I wonder if most other cities think all of their teams have a chance to win it all?

All three of the Boston Sports teams seem to have loaded up for bear this year. Some people are down on the Cs and the Yankees are never really out of it when they can't be struck out, but it's a pretty good looking group of imports.
When we had Antoine Walker and Paul Pierce, I thought Jim O'Brien could do anything. He had them jacking up threes at a record clip, and we were winning games. We all knew deep down that we weren't going to win it all, and most of the local sports media got down on 'Toine for his shot selection, but they couldn't have done any better with him playing in the post all the time.

My Antoine quote when some reporter tried to challenge him on his shot selection:
Reporter: Antoine, why do you take so many threes?
AW: Because they don't have fours.

Low post moves were not going to erase the fact that we had no center. Every bigman that came through town seemed to get 17 boards and 25 points against us. We did what Christian Leattner learned to late in his short career. Extend the defense, and get the center out of the middle by jacking up threes. And the the chagrin of basketball purists everywhere, it worked.

Back when the Eastern conference was good, there was now way that team was going to play great defense and score enough to stay in games, but they did it every night. I was actually very proud of Jim O for quitting when Ainge ripped apart his team in the youth movement. He never quit on the Celtics, he played his poor hand into a seat at the Final Four of the NBA.

Now, we have Garnett. I love Walker, but Garnett is twice the player Walker was in his prime. Rondo is very raw, and some teams will take advantage of him early, but if he can learn from his mistakes, we have a chance. I said it. We have a chance.

Before the Pats won their first Superbowl, I would never have believed this team had a chance. Bledsoe was knocked out and seemingly near death in the second week, and the Pats sat at 0-2 with the guy I thought was their best player. Then I learned that a group of who grew together as a team and never backed down could win a championship. I think part of the key was finding guys who were going to hit like rhinos. Any interception ended up with was part of the equation the linebackers trying to knock the heads off of any offensive player who was crazy enough to try to make a play.

Of course, Doc Rivers has not proved he could out Coach B's stoned kid, so the jury is out on that one. KG and Paul have complimentary games that are about as opposite as Barkley and Hakeem's were similar. We can be a wide open running team that gets to the hoop instead of that dump it in the post Rockets team that fizzled when Malone picked up and carried the Houston defenders off of Stockton late in those Jazz/ Rockets match-ups.

KG has the cache to get the calls and Paul Pierce can draw doubles and carry two man to the hoop. After the scandal this summer, the refs and officiating should be more scrutinized than ever, negated Bruce Bowen. If we get too far down in the fourth, Pierce always has been able to get points, and now we have a deep man to shoot us back in the in the form of a slightly less mobile Ray Allen.

We'll probably start out slow, and hit our stride at mid season. If we can play team defense like we did under O'Brien, I would a healthy Cs team is a lock for the finals. Unfortunately, Doc is known more for guys that hustle than he is for guys that play a good coordinated defense. It's still a team more ready to win than I have seen in a decade.

It's going to be a busy year of rooting for the home teams. Don't let those idiot Globe writers and Lobel get you down. Enjoy Garnett while you can. You may never see a player like him again in Boston.