NBA: Conference Finals // MLB: Current Rankings

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: Conference Finals // MLB: Current Rankings. . . NBA---THAT the East’s Miami Heat and the West’s Oklahoma City Thunder would reach the NBA-2013/14’s Conference Finals was a safe prediction last October and stayed that way through most of the regular season and into the year’s playoff rounds, but it didn’t happen in the easy ways that a hefty number of predictions said it would. Neither team entered the playoffs as very best in the NBA, with during most of the regular season both back of the amazing Western Conference-Southwest’s San Antonio Spurs and the Eastern Conference Central’s Indiana Pacers, plus league-wide the L.A. Clippers, Houston Rockets and Portland Trail Blazers close at the heels of the Heat and Thunder for more than just a week or two. And, both the Heat and Thunder struggled for their semi-final positions for their shot at the conference best-of-seven, and for the year’s NBA championship title if the Heat can knock off the Pacers and if the Thunder can take down the Spurs that are less winded after a 4-1 semi-final defeat of the West’s Portland Trail Blazers. Last night, it took the last of six games for the Heat to eliminate the Brooklyn Nets by just two points, 98-96, and a sixth contest for the Thunder to beat and eliminate the L.A. Clippers, 104-98. It also took a sixth game win for the Pacers to prevail over and eliminate the Washington Wizards, 93-80. The Spurs were the only team rising to Conference Finals this year from a semi-final win that carried a large anti-opponent deficit, 104-82 vs. the Trail Blazers. The Heat, Thunder and Pacers semi-final/last game victories carried but two, six and seven point deficits respectively. So, it’ll be the Heat against the Pacers for the Eastern title, and a Thunder vs. Spurs Western challenge. Last night, the year’s NBA MVP and Thunder star, Kevin Durant, made the difference for his team’s Clippers cutaway. Durant scored 38 points, consistency of his performance factors probably key to how well the Thunder will do vs. the Spurs extremely fast-in-transition and nearly seamless defense. For the Heat, there’s great star depth in a foursome, i.e., James, Wade, Allen, Bosh, primarily as shooters, less at each being quick enough to evade any Pacers defense rotation-variance. Likely outcomes? The rational take is that the year’s NBA Conference title games will be close. It shouldn’t surprise if 3-2 standings regarding each conference series again leads to sixth-game matchups. As for that Heat and Thunder prediction of last October for respective “Conference crowns” and occupying the NBA 2013/14 championship series slots, well, it’s more than a bit fragile now . . . MLB---AFTER nearly six weeks of the current MLB season, and more than 40 games played by each of MLB’s 30 clubs, which for most of them is a fourth of the season gone by, the biggest edges in wins gained by division leading teams over second place clubs are the four wins up having been purchased by the American League’s 24-12 Detroit Tigers over the Kansas City Royals, and the five wins more that belong today to the National League Central’s 26-15 Milwaukee Brewers over the St. Louis Cardinals. Meanwhile, the leads held by the remaining four division number ones is precarious, examples: the AL’s Eastern Division leader, the 21-18 Baltimore Orioles, they are ahead of the 21-19 N.Y. Yankees by just one loss, and the 25-16 Oakland A’s are only three up over the L.A. Angels. Within the NL, the West’s 26-15 Giants are but three wins ahead of the Colorado Rockies, and the East’s 22-17 Atlanta Braves are only one win above the Washington Nationals. From a first glance at this, we can decide that much within the two leagues is subject to change, and there is no way to refute this. However, a question remains: “Will most of the current standings alter greatly in the near future?” Not an easy query to respond to when it’s a fact that almost three weeks ago four of the six division leading teams were also then division leaders, and the two that weren’t, the Yankees and the Giants, they were holding second place positions from just one win back of first. Not that there hasn’t been the unexpected turn, for instance, the AL West’s 14-8 Texas Rangers of three weeks ago dropping from second place to fourth position, now under .500 at 20-21, and in three weeks time the NL East’s now third place 21-20 Miami Marlins jumping up from last place at 10-12. END/ml