The end of every sports season is greeted with mixed emotions, at least by The Dean anyway. The culmination of all the games played and wagers placed, with one more series to analyze, and predict. As I was aimlessly figuring out what to do with all the time on my hands this weekend, a result of only early season baseball to view on the TV, I had that same feeling that happens at every Super Bowl, NCAA basketball championship, etc. But enough of that, let’s appreciate what we have, which is a great matchup of two teams that are clearly the two best in the league this year.

Here is Dean’s first prediction: every game in this series will come down to the final possession, will be hard fought, and will be filled with highlights that will make us all hoot and holler when they happen and whenever they are replayed.

I don’t know the last time a team, Miami Heat, has had so many people hating on them. The disdain for the Heat spans rivalry. This isn’t Celtic fans hating the Lakers, or Knick fans hating the Heat. This is everyone other than Heat fans hating the Heat. As you do your own analysis of this series, it is important to be sure you are separating those feelings from what matters. Let me lay down what Dean believes matters, and the conclusion I have drawn from them.

Experience Matters. I always like to look at any matchup and say, “who has been here before?” Experience matters, it matters a lot. Both teams have players that have been to the Finals (the Mavericks have more), but only the Heat have players that have won it all. Both teams also claim players that have been in and won championships at the college level. Does that translate specifically to the NBA Finals? No, but it sure doesn’t hurt. The biggest difference in experience with these two teams is with their head coaches. While neither Rick Carlisle nor Eric Spoelstra have ever coached in the Finals, Carlisle has won a championship as a player with the 1985-86 Boston Celtics, and has much more experience than Spoelstra. Will any of that matter as this series progresses? I think so. Spoelstra had a favorable coaching matchup against the Bulls, with Tom Thibodeau being in his first playoffs as a head coach. Many believe that Thibodeau didn’t do such a great job, don’t look for Carlisle to as poorly.

Who has done more to this point? While it is true that the Eastern Conference was much improved this year over past years, make no mistake that it was still an inferior conference to the West. The Mavericks disposed of a more impressive list of teams on their way to the Finals, and let’s not forget about a 4-0 sweep of the defending champion Lakers. Forget seedings, the Heat were the best team in the East. They lost quite a few games this year that were a direct result of not having played together before. By the time the playoffs rolled around most of those kinks had been worked out. With that in mind, that makes the Heat’s run in the playoffs less impressive than the Mavericks.

Deeper bench. I believe that the Mavericks present more matchup issues for the Heat, then the Heat present for the Mavs. Don’t get me wrong, there are matchup issues for the Mavs to confront, but not as many as the other way around. The guard combination of Jason Kidd and JJ Barea stands out to me as the one that will give the Heat a lot of trouble. How the Heat guard Dirk will be very interesting. By putting Bosh on Dirk (which is the expected route), Dirk can draw the Heat big man away from the basket giving the Mavs a considerable advantage on the offensive boards.

Caring for the Ball. The Mavs have better outside shooters, 38% from 3-pt compared to the Heat’s 32%. The Mavs are slightly better from the foul line 82% to 80%, with the Heat getting to the foul line a bit more per game. The Mavs take better care of the ball, with a 1.7 Assist to Turnover ratio compared to the Heat’s 1.1. The Maverick guards Kidd and Barea both have outstanding ratios of 3.3 and 3.7 respectively, while no one on the Heat is better than 2.0. The Mavs also steal the ball more though only slightly, 7.7 per game to the Heat’s 7.0.

Its Time. It just feels to me that it is time for the Dirk and Jason Kidd to win a title. LeBron will get his, I don’t doubt that, but I do doubt that he will get it this year.

Dean’s Prediction. Mavericks in 6.

Sheets on the seats and phoniness has Saint Dougie irked.

After looking around the panned television shots of the American Airlines Arena after the Heat went on their late overtime run last night to effectively matador the Bulls right out of the playoffs and after looking at these idiots in the crowd and seeing the tanned faces, the gold chains and the trophy wives repping phoniness personified? To quote my main man Colonel Frank Slade (a wonderful Al Pacino) in Scent of A Woman: “If I were the man I was five years ago, I’d take a FLAMETHROWER to this place!”

Meanwhile, a team that has not 1, not 2 but 3 of the top 6 from the USA’s gold medal winner in China in ’08, a team that was going to be the greatest of all time, win 70 games and 9 championships, a team that threw themselves a pre-season championship style pep rally, demolished the all-time record for chest bumps in a single sporting event last night. This chest bumping record was set after the big bad Heat beat a Bulls team at home with a 21 year old kid leading a group of players with nary an offensive threat in the mix. Charlie Sheen is jealous of all the chest bumps going on! Get yourself an 8 ball and some topless Goddesses and have at it, Chuck! Chest bumps all around! Winning indeed – winning South Beach style! Act like you humps are doing what you are SUPPOSED to be doing! Hell, you told us as much in the preseason! You didn’t beat the ’87 Lakers or ’98 Bulls. You beat the ’11 Bulls. At home. In Game 4. Chest bump worthy? Aww hell naw!

Oh, but the Bulls have the Coach of the Year in grizzled old Tom Thibodeau, right? Thibs? Can I call you Thibs? You might want to put down that 220 page defensive manual you swear by and pick up a copy of NBA Offense For Dummies, my man. I mean, after D Rose was repeatedly trapped on pick and rolls to the Bulls detriment time and again, you may have wanted to go to the complex John Wooden set that takes years to master – the flattened out 1-4! And if sticking with the high ball screen which yielded Rose an 8 for 27/7 turnover night was Coach of the Year’esque, Thibs really upped the ante down the stretch of the game by finally going to the 1-4. He went to it just in time to have the 6-2 Rose attempt to get quality shot attempts over the 6-8 and damn near as quick Lebron. So Rose fires up fade away biscuits multiple times to seal the Bulls fate. Coach of the Year indeed! Where’s Mike Brown when you need him? (My bad! He’s about to take the Laker job!)

So there you have it. The Heat are 1 measly win away from the Finals and they act like giddy little school girls. The rabid South Beach fans that don’t go to Dolphins, Marlins or Miami Hurricanes games are gleeful and celebrating their true fanhood and the Bulls coach of the year helps everyone out in the process. As for me? In Dirk I trust.

BACK IN BUSINESS

The gratitude I feel toward my next door neighbor for allowing me to use their rake yesterday is heartfelt. Those heaping piles of dead presidents laying about the domicile were getting to be a burden to continually circumvent while meandering around my house. (Domicile, Circumvent and Meandering = 50 cent words. Words completely affordable to your saintliness after a 13-4 week last week.) Thus, the use of the rake was most necessary as my cleaning lady and her adorable French maid ensemble (complete with thigh highs) raked the Franklins into neat piles as requested. She also baked me some cupcakes and left me some self taken Polaroids on the counter.

But I digress… to come out firing in February with a 13-4 week after a few months in hibernation was actually slightly disappointing. Saint Dougie aims for perfection, for as Slick Rick once spat, “straight and narrow or your soul gets caste”. Who am I to disagree?

So with a 76.4705 winning percentage last week stuffed humbly into my wallet, stuffed being the operative word, for we do not lay chump change here in the bunker, let’s ride on this fine Tuesday NBA evening. Every dog has its’ day but the hell with that, it’s my year. Indeed, tonight, it is all about the dogs. Underdogs. A 4 pack of ‘em. Bizarro world ensues. Cue the Twilight Zone theme music.

Clip Joint (The Blake Griffins) at a cool +9.5 in Orlando vs. The Magic

Indy Pace Cars getting a healthy +10.5 vs. the Heat

Everyone’s favorite dinosaurs, the Raptors +7 in Milwaukee.

Grizzly Bears copping +6 in OKC

First of all, I wanna send out a round of lacy white angel wings to all the single ladies out there. Fly high, girls. Fly high and fly proper.

So LeBroad goes out and gets 51 and the Magic get burnt by the Heat and so the Spurs roll into LA and neckbone the Lake Show forcing Saint Dougie into a 1-2 night at the office. Relax, my God fearing populace. No one is stealing my halo. Ain’t happening. Still 7-3 on the week and snacking on lobster spring rolls at Devon’s and washing them down with double Goose, cran and 7-Up tall boys. Ain’t nothing changed but the day of the week it is.

Tonight is Friday and the feeling is awful freaky from the Saint’s headquarters in the bunker on Derry Street. Dr. Gal aka Big Cuz and Drew Rodeo Drive will be weighing in later today with their picks of the night. We will each roll with a 5 game set.

My 5:

In a bizarre twist, I am going to pick the worst game on the board of the bunch. Raptors at home at – 3.5 vs. the T-Wolves. Both teams coming off Wed night losses. Dinosaurs are dynamite at home tonight. Raptors.

Meanwhile, I love the Magic act to bounce back and cover that -5.5 on the road tonight in Washington. Magic pull a rabbit out of their top hat.

The 76ers will run and hide with their -4 vs. the Knicks at home tonight in what should be one of the better crowds in the 215 this season at the Wells Fargo Center. Sixers turner corner continues.

I like that big ol’ 13 that the poor, poor Cavs are getting at Memphis tonight. Cavs cover. Mind you, they don’t win. But they do cover that one tonight.

Lastly, I like the Thunderous Durantulas. You down with OKC at -2 on the road in Phoenix? Saint Dougie is. OKC is the call.

Stay saintly.

He is tough to locate with his globe-trotting, high life style but The Dean was able to find St. Dougie for just long enough today to get his action on tonight’s NBA Games.

Here is where his Saintliness is laying his cash tonight.

Miami (+2.5) at Orlando. Riding with the Magic in this one at -2.5.

Spurs (+3) at LA Lakers. Riding Lakers in this one at -3.

Bucks (+7) at Golden State. Riding with Bucks at +7

Keep the fan requests coming and St. Dougie is more likely to be seen more often. Send your love, and he will send it back 10-fold.

Where I come from we call someone a ‘hump’ when we wish to convey that we have no respect for that person. Said person has done something that causes us to either lose any respect we had for the person, or never respect them at all. David Stern, commissioner of the NBA, is hump, and in my eyes has always been a hump.

Stern is credited with turning the NBA into the money machine it is today. It was under his watch that the NBA moved from being a red-headed step child of the sports world to a US game with the most international appeal. The NBA
Finals weren’t even shown live on TV in the early ‘80s. Then came Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Dr. J, and eventually Michael Jordan. Now the NBA players are having prime-time specials to announce the team for which they are going to play. If people want to credit Stern with the NBA’s rise in popularity, then also blame him for turning a team sport into an individual sport.

But that is not what has my ire raised today. What has me calling out Stern today is the NBA’s ridiculous fine of $50,000 levied against Minnesota Timberwolves’ president David Kahn for speaking of Michael Beasley’s past marijuana use. The team was fined an additional $50,000 for the same ‘infraction’. The NBA deemed the comments inappropriate. I understand that $50,000 is not a lot of money relative to the amount that Kahn and the T-Wolves are worth. But the fines are also proof positive that David Stern is a complete hump!

Kahn commented that he believed the newly acquired new two overall pick from last year had matured a lot in the past year. Kahn pointed to Beasley past known use of marijuana as a sign of his immaturity and made the comparison that Beasley is now more mature because he doesn’t do that anymore. Whether he does or doesn’t isn’t the point. Beasley posted a picture of himself on Twitter showing off a new tattoo and in the background of the picture was a bag o’ weed in June of 2009. It was public knowledge, it was world wide web knowledge, that Beasley smoked weed, but when Kahn talks about it he is being inappropriate?! How does that make any sense?! It only makes sense in David Stern’s hump world that people should be punished for speaking openly about such a topic. The NBA that exists today is dominated by young men that have grown up in a weed culture, they smoke weed, weed is part of their lives and they make no bones about it. But David Stern, being a self-loathing hump, hates the very thing he created and he will cut the head off of anyone that is honest about the league.

LeBron stays in Cleveland and gets someone, maybe CP3
The Knicks will get someone else, maybe Tony Parker, maybe Carmelo, and they might be able to keep David Lee.
The Heat got their guys.
The Bulls got better with Boozer.
The Celtics will keep their core intact.
The Magic will keep their core intact.

When all of the above happens, the East will have just gotten hyper-competitive, and the NBA will become a better product.

Perhaps you have heard the unsubstantiated rumors about LeBron James’ teammate Delonte West and LeBron’s mother being involved in a sexual relationship. On the surface it sounds crazy, and I do not have any first hand knowledge or a reliable source to validate the rumor. (Calvin Murphy says its true but he is less than reliable) If I were a betting man, and I am, I will put my money down that it is true. And I do that based on one reason – it is the only thing makes sense to explain LeBron’s performance in Game 5 of the Cavaliers series against the Celtics.

If you saw LeBron’s performance in Game 5 you were left to really draw only one conclusion, he was throwing the game. Problem with that option is, it just doesn’t resonate. There is no purpose to him throwing a game, no one could ever pay him enough money to throw a game and he has no history tying him to any type of gambling. Even if there was, is there really a debt that would be so large that LeBron couldn’t just pay it?! If you want to get into a conspiracy theory along the lines of Michael Jordan’s being secretly banned from basketball, and his father’s murder both being related to some bad stuff Jordan was wrapped up in, you have a real tough case to make because LeBron has nothing attached to him that allows that theory to hold any water.

What does hold water is that LeBron and his mother are extremely close and if he had found out that his crazy teammate Delonte (he is literally and clinically crazy) was catching hummers and puttin’ the wood to his mother, this would be enough to ruin LeBron for at least a few nights and completely throw him off his game, and cause him to have a “I-don’t-really-give-a-shit” attitude.

Again, I have no proof and I have not seen or read any proof that is strong enough to convince me the rumors are true. All I am saying is, LeBron’s discovery of his mom banging his teammate is the only thing that makes any sense as a reason for his odd on the court behavior in Game 5.

The 2009 NBA Finals are exhibiting the essence of basketball which is about matchups, which are about individuals. However, it is the combination of those individuals and how the work in unison that ultimately determines who is the best team.

With that in mind, the following individuals are the ones that have left a mark on my psyche through the first two games.

Dwight Howard
Everyone, myself included, questioned why Howard wasn’t given more of the spotlight. His performance so far in the Finals has been less than impressive. True he is getting his rebounds, and true he had a much better second game. However, last night when he received the ball in the post with his back to the basket in the 3rd and 4th quarters he either had the ball stripped, threw a bad pass, or forced a shot. I am very unimpressed and disappointed with Howard so far.

Jameer Nelson
People get excited when a very good player returns from injury. Why wouldn’t they? A player that was instrumental to the Magic’s success this year was gonna be back in uniform, a cause for celebration, no? No! The flow that the Magic developed over the course of these playoffs was a fine balance of movement, anticipation, and comfort in their surroundings. To introduce a new element into the middle of that is to play scientist and hope that the chemicals don’t blow up. I am not pinning the first two losses on Nelson, not at all. I think that getting Nelson acclimated to full speed is a great idea, and if Orlando would have won last night (which they should have) they would be sitting pretty headed home.

Rafer Alston
Alston is a by-product of Nelson. Alston seems to be the one most affected by Nelson’s return to the lineup.

Derek Fisher
It seems that when Fisher touches the ball late in a game good things are going to happen for his team.

Pau Gasol
The White Willie McGee. Dude is f’n ugly.

JJ Redick
Hit a big shot, missed a big shot, and had a turnover on a good pass that just took him too long to make. Redick got plenty of playing time and did ok, but had missed a chance to raise his own stock.

Hedo Turkoglu
A close runner-up to the ugliest dude on the court. Turkoglu’s value to this Magic team can not be understated. I would have liked to have seen that pass to Courtney Lee be slightly better, but it certainly wasn’t a bad pass.

Stan Van Gundy
I am a big fan of both Van Gundy’s and Stan is showing that he is a better coach than Phil Jackson. I don’t know if there is a stat on points scored off of inbound plays, but I am willing to bet that Van Gundy’s teams are at the top.

The list does not have Kobe Bryant because Kobe has not left a mark on my psyche. He is doing what he does. I will say that Kobe I don’t expect Kobe to have his shots blocked when shooting for the win . . . The Magic covered the 6.5 points last night and came within a layup of winning when they were +260 . . . The Magic are -4 in Game 3 and -200, while the Lakers are +165 . . . The Dean likes the Magic to cover in Game 3.

In 3 of Orlando’s 4 wins, someone off the bench played more minutes than at least one starter. In the lone game where that did not occur, Mickael Pietrus played 1 min and 50 seconds less than Dwight Howard (Game 3). Only once did Cleveland have a non-starter play more minutes that a starter, also Game 3. Aleksandar Pavlovic played more minutes than Anderson Varejao.

It was always Pietrus who was the non-starter that netted more minutes, so perhaps he should be considered the key to the Magic winning the series. This stat also points out what a lot of LeBron Lovers point to as the reason the Cavs lost. They lament “Poor LeBron can’t do it all himself!!! His teammates let him down, his teammates are only good because the get to play with LeBron!”. Bullshit. I guess his teammates had no part in the Cavs having the best record in the NBA in the regular season. I suppose that his teammates had no part in the Cavs winning their first 8 playoff games this year.

The bottom line is this, once you look past all the hype, and the commercials, and the chalk dust in the air that is clouding everyone’s vision, a few things become very clear:

1. LeBron should have carried his team past the Magic. If LeBron wants the monikers of King and The Chosen One, then this is what he should have done. Is it fair? Probably not, but wtf?! he is The King, isn’t he?
2. The matchup problems caused by the Magic should have been more talked about from the beginning. The Magic bench is better than the Cavs and no one on the Cavs can cover Hedo Turkoglu. He alone was cause for the Magic to win this series.
3. Mike Brown isn’t good enough to be a CYO coach. Coach Brown contributed absolutely nothing to his team in the series with Orlando. No adjustments were made on either the offensive or defensive side of the court that had any positive impact. I will not accept the ‘inferior talent’ argument either. His team had the best record in the NBA this year. The Magic were playing without Jameer Nelson. Mike Brown is not an NBA caliber coach and it showed in this series. His interview at halftime yesterday epitomized his lack of ability as a coach. When asked what can he do to stop Dwight Howard, he responds that Howard is taking hops every time he gets the ball in the post. Thanks for that Coach, but what is the audience going to do about that? Just wanted to get it out there so you have an excuse for when your team ultimately loses?

The Cavs didn’t deserve to win any games in this series. The get a miracle shot to win Game 2, and because of that they get a Game 5 at home, otherwise they would have been done in 4. And do the Cavs really get a pat on the back for winning Game 5 at home, down 3-1?! Really?! The team with the best record in the NBA gets accolades for not quitting in a Game 5 at home, down 3-1?! Really?!

When push came to shove, neither the Cavs nor LeBron showed up. Last night was THE Game of Forever for Cleveland and LeBron goes 8 of 20 from the field, missed 4 foul shots, grabbed 1 offensive rebound, had 3 turnovers, and scored a grand total of 0, yes ZERO, points in the 2nd Quarter. Way to go King, really impressive how you carried the peasants all the way to a Game 6 loss.