NBA Finals Preview: Lakers vs. Magic

You just have to love sports; there are no two ways about it. Still, I can give you two more ways to love sports.

The first way is that sports makes everyone think that they can see the future. Like me for instance, who saw a future that never came to be in a world where the Nuggets and the Cavs both won their series in six games.

I went from worrying about the mojo that the city of Denver has over Cleveland to adding yet another city that has mojo over Cleveland.

Let's see that list real quick:

Pittsburgh (decades of kicking Cleveland butt)
Oakland (Red Right 80)
Denver (the Drive and the Fumble)
Chicago (the Shot)
Miami (Jose Mesa)
Orlando (the Puppet Masters)

I wish there was a list of cities that Cleveland had mojo over, but you have to win to gain that kind of upper hand.

Even those at Nike, who set up the marketing campaign, had it wrong as they had the Lakers (symbolized by a puppet Kobe) against the Cavs (puppet LeBron).

That leads to the second way that sports is great. As the nation laughed at the antics of those two puppets, the Orlando Magic got really upset. So upset that they went out and proved that they deserved their own puppet (unfortunately Dwight Howard is not on the Nike payroll).

So, the interesting NBA Playoffs have the two best teams in the NBA Finals. Sorry to any Cleveland fans that feel like the better team lost the Eastern Conference Finals, but Orlando was the better team in five of the six games played.

The Magic really put it all together in the seventh game against Boston, in a series they also played better in five of the seven games. They steamrolled the Cavs in the East Finals and now are at the biggest stage.

The Lakers are a tough team to predict because if properly motivated, they sure look like the best team in the NBA. When they are in "we just have to show up" mode then they are very beatable. It is hard to think that they would not be properly motivated for this series after the beat-down they took in last year's finals.

The thing is that the Magic are a great team. They took the best punches from the team with the best record in the NBA and they stood tall and punched back. There is no reason to think that they will have any type of letdown now.

The Lakers do have a taller team that will match up better with the Magic. The Lakers have four guys they can throw at Dwight Howard and try to get him in constant foul trouble.

One thing I learned about myself from my horrible Conference Finals picks is that I like to predict the future then explain why I was wrong. I like it even better when I predict the future and I am right since I don't have to explain anything then.

So, although I would like to see the Magic beat the Lakers, I have to go with the Lakers to finish what they started last season and take the NBA title in six games. It should be a competitive series and the Lakers will be happy to win the title at home in front of their front-running fans.

The Staples Center will not be as quiet as it was last year, and that is my final prediction.