East of Boston

Celtics vs Hawks

The Boston Celtics have finished out an awesome season, and now get to play the Atlanta Hawks in the playoffs.

The Hawks are the lowest seeded team in the weakest conference, and would have beec 12 games out of the playoffs if they were in the West. If there were ever a group of guys who were Just Happy To Be There, it's these here Hocks.

Not that there's anything wrong with Atlanta... they're a team on the way up. Their oldest full-time player is Mike Bibby, and he's not that old. They have Joe Johnson, an All Star guard who was originally drafted by Boston... who then gave him away for peanuts right around the time I started getting my first grey hairs.

Their center is Al Horford, who is a mean young man who goes 6'10" or so. He won two NCAA titles at Florida, but that's gonna seem like 10 years ago once Boston starts kicking him around some.

They have 2 tough forwards who are sort of interchangeable at the Power and Quick forward spots. Marvin Williams is a UNC kid who has had a fair-to-middlin' pro career. Josh Smith jumps around like House Of Pain or Kris Kross, and may block 7 shots in one of the games we play. Smith is a small Power forward. Williams is a burly small forward.

The Atlanta frontcourt have a combined basketball IQ of 70, and the playoffs are where things like that get exposed. KG has more years in the NBA than their whole frontcourt combined.

Smith will bounce around a lot, but he ain't stopping KG when KG is smelling blood. Marvin Williams can't dream of guarding Paul Pierce. JJ may be a but faster than Ray Allen, but Ray will rain junpers on his stupid, alliteratively named head. Kendrick Perkins and Horford should beat each other up for 5 fouls each per game, and may even fight. Rajon Rondo will- mark my words- cause Bibby to have at least one 3-15 shooting night. We'll beat them like a government mule.

After that happens.. and as near as I can tell... Boston will play the winner of Cleveland/Washington... and that most likely means 7 Games With Lebron James. We'll worry about that one after we stomp these Georgia clowns.

I'm betting a considerable sum of money along the lines of Atanta not winning a game this series. The only reason I'm in this state at the moment is to get as much action as I can find on Boston sweeping the Hawks. I think Atlanta has two chances of winning this series, boy... Slim and None... and ol' Slim, he just left town, Jack.

When General Sherman was treating Georgia like Georgia needed to be treated, people used to come up to him and complain about it. Sherman- who had promised to Grant that he would "make Georgia howl "- explained how things were going to go down.

"Warfare us cruelty. The worse it is, the sooner it will be over... Generations shall pass before they clamor for it again.... They have sown the wind... they shall now reap the whirlwind."