The Boston Celtics swept the Indiana Pacers to make it to the NBA Finals. As the Celtics make their second Finals appearance in two years, renowned sports broadcaster Bill Simmons claims Boston’s path to the Finals was quite easy, given the teams they had faced. Drawing a comparison to LeBron James’ Cavaliers, Simmons talks about the condition the Eastern Conference has been in for more than the past decade.
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On one of the recent episodes of The Bill Simmons Podcast, the 54-year-old sportswriter and critic compared the double standards between the Celtics’ path to the NBA finals as opposed to LeBron James’ run in the East from 2011 to 2018.
“A lot of the people who are watching the series are like, ‘Oh, Indiana is not good. They haven’t played anybody.’ Who did the LeBron’s Cavs play from 2011 to 2018? Can you remember, like great teams they played? But this is how it goes. The East Conference has sucked forever.”
While that is one way to look at the Celtics’ path to the Finals this year, it still should not take away from LeBron James’ run to the Finals when he was with the Miami Heat and the Cleveland Cavaliers before he moved on to the Los Angeles Lakers.
Looking back at LeBron’s run to the finals while battling teams in the East, he faced the Celtics ‘Big Three’ in his second year with the Heat and went on to seven games in the Eastern Conference Finals. He also played Paul George’s Pacers a series before and faced off against Carmelo Anthony’s Knicks in the first round.
Over the years, James took down some good teams in the East such as the number one-seeded Atlanta Hawks squad, a revamped Toronto Raptors team (also the 1 seed), and the last of Derrick Rose’s Bulls squad.
He faced the Celtics and the Pacers multiple times during his tenure with the Cleveland Cavaliers over the years that certainly did not make the series as easy as a sweep for LeBron James.
Did the Boston Celtics have an easy path to the Finals?
Taking a look at the teams the Boston Celtics had to face this year, one can argue that they had an easier path to the NBA Finals than whoever makes it out of the West. The Celtics swept the Indiana Pacers in the Eastern Conference Finals. But had Pacers star point guard Tyrese Haliburton not gotten injured, the series would’ve not ended in a sweep.
Boston faced off against the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Conference Semifinals, taking down the Cavs in five games. What seemed to be an exciting series quickly went downhill after Donovan Mitchell got injured and the Celtics went on to run away with the series.
As for the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs, the Boston Celtics had a rematch with the Miami Heat from the previous year’s Conference Finals. Playing without Jimmy Butler, many had already expected the C’s to dominate from the get-go. And only dropping a single game in the series, the Celtics took care of the Heat and moved on.
Taking a look at the teams that could’ve faced off against Boston were Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Bucks, as well as Joel Embiid and the 76ers. Had it not been for injuries, the Celtics’ path to the Finals may have been a lot more difficult and a lot different.
