Archive for April, 2009
Garnett out of the 2009 NBA Playoffs?
Tuesday, April 21st, 2009
When will KG return to the Celtics roster?
That is probably the only question sports fans from Boston are asking themselves these days with the 2009 NBA Playoffs kicking in high gear this week without the guy that led the Celtics to the title last year, Kevin Garnett.
You read it, the Boston Celtics won’t be having their emotional leader at least for Game 1 of their best of seven first round series with the Chicago Bulls. That however, isn’t the real problem. The real one would have to be the fact that KG could be out for the rest of the playoffs as well.
It turns out that Kevin Garnett continues to have problems with his right knee. In preparation for the postseason hoping to come back to the Celtics roster in time, Garnett was put back on the shelf after a 20-minute workout that left the swollen tendon in his right knee in worse shape than it was a week earlier.
Of course, the rest of the Boston Celtics remain optimistic about the entire thing, probably thinking that; one, KG can still come back at some point of the playoffs and two, they think they can still win without him.
Celtics head coach Doc Rivers on the other hand claims that he has, UNOFFICIALLY, ruled out his star forward for the playoffs. Apparently, he’s confident that his team will be just fine without KG, praising the improved play of backup forwards Glen Davis and Leon Powe.
Rivers also said that with Paul Pierce and Ray Allen on board, the Celtics will still be a tough team to beat.
Rivers may have a point. With KG out the last few weeks, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen have been stepping up to keep their team afloat. Pierce is playing like the guy who led the Celtics to the Eastern Conference Finals back in 2002 while Allen continues to set milestones for Boston this season, tying a career high 48 percent shooting from the field and setting a franchise record for free throw accuracy with a whopping 95.2 percent this year.
STILL, a Kevin Garnett is a huge piece to replace. He gives the Celtics that inside presence and the defensive intensity only a few guys can bring to a team. With Garnett out, Boston could still beat a Chicago Bulls squad in the first round and probably a hungry Magic team in the second.
But beating a Cleveland Cavaliers contingent led by…
2009 NBA Playoffs Preview: West
Monday, April 20th, 2009
I guess you can call it the wild and wackier side of the postseason.
Yep, unlike the Eastern Conference, seven of the eight seeds in the West for the 2009 NBA Playoffs were not determined yet until they played the last game of the regular season.
While everybody knew the Los Angeles Lakers will remain on top of the field, nobody knew which teams will occupy seeds two to eight. But now that the dust has cleared and the 82-game regular season finally came to a close, we already have the seedings complete.
Playing the top-seeded Lakers are the no.8 seed Utah Jazz. This might be a tougher series than the Lakers expect. Sure, the Jazz have a big problem with winning games on the road this season, but at 33-19 against conference opponents, Utah is still a tough nut to crack in the West. And as good as the Jazz are in the West, they are even better at home.
The rejuvenated Denver Nuggets, led by their court general Chauncey Billups, will take on the New Orleans Hornets as the overall no.2 seed in the conference. Nobody anticipated how good of an impact Chauncey Billups will have on Denver but can he outplay CP3?
Even though the New Orleans Hornets can only muster seed no.7, Chris Paul still remains as a solid candidate for MVP. It’ll be nice watching Chauncey take on CP3. And while Denver appears to be the more talented team on paper, it’ll still be a shocker if they can get past the Hornets to get to the second round of the playoffs for the first time in quite a while.
A good ol’ fashioned shootout in Texas is next as the no.3 seed San Antonio Spurs take on their state rivals, Dallas Mavericks, to kick off their postseason campaign. Jason Kidd, Dirk Nowitzki and Jason Terry will be put to the test as they take on arguably the most consistent team in the NBA.
However, as good as the San Antonio Spurs have been in years, they’re starting to show the effects of the wear and tear they accumulated playing in the league together. Can their old wheels still be fast enough to keep up with the run and gun pace of the Dallas Mavericks?
Last but certainly not the least, we have the no.4 seed Portland Trail Blazers playing the no.5 seed Houston Rockets.
The Blazers are arguably one of the most exciting teams to…
2009 NBA Playoffs Preview: East
Friday, April 17th, 2009
Although everybody knows the Western Conference is always better, I always found the East to be more entertaining.
Probably because I’ve always hated watching John Stockton and Karl Malone play in those stupid shorts in Utah or watch the seven-foot Vlade Divac get taken down by six-foot-three point guards in Sacramento. And while those guys’ playing days are over, I’d still keep my eyes glued on the East for the 2009 NBA Playoffs just because this side of the NBA has two of the hottest commodities in basketball today, Dwyane Wade and LeBron James. Oh yeah, the East still has the Pistons too although I’m not counting on them to win anything this year.
Yup, the Detroit Pistons, after all the struggles they went through all year, still found their way to the postseason as the no.8 seed. How about that huh? Still, the festive mood in Detroit could end sooner than you think since they have the overall no.1 seed Cleveland Cavaliers waiting for them.
Unlike the Detroit Pistons, the Cavaliers have been playing tremendously that the merit the trip to the postseason. They have the best home record and would definitely not lose a home game to the struggling Pistons.
The Pistons have now lost Allen Iverson for the year and Rasheed Wallace now comes off the bench, how in the hell can their fans expect their team to overcome a hungry Cavaliers squad led by an even hungrier LeBron James?
The defending champions Boston Celtics have the Chicago Bulls in the first round and if the 2007 playoffs were to tell us anything, it’ll have to be the fact that you can’t underestimate Chicago. You see, it was two years ago when the no.5 seeded Bulls squad shocked the world when they swept the no.4 seeded Heat contingent led by Dwyane Wade and Shaquille O’Neal in the very first round.
The Miami Heat team the Chicago Bulls swept…
2009 NHL Playoffs Betting Tips
Thursday, April 16th, 2009
The NHL Playoffs are now underway.
And while most of us would rather keep our eyes glued on the NBA’s postseason wars, the 2009 NHL Playoffs still got underway and our friends from SPORTSBETTING.COM wasted no time in milking from it.
The puck dropped on the NHL postseason on Wednesday and as it stands, the balance of power lies in the West with the defending champions Detroit Red Wings and the San Jose Sharks listed as the odds-on favorites at SPORTSBETTING.COM to take the Stanley Cup at +300. Boston has the best odds of the Eastern Conference teams at +500.
The defending champions will take on the Columbus Blue Jackets first. A threat to repeat as champs, the Detroit Red Wings had a successful season accumulating 51 wins, 21 losses and 10 OT losses for 112 points but thanks to some shoddy goal tending, went 3-7 in their final 10 regular season games. Chris Osgood, who finished the season with a 3.09 GAA and a .887 save percentage, is expected to start for Detroit.
In stark contrast, the Wings will be up against a good, albeit young, goalie Steve Mason (33-20-7, 2.29 GAA, .916 save percentage and 10 shutouts) and the Columbus Blue Jackets, who finished the regular season with a 41-31-10 record for 92 points, the Jackets are +5000 to win it all this year. In terms of series prices, Detroit is a prohibitive fave to win the best of seven series at -450 and while Columbus is a +350 underdog.
Dating back to 2006, the Red Wings have the advantage against the Blue Jackets winning 12 of 20 games and in those 20, the Under has prevailed 14 times.
Next, we have that other powerhouse team from…
Brawn GP, the team to beat in F1?
Tuesday, April 14th, 2009
If they are, then it wouldn’t hurt if they do a little trash talking right?
After two races into the 2009 F1 season, Brawn GP has two victories. Jenson Button won the Malaysian Grad Prix after winning the first race of the season in Melbourne.
The team once known as Honda, Brawn GP has made a lot of adjustments to give them the hot start they have now while usually competitive teams like Ferrari and McLaren have been struggling.
Team boss Ross Brawn reckons that Ferrari and McLaren are paying for last year’s success while his Brawn GP team is benefiting from a dismal campaign last season. Brawn says because both Ferrari and McLaren were focused on winning the championship, they were not able to turn their attention to this year’s vastly new designs.
That’s why instead of dominating the first two races of the season, McLaren has only scored one point while Ferrari has yet to score anything.
‘’It is a reflection of what has gone on in the last year or two,’’ Ross Brawn said. ‘’McLaren and Ferrari had a Championship to fight over and I can understand that it was very difficult for them to say ‘Look, we’ll stop pushing this year and put our effort into next year’.’’
Brawn on the other hand had most of last year to work on the new car as it quickly became apparent that the 2008 Honda could not be a success.
‘’For us it was a very easy decision. It wasn’t a clever one, just a very easy one. We didn’t have a very good car so why waste time on it?’’
Brawn GP, along with Toyota and Williams…
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