Ahead of the 2006 NBA Playoffs which begin today, the predictions are rolling thick and strong. Check out the Blogcritics and Marcellin Mutoni’s round 1 takes. Complete Sports has gone all the way and predicts a Detroit win:

This year, I think things may be tilted in Detroit’s favor. They’ve basically been resting for a while now, having locked up the East a while, they have home-court advantage, and their bench is better than it’s given credit for. And not to sound like a broken record, but their offense is better under Flip. Another thing is, I don’t think Rasheed Wallace will be leaving Big Shot Rob open for anymore late shots. PISTONS IN 7.

The Detroit Pistons have certainly moved from strength to strength after Brown moved on to coach the Knicks. Not many will predict any one except the Pistons or the Spurs to win the title. Can the Miami Heat or some other team tide over these two champion teams?

We will see.

San Antonio Spurs have over taken Boston Celtics as the second best NBA team ever in terms of winning percentage. Lenny Wick points it out on Livejournal NBA community here. It shows how poor Boston has been in the years following the Lary Bird and their Championship days.

It also shows how consistently well San Antonio has been performing over the past 5 years. San Antonio hasn’t changed their team too much in a league where trades are frequent and teams hardly remain similar over a few years. The rewards have come in championships and wins. Lakers stand at the top with them maintaining some performance in the Shaq-Kobe era.

The NBA keeps surprising me. Who would have though an Australian Andrew Bogut, an Australian, would be number 1 pick in the draft.

From NBA.com :

Short of last year’s record nine international players selected in the first round, seven players from outside the United States were chosen in the the first round this year: Andrew Bogut (Australia), Fran Vazquez (Spain), Yaroslav Korolev (Russia), Francisco Garcia (Dominican Republic), Johan Petro (France), Linas Kleiza (Lithuania) and Ian Mahinmi (France).

What interests me and most people is this though :

San Antonio has a habit of mining international gold with their less-than-desirable draft positioning. Manu Ginobili (1999, No. 57) or Tony Parker (2001, No. 28), anybody?

At No. 28 this year, the Spurs took Ian Mahinmi, an 18-year-old power forward from France. How little known was this guy? He’s not included in the official NBA Draft Media Guide and his player page on ESPN.com is bare bones. From what we’re gathering, he’s a rebounding machine ala Dennis Rodman.

Spurs have set a standard in the NBA with their draft picks and persisiting with the players they back. So we get longer contracts and lesser trades. While most NBA teams look totally different in a year or two because of the trades, Spurs have the same core bunch year in and year out, a mantra for a successful team.