The Party's Over

Oops.

S.O.L. was wrong, wrong, wrong. Wrong about Lebron? Maybe a little but in time I believe he will become the great player he showed in his stirring march to the Finals. Wrong more about the Spurs.

Never have I seen a team not called the Lakers or the Celtics look so dominant with so much ease. Talk about firing on all cylinders.

I hate the way that Phoenix series played out. I'll forever believe they stole it from the Suns. But once the Spurs hit their groove, not even the Prime Time Lakers could have stopped them.

Tony Parker is a man among men now. A top-five player in the league in scoring points in the paint. -- at 6-feet tall. There's refs taller than he is, folks. Okay he's French. And yeah, he's dating a Desperate Housewife (soon to be married to her) but no way no how never can you call this kid soft. And he's 25 years old, folks.

Spurs are team to beat until someone tells me otherwise.

Welcome to the newest NBA Dynasty. T.D. Parker, Bowen, Ginobli. You might argue not one of them is quite in or finished with his prime.

I'm still in H-town. I'll post more about my adventures soon.

Tonight, the Mets are in the House That Ruth Built, on a losing streak that's their worst in two seasons and against a revitalized Yankees club that has won nine straight. Something's gotta give.

I was right about The Sopranos, wrong about the Cavs. So, what's one more prediction?

Mets win two of three.

Signing off from
Santa Moncia, CA

Game 2 - Do or Die

Looking Up
I didn't say it was going to be easy.

To call tonight's NBA Finals Game 2 a must win for LeBron and the Cavs is stating the obvious but I think it's interesting how few observers seem to be giving them a chance. San Antonio's dominant performance in Game 1 is a big reason for this but I'm still not backing off of my prediction of a Cavs series win.

I think LeBron will not be as easily shut down as he was in Game 1, if only because every time a team has slowed or stopped him, he's found a way to make them pay the next time. If anything was apparent after the Cavs stormed back to beat Detroit in the Eastern Conference Finals, it was how quick a study of the game LeBron is. I expect nothing less from him on the biggest basketball stage there is. This is going to be LeBron's domain for foreseeable future. He has already shown his understanding of these moments and how important they are for his legacy. And he’s never said he wants that legacy to be about anything but winning.

The Spurs played great in Game 1. They almost played a perfect game. But still, if you take out the can’t-miss third quarter where the Spurs opened up a 15-point lead, the Cavs were pretty much in the game. The Spurs lead at the half was five points. If the Cavs stay within a basket or two of that, their fourth-quarter 13-4 run might have helped them steal the game.

I saw signs of LeBron figuring out the defense in the fourth quarter. He was getting better looks and the coaches were getting him into better position to make shots. I also think the Cavs were surprised at the intensity of the physical play under the basket. You would think after playing Detroit, it wouldn’t get any tougher but there’s a degree increase when you get to the Finals. Refs seem to let the teams play more and they allow more contact. If you’re gonna score, you’re gonna have to earn it.

This almost always is a shock to players playing in their first Finals. It takes two or three quarters to get a feel for it and I think that and the hyped up feeling that’s natural for first-timers, might have put the Cavs at a real disadvantage.

It’s a big hill to climb but I like the Cavs chances of stealing Game 2.

Ciao Familia

I’m a t.v. writer and while I don’t say much about it here, I can’t let tonight’s “The Sopranos” final go by without a personal goodbye.

I don’t know if it’s the best show ever on t.v., but it sure was unique. Creator David Chase and his staff created not merely a series, but a weaving, sometimes meandering turnpike through the soul of America, pitting our trumped up pseudo morality against our insatiable appetite for violence.

You can trace this back to the first season when Tony, on a college trip to Maine with his daughter Meadow, discovers a former colleague turned informant. When he sneaks off during one of Meadow’s interviews to garrote the rat to death with his bare hands, you are without even realizing it, rooting for him to succeed. When the guy’s eyes bulge out and he breathes his last breath, dropping to the ground in a heap, it is a satisfying moment for Tony – and us. It’s these sorts of feats of magic that make this show so compelling and kept me turning in faithfully.

I think Chase will choose to fade out rather than go out with a bang, because his series has always been so novelistic, and as outlandish some of his characters, his anchors have always been real life. Or it could be a bloodbath. But I will miss "The Sopranos," if only because it’s one more smartly written show leaving the airwaves, but what I’ll mourn is the failure of American television (especially the networks) to learn the right lessons from this show's success. That is that characters count and stories need room to grow, that chopping up one-hour dramas into more parts rather than less is killing storytelling. That we need bad characters as much as good ones, that wrong vs. right doesn’t necessarily have easy answers and that the audience is smarter than we think.

The hole in my heart might yet be filled by David Milch’s newest series, “John From Cincinnati,” which follows Tony’s last hurrah tonight on HBO. I have high hopes for this series and the coming season of “The Wire,” and trust HBO will keep the good stuff coming.

But allow me a moment to grieve for what feels like the end of an era.

Thanks David Chase et al and the fabulous cast and ciao Tony and Chris and Sil and Paulie Walnuts and Janice and Hesh, Meadow and A.J., Bobby and Big Pussy and Uncle Junior, and Dr. Melfi of course and Tony's ducks and Carmella. Especially Carmella.

Un amico non è conosciuto finchè è perso. (A friend is not known til he is lost. - Italian Proverb).

King for a Day ... or More?

LeBron's highlight reel Game 5 against Detroit will stand out as one of the greatest playoff performances in NBA history for sure, but only a casual NBA fan would be looking for LeBron to repeat that same performance in Game 6.

He didn’t match his 48-point score whenever, wherever, however performance. If anything, he did better.

In Game 6, which turned out to be the deciding game as the Cavs topped the Pistons for their first-ever trip to the NBA Finals, LeBron scored only 20 points. But his 14 boards and eight assists were both team highs.

His own offense was overshadowed by a previously unknown second-round draft pick rookie, who poured in 19 of his 31 points in the key fourth quarter.

Even without leading his league in scoring, LeBron had his stamp all over the game. This series will be remembered for LeBron’s maturation. And if he can turn it into a victory in the Finals, which begin Thursday night in San Antonio, it will go down as his career-defining moment.

LeBron gets it now. He has learned how to win and more important he has learned how to win under the brightest lights on the biggest stage and in the enemy’s gym.

The reason Daniel Gibson was open -- wide open -- for those three-pointers in Game 6 was because the Pistons knew they couldn’t win without stopping LeBron. What they didn’t realize was that LeBron has learned that he could lead his team to victory without shouldering the scoring burden.

There have only been a handful of players who could control a game without scoring. Few realized that LeBron was in this category before this series.

Sure, LeBron has unstoppable scoring machine in Game 5 was beautiful to watch but that’s not what validates greatness. It was Saturday night’s Game 6 that will solidify LeBron’s place in basketball history.

He took exactly what the Pistons gave him, which wasn't much. He handled the ball on almost every trip down the court. Instead of forcing up shots, ala Kobe Bryant (go watch the 2004 finals) he tried to find open teammates, and he hit the boards. What other superstar player not named Steve Nash would pass up the glory of scoring just to get a win? What other superstar understands the nanosecond-by-nanosecond flow of a game so completely, that his instincts – to shoot or not to shoot – are almost always correct?

It's a freaking short list, people.

LeBron led his team in rebounds and assists and for the series, he averaged nearly a triple double. The most telling thing about LeBron's game is his ability -- at only 22 years old -- to read and react to defenses from moment to moment. On top of that, he's somehow convinced a not-quite-ready-for-prime-time group of players that they are title contenders.

LeBron has become a true leader. He's got his team believing in him and themselves. This is no small accomplishment in professional sports. I seriously wonder if any player so young has been able to accomplish so much with so little talent on his team.

This is why I’m predicting LeBron will lead his team over the Spurs in the NBA Finals.

Yeah, I know. Crazy, huh?

Maybe not.

Nobody has given the Cavs a chance. In Vegas, the Spurs are 2-1 favorites to win in five games.

The Spurs are the smart pick for sure.

They are peaking at the right time. Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobli are healthy. Tony Parker is getting better and wiser every year. They have the deepest bench in the playoffs. They have the best active coach (all due respect to Philip) in the NBA. And they've already been to the mountaintop three times. This Spurs team has never lost in the NBA Finals. And, they have home court advantage.

With all that going for the Spurs, why should the Cavs even show up?

Here's why.

First off, the Spurs Western Conference run, while impressive, was easier than it could have been. Phoenix was the series that was supposed to be the default NBA Finals – the two best teams left in the playoffs. But Robert Horry, Amare Staudamire and David Stern turned that into a dud. Golden State had already taken out the number one seed, which left the Spurs to face the young, inexperienced and ultimately overmatched Jazz.

Not surprising then, the Spurs dismissed them with professional ease.

Second, the Spurs have not faced a defense as good and as disciplined as the Cavs. Anyone who paid close attention to the Cleveland-Detroit series, knows the Cavs out-played the Pistons on the defensive end.

And San Antonio plays offense a lot like Detroit. The Spurs like to run a measured half-court offense, feed it to Duncan on the blocks or use their guards to drive and dish to open three-point shooters.

After watching them take down Detroit, this might not surprise the Spurs, but the Cavs should be able to slow them down, which will keep the games close. And keeping the game close is the key to this series.

Because in the playoffs (as we've seen this entire postseason) close games come down to the fourth quarter. Especially those last seven or eight minutes, it's make-or-break time. The intensity ratchets up higher and then keeps going up impossibly more and more. These are the moments that separate the winners from the also-rans.

These are pros. They’re supposed to be able to hit a three with a hand in your face. But what about hitting a three with a title on the line and your palms are sweaty besides and the ball is slick and your heart is pounding so hard it’s making your hands shake?

Can you make that shot? Or will you apple up and clank it off the rim?

If the two teams find themselves in a close fourth quarter in this series, you might say that a team as experienced as the Spurs would have the overwhelming advantage.

But like I said earlier, the Spurs have hardly been challenged this playoffs. Sure, they’re peaking but is it because they’re finally jelling or is a mirage? Is the reality really that they’ve had a relatively easy road to the Finals?

On the other hand, Cleveland was just baptized by fire.

LeBron & Co., had to look into their own hearts, had to battle the odds of being down 0-2 in a seven-game series. And they not only survived, they came out as a totally different team. You want to talk about peaking, look at the Cavs.

And they’re fresh off of a war, while the Spurs had a comparatively easy series with Utah. While the Cavs fought off the Pistons, the Spurs were at home watching and waiting – and more likely than not hoping for a Cavs win. Because before their collapse against the Cavs, the Pistons were the proven winners. The one team you didn’t want to face.

Well, now that’s the Cavs.

The Cavs, you might be interested to learn, who went 2-0 against the Spurs this season. The Cavs who right now have the league’s best player, this year’s Dwayne Wade, the one guy nobody can stop. Not even defensive grand master Bruce Bowen.

The Cavs who have an active shot-blocking seven-footer and some very nice interior defenders. A host of decent shooters. A tougher complimentary player in Larry Hughes and a coach who was schooled at the Gregg Popovich’s side (he was with the Spurs back when they won their first title).

What I'm saying is the games are going to be close. And if they’re close, I think the Cavs can win. Not just with LeBron's offense, but with his leadership.

I'm picking the Cavs. In six.

LeBron’s earned his crown. Now it’s time for him to wear it.

Welcome to the NBA

Los Angeles Sunset
Roll out two welcome mats this week for young comers, LeBron James and Deron Williams.

For Deron (pronounced like Darrin), the welcome party was not a good one. Coming off a great Game 3 performance in which he single-handedly got his team back into their playoff series against the Spurs, Williams had to fight the effects of a stomach flu and a tough defense down the stretch in watching his team flail, fade and fall to the Spurs in the crucial Game 4. Now the Spurs get two of three in San Antonio to close out the series and get to their fourth title game in the last decade.

Meanwhile, the young Jazz have only to sit and wonder why. And part of the reason is with the meltdown of the team's one supposed veteran. Derek Fisher, until now an inspirational figure and floor leader during Utah's playoff run, completely fucked his team last night. His flopping has always been more suited for World Cup Soccer than the NBA and when he wasn't getting the calls last night, he lost his cool and Utah lost the series.

I'm not sure this is a game you can rebound from but Deron Williams is such an unusual character and such a gifted player, that I think it's entirely possible to see this series return to Utah. Playoff teams have to grow up sometime. Why wait til next year?

Halfway across the country, the NBA's so-called lessor Division is playing basketball too. The feeling among most experts is that Detroit and Cleveland are playing for the right to lose the NBA finals to whoever comes out of the West. I think it's overstated but there's no doubt that the East is way behind the West in terms of fielding the NBA's best basketball teams.

Like the Spurs, the Pistons rushed out to a 2-0 lead and looked headed to an easy series win. But LeBron James continued his maturation as player and leader and with each passing quarter, his play has subtly and not so subtly improved by noticeable increments. Cleveland didn't so much as beat the Pistons on Sunday, LeBron took it from them.

Word is that shooting guard and quality defender Larry Hughes will miss tonight's game with a food injury but I'm not so sure this will slow down LeBron just yet. I think a switch went off somewhere in the course of the fourth quarter in Game 2 and he's coming to understand how to win playoff games. I don't know if he has the horses to help him but I do know that the Pistons are beatable (Chicago won two straight off the Pistons in the last series after they took a 2-0 lead against them) and Dwayne Wade proved last year that they are susceptible to a one-man team.

The Pistons strength is keeping the game close until the fourth where their quality defense (especially in playoffs) and ice-water shooters (Chauncey Billups and Richard Hamilton) hit just enough down the stretch to give them the win. But in a close game, there's no guarantee of stopping a guy like LeBron when he gets it. And right now, he's getting it in a big way.

It's clear by now that S.O.L. fears the end of the basketball season is upon us and for that reason, I'm rooting for the underdog in both series. I'm not ready to give up on the hoops obsession, even if USA basketball is coming this summer. Shit, especially since USA basketball is coming.

Poor Kobe

Kobe announced this weekend that he’s frustrated by the lack of progress by his Lakers and the inability of the front office to surround him with a championship caliber team.

Kobe’s solution is to invite Jerry West back to L.A. when the Logo officially steps down from his current job in Memphis.

The irony here runs deeper than a black hole. In the Kobe-said, Shaq-said fallout in L.A. two summers ago, plenty of blame went around. But no one can convince me that Kobe did not want to be The Man in Lakerland, at any cost. The cost was, apparently, Shaq being run out on a rail – all the way to South Beach where he got his, with the help of Dwayne Wade and a bunch of has been backups.

Meanwhile, Kobe has the Lakers to himself, continues to fail to learn what it takes to be an actual leader of them and wonders why he’s been watching the playoffs (and in his mind less talented players) from the confines of his own home?
Deny all he wants, but Kobe could have gone to Jerry Buss and been a real man and said “do what it takes to keep the big fella – I’ll make it work”. But he didn’t and if anyone’s surprised at the results, they’re not paying attention.

You can’t call yourself a leader. You have to actually be a leader. You don’t have to be a nice guy, you have to get your team to believe – not in you but in themselves. You have to show them the way and let them know they can follow you over the steepest cliff and if they crash, you will crash together. And never, for even a second, let them think you will ask of them what you wouldn’t do yourself.

You want a team leader? Watch the Utah-Spurs game tomorrow night. Take a gander at a kid named Deron Williams. Shoot, you could have your pick tonight in Cleveland – between LeBron and Billups. You want leaders. Them there’s leaders.

Don’t cry for Kobe. Unless you want to cry for his thick head.

Life Goes On

After an appropriate period of mourning over the Suns-Spurs playoff series, S.O.L. is ready to talk about the Western Conference Finals.

It's hard to pick against the Spurs. They're deep, smart, physical, play great defense and most important, they're on a serious roll. Nothing is as important in the playoffs of any of the major sports -- nothing -- than getting hot. How many times have we seen the blistering team beat the better one on their way to an improbable title? Too many times to list here -- and in this case, the blistering team is arguably the better team anyway. But does that mean we should just anoint the Spurs as Western Conference Champions?

Nah.

The Jazz aren't playing half bad either. And they're built for the playoffs. On top of that, surprisingly for a Jerry Sloan-coached team, they score a lot of points and they run a lot.

I think the matchup will come down to Utah's outside shooting -- which will decide who goes on to represent the West in the NBA Finals. The Spurs have a very, very good interior defense -- as they proved against the Suns. If they can stop the best distributor in the league in his sneaker tracks, then there's no reason to think they can't stop a mere mortal from getting to the basket. However, Utah has two things the Suns didn't have. They have bigs who can shoot outside (Mehmet Okur, Andrei Kirilenko) and they've got a strong, tough inside post-up game (Carlos Boozer and Paul Millsap). On top of that, AK 47 can also play a pretty decent point forward and it's hard to stop dribble penetration by a guy who's 6-9 but as rangy as a seven-footer.

Deron Williams, Derek Fisher and AK will get into the lane and if Okur is his usual accurate three-point shooting self, Utah has a chance to spread the floor in a way that Phoenix only did in spurts against the Spurs. Forcing Duncan (and/or Francisco Elson and Fabricio Oberto) to guard Boozer one-on-one will play right into to Utah's hands. And here's where the refs could play a role in the outcome -- Boozer is a master at getting to the line and he continued doing this in the first two rounds. If he can get his share of free throws, that could be a problem for San Antonio. They're deep, yes, but there is a precipitous decline from Duncan and Horry to Oberto, Elson and then to Matt Bonner.

On defense, the Jazz have the big bodies and physical play to slow down Manu Ginobli and keep him from taking over the game like he did in Games 5 and 6 against the Suns.

The big concern for the Jazz will be stopping Tony Parker from dashing around the floor like a speed demon. Williams is going to be great one day but he's still prone to getting into foul trouble and he will have his hands full staying in front of Parker. If he's got two fouls in the first eight minutes, the Jazz don't have a chance.

The X-factor has got to be Derek Fisher, a familiar thorn in the side of the Spurs. How much his veteran leadership adds to the mix, whether he can hit those clutch shots down the stretch like he did against Golden State – those can be turning points, one way or the other.

The Jazz are an underrated team in part because there is a consensus that they lucked out in drawing a second-round matchup against Golden State, the eighth and last seed in the West, instead of number one, 67-win, MVP carrying, juggernaut of Dallas. But the Warriors were not your typical eight seed. Injuries put them in a hole the first half of the season and they not only fought out of it, they imposed their will on the basketball court in getting into the postseason and all but sweeping the Mavs out in the first round.

They play a frantic, scrambling, all-hands defense, like the Orcs in Lord of the Rings attacking the castle in waves upon waves upon waves upon waves. If you can withstand that sort of pressure – and the way the Warriors almost never quit and made shot after improbable shot – you can call yourself a proven playoff performer. If that doesn’t give you confidence that you can win it all, nothing will.

While the Spurs have to feel confident, too, you’d have to think they feel lucky to have been able to dispatch the Suns in six games. Lucky that the League disemboweled Phoenix by suspending two players who didn’t throw a punch – and that the guy who did throw one, is back on the bench in uniform for today's Game One.

They should feel that they are better than Utah, of course, but who could blame them for having a seed of doubt in the back of their minds about what went down in Round One? Yeah, right. Doesn't sound like a Gregg Popovich-coached team, does it? Well, the truth is that over the years the Spurs have been at times mentally soft (2004 vs. the Lakers for example) and anyone who has seen Duncan on the free-throw line knows he can have lapses in confidence.

It’s obvious no doubt, but if Utah is to have a chance in this series, they need to assert it today, in game one. This team has to come out firing, has to keep the pressure on, has to play like this possession right here might be the difference between a trip to the finals and a trip home.

Tomorrow: finally, S.O.L. talks about the East.

Suns Set

Road Oak, Healdsburg, Ca. May 2007
Wow. S.O.L. is not used to being wrong.

But last night’s game between the Spurs and the Suns makes twice this playoffs that I’ve been on the flip side of right. I really thought the Suns would pull out Game 6 tonight, even though it was in San Antonio. But playing short-handed in the previous game seems to have taken the flow out of their free flow offense.

That and a stifling Spurs defense, especially Bruce Bowen on the perimeter and Tim Duncan inside. T.D. had something like 10 blocks in the game, most of them coming from the weak side as a help out defender. When a two-time league MVP and 10-time member of the All-Defensive team, is playing help D, you’re offense is in trouble. Even the high-powered, high-scoring Suns offense.

The Spurs harassed Steve Nash all night and the refs were letting them do it. For the third time this series, Nash and his mates didn’t solve the Spurs’ defense until their backs were against the wall. And except for Game 3 in San Antonio, they ran out of time.

I still think the decision to suspend Diaw and Stoudemire was stupid and could have been handled better. It disemboweled the Suns for Game 5 and now we'll never know what this series could have been had NBA commissioner David Stern kept his whistle in his pocket.

Nash summed it up well in comments quoted at ESPN.com.

"I can sit up here and complain about it after the fact... I guess cry about it after the fact. But it's tough not to just think forever what would have happened if this stupid rule didn't get in the way of this series. There's no guarantees of anything, but to come this far and put this much into a season and for us to be without two key guys for Game 5 for nothing we instigated -- and for not either one of them having a malicious tone in their offense -- will forever haunt us. But I don't want to cry about it after the fact. The Spurs played great."

Allow me to cry then.

This will be a rough summer for Nash and the Suns, a serious bitter pill that was in part self-inflicted. If Amare Stoudemire and Boris Diaw stay rooted to the bench after Robert Horry hip-checked Nash into the scorer’s table at the end of a stirring come-from-behind win in Game 3, we might be talking about the Suns moving on, instead of the perennial championship-contending Spurs.

The only good thing about the Spurs going on to win another title is Duncan and coach Gregg Popovich surpassing Phil Jackson and the Lakers’ recent run. Three titles don’t seem all that impressive when the other guy is out there winning four. And with Manu Ginobli and Tony Parker still relatively young, there’s no reason to doubt they could win this year -- and next.

The Spurs will face the young, upstart Utah Jazz. On paper it looks like a mismatch. But if anyone can man-up against these Spurs, it's the Jazz. Still, the wound of seeing the Suns bounced out of the playoffs like this is still too fresh to talk about the next round. I'll save that for another day.

There’s a fine line between getting over the hill that stands between pretenders and contenders. The window of opportunity is small and it shuts awfully fast (see: Sacramento, Portland and Indiana for recent examples). The Suns are fortunate to be young but if they can’t figure out how to stand toe-to-toe with physical, grind-’em-out teams like the Spurs at playoff time, this Phoenix team will fade into history title-less, just like all its predecessors.

Game 3 should have been the defining moment for the Suns. But it all changed in a blink when Horry disgraced the NBA and Stoudemire and Diaw left the bench to defend their fallen teammate. A lesson learned of course. A lot of lessons learned. How will the Suns respond? They have all summer to think about it.

For now, NBA fans are poorer for not getting to see more of Steve Nash.

Suns Burned

Somewhere in the middle of the chippy third quarter Wednesday night in Phoenix, it was clear how badly the Suns missed their two best big men. It was visible on the offensive side of the court for the Suns when playmaker extraordinaire Steve Nash would work the pick-and-roll. He'd go around a pick, get into the lane and when the defense closed in, he'd pass it off to .... Kurt Thomas?

Thomas was game but he's no Amare Stoudemire and that reality, more than anything else last night is what burned the Suns, putting them in a 3-2 hole in their best-of-seven playoff series.

You won't likely see as gutty a performance (on both ends of the court) from an aging defensive specialist like Thomas in a bigger game. He gave it all he had. But while Thomas is known for his ability to play tough under the basket, it's in bursts of minutes here and there, a total of 20 or so a game. Last night, he played nearly 40 minutes and by halftime he was sucking wind so bad he could barely answer Craig Sager's halftime interview questions. Or maybe it was Sager's lime green coat.

Considering their handicap, it was amazing to watch the Suns nearly run the Spurs off the court in the first half. They held them to season lows in points for a quarter (13 in the first) and a half (33 at intermission) but they couldn't score at their usual blistering pace and their short rotation all but gave out by the end of the game.

You could blast the league (as S.O.L. did yesterday here) for suspending the Suns best big man Amare Stoudemire and his backup Boris Diaw, and in my oh so humble opinion, you'd be right. But those two knuckleheads knew the rule and left the bench anyway, so some of the blame ought to be on their very broad shoulders.

The dirty, black-hatted Spurs -- a team I liked before this series -- now has the series lead, ahead 3-2. But as tough a loss this must have been for the Suns to handle (they held the lead for all but perhaps five minutes of the game), they have to feel good about the way they played and how easily they could have won this game despite being without two of their most important players (Did I mention that Stoudemire is leading his team this series in scoring and rebounding).

You could even that the Suns are missing another player too, even though he's on the floor for everyone to see. I'm talking about Leandro Barbosa. This is the cat who shredded the Lakers during the first round. There is just no way the Brazilian Blur should not be torching the Spurs up and down the damn court. The Spurs really don't have anyone who can hang with him. The problem is that his success really hinges on his shot and right now that shot is just not falling. Last night he was 3-for-12 for a measly eight points, only two more than the number of fouls he picked up (6).

S.O.L. predicted a Suns win last night and was feeling pretty damn good after the first quarter -- though I admit to being nervous at the relatively close score. A new day dawns for the Suns come Friday night in San Antonio?

Remember the Alamo, indeed.

Suns fans. Keep your tickets for Sunday. Game 7 will happen.