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AC TITTICOCK'S WEEKLY FREE NBA BASKETBALL PICKS AND WINNERS
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AC's Wagercom 2008-2009 NBA Picks Season Record
Wins: 118 Losses: 90 Ties: 0
NBA Picks Winning Percentage: 57%
Contact AC at ac(at sign)wagercom.com or post your questions/comments on the Wagercom Message Board
Read AC's Bio
AC's outlook on the NBA is an entertaining original column featured here at Wagercom. If you are prone to NBA betting or even just an NBA fan, make sure you come back often to read his articles and free NBA Basketball picks against the spread. AC will be providing us with a weekly outlook during the basketball season including free NBA Basketball picks on some of the weekend games each Friday and Saturday.
Our NBA expert AC has had 6 consecutive winning seasons picking NBA games against the spread making you money including the VIG. AC does this out of the kindness of his heart and for the naked pictures of your girlfriends you send him as a token of your appreciation. So enjoy the columns and the picks..
AC'S NBA 2008-2009 NBA FREE PICKS PLAYOFFS WEEK 5:
There are two Game 7s on Sunday which makes AC giddier than Michael Jackson at a NAMBLA convention. The Lakers are facing the upstart and scrappy Rockets while the Orlando Magic travel to Boston to take on the beat up and injured defending champion Celtics. Both should be classic games with plenty of plot lines for even moderate NBA fans to be interested. This week, not only will AC give you free money winning picks on these two game (and for those of you not playing at home, AC is still 57% against the spread this season), but he will also go over the five most important plot lines from each series and compare them to 1980s movies (since if you hadn’t noticed, AC is a very bad writer and relies on gimmicks and lists).
Rockets vs. Lakers:
1. Romancing the Stone: This goes to Kobe Bryant whose obsession with getting a ring knows no bounds. He has only one goal in life (other than to do bad things to hotel workers) and that is to win a championship without Shaq. He is so focused that he has alienated his teammates and usually tries to do too much in order to win, like averaging 25 shots a game in this series. There is no “I” in “TEAM” but there is a “ME” in “TEAM” and Kobe is determined to show that “he” can win it all.
As an aside, the take-off of Romancing the Stone called Romancing the Bone goes to Sasha Vujachick for obvious reasons.
2. Can’t Buy Me Love: This goes to Andrew Bynum who can’t “Bynum” any love in this series. While Lakers fans have anointed him the next great center in the league, he has played poorly and sparingly in this series. There are some in the national media who are even calling for seldom used DJ Mbenga to get Bynum’s minutes which may be hard to do on Sunday because DJ Mbenga has a prior commitment to spin at Palladium in Hollywood all Sunday afternoon. Bynum was putting up monster numbers before his injury (he averaged 26 points and 14 rebounds in the five games before he hurt his knee) but his return has been worse than a Ray Romano stand up special. Bynum is a bigger tease to Laker fans than a 17 year old mormon girl with a promise ring whose parents have left her home alone is to her boyfriend. With Yao Ming hurt, the Lakers could really use a healthy Bynum in Game 7.
3. Short Circuit: Number 5 is alive (or in this case Number 0) as this movie goes to the diminutive Aaron Brooks who has broken out for the Houston Rockets. Houston traded away Rafer Alston to open up the starting pointing guard spot for Aaron Brooks and he has seized the opportunity. Brooks is listed as being six feet tall but he’s six feet tall like Charlie Crist likes females. Though Brooks may be small in stature, his quickness, speed, and understanding of the game have propelled him to the starting spot and he has completely outplayed the opposition on the Lakers. Despite his small stature, Brooks comes up big in big games and in Game 7 he will make things difficult for LA.
4. Just One of The Guys: This movie goes to the entire Rockets team who is made up of a bunch of role players (other than Ron Artest) with Yao and McGrady hurt. Battier, Brooks, Scola, Landry, etc., are all just one of the guys, and yet as a team they play phenomenally well together. They are showing you don’t necessarily need a superstar to win in this league as long as you have a group of players who know their roles and can fit in with a system (like Joyce Hyser tried to fit in as a guy in this underrated 1980’s movie which featured the most unexpected and greatest topless scene of the decade). One could also give the movie Revenge of the Nerds to the Rockets here for GM Daryl Morey’s use of stats in putting this team together, but then I would not have been able to give props to Joyce Hyser’s fantastic boobs (in case you missed it the first time).
Side note: There is one thing that has always bothered me about Just One of the Guys and that was Rick’s pronunciation of Cindy Lauper. When he utters the seminal line: “and I’m Cindy Lauper,” he pronounced the “au” as if he hurt himself and was saying “ow.” How could they not fix this? Seriously, who didn’t know how to pronounce Cindy Lauper correctly in 1985? This has bothered me for 24 years now and I demand to know an answer.
5. Blow Out: This forgotten John Travolta move from the early 1980s goes to this entire series which has had more and bigger blow outs than a New Jersey hair salon. Each team has had 30 point second half leads in consecutive games and only two games have had final winning margins of less than 10 points. I don’t think I have ever seen alternating 30 point blow outs (and I am counting Game 4 as a 30 point blow out for Houston) and I have seen a shirtless gimpy midget being “taken care of” by a transsexual (don’t ask, and I won’t tell).
Orlando vs Boston:
1. Weekend at Bernies: This goes to Ray Allen who apparently died after the Chicago series and has been carried around by the Celtics in order for Wyc Grousebeck to avoid paying a wrongful death suit (seriously, can you think of any other reason?). Ray Allen is shooting 5 for 36 from three point land in this series (good for 14%) and in 3 of the last 4 games has not even hit a 3 pointer (0-5 in Game 3, 0-5 in Game 4, 0-7 in Game 6). The most bizarre part of all of this is that he is missing open shots. If Ray Allen were playing like the real Ray Allen, this series would have been over in 4 or 5 games.
2. Irreconcilable Differences: This awful 1980’s movie goes to the awful coaching of Stan Van Gundy and the terrible team chemistry of the leaderless Magic. In this series we have seen:
A. Van Gundy and back-up Magic point guard Anthony Johnson get into an argument on the bench.
B. Dwight Howard call out his coach for not getting him the ball (though as a Celtic fan, I love when Howard gets the ball since his awful running hook shot is only eclipsed by his proclivity to turn the ball over).
C. Van Gundy continue to start JJ Redick over Courtney Lee even though Lee has been killing the Celtics and Redick has been playing like he is auditioning for Ray Allen’s role in Weekend at Bernie’s II.
D. Van Gundy not give the ball to Rashard Lewis on every play despite the fact that neither Glen Davis nor Brian Scalabrine can cover him.
E. The Magic fold at the end of every game (except Game 6 where the Celtics choked away a lead) because they have no one stepping up to take big shots and calm them down.
3. Staying Alive: Another bad 1980’s John Travolta movie (perhaps I should have just used John Travolta movies for this column but what’s done is done) goes to the Boston Celtics who despite injuries to Kevin Garnett and Leon Powe and 200 games of wear and tear, have managed to stay alive. They have made two huge end of game comebacks in this series despite being clearly outplayed for 40+ minutes in each of those contests and they lack the overall talent of the Magic. When Brian Scalabrine is a key guy coming off of your bench and you are actually happy to see him in the game, your team has major problems. Even with the injuries, the lack of a bench, Paul Pierce’s turnover-it is, and the death of Ray Allen, the Celtics have managed to keep winning. They have the heart of a champion but how long can they keep up this magic act (semi pun intended)?
4. Less than Zero: This goes to Dwight Howard and the referees as it signifies the number of three second and goal tend calls whistled on Howard in this series. He camps out in the lane on every play and regularly swats shots as they are on their descent. He’s more coddled by the refs than a Faberge egg in the Hermitage or Burt Reynold’s nuts by 1970s groupies. Rome was built in less time than Howard spends in the lane. There is a reason he gets so many offensive boards, but if the refs aren’t going to call it, there isn’t anything Boston can do.
5. Lean on Me: This goes to Paul Pierce who despite his mediocre performance is still who the Celtics turn to when they need a basket. He has had flashes of the old Pierce during crunch time of several games but his lackadaisical play for the majority of games is concerning. Maybe he’s injured or maybe he’s just worn out, but the Celtics lean on Pierce when they need to win and while he has delivered at times, he needs to be more consistent.
Bonus 1980s movie for the Refs:
Disorderlies: No homage to 1980s movies would be complete without a shout out to Disorderlies which established the Fat Boys as the leading actors of their generation. This movie goes to the refs who have not just been abysmal, but have created unbelievable disorder. With flagrant and technical fouls regularly having to be reviewed by the league afterwards (and frequently overturned), there is no sense of order during the game and no certainty as to if anything will be changed the day after the game. The NBA refs have been an utter abomination and something has to be done about it (and by the way, how does Bill Kennedy still ref Celtics games? Really, how is this possible? The NBA fined him for lashing out at Doc Rivers during the regular season and then has assigned him to Boston playoff games where he undeniably calls everything for the other team. Just watch him if he refs another Boston game, it is ridiculous.). I know it is difficult to ref an NBA game since there is a foul on every single play but there are more WMDs in Iraq than there are good NBA refs and this is killing the product.
SUNDAY FREE NBA PLAYOFF PICKS
Sunday Picks:
Houston +12.5 at LA:
As mentioned above, there have been many blow outs in this series but I just don’t see the Rockets folding in Game 7. I am willing to wager that this is the highest line for any Game 7 in the history of NBA basketball and it doesn’t make sense. Yes LA beat Houston by 40 in Game 5 but the Rockets came back and slaughtered the Lakers two days later. Houston is scrappy and they don’t back down while all of the pressure is on the Lakers who aren’t as talented as people think. Now I don’t think the Rockets will win, but anytime we can get 12.5 points in a Game 7, we’re going to take it and make sure our favorite gentlemen’s club has some bottles of cold Cristal waiting for us.
Orlando at Boston -2.5:
There is absolutely nothing I like about this game for Boston, nothing. As noted in this week’s column, they have no answer for Rashard Lewis, Dwight Howard is allowed to camp out in the lane for hours, Paul Pierce has been inconsistent, and to call Ray Allen’s play awful would be an insult to the word awful. That said, the Celtics are at home, they have Eddie House to come in and rile the crowd into a frenzy with his three point shooting, and they simply know how to win. Plus, there is a little known fact that on 2 days rest Ray Allen’s shooting percentage from behind the 3 point arc goes up from 41% to 46% on the season. Maybe Allen just needs that extra day. The Magic have the talent but the Celtics have the heart, the crowd, the experience, and an actual go to guy in Paul Pierce. Take Boston but this could be a very close game.
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