Game 24 Preview: Blazers vs. Cavaliers [Updated]

I grew up watching Bruce Lee films courtesy of my dad who legally changed his name to Bruce in admiration of him.

Hope Blazers win or not lose that badly, Joel wins, Bayless dunks on LeBron and it snows tomorrow in Portland.

we might not lose

He’s just not even worth talking about as I"m buttering my toast anymore… and that’s sad.

Unfortunately, we’re wee bit short there since Greg went down and our starting PF is soft. Maybe Varajao catches H1N1 before the game?

Webster needs to play big minutes and be productive and the rebounding has to stay near even. If Roy has to guard LeBron extended minutes due to us playing 3 guard lineup, we’re roadkill.

To see what kind of energy JB and Dante can bring rather than “develop” Blake, Miller and Howard since there is no way those stalwart vets are going to “manage” a win.

24 point BLOW-OUT!!!!!!!!!!

Jerryd Bayless with the quadduple-double, Juwan Howard blocks Shaq 5 times, LA tears the rim off the hoop and eats it. Steve Blake is run down in a tragic exploding licorice cart accident. Miller dedicates his 25 pt, 12 assist game to the memory of Steve and pours some Hennessey on his court-side ash pile…

yep…perfect game all around….

We gotta fight and not let Cleveland just show up and win.

As long as we play hard, I’ll be happy.

And please play whoever is playing good. If, say, Bayless happens to be doing good, what the hell— give the stupid fat dumb ugly kid some more run, ya know? Just for poops and chuckles.

Mortimer

And who else……LMA? Howard?

…I just envision the final battle in “Game of Death” at the top of the enemy pagoda. Bruce almost met his match there.

If they re-made that movie today, I’m thinking Oden would be a great casting choice for Kareem’s character.

Bruce Lee is a movie star poser….

Please don’t ask LBJ for a pair of his autographed game shoes before the game and pretend they are for someone else (like you did last year).

… as the starting lineup is basically that from last year, with Webster in place of Batum. But what’s missing is a bench. No Travis or Rudy, or for that matter Channing Frye.

Here’s where Andre, Jerryd, Dante and Juwon have to step up.

Making the trip from Columbus to the Cleve for this one, through the zero degree windchill.

At the time I bought these tickets, I was looking forward to seeing Mr. Oden in person for the first time since he shook the backboards at Ohio State. It was not to be…

What’s the over/under on the Cavs rebounding advantage? I say the Cavs will outrebound Portland by at least 17. Anybody got the under? Watching Howard try to box out Varajeo will be interesting.

Also, who will guard Lebron when Martell’s not in the game? Dean better scrap the three guard line up…

really scared. No way the Cavs are going to lose 3 in row. Even if somehow the Blazers manage to stay close the refs will fix it so that the Blazers don’t have a chance. I’m reminded of the game last year when Lebron “blocked” that 3-pointer by Travis and when Travis “traveled”. That game should have been the Blazer’s. I’m still convinced the LBJ is some sort of hybrid because no one should be able to move that fast when they are 250lbs.

first time in a looong time, i’m going to a blazer game. this should be fun.

That will really throw ’em off.

    Sometimes when it appears in reality and on paper there is no reason you should win a game, or be able to win a game, that becomes exactly when you do win the game. Yes, on paper it looks like you could scribble in a “L” with some degree of relative confidence but we’ve played The Cav’s pretty well in the past. It’s not totally hopeless.

  To further on Daves martial art film analogy we need to change the script. The problem in the old martial art films is the hero was often attacked by overwhelming amounts of adversaries, entire clans of Ninja’s, entire populations of “evil” villages…you get the picture, BUT the hero always ended up dispatching the competition. Why? Because in the old martial art films huge groups always lined up and conviently attacked the said protagonist ONE at a TIME…we need to change that. We aren’t going to stop LeBron, we have to know that, but we also must know that we need to make this a team game. If we are to beat the Cav’s it will be as a team, if we are going to slow LeBron? It will be as a team. If we go one on one against The Cavs and LeBron? Then it’s going to be a long, long night.

Mo Williams & Andy Varejao both ill, missed shootaround, questionable vs. Blazers. Daniel Gibson (finger) also questionable.

Andre threw a ball at him last season. They also got into it once when Williams was on the Bucks.

“After Williams drew a charge on him, Miller threw the ball at Williams with 6:27 left in the first quarter and the two exchanged words and received technicals. Moments later, Miller fouled Williams on the other end of the court. More words were exchanged and Williams, who said he was mostly talking to himself, was ejected.”-link

Should be interesting.

is to be close late and make LBJ beat you. As crazy as it sounds, in their losses he almost forgets he has teammates (I call it the LBJ+4 stiffs offense) and he can often get cold or take bad shots. See their playoff loss to Orlando last year as example 1.

just don’t let him go to the hoop

Update: Well, the Blazers are apparently the ill-aspected ravens of the league when it comes to bringing injury and misfortune to town. Brian Windhorst is reporting that the Cavs might be missing Anderson Varejao and Mo Williams tonight due to illness and Daniel Gibson due to a finger injury. Nothing conclusive yet, but it appears the Cavaliers will enter the game short-handed. A word of advice to the rest of the NBA: when Portland comes to your city just meet them at the gate, toss them some vittles, and tell them to go away. Just forfeit the game. You’ll be happier in the long run.

No kidding!!!!!!!!! It seems in practically every Blazer game someone gets hurt, either one of the Blazers or someone from the other team (Chris Paul, Hasheem Thabeet). At this rate by the end of the season half the league will be out with injuries.

…oddly, you omit Frenchie and Trout. I guess those guys have been out so long, we don’t even think of them as part of our team anymore.

Batum in particular will be missed tonight. His length and quickness (if not his bulk) would have caused LeBron problems. Conversely, with GO, Batum, & Trout all out, look for LeBron to frolic like a hungry lion at a watering hole populated exclusively by infant gazelles.

Are proof that we have some serious serous Gods on our side that apparently fight with the Gods that hate us.

The only thing that would prove it even more if it He/She smote LBJ (not seriously but enough to keep him out of the game) like the gods did with Chris Paul and Danny Granger.

Besides, how would having him injured help the Blazers? True, he could go either left or right. And, with his rep for arm-twisting, I guess he’d have been tough in the paint. But had LBJ played in the NBA, surely it would have been for the Rockets, Mavs, Spurs, or Wizards. No way would he have been a Cav.

He can at least challenge LeBron’s shot because historically Batum deals with the ‘superstar’ on the opposition. Let’s just hope our shots start falling like they did against the Pacers and we force the Cavs into a shootout with us where they’re going to have to have LeBron tear us up to beat us.