The Threematch: What everyone has been waiting for?

Well, all of THAT kind of sucked. Thankfully the NBA's preseason-like playoffs have concluded and the league is right back where it started this year with Cleveland getting another chance to "defend the land" against the greatest superteam ever assembled in the Golden State Warriors. Neither team has been tested thus far throughout the postseason (although shout out to Indiana on a fun series) and frankly, anybody that claims to have any idea what a superduperteam can do versus the most dominant lethargic postseason team I have ever seen is lying. Nobody has any clue what will happen with these two when neither team has faced any real adversity (Lebron's game 3 sickness does not count) nor have either them given full effort for three consecutive games these playoffs. How can you tell when a team isn't giving full effort? It's pretty simple really. For Golden State, not giving full effort usually involves a heavy reliance on JaVale McGee in the paint and heavy minutes to the Patrick McCaws and David Wests of the world. Cleveland got to the point against Boston where they just let Kevin Love take a majority of his shots from beyond the arc and Lebron was being a bit more passive than we've seen from him all season.

These playoffs were soooooooo obvious that I stopped recapping the series immediately because there was absolutely nothing to learn from the results other than which teams should be ready to blow things up and start over anew. Toronto is about to lose Kyle Lowry in free agency (Philly?) and even if they don't, the man looked past his prime this postseason, which is his natural postseason style of play. Kyle Lowry is not winning anybody a championship in their starting lineup. The Clippers also need to blow things up and I would start by removing Doc Rivers from the front office but, since that team has no balls after an eternity of sucking and this sudden, five-year stretch of success under Rivers, they'll probably just keep everybody and depress their fans more than fifty years of losing ever did. Houston and Oklahoma City will return to the playoffs next year but, both teams need to find ways to compliment two uncomplimentable (new word!) stat-hogs for a shot at the Western Conference Finals. The good news is that the future of the Celtics, Bucks, Spurs, Wizards and Jazz will be fun to watch. Just don't count on any of them to prod their way into the Finals while Lebron and the greatest team ever assembled are still fully functioning.


#1 Golden State Warriors v. #2 Cleveland Cavaliers
In order to decipher a winner for this series, one has to observe the key differences between last year's GREATEST FINALS EVER (in terms of entertainment value, sorry Golden State) and this year's squads.

1. Mike Brown will likely be coaching Golden State instead of Steve Kerr due to Kerr's continuously scary back issues.
2. Draymond Green is coming in with no ejectionable offenses and therefor, is unlikely to get suspended during the series.
3. Cleveland lost Timofey Mozgov, Matthew Dellavedova, Mo Williams and Jordan McRae and added Kyle Korver, Deron Williams, Derrick Williams and Kay Felder
4. Golden State lost Leandro Barbosa, Anderson Varejao, Andrew Bogut, Harrison Barnes, Festus Ezeli and Brandon Rush and added Kevin Durant (!), Patrick McCaw, David West, JaVale McGee, Zaza Pachulia, Matt Barnes and Damian Jones
5. Ty Lue is no longer a rookie head coach.
6. Stephen Curry didn't just suffer a minor ankle injury but both Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving did (Pachulia is injured also but, that is not that important)
7. The Warriors weren't trying to go for a historic regular season and instead, saved all of their dominant nonsense for the postseason.
8. Klay Thompson has been frozen cold the last 45 days.
9. Golden State has a 3-day rest edge over Cleveland as opposed to Cleveland having 7 extra days before the Warriors took out OKC in 7.
10. Even though it doesn't mean anything as far as winning or losing are concerned, the Warriors have a higher Boring:Fun ratio with KD on the court and it's sad that something as beautiful to watch as Steph and Klay hitting 600 threes a year is no longer this team's pace.

Scott Cunningham - Getty Images
The addition of Kyle Korver will help Cleveland in response to any deep-shooting runs that the Warriors go on.

Ultimately, we all just want a fun series with exciting plays, drama, ridiculous box scores and no more testicular interruption from Draymond.

                          My Pick: Warriors in 4.

If anybody knows how to prevent Lebron James from winning an NBA Finals, that man is Mike Brown. In all seriousness, I think Golden State enjoyed their rest and if it's going to be an ugly series, I'd rather have witnessed history that would forever alter the league (Adam Silver would go to the furthest lengths in order to make sure no former MVPs join a 73-win team again unless that MVP is Derrick Rose) than see Golden State win in 5 and start the "Can Durant ever be an all-time great?" discussions. Plenty of weird shit can go down between now and game 4 but, this prediction was made without any injuries predicted (there's bound to be one) and under the belief that this is truly the greatest team ever assembled even though their bench is not quite as deep as the past two seasons.

Again, I don't claim to know what in the wide world of sports is about to happen over the next two weeks, all I know is that it needs to be entertaining or historic to make fans forget the past month and a half of non-competitive basketball. Thank god for the unpredictable mess that is Major League Baseball.