NBA: Standings & Breaking Away; Nuggets & The Spark // MLB: National League-East

sports-notebook.blogspot.com . . . FOR MORE ANALYSIS, GO TO "MILE HIGH SPORTS RADIO," AM1510 or FM93.7, and to Denver’s best sports blogging team---milehighsports.com. SPORTS NOTEBOOK posts its columns Tuesday and Friday of each week. Ed., Publ., Marvin Leibstone; Copy & Mng. Ed., Gail Kleiner. . . // . . . NBA: Standings & Breaking Away; Nuggets & the Spark // MLB: National League East . . . // . . NBA---WINNERS usually do all that they can to keep on winning, and during the last nine days each of the NBA’s six division leading franchises added won games to their spread. Within the Eastern Conference’s three divisions, the Central’s 46-15 Indiana Pacers and the Southeast Division’s 41-14 Miami Heat are now two up + 12 games ahead of second place rivals, the 32-29 Washington Wizards and the 34-27 Chicago Bulls, and the East’s Atlantic 33-26 Toronto Raptors accrued one win and today are three above the 30-29 Brooklyn Nets. . . AS to Western Conference teams, the most wins among all six top franchises during the nine days belonged to the West’s Southeast 45-16 San Antonio Spurs, They had four wins, the Spurs now three atop the 42-19 Houston Rockets. And, the West’s Northwest and currently 46-16 Oklahoma City Thunder bought three wins, going to four over the 42-19 Portland Trail Blazers. Meanwhile, the West’s Pacific Division leading team, the 42-20 L.A. Clippers, purchased two wins, presently four ahead of the 38-24 Golden State Warriors. . . LEAGUE-wide, the East and West conference’s number one teams, the Pacers and the Thunder, they sustained their lead over the Spurs, though by a single win. And, with their 12 wins up each, only the Pacers and the Heat have what could be defined as runaway leads, the sort that a team coasts into the playoffs with. The remaining top winners are three and four wins up and so vulnerable, for instance, the West’s top team, the Thunder, could slip behind the Trail Blazers sooner than later should they lose four within the next nine or 10 days, of course with the latter winning four, doubtful in that the Thunder holds the highest wins-over-losses percentage among all 30 NBA teams, .742. . . YET as the top NBA teams continue to win more than lose, so, too, can franchises at the bottom rungs of the ladder be winners if only for a night or two. Except for the East’s Atlantic 15-43 Philadelphia 76er’s, and the West’s Northwest 21-40 Utah Jazz, each of the remaining division last place teams won one or two games in the last nine days, the 12-48 Milwaukee Bucks finally owning a .200 win-over-losses percentage. . . ONLY one of the six third place franchises failed to change the status-quo since February 28, the Dallas Mavericks remaining at 36 wins, though only one third place team gained more than one win in the same period, the West’s Pacific 36-25 Phoenix Suns, advancing by three. . . // . . DENVER NUGGETS---SURELY elation accompanies a won game after a team has lost six straight. With luck, the euphoria simmers and then exists as cautious optimism regarding future wins. The Western Conference’s Northwest Division 26-34 Nuggets are now in fourth place, with a rational goal being a regular season finish at or above .500, more possible now that guard Ty Lawson has returned to the team from an injury. During his first game back, Lawson scored 31 points, his regular season ppg average close to 19. But whether or not Lawson’s absence was an only cause behind the team’s losing streak may be debatable, for with Lawson aboard in earlier months the Nuggets lost several games in a row, some against teams lower in the rankings. Still, Denver Post writer, Christopher Dempsey, reported a comment made by Nuggets forward, Wilson Chandler, that when learned Lawson couldn’t be on the floor for many projected games, Chandler’s words, “. . . it deflated the team.” If Chandler’s assessment is correct, then perhaps the Nuggets have intentionally, or unintentionally, leaned into being a team overly dependent upon a single and exceptional player, even though Lawson believes in ball possession for the man with the best chance for a clean shot, not to be for he alone except when no other opportunity exists. Maybe there’s a dynamic here, an indefinable characteristic, that which seems to motivate others to pump up their game. Unquestioningly, Lawson’s speed and savvy setting up successful plays, and his effective shooting, his assists and surprising rebounds, impresses “and inspires.” If this is what it will take to bring the Nuggets to a respectable season finish, so be it. Imagined now is that Nuggets head coach, Brian Shaw, won’t be implementing an overhaul, applying any not seen before tactics, instead seeing Lawson as super capital for more wins than losses, allowing the team to evolve on the floor from Lawson’s hustle and skills and with that interaction with Lawson that Chandler has noted and benefitted from, Chandler averaging more than 20 ppg during recent games. . . // . . MLB---GIVEN how a baseball season ends with lots of expectations soured and the unexpected applauded, all predictions and assessments that are made “prior to” can only be placed into a category labeled, “Yeah, well, maybe.” Right now, there’s money on the Washington Nationals to lead the NL East throughout most of the 2014 regular season and into the NLLC series. Yet in 2013, expectations were high for the Nat’s to do the same and they started falling back versus NL teams. Not that the Nat’s 86-76 2013 finish was anywhere below the margin. Today, however, are Nat’s additions that could eliminate the standings quagmire that the team fell into as the 2013 season moved on, among these plusses and from the Detroit Tigers, RH Doug Fister, 14-9, ERA 3.5., and from the Oakland A’s, LH Jerry Blevins, 5-0, ERA 3.1. These two will join RH Jordan Zimmermann, 19-9, ERA 3.2, and RH Stephen Strasburg, 8-9, ERA 3.0. Balanced strongly with this is a powerful line-up, including outfielders Jayson Werth, batting average .318; Denard Span, BA .279; Bryce Harper, BA .274. OF’s Werth and Harper combined for 45 home runs last year, and with Span the three had a total of 187 RBI. Also, Nat’s infielders Ian Desmond, Adam LaRoche and Ryan Zimmerman accrued a total of 66 HR’s and 221 RBI’s during 2013. The Nat’s taking all? It’s an informed guess still, the answer, “Yeah, well, maybe!” END/ml