The 2025 NBA Playoffs have reached the Conference Finals stage. It’s been a wild ride through the first two rounds. We’re not the only ones noticing, too! As evidenced by this question from the Blazer’s Edge Mailbag.
Dave,
I’m watching these playoffs and they’re interesting. So many low seeds are advancing. Upsets seem to be everywhere. Just wondered if you’re watching and what you think of it so far. Anything interesting coming up in your mind?
Rob
I actually thought the first round of these playoffs was the most interesting in living memory. The second round was muted by injuries: Jayson Tatum, Steph Curry, Aaron Gordon, several Cleveland Cavaliers players. But I did see the second round as a victory for basketball, of sorts. It showed that strategy and roster construction still play roles in this game. Three-point shooting and superstars aren’t everything.
To me, the Indiana Pacers were the purest example. I loved their ball movement versus Cleveland. Their defense in the later games was also impressive. Headed into the series and then again in its latter half, Head Coach Rick Carlisle game planned for the first-seeded opponent precisely and effectively.
I also loved Oklahoma City’s battle with Denver in this sense. Nikola Jokic is phenomenal. There’s no way the Thunder were going to stop him. He makes the game look simple. It continues to do so no matter what the opponent throws at him. Instead of beating their heads against that wall, the Thunder tried to sever the connection between Jokic and his teammates. When they couldn’t stop his production, they blunted its impact.
The mechanism for this was turnovers. Oklahoma City made sure they were ready for Jokic passes. They’re the most dangerous turnover team in the league, not just in their ability to force them, but the lightning-quickness with which they convert turnovers into points. (This is a partial model for the Trail Blazers’ developing defensive attack, I believe.) In Game 7, the Thunder forced Denver into 23 miscues and held a 37-7 points-after-turnovers advantage. The curse began to work in reverse too, as extra pressure on Jokic prevented him from getting up shots and taking over the game.
Even though injuries clouded the Knick-Celtic series, I liked how New York handled Boston early on. The Celtics weren’t hitting their threes. That caused a real dilemma for them, as the long ball is their regular-season trademark. You could see the wheels turning inside the Celtics’ heads. “Do we keep shooting them—because they should go in—or do we develop the offense more through inside play?” They stayed the course at first. When that didn’t work they did develop a more measured attack. Then Tatum’s injury forced them back into three-point desperation mode. New York’s defense forced Boston into a mental/emotional dilemma that they never found their way out of.
I loved seeing so clearly that basketball mattered in an actual basketball game. Missing stars may have contributed to the effect, but I’ll take it.
The league is going to have to figure out how to keep its players healthier though. It’s so frustrating to experience an entire season of ups and downs only to watch major players bow out of the playoffs before their teams do. I don’t know what the solution is. I’m at a loss. But injuries are a real opponent in the modern game.
As far as individual players, it’s hard not to cite Jalen Brunson’s greatness, but the guy who surprised me was Julius Randle. He’s always been a good player, borderline great sometimes. Shooting over 50% in the first 10 games of these playoffs has been a major achievement, somewhat sustained too. Randle has never shot better than 37.4% in a postseason before. That efficiency is making him dominant.
Randle stands with me in a yin-yang duo with Jokic. Denver’s MVP shows that even the biggest stars can be contained. Randle shows that talented players—I’m talking those star/borderline-great guys—are often way better than you think. When they go on a sustained run, they can change a team’s fortunes. There’s always a possibility that you’re going to see the best out of a Randle-level guy for a month or two. When that happens, the whole game changes. It’s one reason to keep talent around.
I do wonder if the NBA is worried over the Conference Finals and NBA Finals. They’re looking at Minnesota, Indiana, and Oklahoma City along with the Knicks. Only one of those teams is a marquee franchise. I can see them face-palming over a Timberwolves-Pacers Finals. Even Thunder-Pacers isn’t that memorable from a public-relations standpoint. I wonder if conspiracy theorists will come out in the upcoming Knicks-Pacers series. I also wonder if we might see a slow move away from parity in the future. It’s cool having all kinds of different NBA Champions. Three of the current candidates would be winning their first-ever title if they took it all. But the winners are starting to blur at this point. Was Milwaukee before or after Denver? Who came in between them? The league might look at the parity-preserving measures they’ve taken in the past ten years and try to scale back a little in the next round of negotiations and rule revisions.
What have you found interesting about the playoffs so far? Share your thoughts in the comment section below!
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