Tag Archive: sixers playoffs

It Doesn’t Matter If You Win by an Inch or a Mile….

May 7, 2012 Randy Neil

Enjoy it while you can, New York, because you guys are going to lose to the Heat, one way or another. Seems like the only way the Knicks are capable of beating Miami is if Carmelo scores 40+ points. This isn’t going past 5 games.

Cole Hamels admitted to intentionally drilling Bryce Harper in the 1st inning of last night’s game. I dig it. That Harper kid has done some awesome things in his major league debut (which… for all intensive purposes is a year-long debut), but there is always that chance that the adrenaline stops flowing and the hits stop coming. I think this kid has a lot of raw talent, but you always got to keep these things in perspective. Remember when Jason Heyward was supposed to be that guy? He’s still an every day player, but it certainly didn’t pan out to the hype.

I’m going on somewhat of a concert bender this week. 2 days ago I saw Miike Snow at the Electric Factory, tomorrow it’s Santigold and Theophilus London, and Friday it’s M83 at Union Transfer. They are all probably going to be good shows, but I think I’m probably going to enjoy Santigold the best. Why? Not because she has better music or anything. It’s mostly because I can’t dance up on girls with some very ambient emo-synth music going on in the background.

Jamie Moyer and Chipper Jones apparently have some beef going on. Saturday night, Jones was on second while Moyer was on the mound, and Jamie promptly stopped his delivery to call out Chipper for stealing signs. They jabbered a bit back and forth, but Chipper took a cheap shot after the game. When questioned about it, Chipper said something like “Every pitch Moyer throws is 78 mph, we don’t need to steal signs” or something like that.

This got me to thinking: Who would win in a fist fight between Jamie Moyer and Chipper Jones? How can I Don King this situation? I would probably take Moyer if my money was riding on it. They are both in ‘relatively’ good shape for their age, but Moyer seems more conditioned. Chipper got super fat in the off-season which makes me think that he’s just a retirement away from getting to John Kruk’s size. If the fight went past a minute, Chipper is exhausted and down for the count. Moyer in 5 rounds.

Yeaaaaaaa the Sixers won. It’s exciting for me. There are a lot of people out there who want to point out the injuries that have turned the Bulls into a somewhat-average team. It’s true, we aren’t playing their best. It would definitely be much more gratifying to knock off considerably the best team in the East with their full roster. Who knows what the results would be if Derrick Rose and Noah weren’t out. We would probably only win 1-2 games in the series. But you know what?

Fuck it. I’m going to go Fast & Furious circa 2001 on your ass and say, “It doesn’t matter if you win by and inch or a mile, winning’s winning.” They still have a good team that won a lot of games without Derrick Rose. We still have a very young core of players and tasting success in the playoffs is essential to their development. Cheap wins are still wins.

I’ll even go as far as to say that our matchup AFTER this series is favorable as well. We either play the Celtics or the Hawks (it’s looking like the Celtics), and that’s OK with me. We are 2-1 against Boston this season. It’s possible to taste more success if we make it past the Bulls. Nobody is predicting the Sixers to win the East or anything, but getting some healthy playoff wins under their belt bodes well for the upcoming seasons. You can see Jrue Holiday’s confidence level change dramatically from Game 1 to Game 4.

Small note about Fast & Furious now that I bring it up: Why did Jesse think his Jetta was going to be faster than a Honda S2000? Was that some sort of error on the writers?

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The Saddest Sixers Post of the Year

April 13, 2011 Randy Neil

Man, things are looking ugly. Lou Williams is still uncertain about his playoff chances. The Sixers clinched the 7th seed spot. The Heat clinched the 2nd seed. We are doomed.

If the Celtics ended up holding the 2nd seed, or New York didn’t climb back into the 6th seed, I would have said we had a chance at a playoff series victory, but now, we don’t have a chance in hell.

Let’s take a look at the regular season games between the Sixers/Heat shall we?

October 27th, 2010 – The Heat visit Philadelphia for the 2nd game of the year, and end up cruising over the Sixers, 97-87. Wade grabs 30 pts, and the top scorer on our team for that game… Evan Turner. That’s right. He went 7-10 in that game, grabbing 16 points.

November 16th, 2010 – The Sixers now visit Miami for the first time, and meet almost the exact same fate. Miami takes the game 99-90. Wade, Bosh, and James combine for 61 points.

March 25th, 2011 – This was the most recent loss, and probably the most heartbreaking. The Sixers led this game with about 8 minutes to go by 10 points, and they gave that all away, eventually losing 99-111. Certainly, many could speculate that this was the game that started the Sixers slump.

The Sixers have their last game of the season tonight, facing the Detroit Pistons. Andre Iguodala will be sitting out to rest his tendinitis and Andres Nocioni will be starting in his place to help Evan Turner ‘adjust to coming off the bench for the playoffs.’ No matter what, the 76ers will end the season with a .500 record or better.

Looking back on last year, I’ll take it.

I still see this year as a huge improvement, and listening to Doug Collins always seems to help comfort my soul a little bit in dire times.

Mmmm… I’m still frightened. Thanks anyway coach.

Most are predicting this series to be an easy sweep for the Heat. I’m hoping otherwise.

The games begin on Saturday at 3:30 ET on ABC. At least our boys will have huge national coverage! So with one last battle cry, I will exclaim (in a very cowardly voice) :

BRING THE KING.

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