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• T.J. Simers of the Los Angeles Times: As often as the headlines go sour in professional sports, what a kick to hear Coach Vinny Del Negro walk through the locker room singing, "It's a miracle." Del Negro stopped to crack: "I just got a text from Mike Eruzione." Everything, including ABC-TV's pregame concentration on Memphis, was stacked against the Clippers. And yet inside the Clippers' locker room Chris Paul made sure everyone knew he had already booked a flight to San Antonio for his wife and son. "And I didn't want them going there without me," he said. Memphis has its mottoes; the Clippers have their leader in Paul. But maybe this series never gets this far if it isn't another veteran in Caron Butler who opts to play with a broken hand and no pain medication. Maybe it was the third time, or the fourth, that he got his hand whacked, but all Butler can remember is that he could not feel the fingers on his hand as he went to shoot free throws. "I'm going to be crying all the way to San Antonio," he said to the courtside media, and that was with two quarters still to play because he believed his team was going to prevail.
• Geoff Calkins of The Commercial-Appeal: This was a season brimming with all kinds of peril for the Memphis basketball franchise. The lockout could have destroyed the momentum from last season. The team could have been sold to Larry Ellison and his moving vans. The Grizzlies could have allowed themselves to be brought down by the Randolph/Arthur injuries. Instead, there was that moment, with 4:05 to go, towels and hopes held high. That's all you're promised as a sports fan. You're not promised a championship. People always talk about how winning brings a town together. But it's not the winning. It's the caring, the moments of shared agony. Ask any fan of the Boston Red Sox or the Chicago Cubs. So, yes, Sunday was a bummer, an ugly exhibition of basketball that only a mother -- or a Clippers fan -- could love. But if you let that define the season, you're looking at it all wrong. "It was a very satisfying season with a bitter end," said Lionel Hollins. "Hopefully, the sun will come up tomorrow. I'm pretty sure that it will."
• Greg Cote of The Miami Herald: The Heat’s MVPs took over when Miami needed them most Sunday. The plural there is not a mistake. LeBron James is the NBA’s newly minted league MVP, but if anybody doubted (or forgot) Dwyane Wade’s continuing value around here, Game 1 of this second-round playoff series offered a rather timely reminder. This matchup is supposed to be the Indiana Pacers’ team approach against Miami’s more star-driven makeup. If so, here is your early scoreboard Stars 1, Team 0. ... Heat president Pat Riley said something telling on that topic Saturday at the announcement that James became the eighth player in NBA history to win three MVP awards. Riley had mentioned how Michael Jordan had won all his MVPs and all his championships and said, “By being a team player? Nah. By being Michael Jordan.” Bingo. ... Two superstars in charge is not everybody’s idea of what a “team” should be. Try to find a Heat fan who’s complaining today.
• Bob Kravitz of The Indianapolis Star: After the game, Pacers guard George Hill was checking out the final score sheet, so I asked him if anything jumped out at him that would explain this loss. "No comment," he said. Then he commented. "Y'all know,'' he said, clearly referring to the 38-28 free-throw disparity. "We know. Everybody knows. The world knows. But sometimes it's better left unsaid." Mr. Hill, Mr. Stern on line 1. Was there a free-throw-attempt and free-throw-make disparity? Obviously. Are guys like LeBron James and Dwyane Wade going to get calls that Paul George and Darren Collison aren't going to get? Obviously. Did it hurt the Pacers to have so many players in early foul trouble? Obviously. Deal with it. Losers whine. And then they go home for the summer. Don't be that fan base. Don't be that city. ... If you want to know the real reasons the Pacers lost this game read on: Danny Granger and Paul George were complete no-shows. When Granger, the leading scorer, makes 1-of-10 shots and scores seven points, has one more turnover than shot made, you have no chance to beat a good team on the road.
• Steve Bulpett of the Boston Herald: Kevin Garnett insists with dagger looks and sharp rejoinders that his game has not changed of late. He takes such suggestions as insults, and says this is simply the way he has been all along. Well, not to argue with a man of wealth and taste, but ... baloney. On rye, with a dash of hot mustard. We’re not suggesting Garnett made a deadline deal with Mephistopheles or anything, but he has clearly been a greater force of late. The eyes have it, and the numbers offer support. So does Flip Saunders, the coach for his first 10 NBA years and now a consultant for the Celtics. “From an offensive standpoint, I’d agree that this is the best he’s played in a while,” Saunders said. “And it’s because he’s being more assertive than maybe you’ve seen in the past.” The Kevin Garnett you’re seeing on the offensive end right now — the one who is establishing position in the paint and demanding the ball — is the same one who went for 28 points in the Celtics’ lone win over Miami in last year’s playoffs. Not the one who slipped to seven points on 10 shots the next game.
• Bob Cooney of the Philadelphia Daily News: Game 1 was lost, but confidence was gained for the 76ers. Nearly everything coach Doug Collins was hoping for his team to do against the ultra-experienced Boston Celtics in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference semifinal series, they did. They got big leads, they thwarted runs, they defended. But they lost a one-point game, 92-91. Still, besides a win there could not have been a better game for the Sixers at TD Garden. They put a scare into the Celtics, into their crowd. They not only could have won the game, they really believe they should have. There is as much doubt surrounding the Celtics as there is confidence emanating from the Sixers. Sunday, the team gathered for a film session before taking to the court to just loosen the muscles, take some shots, have some fun. The elderly Celtics, meanwhile, were told to stay away from the court by coach Doc Rivers, in order to rest some of the bumps and bruises accumulated during a tough six-game series with the Atlanta Hawks that ended on Thursday. That shows just one of the many differences between these two teams. The biggest one is the abundance of playoff experience, and wins, gathered by most of the Celtics. It is something they went back to on Saturday to help them pull out a victory after trailing by as many as 13 points in the first half, 10 in the second.
• Berry Tramel of The Oklahoman: Seemed like a quick series was inevitable, and though the Thunder hung tough in April 2010, taking the series to six games, no ever thought the Lakers were vulnerable. That has changed. The Thunder team that awaits the Lakers in a Western Conference semifinal series that begins Monday night is different from those Baby Boomers of two years ago. This Thunder team is not an upstart. Not seeking an upset. This Thunder team has legit championship aspirations. And this Thunder team was built to beat LA. That Thunder team started Nenad Krstic and Jeff Green opposite Bynum and Gasol. This Thunder team starts Kendrick Perkins and Serge Ibaka. Big difference. Big, big difference. Krstic was an adequate offensive center but defensively deficient. Green could score but was outmanned trying to stop big or skilled power forwards, and Gasol is both big and skilled. Thunder mastermind Sam Presti knew that the road to NBA titles has been going through Los Angeles for 40 years. He knew Bynum or Gasol or both would be Lakers for years to come. So Presti shipped Green to Boston for Perkins, the NBA's best post defender, and signed him to a four-year contract extension. That trade has paid off handsomely over the last 15 months. But at no time is it more valuable than now, with another Thunder-Laker series on the starting line.
• Elliott Teaford of the Los Angeles Daily News: World Peace said he wasn't worried about the reception he's bound to receive tonight from Oklahoma City's fans. Kobe Bryant acknowledged it and said it might be something the Lakers need to get past in order to play their game. "It's going to be intense," Bryant predicted. "The crowd is obviously going to have a field day with that. I'm sure their players will generate some type of energy from it. For us, we've just got to keep our poise and do what we do." World Peace's return to the active roster Saturday made the Lakers whole again and they benefited from his defensive intensity and his shooting touch from the perimeter. They'll need all that and more from him against the Thunder. The World Peace vs. the Thunder storyline is one of many in this series. It is, after all, the first playoff matchup between the Lakers and Derek Fisher since they traded him to the Houston Rockets on March 15, creating an opening at point guard to acquire Ramon Sessions from the Cleveland Cavaliers. ... In many ways, the Nuggets were the perfect warm-up act for the Lakers' rumble with the Thunder. Denver was young, fast and athletic but lacking in the star power and the snarl the Lakers expect to see from Oklahoma City.

After seeing a 3-1 series lead vanish after back-to-back losses, the Los Angeles Clippers went on the road and beat the Memphis Grizzlies by 10 points to pick up the first Game 7 win in franchise history.

According to Elias, the Clippers are the sixth team in NBA history to win Game 7 on the road after relinquishing a 3-1 series lead. It was only the third postseason series win in the franchise’s 42-year history and second since the club moved to the West Coast from Buffalo for the 1978-79 season.

The key to Sunday’s win was the defense. The Clippers held the Grizzlies to 72 points. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, that’s the second-fewest points allowed on the road in Game 7 during the shot-clock era. The Indiana Pacers beat the Boston Celtics 97-70 in the 1st Round of the 2005 playoffs.

The biggest improvement was in transition defense. In Game 6, the Grizzlies outscored the Clippers 24-11 and made all eight shots in transition. On Sunday, the Grizzlies made only two of nine shots in transition and were outscored 16-6. In their four wins, the Clippers allowed nine points per game in transition; in defeat, that number climbed to 20 points per game.

The Clippers bench outscored the Grizzlies 41-11, with the five players off the bench all finishing with a positive plus-minus. During the 10 minutes that the five bench players were on the court together, they outscored the Grizzlies by 10 points.

The Clippers and Lakers both advancing to the Western Conference Semifinals creates a logjam on the schedule at Staples Center next weekend. With the Los Angeles Kings still alive in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, the arena will host four basketball games and two hockey games from Thursday through Sunday, including doubleheaders on Saturday and Sunday.

The Lakers (Friday and Saturday) and Clippers (Saturday and Sunday) will both be playing on consecutive days. Our friends at Elias let us know that this will be the first time an NBA team has played playoff games on consecutive days since May 10-11, 2003. The Dallas Mavericks played the Sacramento Kings and Detroit Pistons played the Philadelphia 76ers on both of those dates.

Notes from South Beach
Chris Bosh left the game with an abdominal strain in the second quarter, but that didn’t slow down the Miami Heat. LeBron James and Dwyane Wade combined for 42 points in the second half, outscoring the Indiana Pacers on their own. In the fourth quarter, James had 16 points to match the Pacers’ output.

LeBron joined Shaquille O’Neal as the only players in Heat history with a 30-point, 15-rebound playoff game.

After averaging 21.4 points per game in the 1st Round, Danny Granger scored seven points in the first game against the Heat. He was held scoreless in the first half for the first time since April 10, 2007 (regular season and playoffs combined).

Did you see that New York Times story about how the exorbitant cost of higher education is burdening a generation of college graduates with a collective $1 trillion of debt? That’s what the Los Angeles Lakers reminded me of late in Game 7 Saturday night. They finally figured out what they had to do put away the upstart Denver Nuggets, but the price could be seen in the faces and body language of Kobe Bryant, Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol as they made one of their final trips downcourt.

They were weary. Gasol opened his mouth wide to gasp air. Bynum tilted his head back. Bryant leaned over and grabbed the bottom of his shorts. Through strategy and effort, Denver had nullified the Lakers’ two 7-footers during the middle part of the series. Finally, Gasol and Bynum responded with a higher energy level themselves in Game 7, relentlessly going after offensive rebounds and hustling back on defense.

Had they played that way in Game 5 they could have bought themselves three days off instead of playing two extra games and expending additional energy. Now, with only one day to recover, the Lakers have to travel across two time zones to face the Oklahoma City Thunder, a better team with an even faster point guard than the Nuggets, in addition to the noisiest environment in the NBA. That’s their initial challenge. The schedule gets no more lenient from there, with the first four games of the series held in a six-day span, including back-to-back games in Los Angeles Friday and Saturday.

The Lakers have three starters who are over 30. The Thunder have three starters who are under 24. Also, while the extra games allowed Metta World Peace to fulfill his seven-game suspension, it also provided more time to recuperate for Kendrick Perkins. He has a right hip muscle strain that forced him out of the final game of Oklahoma City’s first-round sweep of the Dallas Mavericks and is being called a game-time decision. World Peace can be as effective a deterrent to Kevin Durant as can be found, but Perkins always gives Pau Gasol problems.

The Thunder won the first two games against the Lakers this season and were leading in the second quarter of the third game before James Harden was concussed by World Peace’s elbow. It still took double-overtime for the Lakers to beat the Thunder at home.

There was a noticeable difference between the Thunder’s performance at home and on the road in the 2010 playoff series with the Lakers. The Lakers’ only victory in three tries came on a Gasol putback at the buzzer. Since then the Thunder have the experience of advancing to the Western Conference finals themselves, plus importing the championship rings of Perkins and Derek Fisher while the Lakers have exported championship core members Fisher and Lamar Odom.

The Lakers have had more turnover than the Thunder since they last met, including the coach. They still had adjustments to make, Mike Brown still needed to show something to players who were used to the winningest coach in playoff history.

Brown said the lesson his Laker team learned from the Denver series was “How good we can be if we decide to play every possession.”

That takes energy, though. And the Lakers used a lot of it to get out of the first round. If that’s the currency, the Thunder are richer.

The under-the-radar Indiana Pacers head south to take on the larger-than-life Miami Heat as their Eastern Conference semifinal series tips off Sunday at 3:30 ET on ABC.

The Pacers have had a pair of unsuccessful trips to South Florida this season, getting blown out by 35 on Jan. 4 and losing on a Dwyane Wade buzzer-beater on March 10. The 35-point loss was the Pacers' worst in more than two years.

Pacers leading scorer Danny Granger was held to just six points and made 2 of 13 shots from the field in that loss, a major reason he averaged just 13.3 points against the Heat in the regular season, more than five points below his team-best 18.7 scoring average.

While Granger was one of five Pacers to average at least 10 points per game in the regular season, no Miami Heat player topped that level outside of the team’s All-Star trio of Wade, Chris Bosh and LeBron James, who led Miami with 27.1 points per game.

For the seventh time in seven attempts, James was able to lead his team to a series win in the first round of the postseason this year. But things are about to get tougher for the three-time MVP.

While James is unbeaten in seven first-round series, his team has lost three of his six conference semifinal series, dropping a seven-game series to the Detroit Pistons in 2006 and losing to the Boston Celtics in 2008 and 2010.

It will be strength against strength when James and the Heat attack the Pacers with the pick-and-roll. Miami averaged 0.94 points per play with the pick-and-roll in the regular season, sixth best in the NBA. But Indiana defended the pick-and-roll nearly as well as anyone, allowing just 0.86 points per pick-and-roll play, fourth best in the league.

A better bet for the Heat might be to dump the ball down low to Bosh or have James set up on the block. Indiana allowed 0.91 points per play in post-up situations in the regular season, better than just five teams.

Indiana’s offensive balance is undoubtedly an asset at times, but the lack of a go-to scorer has hurt the Pacers late in close game this season.

Indiana has made just 2 of 12 game-tying or go-ahead shots in the final 24 seconds of a game this season, with six different players attempting such a shot. Granger and Paul George lead the Pacers with three shots each in such situations, but neither has made a game-tying or go-ahead bucket in the final 24 seconds this season.

While the Heat’s end-of-game struggles have been more scrutinized, the Pacers have first-hand knowledge that Wade has emerged as the Heat’s most reliable option late in close games. Wade’s game winner against the Pacers on March 10 was one of his three game-tying or go-ahead buckets in the final 24 seconds this season.

Miami’s problem is if it can’t get it to Wade in such situations. While Wade was 3-for-6 on game-tying or go-ahead field goals in the final 24 seconds this season, the rest of the team was a combined 3-for-10.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- What was once indifference between the Los Angeles Clippers and Memphis Grizzlies has descended into hostility over six games. These teams actively dislike each other. The Clippers have made light of Memphis' "Grit 'n' Grind" handle and generally annoyed the Grizzlies with their posturing. Memphis has countered that the Clippers are a bunch of floppers -- its head coach going so far as to accuse Chris Paul in a live interview during Game 4. When the topic of Paul's injury came up after Game 6, Zach Randolph fired back that he didn't even know Paul was hurt, implying that the Clippers' injuries were merely incidental, a sideshow.

All of it will come to a head on Sunday afternoon in Game 7.

The health of Chris Paul and Blake Griffin
Whatever Randolph says at the podium, the Clippers simply aren't the same team with Paul and Blake Griffin hobbled. On Friday night after the Grizzlies' Game 6 win in Los Angeles, Paul, Marc Gasol and Randolph pointed out that nobody is 100 percent this time of year. True, but the Clippers can't function as an offensive team without Paul and Griffin. When the Clippers had their offense rolling late in Games 1 and 3 and most of Games 2 and 4, the formula was simple: Make the Grizzlies choose between bringing bodies to the paint to stifle Paul's penetration, which presents problems on the perimeter and with balance, or yield seams to Paul and pray that the help will come from the right place at the right time.

Paul clearly doesn't have the same burst off the bounce or the ability to change speeds, probe, beat his guy and get to his spot for an elbow jumper before the defense can recover. Without that, the Clippers' offense suffers from rigor mortis. Paul can't split a trap, and ultimately, the Grizzlies can play him straight up, while the help can stay home on the Clippers' perimeter shooters. With Paul on the court in Game 6, the Clippers shot only 39 percent.

Meanwhile, Griffin pummeled Memphis in his breakout Game 4 as the roll man with Paul, posting up and going decisively into his move. That's the key: Griffin's knee won't prevent him from being on the floor, but without a confident face-up game, he must rely entirely on those up-and-unders, spins and step-throughs. With the bum knee, he's a step slow -- and you can slice a few inches off the vertical. That's the difference between wreaking destruction at the rim and having to finesse his way to the basket.

The Grizzlies' inside job
Gasol got what he wanted after a frustrating long weekend in Los Angeles during Games 3 and 4: He's again the centerpiece of the Memphis offense. On Friday night, there was a lovely balance to Gasol's game, an exhibition of his versatility. Memphis used him to run a pick-and-roll in the left slot, from where he was able to beat the Clippers' rotation on the dive. They posted him up on the left block, where he launched that pretty hook over the Clippers' defense. And when the Clippers came hard at Gasol in the high post, he dumped it off to Randolph (the recipient of all three of Gasol's assists) in Memphis' savvy high-low game.

The pinpoint bounce pass that Gasol delivered to Randolph at the three-minute mark in Game 6 was a thing of beauty. Mike Conley and Gasol ran that angle pick-and-roll on the left side. Gasol stopped at the edge of the paint and received the pass as the Clippers trapped Conley, forcing Kenyon Martin to rotate up from the baseline. As Martin approached, Gasol hit Randolph wide open beneath the hoop on the right side. A perfectly executed play by Memphis at the biggest moment of the series, which is how you advance in the postseason.

Randolph has found his legs and looks more like the bully from last season's playoffs than the player who was struggling to carve out space for himself down low. For Randolph to be successful, he needs to rip through and keep his defender moving. That's how he creates that space, and that's what he's been doing the past few games.

Having two big men with diverse but overlapping skill sets allows Memphis to do some interesting stuff in the half court. Sometimes the offense just needs a nudge.

Who else for the Clippers?
With Paul and Griffin banged-up, the Clippers must get something exceptional from one of the supporting actors. Randy Foye, Caron Butler, Mo Williams and Nick Young have each had their moments over this season and, to a lesser extent, in the playoffs. In Game 5, that performance came from second-year dragonfly Eric Bledsoe.

Clippers coach Vinny Del Negro isn't predisposed to trust young players. Whether it's because he's risk-averse, conflict-averse or just more comfortable with guys who've "been there," Del Negro favors vets. With Paul hurting and Williams suffering a hand injury in Game 6, Del Negro had to lean on Bledsoe for significant minutes -- and it's about time.

Bledsoe doesn't stretch the floor for the Clippers, but he's their best perimeter defender on and off the ball. He has an uncanny synergy with Paul in the backcourt. For aforementioned reasons, the two played together for only 76 minutes in the regular season. The Clippers scored 111.4 points per 100 possessions during that time and gave up only 93.5. In this series, Bledsoe is a plus-35. When Bledsoe on the floor, Conley is minus-34 (and plus-47 when Bledsoe is off).

Both Bledsoe and Foye, who has struggled in the series, will have to make major contributions on Sunday for the Clippers to escape Memphis with a W. The Clippers also will have to be more resourceful because their two best creators are limited. When Reggie Evans is your roll man off the high ball screen, life doesn't become any easier, because now two defenders are blitzing Paul. As it is, Tony Allen and Conley make things difficult enough because they can play the Clippers' perimeter straight up. Getting the shooters clean looks at the basket will have to come via flare screens and a ton of movement in the half court.

So who's it going to be?

The battle on the margins
In many ways, this series has been fought in the periphery -- on the offensive glass, in passing lanes, at the foul stripe. Neither team has gotten much of what it wants offensively, but there have been ample opportunities to supplement that cruddy output with extras. For instance, the Grizzlies have annihilated the Clippers on the offensive glass, where Memphis has collected more than one out of every three available rebounds -- its 33.7 offensive rebounding rate is tops among postseason teams. (As a frame of reference, the Bulls ranked first in the regular season with a 32.6 offensive rebounding rate.)

For the Grizzlies, this is vital because they're a terrible shooting team. They've been outshot by the Clippers in the series but have been able to make up ground by getting additional looks at the basket -- at short range, no less. Memphis' prowess on the offensive glass is especially impressive when you consider that the Clippers were a pretty decent defensive rebounding team during the regular season. Overall, the Grizzlies have racked up 15.4 second-chance points per 48 minutes, with only 10.2 for the Clippers.

In the turnover event, the Clippers protected the ball better than any team other than Philadelphia during the regular season, and Memphis led the league in opponent turnover rate. Something had to give, and true to form, the Clippers and Grizzlies have played to a draw with identical 12.69 turnover rates. The Grizzlies had been winning the turnover battle but coughed the ball up 22 times in Game 6 -- the only reason the Clippers were in a game in which the Grizzlies shot better and controlled the glass decisively.

Then there's the foul game. Both teams hack with impunity, and both are spending plenty of time at the stripe in this series. But the team that has gotten to the line with greater frequency has won five of the six games -- the Clippers' Game 3 rally the only exception.

Here, the Clippers have to be careful on Sunday. When players are gimpy, they have a tougher time staying in front of their guy. They're more desperate defenders and, in turn, tend to be more likely to foul. Paul didn't foul out of a game all season but was whistled for six fouls in Game 6. Evans, who likely will pick up some of Griffin's minutes, is a foul machine. With the Grizzlies re-establishing their inside game, there will be more pressure than ever on the Clippers' defense to body up on the block. They'll have to do so carefully.

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Information in this post was provided by NBA.com.

LeBron James became the eighth player in NBA history to win three MVP awards Saturday, earning the honor after leading the Miami Heat in points, rebounds and assists this season.

James also led his team in total points, rebounds and assists when he won his first MVP award with the Cavaliers in 2008-09. He joins Wilt Chamberlain as the only players in league history to lead their teams in each of those categories in at least two MVP seasons. (Chamberlain did it three times).

For the sixth time in his nine NBA seasons, James averaged at least 27 points, 7 rebounds and 6 assists per game. The only other player with six such seasons is Oscar Robertson, who did it six times in his 14 seasons.

As James made clear when he accepted the award, he has a "bigger goal" remaining this season: winning his first NBA title. At the moment, James is the only member of the three-MVP club without an NBA championship ring. The other seven players with three or more MVP trophies have combined to win 34 NBA titles, an average of nearly five per player.

James, Karl Malone and Steve Nash are the only players to win multiple MVP awards but not a league title (Malone and Nash have each won the award twice).

James earned 85 first-place votes and 1,074 total points, finishing 185 points ahead of runner-up Kevin Durant in voting. According to multiple metrics, James was the clear choice.

With James on the court, the Heat outscored opponents by 474 points during the regular season, giving James the highest plus-minus rating in the league. James has led the NBA in plus-minus each of the last four seasons since Paul Pierce had an NBA-best +784 rating in 2007-08.

James also led all players in estimated wins added, a metric that estimates the number of wins a player adds to a team over the course of a season above what would be expected from a "replacement" player. The concept is similar to wins above replacement (WAR) in baseball.

James is estimated to have added 23.5 wins to the Heat's season total this season. The top three in estimated wins added mirrored the top three finishers in MVP voting, with Durant (20.0) ranking second and Chris Paul (17.5) coming in third.

If you love basketball, you should make it a priority in your life to watch at least one NBA playoff game from within 15 feet of the basket. You will see, hear and feel the intensity with which players battle for the ball. It’s not a comparison to the regular season that you can track statistically, such as pace or points per possession or whatever other metric you want to use. It’s something you must quantify through your own impressions. It’s what makes the playoffs the playoffs.

“As soon as that ball goes up, it’s kind of a free-for-all,” Blake Griffin said.

The victories are so hard-fought that something as simple as tying up Zach Randolph for a jump ball during Game 6 of the Grizzlies-Clippers series could prompt L.A.’s Kenyon Martin to celebrate like a linebacker who had just dropped a quarterback for a 5-yard loss.

“Whoooo!” Martin yelled, gripping the ball like a prize for his effort as he locked eyes with the courtside fans. “Let’s go!”

It was the Grizzlies who ultimately prevailed on more of these little skirmishes. They outrebounded the Clippers, 48-32. They had more blocked shots, 9-6. They finished with more points in the paint, 46-40. That’s why it feels like they’re in the lead of a series that is tied at three games apiece ... because Game 7 is in Memphis on Sunday.

It’s not as if the Clippers weren’t willing to engage in the battle. Martin, and particularly Reggie Evans, spent the afternoon wresting with Randolph, Marc Gasol and whoever else dared enter the lane. Eric Bledsoe had almost as many rebounds as Griffin, proving that the ball was there for anyone bold enough to get it.

The Grizzlies just were more determined. It was a result, Randolph said, of “having our mindset coming into the game, knowing it was going to be a physical game. Having 48 minutes of pushing, arm-grabbing, locking, whatever.”

“We did a great job of taking the first hit,” Gasol said. “Doesn’t matter what happens. We kept on playing. We were very focused on our task defensively. We made some shots; defensively we were way more disciplined than we’ve been.”

Lamented the Clippers’ DeAndre Jordan: “They got stops, they got offensive rebounds.”

Lionel Hollins won the coaching matchup, as well, thanks to his substitution pattern. During a timeout with 9:28 left in the game, Hollins sent in Rudy Gay, Hamed Haddadi, Tony Allen and Randolph. They fell behind by eight points, then that group rolled off seven consecutive points to get right back in the game. Haddadi might seem like the odd name in that group, but he had three rebounds, a blocked shot and scored two points on a putback of a missed free throw during his three-minute stretch before Gasol replaced him.

“We had the right lineup that I wanted in the game,” Hollins said.

Vinny Del Negro can’t truthfully say the same thing. He stayed with the group that got the lead just a little too long, waiting until there was only a point separating the teams before calling a 20-second timeout and substituting Chris Paul for Mo Williams. He let Bledsoe, who had been outstanding taking on an added burden for the injured Chris Paul, stay on the court a little past his stamina point.


The Clippers lost the lead and couldn’t prevail down the stretch. Paul committed an uncharacteristic two turnovers late in the game and missed the only shot he took. Their decisions on and off the court weren’t as good as Memphis’. They lost the mental game in addition to the physical battle.


From the bumps under the basket to the calculations on the sideline, there’s a greater magnitude to everything in the playoffs.

Welcome to Five for Friday, where every week we post some of the best HoopIdeas we get from readers through comments, e-mail and Twitter. In honor the recently departed regular season, some ideas that call for its restructuring.

I particularly like the seed planted by this first HoopIdea: What if we broke up the season into multiple parts, each ending in a single-elimination tournament, then used the results of those seasons for a traditional NBA playoffs to crown an overall champion?

THREE TOURNAMENT SEASONS AND THEN THE PLAYOFFS

Divide the regular season into three tournaments: Fall, Winter and Spring. Each tournament consists of two phases, home and away games to determine seeding, then a single elimination tournament ending in a final four. The results of the tournament give each team a certain number of points. After all three tournaments, the team with the most points gets the No. 1 seed for the end of season playoffs, and so on. After each tournament all standings are reset and trade period is in effect. We get three final fours and three trade period per season AND playoffs! -- Louis from Switzerland

CHANGE KICK BALL RULES

A kick ball should be treated the same way as handball for soccer. Dead ball foul free set shot from spot of violation. #HoopIdea -- Steven Lepre (@NashtySteve) via Twitter

TECHNICAL FOULS ACCUMULATE MORE QUICKLY

Technical fouls should be like yellow cards in soccer. You get one in two consecutive games you miss the 3rd game. -- WM Kootenay (@k00tenay) via Twitter

END BACK-TO-BACK TIMEOUTS

A pet peeve of mine is when teams call a time out because they can't get the ball in bounds. I don't mind that they can burn a time out to save the possession, but it makes everyone sit through another timeout. Instead, make it so that if a team calls timeout after the player's been handed the ball to inbound, they simply hand the ball to the ref and the ref hands it back to reset the 5-second timer. Let 'em improvise a little. -- Nathan Sitaraman

DO AWAY WITH DIVISIONS

The NBA should just be one league and each team should play everyone twice. That would be 58 games. Then you match up the best teams in the playoffs, regardless of location. With everyone having chartered planes the travel isn’t bad anymore. Back when the East was so terrible the Finals would have been the Lakers and Kings or Spurs and Lakers a couple of years and the ratings would have been much better. -- Rick P. Macke

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Bucks forward Luc Richard Mbah a Moute is spending his offseason in Los Angeles rehabbing from surgery, watching the NBA on TV, and helping me learn the proper French pronunciation of his name.

All three are works in progress -- especially the last one.

For the record, he's fine with your calling him "Luke Richard," with the total American pronunciation of both. But ohhhh, no, that's not good enough for me. I'm going for the real thing out of respect.

And mangling it.

But he has agreed to come on many times through the playoffs, so I'll keep practicing.

He crowns the NBA's defensive player of last night, admits to flopping, describes good hard playoff fouls, talks about how to stop James Harden, picks winners in Lakers vs. Nuggets, Heat vs. Pacers, Sixers vs. Celtics and much more.

And then we're joined by David Thorpe, who shares Lakers vs. Nuggets insight (he picked Denver before the series began, is he sticking with that?) before we argue about whether or not last night's games would have been better with more timeouts.

The NBA Today with Luc Richard Mbah a Moute and David Thorpe.

Sandy Weil is the Director of Analytics at Sportsmetricians Consulting, the researcher behind groundbreaking hot hand research and a repeat contributor to HoopIdea.

Let’s face it: the middle of the NBA season can be a dull time.

But it could be much more exciting if the NBA adopted a schedule like they have in the big European soccer leagues.

In those leagues, they carve out space for this additional tournament during their season and everyone competes for both the regular season and tournament titles. Usually, this means multiple competition formats are underway simultaneously. They have the "table" (the regular season: a full slate of home-and-home games) and, going on at the same time, an elimination-based "cup competition" (examples include the FA Cup in the UK and Copa del Rey in Spain).

By adopting a season format modeled after European soccer, the NBA can simultaneously:

• Reduce the number of games
• Add the excitement of a mid-season, single-elimination tournament
• Eliminate the All-Star game while keeping the spectacle of All-Star weekend
• Boost mid-week TV ratings
• Increase national television revenue
• Increase competitiveness by giving owners and players another trophy to compete for.

Let's imagine the following season scenario: The NBA season starts on Christmas Day, with a big slate of games. The regular season consists of a 58-game format where each team plays a home-and-home against everyone else. Then in February, when the season starts to drag a bit, the NBA holds a single-elimination tournament.

Call it the Commissioner's Cup.

Giving the top team in each conference a bye in the first round of the tournament creates the equivalent of a 32-team bracket (five rounds). The NBA holds the first three rounds on Monday and Tuesday nights in February, with Wednesday through Sunday nights reserved for "regular season games."

The culmination of the Commissioner's Cup is a neutral site Final Four-style weekend event in place of the current All-Star Game weekend.

After that tournament, the NBA finishes off the regular season as they do now and begin the playoffs at the same time in April.

In this format, all teams would play between 59 and 63 games. But since the NBA Final Four games replace the All-Star Game, we end up with between 59 and 61 during the same time frame as the current, compressed regular season's 66 games.

This doesn’t mean we’d need to have all those back-to-backs (or back-to-back-to-backs). If the season began on Christmas, a 59- or 60-game season would make for exactly the same game frequency as the normal 82-game season.

There are some certainly details to work out. For instance, how should they seed the teams and how to decide who hosts the early round games?

In the FA Cup, they draw the match-ups at random, including who gets to host the game. That would be one option. Maybe one good middle ground is to randomly draw the match-ups from each region, with coin flips for who gets to host each game -- promoting regional match-ups preserves a bit of the rivalries that would get lost in switching to the 58-game regular season slate.

The most obvious downside is that teams are guaranteed to host only 29 home games each season, instead of the current 41 -- a 30 percent drop in games. Since most teams will host zero or one Commissioner's Cup games, the tournament wouldn’t much offset the deficit in games.

To make it work, the first round of TV contracts that include the single elimination tournament games would need to see a nice bump in revenue because of the meaningful games being played in the middle of February.

If the NBA is talking about shortening the season, why not also add needed excitement to the middle months of the season?

SHOULD THE NBA ADOPT A SHORTER SEASON? JOIN THE CONVERSATION HERE:

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• Ron Borges of the Boston Herald: In sports you often don’t know when a game is being decided. While some things are obvious it is most often the little things that separate those going on from those going home. A critical but mostly unnoticed case in point came with 9:29 remaining and the Celtics leading 71-65. Atlanta’s Josh Smith got into a silly beef about whether or not he could enter the game and was hit with a technical that cost the Hawks a point. Seconds later he had his shot blocked. While he was gesticulating toward his shoulder and refusing to run up the floor, the Celtics fled the scene. Had he trailed the play he might well have knocked the ball loose because his teammates stopped the Celts charge, but Smith was nowhere to be found. Instead of getting into the game defensively, Smith was pleading his case down court, even though no one was listening. ... Smith’s selfishness cost his team three points when it seemed unimportant, which only goes to show you never know when the game will be won or lost. You only know it will be, and it often happens when you don’t even realize it just did. At this level, every play counts. You may not make them all and you may have your own mental lapses and when you do you’ll lose, too, as happened in Game 5 when Rajon Rondo [stats] failed to bring the ball up the middle of the floor with seconds left and ended up trapped on the sideline with nowhere to go but where the Hawks went last night: home. But when it counted, the aging Celtics knew how to win and so they move on to play the 76ers tomorrow night while the Hawks move on to play golf. “We’re playing like this is it,” Pierce said of the fierceness of the Celtics’ approach in the twilight of the New Big Three’s time together. “This could be our last chance together so we’re going to give it one last run and see what happens.”
• Michael Cunningham of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Kevin Garnett on Hawks co-owner Michael Gearon Jr.’s comments: “First off, I want to say ‘Thank you’ to their owner for giving me some extra gas tonight. My only advice to him is next time he opens his mouth, actually know what he’s talking about, Xs and Os versus checkbooks and bottom lines. . . . We’re not dirty. We’re firm, we’re aggressive. We’re not dirty. You have to understand the word ‘dirty’ in this game is very defined. Going under guys, trying to hurt guys, ill intent–is not they way we play basketball. ... We play with a lot of passion, play with force. It’s the playoffs but I’m not trying to hurt anybody, nor has my teammates. I just found that comment to be a little rude and a little out of hand and I wanted to address it. Just because you got a bunch of money don’t mean you can open your mouth.”
• John Smallwood of the Philadelphia Daily News: I DON'T KNOW WHETHER two free throws can change a legacy, but for one night, at least, Andre Iguodala was finally what Philadelphia had begged him to be - the leading man, the guy who made the plays that carried the team to victory. It hasn't been too much to ask. After all, he is the Sixer with the biggest contract, the one who has been sold as the face of the franchise. Now, let's be real, because sinking two free throws with 2.2 seconds left isn't exactly like draining a long jumper the buzzer to win. That's the realm of the Michael Jordans, Larry Birds and Kobe Bryants. Still given Iguodala's star-crossed history as a Sixer, Philadelphia will gladly take what he delivered Thursday night. And make no mistake, because by sinking those two free throws against the Chicago Bulls, Iguodala, the other A.I., the man who could not be king, sealed the most significant victory this organization has had since the Allen Iverson-led Sixers blew out the Milwaukee Bucks in Game 7 of the 2001 Eastern Conference finals. No, these Sixers did not advance to the NBA Finals, but their 79-78 victory over the Chicago Bulls did advance the franchise to the second round of the NBA Playoffs for the first time since 2003. ... This is the fifth time he has gone to the playoffs with the Sixers. This is the first time he will play more than six games. "Iguodala has gone through a lot here," Collins said. "I told him, 'Nobody deserves this moment more than you did.' "
• Steve Rosenbloom of the Chicago Tribune: The ending of Game 6 was as frustrating and painful as this series had been, so it's just as well. This Bulls team was going nowhere. Not like this, anyway. So, now what? Rose needs to get healthy. Duh. It can’t come soon enough. But one convincing argument this series made was the Bulls’ lack of a reliable second scorer. Wait, isn’t this how last season ended? You can hope the Bulls amnesty Boozer and make Taj Gibson the starter. I doubt it will happen, but a man can dream. Injured or not, Gibson was a stud when the Bulls needed one. He turned Game 5 before suffering that gruesome-looking ankle injury and had a similar impact on Game 6 with 14 points, 5 rebounds, and 2 blocks. Hamilton showed a bit of what the Bulls needed -- what the Bulls will need more of going forward -- but the Bulls have to look at that position. He gave the Bulls 19 points and 8 rebounds in Game 6, but Hamilton hasn’t shown he can stay healthy or play consistently. And please, address backup point guard, because that’s now a starting position without Rose to start next season. Yeah, next season. It’s here.
• Benjamin Hochman of The Denver Post: The braggadocio echoed. Just minutes before Thursday's tipoff of Game 6 at the Pepsi Center, the rapping voice of The Notorious B.I.G. was heard over the loudspeaker. The song? "Goin' Back To Cali." This opening-round playoff series was supposed to be over Tuesday night. But, after the Nuggets won in Los Angeles in Game 5, they came out with a rapper's swagger in the first quarter of Thursday's Game 6. And now, they're indeed goin' back to Cali for Game 7 with the Lakers, after Denver's 113-96, wire-to-wire victory Thursday night. "I planned to play that as the last song," said Cassidy Bednark, also known as D.J. Bedz, the Nuggets in-house D.J. "Then, I got slipped a note that said, 'Big Al Harrington wants to hear "Goin' Back To Cali." ' Obviously, it was meant to be." Game 7, Denver's first since 1994, will be Saturday night at the Staples Center. Denver trailed 3-1 and now has a chance to pull out a historic victory against the No. 3-seeded Lakers. Before Thursday's game, on the locker room dry-erase board, the first thing written was: "Hit first — hit hard. We must be the physical team." Hit first? Hit hard? The Nuggets came out like Mike Tyson in his heyday. Ty Lawson, 3! Danilo Gallinari, 3! Lawson, layup! Lawson, 3 again! And then, when Kenneth Faried unleashed a two-handed slam, Denver was up 13-0 before the Lakers knew what hit them.
• Elliott Teaford of the Los Angeles Daily News: The Lakers were toast from the start, after Kobe Bryant came down with a stomach ailment that weakened him and after Andrew Bynum missed three early point-blank shots in a matter of seconds Thursday night at Pepsi Center. Now the question is: Do the Lakers have what it takes to win Game 7 on Saturday night at Staples Center? They sure didn't have it during a dispiriting 113-96 loss to the Denver Nuggets in Game 6 of their Western Conference quarterfinal series. "No way I thought what happened tonight was going to happen," Denver coach George Karl said after the Nuggets scored the game's first 13 points, led by as many as 28 in the second half and tied the best-of-7 series at 3-all. The Lakers' inability to match the Nuggets' energy cost them dearly again. Bynum went up for a layup in the opening moments and Nuggets center Timofey Mozgov blocked it. Bynum grabbed the ball and tried again and point guard Ty Lawson blocked it. Bynum rebounded again and then missed a hook shot. The sequence offered a tidy summary on what followed.
• Geoff Calkins of The Commercial-Appeal: Give Blake Griffin credit. He came up with a pretty good line. Leaving the hallway media scrum after Game 5, he compared the Grizzlies-Clippers series to "The Hunger Games." ... Beating the No. 1 seed as a No. 8 seed was harder. Making the playoffs after devastating injuries to Randolph and Gay was harder, too. The Grizzlies keep saying they're tough-minded. We'll see how tough-minded tonight. The contest at Staples awaits them. The lurid people of Los Angeles will be assembling soon. The DJ is ready to offer more helpful cheering instructions. The backup columnist is poised to call us "dumb" or "hicks." It's not a pretty picture, I realize. But you can take comfort in this: I actually read the book and saw "The Hunger Games" movie. Turns out, the kids from the small market win.
• Broderick Turner of the Los Angeles Times: In the eyes of Kenyon Martin, it is pretty simple for the Clippers. "We've got to go home and win," Martin said. "It ain't a two-game series for us. It's a one-game series."

The Philadelphia 76ers became the fifth 8-seed to win their opening playoff series, dispatching the injury-riddled Chicago Bulls in six games Thursday night.

The fact that the Bulls were without reigning NBA MVP Derrick Rose for most of the series likely matters little to Philadelphia fans celebrating their first postseason series win since beating the New Orleans Hornets in the 1st Round of the 2003 Eastern Conference playoffs.

The 76ers advanced to the Conference Semis despite shooting under 40 percent in three of their four wins against the Bulls, including a field goal percentage of 39.7 (29-73) Thursday. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Philadelphia is the first team to win three games in a series despite shooting under 40 percent from the field since the Indiana Pacers did it against the New York Knicks in the 2000 Eastern Conference Finals and just the fifth such team in the Shot-Clock era.

The 76ers also struggled on the boards, and were outrebounded by 23 Thursday night (56-33). According to Basketball Reference, a team was outrebounded by 23 or more in a postseason game 24 times from 1986-2011 and only once did that team win, when the Washington Bullets beat the 76ers 95-94 in Game 1 of the 1st Round of the Eastern Conference playoffs.

Prior to Thursday, no team in postseason history has won a game when shooting under 40 percent and being outrebounded by 23 or more, according to Elias.

Philadelphia got a big break when C.J. Watson, who made 80.8 percent of his free throws in the regular season, dished to Omer Asik on the Bulls second-to-last possession. Asik missed both of his foul shots after he was fouled by Spencer Hawes, befitting a player who ranked last in free throw shooting (45.6 percent) among the 175 players to attempt at least 100 free throws in the regular season.

When Andre Iguodala got his turn from the line moments later, he converted both of his attempts despite entering Thursday having made a team-low 45.0 percent of his free throw attempts in crunch time (score within 5 points in the final 5 minutes).

Philadelphia’s streak of eight straight seasons without a playoff series win, tied with 1969-76 for the longest such streak in franchise history, comes to an end, as does their string of five straight losses in playoff series.

In the Conference Semis, the 76ers will attempt to become just the second 8-seed to win a pair of playoff series. The 1999 Knicks advanced the NBA Finals before falling to the Spurs in five games.

• Trust me, you want to see Kyrylo Fesenko's "SPACE MOUNTAIN IS TERRIFYING" face.
• Speaking with SLAM's Tzvi Twersky, Allen Iverson recalls his first game with Michael Jordan: "Like, you’re just out there with him, and he’s your idol. You look up to him; he’s the reason you play basketball. And, then, you’re just standing beside him, waiting for the jump ball. I just remember I couldn’t stop looking at him, like, the way he had his uniform on, I’m looking at his socks -- he didn’t have the NBA socks on, which we’d get fined for not wearing them (laughs). He didn’t have the NBA socks on, and I’m just looking at him. He didn’t even look real."
• Here's how the Heat-Pacers regular season series went: Heat win in a blowout. Heat win by a little less. Heat win in overtime. Pacers win in a blowout.
• John Hollinger (Insider) expects a competitive series between Miami and Indiana, at least when Roy Hibbert is on the court: "To see how much of a factor Hibbert might be, check out this stat: When LeBron James was on the court against Hibbert in the four regular-season games, Miami was plus-17 in 128 minutes -- not good for the Pacers, obviously, but manageable. When LeBron played and Hibbert didn't? The Heat were plus-30 in 31 minutes."
• ESPN's Israel Guttierez brings you a series prediction from Heat coach Erik Spoelstra: "This next series I'm sure will feel like it's played in a cage rather than a basketball court. It will be extremely physical."
• Chris Paul channels his inner John McEnroe.
• At the end of playoff games, the Grizzlies are suffering from bad-shot fever. The only prescription is more Marc Gasol, writes Rob Mahoney on Court Vision.
• Remember when JaVale McGee threw the game ball into the stands after Denver took down the Lakers in Game 4? He was throwing it to his Mom.
• PopcornMachine gives us a look at what the Heat did to the Knicks at the end of the first three quarters of Game 5.
• Arron Afflalo hasn't found his shooting stroke in the playoffs, but he's still making smart moves off the ball, writes Brett Koremenos.
• Having won a title in the last five years is a surprisingly powerful predictor of winning another, as Stat Geek Smackdown champion Benjamin Morris has explained. On Skeptical Sports, he digs into why that might be, and suggests it could be the result of the playoff format conveying big advantages to the best teams, whereas the regular season is more random: "In stark contrast to other team sports, the NBA Playoffs are extremely deterministic. The best team usually wins (and, conversely, the winner is usually the best team). ... This is pretty much a function of design: A moderately better team becomes a huge favorite in a seven-game series. So even if the best team is only moderately better than the 2nd best team, they can be in a dominant position. ... On the other side of the equation, regular season standings and leaderboards—whether of wins or its most stable proxies—are highly variable. Note that a 95 percent confidence interval on an 82-game sample (aka, the “margin of error”) is +/- roughly 10 games. If you think of the NBA regular season as a lengthy 30-team competition for the number one seed, its structure is much, much less favorable to the best teams than the playoffs are."
• Wizards blog Truth About It isn't feeling any regrets about letting JaVale McGee go
• Scary times for Clippers fans. When Blake Griffin went down clutching his knee, lots of people didn't know how to react. After all, he has that habit of making fouls look worse than they are. Which is too bad, because Griffin has spent this series repairing his on-court image, in minds of many. He's attacked the rim fearlessly, shelved that herky-jerky jumper and accepted the thankless duty trying to push the Grizzly big men, all of whom are bigger than Blake, away from their comfort zones. And he's done it all with solemn intensity rather than theatrical scowling. Here's hoping he comes back strong in Game 6.
• SI's Lee Jenkins on HoopSpeak Live, talking about the Lakers and Nuggets and how much George Karl enjoys not coaching Carmelo Anthony.
• Michael Schwartz's thorough postmortem on the Phoenix Suns contains this gem: "The Suns were also significantly better offensively with Frye on the floor, scoring 107.7 per 100 with him but just 98.8 without him. If Channing were a team, he would have ranked second in offensive efficiency this season. Phoenix also shoots better from every distance and floor area with Frye in the game, pretty crazy considering Frye himself shot just 41.6 percent from the floor. One would not think that would be the case for a streaky shooter who was so bad to start the season, yet his spacing ability really is that important to the Suns’ offense, and it has been the last three seasons." (Via Valley of the Suns)
• It's nowhere near Los Angeles, but Stephon Marbury has a statue before Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
• Ryan Hollins joins McGee as an oft-ridiculed 7-footer making a difference in the playoffs. Meanwhile, Kevin Garnett is still the player who makes the Celtics great.
• Like Star Wars? The commenters of Daily Dime Live (which starts tonight at 7 p.m.) will make you smile.
• Anthony Davis, King of the Fry-o-lator.

On Hardwood Paroxysm Ian Levy has pretty pictures of teams' most effective plays, compared to how often they run them. Some lessons:

Cutting big men: Nice if you can get 'em

The first thing you notice is that big men cutting are most teams' most efficient plays. Fantastic.

But that's only so useful. By the time a big man catches the ball on his way to the hoop, the defense is already in dire straits.

In other words, "really easy plays when the defense is broken and the ball's in the paint" are good. But of course, most teams can't decide to run that play every time down. It's simply not available without the defense cooperating. Those plays are rare even on the most efficient teams.

Too much Kobe Bryant

The Lakers have some plays that they use way more than they evidently should. The first is (surprise!) Kobe Bryant isolations. Levy writes:

Of the Lakers’ five most productive offensive outcomes, none occurred more than 200 times on the season. Meanwhile nearly 1,100 Lakers’ offensive possessions were used by Kobe Bryant in either isolations, post-ups, or pick-and-rolls. The offensive efficiency the Lakers received from those possessions fell in between what they got from Metta World Peace in the post (0.84 ppp) and Ramon Sessions in the pick-and-roll (0.88 ppp).

Ouch. (Note: Ian is a very nice man, and he's telling nothing but the truth. Please be kind.)

Not enough Kobe Bryant

Here's the thing, though: Those 1,100 or so inefficient Bryant plays Levy spoke of? Those are the ones -- isolation, post-ups, as the ball-handler in the pick-and-roll, where Bryant gets the ball and then the action begins. Those are the plays where Bryant is in total control. Those are from the "in my teammates I do not trust" playbook.

Those are also the plays where the defense gets to say "oh, look, there goes Kobe doing his thing, let's load up on that."

However, the Lakers' best plays? Many of them are Bryant too. But they're Bryant relying on team actions to get him the ball where he can be more effective.

Look at Levy's charts! Bryant spotting up: Fantastic! Bryant coming off a screen: Among the team's best plays.

Those are plays where neither Bryant, nor the defense, can be sure Bryant will get the ball. Both struggle with that uncertainty.

Meanwhile, when Phil Jackson unloaded in his book on Bryant's over-reliance on his own scoring abilities, he didn't specifically complain that Bryant shot too much. He complained that he craved too much control, for instance by breaking plays to catch the inbound pass late in games, instead of working team actions to try to get somebody, Bryant or otherwise, open.

Bryant wouldn't work off the ball like Jackson -- and, now we learn, efficiency statistics -- demand.

Too much Andrew Bynum in the post

The Lakers' other play that seems to be run more than can be justified by its efficiency, is Andrew Bynum in the post. It is the Lakers' most common playtype, but their ninth most efficient.

These statistics all come from Synergy Sports Technology, where you can watch video of those plays.

Here's an informed guess, after watching lots of Bynum video for a post last week: All Bynum post-ups are not created equal. When he catches the ball close to the hoop, he is deadly. But he is not averse to catching the ball with a man on his back 15 feet or further from the hoop. And there, things don't look nearly as fluid. The spin move that, from good position, would have led to a chop shot, now ends with a spinning, off-balance big man deciding between dribble-probe and jumper, neither of which is a specialty.

Bad Bynum post-ups bring no joy at all. The good ones, though ...

The power of open shooters

The Spurs ended the regular season with the most efficient offense in basketball.

Their most common playtype was Tony Parker handling the ball in the pick-and-roll. That is no surprise at all. But would you believe that Richard Jefferson, Danny Green, Matt Bonner, Gary Neal and Kawhi Leonard spotting up were all more efficient per possession?

What I'm getting at there is: Look at how the Spurs managed to squeeze offensive productivity from inexpensive players. Asking players like that to create doesn't appear to work very well. But asking them to play alongside stars like Parker and Manu Ginobili, and to catch-and-shoot the open jumper ... that just works.

(Side note: One of the Spurs' least efficient options, and most over-used, is Tim Duncan posting up.)

Similarly, the Lakers have been getting excellent productive from Steve Blake and Matt Barnes spotting up.

James Harden, oh my

The Thunder finished the regular season with the league's second-best offense. And while these charts generally make ball-dominant guards look pretty inefficient (Bryant and Parker, for instance) ... Harden is amazing. Three of the Thunder's five most efficient playtypes are Harden , whether spotting up, isolating, or handling the ball in the pick-and-roll. He's a very rare player in that even when he is essentially a ballhog, flying solo, he's still, as the Mavericks will attest, very tough to stop.

That no doubt has a lot to do with the many potent offensive players he plays with. The defense can't just load up on James Harden with Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and Serge Ibaka around. But still -- lots of players have great teammates, and very few produce like this.