{"id":1716,"date":"2007-10-28T14:01:27","date_gmt":"2007-10-28T19:01:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/nba-2007-08-preview\/nj-nets\/"},"modified":"2007-10-28T14:01:27","modified_gmt":"2007-10-28T19:01:27","slug":"nj-nets","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/nba-2007-08-preview\/nj-nets","title":{"rendered":"NJ Nets"},"content":{"rendered":"

Predicted Record<\/strong>
\n42-40 (Tom), 45-37 (Gil)<\/p>\n

Last Year’s Record<\/strong>
\n41-41<\/p>\n

Gil’s Commentary<\/strong>
\nSome think this Nets squad will fall out of the playoffs, but that’s crazy-talk. As long as Kidd is somewhat healthy, he’ll maximize the output of the team’s lesser players and keep them in the hunt for a lower playoff seed.<\/p>\n

Nenad Krstic’s knee blowout last December threw the team for a loop. While Krstic is never going to be a rough-and-tumble rebounder and defender in the paint, he provided a nice mid-range option for the team’s many wing players to pass to, and could also make with a McHale impression in the low block. Once he got hurt, the team went almost exclusively to a perimeter, S\/R offense.<\/p>\n

The loss of Krstic and the need to shake up a stagnant team opened up minutes for another eastern European player, Boki Nachbar. He turned out to be a high-flying dunk-machine with 3-point range. Unfortunately, this pretty much duplicates the skill set of Vince Carter and Richard Jefferson, but he did throw down some pretty awesome dunks (look up Nachbar on Youtube; you won’t be sorry). I entertain a fantasy-notion that the Nets will trade Carter and spare parts for a legit center or PF, and let Nachbar take a lot of minutes at the 2\/3 spots. As you can tell, I have a boring fantasy life.<\/p>\n

Rejoinder From Tom<\/strong>
\nRichard Jefferson has gone from being featured over Carmelo and LeBron with the 2004 Olympic team to being completely snubbed by the Virtual Memories Annual NBA Preview. That’s gotta hurt.<\/p>\n

Gratuitous Comics Connection<\/strong>
\nDover serves as headquarters for Joe Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art.<\/p>\n

Gratuitous Pharma Connection<\/strong>
\nWyeth, headquartered in Madison, NJ, will flat-out not leave me alone, which is a lot better than other major pharmas, which never return my calls.<\/p>\n

The Bottom Line<\/strong>
\nI could spare myself a lot of viewing time if I just let myself accept the truth: The Nets are a competitive team that will lose a hard-fought second-round playoff series. Again. –GR
\n<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Predicted Record 42-40 (Tom), 45-37 (Gil) Last Year’s Record 41-41 Gil’s Commentary Some think this Nets squad will fall out of the playoffs, but that’s crazy-talk. As long as Kidd is somewhat healthy, he’ll maximize the output of the team’s lesser players and keep them in the hunt for a lower playoff seed. Nenad Krstic’s … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “NJ Nets”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":1713,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"nba0708index.php","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1716","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/P4C7K-rG","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1745,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/nba-2007-08-preview\/season-honors","url_meta":{"origin":1716,"position":0},"title":"Season Honors","author":"Gil","date":"October 30, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"TEAM HONORS NBA Championship Tom: Phoenix Over Miami Craig: Spurs over Dallas and then some eastern conference team, say the Pistons Gil: Spurs beat Phoenix, wallop the Bulls. Surprise Playoff Teams Tom: Charlotte, Portland Craig: NJ and Lakers Gil: Milwaukee, Lakers (post-Kobe trade) Surprise Non-Playoff Teams Tom: Golden State, Washington\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1740,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/nba-2007-08-preview\/cleveland-cavaliers","url_meta":{"origin":1716,"position":1},"title":"Cleveland Cavaliers","author":"Gil","date":"October 30, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Predicted Record 48-34 (Tom), 54-28 (Gil) Last Year's Record 50-32 Gil's Commentary The biggest victims of the subprime mortgage crisis appear to be Sasha Pavlovic and Anderson Varejao, who can't get bupkes out of Cavs owner Dan Gilbert, who made his fortune at online mortgage broker Quicken Loans. Improbably enough,\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1755,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/nba-2007-08-preview\/tip-off-interview","url_meta":{"origin":1716,"position":2},"title":"Tip-Off Interview","author":"Gil","date":"October 30, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"To celebrate the Tipoff of the NBA season, I did an interview yesterday on the Adam Taxin Radio Show on WNWR 1540 AM in Philadelphia. You can download the audio (mp3, about about 3mb) or just read this transcript: Adam Taxin: The baseball season ended not much more than 24\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 1 comment","block_context":{"text":"With 1 comment","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/nba-2007-08-preview\/tip-off-interview#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1719,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/nba-2007-08-preview\/toronto-raptors","url_meta":{"origin":1716,"position":3},"title":"Toronto Raptors","author":"Gil","date":"October 28, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Predicted Record 40-42 (Tom), 44-38 (GR) Last Year's Record 47-35 Sam Ricchezza's Commentary Well, well, well. The Raps went from dirt to first last year (okay, it's only the Atlantic) aided primarily by the magic, force and will of Bryan Colangelo. So they lost to the Nets in the 1st\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1722,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/nba-2007-08-preview\/miami-heat","url_meta":{"origin":1716,"position":4},"title":"Miami Heat","author":"Gil","date":"October 28, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Predicted Record 40-42 (Tom), 43-39 (Gil) Last Year's Record 44-38 Gil's Commentary No other NBA event in recent years bothered me as much as Miami's championship, mainly because it meant Alonzo Mourning, Gary Payton and Antoine Walker were \"vindicated\" for being douchebags throughout their careers. So I laughed my bitch\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1713,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/nba-2007-08-preview","url_meta":{"origin":1716,"position":5},"title":"NBA 2007-08 Preview","author":"Gil","date":"October 28, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"It's time for the race (well, marathon) to see who will keep the Spurs from repeating THIS time! Which is to say, \"The new NBA season is upon us!\" Sure, the league's been pummeled lately, what with the referee-gambling scandal, the Knicks' ugly sexual harassment suit, and the uncompetitive finals.\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1716"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1716\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}