Top 20 Thunder - Lakers Game Three Takeaways

20) You will be shocked, just shocked, to hear that Jordan Hill and Metta World War took a post-whistle opportunity to try to get in some cheap shots

19) If you want evidence that Russell Westbrook is growing up before our eyes, consider how well he played after the double technical with World Wide Warped

18) The Lakers got off to a big early lead, which as the Celtics showed earlier in the evening, meant absolutely nothing

17) Kevin Durant scored twice tonight on absurd attempts to just get to the line, because he's that crazy skilled and the refs were crazy crooked

16) Ramon Sessions had that "Oh, he can play at home" playoff game that all borderline starters get

15) James Harden is well and truly hated by the Laker crowd, since it's all his stupid head's fault that World Mourning had to go away

14) Judging by the number of reactions shots, Jack Nicholson has a coaching position on the Lakers

13) Watching Derek Fisher try to guard Kobe Bryant is comedic on many levels

12) It's pretty unfair when the younger team also has the dramatically better bench

11) Jeff van Gundy complains that we're getting too many statistics, because sports and his analysis only makes sense if you can't put numbers or thought to it

10) I'm not saying that the refs were in the bag for LA tonight to get a longer series, but they were wearing Forum Blue and Gold

9) Independent of anything else that happens this playoff series, the Lakers made the right move in ditching Fisher for Sessions and Steve Blake

8) Kobe cost his team a lot in the fourth quarter, but he can still get phantom foul calls on Harden, and everyone else

7) The fact that the Thunder have not been turnover-prone in the playoffs is one more reason to think that the Western winner will sweep the finals

6) If the Lakers got as many second shots early in the game as they get late, they'd be in a lot better shape

5) OKC has no fear of quick shots in crunch time, which is probably a winning strategy, given how hard life gets late in the shot clock

4) If you liked made free throws, this was the game for you

3) The fact that World In Pain got a strip on Durant with 13 seconds left kind of tells you where the refs and league wanted this one to go

2) Serge Ibaka must have forgotten the scoreboard to try for a putback, down 3 with 2 seconds left

1) The first Thunder playoff loss of the season only required the Lakers to shoot 41 of 42 from the line while taking 14 more free throws

Top 20 Celtics - Sixers Game Four Takeaways

20) If you thought the Sixers were going to make a game of this after starting the game down 14-0, you are lying

19) ESPN gave this one Doris Burke, which meant that they really had absolutely no idea it would be a close game

18) The Celtics went into full GlobeTrotter mode all of four minutes into this one, with Rajon Rondo pulling off the showiest uncalled travel you ever did see

17) Every Sixers game ever involves an analyst talking about how they have to stay out of half court sets, as if this wasn't true of every NBA team in the playoffs

16) When the Sixers turn the ball over, they might be the worst team in the Association

15) When Brandon Bass outscores your entire team in a quarter, and your team is not composed of 8-year-olds, that is a problem

14) It only took ten minutes for the ESPN heads to start talking about a more interesting game, or five minutes faster than normal

13) Andre Iguodala had a missed two three throws / missed dunk sequence in the second quarter that made you wonder how he was employed to play pro hoop

12) The refs changed a foul from Brandon Bass to Avery Bradley after ESPN's Dave Pasch sounded pained about him getting his third

11) Perhaps, after all of these years, the refs might actually be watching Garnett for punk behavior

10) This wasn't a game until Garnett's technical, just in case you buy into the bullsquat over how the NBA's biggest punk-ass bitch has Dark Jedi Technical Powers

9) Spencer Hawes got a technical foul for getting delay of game blocked by Ryan Hollins

8) Jodie Meeks hitting a three for the first lead with 10 minutes left was merely the biggest shot of his life

7) If you don't think Boston is getting 20 more free throws than the Sixers in Game Five, you don't know NBA basketball

6) You can really count on ESPN to find Celtics Fan on the road

5) I don't mean to do Doc Rivers any favors, but the guy wearing Ray Allen's jersey ain't him

4) This game shows that Doug Collins' faith in Lou Williams and Elton Brand is occasionally basketball-related

3) Meeks is an odd form of closer, but on a team where the leading scorer is an erratic bench guard, it kind of makes sense

2) When you need to put Kenyon Dooling out there to shoot threes in crunch time, you might not have a good enough bench to win a playoff game after all

1) No matter what else happens in this series, we'll always have this spectacularly gutless Celtics collapse -- the first time in 45 games they blew a 15-point lead -- to keep us warm at night

The Poker Diaries: Are You Brave Enough For Omaha?

Every Omaha Player, On A Draw

For those of you who are just joining the Poker Diaries, this is a collection of free flowing tales, stories and unabashed whining. It's where I seek to make permanent the fleeting moments that spice my life as a home and occasional casino, cash and tournament player. The goal, as always, is to entertain, or at the very least, give my opponents a lot of false information about how much I think about the game, or how bad of a player I am, really. Can't hitch a ride without showing a little leg, after all. Especially if the driver's got issues. Anyway, now that we've done mental damage, let's get into it, shall we?

We are now just a little more than one week away from the next home game here at the Man Cave. It's simultaneously my favorite game, and the most maddening. Yep, it's Omaha Time.

For those of you who like your poker basic, your life predictable, and your poker to never, ever change from the format that 98% of the stuff on the Tee Vee is, Omaha is the form of poker in which the player receives four cards face down, and has to play two with the community five. So it's just like hold'em, except for the fact that it's well, totally not. Big pairs crack like mad, your king-high flush is a routine loser, and if you are good enough to muck a small boat before it crashes you aground, this is so the game for you. It's also all kinds of great, especially if you hate Pre-Flop Shove Fest, or can manage a little discipline in your play when all around you, people are losing their heads for a flopped straight that isn't going to look very good at all after the turn and river.

However, this all has one major hidden bummer factor: getting enough people to play.

You see, nothing scares poker players more than Omaha. Bring it up at a cash game of dealer's choice, and you can get hardened hardcore aggro players to tuck their tails and bail. Put forth the proposition that perhaps their brains are big enough to remember a different set of rules for starting hands, and the lips start to quiver. Bring up the idea that if you aren't good at more than one form of poker, and you may not be very good at poker, and you move officially into Fighting Words. And when you give an out to your regulars over how they don't necessarily need to play the tournaments with Omaha in them to qualify for your Player of the Year side pot (what, your home game does not have a player of the year side pot? I bet it doesn't even have a dork-tastic trophy. How do you live without such things?)...

Well, you turn your 3-table tournament with the possibility of turning people away into a 2-table event where you are begging people to come. Or telling those knocked-kneed players where you go for your tips on how to play the damned game. And those who love Omaha (and really, there's a lot to love, just from the simple fact that there are so many more hands that you can play, not that you necessarily should) really do appreciate having a game for once, especially a tournament one. Finally, there's the simple fact that this tournament is only half Omaha, so if you really want to avoid those hands, you mostly can.

Also, I'm not exactly sure how losing at Omaha is all that more exasperating than losing at anything, really. Last time on the felt, dealing ordinary hold'em, I made a massive misread of a shove and put my pocket 5s against another guy's pocket queens... and watched him flop a house while I flopped quads. That had to hurt more than any Omaha hand ever, really.

So, before we wrap this up, let's review...

1) I'm hosting a poker tournament here at the Man Cave in Central NJ in a week

2) You get to play half Omaha, half Texas hold'em, on speed felt, with good chips, with a tournament clock on a monitor in a private home

3) It's a true mid-stakes game with a hand-picked group of people who generally manage to not behave badly

4) There's soda, beer, booze, light snacks and no rake (but a tip jar, so please, be kind), and

5) Very, very few people at the table who are at all confident about their Omaha game.

Seriously, I'm having a hard time filling the room for this?

Top 10 Spurs - Clippers Game Two Takeaways

Air Diaw

10) From watching these first two games, you'd never guess that Chris Paul is actually any good

9) When Tim Duncan looks quick and comfortable, the Spurs' opponents really don't have a chance in hell

8) If Blake Griffin is going to continue to get one more rebound than a dead man, we're going to really have to start calling him a power forward

7) ESPN cared so much about this game, they didn't notice a bass voice fan who screamed for three second calls all night

6) The Spurs scored the game's first 22 points in the paint, which meant that even when this game was close, it really wasn't

5) The tone of this game was such that with the Spurs holding a 9-point lead with 16 minutes left, in the midst of a Clipper run, the ESPN analysts felt moved to tell the audience that the series was not over

4) Gregg Popovich casually displayed his intellect by intentionally fouling DeAndre Jordan, rather than give the Clips the last shot of the first half; two missed free throws ensued as Memphis Fan wondered why the hell Lionel Hollins is employed

3) The Clippers shot very well from three point range and never, ever really threatened, mostly because the Spurs just scored easily whenever they wanted to

2) There's something really wrong with how the Spurs are getting quality minutes out of Boris Diaw, and how that fat sack of French manure has an incredible chance to have one more championship ring than Karl Malone, Elgin Baylor and Charles Barkley

1) I'm not saying that the outcome of this was never in doubt, but I was very tempted to file this list at the end of the third quarter, when every other member of the media filed their game stories

Heat - Pacers Game Three: Top 10 Takeaways

10) While the fault of this loss was clearly on the Heat big men and Dwyane Wade, it's still much more fun to pin everything on LeBron James and his lack of leadership

9) If George Hill is going to be this much better than Wade, it's really not going to be a long series after all

8) In the time it took you to read this, Roy Hibbert has another rebound

7) This game went from tied to a blowout faster than James' hairline receded

6) Wade's sideline hissy fit ensures two full days of ESPN psychoanalysis

5) Danny Granger is very good at pulling on jerseys, which is good, since James has very little hair to hang on to any more

4) It's a little hard to see how this is the upset of the century when the Pacers lost all of four more games in the regular season, and don't have a starter down due to injury

3) Erik Spoelstra started Dexter Pittman at center, which lit such a fire under Joel Anthony that the Heat big man came through with 1 rebound in 27 minutes

2) Heat Fan (humor me that he still exists with this team down in a playoff series) has to be encouraged by Mario Chalmers' game, in that if he can keep playing like this, maybe the Heat can make the series go six

1) We're just two more Heat losses away from the annual national holiday that is Heat Elimination Day