After each game day until the end of the NBA Finals, we’ll be taking a look at the conventional wisdom of the moment — which team is the current favorite to win it all, and which team should be ashamed to still be putting on its jerseys.
Here’s how it looks on the morning of Monday, May 30.
Start planning the parade:
Miami Heat
No one seems happy about it outside of area code 305, but the Miami Heat are on their way to completing the journey they set out upon last summer. LeBron James and Chris Bosh will get their first title, Dwyane Wade his second, and afterward they’ll drink champagne while sipping on the tears of Cleveland residents and puppies, most likely.
The saddest thing about how all of this is playing out is how incredible those three are performing in this postseason, and no one is able to enjoy it due to the circumstances that brought them together.
Is that irony? It’s something.
Give it up already:
Dallas Mavericks
If this were a Disney movie, there is no doubt the Mavericks would win the NBA championship, besting the evil empire and their history in the process.Unfortunately, this is real life. And as much of a feel-good story as Dallas is, the Mavs have only one of the best basketball players in the world while the Heat have three. Usually, that’s all that matters.
Finals matchup: Point Guard
Jason Kidd vs. Mike Bibby
Two old pros who have been chasing a championship for a long time, and could use a ring to justify their status among their brethren. For all of his individual success, Kidd wasn't able to get the Nets over the top in successive Finals appearances in 2002 and '03, and he's well aware that his opportunities on the big stage are dwindling. His shooting has dropped this season but the 38-year-old is still diming people up, averaging almost eight assists per game in the playoffs with a sterling 3.3 assist-to-turnover ratio. Against a team like Miami that lives off of deflections and runouts, protecting the ball is crucial, and Kidd is still among the best in the game at it. Despite his shooting dropoff, the Mavs will still move Kidd to shooting guard on occasion. He's more wily on defense now than able to stay in front of people and use his size and strength; he took Kevin Durant down the stretch in the Mavericks' clinching Game 5 win and stripped him clean as Durant tried to go by. It would not surprise to see him get Wade in similar situations in The Finals.
Bibby has struggled mightily since coming to Miami, shooting an abysmal 26 percent in the postseason; even his true shooting percentage, which incorporates both two- and 3-pointers, along with free throws, has been awful in the playoffs: 34.7 percent. To be fair, it would be difficult for anyone coming in with six weeks to go in the regular season to try and find a comfort zone playing off of the Super Friends, and Bibby showed a few signs of life late in the Chicago series. But if you're Dallas, and you have to concede something, it's hard to imagine it wouldn't be letting the 33-year-old Bibby fire away to his heart's content.
EDGE: DALLAS
