I am writing to comment on February's sports article, "Basketball Predictions" by Shalin Patel. First, all these were Shalin's opinions and perhaps instead of appearing in the Sports section, they should have run in the Fiction or Opinion section. Although sometimes he told us, the readers, that these were his opinions, it wasn't very clear.

In the Rookie of the Year category, I generally agree, except Derrick Colemen isn't just another rookie, he should be rated higher than that.

For MVP of the NBA, Charles Barkley and Michael Jordan are sensible choices as Shalin stated, but I believe he skipped over a few people, such as hometown Larry Bird and the Washington Bullet's superstar Bernard King, who has made an incredible comeback from a devastating knee injury. And Reggie Lewis, far from being a dark horse for the MVP award, is a quality player, but, don't you think he might want to work on being an All-Star before he sets his goals on the MVP.

Shalin goes on to discuss what seems to be a joke: the play-offs and championships. First I'd like to bring up the fact/opinion that although the Spurs might win the championships; they're not even first in their division and, if they were in the Pacific Division, they would probably not even make the play-offs. Also, the Trailblazers, as of the end of February, seem virtually impenetrable. Then there are the Lakers and the Jazz. I don't believe you can really determine, or even predict a team, but judging by stats, the Trailblazers are looking pretty hot.

In the East, Chicago was predicted to go to the finals. Their defense is doing well, but there is definitely room for others to pass them. The Celtics will have no trouble making it to the semi-finals, but if his prediction is right about Chicago and Detroit playing, this will be a battle, and nothing can be even discussed after that. n