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Trashcan Burn is a blog site dedicated to, well, anything we feel like. Video games, movies, buzz topics, sports-- whatever! Eventually, we might narrow down the scope, but for now, free reign is the rule. (And, yes, the spelling is intentional!)
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February
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I'll think before I write about the subject, but do remember that any pictures you put up have to be yours or copyright free. So, if that picture is from NBA.com, I suggest you take it down, Markus. One kid in my Web development class actually got sued because he put up copyrighted material (a couple pictures) on his student project. Just don't want any of us to get sued...
ReplyDeleteWHAT!? It's from ESPN.com, i don't see anywhere on the page that it says i can't use it or that it's copyrighted or anything like that, but maybe i should take it down anyway? I don't wanna get sued either and i seriously doubt i would anyway, you gotta love Odom doing some serious penis dunking on the Cavs home court win streak.
ReplyDeleteWell, it's obvious that the East is better this year than it has been for several years, for a couple different reasons.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, we all know that the East has been a top-heavy conference for several years now. There have been a few teams at the top--Boston, Detroit, Cleveland, Miami--and the rest of the conference has sort of sucked for the last 5 or 8 years. This year we have that again--Cleveland, Orlando, and Boston are light-years ahead of anybody else in the conference--but instead of widespread mediocrity in the rest of the conference, we have a number of respectable teams. Atlanta is proving that last April was not a fluke and they're a pretty good team, especially when they're all healthy. Miami is playing well because of Wade's return and some strong rookie play from Chalmers and Beasley. Philadelphia, thought they've been very disappointing, is playing well. Even teams like New Jersey, Milwaukee, and New York aren't sucking as much as many expected.
Now, having said all that, the West is still clearly better in my book because of the tremendous depth they have 1-through-9. Any of these 9 teams would be in the top 4 or 5 in the East, easily. I mean, right now in the West the #9 seed is Utah at 29-23. Can you name a team in the East besides Cleveland, Boston, and Orlando who is better than Utah, especially if hey were 100% healthy? No, because there isn't one. So, just like in previous years, there will be a team in the West who will not make the playoffs who is probably better than at least 3 if not 4 or 5 of the teams in the East who do. That alone makes the West better than the East to me.
I don't know how much this adds to the discussion, but I'm shocked by the improvements in Cleveland and especially Orlando.
ReplyDeleteBoth teams seems tremendously similar to previous incarnations and yet they're performing at such a higher level. Is it just individual improvements manifesting on a macro scale?
Re: Cleveland and Orlando...I think a HUGE reason Orlando has improved so much is the play of Jameer Nelson. Look at his numbers from last year to this year, particularly his scoring and three-point shooting percentage.
ReplyDeletehttp://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/stats?playerId=2439
The only major complaint about Orlando last year was it's so-so backcourt, and Nelson has almost singlehandedly answered that question. Add in the way Howard is playing, with Lewis and Hedo there (even though Hedo is having a much worse season than last year, particularly his shooting percentage), and the strong contributions from rookie Courtney Lee...there you go. That's why the Nelson labrum injury is so serious...unless he's back from the playoffs, they could go down real quick.
As for Cleveland, their offense has improved tremendously, and I credit it almost solely to Mo Williams. Even though his numbers aren't THAT great, the simple fact that LeBron now has someone who CONSISTENTLY scores more than 15 points a game and who can hit thress is huge. Cleveland's offense is flowing a lot better this year too...more movement off the ball, better ball movement, better three-point shooting from guys/scrubs like Szcerbiak, and solid inside play from guys like Ilgauskas, Side-Show Varajao, and even JJ Hickson...then add LeBron having another MVP-caliber season. Bam.
Mark, about the photo: did you read ESPN.com privacy rights or rights of usage? NBA.com and ESPN.com don't put copyrights (like most companies) on the picture itself but explicitly state rights in a separate statement. You have to be really careful about the shit. I was going to put up a sweet picture for Fallout 3, but I couldn't because every game site and Bethesda site I went to has strict usage rights. Double-check that man because this site is in my name.
ReplyDeleteAs for the discussion...
I can't really say either side is better because some of these "great" teams in the West cannot beat the "great" teams in the East. Vice versa. Road trip records speak a lot. For instance, compare road trip records of the top eight in the West and East combined: West= 113-89 vs. East= 106-96. Four teams in the East have a winning record on the road and five for the West. What does this tell me? Both sides are pretty shitty outside the top four per side. So, realistically, the top eight in the league are about on par. I could care less about the rest for either side. If you can't win on the road, you can't really win the playoffs.
However, there is one final thing to consider. Out of all the teams in the NBA, only four teams have a winning record against teams above .500. LA, Boston, Cleveland, and Orlando. Seems like the East is pretty stacked here.
So, who's better? East. If you want to compare all the teams, then I give to the West, but if we're talking realistic runs to win at all and playing well on both the road and home against good and bad teams, I have to give to the East. Gut instinct wants me to give to the West out of habit, but I have to admit the East is finally better than the West.
Copyright that ESPN! I'm still gonna give it up to the West but just from gut instinct, my biases, and the fact that i think the West is still deeper. However, i think the gap is pretty much closed now, like i think it's 55/45 at most, so i think it's actually pretty close. We'll let the Allstar game decide it, that's a real contested game that's a good gauge....
ReplyDeleteThe All-Star game as a gauge? You make me laugh sir!
ReplyDeleteRe: copyright issues...I talked to a journalist friend who works for the City Pages at the T-Wolves game tonight, and he said as long as your site isn't making money, you can use whatever images you want without permission and it's cool. Hell, he said the City Pages has been sniping photos and haven't gotten in trouble for it yet, and that's debatably one of the most popular weekly magazines in the Twin Cities. Just saying.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I realize that odds are nobody will notice, but as I stated before, I know a guy who actually got sued for a school project. There's no profit there. Plus, if you read the copyright statements, they usually ask for recognition in the form of a link (sometimes expressed consent a la ESPN and NBA). The law technically isn't on our side.
ReplyDeleteI know exactly what you are talking about though, and I wouldn't care except when I created this site Google flipped a bitch about making sure I understood the rights and privileges regarding material that doesn't explicitly belong to us.
Plus, and I'm being extremely optimistic here, sometime down the road we might actually get some hits. It would be nice to profit from that. As long as we stay cool now, it wouldn't be a big deal later. I know that's a very remote possibility, but hey--- Matt, I know you said you wished you could just write about games for a living. If we get good at this and do some promotion...