MetroRiderLA

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Your defending champions aren’t having as easy of a time as Boston is against Orlando. Lakers lost the first game after eight consecutive postseason wins. It was bound to happen, and don’t forget Phoenix had to be pretty good to climb through two other teams to get there. Phoenix also had home-court advantage, though in these politically polarizing times, it wouldn’t be much of an advantage. I’m shocked that Los Suns aren’t being booed in their own arena when Phil Jackson is more understanding of the immigration law (albeit mealy-mouthedly) than Los Suns.

We dread venturing into the immigration more than we have to, and it’s hard not to have strong, passionate feelings for or against what is going on in Arizona. But we just want to focus it on basketball … and transit to the basketball game. The ‘net is plenty big enough for rancorous free-fire, so take it there.

Phoenix had a 118-109 win in the desert. Amare Stoudemire logged a stunning 42 points. Suns want to make it competitive. They can only do it on the basketball court, though. If Phoenix still had been in the NBA Playoffs 2010 (of Transit) and not been swept by Portland, it would face humiliation by not fielding any train service against L.A.

Portland, eliminated in the first round in the NBA, is a finalist contender on MetroRiderLA. And L.A. versus Portland is a transit fans’ dream match. We’re bound to see why.

L.A. knew it was going to be a tough series against Portland. It knew that Portland is absolutely deadly when it comes to urban rail, and PDX had solidified its reputation by just dunking all over the Blue Line.

This time, the games focus on the big trains. Mainline rail. Pundits note the problems the WES is causing for team morale; it has a presence but injuries and poor performance have hampered it, yet its other trains can come in to save the day. This one promises to be much more competitive.

Tipoff begins after the jump.

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Again, eight teams entered, and four get to leave. The most amazing thing about the finals — and no, it’s not that a team from the South may have a shot at being a finalist for a championship transit city — is that the finals teams here represent four corners of the U.S. There are now no teams left from the Mountain or the Central time zones.

This is how the new bracket shapes up:

The predictive value has now fallen down to just 50%. Only the Lakers and the Celtics are still in the actual finals. In the actual conference finals, the shabbiness of Lynx has not hindered Orlando at all. It has yet to lose in the playoffs. Also, Phoenix and San Antonio were able to trump their transit-endowed cohorts in Portland and Dallas.

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Imagine this. Utah has managed to force L.A. to a fifth and deciding game in the NBA Playoffs 2010 (of Transit). L.A. has better buses and mainline rail, while Utah had a marginally better urban rail game and a slightly superior website.

Now, it doesn’t come down to transit, but actual team records. Who leads? Let’s get the side-by-side first.

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The defending champion Lakers are getting closer on the repeat road with their sweep of the Jazz in Utah. This continues a series of several wins L.A. has scored over the Jazz.

Here, though, in the transit series, L.A. has a tough workout ahead of it in a hungry, ambitious Utah system. Its decade investing in transit has made it a rightful playoff contender. Yet its seedings here have paired it with Denver, which has made similar investments, and it proved to be a stalemate. Walking out with a tie should have fatigued Utah and gave L.A. a sweep, but Utah pulled out a surprise with its urban rail services. L.A., though, proves unstoppable with its bus services and hard to handle with mainline rail.

Now, which system has the better website? Both teams are about to make their case.

Tipoff begins after the jump.

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Both images are used with a Creative Commons license via Flickr; click on images to see more details

Boy did the Lakers break the hearts of the Jazz on Saturday night. Lakers are up 3 games to 0, winning the third game with just a single point. The purple and gold are having a much easier time on the real court than this humble transit tete-a-tete.

Los Angeles was stunned that Utah, of all places, could muster a victory in the urban rail game. Its two lines helped to pull a surprise win over the Blue Line service to Staples Center. L.A.’s waiting for the Expo Line to add a powerful game. Any year now …

Now we get to mainline rail, and Utah has a major smile on its face. Its FrontRunner commuter rail line manages to do what Metrolink cannot: run clock headways. L.A., though, is already planning for games ahead.

Tipoff begins after the jump.

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In just a week, MetroRiderLA completed the first round of the NBA Playoffs 2010 (of Transit). It’s on to the semifinals, and the games will post as close to the first day of actual semifinal action as possible.

Until then, these review/preview posts will be a sorbet between the start of transit action. We’ll include an updated bracket along with some analysis and highlights of the winning and losing transit systems. The bracket follows the jump — but first, an interesting question brought up.

Basketball fan George said:

How did Chicago lose on buses? The CTA website has a feature that tells you when the next bus arrives at each stop. No other major US system does that.

Cleveland has better urban rail than CTA with its 24-hour service on Blue and Red Lines? This is a joke post, right?

Yes. All of the NBA Playoffs 2010 (of Transit) posts are unadulterated, unabashed navel-gazing. Yet it is navel-gazing done with keen objectivity. It’s actually hard for a series like this to take greatly unequal transit systems and compete them against one another. You get a New York City team in here and the series is over. So the transit system comparisons adhere to a philosophical tenet of team sports: the sporting chance. Our system attempts to place greatly unequal transit systems on a level playing field, precisely so a weak team like Cleveland’s RTA stands a chance against Chicago’s CTA. A sporting chance …

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