as seen through my eyes.

Head-to-Head

Ben Wallace vs. Shaquille O'Neal
Advantage: Miami

Rasheed Wallace vs. Udonis Haslem
Advantage: Detroit

Tayshaun Prince vs. Antoine Walker
Advantage: Even

Rip Hamilton vs. Dwyane Wade
Advantage: Miami

Chauncey Billups vs. Jason Williams
Advantage: Detroit

Detroit Bench vs. Miami Bench
Advantage: Miami

Flip Saunders vs. Pat Riley
Advantage: Miami

Palace of Auburn Hills vs. American Airlines Arena
Advantage: Detroit

That's the way I see it folks. The Miami bench has a narrow edge over the Detroit second teamers. The two starting Pistons advantages at Power Forward and Point Guard are by a large margin.

The Pistons will have to play very well to overcome the Heat.

Miami Heat Scouting Report

Shaquille O'Neal - The Big Diesel. The most dominant paint scorer of the last 10 years and arguably one of the greatest centers to every play the game. He's lost some weight, making conditioning less of an issue, but the way the refs are calling his bulldozer attack has also changed his ability to directly attack the rim. Ben Wallace will need help in the form of fresh legs to slow Shaq.

Udonis Haslem - Less of a scorer this season, Haslem still has the ability to hit open 18 foot jump shots and mix it up on the boards. The 5th option of the Miami starters, Haslem will look to make timely contributions with put backs and tips. Assuming he is not guarding Rasheed Wallace at the 3 point line.

Antoine Walker - Despite looking lost earlier in the season, 'Toine has really raised his game in the playoffs. He's attacking the rim, rebounding and nailing three pointers at an alarming rate. Walker seems to have found his role as the third option, creating his own offense instead of waiting for Shaq and Wade to provide him with touches.

Dwyane Wade - This is not LeBron James. In only his 3rd season, Wade has established himself as a playoff veteran with 38 games to his credit. He plays hurt, he's fearless to the rim, his passing is tremendous for a two guard, and his jumper is improving.

Jason Williams - "White Chocolate" was once the flashiest AND1 Streetball style point guard in the NBA. Under the tutelage of Hubie Brown and Mike Fratello in Memphis, he reigned in the slick moves for more consistent play. This playoffs however, JWill's knee problems have limited his effectiveness. A questionable outside shooter and decision maker, he does possess the ability to feed the post effectively and run a fast break with the efficiency of a poor man's Jason Kidd. His defense is not recognized as a strong suit.

Alonzo Mourning - A veteran center, with tremendous shot blocking skills. Energy rebounder and paint defender, with the ability to finish, post up and shoot FTs at a respectable rate. More of a defensive presence.

James Posey - Known primarily for his work as a defender, Posey is only a consistent offensive threat shooting three pointers off of spot up looks. Tough and physical, he provides an effective change of pace to Antoine Walker.

Gary Payton - Veteran Point Guard, at one time considered the best in the NBA. His body and skills have eroded but the ability to make timely shots has not. His true value is on defense and running basic offensive sets.

Derek Anderson - Swingman capable of playing positions 1 through 3. A good outside jump shooter, "DA" is another veteran presence with playoff experience. Can be made a "volume scorer" by limiting his open looks.

Shandon Anderson - Swingman known for hard nose defense. Not a scorer, Anderson will be used to stymie Rip Hamilton and to protect Dwyane Wade from fouls.

I would take Tay over Walker any day. This series will be much easier than the cleveland series because williams will get manhandled unlike Snow who played terrific D against Chauncey. Lebron gets more calls than Wade and is better than Wade. Antione Walker can either be very good or very bad and is very inmconsistant, and Shaq won't set screens or gaurd the Wallaces like Verajao did to help Lebron.

Wade needs to score to make things happen. Lebron was a force in all ways i.e. scoring, ball distribution, assists etc. and he makes his team mates better. After defending him I think Wade will be an easier guy to defend, relatively speaking, than Lebron.

Agree on Tay.

Totally disagree on the series being easier. I think we are in trouble here. Big Big.

Riley vs. Flip? uggh.

If we play like we did in the Cleveland series, I think we may win...
two games at best.

nice and very objective summary, micro. I hope the team will be aware of how much damage Wade can cause since he almost kicked us out last year and maybe would have, hadn't he got injured. Who knows, maybe he gets injured again- considering on his dangerous play that would me quite possible anytime and I wonder if he manages to stay healthy for his career.
If we shut down Shaq just a little bit (meaning limiting him to about 16- 20 ppg) and keep Wade under control (24ppg with a weak shooting %) our chances are ok.
But if there's a lack of concentration, Walker could step up- and I would hate so see that crybaby stepping up. Hopefully he returns to his slightly below 40% average.

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I'm a wannabe- GM, but I stand to it.

Actually, I don't really agree with that. He's still not able to produce consistently throughout the course of a game, especially not in the 4th. I guess it would be worse if he hadn't lost as much weight as he has, but he's still not going to be good for more than 30 really productive minutes a game, 35 at most. Not to sleep on the guy or anything, but that's how I've seen things unfold with him this season.

Snow did play some good D, but is he really that much of a lockdown defender? I think Chauncey just played badly. He's going to have to step it up a lot in this series.

Snow did enough to knock CB out of his rhythm. Don't need to be a lockdown defender, just a PIA. Just like Lindsey harrassed LBJ.

Does anyone think the Heat's defense will be comparable to the Cavs? The Cavs played the Pistons tough.

there's no way i can say walker/prince is even. prince totally has the advantage ... walker pretty much guards himself. i'm glad he's confident now because that means he'll take more shots.

the heat don't have a guy like varejao/foster who is going to hustle for so many offensive boards. cleveland did have a lot of athletic big men and it gave us some problems in games 3/4/5 when they fought harder for rebounds. who's going to guard rasheed? no one. who's going to cover mcdyess on pick-and-rolls or pick-and-pops? no one. will we actually use davis in this series to our advantage? yes.

the fact that i feel we match up better with miami AND we actually get excited to play them leads me to believe we should have an easier time dispatching the heat. but as we've seen with this team anything is possible.

I knew folks were gunna have a problem with Prince/Walker, but it's the most honest report I could whip up at 2 am in the morning.

You have to get over your preconceptions and deal with how the Heat have played the last 2 weeks. You're not facing the chemistry issue ridden Heat of 6 months ago, this team is starting to gel.

Riley is regularly playing 9 men from the bench making this squad MUCH deeper.

Walker is playing like he did in Boston. Period. As much as Tay has played well, Walker has quite frankly been brilliant lately. And I don't even like the guy, so take it for what it is worth.

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Nov 13 LW Milan Lucic had an active night. He scored his first goal in eight games since his Oct. 25 hat trick and also pounded Michael Komisarek in a third-period fight. Lucic cut his hand in a fight with Michael Komisarek. "I'll be fine," he said. "(X-rays are) negative, but there's so many broken bones in there from before you can't really tell."

Mr Bobblehead sure seems like the wild card in all this to me. None of the other Heat players are going to surprise you - they're going to do what they do, but BH is a changed guy the last couple of months. He can self destruct at a moment's notice, but right now he gives the Heat a new scary dimension.