I feel like what happened yesterday in the Cavs/Pistons game is what Rasheed Wallace was thinking of when he made his guarantee. He knew that the Pistons were capable of doing that, and he knew that if they did, there wasn’t much that LeBron or anyone else could do about it. Why they waited until Game 7 to do it, I’m not sure… but they did, and it happened, and now it’s over. Both teams played hard, my man.
Before moving on, all credit to the Cavs. They played out of their minds… LeBron was great, Anderson Varejao was a revelation (I’ve been in a strip club with his brother, by the way), and I’m still a little confused about how a team plays that sort of defense against the Wizards, and then a whole different type of defense against the Pistons. Credit to the Cavs, but… that doesn’t reflect well on Flip Saunders or the Detroit offense.
Looking ahead to the series with the Heat, I’m not sure what to think. On paper, they’re better than the Cavs, and a lot of people are going to pick them to win. I can see that. The Pistons looked real vulnerable at times in this last series, and the Heat are well-rested. It’s a pick that makes a little sense.
But there are also reasons why this series might be a little easier for Detroit. They’ve played against Shaq and Dwyane Wade in the playoffs before… in this round, they’re not going to be surprised by anyone’s greatness. They know what to expect here. And as much as I love Dwyane Wade, he’s not quite as hard to guard as LeBron… he doesn’t see the court quite as well, and he’s less like a damn train when he’s going to the rim. Not to say it will be easy by any stretch, but it’s not quite the same.
And maybe Detroit needed this last series to wake them up. Maybe they needed to get punched in the mouth like that. They can say what they want, but every player in that locker room knows that how they played defense in Game 7 against Cleveland was different than how they played defense in Game 6 against Cleveland. And maybe since they finally took it to that next notch, it’ll be easier to keep it there.
But I still have all the same questions about them that I had when I made this post. None of those things have gone away or been answered because they beat the Cavaliers.
After five hours of surgery, Barbaro is walking again. But he’s still not out of the woods, they still might have to send him away to horsey heaven. And it’s really touching to me how much people care about Barbaro the horse. All of these horse lovers, who are so devoted to an activity that sees about 800 horses die a year after injuries suffered on the track, pulling together to save one special horse, because he’s so very fast. It’s beautiful. It’s what being an animal lover is all about.
