OT: The NBA 06-07 Season Thread

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Sun Oct 08, 2006 3:22 am

Well...it's here. I know there are only a handful of NBA guys here, so let the season discussion begin.

This should be a damn interesting season. I think the Mavs have to be the favorites right now...especially with Amare still on the mend. The Mavs got even deeper, especially with the addition of Devean George. The Suns also got a little deeper with the additions of Marcus Banks, Jumaine Jones and Eric Piatkowski off te bench. I just don't think they've got the defensive gusto to take out the Mavs. I think the Spurs are on the decline now and with Manu and Duncan fighting injuries each and every year, I think their window has closed. Needless to say, I think the winner this year comes out of the West.

Miami is a year older and I think they'll fall in the playoffs prior to making it to the Finals. My sleeper Eastern team is the New Jersey Nets. Once they get to the finals though, they will go down to Dallas, Phoenix or even the Spurs if the cards fall correctly healthwise.

I am also looking for a couple more guys to play fantasy hoops...if you're interested, just PM me. I need about 3 or 4.

Programmed2Kill · Post by **Programmed2Kill** » Sun Oct 08, 2006 12:07 pm

NBA?

Damn, being a Sixer fan totally made me forget the season is coming up.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Sun Oct 08, 2006 12:56 pm

That is what happens when you lose to middle of the road Euro teams in a NBA promotional tour.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 7:39 pm

Man...Amare is starting to impress. The explosiveness is starting to come back. A couple HUGE dunks over guys in the game this morning. Gotta have a lot of Suns fans excited. Hell, I'm really excited...if the Suns win a championship my mom gets a ring...that is some tight sh*t.

Diablo25 · Post by **Diablo25** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 7:45 pm

I'm a Sixers fan also and have lost interest in the NBA over the past few years. I'll be excited for the start of the season and then see how interested I am. The Sixers did beat a Russion team today in their last game on the "Euro Tour". AI had 28. Rodney Carner (1st rd) has been kinda impressive. His perimeter game looks much better than I expected...and he is a leaper. Mo Cheeks is stressing defense this year (being that they had none last year). Moses Malone has been brough in as a full time asst coach. He should help get Sammy D to grow a sack. Andre Iggy is the Sixer I'm most interested in watching.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 7:54 pm

I thought Carney looked really good yesterday when they beat the Suns on a huge three late in the game by the aformentioned Carney. So, there is some promise there. I just don't think the Sixers will ever be much as long as they've got Webber on the team. Obviously he's not a very tradable commodity right now, so you'll have to wait till he retires. The Sixers did make a good decision not to trade Iverson though. He still gives them a shot to win every time he touches the floor.

sportdan30 · Post by **sportdan30** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 8:37 pm

dbdynsty25 wrote:That is what happens when you lose to middle of the road Euro teams in a NBA promotional tour.

Or when Stephen Jackson shoots ups a strip club like the wild west. Or when NBA players continually get caught with dope in their cars, ala Jamaal Tinsley. Oh I forgot. The weed is good for you now.

All this said, I'll be following Hinrich and the Chicago Bulls. I'm looking forward to seeing how much of a difference Ben Wallace makes.

EZSnappin · Post by **EZSnappin** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 9:46 pm

sportdan30 wrote:All this said, I'll be following Hinrich and the Chicago Bulls. I'm looking forward to seeing how much of a difference Ben Wallace makes.

I heard he's convinced Kirk to slick his hair down like Riley on road trips and "wear it loose" for homestands.

reeche · Post by **reeche** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 1:07 pm

I'll post a prediction thread nearer to the start of the season but this looks to be one of the tougher seasons to predict.

The Suns on paper shuld be a lock. They were good last year and now they get back Amare but of course things never work out the way they look on paper. I haven't seen Amare enough yet early to see if he's still the player he was.

The Spurs don't really seem any better to me than they were last year. Just a year older and slower.

The Heat were a fluky champion if ever I saw one. One of the worst teams of my lifetime to win a title imo strongly benefited by a Jordan Rules approach to calling fouls.

The Mavericks to me still look like the most solid and constructed team among the bunch. They should have won it last year.

The Pistons as always will run through the regular season with a good record but that team is getting a little older too and playing all those minutes isn't helping.

The Bulls are a lot of people's sleeper pick and for once I kind of agree with the reasoning behind it. They are super tough and scrappy on defense. Just don't know if they have enough offense to make that leap to the next level.

As always should be a fun season.

fsquid · Post by **fsquid** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 1:19 pm

Rodney Carner (1st rd) has been kinda impressive.

Carner?

wco81 · Post by **wco81** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 1:33 pm

reeche wrote:The Heat were a fluky champion if ever I saw one. One of the worst teams of my lifetime to win a title imo strongly benefited by a Jordan Rules approach to calling fouls.

Why would they stop with the Jordan Rules for Wade? He'll approach 40 in every big game with that help.

Only reason Heat would be stopped is if Wade's Jordan Rules are trumpmed by LeBron's Jordan Rules. (you know, the crossover he does before picking up the ball and taking 3 big strides to the rim).

Only thing is, he isn't as reliable a FT shooter.

In the West, Nash gets a lot of tick-tack calls and so will Stoudemire if he shows his highlight form again.

lexbur · Post by **lexbur** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 1:52 pm

wco81 wrote:Only reason Heat would be stopped is if Wade's Jordan Rules are trumpmed by LeBron's Jordan Rules. (you know, the crossover he does before picking up the ball and taking 3 big strides to the rim).

Yeah, I hate the way they let LeBron so blatantly cheat. I hope they clamp down on that this year.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 2:00 pm

wco81 wrote:In the West, Nash gets a lot of tick-tack calls and so will Stoudemire if he shows his highlight form again.

Haha...guess you didn't watch the playoffs last year, especially against the Lakers. And you do know the Suns averaged a RECORD low 17 or so free throws per game...destroying the previous low. Yeah, the Suns get calls.

jLp vAkEr0 · Post by **jLp vAkEr0** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 2:11 pm

Rajon Rondo looking like another steal for Ainge in the draft.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 2:13 pm

jLp vAkEr0 wrote:Rajon Rondo looking like another steal for Ainge in the draft.

You're welcome. Oh yeah, thanks for taking sh*tty ass Brian Grant off the Suns books.

Kazuya · Post by **Kazuya** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 4:33 pm

reeche wrote: The Heat were a fluky champion if ever I saw one. One of the worst teams of my lifetime to win a title imo strongly benefited by a Jordan Rules approach to calling fouls.

I must say, I'm surprised to hear you say that... you've always seemed like a no excuses kind of guy when it comes to NBA officiating. I know I've heard you say before that a team's fans always see the game differently than their opponent's team. As a Mavs fan I wasn't happy with the officiating at all, but it's just one of those things you have to deal with.

reeche · Post by **reeche** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 6:55 pm

I probably was in a hurry to type that and wasn't careful in my phrasing. My general problem with officiating is more about where we are with fouls rather than a consisteny of calls issue. What's a foul slightly changes every season and I'm a realist and have no problem with that. The players change and the game changes.

I generally don't like wco81

style complaining that is always looking for conspiracies or seeing preferential treatment in every game they see. The NBA was pretty consistent in my book last year in their playcalling. The only thing that happens in the playoffs is teams get even more conservative and run what works for them. So of course Wade is going to get more touches and more foul calls. There is no conspiracy or cheating going on in those instances. The superstars benefit not solely because they are superstars but because they are the ones best able to adapt to the current rules. Thats part of what makes them superstars.

In an attempt to rightly increase the offensive nature of the game, I think they fixed it in the incorrect manner by calling more ticky tack fouls. The real fix to improve offense would have teams actually running and passing the ball around more. The cheapier and easier fix is to call more fouls and send more people to the line. I think that's more boring and slows the game down to much imo along with introducing questionable calls into the game.

I think the Miami Heat were the better team in that they played the best basketball under the rules and that's what counts. I don't think they were the best mythical basketball team last year whatever the hell that means. I think they play a very ugly style of basketball but I recognize it's about winning and not about how pretty the basketball is.I hope the game is called not so tight this year in the NBA so that a team like the Heat has less of a chance of winning.

Dwayne Wade is a phenomenal player (so is Lebron James and others) so I don't like to overly attack those players because they are just playing smart basketball. It's not even an nba offical problem as I think they are just calling what they are mandated to call. I think it's a high level league issue that the NBA needs to adjust

End diatribe.

wco81 · Post by **wco81** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 7:43 pm

I don't even think Wade believes those calls were legit. If an opponent was getting those calls and he wasn't he'd feel jobbed as a lot of NBA players often do.

During the offseason, he'd appear during NFL games and so forth and he'd be asked about the calls he got and he had a rehearsd answer.

Superstars know the game and they're not going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

He is one of the top 5 if not top 3 players in the NBA. But that's meaningless in FIBA play.

Kazuya · Post by **Kazuya** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 10:30 pm

What do you guys think about the crackdown on showing emotion/reacting to officials calls? Rasheed is convinced it's a rule targeted at him. I think it's pretty funny that the NBA slapped their license on a game, NBA 2K7, where the players do the very over-reacting they are trying to cut down on. Nice job, NBA.

wco81 · Post by **wco81** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 10:38 pm

Some refs have always had a quicker trigger than other refs for technical fouls.

It's all to the ref's discretion as opposed to some quasi-objective set of guidelines.

But there were some criticisms of the officiating including a record fine for Cuban in the Finals. So Stern doesn't want that kind of dissent under the spotlight.

reeche · Post by **reeche** » Thu Oct 12, 2006 11:45 pm

Kazuya wrote:What do you guys think about the crackdown on showing emotion/reacting to officials calls? Rasheed is convinced it's a rule targeted at him. I think it's pretty funny that the NBA slapped their license on a game, NBA 2K7, where the players do the very over-reacting they are trying to cut down on. Nice job, NBA.

I tend to be against overly prohibitive rules the NBA attempts to create a phoney marketing image to the game. That being said if they want to crack down on it, its sort of not a big issue to me. Players should not have the right to verbally abuse refs although emotion is part of the game and I want to see that. So my take is I'll wait and see how it goes. It's human nature to be slightly annoyed when players are griping about every call but If I got some of the bs calls tagged on me that a lot defensive players did last season, I might drop a string of f-bombs myself.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Sun Oct 15, 2006 12:32 am

He's baaaaaack:

Just like old times. Hope he holds up. He claims he's almost 100% now. If so, the NBA may be in trouble.

jLp vAkEr0 · Post by **jLp vAkEr0** » Mon Oct 16, 2006 1:51 pm

dbdynsty25 wrote:He's baaaaaack:

Just like old times. Hope he holds up. He claims he's almost 100% now. If so, the NBA may be in trouble.

Man, I might get NBA League Pass just to watch the Suns.

I think the C's would be fun to watch this year, but they aren't going anywhere so I ain't getting LP just for them.

reeche · Post by **reeche** » Mon Oct 30, 2006 12:41 pm

Very tough year to pick. So many questions and the western conference as usual is stacked. I don't know if it's a good thing or a bad thing that the Suns play in the pacific since they will cakewalk to their division win without much competition where as the SouthWest division is just a brutal battle. San Antonio, Dallas, and Memphis are all good teams. Houston has the potential to play well and New Orleans is a scrappy youngish team. Whoever comes out of that division is battle ready compared to the other two divisions in the western conference.

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East Playoff Seeds

1. Miami Heat
2. Detroit Pistons
3. Chicago Bulls
4. New Jersey Nets
5. Cleveland Cavaliers
6. Washington Wizards
7. Toronto Raptors
8. Orlando Magic

Eastern Conference Finals
Heat vs. Pistons

West Playoff Seeds

1.) Phoenix Suns
2.) Dallas Mavericks
3.) San Antonio Spurs
4.) Denver Nuggets
5.) LA Clippers
6.) Houston Rockets
7.) Memphis Grizzlies
8.) LA Lakers

Western Conference Finals

Suns vs Mavericks

Finals

Mavericks & Pistons

Champion

Mavericks

MVP
Lebron James (He should have won last year)

Breakout Team
Raptors or Bulls

Breakout Player

Peja Stojokaovic (Weird choice since I don't think that team is going anywhere but with a good point guard, I think he has a chance to put up some much better numbers)

wco81 · Post by **wco81** » Mon Oct 30, 2006 12:55 pm

I don't see the Pistons going far without Wallace.

And they're not going to beat the Heat unless Wade is injured and/or the NBA decides to officiate the games straight up.