Goeiedag, enchantée and welcome to this week's episode of Eight 2 Four presents: All-NBA Team of the Week. Are you ready for Playoff basketball? Because I am! The Play-In games have been decided and the biggest surprise is the New Orleans Pelicans kicking the LA Clippers out. If the Clippers could have used Paul George, he was stuck in Health and Safety Protocols, it might have been a different story but the Pelicans have deserved a Playoff run, based on their consistent play the last couple of months. They can prepare themselves now for a, possibly very, short Playoff series against the Suns. The second team in the West who made it to the Playoffs are the Timberwolves, and they celebrated like they just won the whole thing. In the East, Brooklyn had no problems with the Cavaliers, even though it got pretty close at the end, and they meet Boston in the first round. The Cavaliers fell short in their second chance game against Trae Young and the Hawks, who now have to play Miami. This week, we’ll lift out the 5 most interesting Playoff match-ups of the first round. The five series most likely to go the distance or end up with an upset. Get ready for your All-NBA Team of the Week!
PICK #1
Our first pick of the week is the Boston Celtics against the Brooklyn Nets, or Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown against Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving. This is by far the most exciting series in Round 1, but in fairness, pretty much any series Brooklyn was going to play would have been the most exciting series. Very rarely you see such great players as KD and Kyrie as a 7 seed, playing for their lives from the start of the Playoffs. The Celtics have gotten a very raw deal, having to play these superstars early on in the piece. But that doesn’t mean that the Celtics are without a chance. In fact, quite the opposite. If there’s one team in the East that can handle the Nets, it would be the Bucks. Haha, but the Celtics are a close second.
The Celtics have the third best record in the league since January 1st, behind the Suns and the Mavericks. Tatum and Brown have finally proven, once and for all, that they are a lethal duo that has no problem playing together. Flanked by potential Defensive Player of the Year, Marcus Smart, who all of a sudden turned into a pass-first point guard and a rejuvenated Al Horford, this team is not scared of the Nets. Even without Robert Williams, who made such a jump he should be considered for Sixth Man, these Celtics have enough firepower on offense to go toe to toe with KD. And that is where the Nets will come unstuck. If they come across teams that can put up as many points as themselves, the game will be decided by defense and the Nets have no defense. On the other end of the court, Boston is one of the best defensive teams in the league.
And this is exactly why this series is one of the most exciting ones in the first round. No matter what happens, we will lose a potential championship winning team in round 1. On top of that, these teams have a history. So far, in every playoff series these teams have played, the Nets were the better of the Celtics. Jason Kidd killed them in 2002 and 2003, and last season, when the Nets still had Harden, the big 3 outplayed Tatum. Then, of course, these teams have some history off the court as well, with the Nets taking on old mates Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce in return for a few role players and, more importantly, 3 draft picks that eventually turned into Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum. A massive win for the Celtics and the Nets had nothing until they were able to sign KD and Kyrie. I’m really looking forward to this series, it’s going to be a close one that could well run into overtime in game 7.
PICK #2
Our second pick of the week is the Memphis Grizzlies against the Minnesota Timberwolves. Two young teams, with almost no Playoff experience. Yes, the Grizzlies made it to the Playoffs last season, but lost to the Jazz in 5 games and even though Ja was incredible, they never really stood a chance to beat Utah. If we go back earlier, the Grizzlies had a nice few years between 2011 and 2017. The Timberwolves, on the other hand, haven’t made it to the Playoffs since 2018, when Jimmy Butler, Andrew Wiggins and KAT lost in the first round against the James Harden Rockets. Before that we have to go back to 2004 when Kevin Garnett and Latrell Sprewell lost against the three peat-Lakers in the Western Conference Finals. That’s a lifetime ago.
But if everything goes to plan, both teams are embarking on years of Playoff victories and heartbreak, starting now. These are two teams that hold the future of the Western Conference in their hands. Give it a few years, and this could become a staple matchup in the Western Conference Finals. KAT, D-Lo and Antman against Ja, Triple J and the most scrappiest bunch of role players you have ever seen. The Timberwolves are closer to their championship window now, with KAT and D-Lo already 26. The Grizzlies’ duo is only 22, and have some time to put the right pieces around them. But none of these players care about a timeline, that’s a worry for the front office, these guys care about winning, every time they step onto the court.
This season, they met 4 times and each time the home team finished with a win. But it was close on every occasion, except once. On November 20th, the Grizzlies absolutely smashed the Timberwolves, 138 to 95, setting all sorts of NBA records. Now, that was only a single game and doesn’t really mean much. If we look at every head to head these teams have had in the past, these teams are so evenly matched, it’s not funny. They’ve played 101 games and the Wolves have the slightest of edges, leading 51 to 50. We could see this series go to 7 games, since both teams are so closely matched, and I give the Grizzlies the slight edge since they have the extra home game. One thing that could derail this prediction is decompression on Minnesota’s end because they seemed really relieved just to make it to the Playoffs.
PICK #3
Our third pick of the week is the Philadelphia 76ers against the Toronto Raptors. Philly is the team with the biggest question marks around them. What James Harden will we get to see? Is Joel Embiid going to be able to stay on the court? How will they fare in Toronto, without their star defender Matisse Thybulle? What can Tyrese Maxey show us in the Playoffs? How much can the likes of Tobias Harris and Danny Green contribute? What is coach Doc Rivers doing in the offseason? There are nothing but questions surrounding this Philly team and they have a lot to work out. Toronto, on the other hand, knows exactly what it is capable of and who will be contributing. Coach Nick Nurse has been playing Playoff basketball since the All-Star break, mainly focusing on a 7-man line-up, putting his fate into a reborn Pascal Siakam and potential Rookie of the Year, Scottie Barnes.
The Raptors have one big problem, they don’t have anyone to throw at Embiid. But other than that, they have plenty of defensive firepower to throw at the rest of the Sixers roster. They might use the old “let Embiid go nuts, as long as we can stop everyone else” tactic. On the offensive end, Toronto has plenty of weapons. Siakam has averaged 24 points and 8 rebounds per game since the All-Star game and is finally looking like the Siakam we saw when Toronto won the title. Fred VanVleet is one of the best 3-point shooters in the league, averaging nearly 40% on 10 attempts per game, and you can count on it that that number will go up in the Playoffs. Scottie Barnes was fantastic in the regular season and I have no doubt that he’ll continue that run into this series too. OG is a defensive beast, and Gary Trent Jr is a scoring machine. I’m not convinced this Raptors team is capable of a massive upset this season, but they’re definitely capable of upsetting a distraught Philly team.
Philly will have to show up in their home games, they can’t afford to lose a game at home. If they can win those first 2 games, they can travel peacefully to Toronto, they could even afford to lose both games in Toronto and still take the series down the line. But if they drop one game at home, all of a sudden the pressure on this team will be huge. And the pressure is already at boiling point. The Philly audience has no patience and will not want to see another offseason with Embiid wasted. Embiid himself will not want to see another offseason wasted. Can Harden prove his worth to this organisation? I’m sure he wants to, with $260 million on the line. This series is going to be a very interesting one, but, as usual with Philly, more so because of what goes on off the court than on the court.
PICK #4
Our fourth pick of the week is the Golden State Warriors against the Denver Nuggets. This is the series of the injured. Basically, the team that comes out the healthiest will win this series. Luckily for the Warriors, Steph Curry is back and ready to play. That means that the Warriors can count on their preferred starting five with Curry playing alongside Klay, Draymond, Andrew Wiggins and Kevon Looney. In the Denver camp we’re still waiting on some good news. Shams Charania of the Athletic reported last week that Jamal Murray will probably not return these Playoffs, but MPJ could be fairly close to a return, maybe even during this series. Then again, if he doesn’t make it back in this series, there might not be another series to return to. You know, if the Warriors are able to knock off the Nuggets.
And they’re definitely capable. The Warriors finished third in the regular season and that’s pretty impressive given Curry missed about 20 games, Draymond nearly 40 games and Klay only played 30-odd games this season. This team has relied on their role players all season, probably why Wiggins made it to the All-Star game although K-Pop fans made sure he didn’t miss it. Jordan Poole made an incredible leap this season and just looks like a seasoned splash brother on the court. He’ll play a very important role for the Warriors these Playoffs, no doubt about it. And vets like Iguodala, Porter and Bjelica are always tough to win the bench minutes against.
And that is where Denver will struggle, when Nikola Jokic is not on the court. His on/off numbers this regular season were off the chart. The difference this season was nearly +20 in 100 possessions, that’s huge. Jokic will have to pick 4 games throughout the series where he can be so dominant that it doesn’t matter what the rest of the team does. Four games where he will need to put up Wilt Chamberlain numbers in order to beat these Warriors. It is very unlikely it will happen, but after the season we’ve seen Jokic play, I’m not interested in betting against him. Then again, he might not have anything left in the tank after the season he played. This could be a walk in the park for the Warriors, and exactly the warm up they need in the lead up to clashes with the Grizzlies and the Suns.
PICK #5
Our fifth pick of the week is the Miami Heat against the Atlanta Hawks. A series between the number 1 and 8 is rarely an interesting match up and chances are pretty high that it won’t be any different this season. Only, it doesn’t happen very often that the number 8 in the league has one of the best offensive players in the league. Trae Young made more points than any other player in the regular AND dished out the most assists too. He will be a handful for Miami to control and with Trae there is the chance he will go off on any given night. And he showed us last season that he can pretty much do it whenever it counts, leading the Hawks to the Conference Finals.
But Miami is still the number 1 seed, and they’re a well-deserved number 1 seed based on the whole season. They fought hard and led the league for a very long time, and yet, something doesn’t seem right. For a lot of people, me included, Miami is not the favourite to come out of the league, in fact, I wouldn’t even put them in my top 3. And funnily enough, that in itself will make Miami a favourite because these bulldogs love to be the underdog. They live off negative commentary and being disrespected. Jimmy Butler, Bam Adebayo and the rest are out for revenge after losing the NBA Finals in the bubble against the Lakers. They want to prove to everyone that they were deserving to be there and even to win it.
The Hawks have something to prove as well. Somewhere early in the season, Trae said that they’re having a hard time getting motivated for the regular season. And the Hawks really struggled to make it, but they are now in the Playoffs. Let’s see if they struggle to get motivated. Trae has made it hard on himself, because he has to win this series otherwise that quote will end up biting him in the ass. We’re going to see 2 scrappy teams who don’t want to lose in the first round and they’re going to go hard at each other. The first team that can win away from home, will likely be the winner of the series. My money is on Miami, who do you got?
This is our All-NBA team of the Week. Please share our podcast and give us 5 stars. If you have any questions, you can contact the show on eight2fouroffice@gmail.com. Thank you for listening, ballers out!