Season Midpoint Playoffs Poll

Nuggets 1 · Post #1 » by **Nuggets 1** » Tue Jan 20, 2009 9:31 pm

Cheers and congratulations Nuggets fans for a successful first half of the season. What is your best prediction right now of how this surprisingly successful season will pan out at the end? The poll runs for 30 days and you can not change your vote. I may do another similar poll sometime in March or so.

pickaxe · Post #2 » by **pickaxe** » Tue Jan 20, 2009 9:57 pm

I think they need to watch the sloppiness in the last few games. If they can drum up the level they were playing at when Chauncey first came over, that's our key into the second round. Past that, we need to solve the premiere Center matchups and get Nene playing at his best, which is damn awesome.

Coach Karl needs to hold himself to the highest standard ever held to, because his sub par outings are not going to cut it. He may as well quit now if he doesn't feel inspired to win chess battles with other coaches.

Melo is a huge key to the playoffs, Chauncey will offer us the key to the next rounds with his game savvy. K-Mart, Nene, JR, a ring's there for them if they keep their games sharp. Gotta stay sharp though.

Nuggets 1 · Post #3 » by **Nuggets 1** » Tue Jan 20, 2009 10:03 pm

I added in an option that was left out at first: that the Nuggets will make the playoffs but fail to win even a single series. Only 2-3 voted before the option was added in, so I declare the poll to be valid, though not perfect.

Nuggets 1 · Post #4 » by **Nuggets 1** » Tue Jan 20, 2009 10:09 pm

meloivynene wrote:I think they need to watch the sloppiness in the last few games. If they can drum up the level they were playing at when Chauncey first came over, that's our key into the second round. Past that, we need to solve the premiere Center matchups and get Nene playing at his best, which is damn awesome.

Coach Karl needs to hold himself to the highest standard ever held to, because his sub par outings are not going to cut it. He may as well quit now if he doesn't feel inspired to win chess battles with other coaches.

Melo is a huge key to the playoffs, Chauncey will offer us the key to the next rounds with his game savvy. K-Mart, Nene, JR, a ring's there for them if they keep their games sharp. Gotta stay sharp though.

Who backs up Chauncey Billups as playmaker in the playoffs, since the other team will be harrassing him all game every game? Anthony Carter is overrated as a defender and not such a great playmaker in the playoffs. Aside from needing another big man, it seems to me that the Nuggets need a second playmaker if they want to win in the playoffs.

Nuggets 1 · Post #5 » by **Nuggets 1** » Tue Jan 20, 2009 10:19 pm

After a rocky start due to me forgetting an option, the poll has apparently been started over and is now good to go. Thanks for the reset of the poll to whoever did it.

legendarywalton · Post #6 » by **legendarywalton** » Tue Jan 20, 2009 11:12 pm

There's just nothing special about this team. We've beaten everyone we should beat, but I can't see us beating the Jazz or the Rockets, who I see ending up in the 6 spot. I hope that Portland ends up at the 6, because that is the only way we win a series. Dallas or Phoenix would be tough series, and we'd end up losing because we just don't have the experience it takes to get out of the first round, even with Chauncey.

Post #7 » by **corona** » Tue Jan 20, 2009 11:20 pm

Dallas or Phoenix would be tough series, and we'd end up losing because we just don't have the experience it takes to get out of the first round, even with Chauncey.

we're 3-0 against dallas. we'd be fine against them. our games against phoenix have been close/tough and we matchup pretty well.

i think we get out of the first round by beating one of portland/dallas/phoenix/utah
i think we could beat new orleans (first or second round)....but i don't have confidence in karl's defensive schemes against paul.
lakers - don't think so
spurs - have a better chance than before. but they get the whistle, they have the overall experience and we'd probably still lose.
houston - depends on the health of mcgrady/artest.

RRFB · Post #8 » by **RRFB** » Tue Jan 20, 2009 11:43 pm

I think we'd have a good chance at beating Dallas, Phoenix or Portland in the first round. Utah, I'm not so sure. We've only played them once and that was without Melo and before the Chauncey trade.
In the end, George Karl is our biggest drawback. He'll be the reason we don't make it out of the first round, as every single coach of the top teams in the West will out coach him in a seven game series. He is just too stubborn and refuses to make any adjustments.

JRMelo15 · Post #9 » by **JRMelo15** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 12:12 am

Here is how i see it:

If we play Lakers or San Antonio - we will lose for sure in the 1st round.
Portland, Dallas, New Orleans - we will beat them in a good series of 6 games.
Phoenix, Houston, Utah - we can beat them if they will not be healthy If they are, it will take 7 games.

So unless we get SAS or LAL again in the 1st round, I think this team can finally make it to 2nd round ( hope we play the Rockets and beat them in 7 games. Then watch T-Mac cry on TV again :lol:

)

Nuggets 1 · Post #10 » by **Nuggets 1** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 1:02 am

I''ll make a few quick comments. First I think many here will agree that the Nuggets chances to win a playoff series shrink to very little if any of their best 5-6 players are injured, because this team has a very short bench. The roster is short 1-2 players if I'm not mistaken, as a result of the owner's decision to quickly slash the payroll.

Coach wise, the two coaches who are most suspect for the playoffs other than Karl imo are Porter (Suns) and McMillan (Blazers).

I'd like to see a Blazers-Nuggets series. The Blazers themselves have very little playoff experience. On the other hand, the Blazers are on balance more talented than the Nuggets. Blazers-Nuggets could be a very competitive series, and you wouldn't want to miss a game of it. Being very pessimistic about the Nuggets, I would look for the Blazers to win.

Suns-Nuggets would probably be a Suns win as long as Shaq can hit free throws and Nash can hit his threes. Jason Richardson is an outstanding playoff performer; he will be a big, big help to them as they try to avoid disaster following the controversial Marion for Shaq trade.

Rockets-Nuggets would probably depend on the Houston injury situation. If all the Rockets are good to go, they win the way I see it.

Pretty much the same for Jazz-Nuggets as Rockets-Nuggets, it mostly depends on the Utah injury situation. I don't understand how the Jazz are so bad on the road, but they are, so if the Nuggets have home court advantage against the Jazz, they might be able to get an unusually big advantage from that.

Spurs-Nuggets main issue is whether the Spurs are too old to prevail against the aggressive and energetic Nuggets. I doubt they are too old. Manu Ginobili versus J.R. Smith in a high pressure playoff series? Yikes. Tim "I rarely get called for fouling" Duncan versus Nene "I always get called when I foul" Hilario? Yikes again.

Lakers-Nuggets and Hornets-Nuggets are both total disasters for the Nuggets in my opinion.

So in summary, I am one pessimistic son of a gun regarding the Nuggets chances to win a series.

pickaxe · Post #11 » by **pickaxe** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 1:35 am

Nuggets 1 wrote:
meloivynene wrote:I think they need to watch the sloppiness in the last few games. If they can drum up the level they were playing at when Chauncey first came over, that's our key into the second round. Past that, we need to solve the premiere Center matchups and get Nene playing at his best, which is damn awesome.

Coach Karl needs to hold himself to the highest standard ever held to, because his sub par outings are not going to cut it. He may as well quit now if he doesn't feel inspired to win chess battles with other coaches.

Melo is a huge key to the playoffs, Chauncey will offer us the key to the next rounds with his game savvy. K-Mart, Nene, JR, a ring's there for them if they keep their games sharp. Gotta stay sharp though.

Who backs up Chauncey Billups as playmaker in the playoffs, since the other team will be harrassing him all game every game? Anthony Carter is overrated as a defender and not such a great playmaker in the playoffs. Aside from needing another big man, it seems to me that the Nuggets need a second playmaker if they want to win in the playoffs.

I know I'm gonna catch heat for this, but my answer is Melo. The play off of Billups will be just like AI except we have Billups instead of AI, so there are more routes out of Billups' hands than just the rim.

Nuggets 1 · Post #12 » by **Nuggets 1** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 3:33 am

Well Melo has been assisting more so it's a possibility. But then where is the scoring that Melo would have made going to come from?

Oh yeah, KMart will make a lot of threes.

No he won't.

Seriously, if Billups is boxed in by the defense, imo the only way the Nuggets can have a good offense is if both JR and LK are making some shots. I think the Nuggets will lose most playoff games where the two of them score less than 20-24 points combined. The other coach is not going to tell his team to concentrate on JR unless he is forced to, so the Nuggets wild card is if JR goes on any big scoring runs in the 2nd half of games, catching the defense and the other coach by surprise.

In general Smith has been either prevented from playing by Karl in the playoffs (costing him very valuable experience) or else he has not played as well as he does on average in the regular season. The Nuggets only chance to win a playoff series is if Smith finally plays well in the playoffs. Does he have enough confidence and does he get enough playoff minutes to do that? I doubt it right now.

Post #13 » by **corona** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 4:58 am

Nuggets 1....do you go by 'tremaine' on other boards?

eathy · Post #14 » by **eathy** » Wed Jan 21, 2009 5:51 am

this is waay too early.

personally i'd be hoping for a Portland/Jazz/Rockets/Mavs first round matchup... but that probably won't happen.

Nuggets1, George Karl USES whatever he can in the playoffs... He played JR against the Spurs (then benched him because he screwed up 2 very winnable games), and he played him a lot against the Lakers.