All this talk about the gap between the Eastern and Western Conferences decreasing is ridiculous. The East is as good as its been in a long time, at the top of the standings, but the triumvirate of Boston, Detroit and Orlando doesn’t have a chance against the Western powers. The Celtic’s bandwagon is growing day by day, but they can’t beat good teams on a consistent basis and are going to embarrass their conference in the finals.

The champs are coming from the West, and thank God its not going to be the Spurs. I know San Antonio is still the defending champs, but a slower Tim Duncan won’t be able to lead these Spurs through the dangerous Western Conference playoffs. And after last year’s suspension debacle, they won’t be getting any help from the refs this time. My Lakers are going to be one of the toughest outs, but out they will go. Give Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol a full year together and see what happens in 2009. Dallas hasn’t won me over either, and I don’t think the fragile squad has recovered from last year’s first round spanking.

The favorites at this point have to be New Orleans and Phoenix, which is awesome, since they are two of the most exciting teams to watch. The Suns are lucky the Spurs have fallen flat of late since San Antonio has been the only thing to prevent Phoenix from racking up a slew of titles already. Chris Paul is quickly becoming my favorite player in the game, but the inexperienced Hornets are still a little too young to oust the Suns in the Western Conference Finals.

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