Thoughts on the Finals and the Draft

I think this is a bit of a weak Finals. Neither team is truly dominant. The Magic and Lakers both have a great many good pieces, but neither has the high intensity and suffocating defense of the Finals teams I'm used to seeing. The execution has been good not great and, really, the games have been more about shooters than what I'm used to seeing in a Finals.

On the Magic: This is a great young team that, with a few more years of experience, could be the cream of the East. Howard is really the key. At this point, he is an amazing athlete with not much of an offensive game. If he wants to be the next Shaq, he needs to be able to shoot the ball...at least a little bit. I really like the combination of Hedo and Rashard.

Lakers: good not great.....

Draft...

Eddie Jordan and the NBA Finals

That's probably the only time you'll ever hear those two subjects together. Eddie Jordan, former coach of the Wiz, was recently hired as the long-telegraphed new coach of the 76ers. The NBA Finals--between Orlando and the Lakers--are on tap, starting Thursday.

There is a lot of disaffection coming from Philadelphians after the Jordan hire. The team with Jordan seems like, well, the Washington Wizards. Some talent, but big holes and no hope for a second-round playoff berth. That prognosis causes NBA fans indigestion because you can't grow if you don't either have money (we had some last summer and it got gobbled up in a second by Elton Brand), have high draft picks (no hope for that), or have an excellent GM and/or coach.

I have faith in Stefanski, and I like that Eddie Jordan comes with a motion-offense system that should make the Sixers' game prettier. I don't really understand the dejection over Jordan. Who were we gonna get? Phil Jackson? Jordan is better than DiLeo and better than Cheeks. He will at least instill some structure into the Sixers which will at worst make games watchable again. Personally, I thought that hiring Jeff Van Gundy (whose brother is having some serious success this year) or Avery Johnson would have been perfect. Those two have had real success and are true defensive coaches. When you hear that your new coach is gonna preach offense, you think to yourself, "Awesome! My team could be as good as Golden State this year." Which translates to a first round-exit at best and another number 17 pick.

As for the real NBA, the Orlando Magic and the LA Lakers are showing off what you can do with a very good GM. Orlando's old GM Jeff Weisbrod famously chose Dwight Howard over Emeka Okafor and traded Tracy McGrady for Steve Francis and Cuttino Mobley. The Magic under Otis Smith have built on the amazing Howard move (I mean, really, imagine if they had Okafor. There would be no NBA Finals) and added both Hedo Turkoglu and Mickael Pietrus for mid-level money. He also broke the bank for Rashard Lewis, and made a swap for Rafer Alston when Jameer Nelson (another solid Magic pick) went down. This team has no dead salary, has some amazing talent and was composed brilliantly. A no. 1 draft pick well spent stands alongside a big free agent signing, a couple of amazing mid-level FA signings, guys acquired through shrewd trades, and guys acquired through deft drafting (Gortat, Nelson).

The Lakers' GM Mitch Kupchak is similarly brilliant. He has his one superstar Kobe, complimented by Pau Gasol (acquired through a theft of a trade in exchange for his brother and two crappy picks), Lamar Odom (Shaq deal...Caron Butler could be here too if not for the heinous Kwame Brown trade which was saved by the Gasol deal), Andrew Bynum (great value/upside draft pick that makes the rest of the league look stupid), Trevor Ariza (quality addition through trade with Orlando for Brian Cook and Mo Evans), and some very good role players (Farmar, Fisher, Walton).

You need to be lucky in the new NBA, but having smarts like Portland and OKC's GMs gives you the edge to make it all the way. Do the Sixers have that? I don't think so.

Playoff Thoughts

• Some interesting Nuggets tidbits. One, no one is talking about the potential Melo-LeBron Finals. After they were pinned together for years, now it's all about LeBron. But having these two pitted against one another in the Finals will be interesting.
  
• Secondly, how about Billups and Anthony teaming together on the Nuggs? The Pistons COULD HAVE HAD THIS COMBINATION. Instead, they chose Darko Milicic over Dwayne Wade, Carmelo Anthony, AND Chris Bosh. They definitely don't get enough grief for this. WORST PICK EVER.
• The semis are looking great. Melo looked like a beast out there in Game One. Kobe definitely got some calls, but I think the series will be decided by the ability of the Nuggets to close things out at the end of games. They have some real knuckleheaded players like JR Smith and Kenyon Martin.
• If Anthony continues to play like this, he's definitely a top-5 player in the league.
• All day, I've been thinking about how the Cavs can match-up with the Magic's Alston-Pietrus-Hedo-Lewis-Howard line-up. The answer is that they can't! The Cavs have to step up and not worry about match-ups. They have some good, quick guards--Mo Williams, Boobie Gibson, Delonte West--that the Magic can't run around with all night, they have LeBron, they have some size, they've gotta play their game!
• That said, the Cavs have no one that can cover Dwight Howard (the corpse of Ben Wallace?) and no one that can cover Hedo or Lewis (at least they don't have two guys to cover those two guys).
• Thoughts on the Draft: Clippers could be a good squad if they weren't so freakin' dysfunctional. Griffin with Kaman, Camby, Baron, Gordon, Thornton, those are some young guns and some good vets. Problem is they have the Cancer: Zach Randolph who is a terrible person, doesn't play defense, and plays Griffin's position. He's got to go.
• Ricky Rubio is really the only other decent pick in this draft. Though we did say that last year, and the '08 draft turned out to have A LOT of good talent. Still, it's hard to sing the praises of a draft where Hasheem Thabeet (50-50 probability of being a complete stiff) is the slam-dunk no. 2 or 3 pick.
  

So what happened?

A season that started weak, ended weak. The Sixers bowed out once again 4-2 in the first round of the playoffs. Once again they looked not as promising in the playoffs as they did at certain points in the season. This time, Iguodala was not the goat and Elton Brand is waiting in the wings. There is some hope... but the direction is unclear.

Here are some thoughts on the Sixers this offseason:

• Every NBA fans' nightmare is that his team will become mediocre. Cleveland was mediocre for a while...then they got terrible...then they got Lebron. The Spurs swallowed a terrible season without David Robinson (due to injury) and then fell ass-backwards into Tim Duncan. The Celtics were loaded with young assets--and stunk--and decided to move those young'uns for some real talent. My fear today is that the Sixers are no better and have no better prospects than the Milwaukee Bucks. The Bucks have Villanueva, Ridnour, Redd, Ramon Sessions, Andrew Bogut, and Bobby Simmons. Plus they're lottery-bound. You could say that they're an "up-and-coming" team, but who would you be kidding? They're mediocre. They need to improve substantially and get at least two more good players. I think the Sixers are in the same boat. Neither team has a boatload of money to spend either...Oh well.
• The Sixers have glaring holes and they made add another when Andre Miller leaves the team this summer. They have no shooters, unless you count the corpse of Donyell Marshall. They will probably have no real point guards. Plus, they will have no offense from the center position. Basically, they've got a bunch of swingmen and role players who can't shoot.
• The logjam still exists. How many undersized two-guards that can't shoot does a team need? Royal Ivey is a decent journeyman nobody, add Willie Green, Kareem Rush and Lou Williams to the mix and you have the ultimate undersized mix of barely-average guards. I guess it's unfair to Lou--whose played well this year--and Willie--who had a career season--to still clump them in with Royal and Kareem, but no team in the NBA that is sane has this many guards who are 6'2 or under and can neither shoot nor play point.
• Andre Miller will probably go to a contender or a pretender or anyone else this summer. That subtracts the Sixers best player from the mix. Yes, he's old and unexciting. But he was the one steadying force who could get it done day in and day out. Without him, you could be looking at the pre-Al Horford and pre-Joe Johnson Atlanta Hawks. Ug.
• Sam Dalembert still sucks. The fact that Theo Ratliff, who has passed around like a bong at a Wesleyan party due to his expiring contract before this year, played serious playoff minutes tells you something. Dalembert is at best an inconsistent slightly crappy C and more realistically a very overpaid, skinny version of DeSagana Diop.
• Is there hope? There's Andre Iguodala. He proved that he can be a great number-two guy. He could be the second coming of Scottie Pippen if he were taller, improved his defense, and learned to shoot. There's Thad Young. Oozing with potential. But he and Iggy are 3s. I guess you could make Iggy into a 2--but that would require replacing his wrists with a smoother pair. Then there's Elton Brand. The team can reconfigure itself around Brand, Young and/or Iguodala, and some young guys (Speights, Jason Smith, Lou). That wouldn't be the worst team, especially if Brand can become anything near his former self.
• We have no coach. Our team's philosophy is shot. Run with us only goes so far if you have no 3-point shooters. In the Sixers' wildest dreams, they'd be a faster version of the Magic. But they have no shooters. Brand is no Dwight Howard and Andre Iguodala is barely better than Hedo Turkoglu let alone Rashard Lewis. If they had a guy like Rajon Rondo manning the point for years to come, I'd have hope. They don't.
  
• What's needed? A shooter. A real young point guard (see: the draft). A new philosophy. Avery Johnson. Major changes need to be made....
  

Shana Tova, Mr. Jasner

Sixers writer Jasner headed for Philadelphia Jewish Sports Hall of Fame

Daily News sports writer Phil Jasner has been selected to the seven-member Class of 2009 of the Philadelphia Jewish Sports Hall of Fame.

The induction ceremonies are scheduled for May 18 at the Gershman Y, Broad and Pine streets.

Jasner has covered the Sixers for the Daily News for 30 seasons. In 2004, he was honored by the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame with the Curt Gowdy Award, and he is also a two-time Pennsylvania Sportswriter of the Year.

Also being inducted:

* Phillies general manager Ruben Amaro Jr.

* Morton Shiekman, a Penn offensive guard who was drafted by the Pittsburgh Steelers in the 1940s.

* Gary Martin, a two-time lacrosse All-America at Penn State who played for the Wings.

* Cliff Bayer, an NCAA foil champion at Penn and an Olympian in 1996 and 2000.

* Jeanne Friedman, a founding member of Boston University's crew team, where she won gold twice at the U.S. nationals. She is a former Penn assistant coach and has been the head coach at Mount Holyoke since 1991.

* Michael Tollin, a movie and television producer, and his father, Sol. *