I'm actually not. Remember my big prediction? It was assuming the Lakers end up with the 3rd seed. I then went on to state that if they don't I view them as the second most likely contender. It all comes down to tonight really. If the Mavs win the Lakers almost certainly aren't going to catch them. Remember I'm picking all of this based on a 95% confidence interval so I could always be wrong.

Good game Paulie. When it came down to it we had plenty of chances we just missed the open shots. It will be one hell of a playoff matchup that's for sure.

Of fucking course, it wasn't even on tv here :/ laaaaame. From the box score though it looks like it was a dead even game.

Yeah it was bizarre that because of college basketball one of the most compelling games of the season was on NBA TV nationally. Mavs shot like shit particularly early (they didn't make a three until the 2nd half I believe) and Dirk was off in the first half before coming back on. Unexpectedly though they murdered LA on the offensive glass. But they let LA rip off a run near the end of the half and though they managed to chop it to 2 right at the end they kept missing the shots (some of them wide open) that would have really pulled them back. Kobe's injury looked really scary but one of the big stories of the game was how well Marion played him defensively.

Other thoughts. The Lakers D is playing really well right now. They made the Mavs make several really ugly decisions on offense. Correspondingly the Mavs played really good defense but the Lakers got more marginal shots to fall. Marion on Kobe and Chandler on Gasol were the particularly good matchups. The officiating wasn't great but it wasn't really a big factor.

omg

The shots of him in Santa Monica are priceless

he really doesn't look THAT much like Pau when he takes the shades off

Lakers: 10-1 in their last 11, 7 wins against playoff teams and 5 of those on the road. Giving up an average of just 87.7 ppg, margin of victory +9.6ppg. Sexay. Still got a tough schedule left, though luckily most of it's at home. 10 more wins would be nice.

Spurs receive asses on a silver platter. Guess that's how much things can turn around if you're cold and the other team's hot.

i've listened to the nba analysts over the last few months and i now have my prediction:

the Lakers are over-the-hill
the Spurs are wearing down
the Mavs have never got it done when it mattered most
the Heat don't have the depth or chemistry
the Bulls don't have the experience
the Celtics lost their size and toughness
the Magic are too reliant on the 3-pointer
the Thunder don't have a third option offensively

therefore, my prediction is that nobody will win the NBA Championship this year.

obviously im being sarcastic (Corrections, i dont believe that Mavs thing anymore than any of the others, don't worry). seriously if you listened to espn you'd be convinced that every contender can't contend based on something.

So is Dwight Howard the MVP thus far?

Howard, Rose, Dirk, Lebron... I think they all have good cases. Rose seems to be on top of most people's lists.

I think most would agree that Patty Mills is far and away the best candidate

would seem so, even though john hollinger consistently and effectively (imo) disproves rose's mvp credentials... had dirk not missed those games earlier i think i might have given him the edge, he's been incredible this season (though to have dirk win as many mvps in his career as kobe and shaq combined would be ridiculous). bron and wade have been brilliant but they also cancel each other out a bit. i do think that leaves howard as the optimal choice.

i think everyone is overthinking the MVP thing. my general rule: if the best basketball player on the planet is on a top 5 team, why are we trying to rationalize someone else as MVP? its like the MVP has become the Coach of the Year award, and by that i mean we are now trying to give it to the "biggest surprise" of the elite players instead of the best (i mean, why has Kobe not even been in the discussion the last few years while being a top 2 player on a top 2 team?)

imagine you are looking historically at 2011. Kobe, a top 10 player in history who is still statistically within his "prime years", is playing on a top 5 team coming off two championships. LeBron, a likely top 15 player in history when its all said and done (and maybe higher) is at his absolute peak and is playing on a top 5 team.

why then are we trying to give the award to Derrick Rose (and i LOVE him by the way), who is probably the 2nd best PG in the league if CP3 was healthy and who is probably the worst defensive MVP candidate since Barkley (ok ok, Nash).

i vote no on Rose for these reasons: Unseld, McAdoo, Barkley, Malone, Robinson, Nash, Nowitzki. because we are destined to look back and say "really? Derrick Rose?"