Gee Whiz, They Play Basketball In Canada...

[MajGenl.Meade]

It's ironic that last year they did better with two of the "best three" out of action. This year they are in action but also inaction. Fun fact: Kevin Love is something like a second cousin to the Beach Boys' Mike Love.

[MajGenl.Meade]

[Lord Jim]

[rubato]

Anyone want to predict that CC will win at least one game?

yrs,
rubato

[Lord Jim]

I knew they were in trouble when I tuned in a few minutes after the game started and they were already down 15-4...

Things got a bit better by half-time, but you don't win when your defense melts down...

“We weren’t ready to play,” Warriors Coach Steve Kerr said. “Obviously, they just punched us right in the mouth, right in the beginning.”

That pretty well sums it up...

[MajGenl.Meade]

As if we ever doubted that!

[Bicycle Bill]

They get one rest day between games, except that they provide an extra day off for travel day, both for the players and the entire entourage of media and team officials that travels back and forth (otherwise, it makes no sense to have game 4 on a Friday night and then game 5 on a Monday night when Sunday is generally a much preferable date). Clearly, though the Cavs are not showing it, having the rest day between games generally allows for a better recovery and superior basketball play, and ditto for the extra day for travel. BB, your comparison to the inert game of baseball is inapt -- baseball requires a high degree of skill and very occasional bursts of top effort, but is in no way exhausting (the only thing exhausting about baseball is the travel schedule). In contrast, basketball, like soccer, involves a substantial and exhausting physical effort with the typical player running over 3 miles per game, much of that at a high effort level, combined with numerous jumps and cuts creating much pounding on the leg joints; the typical NBA player puts in more effort in a few trips up and down the court than the typical baseball player puts in an entire game (pitchers excepted, who by the way, pitch once every 5 days, which under your thinking makes them uber-softies).

Not to belabor the point, LR, but there was no travel time between game one and game two (both played in California); nor is there any travel time between games four and five, as well as games five and six (all of which are scheduled in Cleveland).

Now look at the road trip my town's college-level summer-league team is currently on:

• ● Mon 6/6 — 7:00 PM home game in La Crosse WI
  ● Tues 6/7 — bus to Eau Claire WI (about two hours north), road game @ 7:00 PM vs Eau Claire
  ● Wed 6/8 — bus to Wilmar MN (roughly four hours west of Eau Claire), game @ 7:00 PM vs Wilmar
  ● Thur 6/9 — stay overnight in Wilmar, game 2 of series @ 7:00 PM vs Wilmar
  ● Fri 6/10 — get up early AM and bus to Thunder Bay in Canada (an eight-hour bus ride not counting time at Customs); game @ 6:00 PM (ET)
  ● Sat 6/11 — stay overnight in Canada, game 2 of series @ 5:00 PM (ET); after game, board bus for overnight drive back to La Crosse (and second pass through Customs); arrive back in La Crosse roughly 6:00 AM
  ● Sun 6/12 — rejoin host families, maybe sprawl out and grab some ZZZ's after spending all night on a bus — but don't forget; home game tonight at 7:00 PM!!

Keep in mind, these are college players, generally between 19 and 23; these kids don't get paid; they are doing this more for what is described as "the minor-league experience" of road trips like these, wooden bats (just like in the MLB), and getting to play in front of 2000-4000 people almost every day for two and a half months (72 games over a 76-day season.  Remember too that there is a team in Thunder Bay and their closest opponent in the league is in Duluth (MN), maybe four hours south; with teams in the rest of the league scattered across Minnesota and Wisconsin as well as two teams in Michigan (Kalamazoo and Battle Creek) and one team each in Illinois (Rockford) and Iowa (Waterloo), they have an itinerary like this — or even more grueling — literally EVERY TIME they leave home to go play a road game.

See why I call the pros a bunch of wussies by comparison?

[MajGenl.Meade]

Baseball? Standing around scratching their crotches for three hours? At 65, I could play that schedule. Would be a rotten player but sitting on buses and doing not much sport at all for hours on end should be pretty easy.

[No Greater Fool]

They get one rest day between games, except that they provide an extra day off for travel day, both for the players and the entire entourage of media and team officials that travels back and forth (otherwise, it makes no sense to have game 4 on a Friday night and then game 5 on a Monday night when Sunday is generally a much preferable date). Clearly, though the Cavs are not showing it, having the rest day between games generally allows for a better recovery and superior basketball play, and ditto for the extra day for travel. BB, your comparison to the inert game of baseball is inapt -- baseball requires a high degree of skill and very occasional bursts of top effort, but is in no way exhausting (the only thing exhausting about baseball is the travel schedule). In contrast, basketball, like soccer, involves a substantial and exhausting physical effort with the typical player running over 3 miles per game, much of that at a high effort level, combined with numerous jumps and cuts creating much pounding on the leg joints; the typical NBA player puts in more effort in a few trips up and down the court than the typical baseball player puts in an entire game (pitchers excepted, who by the way, pitch once every 5 days, which under your thinking makes them uber-softies).

Not to belabor the point, LR, but there was no travel time between game one and game two (both played in California); nor is there any travel time between games four and five, as well as games five and six (all of which are scheduled in Cleveland).

Your scheduling foo needs improvement. After game 4 the teams alternate sites.

[rubato]

Baseball? Standing around scratching their crotches for three hours? At 65, I could play that schedule. Would be a rotten player but sitting on buses and doing not much sport at all for hours on end should be pretty easy.

As long as you can, once in a while, turn on a fastball for a double, throw a player out at third from right field catch a flyball at the warning track at a dead run, backwards, turn a double play, or steal second base you can scratch away and collect buttsplinters to your hearts content the rest of the time.


Yrs,
Rubato

[MajGenl.Meade]

Gee whiz... they are all done playing basketball in Cleveland

[Bicycle Bill]

Gee whiz... they are all done playing basketball in Cleveland

On the 'plus' side, since Golden State "stole" a game from Cleveland on their home court, anybody who goes to their local Taco Bell between 2:00 and 6:00 PM on Tuesday 6/21 will be able to get one free Doritos™ Locos taco.

Yippee.

-"BB"-

[Lord Jim]

This was definitely the best game of the series...

For once, both teams played like they belonged in the finals...

[Lord Jim]

I'm going to the game Monday night...

My Brother-in-law Roman Craig has secured two (rather good actually ) tickets for the game...(not in the private box section, but in a high class mezzanine section that has access to better quality food and drink then what is available to the hoi poli...I've attended Warrior games in this seating section before...It's a pretty good way to watch a basketball game...)

He gets good local sports tickets because of the business he's in...(He has a fairly successful sport promotion shop, selling all kinds of Bay Area team oriented jackets, shirts, caps, etc.)

He and I don't have the world's greatest relationship...And I absolutely do not trust the man...

My initial response when he made this offer was, "That sounds great Roman. But are these real tickets, or are we going to have security guards surround us and escort us out when the people who actually have these seats show up?"

He assured me that would not be the case...(We'll see....)

What lends an air of authenticity to this, is the fact that I wasn't his first choice...he was planning to go with his brother, but he's out of town...And my sister-in-law doesn't want to go...

So I decided I couldn't turn this down...

So, on the plus side I'm going to attend what is probably going to be an impressive NBA championship finale from an excellent vantage point...

On the negative side, I'm also going to have to spend about five hours in the company of an insufferable braggart...

I'm willing to go with that trade off...

[MajGenl.Meade]

On the negative side, I'm also going to have to spend about five hours in the company of an insufferable braggart...

Well, you should be used to that - all the alone-time you get?

Enjoy Cleveland's victory!

[Bicycle Bill]

On the negative side, I'm also going to have to spend about five hours in the company of an insufferable braggart...

At least it will (hopefully) distract your mind from whatever new faux pas your party's candidate commits between now and then.
And trust me, he will.

-"BB"-

[Lord Jim]

Well, the first half was exciting...

You're not going to win a whole lot of games when you allow both James and Irving to score 41 points and you score 4 points on 16 turnovers...

It would have been nice to have been at a championship winning game, but it was not to be...

[Long Run]

It would have been nice to have been at a championship winning game, but it was not to be...

[Lord Jim]

That's exactly the kind of non-empathetic, heartless response I'd expect from a Republican...

[MajGenl.Meade]

Well, the first half was exciting...(

... as was the second half, only even more excitinger.

Game 6 will be ours and that just leaves one game to go in the most amazingest historicalest comebacky thing of all time!