Upsets? Maybe Magic, Nuggets were supposed to be here

How many times does Dwight Howard have to catch a pass in the low post, turn and practically slam his elbows --- along with a couple of Cleveland Cavaliers --- through the rim before we get the point?

How many times do we have to see Kenyon Martin and Nene and Chris Andersen treating the Los Angeles Lakers like so many purple bowling pins before we understand?

Here comes Hedo Turkoglu sliding off another high pick-and-roll to finish at the hoop for another layup, or stepping back to sling in another 3-pointer in the face of the jaw-sagging Cavs' defense.

Here comes Chauncey Billups weaving through the lane like a skier through slalom gates, Carmelo Anthony pulling up to stab in one more mid-range dagger, J.R. Smith firing his six-shooter from deep in the corner for yet another killer trey.

Maybe there's nothing really wrong with the Cavs and Lakers. Maybe it was just our own misperceptions of the teams that they're facing in the Conference Finals.

As Orlando and Denver make their statements, the NBA Finals showdown between LeBron James and Kobe Bryant no longer seems pre-ordained and the basketball world is suddenly forced to take another look at the Magic and Nuggets.

As Butch said to Sundance: "Who are those guys?"

Everything we thought we knew --- Orlando is too perimeter oriented, Denver too undisciplined --- is tossed out the window. It goes against everything we've been conditioned to believe -- that championship teams have to ripen on the vine, have to suffer before they thrive, have to climb the ladder one rung at a time. Because that's how Michael's Bulls, Isiah's Pistons, Hakeem Olajuwon's Rockets and The Admiral's Spurs did it.

Is the surprise in part because of the calendar? It is supposed to be too late in the season for true contenders to reveal themselves?

Maybe. But it happens, though rarely ...

1977: In his second season in Los Angeles, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar led the Lakers to the best regular season in the league. After a bye in the first round of the Playoffs, the Lakers beat Golden State in the second round and were expected to advance to the NBA Finals after dueling in the Conference finals with Portland. The Trail Blazers, led by rookie center Bill Walton, were talented but generally thought to still be green and over their heads. That is, until Walton and the Blazers shifted their game into a higher gear and wound up taking out Abdul-Jabbar and the Lakers with the buzzsaw of a 4-0 sweep. Portland then proved that the WCF feat was no fluke by spotting the star-studded Philadelphia 76ers of Julius Erving, George McGinnis and Doug Collins a 2-0 lead in the NBA Finals before coming back to win four in a row to clinch the championship.

1978: A year later, Erving, McGinnis and the flamboyant Sixers were back, cruising through the regular season with a 55-27 record, best in the East. Philly had a bye in the first-round, swept the New York Knicks in the second round and were supposedly on a return trip to the Finals. That's when they ran into the Washington Bullets. The Bullets had finished 44-38, not even good enough for first place in the Central Division, and even with veterans Elvin Hayes and Wes Unseld were not supposed to be a match. But Bobby Dandridge stepped up as the X-factor the Sixers and Philly went down in a shocking 4-2 defeat in the Eastern Conference finals. The Bullets, unheralded and unappreciated when the Playoffs began, didn't stop until they had gobbled up the championship in a classic 4-3 win over the Seattle SuperSonics in the NBA Finals.

1986: Most memories of the 1986 Western Conference finals go immediately to that twisting, turning, off-balance shot that Ralph Sampson bounced in to win Game 5 and lift the Houston Rockets over Magic Johnson, Abdul-Jabbar and the defending champion Lakers. What everyone forgets is that the Lakers were overwhelming favorites entering the series and most experts figured that the young Rockets, with Sampson and Hakeem Olajuwon anchoring their Twin Towers lineup, were going to need seasoning and experience to eventually compete at the elite level. What the Rockets showed was that youth didn't have to wait to be served. Even though the Rockets lost to the Boston Celtics 4-2 in the NBA Finals, the party-crashing new entry in the era of Boston-LA could have changed the dynamic of the league ---maybe even held off the reign of Detroit's Bad Boys --- if the Rockets weren't taken down by the substance abuse problems of Lewis Lloyd, Mitchell Wiggins and John Lucas.

1995: Though they entered the Playoffs as the defending champions, the Rockets were only the No. 6 seed in the West and had to climb out of a 2-1 hole against Utah in the best-of-five first round and a 3-1 hole against Phoenix in the second round. By the time the Rockets arrived at the Western Conference finals matchup with in-state rival San Antonio, their tanks were supposed to be empty. But it took only Olajuwon's inspired effort in the series opener in the Alamodome on the night that the Spurs' David Robinson was awarded the MVP Trophy for Houston to open eyes San Antonio's regular season-best 62-20 record was no match for the Houston steamroller, which won the series 4-2 and then flattened Shaquille O'Neal and the Orlando Magic in the NBA Finals, 4-0.

2004: Everyone appreciated the way coach Larry Brown had his superstar-less Detroit Pistons playing the right way all season long. But the Indiana Pacers with Reggie Miller and Ron Artest had been the class of the Eastern Conference all season. That meant nothing to Chauncey Billups, Rip Hamilton, Tayshaun Prince, Rasheed Wallace, Ben Wallace and the Motown machine that was only warming up with the 4-2 win in ECF over the Pacers. The Pistons saved their best trick for last, breaking up the Shaq-Kobe-Phil Jackson Lakers with their 4-1 thumping in the NBA Finals. The Lakers were too talented and too deep ... until it was too late and the better team all along was running away.

Could that be happening now to the Cavs and the Lakers?

When we see the Magic and the Nuggets now, is the only real upset in our perception?

Longtime NBA writer Fran Blinebury's column appears weekly on NBA.com. Send him an e-mail.