Eastern Conference Finals recap

Everyone's got LeBron on the mind right now after the phenomenal performance he put up against Detroit in the Eastern Conference Finals. After Game 2, LeBron seemed to turn the corner as a player. He showed a different mentality, understanding that he had to step up and take a leadership role and make things happen for his team. Obviously what stands out the most is his 48-point masterpiece in Game 5. He got to the rim at will and made seemingly impossible shots at the biggest possible moments. To me, the turning point was when he got in Antonio McDyess's face after his hard foul on Anderson Varejao. That was the display of leadership we'd all been waiting for. From there on out, the Cavs had the series in their clutches and with some help from Daniel Gibson, they won Game 6 in a blowout.

Yes, it was a great performance, but let's not get carried away. The Pistons were a flawed team. The biggest difference between this year and last year was the switch at center from Ben Wallace to Chris Webber. I could go into how Webber has always been a loser or how he is soft or how he quit on the Sixers and I can never root for him again, but...the issue isn't that Webber is a bad player or a bad fit for the team. They simply missed Wallace's shot-blocking. Without Big Ben in the middle, LeBron was able to attack the basket constantly and either draw fouls or score on earth-shaking dunks. Ben Wallace's departure left Rasheed Wallace as the only remaining shot-blocker and well...we all saw how that worked out. Combine that with Chauncey Billups' struggles, LeBron muscling Prince out of the post, and 'Sheed being his erratic self, and all Detroit was left with was Rip Hamilton. Basically the Pistons were all but neutralized offensively, and defensively had to choose between letting LeBron score at will or leaving shooters like Gibson wide open.

I'm not trying to say the Cavs weren't good or that they don't deserve to be in the Finals. The point is, Cleveland went up against a team that had a better reputation than deserved and had extremely favorable match-ups. San Antonio is going to be far more difficult. In my next post, I'll break down that series and give a prediction.