3rdCoast
06-26-2005, 12:19 PM
LINK (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8344153/)
By Michael Ventre
NBCSports.com contributor
Updated: 11:37 a.m. ET June 25, 2005
If Laker fans thought Shaq was insufferable this past season, wait until he hoists the NBA’s championship trophy over his head next June.
Because next year is looking like the Miami Heat’s year.
Pardon me for disrespecting the San Antonio Spurs, who won the NBA Finals in a gutsy Game 7 Thursday night, or the Detroit Pistons, now dethroned champs who know that however far they fall they will always have the love of their head coach, if he sticks around. Both of these teams will certainly be in the thick of things next season as well. They’re too talented, experienced and deep to disintegrate into middle-of-the-pack drones.
But 2005-06 will be the year Shaq earns his paycheck and makes good on the promise he made to Miami fans when he arrived there last summer. The title will be wrested back from the West to the East by a massive pair of well-manicured hands that still can’t shoot free throws but can shove aside the competition with regularity.
The reasoning is simple: If not for injuries to Shaq and Dwyane Wade this year, the Heat probably would have beaten the Pistons and represented the East against the Spurs. As it was, the clubs fought to a Game 7, where the Heat finally ran out of steam.
Shaq is a year older and a year wiser. When he came to Miami, he guaranteed he’d bring a championship. He’s still on the hook for that promise.
But the 2004-05 season was the first in years in which Shaq made a personal commitment to conditioning. He probably wasn’t as thin as some worshippers reported – the pounds-lost figure ranged anywhere from 25 to 65 pounds – but he was indeed noticeably quicker and more energetic. In the Eastern Conference, he was able to handle just about anybody who was assigned to guard him. He was both an irresistible force and an immovable object.
His collaboration with Wade was a match made in basketball clinics, a Mr. Inside and Mr. Outside that worked in a synchronized fashion, unlike the Shaq-Kobe pairing that ended in disgrace in Detroit back in ’04 and eventually a bitter divorce.
Wade suffered a ribcage injury and Shaq endured a nagging thigh bruise this past postseason. With its two stars at less than peak effectiveness, the Heat still managed to resist the Pistons’ march toward a repeat until they could hold out no longer.
Next season the Heat will be better. Team president Pat Riley, known mostly for his glory days on the sidelines with the Lakers and later the Knicks and Heat, has turned into one of the league’s most capable executives. He flim-flammed the Lakers out of Shaq, and helped build a roster around his two stars that includes complementary soldiers like Damon Jones, Udonis Haslem and Eddie Jones.
Also, the Heat as a group has that positive brand of frustration that comes from getting tantalizingly close to the ultimate prize but being foiled in the final stages. Next season Miami will be even more determined.
So what makes anyone think the Pistons will collapse and allow the Heat to supplant them as kings of the East?
It won’t be that dramatic. The Pistons are built to last. They have no real weakness. They’re battle-tested and intelligent. And they have a fierce competitiveness that will prevent any kind of post-Finals disappointment to translate into a free fall next season.
But the Heat had the best record in the East last season, and they will do so again in 2005-06. That means the Pistons at best will finish with the No. 2 seed in the playoffs. But their main antagonists in the conference semis won't be the Heat. It will be their old sparring partners, the Indiana Pacers.
This was a freakish year for the Pacers, and yet they still managed to reach the playoffs and make a good showing. In ’05-06, they’ll have Ron Artest back, and they’ll surely make roster moves to improve.
As accomplished as the Pistons are, the Pacers are the one team who project an arrogant disregard for Detroit's lofty status. In other words, the Pacers are in their heads and under their skin. And they will eliminate Detroit if the teams meet in next spring’s postseason.
But Indiana is not good enough to beat the Heat in a seven-game series. So when the NBA Finals come around, four games will be held within three-point range of South Beach.
In the West, the Spurs will rise again, because they too are a complete team with a shimmering future. What rhapsody can be uttered about Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili, Tony Parker, Bruce Bowen, Robert Horry, Gregg Popovich, et al., that hasn’t already been expressed ad nauseum over the previous few weeks? The Spurs are deserving champs and certainly are balanced enough to repeat.
And they will – as Western Conference titlists. The Phoenix Suns will be sharper and tougher. The Dallas Mavericks, Houston Rockets and Seattle SuperSonics all will be a degree or two improved and more determined. Even the Minnesota Timberwolves could get back into the championship picture.
But Western clubs will find it extremely difficult to unseat the Spurs. They’re just so efficient and unflappable. A contender would have to match their intelligence and their savvy, and that’s nearly impossible.
Until the NBA Finals.
That’s when a disease called repeatitis will strike. There is no known cure. It afflicts those clubs upon which pressure is heaped because of their status as defending champs. And it is aggravated by the presence of a hungrier opponent.
Like the Miami Heat.
Get used to more Shaq bragging. Next year, you won’t be able to hold him back. That goes double for his team.
Michael Ventre writes regularly for NBCSports.com and is a freelance writer based in Los Angeles.
By Michael Ventre
NBCSports.com contributor
Updated: 11:37 a.m. ET June 25, 2005
If Laker fans thought Shaq was insufferable this past season, wait until he hoists the NBA’s championship trophy over his head next June.
Because next year is looking like the Miami Heat’s year.
Pardon me for disrespecting the San Antonio Spurs, who won the NBA Finals in a gutsy Game 7 Thursday night, or the Detroit Pistons, now dethroned champs who know that however far they fall they will always have the love of their head coach, if he sticks around. Both of these teams will certainly be in the thick of things next season as well. They’re too talented, experienced and deep to disintegrate into middle-of-the-pack drones.
But 2005-06 will be the year Shaq earns his paycheck and makes good on the promise he made to Miami fans when he arrived there last summer. The title will be wrested back from the West to the East by a massive pair of well-manicured hands that still can’t shoot free throws but can shove aside the competition with regularity.
The reasoning is simple: If not for injuries to Shaq and Dwyane Wade this year, the Heat probably would have beaten the Pistons and represented the East against the Spurs. As it was, the clubs fought to a Game 7, where the Heat finally ran out of steam.
Shaq is a year older and a year wiser. When he came to Miami, he guaranteed he’d bring a championship. He’s still on the hook for that promise.
But the 2004-05 season was the first in years in which Shaq made a personal commitment to conditioning. He probably wasn’t as thin as some worshippers reported – the pounds-lost figure ranged anywhere from 25 to 65 pounds – but he was indeed noticeably quicker and more energetic. In the Eastern Conference, he was able to handle just about anybody who was assigned to guard him. He was both an irresistible force and an immovable object.
His collaboration with Wade was a match made in basketball clinics, a Mr. Inside and Mr. Outside that worked in a synchronized fashion, unlike the Shaq-Kobe pairing that ended in disgrace in Detroit back in ’04 and eventually a bitter divorce.
Wade suffered a ribcage injury and Shaq endured a nagging thigh bruise this past postseason. With its two stars at less than peak effectiveness, the Heat still managed to resist the Pistons’ march toward a repeat until they could hold out no longer.
Next season the Heat will be better. Team president Pat Riley, known mostly for his glory days on the sidelines with the Lakers and later the Knicks and Heat, has turned into one of the league’s most capable executives. He flim-flammed the Lakers out of Shaq, and helped build a roster around his two stars that includes complementary soldiers like Damon Jones, Udonis Haslem and Eddie Jones.
Also, the Heat as a group has that positive brand of frustration that comes from getting tantalizingly close to the ultimate prize but being foiled in the final stages. Next season Miami will be even more determined.
So what makes anyone think the Pistons will collapse and allow the Heat to supplant them as kings of the East?
It won’t be that dramatic. The Pistons are built to last. They have no real weakness. They’re battle-tested and intelligent. And they have a fierce competitiveness that will prevent any kind of post-Finals disappointment to translate into a free fall next season.
But the Heat had the best record in the East last season, and they will do so again in 2005-06. That means the Pistons at best will finish with the No. 2 seed in the playoffs. But their main antagonists in the conference semis won't be the Heat. It will be their old sparring partners, the Indiana Pacers.
This was a freakish year for the Pacers, and yet they still managed to reach the playoffs and make a good showing. In ’05-06, they’ll have Ron Artest back, and they’ll surely make roster moves to improve.
As accomplished as the Pistons are, the Pacers are the one team who project an arrogant disregard for Detroit's lofty status. In other words, the Pacers are in their heads and under their skin. And they will eliminate Detroit if the teams meet in next spring’s postseason.
But Indiana is not good enough to beat the Heat in a seven-game series. So when the NBA Finals come around, four games will be held within three-point range of South Beach.
In the West, the Spurs will rise again, because they too are a complete team with a shimmering future. What rhapsody can be uttered about Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili, Tony Parker, Bruce Bowen, Robert Horry, Gregg Popovich, et al., that hasn’t already been expressed ad nauseum over the previous few weeks? The Spurs are deserving champs and certainly are balanced enough to repeat.
And they will – as Western Conference titlists. The Phoenix Suns will be sharper and tougher. The Dallas Mavericks, Houston Rockets and Seattle SuperSonics all will be a degree or two improved and more determined. Even the Minnesota Timberwolves could get back into the championship picture.
But Western clubs will find it extremely difficult to unseat the Spurs. They’re just so efficient and unflappable. A contender would have to match their intelligence and their savvy, and that’s nearly impossible.
Until the NBA Finals.
That’s when a disease called repeatitis will strike. There is no known cure. It afflicts those clubs upon which pressure is heaped because of their status as defending champs. And it is aggravated by the presence of a hungrier opponent.
Like the Miami Heat.
Get used to more Shaq bragging. Next year, you won’t be able to hold him back. That goes double for his team.
Michael Ventre writes regularly for NBCSports.com and is a freelance writer based in Los Angeles.