Balanced article. It comes down to three things:
A. The value of Home Court - if the HC situation was reversed, Hollinger would probably be picking Celts in 5
B. How you weight a couple factors: 1. overall play in regular season, 2. head to head play, 3. recent play, and 4. ability to step up in post season. Hollinger puts very little stock in 2 & 3 because historically they haven't been good indicators of success. In short he doesn't put much stock in anecdotal evidence that a team is an outlier from these historical trends.
C. Shaq's health. Basically KG, PP, RA, RR + anybody at center is a great lineup. But Shaq + 3 of the above + anybody else is also a great lineup. It just makes the C's that much deeper and harder to contend with.
All that being said Hollinger expects Heat in 5 as the most likely of any individual outcome, and sounds like he believes that would happen in a majority or at least large plurality of times. That doesn't mean he thinks its the only possible or even probable outcome.