Gambling is hard.

I had the right read on the Spurs @ Golden State game last night. The Spurs getting +9 I thought was completely outrageous. In my mind Golden State was not going to nutz on the Spurs and have their way with them. I was completely right on all of that. Golden State only scored 100 points.

What I did not foresee happening, was the Spurs laying the absolute smack down, and blitzkrieging GS to a tune of 129 points, and in the process, blowing all my under bets I also had on the game. Ugh. My struggles to predict over/unders from the preseason have continued.

Wasn't too bad though, only down $50.

My take aways from that game is Golden State is going to continue to get destroyed on the glass all season. SA out rebounded GS by 23 and dominated the offensive glass 21 - 8. Golden State's offense will be fine, early on they missed a ton of wide open looks and layups, and the Spurs are the best defensive team in the league. GS was unprepared to play against a great team and they showed it. Team chemistry and body language looked like crap too. Still think they will pile up a ton of regular season wins, however getting the #1 seed might not be a gimmie anymore.

The Spurs on the other hand are the more interesting team to think about. If you knew nothing about the NBA before watching the game, you would think that the Spurs were the super team. Scoring 129 was preposterous to fathom before the game. They only scored that many points all of last year 1 time.

-Said it yesterday, who the hell is going to guard Aldridge from GS? He dominated GS inside and outside all game.
- Simmons played fantastic. Defensively he was every where - including his own Lebron impersonation - hustling back for a chase down block on Curry.
- Parker also played well. And while he probably won't try as hard as he did yesterday on most nights it was really great to see.
- Gasol struggled defensively. Every time he made a defensive miscue - Pop immediately called a time out. Gasol hasn't been a good defender in recent years, but by midseason he might be.

Jazz vs Portland Quick thoughts -

- Jazz were out 2 of their starters and still played extremely well. How many teams can just lose two of their best players and keep rolling? I think they are going to be a juggernaut in the regular season. Still too young to make some noise in the playoffs though.
- Portland has an embarrassment of riches at forward. Crabbe, Aminu, Harkless, Turner, Vonleh. Those guys flanking CJ/Dame are going to be super fun to watch. They are a Tristan Thompson/Tyson Chandler type away from being a legit contender.
- The Jazz really struggled to create offense with out George Hill in the game in the first half. He is probably the one guy they can't afford to get injured.
- Joe Johnson played great. The Jazz are going to need his offense with Favors and Hayward out and he stepped up to the plate.

Knicks vs Cavs even quicker thoughts -

- Knicks impressed me early on. Their starting 5 will make them competitive most nights.
- Porzinger is just a God damn stud and so much fun to watch.
- Their problem is their bench is pretty bad last night. Jennings is a nice back up PG, but man if he isn't shooting well, he really tanks the team. O' Quin should be better than he is, but just kinda sucks. Low IQ player. I did like what I seen from Kuzminskas last night. He is a 27 year old rookie from Lithuania and looked like he belonged in the NBA.  
- The Cavs are the Cavs. They are a powerhouse and looked great in the second half.

I will post again this afternoon with my picks for tonight.