's also taken Curry from being a really good guard to an MVP candidate as well as turning Draymond into a DPOY candidate. Klay Thompson went from having a 14.3 PER last year to 20.8 this year. It's amazing that he's done all this and still might not win coach of the year.

1st place: Mike Budenholzer
For years the Hawks have been a perennial 5-8 seed in the eastern conference, occasionally winning a playoff series but never having the team to go all the way. In comes Budenholzer and in just his 2nd season, he's taken this team to the best record in the eastern conference. And he's done this without having an MVP candidate - which just doesn't happen. History says you can't win 60 games without a top 10 player but somehow Budenholzer has pulled it off. Consider this, Al Horford is the Hawks PER leader with 21 and Win Shares leader with 8, there are 23 other players who have had a PER of 21 or more and Win Shares of 8+. I know this isn't exact, but that means there's been approximately 20 players who have had a better season than a guy who is the best player on a 60 win team. Budenholzer has to get a bunch of credit, no one expected this team to even be a chance at the conference finals let alone go all the way.

[valkorum]

Handy Link for Playoffs

http://www.nba.com/playoffs/?ls=iref:nba:serieshubs:top:bracket

Link doesn't seem to take me anywhere mate.. not sure if my bad

Works for me - it should take you to the NBA page where it has the brackets and current series score.

[Sideboob Bob]

It works now. :o

Cheers man

[jvalles69]

Has any team had immediate success in the finals when they become a powerhouse?  I can't think of any, most teams have those bad beats and the heart ache of losing a conference series or the big dance, that's why GSW won't win the title this year...and prob not next year if OKC are healthy, Durantula's a coming!

[Jay]

Jay's 2014-15 NBA Season Awards Ballot

All-NBA Teams

1st Team:
G: Chris Paul
G: James Harden
F: LeBron James
F: Anthony Davis
C: DeAndre Jordan

2nd Team:
G: Steph Curry
G: Russel Westbrook
F: LaMarcus Aldridge
F: Blake Griffin
C: Marc Gasol

3rd Team:
G: Kyrie Irving
G: Jimmy Butler
F: Kawhi Leonard
F: Pau Gasol
C: Tim Duncan

Conclusion: The hardest position by far was centre. You could make an argument for any of Jordan, Gasol and Duncan to be on the 1st team and you could make an argument for Tyson Chandler or Horford to squeeze into the next two teams. In the end though, I gave the edge to DeAndre because of his defense and efficiency on offense - he has also played heavy minutes in every game on one of the best teams in the league. I think the rest of the selections won't raise too much debate, but the 3rd team was tricky. Klay Thompson and John Wall makes a strong case for a guard selection but I just couldn't squeeze them in this year.

[Jay]

Has any team had immediate success in the finals when they become a powerhouse?  I can't think of any, most teams have those bad beats and the heart ache of losing a conference series or the big dance, that's why GSW won't win the title this year...and prob not next year if OKC are healthy, Durantula's a coming!

07-08 Celtics. They had 20-odd wins, in the previous season and then went out and got Garnett and Allen which led to one of the most dominant regular seasons since the Bulls.. And a championship.

Remember that GSW last year lost in 7 games and the year before pushed the Spurs in the 2nd round. It's not like Curry and co. are playoff rookies.

[Sideboob Bob]

Has any team had immediate success in the finals when they become a powerhouse?  I can't think of any, most teams have those bad beats and the heart ache of losing a conference series or the big dance, that's why GSW won't win the title this year...and prob not next year if OKC are healthy, Durantula's a coming!

Theres only been 9 teams with a better regular season record in the NBA ever. They're a top 10 regular season in the entire history of the NBA.... They lost 2 games at home out of 41 for the whole year. 15 games lost for the entire year.

They had a 10.2 point difference per game (meaning the average game was a 10.2 point win) only 7 teams have had better than that (3 being jordans bulls teams, another being the 07-08 celtics as Jay said).

They have the potential mvp and dpoy on the same team (i don't know how many other times that has happened.. maybe 3? (Jordan hakeem and maybe jordan pippen again?)), two of the best shooters to ever play the game (steph curry IS the greatest 3 point shooter ever), lockdown defenders, great chemistry, the filthiest trash talker in the nba, athleticism.... an Australian... i don't know what they don't have.

Actually finals experience is what they don't have..

Regardless, I think any team with that resume can't be discounted

[Sideboob Bob]

Those are bloody solid jay!

Uni holidays Lecture catchup weeks are the best

[Jay]

Those are bloody solid jay!

Uni holidays Lecture catchup weeks are the best

Lectures? What are they? :P

The final award... MVP is coming soon!

[Keeper27]

what are the chances of BOTH the Bulls & GSW to win by over 5.5??

good?? pretty good?? i dont like the lines for either games, GSW sometimes tend to let teams back into the mix when they should be embarrassing them. Bulls Line is ok but rather play it safe.

[valkorum]

Conclusion: The hardest position by far was centre. You could make an argument for any of Jordan, Gasol and Duncan to be on the 1st team and you could make an argument for Tyson Chandler or Horford to squeeze into the next two teams. In the end though, I gave the edge to DeAndre because of his defense and efficiency on offense - he has also played heavy minutes in every game on one of the best teams in the league. I think the rest of the selections won't raise too much debate, but the 3rd team was tricky. Klay Thompson and John Wall makes a strong case for a guard selection but I just couldn't squeeze them in this year.

Centre: No thought for DMC, shame on you.  I am predicting he will make 2nd team.

[Jay]

Conclusion: The hardest position by far was centre. You could make an argument for any of Jordan, Gasol and Duncan to be on the 1st team and you could make an argument for Tyson Chandler or Horford to squeeze into the next two teams. In the end though, I gave the edge to DeAndre because of his defense and efficiency on offense - he has also played heavy minutes in every game on one of the best teams in the league. I think the rest of the selections won't raise too much debate, but the 3rd team was tricky. Klay Thompson and John Wall makes a strong case for a guard selection but I just couldn't squeeze them in this year.

Centre: No thought for DMC, shame on you.  I am predicting he will make 2nd team.

Only played 59 games, and was on a 29 win team. Just couldn't squeeze him in based on that. He's a beast though, I'd expect him to be first team next year.