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		NBA playoff report By David Zizmor May 13, 2010

	The series between the Lakers and the Suns this is the really interesting one as people did not give the Suns enough credit and obviously people were giving the Lakers a lot of credit and they are the defending champions and they are the number one seed and the Suns had a very excellent season and no one really seemed to notice. They were kind of written off as a mediocre 2008-09 team and they finished this year in third place in the Western Conference and not by very much, they finished with a 54-28 record only three games behind the Lakers. So they were very competitive overall during the course of the season and they weren't that far behind the Lakers as far as everything goes in the standings. When you look at the season series however, the Lakers I wouldn't say dominated because some of these games were a little closer than they looked as the Lakers won three out of four against the Suns this season. Going into this playoff series you have to figure the Lakers are the defending champs, they did win the season series. The Lakers really turned on the gas in the last couple of games in their second round, it'll be the Lakers against the Suns and this is a good match and the problem your going to see here as far as match ups are concerned are in the front court. Phoenix while they have Amare Stoudemire but he's not an aggressive rebounder as you would think considering how big he is and how active he is. He's a very good offensive player but not someone you would call a great offensive player. Defensively he's okay for a guy as big as he is and as long as he is he doesn't get to the ball for rebounds as you would expect or at least hope. For the Lakers they have Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol two guys who are very active and seem to get to rebounds and certainly Stoudimire can. The simple fact of the matter is the Lakers have size up front and the Suns are going to have trouble defending and its not that the Suns can't but its just going to be hard. Gasol is one of the fastest front court guys in the NBA on the offensive end and okay defensively. He really doesn't try as hard as he should if Stoudemire can't stop him on the offensive end then it's just another worry besides Kobe Bryant. If those two get going then the problems will start to mount for Phoenix and if the Lakers get rolling then they're in trouble. The Suns however are not a slouch they didn't get this far because their a bad team, they got this far because they're really good. Steve Nash is playing fantastic with the basketball. Nash is the floor general and to say he's one of the best floor generals in the NBA and at point guard at age 36 he's still one of the longest surviving guards in the league at age 36 and still going strong. Nobody quite distributes like this guy, he's really feeling it he's been playing fantastic basketball and he's able to move the ball around with the likes of Stoudemire, Grant Hill, and all sorts of other guys on this team, this team has had guys making things work left and right and it's finally come together and it's a little odd that most of these guys have been together in the last seven years, that all of a sudden they've finally break through here in the playoffs. The Suns really have a long track record of having a tough time against San Antonio in the playoffs and some of those games in years past have resulted in some really tough, tough loses. A lot of people remember a couple of years ago when Robert Horry checked Nash into the scorers table and nothing happened to Horry but two guys on the Suns got suspended for the same thing. That basically sealed the deal and gave the win and the Suns had to go home. This time a different story the Los Suns swept the Spurs in four straight who would have guessed it and the Spurs played good basketball but the Suns dominated them in this series. Part of the reason the Suns were having a good offensive game that wouldn't be too bad, it's the kind of defense you would need especially from a Suns team. This Suns team is playing excellent basketball. They certainly have their hands full, yet they’re a very talented and very experienced Lakers team. The Lakers haven't been playing with the same kind of fervor. Also you have to consider that the Suns are under a microscope with all the political stuff that's going on in Arizona and the Suns have made their statement against the immigration bill that's been pushed against the Arizona legislature. The Suns are the team that people rally around and ever since they wore those Los Suns jerseys they've really have been on a big roll, they've really come together. I would have to say to this whole political issue it's made them a closer team and they have followed that discussion amongst themselves and the ownership, and for whatever reason it kind of crystallize their team unity. Cavs-Celtics: The issue here is in regards to LaBron James elbow so go the Cavs, that's the way it's been so far. There are nights when he's lights out or more recently when his lights are out. The elbow without question has been bothering him lately and the Cavs have fallen off and have had their butts handed to them. So it's just a matter of which elbow we see the good elbow or the bad elbow and this is what it comes down to. LaBron is a fantastic player and the fact of the matter is Cleveland is really a team of supporting players around a superstar the team could do no wrong. For example if Michael Jordan is healthy the team is going to win and there is no question about it. He left to play baseball in the minors and all of a sudden the Chicago Bulls can't win a title not to mention the Birmingham Barons can't win one either with their not very experienced minor leaguer who handed the big ball rather than the small ball. Again when LaBron is hurt or is unavailable the Cavs just don't have the skill level and going into the playoffs the Celtics are an okay team and they're a championship caliber team and they don't have a lot of guys who are eventual Hall of Famers who are on the down slope of their careers, guys who are older and are dinged up and they have to bring every ounce of energy in each game in order for them to have a shot at winning the series. Magic sweeps Hawks: I don't know if you would call this a huge surprise but boy I was all wrong about this Atlanta team I thought the Hawks had a lot of talent but they came out and they just laid an egg and Orlando dominated and this series wasn't even close. The only people who enjoyed this series were Magic fans just because if you like basketball and there weren't any good teams to watch in this one. Orlando won the first game by almost 40 points and the second game by almost 15, the third game by five, and the fourth game by 14. None of these games were close Atlanta was not in any them at any point in time outside of the opening tip off. Atlanta got killed this year and if they made the finals last year. Orlando is going to end up as the team that's favored in the series coming up. Cleveland is going to have all these troubles throwing around LaBron's elbow if the Cavs make it. If Boston makes it they have to go twelve rounds with the Cavs just to make it this far and again Boston is an older team and I'm not sure how well they’re going to hold up. You look at Orlando this team has done a little bit of everything point guard Jameer Nelson he was there in the last playoffs in 2008-09 and had suffered a big injury earlier in the season. He just wasn't available for the post season and he's back playing excellent basketball. Dwight Howard you all know him he's the super duper guy he can dunk like nobody's business he had 18 points in the playoffs with 13 boards and multiple blocked shots and they have Vince Carter who shockingly is playing very good basketball. I kind of criticized him in the last update by saying he wasn't going to bring it. He had a history of choking in the playoffs and that's what he should expect and if he was going to do well it would be a shock, so low and behold I'm shocked. Carter has been playing excellent basketball he wasn't stopped at all by Atlanta and I won't say Atlanta did a horrible job of trying to stop him. David Zizmor is covering the NBA post season for Sportstalk Radio