By Brendan Lynch

The halfway mark of the 2002-2003 NBA season approaches and the general trends of the year bear themselves out with each passing game. Every season, there are a few teams and players that confirm what seems to be pre-season conventional wisdom and a few that make you wonder who struck a deal with the devil. I'm breaking down the 1st 34 or so games of this season into 2 categories: Actual Surprises; and what I'll call Big $%&!?#! Surprises, things you just knew would happen and drive you bananas.

Surprises:

1. The Lakers are 15-20! Shaquille O'Neal is still hampered by his surgically repaired big toe and the Lakers' awful supporting cast is exposed. They'll probably be fine by the end of the year, but for right now, things are a lot more interesting.

2. The Pacers lead the Central Division and have the second best record in the East. Many thought that Isiah was going to screw up all of that talent again, and that Indiana would be the 7th or 8th playoff seed. Turns out he knows what he's doing after all.

3. Phoenix is playing very well behind rookie of the year candidate Amare Stoudemire. The Suns trail the Kings by 4 games in the Pacific. I'm still not sold on the Suns, because I'm not sold on Stephon Marbury like many others are, but so far he's fueling the team.

4. Jason Kidd thinks he's Reggie Miller all of a sudden. As if things weren't bad enough when he was just a walking triple-double, he seems to have corrected his shot, just about the only flaw in his game. He's leading the Nets with 20.5 ppg and shooting 46% from the field.

5. Kedrick Brown is having trouble working his way into the Celtics rotation. I was convinced that this guy was set to win 6th Man, Most Improved, etc. After an ankle sprain and turf toe (?!?) all he gets is garbage time. He had an unbelievable alley-oop layup from Paul Pierce last week, but a plummeting Celts team needs more help than that.

Oh, Big $%&!?#! Surprises:

1. Antonio McDyess, Marcus Camby, Vince Carter and Grant Hill are all injured. Not exactly unexpected. These guys are stealing money.

2. Vin Baker is not good. Dunkin' Donuts is running a promotion to win a one-on-one game against Baker. First of all, why is that a prize? Second, I don't care who wins the contest: teenager, fat guy, old lady, whoever; I'm betting against Vin.

3. Jersey is finally playing up to potential now that Dikembe Mutombo is injured. They're on a 10 game winning streak, and it's thanks to the absence of their invalid starting center. Imagine where they could be if they traded Van Horn and MacCulloch for somebody useful?

4. Forty-year-old Michael Jordan is good sometimes, bad sometimes, and the Wizards are .500. I'll never understand why teams think that trading for Jerry Stackhouse is a good idea. D.C.'s front line is either too young to know what they're doing or too old to do it. I think this team finishes they year exactly 41-41.

5. It's looking more and more like Atlanta will have to shell out the $125 playoff rebate to their season ticket holders. That was a baaaaaaaaaad idea. I just don't see how trading for Glenn Robinson had recently-fired head coach Lon Kruger coming up with a money-back guarantee for the playoffs. He had to have been trying to get fired, right?

That'll about do it, let's see what happens in the second half of the year, when you just know the Lakers will probably rebound, somehow scrap through the Western Conference Finals again, and go on to smoke the East.


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