Rose rocks

The NBA playoffs are underway and the weekend featured a bunch of games - some of them good, some of them bad and few of them great. There were also some great personal performances from some names old and some new. LeBron and Kobe didn't do anything to change our opinion that they are on a collision course. LeBron had a 38-8-7 game on Saturday and Kobe was Kobe on Sunday - nailing ridiculous jumpers to kill Utah runs. They both won without being really challenged. There were also some strange results as a bunch of road teams won. Philly beat Orlando and Dallas beat San Antonio on the road. Rockets beat Portland which had no answer for Yao Ming. I thought Portland was the team thats supposed to be loaded with young, big bodies, but seems like none of them are big enough for Yao as Yao didn't even miss a shot.

The guy who was really impressive and who served me a plate of crow for lunch was Derrick Rose. I love his game, but he had a big-time coming out party on Saturday against the Celtics. I was dogging the Bulls and saying how the Celtics can beat them with or without KG, but Derrick Rose was so awesome he showed me why and how the Bulls could beat the Celts with or without KG! Dude had 36-4-11 and shot 12-19. Numbers that are some kind of rookie records at various levels. I think nobody except MJ has scored like that in a playoff debut. The Celtics clearly missed KG and both Ray-ray and Pierce went AWOL. Rando was the only guy who showed up, but his 29-9-7 was not enough as the Bulls took it in OT.

I still think Boston takes this series, but nothing is going to be easy without KG. You realize how important he is on both ends of the floor when he is not playing. They came back and won today's game behind some solid shooting by Ray-ray. We can't over-analyze 2 close games, but if I have to put some money, I'll still put it on Boston. But Rose had 36 the other day and Ben Gordon dropped 42 today - another MJ type performance and apparently he is only the second guy outside of MJ to score 40+ for the Bulls in the playoffs. Of course MJ did it 38 times or something. Ridiculous! So lets see what they do the rest of this series. It should be a good one.

San Antonio came back and won against Dallas at home today as well after losing to the Mavs on Saturday. I expect the Spurs to win too when it's all said and done. Tony had 38 today and he needs to play at a high level to get the Spurs through. Manu is out and Timmy is hurt. But Timmy holds the cards for the Spurs and the dope-head Josh Howard is the key for the Mavs. That guy is hard to handle if he is doing good. This should be an interesting series too. Orlando lost at home to Philly and I still think the rest of that series may not even be that interesting if Orlando wakes up, which I expect them to anytime now. Denver blew out New Orleans as Chauncey went nuts with 36 points. He has been a God-send for the rich-and-creamies and lets see where they end up. At the end of the day, this playoffs is about 3 teams - Lakers, Cavs and may be the Rockets. Denver and Magic have an opportunity to step up and fill some of the void especially if Duncan is ineffective. But will they ? We will know over the next few days and weeks.