6 Thoughts
1) We're the # 2 seed champs!!! Yeah, boy - we did it!!! # 2 seed champs!!! It's like 2006 all over again!!!...Let's go, like a # 2 seed!!!
2) Miami blew out to an early lead, put it in cruise control in the second half, Atlanta took out its starters, its reserves started playing hard and erased a 20 point Heat lead, then James Jones scored 7 points in two straight possessions to end the game. Coupled with a Philadelphia loss to Orlando, and Boston's loss to Washington (with Heat-embedded guard Carlos Arroyo 'missing' a jumper that could have won it for Boston - "awww - I thought I had it!"), Miami locked up the # 2 seed and a date with Philadelphia in the first round. This is the best scenario Miami could have hoped for at this late juncture. Definitely didn't want to play the Knicks in the first round because those games are never about basketball - it's all mental tricks and weird juju. And in the second round against Boston, Miami will have the homecourt advantage. Win those two series, if you can, and take your shot at Chicago. Could have been better - but as recently as 36 hours ago, it could have turned out quite a bit worse...
3) Mike Bibby: hating all over what the Atlanta Hawks did to him, which was, essentially, to suck the life out of him, and every other member of the Hawk organization over the past two decades. Bibs, normally the most motionless of offensive players, attacked the Hawk defense with panache and passion tonight. Okay, well- at least he dribbled towards the basket, pretty much for the first time as a member of the Miami Heat. Made an early layup, a reverse layup, then tried another reverse layup where he looked like Fred Flintstone spinning his wheels trying to get from the three point line to the rim before getting caught and smashed in the face by Zaza Pachulia (more on him in a second), and then, just to cap it off, made a floater. That's 10 points for Bibs, most of them coming on drives - for Bibs, that counts as an "I hate what they did to me" performance...
4) Play of the game: Obviously, when Zaza Pachulia drove to the basket with 3 minutes to go and made a layup while (mostly inadvertantly) elbowing Zydrunas Ilgauskas in the face to cut the Heat's lead to 1 point, whereupon Zydrunas took the ball out the net, turned around, and threw a fastball off Zaza's back as he was running away! Dorky-White-Foreign Off! That's an ejection for Z, one technical free throw for the Hawks to tie the game, and one more step forward for Zaza in his attempt to infuriate every active player in the NBA. Also, back-to-back games in which Miami players threw fastballs at opposing players - I think that's a new Heat record (in non-Heat vs. Knick games).
5) Call of the game: In the fourth quarter, LeBron James drove the lane, elevated, two Hawks converged on him, tried to block his shot by putting their hands on the ball, LeBron hung, powered it through them, and made the floater, while the whistle blew for the three point play. Except - no, not a three point play. One of the referees called a jump ball, which seemed somewhat impossible since, as LeBron, Coach Spo, and the rest of the Heat bench pointed out, LeBron made the shot. Odd - I mean, really, crazy odd - really, I have no explanation for it. As LeBron argued, it was hard to even imagine how the conversation would go: "I made the shot!" "I don't care - it's still traveling..." Again, sometimes you think you have seen everything, but, really, you haven't seen anything!
6) Most regular readers of this blog know that my mom is Christian and my dad is Jewish, making me what is known as "a halfbreed." The point is, I wasn't raised with too much religion, and there is almost no end to the religious stuff that I don't know. But I am pretty sure that when I was in a meeting last week, and a guy trying to make the point to me to not alter a certain parameter in a computer program I needed to use was way, wayyyy off base when he made his point by aggressively warning me: "Don't touch it. Treat it like the Holy Grail: you touch it, you die!" Now, I don't even know what the Holy Grail is, but I'm pretty sure that in the last Indiana Jones movie (the real Indiana Jones movies, not Shia LeBoeuf), the whole thing was that you had to take a leap of faith to get to the Holy Grail by stepping out into nothingness, and then magically a bridge appeared, and allowed you (or rather, Indiana Jones) to cross the bottomless chasm to this cup which was, I guess, the Holy Grail. And he didn't die. So I'm not sure that was a good comparison. And this dude goes to church, I've heard him talk about it! What is in the Holy Grail? I was thinking maybe it held Jesus's ashes (seriously), until I remembered that, one, I don't think there was anything in it when Indiana Jones got it, and, two, I don't think Jesus was cremated. Man, Judeo-Christian religions are complex!
Miami has a game on Wednesday in Toronto. I'd like to point out that even though I skipped a whole bunch of blog posts in the middle of the season due to a semi-nervous breakdown, I didn't skip any games during that time span, and missed only one all season, when I was on vacation in Puerto Rico, looking for the Holy Grail. Sooooo, when I get Wednesday, that will make two straight seasons of 81 out of 82 games - I've impressed myself, didn't know I had that kind of stick-to-it-tive-ness. Since Wednesday's game is totally meaningless, we'll spend that time maybe giving some year end awards and/or grades - don't think we've done that here before. If you need me before then, I'll be out front, throwing basketballs at my neighbors. May Peace Be With U!!!
