My favourite time of the year is finally here. It's the NBA playoffs and after a hotly contested season by all 30 teams, the best of the best have stood up tall to qualify for the post season's tournament.
I'm really excited for the playoffs to be a feature figure in my home for the next two months, especially with the pandemic keeping me here, for what feels like forever. I made my predictions and thought I'd share it.
The NBA website has a brackets challenge. Unfortunately, it makes you fill your bracket for the entire playoffs and not just the first round. So, what I will do is just post my initial bracket and revisit them for future rounds to come. I plan on writing about the playoffs a lot, so I'll analyze where I was right and where I was wrong (which rarely happens) in the rounds to come.
I'll give a brief analysis of each first round series in this blog and why I think each team would win their matchup.
Eastern Conference
I don't have much to add here. The 76ers are the #1 seed in the East and deservedly so. Embiid is going to be a matchup problem for the Wizards centers, Robin Lopez and Daniel Gafford. The 76ers also swept the season series, going 3-0 against 3 Wizards. In those games, Embiid averaged 29.6 points per game along with 9.6 rebounds and 3.3 assists. I'll give the Wizards 1 game, as I expect Westbrook and Beal to go bonkers in at least 1 game and Philly won't be able to keep up.
My Prediction: 76ers 4, Wizards 1
Oh boy, I have dreaded writing about this series. The Celtics have been an absolute atrocity this season. Covid, injuries, you name it, it's happened to the Celts. With no Jaylen Brown available, I expect this to be a comfortable series for the Nets. At least I can say that the best thing that came out of this season for my Celts has been the emergence of Jayson Tatum as a superstar in the league. The Nets, who will have James Harden healthy, after a lengthy spell out with a hamstring injury, head into this series with Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving alongside Harden all healthy. A lethal offense; you can argue that they may struggle defensively. However, I'd also argue that the Nets only need an ounce of defense to win, given the potency they have offensively.
Something to look out for this series would definitely be to observe how Brooklyn's big 3 mesh together on offense. They have only played a total of 8 games together all season and that can ultimately lead to chemistry problems going forward. Not in this series though, the Celtics are bad. Additionally, the Nets have dominated the season series going 3-0 vs. Boston, a trend I expect to continue as Brooklyn won those games pretty comfortably.
My Prediction: Nets 4, Celtics 0
< Miami Heat posted this picture on their team's Twitter page and I myself got intimidated.
I'm not going to lie after Miami's run last season in the finals, after having lost Bam and Dragic, I take this man seriously. I really really like this Heat team and was hoping that they could sneak into the #5 seed so they can make a deep run. Unfortunately, they got matched up with the Bucks, a team they beat 4-1 in last season's Eastern Conference Semi-Final.
I have spent so much time deliberating this matchup in my head. It's honestly a coin flip at this point.
Miami have great 3 point shooters but the addition of Jrue Holiday has been a tremendous boost to Milwaukee's perimeter
defense. Giannis and Jimmy Butler are two alphas of the sport but I can't see Giannis losing to the Heat in back-to-back years.
My Prediction: Bucks 4, Heat 3.
If you told me these two teams would make the playoffs at the beginning of the season, far less for competing in the #4 vs. #5 match, I would have thought you crazy. But the reality is that these two teams are extremely well-coached. Tom Thibodeau and Nate McMillan have done an exceptional job with their respective teams. Its defense vs. offense in this one.
The Knicks have the league's 3rd best defense whereas the Hawks have the 8th best offense. The Hawks' season really took a turn for the better when Bogdan Bogdanović returned from injury. The Serbian is the player to watch in this series for the Hawks, even more so than Trae Young. His 3 point shooting has significantly juiced up the Hawks offense. Julius Randle has absolutely dominated the Hawks this season scoring 37.3 PPG on 58% shooting from the field.
The Hawks are awful defensively, ranking 21st overall in the league this season. The game slows down significantly in the playoffs. This leads to much more half-court offense and I think the Knicks would be much more prepared to set up their defense. The Hawks' inability to get a stop would significantly hamper them down the stretch.
My Prediction: Knicks 4, Hawks 2
Western Conference
The Utah Jazz have had a phenomenal regular season. They finished with the best seed amongst the entire NBA and have the 4th best offense and defense in the league this season. With a game predicated on ball movement and 3 point shooting, the Jazz should not face much difficulties to beat the Grizzlies who rank 18th in defending the 3 point line.
My Prediction: Jazz 4, Grizzlies 0
It has been 11 years since the Suns made the playoffs. Chris Paul and Devin Booker must think themselves extremely unlucky to go up against the Lakers in the first round, after ending such a miserable playoff drought.
The matchup just does not suit them:
The Lakers are a huge team; the Suns play small.
The Lakers run out in transition; the Suns play really slow and prefer to run half-court offense.
To pile on, absolutely no one on the Suns can guard either Lebron James or Anthony Davis. Both Jae Crowder and DeAndre Ayton are too small. The Lakers rank #1 defensively and to me I feel as though the Suns would struggle to generate good looks against these Lakers consistently enough to cause them any problems in a series.
My Prediction: Lakers 4, Suns 2
Picking a winner in this series gave me hell. The loss of Jamal Murray and Will Barton is going to be a significant blow for the Nuggets. Outside of their starting 5 the Nuggets roster is pretty thin. The Blazers are awful defensively posting one of the worst defensive records in NBA history this season. However, they make up for this on the offensive end, ranking second overall.
The Blazers closed the season well going 9-1 in their final 10 games, saving this guy his house:
The Nuggets edge the season series 2 games to 1 and boast MVP favorite Nikola Jokić.
However, I'm not sure if Jokić can carry this team to a win in a playoff series, through no fault of his own of course. The games played between Denver and Portland have all been close this season and Portland has the most clutch player in the entire league: Damian Lillard.
My Prediction : Blazers 4, Nuggets 3
Okay can I just start by saying how disgusted I am about the Clippers? These guys deliberately lost to OKC and the Rockets to avoid playing the Lakers until they make the Western Conference Finals. Don't get me wrong, I can acknowledge the tactic but it just doesn't sit well with me. Aren't these the same Clippers that when they signed Kawhi Leonard in Free Agency and traded for Paul George, they bragged for weeks that they were going to take over Los Angeles? But they are so afraid of Lebron now? I mean don't get me wrong, I don't blame them but they're acting scared of Lebron now and it annoys me. I really hope they get bounced early, to be brutally honest. But I'd put my emotions aside and admit that they have an incredibly talented team and should be able to beat a Mavericks team. I'm writing this blog 1 day into the playoffs, so the Mavs are up 1-0 and Luka was fantastic as usual, but I still expect the Clippers to prevail.
My Prediction: Clippers 4, Mavericks 2
that bit you added about how Dame's winning streak literally saved a man's house was immortal 💯