C & C Music Factory once sang about Things That Make You Go Hmmmm.... Here are a few items to add to the list:
1) Why did the Dallas Mavericks, sporting the best regular season record in the NBA, change their starting lineup to adjust to the eighth seeded Golden State Warriors? If you are the best team in the league, shouldn't other teams have to adjust to you? This question was posed by Charles Barkley on TNT; it will be interesting to see how Dallas Coach Avery Johnson responds in game two.
2) Is Steve Nash really "making his teammates better" when Leandro Barbosa uses his speed to go coast to coast and score?
2 B) Or when Shawn Marion uses his quickness to get an offensive rebound putback?
2 C) Isn't it more accurate to say that Nash is a great player who is surrounded by players who are good/very good?
3) Is Kobe Bryant making his teammates worse when Kwame Brown fumbles passes and misses point blank shots?
3 B) Or when Smush Parker makes poor decisions, argues with his Hall of Fame coach and loses any interest in playing defense?
3 C) Isn't it more accurate to say that Bryant is a great player who is surrounded by a supporting cast that is not very talented and that has been decimated by injuries?
4) Did anyone notice that Kobe Bryant shot a better percentage from the field (15-33; .455) than Steve Nash (7-17; .412) did on Sunday? Bryant accomplished this despite not having a single All-Star on his team to carry part of the load (Nash has All-Stars Marion and Amare Stoudemire, plus Leandro Barbosa, the newly crowned Sixth Man of they Year). Phoenix can win even if Nash shoots poorly; the Lakers have had trouble beating anyone recently unless Bryant scores 40-plus points while shooting a good to excellent percentage from the field (.450 or above).
5) You would not know this unless you were inside Quicken Loans Arena, but Cleveland fans boo much more loudly when the overhead scoreboard displays either the University of Michigan or Pittsburgh Steelers logos than they do in response to anything that happens on the court. The recent increase in attendance at the Q shows that fans support LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers--but Cleveland will always be first and foremost a Browns town and Ohio will always be first and foremost a football state.
Bonus: I realized that I left out an important "Hubie-ism" from my recent list of seven favorite phrases used by my favorite NBA analyst, so here is an eighth staple of almost any telecast featuring Brown:
When you miss a layup or a dunk in the NBA, the opposing team will score within three to five seconds
Brown has admitted that he does not know why this is the case but it is something that he mentions quite frequently and it certainly seems to be true a significant portion of the time (the Suns often score within three to five seconds of a made basket but that is a different story). My theory about this is that when a team misses a layup or dunk several of their players are often gathered right around the hoop, so a defensive rebound followed by a quick outlet pass will likely lead to an advantage fast break (3 on 2 or 2 on 1).
Things That Make You Go Hmmm...
