Briefly:

• The Lakers and Celtics are set to meet in the NBA Finals again and I couldn't care less. As someone who wasn't even alive was barely a year old the last time these two teams played for the title, the history means nothing to me. As far as I'm concerned, these teams' history concerns two games from the 2007-2008 season. That's it. The only thing these Lakers and Celtics teams have in common with their historical counterparts is the wordmarks on the uniforms.
• That said, Lakers in 6.
• ... with no disrespect intended to Celtics coach Doc Rivers, who coached the Magic for the first part of this decade.
• The Bulls' all-but-official hiring of Doug Collins as their head coach makes no sense from a common-sense perspective, but perfect sense to John Paxson, their GM. And to think everyone once praised the guy for drafting Kirk Hinrich, Ben Gordon, and Luol Deng. As far as I'm concerned, he's the boob who traded LaMarcus Aldridge, overpaid for Andres Nocioni, and failed to trade for Pau Gasol.
• The Pistons as we know them are probably dead, as all signs point to them firing Flip Saunders and trading Rasheed Wallace. Their likely breakup saddens me; in spite of everything they did to the Magic this decade, I wanted them to win the title this year. The thought of the Lakers, Celtics, or Spurs winning it instead was just too awful to stand.
• Speaking of the Spurs... I'm not losing any sleep over their demise. And I'm glad that Robert Horry is done. Pretty soon, we won't have to listen to him say ridiculous things like "I'm smarter than probably 98 percent of this league."

Magic player-by-player evaluations start tomorrow with Carlos Arroyo and will run Monday-Friday for each of the next two weeks. See you then.

Marc Stein of ESPN.com reports the NBA announced it plans to fine players for "egregious" flops starting next season. Bravo to the league for wanting to crack down on this abhorrent defensive "technique". I just wish they planned to punish teams in actual games. If the fines successfully deter flopping, Dwight Howard might actually be allowed to post up every once in a while. Hooray.

I know I've posted this video several times before, but here it is again: Pau Gasol flopping against the Magi three times in a single game earlier this season. He got Hedo Turkoglu once and Howard twice. Perhaps he would not have flopped the second and third times if the officials penalized him and the Lakers, perhaps with a technical foul.

Haha, wow. Talk about unlikely.

The Chicago Bulls won the top pick in the 2008 NBA Draft despite having only a 1.7% chance of doing so. The Miami Heat will pick second, and the Minnesota Timberwolves will pick third. Here's the complete draft order:

1. Chicago Bulls
2. Miami Heat
3. Minnesota Timberwolves
4. Seattle SuperSonics
5. Memphis Grizzlies
6. New York Knicks
7. Los Angeles Clippers
8. Milwaukee Bucks
9. Charlotte Bobcats
10. New Jersey Nets
11. Indiana Pacers
12. Sacramento Kings
13. Portland Trail Blazers
14. Golden State Warriors

Certainly the Bulls' and Heat's gain is the Magic's loss, as those two teams figure to improve tremendously with their picks. They won't be better than the Magic -- barring a trade, anyway -- but they've closed the gap.

Worth noting: the Milwaukee Bucks will pick eighth, which is not exactly where they want to be. Their new GM, John Hammond, indicated earlier today (via NBN) that he might consider trading the pick for veteran help. It'd take quite the deal for the Magic to pry the eighth pick from Milwaukee, but stranger things have happened.

Sixers4Guidos, which bills itself as the first Italian blog for 76ers fans, is hosting the fourth round of NBA MVP/ROY rankings as voted on by bloggers. BrewHoop hosted Round 1, Clips Nation hosted Round 2, and 3 Shades of Blue hosted Round 3. Dwight Howard came in third place in MVP voting in this edition. Shockingly, Marcin Gortat was nowhere to be found in ROY voting.

Look after the jump to see the ballot and comments I sent to Sixers4Guidos for them to compile. I'm surprised that I was the only person who gave Daequan Cook any ROY votes. He's good, people!

Continue reading this post »

The NBA season starts tonight, so it's fitting that the last of the NBA season previews coordinated by Jeff Clark of CelticsBlog would be out today. Here they are:

Golden State Warriors
Golden State of Mind

Los Angeles Clippers
ClipsNation.com

Los Angeles Lakers
Forum Blue & Gold
With Malice

Phoenix Suns
Bright Side of the Sun

Sacramento Kings
Sactown Royalty

Archives
CelticsBlog NBA Page

Jeff from CelticsBlog has coordinated yet another division's worth of NBA previews. Today, it's the Southeast.

Washington Wizards
Bullets Forever

Orlando Magic
Believing in Magic
Third Quarter Collapse

Miami Heat
I Want to be a Sports Agent
Crazy from the Heat

Atlanta Hawks
Atlanta Hawks Blog
Impending Firestorm

Charlotte Bobcats
Bobcat Bonfire

Archives
CelticsBlog NBA Page

UPDATED: Hotlanta Hawks had been omitted in an earlier update. It's up now.

Take a break from today's NFL action to catch up on what bloggers are saying about their favorite teams' chances this season. Jeff from CelticsBlog has done a great job coordinating this huge effort.

The Magic's 2006/2007 record against each team is listed in parentheses.

Utah Jazz (2-0)
Daily Basketball
Taking it to the Rack
Basketball John

Seattle Supersonics (2-0)
Sonics Central

Portland Trail Blazers (2-0)
TrueHoop
The Inferno

Minnesota Timberwolves (1-1)
TWolves Blog

Denver Nuggets (1-1)
Nugg Doctor

Blog Previews Archives
CelticsBlog NBA Section

And since I need to get going on writing the Magic preview for this week, I thought I'd take a page from Bullets Forever's playbook and put some of the questions to you. To that end:

1. What significant moves were made in the offseason?
2. What are the team's biggest strengths?
3. What are the team's biggest weaknesses?
4. What are the goals for this team?

Leave your responses in the comments or in the diaries. I'll take them into consideration when writing my preview.

Jeff of CelticsBlog has done a great job compiling previews for each every NBA team this season. Here's the Central Division, with the Magic's 2006/2007 record against each team in parentheses:

Chicago Bulls (2-1)
Cobra Brigade
Bull Riding

Cleveland Cavaliers (2-1)
YAYSports!
The POJO Dojo
Cavalier Attitude
Truth in a Bullet Fedora

Detroit Pistons (0-4)
PistonsNationBlog
Empty The Bench
Need4Sheed
Motoring

Indiana Pacers (2-2)
Indy Cornrows
Pacers Pulse

Milwaukee Bucks (3-1)
Bango's Bunch

Archives
CelticsBlog NBA Page

Also see: Southwest Previews | Atlantic Previews

Last week, I posted the CelticsBlog-coordinated Atlantic Division Season Previews. This week, it' the Southwest Division.

The Magic's 2006/2007 record against each team is listed in parentheses.

San Antonio Spurs (1-1)
Spur of the Moment
Pounding the Rock

New Orleans (1-1)
Hornets 24/7    
The New Orleans Hornets Fan

Memphis (1-1)
Shades of Blue

Houston (0-2)
HoopsBlogging

Dallas (0-2)
Showboating

Archives
CelticsBlog NBA Page

Jeff at CelticsBlog has reprised his role as NBA Season-Preview host/coordinator. As the countdown to opening night continues, Jeff is compiling team previews from some of the best team-centric NBA blogs out there. This week, the focus is the Atlantic Division teams.

The Magic's 2006/2007 record against each team is listed in parentheses.

Celtics - (2-1)
Celtics Blog      
LOY's Place    
Celtics 17      
Red's Army    
Celtics 24/7
Green Bandwagon

Nets - (2-1)
Hooplah Nation
NetsDaily


Knicks - (1-2)
Straight Bangin'    
Posting and Toasting    


Sixers - (2-1)
Passion and Pride

Raptors - (0-4)
HoopsAddict/RaptorsHQ    
HoopsAddict

Archives
CelticsBlog NBA Page

Look for the other divisions to be previewed in the weeks ahead. 3QC will be participating in the Southeast edition.