Eric Millegan was born in Hackettstown, N.J. and raised in Springfield, Ore. He is a huge Blazers fan but has compassion for all 30 teams. He has previous blog experience, writing as "The Fan" for Oregonlive.com about his beloved Blazers. You can catch Eric as Zack Addy on FOX's series "Bones". Eric's other TV credits include guest spots on "Law & Order: Criminal Intent" and Sidney Lumet's "100 Centre Street." On film, he starred as Ed Simone in "On_Line"- Official Selection of the Berlin International Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, and Cinequest Film Festival (Best Narrative Feature Award).

Amazing, amazing, amazing. Kevin McHale hands a future Hall of Famer, who is statistically the best player currently in the NBA, to the Boston Celtics.

And now, the league has been turned upside down and Celtic fans can, for now, forget about missing out on Greg Oden in the NBA Draft. With Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen, Paul Pierce- all of whom have been top 10 MVP candidates at some time in their career (one, KG, won it in 2004)- the Boston Celtics have become instant championship contenders.

They may, in fact, be the clear favorite to win it all in 2008. All three of them have the experience to go all the way. Ray Allen went to the ECF with the Bucks in 2001. Paul Pierce went to the ECF with the Celtics in 2002. And KG went to the WCF with the Wolves in his MVP season. All these three need is each other to take the next step to reach the NBA Finals and claim the ultimate crown. KG almost won it all in 2004. If Cassell hadn't gotten hurt, they might've done it.

That was the one year KG really had help on the floor in Cassell and Sprewell. Arguably, Ray and Paul are better than those two. This has got to be very exciting to KG. He has a real chance to win it all! And it's good for the league that some of the talent from the West is moving East. Ray Allen, Zach Randolph, and now KG. Now there is a little more balance between the two conferences. With Oden, Roy, and Aldridge, the Blazers have the future of the NBA all sealed up, but with Allen, Pierce, and Garnett, the future, for the Celtics, is now.

Go Blazers.

Peace.

KingSpeed

Tooting my own horn: my picks are looking good!

Spurs go down. Mavs go down. The Warriors are for real.

Dallas lost their first four games of the regular season. They cannot afford to get off to a start like that in the postseason, can they? This is all such a perfect story. The Dallas Mavericks go 67-15 but they're paired up in the first round with the one team that they have been unable to beat. And that team is coached by their former coach! This is gonna be a great great series. Can't wait for Game 2.

And how about those Nuggets? So far, no surprises here. Oh, I shouldn't boast. One game is just one game. I remember when the Spurs lost their first game of the playoffs to Marbury's Phoenix Suns and still won the championship.

Watching the Magic-Pistons game right now. Magic are hanging in there. I don't care who wins this game. I am a Rasheed Wallace fan, yes, but he got his ring and maybe it'd be fun to watch the Magic put some pressure on them. Rasheed Wallace just fouled Jameer Nelson. That puts the Magic in the bonus. I'll keep watching.... That's all for now.

Here I go.. 18 assists and ZERO TURNOVERS. That is what Steve Nash just laid out on the Utah Jazz IN UTAH. Smells like MVP to me. It kinda sucks actually, cuz I don't think Nash deserved MVP the last two years. He was great, sure, but, for me, two years ago, Shaq deserved it for turning the Miami Heat into a contender overnight and last year, LeBron James deserved it for raising his game to the highest level of his career to help the Cavs win 50 games. Well, this year, I think Nash actually deserves the award, but can we really make Steve Nash a three-time MVP? Who would've predicted that 4 years ago? No one.

So will Nash win it this year? Who else is up for the award? It's kinda too bad that Nash outshines Shawn Marion and Amare Stoudemire, both of whom are MVP candidates in their own right. In my opinion. I guess Nash's only real competition, though, is Dirk Nowitzki, the best player on the best team. The thing is, the Suns are close behind and they put the beat down on the Mavs in their last two meetings. So I think Nash might win.

Who else might deserve it but no one is talking about them? What about Tim Duncan? All he does is dominate on both ends of the floor and lead his Spurs to one of the top records in the NBA. They would be NOTHING without him. He is very valuable. Others... Gilbert Arenas looked like he might have a chance earlier in the season, but the Wizards slipped and then he got hurt, which is a shame. I was looking forward to watching him in the playoffs. Boy, the East team that ends up being seeded to play the Wizards, lucks out. Right now, that lucky team is the Toronto Raptors, which is ridiculous because the Cleveland Cavaliers have a better record. This playoff seeding crap is horrible. Why does one earn a higher seed but then doesn't have home court advantage? It makes no sense. I guess having a higher seed means you play a lesser team in the first round, but the very fact that the seeding is messed up by this system makes it all moot. Agh! It's horrible. I hate it. The old four division system worked great. With the way it is now, they should just seed the teams 1 through 8 based on record. OR if you want to give division winners an advantage, then give them home court advantage no matter what their record is. It just doesn't make sense the way it is now. It's a mess.

Back to the MVP race, if you go by the Larry Bird rule (also known as the Efficiency Rating at NBA.com), Kevin Garnett would win the award, but of course, he won't. Second place is Dwayne Wade, whom I'm sure everyone would have loved to have given the award to if the Heat had won more games. Third place is Kobe Bryant, who did score 65 points in a game (I was there) but has his team on a free fall right now. Okay, let's talk about that. How about the Lakers? Wow. They got off to such a great start this season and now they are a game away from missing the playoffs. That would be astounding. On the other hand, the Lakers could still hold on to the 7th seed and would then very likely land in to an intriguing rematch of last year's very exciting seven game series with the Phoenix Suns. Raja Bell vs Kobe Bryant: Round 2! It would be a great matchup of last year's very exciting seven game first round series. On that note, if the Warriors beat out the Clippers for the 8th spot, they would have a very intriguing matchup with the Dallas Mavericks team that they blew out last month to end the Dallas' 17 game winning streak. For these reasons, I can't wait for the playoffs. They're going to be very exciting.

What about the Nuggets? Are they for real? Camby is playing out of his mind. Had a near triple double the other night with 9 blocks. And they WERE on a big winning streak and I was going to blog about wondering how well they might play in the playoffs now that Iverson and Melo are clicking and Camby is playing so amazingly, but then they went ahead and lost to the worst team in the league so now they look like Spurs fodder to me. Still, they will be a team to watch in the playoffs. This will be a very exciting first round, I think. I mean, Cleveland and Miami could play each other first round. LeBron vs the Champs!

I also want to give a shout out to Dwight Howard for his unbelievable stat line vs the Sixers. 14-15 from the field. 10-10 in the first half. That's amazing. Will be fun to see former Pistons Grant Hill and Darko Milicic play in a likely first round matchup with their former team.

Of course, all the teams that aren't in the playoffs are crossing their fingers that they will win the chance to draft Greg Oden or Kevin Durant. The Bucks sat Bogut down for the season. The Blazers ended the season for both Zach Randolph and Ime Udoka. It's no secret that the non-playoff teams are racing towards the bottom. But you're not supposed to SAY it. I leave you all with the quote of the week, from Boston Celtics forward Ryan Gomes who sat out the fourth quarter of a 2 point loss to the Milwaukee Bucks:

``I probably (would have played), but since we were in the hunt for a high draft pick, of course things are different,'' Gomes said. ``I understand that. Hopefully things get better. Now that we clinched at least having the second-most balls in the lottery, the last three games we'll see what happens. We'll see if we can go out and finish some games.''

Peace

Go Blazers

KingSpeed

Went to the Knicks-Pistons game last night. I went because the woman in charge of talent relations at 20th Century Fox (who also helped me get the opportunity to write this blog) offered me the chance to go see the game with "VIP" treatment. The only condition was that I root for the Knicks. I thought that would be challenging. Rasheed Wallace is one of my favorite players ever. And I went to college with Chris Webber (who, by the way, looked kinda depressed on the court; not sure what that's about). How could I not root for the Pistons?

Well, I went to Madison Square Garden ready to do my job. Cheer for the Knicks. First of all, we were treated to a buffet dinner in a special suite. There, I had the chance to meet actor Matthew Modine. The executive producer of "Bones" and his family were also there. My partner, who was with me, was amazed to see Vanessa Redgrave there as well. After the dinner, we were escorted to our seats. Best Seats Ever. We weren't courtside, but we were pretty close, just four rows behind Spike Lee. It was really cool to see the players up close like that.

I rooted for the Knicks like I was instructed. I tried to give myself inspiration. There was, of course, the remote possibility that the Knicks could still qualify for the playoffs. Let me interject here, that when I lived in NYC for 10 years, I rooted for them a lot (except when they played the Blazers). One of my favorite playoff runs of all time was when the Knicks, as an EIGHTH SEED, made it all the way to the Finals. That was very exciting. Camby stepped up and had a great run. Sprewell and Houston were unconscious. LJ was hitting those threes and making the L sign with his arms. Very cool. So, back to last night's game. I figured I'd root for them to make the playoffs. And if they made the playoffs, they'd probably end up playing the Pistons, so that seemed like an interesting story to follow.

Things did not look good for the Knicks early on. Playing without Stephon Marbury and Jamal Crawford didn't help. I decided I'd enjoy watching the extremely short Nate Robinson play amongst the giants. During the second quarter, I was approached and asked if I could be interviewed on TV during the halftime show. That was pretty cool. Made me feel like a celebrity, which I kind of am. A little bit. Later that night, I got an e-mail from a friend who said he turned on the game at the gym, and there I was. Very cool.

Okay, back to the game. I decided to keep my eye on Nate. And I rooted for the Knicks to give the ball to Eddy Curry who had scored 43 points against the Bucks in their last game. Suddenly, Eddy and Nate came alive and the Knicks went on a sweet sweet run. They turned a 10 point deficit into a 10 point lead. The Garden was alive and I was having a great time. But then the Knicks blew it and it sucked. But all in all, I still had a great time.

Peace.

Go Blazers

KingSpeed

P.S. Like I said, keep your eyes on the Houston Rockets. Yao and McGrady are playing REALLY well and no one is paying much attention to them. These guys are going to steal the spotlight from the Suns and Mavs during the playoffs. You heard it here first.

P.P.S. Oh, I forgot to tell you. I got to meet Patrick Ewing! Very cool.

My Blazers are falling apart. I think that loss in L.A. did them in. I mean, man, even after that loss, we were STILL in the hunt for that 8th playoff spot that no one wants. But after getting killed by the Sonics in our own building... I have to admit that I'm starting to think about ping pong balls. And it makes me sad, because I'd really like to see this team play on a national stage. The playoffs would've given them that opportunity. Ah well. I was at that game at Staples, by the way. The night Kobe Bryant scored 65 points. My Blazers played so well. Roy. Aldridge. Zach. And how about that Ime Udoka? Five three pointers!! No one knows who he is. No one guards him. And so he makes a living out there.

Lemme take a break from my beloved Blazers and look to the rest of the NBA. The big team that I'm championing is the Houston Rockets. Before he got hurt, Yao was having an MVP season. He's back and playing very well. And so is McGrady. I think this team is ready for a real playoff run and they're kinda flying under the radar right now.

Look for McGrady to finally get out of the first round. And I think they have a legit shot to take down Phoenix and/or Dallas. Watch out for the Houston Rockets.

Also, how incredible are the Miami Heat and Cleveland Cavaliers? They're both hitting their stride at the right time of the year and Miami is doing it without Wade. Could Wade possibly return and lead Miami to another title? And how will LeBron do in his second playoff run? He was pretty amazing in his first go-round.

And how about those Pistons, sweeping that West road trip? I'm thinking the playoffs, even without my Blazers, will be exciting as hell.

Go Blazers!

Peace.

KingSpeed

P.S. My NBAE team, the Bulls, only had 4 guys yesterday and we still beat Superman Brandon Routh's Phoenix Suns! Great win to end the regular season. We start the playoffs against the Pistons next week!

The Blazers loss to the Spurs was devastating. It's been a few days now and it still stings. As I've said before, I really like this team. These players have made me as excited to be a Blazer fan as ever.

And I can't believe that I'm as interested in a team that is 11 games under .500 as I am, but there's something about these guys. Our team is way better than our record. If Roy hadn't missed a bunch of games at the beginning of the season, we'd have more wins, no doubt. But going into our game against the Spurs, I believed we could win and I still believed that we could challenge for a playoff spot. And we had 'em. We had 'em!! We led by 7 with a couple minutes left and it really looked like we were going to close the deal. And then suddenly, and without warning, we were down 5. It was surreal. How did we go from 7 up to 5 down? We didn't even seem to have done anything wrong. The Spurs just dropped 4 threes on us and it was over. Devastating. Devastating.

But I'm not giving up on these guys. We are still only 4.5 games out of the playoffs, and I want to believe we can start stringing together some wins and at least compete for that 8th spot. Watch out for my Blazers. And if they don't make it this year, they will move up the standings next year.

By the way, props to Mo Cheeks for leading the Sixers to six straight wins. Impressive.

Oh yea, and Go Ducks!!

Go Blazers

KingSpeed

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