Don't Blame The Refs: The Thunder Are Killing Themselves

It's a common practice of haters such as ourselves to try to find a reason, any reason, that the target of our hate is succeeding. In the case of PTU whipping boy, LeBron James, the thought of his actually winning a championship could send any basketball fan scrambling for a Kennedy assassination level conspiracy theory. The most common theory is the fix is in and the refs are going to make sure the Heat win a title. I think this is baloney. Big market teams (and the teams that get the highest ratings) do sometimes get a boost from the officials. There's been a couple games in the past 10 years that appeared to show blatant favoritism towards a team like the Lakers, but I believe that there's a greater chance that Tupac is tanning on the beach on an island somewhere than David Stern called the officials into his office and said "Make sure the Heat get the majority of the calls in this series. And for God sakes, get Durant off the court however you can!". Let's say the NBA does occasionally conspire to fix games for the sake of argument. Even if they worked to get a particular team in the Finals (and it would be the Lakers not the Thunder playing the Heat if they did), once that team was there, the most important thing would be to prolong the series. The league does not benefit from one team winning a series in 5. They would also not purposely put the third biggest superstar on the bench, as some people have implied, through manipulated foul calls. The Finals have been marketed by the league as Magic vs Bird 2.0. They wouldn't then purposely get Magic in foul trouble. The fact of the matter is Kevin Durant has committed dumb fouls throughout the series.


Are some of these fouls a little ticky tack? Sure. But I can't see a scenario in which the NBA would mandate it's referees to take one of the best players off the court in a Finals series. Of the four fouls in the video, the worst call is probably the first. A jab step and a shoulder used to clear some space that Durant and LeBron do all the time. A bad call, maybe, but not sinister if you ask me. The other calls are all legit; a hold as LeBron goes around a screen, a hand across the face of Bron on a layup, and leaving his feet on a Wade layup. All of these could probably have been no calls, but could also have been avoided by KD.

Even if all of these fouls were to get him off the floor in key moments, and the Heat took a lot more free throws, the Thunder really shot themselves in the foot through other dumb mistakes that were not contingent on the officials. Namely, back to back fouls on Heat three pointers (of which the Heat hit all 6 shots) that trimmed a 10 point lead to 4 in about 2 minutes of game time towards the end of the third. Even with the sloppy play on defense and offense by the Thunder they were still within striking distance, but again beat themselves by doing something that was beyond the referee's control: missing foul shots in the fourth quarter. Had they knocked down their shots, not made silly turnovers and stayed composed in crunch time (something that they have mostly been able to do throughout the playoffs), OKC would have won by a few points and the conspiracy theorists could go back to investigating the draft lottery (which actually is fixed) or something until tomorrow night. The truth is the Thunder didn't make enough winning plays, and in a turn of events even more painful for us haters, the Heat did.

NBA Finals Preview: Like Night and Day

The Oklahoma City Thunders may not be the NBA's number one choice to represent the Western conference (that would be the Lakers) but Scottie Brooks' boys should make most basketball fans excited. After all, this is the rare "play the right way" team that is really fun to watch. They're not the Anti-Heat but they're pretty close. Just about all of their main players are home-grown talent, still playing for the squad that drafted them (even if they were known by a different name at the time) the exception being veterans Derek Fisher and Kendrick Perkins, who may own the second ugliest jump shot in the league next to Jared Jeffries. But the trio of Durant, Westbrook and Harden (along with possibly the best defensive player in the league, all apologies to Tyson Chandler) carry the team, and this "our guys" mentality is only enhanced by the fact that Oklahoma City has literally nothing else to do right now. There are no other pro teams who play there, and Sooners football and basketball is a ways away. It's all they got, and the crowds at Chesapeake energy center (that's what it's called) reflect this type of giddy atmosphere. The Heat on the other hand, may have the worst fans in sports. While Lakers fans are often derided as being more about being seen than actually rooting for the Lakers, Heat fans take this kind of front running, attention seeking to another level. When the Heat are bad, the sight of thousands of empty, yellow seats is common place, and when they're good, you still see lots of empty seats next to the plastic surgeons and plastic surgery enthusiasts. Notorious front runners, you can even see their fickle nature from quarter to quarter. If the Heat are down by a few points, instead of rallying their team to victory like a good fan base would, they sit on their hands or just leave. The Thunder fans stand for the entire second half most games. Can you imagine Heat fans pushing their team to a win when they're down by 15 like Thunder fans did in game 6 vs the Spurs? Never.

So the fans are polar opposites, as is how the teams were assembled, and so are their team leaders. Durant is a quiet, by all accounts humble dude who only has tattoos where nobody can see them and announced his re signing with the team that drafted him via Twitter. LeBron is LeBron. Temperaments aside, they have very different games as well. Bron preferring to either bulldoze his way to the rim (when he feels like it) or shoot midrange jumpers. Durant has almost unlimited range as well as occasional outbursts at the rim, but he couldn't physically overpower anyone. Who will become a first time champion this season? I really have no idea, but I'd put my money on the Thunder. They're deeper, playing at a more consistenly high level, and less beat up. It also seems like it's destined to be their time. They knocked off the Mavs, Lakers and Spurs and can now knock off the Heat, teams that accounted for 10 of the last 12 championships. It's Durant's turn.

Thunder in 7

Western Conference Finals Preview

That other series is starting tonight, in what seems like kind of a letdown compared to the star-studded Eastern Conference Finals. Yeah, the WCF has it's share of all-star and former all-star players: Dirk (that's him up there looking like Detective Holder from "The Killing"), Durant, Westbrook, and the rest of the former star players on the Mavs. But there's a reason that Miami vs Chicago game 1 was the highest rated basketball game in THE HISTORY OF CABLE TELEVISION (and not just because the Celebrity Apprentice was a rerun). The Heat have the hate factor, I'd guess that more people watching that game were rooting against the Heat than for the Bulls, and at least 3 more dynamic stars than the Thunder or Mavs can offer. Still, true hoops fans have a lot to appreciate here in the deceptively quick and powerful Durant, and Nowitzki's seemingly impossible shots that he hits so easily.

The Thunder are coming off the most unexpectedly exciting series of the Playoffs, a strange series that despite going 7 games and featuring 4 overtimes, also saw each game have a double digit lead. Dallas, meanwhile, has been sitting on their asses waiting since Mother's day after their equally unexpected beating of the champs. The usual school of thought here is that the team that has an unusually long rest period in between series can be rusty and fall out of sync. On the other hand, the extra rest should benefit the old guys in Dallas, while the intense 7 game series shouldn't bother the youngsters in OKC. Let's look at some match ups.

Point Guard:
Jason Kidd vs. Russell Westbrook

Jason Kidd couldn't have been happier to see old man Fisher in the Lakers series, but Russell Westbrook is a whole nother story. He's about 100 speeds quicker than Kidd ever was, and he has the size to post up Jason, as well as defend Kidd when he tries to post up (as he so often tries to do against opposing PG's). If Kidd can keep up his 3 point shooting, this might not be as lopsided, but this match up should be dominated by the Thunder.

Shooting Guard:
Deshawn Stevenson vs. Thabo Sefolosha

Neither of these guys is as good as their back-ups but the guy with the name that nobody can remember or pronounce is a defensive specialist who may see some time against Dirk in spurts. This one is pretty much a wash, but I give a slight edge to the Thunder since Stevenson is pretty much useless. By the way, he needs to stop doing the Tony Yayo/John Cena thing after every basket. When you hit 2 shots a game, you have no right to celebrate, and the announcers always incorrectly say it means he can't feel his face because he's so hot (which is cool but wrong).

Small Forward:
Shawn Marion vs. Kevin Durant

Not even close. OKC by a hundred miles.

Power Forward:
Dirk Nowitzki vs. Serge Ibaka

These guys games are so completely different. Ibaka plays the more typical Power Forward game in the Oakley mode, while we all know how Dirk does. Who do you think wins this match up?


Center:
Tyson Chandler vs. Kendrick Perkins

Danny Ainge isn't looking so good these days as Perkins is still playing for a Finals berth, and his Celtics looked so overmatched by the Heat. Perk has added a lot of toughness to the young Thunder and can still get pretty damn nasty, while Tyson is probably the best center still playing in the playoffs. Edge to the Mavs here.

Bench:

Dallas's strong suit (besides Dirk) is their super subs (I don't think they actually have a nickname). They absolutely dominated the Lakers bench, but OKC has some decent reserves themselves in James Harden and Eric Maynor and a couple others. If Barea, Stojakovic and Terry can keep up the pace they were playing at a couple weeks ago though, this should be advantage Dallas.

Coach:

I didn't give Rick Carlisle much credit before the L.A. series but he almost outcoached the great Phil Jackson at some points. Scott Brooks was a scrappy, little white point guard who somehow forged a career in the NBA, and his toughness rubs off on his squad a little, it seems. I like Brooks as a coach a lot and give him the edge over the more experienced Carlisle.

How will the series pan out? Hell if I know. Even though I probably watch close to 40
hours of NBA basketball a week, I can't predict how anything will turn out this postseason. My instinct is to say Dallas should win being that they have more experience, have outplayed pretty much every team in the league so far this Spring, and Dirk is playing at a phenomenal level, but nothing is going as planned so far so I'll say Oklahoma City in 6.