A coach who has not missed the playoffs in his entire 19-year career is riding a wave of destruction. The team with the highest payroll in the league is more offensive and less talented than a $2 comedian at a traveling road show. And one of the teams that went to the NBA Finals last season is five games below .500 and treading water as rumors continue to swirl that its coach is about to resign.

	Jason Kidd's division-leading Nets are headed to the playoffs.

Now, you can be pessimistic, and say what a bunch of garbage we are watching. Or, like myself, the eternal optimist, you can love it for the new sense of excitement and new expectations it creates.

OK, so people's predictions were thrown out of whack a little bit.

Let's move past that.

Let's look at the fact that Miami is horrendous, Portland is horrendous and Philadelphia is somewhat horrendous as positives. All that means, essentially, is that three new teams will make it into the postseason this year, and at least give us something fresh to look forward to.

For years, the NFL has been seeking the parity that allows several teams to go into the final weekend of the season with the possibility of making the playoffs.

Sure, the Los Angeles, err, St. Louis Rams still will probably wind up in the Super Bowl, making Dick Vermeil cry yet again because he is NOT coaching them. But that several teams have a chance of at least playing the Rams in the playoffs this year as they head into the final week of play at least gives football fans something to watch this weekend.

Sure, the St. Louis, err, Los Angeles Lakers will probably wind up in the NBA Finals and Shaq and Kobe will do their love hug thing and Jerry Buss will have three 20-something floozies fawning all over him as he hoists the Larry O'Brien trophy to the helicopter-filled skies, but the fact that any number of teams may have the opportunity to meet the Lakers in the playoffs gives basketball fans something too watch for, oh, the final two months of the season.

Let's face it: Spending two months trying to figure out whether the Minnesota Timberwolves or the Portland Trail Blazers were going to be the seventh seed in the Western Conference, with the right to get blown out by the Lakers or the San Antonio Spurs in the first round, is not exactly Must See TV.

But now look at what we've got: Heading into Friday night's game, three teams -- the Los Angeles Clippers, Seattle SuperSonics and Utah Jazz -- are tied for seventh place in the West.

General manager Bob Whitsitt says all that his $87 million worth of players need to do is gel and the Blazers will come storming back from their generally disgusting malaise and be in the mix.

Even Denver, which has had more ups and downs than a Tibetan Sherpa, is only five games out of a playoff spot, and the Nuggets are awaiting the arrivals of both Antonio McDyess and Larry Brown.

Up above, the Sacramento Kings are only a half game behind the Lakers, and the Lakers' schedule so far has been so cake is should have come with ganache.

And Phoenix, in sixth place, has its two star guards throwing punches at each other -- so maybe that Stephon Marbury personality thing was not exclusively a New Jersey/Minnesota/Georgia Tech/Tom Gugliotta/Byron Scott/Keith Van Horn conflict -- and its owner questioning whether the team cares. Maybe the Suns and Blazers should just switch cities and try starting over.

In the East, the entire Atlantic Division has flipped. Jason Kidd has New Jersey flying, Antoine Walker and Paul Pierce have Boston thinking of, well, Antoine Walker and Paul Pierce, and MJ somehow got the Wizzies turned around.

Meanwhile, Orlando, New York, Philadelphia and Miami are leading delusional lives, still talking about the possibility of making it to the Finals. Pat Riley must be blinded by sun spots all over the interior wall of his cranium if he cannot see that his run of success is O-Vah.

I'm not having any fantasies here about the 1980 Oakland Raiders taking their wild card berth and making a run all the way to the Super Bowl.

I realize that, in the end, the best teams are going to be in the NBA Finals, getting interviewed by Ahmad Rashad and Jim Gray for the final time as they make way -- thank God -- for Suzy Kolber. (The only thing I celestially request is that I do not have to spend a week in June in the Meadowlands.)

But I have spent too many Februarys and Marches watching lethargic, mindless, boring basketball -- in other words, I feel like a Blazers fan -- because the postseason berths already have been determined and teams are just waiting until April to get geared up for the "real" season.

Now, as we head into the new year, games actually matter. Most teams are in a position where they are not guaranteed anything -- except in Chicago, where they are guaranteed bad hoops. The top four or fives teams are within a few games of each other, and the bottom five or six teams are within a few games of each other.

Let's hope it stays that way.

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