Basketball Betting

NBA Playoff Preview - Cleveland vs. Chicago

Basketball Betting Lines

04/15/2010 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Every time LeBron James wears a New York Yankees cap, the basketball fans in Gotham smile.

The reasoning is simple. Since the Cleveland Cavaliers' superstar loves baseball's most storied franchise, he must relish the thought of playing in the nation's No. 1 media market.

Whether or not that's true and LeBron opts out of his contract this offseason to play on the biggest stage of them all is a story we will all be visiting quite a bit in due time, but let's put that on the back-burner for now.

I'm more focused on how much The King and his Cavs now have in common with the Yankees as the team gets ready to kick off it's Eastern Conference quarterfinals series with the Chicago Bulls.

The Cavaliers resume is very impressive. Cleveland owns the NBA's best overall record at 61-21 despite shutting things down a week early, the best home record at 35-6 and the second best road mark (26-15). In the process, the Cavs became the first team since the Chicago Bulls (1995-96 and 1996-97) and only the fifth team in the last 19 seasons to finish with sole possession of the best NBA regular season mark in consecutive years.

Cleveland also became only the ninth different franchise in NBA history to have back-to-back 60 win seasons.

But, just like the Evil Empire in baseball, records and little things like division or conference championships now mean very little to a Cavaliers club obsessed with the NBA championship.

Anything less than a World Series title in the Bronx means the season has been a failure. Cleveland is now in that same rarified air.

Best record in the NBA...who cares?

An Eastern Conference crown...yawn.

The only thing that will placate the fans in Cleveland and James himself is that NBA title.

"We got through it," Cleveland head coach Mike Brown said after the team's regular season finale. "Everyone's healthy. Now we can look forward to the playoffs. We know who we're going to play and I think our players understand what's at stake here and they'll be ready."

The Cavs kick off their quest against an eighth-seeded Bulls club that has, in essence, been playing playoff basketball for the last two weeks. Chicago won its final three games down the stretch to vault over Toronto and sneak into the postseason despite a pedestrian .500 record (41-41) and some significant turmoil in the front office.

Bulls general manager Gar Forman released a statement Wednesday, acknowledging a confrontation between head coach Vinny Del Negro and vice president of basketball operations John Paxson back in March.

While not identifying Paxson by name, Forman said the disagreement was "the result of each expressing their passion about the health and well being of their players and the desire to win basketball games."

Yahoo! Sports reported that Paxson shoved Del Negro twice in the chest and had to be restrained in a post-game confrontation after a loss to Phoenix on March 30. The report said Paxson was upset because Del Negro breached a management- imposed limit on the minutes center Joakim Noah was to play because of an injured left foot.

"My team will sacrifice everything they've got in order to make it to this stage," Noah said. "We're going to try to shock the world."

Chicago and Cleveland split a four-game season series this year but the last Bulls win came when the Cavs had shut it down and were resting James.

These two Central Division rivals were regular postseason opponents during the Michael Jordan-era with the Bulls taking five straight series between 1987-88 and 1993-94.

MATCHUPS:

POINT GUARD: Mo Williams didn't quite play up to an All-Star level like he did last season but he remains an unselfish player that can stretch a defense with his three-point shot and carry the offensive load if James is not firing on all cylinders.

Williams' counterpart is the dynamic Derrick Rose, who basically willed the Bulls into the postseason by averaging 30.7 points and 6.3 assists in the team's final three regular season games -- all wins. In fact, Rose scored fewer than 24 points only once in the month of April and is playing with supreme confidence right now. The jumper gets better by the day and Rose's quick first step enables him to drive at will where his soft floater becomes an incredible offensive weapon.

EDGE: BULLS

SHOOTING GUARD: Anthony Parker was an underrated offseason acquisition by Cavs' basketball chief Danny Ferry. The former Raptor is never going to fill it up but his 41.4 percentage from long range really helps space the floor for James.

The Bulls' Kirk Hinrich is a better all-around player than Parker. The third- leading scorer on Chicago behind Rose and Luol Deng, Hinrich has the capability of going off for 25 every night and is the team's best perimeter defender. However, he's actually had a poor shooting year.

EDGE: BULLS

CENTER: Shaquille O'Neal, who hasn't played since late February due to a thumb injury, has been medically cleared to return but I can't see Cavs coach Mike Brown pulling the trigger and giving the Big Aristotle major minutes right off the bat. Cleveland went small in O'Neal's absence, using J.J. Hickson in the middle and the second-year big man more than held his own.

Noah figures to be a tough matchup for any player that mans the middle for Cleveland. His length, energy and athleticism are top notch and give him the ability to change a plethora of shots. The skills on the offensive end are not there, however, and Noah picks up most of his points through effort.

EDGE: EVEN

SMALL FORWARD: James has been the games' best player by a wide margin again this season and figures to easily win his second straight MVP award. He sat the last four games of the regular season to rest and that move can be questioned, especially if James comes out a bit rusty. Either way, that shouldn't last long and it's hard to imagine Chicago, with its lack of solid defenders on the wing, slowing down James for any considerable length of time. The only perceived weakness in LeBron's game is the lack of a consistent, top-tier jumper but when that's falling, forget about it.

Deng wasn't around for the Bulls epic opening round series against Boston last year due to injury but has bounced back nicely, averaging just over 17 points a night. Deng is underrated but asking him to handle James in any form is folly.

EDGE: CAVS

POWER FORWARD: The Bulls have gone with rookie Taj Gibson at the four spot and Cleveland now counters with former All-Star Antawn Jamison. That's a mismatch any way you slice it but Gibson has had a nice freshman season while Jamison has struggled at times since arriving in Cleveland from Washington on Feb. 17 as part of a three-team, six-player blockbuster.

Jamison's paltry 49.4 free throw percentage since the trade is cause for concern but don't underestimate his rather large experience advantage. The veteran should be able to torture Gibson at times down on the blocks.

EDGE: CAVS

BENCH: Del Negro has some solid options off the bench for this series with veterans Brad Miller, Flip Murray and Hakim Warrick. Miller, a veteran center, has played in over 40 postseason games and just knows how to play the right way. Murray is streaky but can always provide instant offense, while Warrick has the athleticism to make things difficult for stretches but seems to have lost the confidence of the coaching staff.

The Cavs have even more impressive options in former starters Anderson Varejao, Delonte West, along with solid backcourt contributors Boobie Gibson and Sebastian Telfair. No team in the NBA can match what Brown is bringing off his bench.

EDGE: CAVS

COACHING: Brown doesn't get a lot of credit since he is expected to win but he's done a solid job of massaging egos around James and fitting the pieces together. That said, he will never be considered an upper echelon-coach until he brings home the Lawrence O'Brien trophy.

The Bulls can spin it any way they like but Del Negro would have been gone had the team not made the playoffs. Any time you have the front office and coaching staff clashing, it's a problem. Del Negro had no experience when he was hired before last season and is still learning on the job, day-by-day.

EDGE: CAVS

PREDICTION: The Cavs have more playoff experience, the best player in the game and a more competent coach but they shut it down for a week while Chicago has been playing for its playoff life each and every day. I think rustiness might be able to steal the Bulls a game or two but they will not seriously threaten Cleveland.

CAVS in 5