Christmas

This year’s Christmas day games are going to be good and competitive. They have the Lakers playing the Nets, the two supposed powerhouses that should run through every team like it’s nothing. But both have problems that could be exploited. The Net’s have two ball-dominant star guards. Will they be able to mesh because if they can’t one of them might have to go? But if they do mesh that is three 25 to 30 point scorers about 8 assists each and if the other teams decide that they aren’t going to let the big three of James Harden Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant score the entire rest of the roster is filled with three-point snipers so as long as one two or all three of them are on the floor there will be at least one player wide open and all they have to do is hit a three. Then the Lakers have LeBron James, Anthony Davis, and Russell Westbrook. That is three current All- star’s, two former MVP’s and then they have a very well-rounded bench. But their problem is they have zero shooting. And an explosive guard that is slowly declining and can’t seem to get a jumper past the three-point line Russel Westbrook. Then they have Anthony Davis who just can’t stay healthy enough to play a full season but when he is playing he is a beast. He is a good shooter for a big man, a great finisher, good handles, and a defensive beast. And now finally LeBron James he is thirty-six years old and has a decent jump shot and good court vision he is slowly on the decline defensively. Every year he is losing his explosive first step that said he has a good post-game and is doing everything possible to stay at a halt decline-wise or keep the decline as slow as possible. Last year his age started to show after he had injury after injury. The biggest problem with the Lakers is the age of all of their players. The average age of all of their players except for two of them is 33 or older. The Christmas day game with the Nets and Lakers is one to watch if both of these teams find a way to work to their max potential.

The next game that I am going to talk about is Jazz, Mavericks. Now I think that this game should have been The Clippers vs either one of these two because both the Mavericks and the Jazz have become playoff rivals to the Clippers after the past two years. But I still expect this game to be a game that will be very close. The Mavericks and Jazz have had regular-season showdowns but nothing as big as what both teams have had against the Clippers. I expect the Jazz to win the game by about five points. There are no big concerns with these teams like the Lakers and Nets but if they could get some better players around their young stars that would help the team’s move to the next level. For the big matchup of the game, I expect the high thirties to mid to low forties from Mitchell and I expect somewhere from mid-twenties to low thirties with around ten assists from Luka.

Now we have the Hawks and the Knicks. Last year they both had unexpected playoff berths as two middle seeded teams being the fourth and fifth seed’s. Everyone expected the Knicks to walk away with the series but they did what they do best they choked. Their best player Julies Randle couldn’t make a shot to save his life and they fell apart defensively they were the best defensive team in the league. But that doesn’t mean the Hawks would have lost if they played normally because Trae Young was cooking and he wouldn’t miss if he tried. John Collins was dunking everything inside the Hawks were just on a whole nother level. But I think the Knicks are going to want some revenge after what happened in the playoffs. I think this game is going to be good but most importantly the matchup. I think Trae Young has thirty to forty with some assists and I think that Julies Randle will have mid-twenties to thirty with two blocks a steal and some rebounds. I expect the Hawks to win but it will be a fun game.
Next, we have the Warriors and Suns. This game is going to be insane outside of the fact that they have no existing rivalry outside of Steph and Paul who have been going at each other for years. The Warriors are coming off a season where Steph couldn’t be stopped. He averaged 32 a game THIRTY-TWO. That is insane. He is the oldest player in NBA history to average that he had an entire month where he scored thirty or more that is insane. He didn’t have much help last year and missed the playoffs while Chris Paul went to the finals. I think that Chris Paul and Steph are going to duel. I expect forty to fifty from Curry and a double-double from Chris Paul. But the scoring duel is going to be Curry and Booker. But the Warriors have newly acquired rookie Jonathan Kuminga who is a defensive hound so we will just have to see how fast Kuminga adapts to be the top scorer in the league.

Last but not least we have the Celtics and the Bucks. This game is going to be good. We have last year’s NBA champions in the Milwaukee Buck and we have a team with a first-round exit to the Nets in last year’s playoffs the Celtics. Now, this doesn’t seem interesting but the Celtics had their second-best player Jalen Brown go down right before the playoffs with a torn wrist ligament so even if they managed to beat the Nets without him they wouldn’t have gotten him back for the finals. But last year the Celtics had lots of injuries and a lot of players go down to Covid, but in the middle part of the season when everyone was healthy and on the floor, they were winning games and they were looking like a championship team like the year before but then the injuries and the Covid cases piled upright as the season came to an end. If all of the players can manage to stay healthy on both teams this might be one of the better games and these teams don’t have a lot of weaknesses both teams have good shooters, good finishers, good defenders, good play-makers and most importantly good chemistry both of these teams have been playing together for at least three seasons with minor adjustments to the roster year to year but nothing major. The only problem with these two teams is player health but other than that they’re both really good.

The games that I am most excited for in order are Celtics Bucks if healthy, Jazz Mavericks, Warriors Suns, Hawks Knicks, and Nets Lakers. I think that this year’s Christmas Day games are going to be some of the most competitive in recent years. But that is just my opinion and my opinion is the only one that matters. Just kidding, all opinions matter.