Thought I’d write an update after the end of the basketball season. Which for me ended on Wednesday with Real Madrid winning the Spanish league Over Barcelona.
So there’s no more basketball on for a whole week! There’s the Olympic qualifying tournaments on 4th – 10th July. And then there’s basketball at the Olympic games from 6th– 21st August. International tournaments have been very profitable in past summers, if you put the work in. Obviously Team USA will turn up and win, but one place you might be able to find value is the team to finish runners up…
NBA Season
That may well end up being the greatest NBA season I’ll ever watch. The Warriors won 73 games, came back from 3-1 down against OKC to then lose against Lebron after being 3-1 up. The greatest game I’ve seen so far was during this regular season when GSW won at OKC with that amazing Curry 3.
Betting wise it’s been a really good year, my best year. Unfortunately it finished on a bad note with GSW not winning the title. I said they’d win if Curry was healthy, that debate will rage on, but he was nowhere near his regular season performance. Despite backing GSW to win it, I’m actually glad Lebron won it.
So what did we learn from the Finals?:
- GSW missed Andrew Bogut more than people give credit for. They couldn’t play Draymond 48 mins at center (they didn’t play him enough minutes at center) and their backups were horrendous. With more rim protection they may well be the champs right now.
- Lebron totally coasts the regular season, and I’ll upgrade “his jumper has gone” to “he’s got a streaky jump shot”. But he’s still the most dominant player in the world.
- Cleveland should trade Kevin Love for some wing players that allow them to play Lebron at the 4 and Thompson at the 5.
Looking ahead to next season. I’ve already pencilled in a few teams who I think may be over/underrated coming into the coming season. Obviously a lot will depend on free agency, drafts and trades.