Heres a statement thats bound to ruffle a few Laker fan's feathers. 

The Lakers were lucky to sneak away with a game 1 victory.  How often do we see a team shoot 14% in a 4th quarter and still be in a position to win inside 2 minutes?  And NO I don't attribute this to a stingy Laker defense.  The Spurs have been doing this all season against many different teams.  They go through stretches where they have trouble scoring.  In the final 18 minutes of game 1 the Spurs could only manage to score 20 points.  2 of those came on a dunk by Kobe off a Timmy miss.  So really we can say that they only managed 18 points in 18 minutes, yet they stll had a chance to grab homecourt in the closing minute of the game!

Scoring is something that can be on one night and off another.  Defense, however, is always going to be a constant.  How many times do you hear a commentator say a player is having an off night on defense?  The point im getting at is that the Spurs are going to be playing defense no matter what. 

Are the Spurs going to have anymore scoring droughts during this series?  Highly likely.  Will they go 18 minutes and only manage 20 points again?  Probably not.  I think its going to depend on who steps up for their respective team.  If fisher and odom can manage more than 12 points combined than they stand a great chance at winning.  On the flip side if Manu can manage more than just 10 the Spurs stand a great chance.  The Spurs shooters also have to demonstrate that they can knock down open threes.  I think the Spurs will shoot better in game 2 and if the play defense as well as they did in game 1 they will not only win game 2, but the series.

Tonights loss at Utah only reaffirms one thing for the Spurs: One of the few things left for the the defending champs to prove, winning back to back titles, will likely elude them yet again. 

After the loss I decided to look back at their schedule and was pretty horrified at what I saw.  The Spurs have not had a quality win since December 7th.  No, I don't consider beating the Bynum-less Lakers last week a quality win.  So taking that win out of the mix it has been   over 7 weeks since the Spurs have beat a team with a winning record.  After discovering this very alarming stat I decided to see how many quality wins, that is beating teams with winning records, the Spurs have had on the road so far.  To my chagrin I found that the last quality win the Spurs registered on the road was...well...the 2007 NBA Finals in Cleveland. 

Thats right the Spurs have yet to beat a quality team on the road this season.  They beat the Hornets at home on November 9th, if you can call any win that early in the year a quality win.

The traditional Rodeo road trip will be probably more critical than ever this year.  The Spurs during the Tim Duncan era don't typically start playing their best basketball until February and March, but this season might be unlike any other during Duncan's tenure.  The Spurs have to prove to themselves that they can beat a winning team on the road.  With a game against the Suns looming on Thursday they will get that chance very soon. 

Jimmy please just stop embarrasing yourself.  Do you actually think any of us are fooled by this 'objective analyst' facade you are putting up.  The worst part is that I am a Cowboys Fan!! The latest article by ole Jimmy, however, is ridiculous.  Granted there were a few good points in there, but in no way are the Cowboys better than the Patriots right now.  You notice I do emphasize the right now. 

I don' t think the Patriots will go undefeated, even though they should.  By the time they are playing the G Men in week 17 they will have already locked up homefield throughout the AFC playoffs.  There will be no need to play their starters for more than a half.  The Giants, however, will very likely be jockeying for playoff position.  Especially if they are playing to lock up homefield advantage in the first round.  I doubt you will see Brady in the 2nd half of that game, unless we see Belichick get greedy, which is a very good possibility. 

As far as the Cowboys or Pats argument there is really no comparison here right now.  The Patriots are superior on both sides of the ball.  Does this mean the Cowboys can't beat them?  Not at all.  As we have seen in the last couple of weeks the Patriots are more than capable of being beat.  Dallas has the right tools to do it.  If the 'Boys hadn't fallen behind so quickly in their week 6 meeting they might have been able to execute the gameplan they needed.  Run, run, run.  Instead they fell behind by 14 quick and were forced to play from behind most of the game. 

Running the ball against the Patriots is beneficial in many aspects.  None more important than keeping their offense off the field.  If the Cowboys can use their two headed monster of Jones and Barber to wear down the defense, you might see a different outcome than when the two met the first time.  If you go three and out against their D, then you are in for a long day.  Again, the Cowboys have the right tools , if they can stick to and carry out the gameplan effectively.  I noticed when the teams first met that the Patriots can be run on.  In fact, in the second half of most of the games i have watched, they have been an average run defense at best.  Couple that with the fact that the Cowboys score more points in the second half than any team in the league, and you have a recipe for an upset.  The most important job of the Cowboys if these teams meet again in the Super Bowl, will be to not let the Patriots come out firing on all cylinders like they did the first time around.  The Patriots are undoubtedly the better team.  But the Cowboys can beat them if they are able to keep Brady off the field.

Dallas, Tx

ESPN has just received unconfirmed reports that Terrell Owens just took a leak.  Again, the ex-49er and Eagle and now member of the Cowboys just urinated.  An annoymous source reports that Owens was at home when this occured.  ESPN will be continuously covering this story throughout the day.   

Much to my chagrin i fear the NBA finals have already been played.

With that said I have to say that after reading through a recent post by my man Bri Moore, I feel that I can safely make the assumption that no one outside of South Texas is dissapointed the Spurs are not representing the West in this year's finals.  With Moore's post and the comments thereafter to back my assumption, its evident that there is a general feeling amongst almost everyone that the Spurs are boring

But why?

Outside of the Dallas' game two thrashing of San Antonio, which I unfortunately payed to witness, was the west semifinal not one of the most riveting and epic 7 game series' in recent memory?  Two overtime games, including game 7!  The other four games being decided by a grand total of 9 points.  Of those four two being decided by only a point.  All four were still any team's game inside 2 minutes  I was literally emotionally drained after almost every game in the series.  This is the first time in my life that I was ever happy to see a series end with my team coming up short, simply because these nail-biting, down-to-the-wire, "balls to the wall" contests were more than i could take.

Is this something that only a Spurs fan can appreciate?  Can one person look me in the eye after watching that series and tell me that they were not entertained by every game save game two?  I will concede to the fact that the Spurs don't put up a lot of points.  Does this make them boring?  What really matters in an NBA game?  Is it not the fourth quarter? 

What the Spurs did in game 7 was incredible.  After weathering lights out shooting by the Mavericks in the first half, and being down by as much as 20 at one point, they were still able to somehow claw their way back into it. 

How about the boring Tim Duncan.  41 points, 15 rebounds, and 6 assists.  He gave everything he had in that second half.  He was so cramped and dehydrated after the game that he literally went straight from the press conference to the trainer's room and was put on IV's for several hours to rehydrate himself.  Isn't this what its all about?  He and his fellow teammates showed more heart than I have ever witnessed.  I have never been more proud of my team.  Not when we won our first title in '99, or after finally getting past the Lakers in '03 to take the title, or even last year after winning the finals in a hard fought game 7.

As a Spurs fan it hurts to see my team not in the finals, but as an NBA fan it hurts even more to hear that almost everyone is glad that they aren't.  Without taking anything from the Mavericks, I am still not convinced they are better than the Spurs.  Furthermore, the Spurs deserve a little more respect than hearing everyone say they are glad they aren't in the finals.  They are just as an exciting club to watch as the next team.  Granted, they come from a small market down in San Antonio where seemingly no one wants to watch them not because they are boring, but more likelt because they are such a small market team with an equally small fan base.  Could that be what its really about?  They don't have a colorful player similar to the likes of Shaq, or an even more colorful owner like Mark Cuban.

Ask anyone in San Antonio and they will tell you.  Down here we love our Spurs.  To us, we love them because they are just as exciting to us as the Lakers are to those crazy cats from Los Angeles.  Watch highlights from the epic west semifinal from this year and I bet you won't disagree.