I really do believe that somehow we will meet LBJ and his Cavaliers on the way to the ECF.

LBJ is LBJ but on any given Sunday (Mon, Tue, Wed or Thurs) he can be beat, get in his head, stop that dirbble penetration.

Looking at the Pistons, we are awful with stopping dribble penetration, this is really the only true weakness in our defense. On the Offensive end, CB has problems with consistent trapping teams in the half court.

Two big areas that needs work before the playoffs.

Joe D has accumulated a lot of expiring contracts, this is the set-up folks. I would be very surprised if Joe D did not make a deal before the trade deadline.

I think the focus will be on getting someone who can slow down Lebron James and play some lock down defense on the guy.

I am looking at the likes of Ron Artest, (errggg), Shane Battier, Mickael Petreus (sp).

Someone who you can sacrifice their offensive game for lock down defense.

It's a whole lot of expiring deals on that bench. Joe has essentially stockpiled these players for a reason.

We don't rely on players, we rely on an elaborate switching and rotating scheme. I don't know if getting a stopper would help. How can he stop bron bron from the bench? Like we are going to sit Tay. or Rip.

__________________

When pistons will meet lebron PO-s then it means that boston's run is over and it's ECF again! But trading for stopper would mean tay or rip benced and it won't happen.Agreed with slippy.

Stopping Lebron's scoring is not the key to beating the Cavs, reducing his assist count, stopping their 3s and battling them even on the boards are.

If Boobie hadn't bombed us with all those 3s in the series, then nobody today would be talking about Lebron's 29 or whatever in a row.

Lebron will get his points. What you need to do with him is reduce his assists which minimizes his effectiveness.

Have to keep the Cavs off of the boards especially the offensive boards and not give them second and third chances.

Having said that I have no opinion on whether we will beat a Cavs team this year in the playoffs, if we play them and if they are at full strength.

When at full strength the Cavs are one of the better teams in the NBA. They are an excellent defensive team as our experience in last year's playoffs showed.

Agree that the key is not stopping Lebron but stopping everyone else.

__________________

We already have our "un"-stopper. Stuckey.

The Cavs beat us by harassing and controlling Chauncey. Hopefully Rodney is ready by the playoffs to run the offense for 20 MPG.

__________________
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."

I agree with all of the above, goes to show what a multi-dimensional player Lebran is. He is like Magic and Kobe combined into one player. Double team him and he will burn you with his passing, don't double him and he will take you.

But he is only 1 guy and he is on kind of sucky team that does not appear to be in any hurry to improve so we have that going for us.

Ros - Billups was tired. Hate to say it but I think that was the case. Hopefully this time around not only do we have Stucky but CB himself should be fresher.

Yes, the Cavs have a very good defense.

Stuckey and AJ's continual improvement over the next 8 weeks and their ability to be able to carry that over into the playoffs along with Maxey bringing his A game in the playoffs will be the major factor in determining how far we advance in the playoffs.

If the second unit can go there in the playoffs and at least keep us even when they are on the floor we will have an excellent chance to advance to the Finals and maybe win it.

Whether Flipper will play them or not is the question. He may figure that the starters are rested enough because of the lower minutes they are logging this year. However, in my opinion that won't be enough.

In my opinion we will need to play the second unit in the playoffs and they will need to be able to hold their own when out there. That will in my opinion be the key to our success in the playoffs.

So let me segway into my next question.

With those expiring contracts, should Joe make a trade before the deadline for someone who can boost our bench for the playoff run and get us over the top?

My guess is that Joe D did not stockpile those expiring for nothing.

Are what we saying is; all of us are very comfortable with the players that we have and no-one could make us a better title contender at this point.

In case anyone missed what Raxrets was getting at, right now the Celtics are the #1 seed and the Cavaliers are the #4 seed. There are a lot of games remaining still, but if these standings do hold, there is a good chance that Detroit will NOT face Cleveland in the playoffs.