Breaking -- The human race has waived Josh Smith: 2014-15 regular season thread part 2

portland v gsw not really that massive, blazers w/o aldridge, batum, kaman, and obv matthews
--Clay

blaze b-teamers doing pretty all right!

this game is really moving, v pretty rn

steeeeeeeph

you can't beat the warriors man it's impossible

Steph's touch around the basket is one of life's greatest pleasures. So soft and pretty.

man steph is so routinely ridiculous, he has some of the best court vision of anyone i've ever watched

it was nice to see mccollum have a game, partic w/ all the injury issues for portland. he's been coming on some lately.

warriors are the most complete team in the last decade

the numbers support that

I am even more befuddled by the Zaza rampage than Shved

draymond has developed into a better shooter than he probably needs to be, I don't see why shooting problems would be a reason not to take a chance on a promising big man, but given that he's gotten pretty decent at it I guess it doesn't matter now

But he's not really a big man. He's a tweener forward and the track record for tweener forwards who can't shoot is poor.

Say tweener one more time

xp I got no idea what tweener means man

but in any case, draymond beat the odds then I guess, draymond is good

I should go to the Celtics/Heat game tonight, right?

always

But he's not really a big man. He's a tweener forward and the track record for tweener forwards who can't shoot is poor.

― Matt Armstrong, Wednesday, March 25, 2015 2:17 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark

i dunno i remember him being pretty skilled in college with a versatile college game that didn't just rely on a power game bullying college bigs who would never play in the nba. it wasn't a michael sweetney situation.

versatile offensive game*

dray is actually not that good of a shooter now fwiw

he's not a good shooter in a vacuum but considering what else he provides he's pretty dece

i could see there being a playoff game tho where they lose because dray shoots 1-8 on threes

http://bkref.com/tiny/rPZ4H

the increase in 3 percentage and true shooting from the beginning of his career to now are considerable for a dude who doesnt need to be a stellar shooter given his other skills

hes shooting 34% from 3 on what one would assume are all utterly wide open looks

considering who else defenses have to deal with on GS thats borderline dont even bother to guard him territory

theres really no way his defense isnt wildly overrated at this point too, i mean he fits perfectly into GS system seeing as he can switch a lot and guard multiple positions, he has bogut and great rotations behind him so he can afford to get under bigger players, but the dray green hype is wildly out of control rn, if you put him on a poor defensive team w a non rim protecting center i dont think he wld move the needle much

there are very few big men who routinely shoot contested three pointers, that's sort of the whole function of using a big to stretch the floor

will be v interesting to see what the warriors do if they face memphis considering hes undersized to guard either of their front court dudes and memphis is a good enough defensive team they cld prob force non splash bros to attempt shots theyre not used to making

yeah but his % is not very good on those shots is the whole point xp

i dunno man his one-on-one post defense is pretty awesome

like u cant stretch the floor if no one bothers to guard u

i think golden state is a bad match up for memphis

wld be an intersting battle of contrasting styles

i dunno man his one-on-one post defense is pretty awesome

― J0rdan S., Wednesday, March 25, 2015 11:11 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this is such a small part of D in todays nba, and i suspect a good bigger post player wld find ways to take advantage of him with playoff preperation

yeah it's not a huge thing but i dunno have you seen him guard dirk? he can't drive past him or post him up. i mean dirk is ancient so whatever but draymond's versatility seems pretty real to me.

like i think if he played one-on-one vs a lot of wings and bigs in the NBA they wouldn't be able to score

i mean dray is a cool player and all dont get me wrong, but hes just a role player who fits really well w the dubs line up and what they do and they are having a classic season mostly because of players better than him

Think the praise has to be at least somewhat warranted seeing as their defense didn't slip while Bogut was out.

yeah it's not a huge thing but i dunno have you seen him guard dirk? he can't drive past him or post him up. i mean dirk is ancient so whatever but draymond's versatility seems pretty real to me.

― J0rdan S., Wednesday, March 25, 2015 11:17 AM (56 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

its too bad this isnt the first round matchup, i mean obvs the mavs wld get destroyed but wld like to see dirk go at dray, one thing is the mavs havent been using dirk in the high post that much this year one wld assume to save his body for the playoffs, but if hes at all physically right and they just go to him at his elbow spot cant see how he doesnt just shoot over dray every time, granted if his mobility is bad and he cant really drive off the overplay that makes things a lil more difficult but still

Think the praise has to be at least somewhat warranted seeing as their defense didn't slip while Bogut was out.

― tsrobodo, Wednesday, March 25, 2015 11:18 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it slipped a lot!

Idunno heard Stein say different and I'm inclined to agree. they went 10 - 3 and gave up over 100 points in less than half those games

hey are having a classic season mostly because of players better than him

― lag∞n, Wednesday, March 25, 2015 11:18 AM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark

this is true offensively but not defensively

their defense was really good last year with a much lesser role for him

i mean bogut is the guy defensively

but also they just play really good team D

they were good but not the best

bogut is def the guy on D, but draymond is the klay to his steph

considering who else defenses have to deal with on GS thats borderline dont even bother to guard him territory

― lag∞n, Wednesday, March 25, 2015 11:04 AM (48 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

steph, klay, ___?

i mean he's not a first option but a floor-spacing big is rarely going to be the first option, kevin love style. and his shooting has improved over the course of the season, and there's no reason to think he can't work on it and be a good 3pt shooter

another interesting GSW storyline is how klay'so fallen off a cliff for the second straight spring

D12 returns tonight apparently

his shooting has improved over the course of the season

― k3vin k., Wednesday, March 25, 2015 11:58 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

its been fairly consistent fwiw

started out way hot then semi-slumped then back up to normal. He shoots just good enough to keep defenses honest. HIs best asset on offense is pushing the ball up.

re Draymond vs Dirk. he owned dirk so hard when they played last.
http://giant.gfycat.com/FrayedPoorGaur.gif
http://gifyu.com/images/DraymondDirk2.gif
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http://gifyu.com/images/DraymondDirk4.gif