Very interesting day in the NBA. The tale of two great starts. Of course, the thing most people will be talking about is CP3 beating THE 3. While, of course, amazing and great and all that, what's more remarkable is that it's becoming less surprising what the Hornets are doing. The beginning of the season is usually bizarre, filled with teams in first that won't be in 3 weeks or so, and top teams still working out the kinks. But here's who the Hornets have beaten so far: Milwaukee, Houston, San Antonio, Denver and Miami. Every single one a playoff team, or in the case of Miami, not a playoff team yet, but expected to contend for the finals. This don't seem to be a flash in the pan. Ariza really seems to have upgraded their defense (5th best in the league), and Okafor is playing like a new man. Can't wait to actually see them play, but from a distance it's hard to argue with their wins.
A little closer in, both to my heart and geography, the Warriors beat the Jazz tonight to go to 4-1. Here's the thing: This was more than just an average win. The Warriors haven't beaten the Jazz for more than a year, and they outrebounded them (which probably hasn't happened in an even longer time). I'm going to repeat this in case you didn't catch it: The Warriors outrebounded the Jazz. In fact, they shot horribly, but made up for it with....yes, you guessed it, REBOUNDING! Lee and Biedrins had 35 rebounds just between the two of them, which I think is more than the entire team got in the first 5 games last year. Ellis had 7 steals, and not coincidentally, Deron had an uncharacteristic 8 turnovers. It's more possible the Warriors are fluke as this was the first real challenge of the year, but they aren't playing that way. Some wins have been gritty, and they don't seem to collapse down the stretch like last year. Maybe not having a lunatic screaming in your ear and pulling you out of the game everytime you scratch your ass might have something to do with that? David Lee has turned out to be the perfect player for them. It's true, he's not a very good defender, but he's not as horrible as advertised. And he makes up for it by being absolutely relentless on the boards. 5 games, 5 double doubles! I think he could be even better offensively, as they figure out more pick and pop plays with him, but for now he's getting most everything on his own off the boards. Beautiful.
