Ladies and gentlemen, this is the playoff thread for the 2015-2016 NBA playoffs. Will Golden State repeat as back to back champs to go with their 73-9 record, or will the Spurs get number 6 under Pop, Duncan and co. Is this Cleveland's year to win a title with Lebron at the helm, or will they choke like dogs again when it matters most? All will be answered starting this Saturday.

Eastern Conference:

1. Cleveland Cavaliers (57-25) vs. 8. Detroit Pistons (44-38)

2. Toronto Raptors (56-26) vs. 7. Indiana Pacers (45-37)

3. Miami Heat (48-34) vs. 6. Charlotte Hornets (48-34)

4. Atlanta Hawks (48-34 vs. 5. Boston Celtics (48-34)

Western Conference:

1. Golden State Warriors (73-9) vs. 8. Houston Rockets (41-41)

2. San Antonio Spurs (67-15) vs. 7. Memphis Grizzlies (42-40)

3. Oklahoma City Thunder (55-27) vs. 6. Dallas Mavericks (42-40)

4. Los Angeles Clippers (53-29) vs. 5. Portland Trail Blazers (44-38)

Thoughts? Predictions?

Also, no Bulls or Kobe in the playoffs? WTF?

I'm honestly surprised that Cleveland managed to win considering that they let Detroit in this game the whole way through and how lackadaisical the Cavs look at times. Then again, this has been their M.O. in the regular season, I don't expect that to change.

Also, lol Toronto. To be fair, Paul George did go off in the second half, but the Raptors are too good to lose like that. Hopefully, they get their act together in Game 2.

Personally, the only problem I would have with Golden State repeating as champs is that thanks to their record breaking regular season, there will be a growing legion of retards who claims this is a proof that Curry is better than Michael Jordan. It's bad enough as it is.

Despite that idiocy, I still rather have that than the Cleveland Refs finally winning a title. If the Warriors wins it all again this year, as long it means Cleveland gets screwed, so be it.

I'll root the Cavs on since they are my hometown team.

At 4/22/16 02:04 PM, Idiot-Finder wrote: Personally, the only problem I would have with Golden State repeating as champs is that thanks to their record breaking regular season, there will be a growing legion of retards who claims this is a proof that Curry is better than Michael Jordan. It's bad enough as it is.

I knew that this argument was going to eventually come up when Golden State won their 73rd game. Of course, we still have the playoffs left to go, so we'll see if they can finish the deal, then we'll make the argument then, not that it's going to stop the armchair analysts from saying their piece.

Despite that idiocy, I still rather have that than the Cleveland Refs finally winning a title. If the Warriors wins it all again this year, as long it means Cleveland gets screwed, so be it.

If the Cavs even get to the finals at all, considering that the East is much more balanced than it was before, compared to the West, which has a 73 and 67 win season for their top two seeds, followed by a big drop off with OKC.

Speaking of OKC and GS, I would expect then to finish off their series in 5. With the former however, They need to start holding onto leads in the 4th quarter if they want to have any chance against anyone else they face.

It seems after letting the Rockets back in the game in the first half, the Warriors finally woke up and remembers that they are the defending champions and performed as such, finishing them off in Game 4. Still, Curry getting hurt is a concern since you do not want that happening to your best player, remember Derrick Rose? Hope it's not too bad for his sake.

So Curry will be out for two weeks, as long the Warriors can face the team that isn't the Spurs, they should be fine. Still, it hurts though but yeah.

Also Kerr won the "Coach of the Year" award despite missing almost half the season due to surgery and Walton even got a vote as well for filling in.

Looks like the Clippers are done for, with Chris Paul and Blake Griffin out for the rest of the playoffs. It was only just yesterday when Stephen Curry went down, the sky was going to fall over Oakland and Dubs nation, now it's almost like nothing has happened. Not like they need Curry until the Conference Finals, (I do not give the Clippers any chance for an upset, and even less with Portland) so they shouldn't be too worried. Now, if Thompson, Green or Barnes goes down as well, then they can panic.

So Kawhi Leonard just repeated as a winner of the "Defensive Player of the Year", what do you think of that?

At 4/27/16 08:41 PM, yurgenburgen wrote: yet another sports thread which fails to specify the actual sport being discussed

NBA should be more than enough to give it away.

At 4/27/16 09:20 PM, SansNumbers wrote:

At 4/27/16 09:18 PM, yurgenburgen wrote:

At 4/27/16 09:15 PM, Idiot-Finder wrote: NBA should be more than enough to give it away.

what does it stand for though
not all of us are hip to the jive with these acronyms

National Badminton Association. Look at this man lobbing it over.

I was going to go with National Beach Volleyball Association since it has sweaty men in shorts playing with a ball trying to score on the other side, it all fits.

Raptors going all the way, dwdw

Well, the Hornets 2 blew it.

With that said, the Curry-less Warriors whipped the Blazers as they should and the Spurs raped the ex-Sonics who went with a WNBA team name for some reason.

By the end of the day, may the best Western Conference team wins, because they are the ones I'm counting on to beat the Cleveland Refs, keeping them from winning for at least another year.

@orangebomb

So far the Curry-less Warriors are ahead of the Blazers by 2-0, no idea if it'll convince Currytards that the team was that good rather than Curry being like Jordan but I doubt it. Even then, the Warriors will still need Curry for the WCF since the team they'll be facing will be tougher.

Speaking of...after getting screwed in Game 2, the Spurs can still bounce back in Game 3, they need to stay focus as they normally do. Plus, between them and the ex-Sonics with a WNBA team name, I consider the Spurs to have the better shot of knocking off the Warriors.

Lastly, as expected, Atlanta couldn't really do shit against Cleveland.

So anyway, when's the all-NBA and all-defense team will be announced?

At 5/6/16 02:58 PM, Idiot-Finder wrote: Speaking of...after getting screwed in Game 2, the Spurs can still bounce back in Game 3, they need to stay focus as they normally do. Plus, between them and the ex-Sonics with a WNBA team name, I consider the Spurs to have the better shot of knocking off the Warriors.

I agree with that, but the Spurs may not get that chance if OKC can actually stay focused for 4 quarters. We'll see what happens in game 3 and 4 in the Thunderdome.

Lastly, as expected, Atlanta couldn't really do shit against Cleveland.

25 3-pointers. I guess the Hawks left their balls in Boston. Though it's only a matter of time before the Cavs inevitably end up in the wrong end of a 3 point barrage, because their defense is mediocre at best and there's no way that either Irving, Love or Smith can keep that up.

So anyway, when's the all-NBA and all-defense team will be announced?

I would think that they would announce that during the conference finals. If they do that player's voting thing again like they did last year, hopefully they wise up and give Stephen Curry the MVP as an act of penance over picking James Harden.

At 5/6/16 04:44 PM, orangebomb wrote:

I would think that they would announce that during the conference finals. If they do that player's voting thing again like they did last year, hopefully they wise up and give Stephen Curry the MVP as an act of penance over picking James Harden.

Curry won the MVP last year so yeah.

He should be an easy choice for a repeat.

Good day for Curry as not only he returns to the game, he also made the Blazers choke despite building a huge lead at one point. So with that said, the Golden State Warriors are now 3-1 and can clinch the series before they can head back to Oakland.

Also, Curry won the MVP by a unanimous margin.

As for the Spurs, WTF?

At 5/11/16 10:18 AM, Idiot-Finder wrote: Good day for Curry as not only he returns to the game, he also made the Blazers choke despite building a huge lead at one point. So with that said, the Golden State Warriors are now 3-1 and can clinch the series before they can head back to Oakland.

Really, the Warriors are simply just toying with the Blazers who largely overachieved by feeding on bad teams and got lucky when they scored 130 on the Warriors in February. Now that their going back to Oakland, they'll put down Portland and watch OKC and San Antonio beat each other up.

As for the Spurs, WTF?

There was a lot of bad officiating in this series. Having said that, no one should underestimate OKC when they have arguably 2 of the top 5 players in the league with Durant and Westbrook, and now finally able to get past there 4th quarter woes, for now at least.

So now the conference finals match up is set in the western side, lets' see if the Raptors can get the job done against the Heat. If they can do so, I'll be crossing my fingers for an upset against the Cleveland Refs and after that, they can fall in the Finals for all I care considering the dumb shit storm made about Dwayne Wade warming up during the Canadian national anthem where the fan base starts posting anti-U.S. venom in the comments section.

I'm surprised they didn't post their obsession with poutine like that Canadian troll had in the comments section of the 2010 Olympics when the U.S. Hockey team failed to come through when we needed them (later gets worse 4 years later where they quit after losing the semi-finals). Seriously, I don't want to keep waiting for the U.S. to finally win the Olympic hockey gold, I'd trade all the medals the U.S. won during the Winter Olympic year for one Olympic Hockey gold the same year.

I'm not sorry about the rant, I have to let it out now and then.

At 5/14/16 04:06 PM, Idiot-Finder wrote: So now the conference finals match up is set in the western side, lets' see if the Raptors can get the job done against the Heat. If they can do so, I'll be crossing my fingers for an upset against the Cleveland Refs and after that, they can fall in the Finals for all I care considering the dumb shit storm made about Dwayne Wade warming up during the Canadian national anthem where the fan base starts posting anti-U.S. venom in the comments section.

I guess they needed to lash out because none of their hockey teams made the playoffs and their Blue Jays' 15 minutes are almost up. Frankly, I rather see them lose to the Heat in Game 7 and let the Cavs actually put in some effort in the conference finals unlike a Detroit team that was too young and the Atlanta Hawks, who left their spines in Boston. Yeah Wade made a mistake practicing when the anthem was playing, but that was nothing compared to Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf sitting out our national anthem with a rather tasteless and empty reason.

In either case, I'm much more focused on the GS-OKC series, as I will say that whoever wins that series will win the Finals, barring injuries of course.

Stuff

Good thing that social media wasn't around in the early nineties when the Blue Jays won back to back WS, lest they claim superiority of our national sport. Then again, the weaker the dog, the louder the bark, and it sounds like I can hear them from where we are from Toronto.

I hope OKC gets swept by GSW.

Tonight begins the Conference Finals, will the Warriors and Cavs hold serve to meet up in the finals?

Personally, I am much more interested in the WCF as the Thunder might be the only team left that can beat the Warriors, or at the very least push them into a long series, whereas the Cavs should mop the floor with Toronto, unless the Cavs decide to be Cavs and lose.

At 5/18/16 08:22 AM, SuperUltraAusterity wrote: So the current season GSW is apparently the most successful in NBA history, even beating out the '96 Bulls.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NBA_teams_by_single_season_win_percentage

And they just lost the openers to the ex-Sonics with a NBA team. What matters is that the Warriors cap off the season with a title, otherwise it's going to be as meaningful as the record setting seasons the Mariners, Cubs, Patriots, and the Redwings had.

At 5/18/16 08:22 AM, SuperUltraAusterity wrote: So the current season GSW is apparently the most successful in NBA history, even beating out the '96 Bulls.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NBA_teams_by_single_season_win_percentage

Well, we kind of knew about that beforehand when the Warriors won 73 games, but the playoffs are a whole different manner. As Idiot-finder mentioned before, they do need to win the title in order to fully validate that lofty record they have, otherwise they would be in the same company with the Seattle Mariners, San Diego Chargers and Washington Capitals as regular season champions but can't win it all come the postseason. (Unlike those teams, GS at least has a ring, but still)

I will expect GS to right the ship in Game 2 and tie up the series when they go to OKC. I can't say the same thing with Toronto, but I will say that the Cavs are overdue for a slip-up, so we'll see.

Well now, Cleveland has went from being unstoppable to on the verge of collapse with both losses in Toronto. I figured that the Cavs would flame out in the Finals, but it looks like it might just be earlier than that, maybe now people would think twice before picking the Cavs to win it all.

Moving on, Draymond Green got a fine but no suspension for "accidently" kicking Steven Adams in the groin. Yay or nay?

It doesn't look good for the Warriors so far.

If they don't turn it around, the record setting regular season will go to waste, making tons of Currytards cry. At least they still have the last season championship to console themselves with.

Well, that was disappointing as the Raptors just fell apart after that two games worth of cocktease. Now lets see if the team formerly known as the Sonics before Starbucks owner screws over the fan base and sold them to some dude from Oklahoma where they would be given a WNBA name wraps up the series before it's too late.

On other news, All-NBA and All-Defensive team have been announced with Kawhi Leonard making the first team on both, kudos.

Also Curry and Lebron made the first team on All-NBA as well.

At 5/27/16 11:15 PM, Idiot-Finder wrote: Well, that was disappointing as the Raptors just fell apart after that two games worth of cocktease. Now lets see if the team formerly known as the Sonics before Starbucks owner screws over the fan base and sold them to some dude from Oklahoma where they would be given a WNBA name wraps up the series before it's too late.

Looks like the Thunder short circuited Saturday night, let alone a 3-1 lead in the series. While anything can happen on a Game 7, the team formerly known as the Sonics have all but eliminated themselves, which is a small consolation to the folks in Seattle. Perhaps we shouldn't be so quick to bury the Warriors after all.

Either way, this is essentially the Finals in all but name as Cleveland won't stand much of chance against either team, the only difference is that GS would take 5 or 6 games whereas OKC would go 6 or 7.

And so the ex-Sonics chokes like the idiots they are.

Now lets see if the Warriors can keep the Cleveland Refs from winning for another year...or will the refs be too much for the Warriors to overcome?

At 6/2/16 06:20 PM, Idiot-Finder wrote: Now lets see if the Warriors can keep the Cleveland Refs from winning for another year...or will the refs be too much for the Warriors to overcome?

There seems to be some folks who say that the Cavs should be favorites, let alone win it all against a more battle-tested and overall superior team in Golden State, and you can see why they play with the disrespect chip on their shoulder despite having 73 wins, for what it's worth. Never mind the fact that the Cavs, let alone every Cleveland team since Vietnam has found new ways to blow it when it matters the most, why would anyone pick them other than being a contrarian?

In any case, Warriors win in 6 games winning every home game to that point and Game 6 in Cleveland.