Lebron Is Human (And That's Just Fine)

So the Celtics won at home 96-83. Not a shocker. They showed a lot of poise when the Cavs whittled down a 16 point lead to an 8 point lead in 3 minutes flat during the second quarter and eventually built and even larger lead. Nor surprising at all. Marcus Morris got a tech, definitely not unexpected. Jayson Tatum is already a star. Okay, that's a bit surprising but not shocking.   

What was unexpected was Lebron James showing signs of fatigue during the game. James was sloppy (6 turnovers), off target (1-6 from 3pt land) and worse, lacked his usual energy on defense (1 steal, 0 blocks)

Rockets Hang Tough, Proves Point.

Until Game 4, the Rockets haven't really proven that they can win against the Warriors when the going gets tough.

But why is that so important?

It goes to that great intangible mental toughness. It speaks to the ability to shut out the screaming crowd, the score, the fatigue, the person guarding you and make that shot you'd make 10 times out of 10 during practice.

It May Be 2-2 But Cavs Have The Edge Now

Before we get all huffy-puffy, let me just say that this Boston team is scary. With their two best players (Irving, Hayward) sidelined, they have proven themselves to be more worthy rivals to the Cavs than the Raptors ever were.

And yes, I remember that Boston beat Cleveland in Game 1 by 25 points, and in Game 2 by 13 points. It isn't about that, or about the Cavs returning the favor by beating the Celtics by 30 points in Game 3 and by 9 just today. (That's +1 for the Cavs by the way.)

Four Is Still Better Than Two.

When your soon-to-be-MVP star scores 41 points on 14-24 shooting and above 50% in 3 pointers, you should win.

When your soon-to-be-HOFer All Star guard scores 23 points and grabs 11 rebounds, you should win.

Except the Houston Rockets didn't.

The Boston Celtics Are For Real, So Deal With It.

So, let's talk about the elephant in the room.

Lebron James is still the best player in the planet (sorry, Kevin Durant).

Still, as the Indiana Pacers and, just this morning, the Boston Celtics have proven, basketball is a team game, and the better team has a better chance of going through.

How do we know the Boston Celtics are the better team (versus the Cavs, the Raptors, the Pacers and the Bucks)?

Because they've lost 2 franchise-level players in Kyrie Irving and Gordon Hayward and yet, here they are, not just in the Eastern Conference Finals but in the Eastern Conference Finals and dominating the Cleveland Cavaliers in Game 1.

Three Wins and a Loss

The Jones Cup record of this version of Gilas now stands at 3-1. After a tough opening day loss to Canada, the Gilas boys have notched wins over Chinese-Taipei’s A-Team and B-Team as well as Japan’s Under-24 Team.

None of their victories came easy, which have led to a lot of negative reactions online. So now we ask the question, should we be worried?

My answer is no, primarily because of these three things:

PLAYER DEVELOPMENT

The likes of Kiefer Ravena and Jio Jalalon would never make it to court, we had the likes of Jason Castro and Terence Romeo on the team. Neither would Christian Standhardinger, the revelation of the tournament, had Blatche, Fajardo, or Aguilar been on the team.

Giving these players a chance to play significant minutes allows us to build a strong reserves system, which hopefully minimizes the drop off in skill, talent, and chemistry when our current Gilas stars are unavailable to play.

It also allows us to create some kind of continuity between Gilas teams. Remember when Alapag was the senior guy and Castro the understudy? That worked out pretty well. And then there was Castro as the maestro and Romeo as his student. Soon, Romeo will be our main guy, with Jalalon or Ravena primed to take over. This tournament will go a long way to getting them ready for that day.