ESPN "experts" picks for Heat/Celtics

[StartOrien]

What's funny is - and I made the same prediction myself - everybody who picks the Celtics have them winning in 6.

[albas89]

It realy comes down to how much Rondo can take advantage of going against a guy like mike bibby

imo, they'll give Chalmers a lot more PT in this series...

[footey]

Without Shaq: Celtics in 7
With Shaq: Celtics in 5

[PosImpos]

Those look like fair predictions.  As others have noted, usually when analysts pick a team to win in 7 it means they are more or less on the fence -- especially when they pick the home team to win in 7, which is the safest pick if you think the series is a toss-up.

Hollinger's pick is pretty silly; he seems to think that the Celtics are going to revert to the way they played for the last month of the regular season instead of the way they performed over the last couple of weeks.  I sure hope they don't.  If they do, though, he's probably right. 

I find it fairly encouraging that the two writers who follow these two teams most closely both picked the Celtics to win.

[jackson_34]

Raptors in 4.

[Who]

Hollinger the only one picking a short series. Everyone else has it going 6 or 7 games.

Interesting that all the 6's are Boston victories and all the 7's are Miami victories.

[Army_of_One_Nation]

I never trust what Adande says. He's a Laker fan boy lol

I Agree, completely.

[guava_wrench]

Hollinger the only one picking a short series. Everyone else has it going 6 or 7 games.

Interesting that all the 6's are Boston victories and all the 7's are Miami victories.

Pretty obvious though. They are taking into consideration venue.

[prov1ml34]

WHEN the Celtics beat the Heat I am going to completely spam Hollinger's inbox with "YOU ARE A MORON" type messages.

[Marcus13]

Hollinger doesn't respect this team at all.  We're not going down only winning one game.

Heat in 7

[StartOrien]

WHEN the Celtics beat the Heat I am going to completely spam Hollinger's inbox with "YOU ARE A MORON" type messages.

That'll show him!

[Q_FBE]

Celtics in 6 is how I see it but I wouldn't fault anyone for picking the Heat in 7.

This should be a tough series and despite the last two wins I'm not convinced the switch has been flipped.

Oh the switch has been definitely flipped. My biggest worry is available energy to the Celtics. Some critical personnel has been carrying an awful heavy load over the years. I still contend that the Heat fold up when the competition gets close in the 4th qtr against the good teams. I know they held off Philly last night but I remain unconvinced because I know we are clearly better than Philly and we dispatched the Bricks in 4 straight.

Basically the experts has this a toss em series and I cannot really fault them for it. I expect a dogfight and am prepared for a dogfight.

[coco]

Didn't Abbott had the Cs out in the first round against a Boshless/LeBronless Miami team last year?  Yep, look it up! 

[Senninsage]

Call me crazy, but I say Celtics in no more than 5 if we get game one, and the same if we get at least one of the first two games.

I think the only way this series goes to 6 or 7 games, is if the Celtics are trailing one or more games behind the Heat.

I think it will really need to be the Celtics who are messing up a bit, for this series to see 6 or 7 games.

[Lucky17]

Forsberg's pick is no surprise, and Legler has consistently picked the Celtics, even when it wasn't fashionable to do so.

What's interesting is Windhorst's pick. He's covered LeBron for years, and to see him pick against LeBron seems fairly shocking to me.