Don't Miss These Regular Season Games That Preview the 2010 Playoffs

Alright you basketball animals, here we have something really convenient and useful: the schedule for the rest of the regular season with all the playoff preview games among the top teams highlighted. Games between any of the major contenders, wild card contenders, and long shot contenders are highlighted in the schedule that follows.

This is the state of the art way to quickly see what the best games of the coming days, weeks, and months are. Plan accordingly. Make sure you clear your schedule for those games in yellow. The swag is on for those games.

Sorry to Trailblazers, Heat, Rockets, and Jazz fans; none of your games are highlighted. You have decent teams, and you are close to being long shot contenders, but you do not quite qualify to be that this year. The Porland Trailblazers are heavily damaged by injuries. The Miami Heat are missing at least one key offensive player to go along with Dywane Wade and one key defensive player to go with Udonis Haslem and Jermaine O'Neal. The Houston Rockets are extremely well coached, but they, like Miami, need a key offensive player and a key defensive player to be able to contend. The Utah Jazz are a bad road team and a bad 3-point shooting team, and no offense to one of the greatest coaches of all time, but I do honestly believe that the Jazz need some new coaches.

First the list of the contenders and then the regular season schedule with games among the contenders highlighted.

CURRENT MAJOR CONTENDERS
Los Angeles Lakers--Quest Specialization
Cleveland Cavaliers--Quest Specialization
Boston Celtics

CURRENT WILD CARD CONTENDERS
Orlando Magic
Dallas Mavericks
Atlanta Hawks

CURRENT LONG SHOT CONTENDERS
Denver Nuggets
San Antonio Spurs
Phoenix Suns