Kobe, LA Lakers advance to meet Denver Nuggets
Kobe, LA Lakers advance to meet Denver Nuggets
It took the Lakers a little longer than expected, but they finally put the Houston Rockets away with an 89-70 win in Game 7 on Sunday to move into the Western Conference Finals for a second straight year. Next up for Kobe Bryant & Co. will be Carmelo Anthony and the Denver Nuggets. Game 1 of the series tips at 9:00 p.m. (Eastern) on Tuesday with ESPN providing the telecast from the Staples Center in Los Angeles.
The top two seeds in the Western Conference have made it through the first two rounds of the 2009 NBA Playoffs – just like we scripted it.
The Los Angeles Lakers made it interesting, though. They needed a seventh game to put away the Houston Rockets in the Conference semifinals; the Sunday afternoon crowd at Staples Center witnessed a superior defensive effort in a one-sided 89-70 final, enough to pay the Lakers as 13-point favorites. L.A. finished the series 3-1 ATS at Staples and 1-2 ATS at the Toyota Center.
There weren’t going to be any cliffhangers in the other Western semifinal. The Denver Nuggets put the boots to the Dallas Mavericks in five games at 5-0 ATS, just like they did in the first round against the New Orleans Hornets. Both losses were on the road and by a single bucket. Denver is the hottest team of the four remaining in the playoffs at 17-4 SU and ATS since Mar. 25. The Jekyll-and-Hyde Lakers are 16-7 SU and 12-11 ATS during the same stretch. The numbers for the full season don’t add up to a lot of cash for L.A. fans:
Los Angeles (regular season): 65-17 SU, 43-39 ATS, Over 42-39-1
Los Angeles (playoffs): 8-4 SU, 6-6 ATS, Under 8-4
Denver (regular season): 54-28 SU, 44-37-1 ATS, Over 42-40
Denver (playoffs): 8-2 SU, 10-0 ATS, Over 6-4
Head-to-head: Los Angeles 3-1 SU, 2-2 ATS, Under 3-1
The Lakers were favored by 8½ points for each of their regular season matchups with Denver. But the early betting odds for Game 1 had the red-hot Nuggets getting just 6½ points. And while betting surveys had Los Angeles drawing two-thirds of the action against the spread, the Nuggets were pulling in 98 percent of the moneyline at +250. Their recent hot streak includes an 8-2 ATS mark in their past 10 away games to leave Denver 25-20 ATS on the season.
Not bad, except for the fact that one of the losses was in Los Angeles. Here are the four final scores:
We can throw the first result out of the window – that was when the Nuggets still had a backcourt of Anthony Carter and Allen Iverson. The April matchup was missing one of Denver’s key ingredients, power forward Kenyon Martin. And the only Lakers defeat on this list was during Andrew Bynum’s lengthy absence. Tuesday’s opener will be the first time we’ve seen these particular versions of the Nuggets and Lakers in action.
I think it’s fair game to compare this series to the 2004 NBA Finals. MVP Chauncey Billups is just as good at point guard now as he was when he led the Detroit Pistons to the title over Derek Fisher and the Lakers. This was also the year that Gary Payton’s career jumped the shark in L.A., but in the end neither Payton nor Fisher had an answer for Billups in the Finals. That should still be the case five years later.
The case for the Lakers, as it was in 2004, is that they have the better overall collection of talent in this series:
Carmelo Anthony: 19.0 PER
Kobe Bryant: 24.3 PER
Nene: 18.8 PER
Pau Gasol: 22.2 PER
Chris Andersen: 18.1 PER
Andrew Bynum: 19.9 PER
Kenyon Martin: 13.6 PER
Lamar Odom: 16.5 PER
J.R. Smith: 16.8 PER
Trevor Ariza: 15.5 PER
Chauncey Billups: 18.8 PER
Derek Fisher: 12.1 PER
Those advanced stats don’t do justice to the excellent defense both teams have played to make it to the NBA’s Final Four. The defensive assignments will also be different and changing constantly as coaches Phil Jackson and George Karl milk what they can out of their talented and deep rosters. But the numbers support the premise that the Lakers have the horses to win the series, especially at home. Denver’s value with Billups at point guard is on a single-game basis – starting with Game 1 (ESPN, Tuesday 9:00 p.m.) and a chance to improve to 11-0 ATS in the playoffs.
It took the Lakers a little longer than expected, but they finally put the Houston Rockets away with an 89-70 win in Game 7 on Sunday to move into the Western Conference Finals for a second straight year. Next up for Kobe Bryant & Co. will be Carmelo Anthony and the Denver Nuggets. Game 1 of the series tips at 9:00 p.m. (Eastern) on Tuesday with ESPN providing the telecast from the Staples Center in Los Angeles.
The top two seeds in the Western Conference have made it through the first two rounds of the 2009 NBA Playoffs – just like we scripted it.
The Los Angeles Lakers made it interesting, though. They needed a seventh game to put away the Houston Rockets in the Conference semifinals; the Sunday afternoon crowd at Staples Center witnessed a superior defensive effort in a one-sided 89-70 final, enough to pay the Lakers as 13-point favorites. L.A. finished the series 3-1 ATS at Staples and 1-2 ATS at the Toyota Center.
There weren’t going to be any cliffhangers in the other Western semifinal. The Denver Nuggets put the boots to the Dallas Mavericks in five games at 5-0 ATS, just like they did in the first round against the New Orleans Hornets. Both losses were on the road and by a single bucket. Denver is the hottest team of the four remaining in the playoffs at 17-4 SU and ATS since Mar. 25. The Jekyll-and-Hyde Lakers are 16-7 SU and 12-11 ATS during the same stretch. The numbers for the full season don’t add up to a lot of cash for L.A. fans:
Los Angeles (regular season): 65-17 SU, 43-39 ATS, Over 42-39-1
Los Angeles (playoffs): 8-4 SU, 6-6 ATS, Under 8-4
Denver (regular season): 54-28 SU, 44-37-1 ATS, Over 42-40
Denver (playoffs): 8-2 SU, 10-0 ATS, Over 6-4
Head-to-head: Los Angeles 3-1 SU, 2-2 ATS, Under 3-1
The Lakers were favored by 8½ points for each of their regular season matchups with Denver. But the early betting odds for Game 1 had the red-hot Nuggets getting just 6½ points. And while betting surveys had Los Angeles drawing two-thirds of the action against the spread, the Nuggets were pulling in 98 percent of the moneyline at +250. Their recent hot streak includes an 8-2 ATS mark in their past 10 away games to leave Denver 25-20 ATS on the season.
Not bad, except for the fact that one of the losses was in Los Angeles. Here are the four final scores:
- Nov. 1, 2008: L.A. Lakers 104, Denver 97 (Nuggets +8½)
- Nov. 21, 2008: Denver 90, L.A. Lakers 104 (Lakers -8½)
- Feb. 27, 2009: L.A. Lakers 79, Denver 90 (Nuggets +2)
- Apr. 9, 2009: Denver 102, L.A. Lakers 116 (Lakers -8½)
We can throw the first result out of the window – that was when the Nuggets still had a backcourt of Anthony Carter and Allen Iverson. The April matchup was missing one of Denver’s key ingredients, power forward Kenyon Martin. And the only Lakers defeat on this list was during Andrew Bynum’s lengthy absence. Tuesday’s opener will be the first time we’ve seen these particular versions of the Nuggets and Lakers in action.
I think it’s fair game to compare this series to the 2004 NBA Finals. MVP Chauncey Billups is just as good at point guard now as he was when he led the Detroit Pistons to the title over Derek Fisher and the Lakers. This was also the year that Gary Payton’s career jumped the shark in L.A., but in the end neither Payton nor Fisher had an answer for Billups in the Finals. That should still be the case five years later.
The case for the Lakers, as it was in 2004, is that they have the better overall collection of talent in this series:
Carmelo Anthony: 19.0 PER
Kobe Bryant: 24.3 PER
Nene: 18.8 PER
Pau Gasol: 22.2 PER
Chris Andersen: 18.1 PER
Andrew Bynum: 19.9 PER
Kenyon Martin: 13.6 PER
Lamar Odom: 16.5 PER
J.R. Smith: 16.8 PER
Trevor Ariza: 15.5 PER
Chauncey Billups: 18.8 PER
Derek Fisher: 12.1 PER
Those advanced stats don’t do justice to the excellent defense both teams have played to make it to the NBA’s Final Four. The defensive assignments will also be different and changing constantly as coaches Phil Jackson and George Karl milk what they can out of their talented and deep rosters. But the numbers support the premise that the Lakers have the horses to win the series, especially at home. Denver’s value with Billups at point guard is on a single-game basis – starting with Game 1 (ESPN, Tuesday 9:00 p.m.) and a chance to improve to 11-0 ATS in the playoffs.