Out with a whimper

The Jazz left the playoffs not with a bang, but a whimper.

When the game was still close, which is to say the first five minutes of play, the Spurs were unconscious and the Jazz couldn't make a shot to save their playoff lives. With the Spurs holding an early 5-4 lead the next three Jazz possessions were: Okur missed 3-pointer, Okur missed 3-pointer, Okur missed jumper. Okur then made a running shot through the lane, but missed on the next rip down the floor.

Summary: Okur shot on five straight possessions, missed two three-balls (badly) got two points out of the effort and the Jazz went from a 1-point defecit to an 8-point hole by the time they pulled the ball out of the net after Tim Duncan's next basket, with 6:38 to go.

The game was over.

Right now, it's a bitter pill. I watched very little of the postgame, I got tired of watching the players shake hands and hoping San Antonio suffers several serious injuries en route to a humiliating loss to the Pistons. (I gotta think the Pistons will find a way to get past the Cavs.)

I guess the next step is to try to improve the team, though time and experience will take care of that to a great extent. One of the real bright spots is that this team has come together and had real playoff success in the early years of the stars. Nobody will be talking about the "window of opportunity closing" for several seasons the way they did for several seasons of the Malone/Stockton era.

The West will be difficult, but there are no Showtime Lakers to overcome. The trophy is winnable.

Jazz notes

Some basketball observations from Game 4:

• The Jazz turned the ball over needlessly too many times. There were too many bad passes, fall downs and mental errors. They need to cut those episodes out of their game completely Wednesday night in Alamo-town if they want a chance to win.
• Deron Williams is great at getting to his spot on the floor for a shot he feels confident in taking. Williams' spot is a half-step behind the foul line anywhere inside the foul circle. He drained that shot time after time Monday night.
  
• The Jazz double-teamed Tim Duncan successfully time after time Monday night by sending a double-team to Duncan as soon as he put the ball on the floor to make his move. Fisher, Williams and Harpring all succeeded in making steals or causing turnovers on Duncan.
• Mehmet Okur needs to hit some shots. They don't need to be threes, but he does need to do something to get the Spurs to guard him on the outside and open the middle for low-post plays by Boozer and (occasionally) Kirilenko and Harpring.
• Manu Ginobili is a flopper.
• Jeff Van Gundy is an idiot. For him to call Steve Javie the best referee in the league in the first quarter of the game, only to have Javie turn in one of the all-time worst officiated games in the history of the NBA playoffs is self-explanatory.
  

The report we'll never see

The Spurs' win in fourth game of the Western Conference Finals was tainted.

I'll say it: The referees brutally hosed he Jazz. They were atrocious. All night.

Normally it's bad form to blame the zebras for a crucial loss. It sounds like whining and excuse-making. It never sounds good.

But the Game 4 officiating was too much to let pass.

Since the NBA grades referees in every game, I would challenge the league to publish its report for this game. It would have to be ugly. It would have to show repeated blown calls and no-calls.

Was the job turned in by DeRosa, Mauer and Javie bad enough to rank with Dick Bavetta's swallowed whistle on a 24-second violation in the 1998 Finals? Probably not. But only because the stakes Monday were much lower than they were when Bavetta hosed the Jazz. The trophy was on the line then, these are "only" the conference finals.

Hopefully the Jazz will be able to overcome the Game 4 debacle, end their long losing streak in the Alamo-town, and come back to Salt Lake City for Game 6. But if Monday's Game 4was the last Jazz home game of the season, the referees will be far more responsible than usual.

What a f***in' idiot

I know ESPN pays analysts to give strong opinions, but does ESPN pay them to be more than obnoxious blowhards?

If it does, it's not getting it's money's worth from Stephen A. Smith.

Called "Stephen A" often, it occurs to me that "A" stands for "Asshole." Make that, "ASSHOLE."

Smith is an epitome of the weaknesses of the national sports media. No performance except the most recent performance has relevance in the eyes of the "Steven A's" of the world. Saturday night and all day Sunday the Utah Jazz were a gritty bunch of scrappers, a team with admirable depth that is an impressive compliment to two young stars, Carlos Boozer and Deron Williams. But after Monday night's loss in Game 4 of the Western Finals, the Jazz were a two-man show, Boozer and Williams having been abandoned by the supporting cast.

Only the last performance . . . .

Granted the Jazz had a really rough patch Monday night. And, granted, the Spurs are likely to end the series with a win in San Antonio Wednesday. But if the Stephen A's of the national media would mix in a little less self-serving bombast and predictability the value of their opinions would more closely approximate the hill of cash ESPN insists on paying them.