It's the same old song. Cleveland vs Golden State for the fourth consecutive season, and while it does get tired seeing the same teams in the Finals year after year, these team have earned it, but this isn't two evenly matched teams. Don't let the Warriors' 58-24 regular season record fool you, they had injury problems during the season. Kevin Durant missed 14 games, Draymond Green missed 12, Klay Thompson missed 9, and worst of all, Steph Curry missed 31. In the postseason they had two easy wins in 5 games series during the first two rounds, before being pushed to 7 by Houston. While Chris Paul was injured late in Houston's game 5 win, Golden State was the better team, as they outscored the Rockets by 63 points over the 7 game series. They look really good going into the Finals. The same can't be the said for Cleveland who are not the same team without Kyrie Irving. During the previous 3 seasons Cleveland has been able to turn on the switch in the playoffs, and dominate the weak Eastern Conference, but that wasn't the case this year. In the first round they won a 7 game series over Indiana in which they got outscored by 40 points. While they looked impressive in sweeping Toronto in the second round, they had another tough 7 game series in the Conference Finals with an undermanned Boston team. Lebron has carried more of the slack, without the type of second option he had when Kyrie was on the team. They haven't shown that same ability to dominate the Eastern Conference competition, so what are they going to do against one of the most talented teams of all time. It's hard to match up with Golden State. They have, on their team, two of the top 5 players in the league in Kevin Durant, and Stephen Curry. Durant, Curry, and Thompson give them 3 of the best 3 point shooters in the league, and Draymond Green is a really good all around player.
Prediction
I can't see Cleveland winning this one. They wouldn't even have been able to match up with Houston if Chris Paul were healthy. Lebron can only do so much, and he barely got them past a weaker Boston team. Cleveland's defense has been suspect throughout the season, but they got away with it as Boston's went cold from outside in game 7. That isn't going to happen with Golden State, because the Warriors have too many weapons. My prediction is Warriors in 5 games. I think they could get the sweep, but since they haven't swept anyone in this year's playoffs, 5 games is a safer prediction. As for Finals MVP, I think Kevin Durant will win it for the second consecutive year. He was hot in the conference finals against Houston, though I wouldn't be surprised if Steph wins it.
