Maddux Sports Blog

I’m not a huge NBA guy. I like basketball a lot, but I’ll take college each and every day over the pros. I do watch NBA, though – especially during the playoffs. That being said, the playoffs this year have been amazing, and I am extremely excited about the conference championship rounds. These two series were somewhat unexpected, but they have pretty much everything going for them. Four incredibly massive stars – three who we know on a first name basis, and the fourth who can lead tall buildings in a single bound. It features not necessarily the four best teams, but certainly the four most deserving. Both series have clear favorites, but they also have underdogs who are full capable of the upset. They both have the potential to set a record for highlight reel plays. As a big college fan, the only thing that makes me a bit sad about this one is that the three biggest stars all skipped college ball. Mostly, that makes me sad because I love to think what any of them could have done in March. Melo essentially won a title on his own, and you’d think that at least a couple of these guys could have done the same in the right spot.

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In many years, the NBA playoffs provide exciting rivalries, and endless close games that could’ve gone either way. But this may be a year where the playoffs are a bit of a dry run until the two top face off in the Finals.

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Tax day has come rolling around. So it’s perhaps unlikely to be thinking of Santa Claus right now. But that may be exactly what Celtics fans are doing. Boston may be thinking with no small amount of anguish about the team they had on Christmas Day, compared with the team they have today.

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The focus in the NBA’s first weekend of play has largely been on upsets. But it may be too soon to draw any grand conclusions from the results. That’s because playoff play is a different animal from regular season play. The difference between the two is generally underappreciated.

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Because the NBA is such a showcase for amazing athleticism, it’s easy to believe that success in the sport is only a physical thing.
As the first weekend of playoff basketball showed, that’s not entirely true. There is a reason that coaches talk a great deal about the mental game. This might seem a bit surprising. After all, basketball isn’t exactly chess. A guy who is really tall and fast and can hit a jump shot should be able to succeed. Right? Not necessarily.

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The NBA and NHL post-season tournaments are on the horizon. Of course, that got me thinking about each sport’s regular season and the upcoming playoffs.

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Here are two things that I’m thinking about concerning the conference finals.

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Justine Henin retired suddenly yesterday despite the fact that she was number one in the world rankings. A couple of things arise from that. First, it’s sad where we have gotten to as a society of sports watchers – an athletes leaves suddenly and I can’t help but wonder what she was about to be caught doing. That’s probably not the case here, but we can’t help but wonder. Second, there goes one of the easiest bets in tennis. She had won three straight French Opens. The tournament starts in a couple of weeks. She hasn’t been playing well lately, but she still would have been an automatic bet for a few rounds.

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I’ve touched on it before, but I am endlessly fascinated by the home court advantage we are seeing in the NBA playoffs so far this year. San Antonio and Boston both won last night. That means that the home squad is a perfect 10-for-10 in the second round. It’s not quite as one-sided overall, but it is still impressive – home teams were 30-14 in the first round, meaning they are 40-14 overall. More significantly to sports bettors, Cleveland in their first game against Boston is the only road team in the first round to cover a spread.

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• It doesn’t really mean much on the grand scheme of things from a betting perspective, but one of my favorite things in baseball happened tonight – Minnesota’s Carlos Gomez hit for the cycle. He did it in what was an epic 13-1 beatdown of the White Sox by Minnesota. The usually solid Mark Buehrle got the start for Chicago, but it didn’t go well. After five decent innings the wheels fell off in the sixth when he allowed five earned runs. That was much better than Ehren Wassermann was in relief – he allowed five earned runs and only recorded one out. This is more of the same for the White Sox recently – they have on win in their last eight. Buehrle and his boys were favored tonight, though you wouldn’t guess it by the final score.
• I like it any time the Yankees lose, but I especially liked it tonight because it was the first loss for ace Chien-Ming Wang. He allowed three runs in seven innings against Cleveland, but that was too many. Cliff Lee started for the Indians, and he was magical – seven strikeouts with no runs or walks in seven innings. Lee has been one of the truly great stories of the season so far. He’s mostly a journeyman type, though he was 18-5 in 2005. This year he is 6-0 in his six starts, and his ERA is a ridiculous 0.81. His strikeout to walk ratio is alright, too – 39/2. He’s far from the biggest name in the league, but if the Cy Young was awarded today he would be a shoo-in. The best part tonight was that he was up against Wang and the Yankees, so Lee went off as +131 underdog despite being essentially unhittable all year. That’s a nice bargain.
• There have been eight games in the second round of the NBA playoffs so far. The home team has won all eight. A monkey could make money on that. If only it were always so easy.