Couple Questions for Cavs Fans

Thanks for a good post, Rock Creator. Welcome to FTS. My short answers:

1. If the Cavs lose, I root for the Magic all the way. I don’t want Kobe to get another ring, and I’m surprised at how much I kinda like the Magic.
2. I honestly think that Cleveland/Denver would be a better series, but I’d want to see LA. Id want to bring down Kobe’s empire.
3. In game one, a lot of it was poor defense and stagnant offense. I think at this point, though, we mostly just have to tip our caps to Orlando for outplaying us and somehow staying hot from behind the arc.

I was gonna comment on one of the other posts but because of my allegiances I didn’t want to come off as a troll and thought I’d just pose the questions directly to you guys instead of seemingly siding with the orlando fans.

My answers from a simple fan.

1. I like all three teams although I’m a die-hard Cavs and Heat fan. I sorta want to go with the Lakers, for Phil Jackson, HOWEVER if the Cavs don’t make it, I don’t want the Lakers to either.
Their fans will be all over it. “Haha, Kobe made it to the Finals this year and LeBron didn’t!!”
So in that case I will root for the Birdman and the Nuggets until that series is over.

As for the Magic, I love Dwight Howard, and I wouldn’t want anyone who beats the Cavaliers to be defeated.

So it’s Rock/Paper/Scissors really and I’ll just watch as a fan again.

 
2. Lakers. Not because of LeBron/Kobe, but just the way the Lakers have played so far. In almost the same lieu as the Cavs, something usually goes wrong more often than not and they have to rely on some luck to catch back up and win.
All the teams right now are very balanced. They’re all good and they all earned their way to where they’re at right now.
I don’t want to face the Nuggets, to me they are better defensively, and they can shoot good 3s if they want to.

3. I’ve said it all along: They get nervous. That, and the fact the Magic are just one hell of a team, and most of their people are just a tad taller than ours. Just so happens the name of their blog is “3rd Quarter Collapse” and that name has held up famous for the Cavs so far.
I forget who said it, but they’ve repeated it throughout the Playoffs and I’ll quote them again: It’s about matchups.

We match up poorly with the Magic.
I voted in a FTS poll, “Who would you rather face?” and the options were Boston or Orlando. I voted Boston, but they didn’t make it.

The Cavaliers have gotten better through this series, but it may be too little too late. It would be something if they would win 3 in a row. They can do it.

got into an argument this weekend on this topic, and i’d like to hear what people here think: rank the potential finals matchups from the NBA’s perspective…as in, which matchups would they most like to see…in no order:

cavs/lakers
magic/lakers
cavs/nuggets
magic/nuggets

i’ll weigh in w/ my perspective later. this started w/ an argument about which conference finals the nba was more interested in as far as who the winner is.

Welcome, and let me add that I got a chuckle out of your declarations of fandom to 3 different teams in your first 3 sentences.

My answers:

1. If the Cavs bow out, I don’t root for anyone. To be honest, I disagree with you completely on this point; as a true fan of any sport, it’s easiest to watch the rest of a championship format as a neutral observer, unless you want to root “against” someone. I don’t care about the Magic, Lakers, or Nuggets enough to root for or against. I’d just want to see good basketball played by both sides and officiated fairly.

2. Cavs/Lakers: two best teams in the league, with the two best players in the league.

3. Throughout the entire year, my conversations about the Cavs always pointed to how they held onto leads and blew teams out this year, which had been a big problem for them the past two years. in the ’06’07 and ’07’08 seasons, I watched them give away too many double-digit halftime leads in the 3rd quarter. So what we’ve seen occur in this series is a past problem that’s resurfaced that the worst possible time. The cause? No clue. I can’t believe it’s any sort of laziness issue… these guys are motivated individuals and it’s the conference finals, fer chrissake. Whatever the problem is, Coach Brown needs to figure it out yesterday.

Personally, I think the playoffs have been a microcosm of the season. A team that is focused and plays well (especially against the poor teams) but has trouble when facing skilled teams that play defense just as well as they do.

That’s what has been such a great treat about this season. This team has never really taken games off all season long. Even when logic dictates that they could/should take a day off they still made an all-out effort to win every game (save for the last one).

So even if the Cavs lose this series, it has been one of the most enjoyable seasons of basketball I have ever watched. A disappointing ending won’t ruin that for me.

 The Cavaliers have been nearly 21 points per 100 possessions worse against the Magic than against the other 28 teams in the NBA. They’ve scored 9.6 fewer points and allowed 11.1 more points per 100 possessions, so you can’t isolate the problems to the offensive or defensive end. To put it bluntly, Orlando has kicked Cleveland’s tail just about every way it can be kicked.