HOOPSWORLD - Atlantic Predictions

[CeltsSteve@xxxxxxx]

My PC has been going wacky since this morning's series of KLEZ Virus related 
emails. I've been getting Emails from myself; notices of "undeliverable" mail 
that I never even attempted to send in the first place; as well as a 
pornographic file attachment from someone that I'll leave nameless but who is 
on both the Celticsstuffgroup@yahoogroups.com list and the celtics@igtc.com 
list.

That said, hopefully this will post without a glitch:


Breaking Down the Atlantic Division 

By <A HREF="mailto:mmaine@hoopsworld.com";>Michael 'Magic Man' Maine</A>
for HOOPSWORLD.com
Sep 22, 2002, 2:15am

Breaking Down the Atlantic

As a reporter for News@hoopsworld.com, you get to see the comings and goings 
of the NBA - and especially the specific teams and divisions you cover - on a 
daily basis. This provides for some in-depth knowledge of the division 
especially in regard to the fact that you get to see each and every 
transaction which occurs during both the busy and not so busy times of the 
year. And as avid readers of the News@ will no doubt quickly point out, being 
a reporter for this establishment also tends to put you in the position of 
having to stand up on the soapbox every so often and basically lay your neck 
out on the line with your ideas on who is helping and who is hurting 
themselves the most.Now, let me first point out to those of you who might 
have missed it, this reporter in particular is partial to a certain team 
based in the Sunshine State, as is well evidenced by simply reading the 
'byline'. So when trying to actually decide on what my predictions for the 
upcoming season were going to be, of course it was hard not to let that 
personal bias as a fan come into play. But you must also remember that 
Hoopsworld in general makes us all that more appreciative of each and every 
team which we as individuals cover and read about as our contemporaries cover 
them on a daily basis. So, with all of this being said and training camps 
being less than two weeks away, here then are the Magic Man's 
prognostications for the Atlantic Division during the 2002-2003 NBA season. 
(For those of you who like to turn to the last page of the book and read how 
the story ends, you can simply scroll down and read the projected order at 
the very bottom of the team by team breakdown...you cheaters!)

Boston Celtics: The Celtics are one of those teams who are hard to figure 
this year for one simple reason - GM Chris Wallace literally decided to take 
the Coach Larry Brown approach to things and blow up the roster which had 
just nearly won the division. By pulling the trigger on the deal which sent 
starting PG Kenny Anderson, F/C Vitaly Potapenko and 2nd year G Joseph Forte 
- who C's President and resident legend Red Auerbach had once called 'the 
future of the team' - all packing off to rainy Seattle in return for F/C Vin 
Baker and G Shammond Williams, Wallace proved he is a gambling man. If Baker 
can remotely resemble his form from his earlier Milwaukee days (in which he 
was an All-star) then he surely can become a legitimate third option behind 
forwards Paul Pierce and Antoine Walker as far as scoring is concerned. But 
by giving up the much-maligned Anderson, the storied franchise also gave up 
its only true point guard and a man who literally has not been given his due 
credit for helping this team finish where it did last season. Garnering 
Williams in this move though may prove the real kicker in the deal. Williams 
has been buried in Gary Payton's shadow the last few years and therefore 
unable to break out. If he can actually reach his potential - and rookie J.R. 
Bremer can turn into a true backup at the position - then the Celtics have a 
real shot at being something special.


Miami Heat: If there is any professional sports team you can actually feel 
sorry for, then this is the team. How do you replace the heart of your 
franchise and still hope to compete? And that is exactly what this team will 
have to try and do in order to get themselves and president/head coach Pat 
Riley back into the playoffs after the first absence in the legendary coach's 
career last season. Riley said it himself last week during the press 
conference which reviewed Heat center Alonzo Mourning's unfortunate situation 
with regard to his kidney disease: "There is no replacing 'Zo." The real 
question for the Heat though becomes whether or not Riley actually goes with 
what he has been telling media in Florida since the news on Mourning broke, 
and that is a wide open uptempo style which will cater to the strengths of 
legitimate Rookie of the Year candidate G/F Paul Pierce and his considerable 
talents.


New Jersey Nets: The defending Atlantic Division and Eastern Conference 
champions are easily the team which is most improved not just in this 
division but possibly in all of the NBA this season. By adding C Dikembe 
Mutombo, PG Chris Childs and F Rodney Rodgers to this roster while only 
giving up F Keith Van Horn - who didn't fit well with F Kenyon Martin or PG 
Jason Kidd - and C Todd MacCulloch, Nets GM Rod Thorn has legitimately put 
his team in the hunt for not only another Eastern Conference Championship, 
but possibly an NBA title as well. It doesn't hurt that these moves may well 
also garner Thorn a well deserved second consecutive Executive of the Year 
Award. Look for the Nets to come to a town near you and beat the pants off 
your favorite team sometime soon.


New York Knicks: While Antonio MacDyess is going to be a perennial All-star 
now that he is playing in the much weaker Eastern Conference, anyone who 
remotely thinks that he is going to be the savior of this franchise is sadly 
mistaken. MacDyess is indeed a monster in the paint in both the scoring and 
rebounding statistics. But he is not a legitimate center and he is not a 
legitimate point guard and those are the two positions which this team still 
needs to address before it moves out of the lottery. Think there's a reason 
that ESPN.com rated Knicks GM as the 26th rated GM in the league out of all 
29 teams? The MacDyess move was the first good move Layden has made since he 
took over in the Big Apple, and frankly, it's far from enough to turn this 
team into a contender for much of anything any time soon.


Orlando Magic: Another team with some huge question marks and a lot of what 
if's surrounding it. What if the newly signed F/C Shawn Kemp decides to park 
outside of the local Krispy Kreme franchise and pick up young Central Florida 
women in order to continue his quest to hold the record for having the most 
illegitimate children by an NBA player in a career? What if Grant Hill's 
troublesome ankle finally decides to call it a career? What if this team goes 
into the season literally having to rely on a guy named Andrew DeClerq to be 
their defensive stopper in the paint? All of these are truly staggering 
questions for a team which literally has ridden the ailing back of budding 
superstar G/F Tracy McGrady into the last two off-seasons only to be 
summarily shown the door by bigger, stronger teams. Still, all reports so far 
indicate that Grant Hill actually is back to his old self, though a little 
rusty which two years off does to anyone. And this makes the Magic an odds on 
favorite to be to pull the same rabbit out of the hat which Boston did last 
year and be able to ride two legitimate stars deep into the playoffs for the 
first time since the Shaquille O'Neal days.


Philadelphia 76ers: While all the real news coming out of Philly over the 
summer centered on All-star G Allen Iverson and his legal troubles, head 
coach Larry Brown and GM Billy King also did some of their usual tweaking and 
sent out aging C Dikembe Mutombo in return for a legitimate second scoring 
option in small forward Keith Van Horn and a Philly fan favorite in the now 
returned C Todd MacCulloch. But can Iverson learn to share the ball and feed 
Van Horn? Which version of the Iverson and Larry Brown Jeckyl and Hyde 
relationship are we going to see this year? The one where everybody at least 
tries to play nice like we saw in 2000 and which helped this team make it to 
the NBA Finals? Or the one we again saw last year which erupted into the now 
infamous 'practice' press conference in which Iverson basically said 'look, 
I'm a superstar, so no one should expect me to practice.'? With these answers 
lies the future of this franchise.


Washington Wizards: Has anyone else noticed that Michael Jordan and company 
are trying to be a professional version of the NCAA's Atlantic Coast 
Conference in the NBA? With the recent addition of fellow University of North 
Carolina alumni G Jerry Stackhouse to this team, Jordan and company now boast 
a total of 6 ACC players on this roster. Three Tarheels - Jordan, Stackhouse 
and C Brendan Haywood; a Maryland Terapin - Juan Dixon; a Clemson Tiger - 
Chris Whitney; and surprisingly for Jordan, one Duke grad - F/C Christian 
Laettner. If Jordan is half as good as the reports are making him out to be 
this offseason, and Stackhouse can learn from the master/part team 
owner/teammate Jordan, then the Wizards are going to be downright scary to 
watch. Throw in the fact that with the recent addition of newly retired big 
man Patrick Ewing now aboard to tutor the young big men on the Wizards roster 
and this team may well be the biggest mover in the whole division. 


So, there's the breakdown on each team and small look at why this reporter 
believes what he believes with regard to each. All of that though, is simply 
justification for what follows, and what I am sure most of you actually want 
to have on record so as to be able to hold it over my head and send me your 
emails later in the season telling me how so utterly wrong and foolish I was 
to have come up with any of this:

1) New Jersey Nets - too much firepower for anyone in the East allows them to 
repeat as Eastern Conference champs. 
2) Washington Wizards - Stackhouse plays nice and gets reigned in by the 
master of all players, MJ. The big men on this team help it compete against 
any team in the league. 
3) Philadelphia 76ers - Larry Brown and Allen Iverson both have someone else 
to complain about other than each other as Keith Van Horn turns into the 
legitimate second scoring option but is a true liability in Brown's defensive 
minded schemes. 
4) Orlando Magic - Kemp drops thirty pounds and plays with a fire not seen 
since his days in Seattle, Grant Hill spends the first half of the season 
shaking off the rust and then actually turns out to be that coveted second 
option to T-Mac which the franchise always hoped for during the 2nd half of 
the season. 
5) Miami Heat - Heat ride two amazing rookies - Caron and Rasual Butler - and 
amazingly climb the fence in the Division. Brian Grant excels at the 5 spot 
in replace of Mourning and Eddie Jones finally shows up to earn his 
multimillion dollar contract. 
6) Boston Celtics - The Vin Baker experiment fails miserably while the team 
also searches for some consistency at the point guard. Either Pierce or 
Walker get hurt and the C's end up staring at the lottery a year after 
pushing the Nets to the brink of elimination. 
7) New York Knicks -No one to play center. No one to play point guard. No one 
to stop Allan Houston from throwing up bricks. No one to stop Spree from 
choking Don Chaney. No one to stop the fans from continuing to chant for 
Scott Layden's firing. No hope for the Knicks despite the second highest 
payroll in the league. 

As always, I welcome your rants, raves and other types of complaints about 
how I wronged your team and I didn't give them a fair shake or that I'll be 
sorry when they actually win the division outright. Just remember though, 
there is a three time defending world champion from Hollywood who really 
doesn't care who wins the Atlantic Division, because they will be chomping at 
the bit for their next victim unless the Kings can somehow find a way to 
dethrone the Lakers and overcome the loss of F Chris Webber to the judicial 
system all at the same time.

- Michael "Magic Man" Maine 
    
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CeltsSteve