The Cleveland Cavaliers shocked the basketball world with their six-game series victory over the Detroit Pistons to join the San Antonio Spurs in the NBA Finals. BetUS.com sportsbook has made the Spurs -500 favorites to win the upcoming series. Find out if paying the juice will be worth a reward in Dave Price’s 2007 NBA Finals Predictions article for Point-Spreads.com.
The Spurs have more weapons. Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, Manu Ginobli, Big Shot Bob, and Bruce Bowen are all experts at their craft. The Spurs have more experience. They have been the elite team in the Western Conference since Shaq moved to Miami with two NBA Championships this decade. In fact, the Lakers are the only team in NBA history with a higher winning percentage than San Antonio. With this being the Cavs first ever trip to the Finals, and with Lebron James being a one-man show most of the time, you could say that the Spurs hold the advantage.
The fact that the Cavs won both the regular season meetings against the Spurs and the emergence of Daniel “Boobie” Gibson gives Cleveland fans some hope. However, we can’t quickly forget that Lebron is just 22-years-old. As great as he is already, it takes experience to be at your best in a big series. Nerves could get the best of him early on in this series, and if he doesn’t play well the Cavs don’t have another player who can step up to carry them. For those of you who are quickly falling in love with Gibson, don’t expect him to look like the same player against the best defense in the NBA. With Parker or Ginobli on him, it’s going to be much tougher for him to get into the lane.
Lebron is also going to have to contend with one of the best defenders in the NBA. Bruce Bowen is the best in the game at making players work hard for their shots and challenging everything. He will nag you to death over the course of a game. With the minutes that Cleveland needs James to play to be successful, he is not going to be nearly as effective late in games because of how hard Bowen will challenge him throughout.
In short, I don’t see much risk in taking the Spurs for this series price. I don’t foresee a four-game sweep but I feel very strongly that this thing will be over in five games. I don’t think the Cavs can get a win in San Antonio and if they go down 0-2 to the Spurs the way they did to Detroit; there’s no coming back from the dead.
BetUS.com has posted betting odds on which player will be named the 2007 NBA Finals MVP:
Tim Duncan: EVEN
LeBron James: +220
Tony Parker: +500
Manu Ginobili: +650
Zydrunas Ilgauskas: +1000
Michael Finley: +1200
Drew Gooden: +1500
Larry Hughes: +1500
Daniel Gibson: +1500
Sasha Pavlovic: +2500
Bruce Bowen: +2500
Fabricio Oberto: +2500
Field: +1500
