What's All the Hype About? NBA Conference Finals Outlook

Lets first look at the teams that each had to play in order to get to the conference finals.  The Cleveland Cavaliers had the Detroit Pistons and Atlanta Hawks.  Now the Detroit Pistons were absolutely awful this year after trading away Chauncey Billups. 

Detroit seemed to lose their identity as a defensive juggernaut and offensively they seemed to get worse as well.  In fact Detroit gave up more points than they scored this year. 

Atlanta Hawks were a legitimate challenge for the Cavs.  Atlanta had good defenders lead by Josh Smith and an underrated superstar in Joe Johnson.  However, Atlanta came out flat, was banged up, and didn't have a true low post threat offensively.  Not to mention that Atlanta isn’t the greatest threat offensively.

Denver has faced the likes of the New Orleans Hornets and the Dallas Mavericks.  New Orleans has had a down year and has had a lot of key injuries plague their team. Tyson Chandler being the biggest, seeing as he is the defensive post threat that the Hornets rely on.

James Posey was banged up a bit and Peja wasn’t the same this year, with his numbers (FG%, 3PT%, PPG, FT%, etc.) decreasing.  So Denver wasn’t taking on the good Hornets team of a year ago, but I will tip my hat, because they still had to get by Chris Paul. 

The next task was to defeat the Dallas Mavericks.  Dallas advanced because San Antonio was minus Manu Ginobili and like the Hornets banged up as well.   Dallas isn’t an overly impressive team, sure they have Dirk Nowitzki, but who else do they have besides that.  Jason Terry? All he can do is score and he is an inconsistent one at that. 

Jason Kidd?  An over the hill point guard, who looked absolutely awful in the games versus Denver.  Josh Howard? Josh is a good player, but I think we all expected him to take is game to the next level, but he may have taken a tiny step back.  The bench is also thin, so I am not overly impressed with the teams the Nuggets have played either.

So Cleveland gets to face an Orlando Magic team that has defeated them two times this year out of three meetings.  Orlando will be a very difficult task for the Cavs, not only because they can shoot the three, but they have a dominant post player in Dwight Howard, who will likely cause fits for Cleveland. 

Orlando can also guard the perimeter and it will be tough for LeBron to get those easy drives with Dwight in the post. Expect this to be a back and forth series with what I think is a likely chance to go to a game seven.

As for Denver, they will have to take on the defending Western Conference champs.  They will have a tough assignment in Kobe Bryant compared to Jason Terry.  The key may be Lamar Odom, who could present a tough match up for Carmelo Anthony or Kenyon Martin. 

However, if Lamar struggles and they can continue to play tough defense and play up-tempo, creating a lot of fast breaks, Denver may be in a good position.  Again expect a very good series, but don’t be surprised if Los Angeles takes it before it reaches a game six.

Predictions:

Eastern Conference: Orlando Magic over Cleveland Cavs in seven.

Western Conference: Los Angeles Lakers over Denver Nuggets in six.