IPB Does The NBA (No, Not THAT Way! Sheesh… You Have Such A Dirty Mind!)

Tonight’s lucky recipient of IPB’s hockey-starved focus is the Detroit Pistons vs. the Cleveland Cavaliers, ECF Game 2. And once we’re done with them, the NBA won’t ever be the same!

TNT (whose HD picture puts VS, NBC and all the other HD providers we get on our satellite/cable combo completely to shame) had an actual, honest-to-God pre-game show, but we opted not to watch it. It would be like cheating — we’re tough enough to jump straight into the action with no prep work. Plus we were delayed in getting started making dinner and weren’t sitting down in time to watch it.

Just as the coverage changes over from pre-game to game, we get a sideline interview with a guy on the Cavaliers called “Zydrunus Ilgauskas”; he is both nicknamed “Z” (thank God) and looks like Mike Rupp’s even more unassuming brother. That’s one reason to cheer for Cleveland. Also, well, they’re not Detroit (sorry, Wings fans) and they have LeBron James. His stupid Sprite commercial that keeps running during the hockey games is reason to hate him, but he apparently refers to himself in the third person as “Bron-Bron”, so that makes him okay in our book. Meanwhile, one reason to cheer against the Pistons is that their website has a big banner on it saying, “Welcome to Deeeeee-troit Basketball.” We thought the NBA spent lots of money on fan relations and making themselves cool. Apparently the Pistons are bucking that trend.

FIRST QUARTER

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