http://www.nba.com/2009/news/features/vince_thomas/04/30/denver.20090430/ Garrett W. Ellwood/NBAE via Getty Images Nuggets' flip-flop puts them in position to challenge Lakers By Vincent Thomas, for NBA.com Posted Apr 30 2009 5:35PM Pause for a moment and ponder the Bizarro World of the recently deceased Nuggets-Hornets fiasco. Remember last season? Denver was the most dysfunctional Playoffs squad of the decade. When ESPN's Bill Simmons recently described those old-look Nuggs as having a "lunatic fringe," I laughed and cringed. Allen Iverson, Carmelo Anthony, Kenyon Martin and (my god) J.R. Smith didn't play with reckless abandon. They abandoned every virtuous basketball tenet and just played reckless. The Lake Show swept 'em up and trashed them in four appalling games. Meanwhile, the insurgent Hornets were league darlings. They had returned to post-Katrina Nola, trying to lead a revival, doing it with a squad that came out of nowhere to challenge the Spurs in a seven-game conference semis. We scoffed at the Nuggets and fawned over the Hornets. The Nuggets were stuck in neutral. The Hornets entered this season as the supposed challenger to a Lakers hegemony. Then Mark Warkentien and Rex Chapman traded A.I. (a disgruntled and careless older sibling) for Chauncey Billups (a dad), who fathered 'Melo and J.R. into better ballplayers. Kenyon and Nene stayed relatively healthy and Dahntay Jones turned into a newer model Raja Bell. Birdman kicked his habits and morphed into a new-millennium John Salley. They're good now. Really good. I see at least a good three- to four-year run as contenders ... just like we were saying about the Hornets last year. The Hornets? Losing Janero Pargo to Greece started the slippage. The injuries have them in what appears to be a freefall. Just in case you forgot, on Monday Denver beat them by 58 points ... in New Orleans ... in a must-win game. It might go down as the worst Playoffs performance in history. Even more concerning is that they limp into the off-season with an old, thin roster not too heavy on talent. Chris Paul's sore right knee had him looking mortal for most of the series, but the more telling optic was his lack of fire and apparent resignation. It was like he didn't think he had the weapons to go to war. The Hornets went from upstarts to has-beens without even a two-year "dynastic" period in between. The Nuggets and Hornets have basically flip-flopped stories and conference import. Other than the Pistons, no '09 Playoffs team will fade from our memories faster than the Hornets. The Nuggs, on the other hand, might matter more than any other team in the Playoffs. They represent the only real challenge to the Lakers. They are the only ones that can make the Western Conference postseason matter. Whereas there are several teams that will give Cleveland problems en route to a Finals appearance, the thinking is that L.A. is gonna coast to the Finals like Usain Bolt in the last 10 yards of his world-record 100 in Beijing. Let's forget, for the moment, that a Lakers waltz to the Finals ignores certain facts like ... oh, I don't know, that the Lakers don't defend with consistent tenacity or hold leads like stingy champs. Instead, let's acknowledge that L.A. is longer, deeper, more talented and more Kobe than any other squad in the West. On paper, and in daydream scenarios, L.A. doesn't see a seventh game until mid-June. But this Denver team is dead serious and very real. The Nuggs can't score like the Lakers -- nobody can. But they can score with the Lakers. I can easily envision Chauncey, Melo and J.R. taking turns going for 30, maybe even doubling-up some games. Denver may not be as long as L.A., but that K-Mart-Nene-Birdman trio is imposing. They are strong, athletic and those dudes get after it. No one can shut down Kobe, but Jones can bother him, especially when Smith, Melo and K-Mart can take turns spelling him. And you know what really makes them a threat? They have that needed mix of young hubris and veteran confidence that it's going to take to get four Ws in a series against the Lakers. All the ingredients are here for Denver. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- I suggest that they beat the Mavericks First and don't count the Rockets out!
The Nuggets is as real as beating a crappy sorry azz New Orlean team who lack everything from motivation to energy level. If Nuggets ever meet LA, i think it will be a blow out. YES, it's even easier than the Jazz. Because when i watch the Nuggets, they're just playing ball, they don't seem to have strategy, just playing passing around shooting like street baller type of game...that's going no where. And they're playing a weak team...so people tend to magnify the situation and say they're realllly good.
We gave absolutely no indication over the course of the season that we are anywhere near capable of knocking the Lakers out of the playoffs. I can't really blame any of the media for counting us out. It's crazy how many of you want them to give us more credit against LA than we've shown we deserve. Hell, we should be relishing this position. This situation is where terms like "disproving the critics" and "shocking the world" come from. Just appreciate it for what it is and root for the good guys.
I think the Mavs should be more insulted by this article than the Rockets. Nuggets > Mavs is not even close to being a lock - and I am far from a Mavs fan.
Nuggets are so overrated. The Rockets can beat the Nuggets in 5 or 6... seriously, they are like the overrated Hornets from last season.
Denver still isn't very good. Beating an injured, immature and old Hornets team was not really very impressive. Get real, Mr. Sportswriter Who Needed A Fresh Idea For A Story.
I would rather face the Lakers now and get it out of the way. We would have had to face them anyway we diced it so we might as well knock em out now.
You're assuming that the "media" even watched the Rockets play. The "media" is doing what you're doing... looking at the box score from 4 games and talking out of their asses. The "indication" is what type of basketball team Houston is. Its record as a unit after the trades, its inside game, its defense, its younger players who can score, its veteran unit, its good road record and the fact that Houston matches up better than any other team in the West with LA. In short it's called basketball IQ. Something in short supply in the media. There's 0 predictive utility in "the media." They are regular guys who may or may not watch particular games susceptible to hype, bandwagonism and homerism who want to say controversial things to get ratings once in a while and on every other occasion goes with the "safe" prediction and analysis when they have no real insight. There really should be some sort of "get one right" before you can shoot your mouth about something else threshold in the media. The "media" were wrong about the last NBA finals, they were wrong about Portland-Houston. Anyone who watches ESPN or reads random blogs for insight or predictions is plain stupid. These guys have zero accountability when totally wrong and therefore have little incentive to even watch the games and form an informed opinion. The regular season is not predictive by any means of the playoffs with a different rules for officiating and a format where you play the same team over and over but for the little it's worth those regular season games were close, they were not blowouts most of the way and the Rockets indicated in THE REGULAR SEASON they could stay with LA but need to close out better. That is one of several advantages LA has over Houston but if you've been paying attention this season instead of getting swept up in hype and hysteria this is a series. It's far from decided before it even begins
OK. Re-read my post. Understand that it was from the standpoint of knowing how the media works, of understanding why we're not getting the "hype" against a more talented, marketable, 60-win team that beat us 4-0, made it to the finals last year and only got better. Calm down. Have a coke and a smile. You first mistake was making an assumption about my assumptions. I haven't followed the Rockets and posted on this board for as long as I have by not giving a sh-t about anything outside of season records and boxscores. I didn't say we couldn't or wouldn't win. I didn't say we had no chance. I pointed out how illogical it was to expect the media at large to think the same as we do. You seem to be able to grasp this concept, you seem to understand the simplistic criteria the mainstream sports media uses in making predictions, but interpreting it from my post was apparently completely over your head. I can't blame them for thinking as they do. From the criteria they (always) operate with, we don't have a chance in hell. But the Rockets have been here plenty of times before. As usual, we'll get our recognition after we take care of business. In the meanwhile, who gives a f--k what everyone else says? (god, when did we start having to spell every damn thing out in the GARM?)
Frankly, I'm more bothered by the "fans" on this board who have already switched to offseason mode and started posting "can we get Andre Miller" and other random trade threads, as if we have somehow accomplished all that needs to be done for this season and whatever we get now in the playoffs is just extra cream on the top. I could care less about the media counting the Rockets out in this series. They're supposed to do that.
The media is treating the Nugs as a "new" team with the addition of Billups. They like it because it is NEW! IMPROVED! BETTER! Just like all the other marketing garbage we are innundated with on a daily basis. What is new is easy to understand for the media, the tagline goes like this. "NEW and IMPROVED. Now with Chauncy Billups!" Its easy and expected for the media to get "excited" about this "new combination of players". Adding a superstar, finals MVP (Billups) for another superstar allstar calliber player (Iverson) is something the main stream media really understands. Maybe its an attention span problem, or a marketing thing, but the media has long reduced team play to individual superstars. Our tagline isn't as marketable. It reads more like a factory recall. After removing two star players, who the media knew fairly well, we feel that our chemistry has improved with increased playing time for what the media would call "rollplayers". Rollplayers translates as "unmarketable people" - at least unmarketable until they do really well for another year or two. We are just a NEW without TMac and Rafer as the Nugs are with the addition of Billups, but, clearly, a little more difficult to understand for the media, as no new superstar players were added (again, seems that superstar movement/exchange is the only thing the media really easily understands -- because it feeds the ever simplistic question "who is better" -- Kobe or Lebron -- who is better CP3 or Deron Williams -- Rose or Rondo?). Kind of stupid questions if you ask me, but a question that people definitely get into, probably because its easier to identify with a star player than with a group or team concept. For example: more people want to be Lebron James than to be a member of the championship Pistons. Yes, if we advance, we will be promoted as the pistons were, as a "team". Ok, back to Rox v Nugs. Its much more difficult to understand the more complex ramifications of two star players being lost, which is the Rox situation, mostly because it makes room for players that very notably aren't superstars. The Nugs situation says "who is better? AI or Billups. Answer: Billups. The Rox situation - and here is what is really sad, really makes me upset -- will be interpreted as are the Rox better w/o TMac. It makes me sad/upset because its disrespectful to TMac (in order to get an easy and sensationized headline) and disrespectful to the players that are playing very well in his absence (Scola, Wafer, AB, Landry etc). And we are newer, since we lost TMac and Rafer much later in the season than the Nugs picked up Billups. Without TMac and Rafer, as I said before, we get increased roles for Scola, Artest, AB, Wafer, Landry and Lowry - and of course our chemistry is much different. Its just that we aren't as media ready. Especially since we slipped to the 5 spot. Funny its only one game back of the Nugs two seed. I say we have a better chance against the Lakers than the Nuggets.
the whole world is counting the Rockets out. Big Deal, what did everyone expect? the media expects the Lakers and the Cavs to meet in the Finals and will write about every scenario that gets them there. If I posted every podcast and article/thread coming out of the LA market, (570 AM KLAC for instance), this board would be flooded with nonsense.
