It is the years 2018-19 in the National Basketball Association (NBA) - The Regular Season

#ballislife
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-nba-honeymooners-13-games-in-13-nights-in-13-cities-11547652076

i'm still willing to suspend judgement on the trae/luka trade until we see who the hawks get w/ the mavs pick but it won't be very high so odds are that won't end up looking great for them. if they nail their own pick this year tho it may end up turning out ok

i do think trae young's size kinda caps his ceiling tho and you prob want more from a player you gave up luka for

found a good graphic to get everyone psyched up for basketball

https://i.imgur.com/vz9GkuK.jpg

what does cp3 part 2 mean?

https://fansided.com/2017/08/23/hawks-chris-paul-draft-marvin-williams-butterfly-effect/

ugh I wish paul had been drafted into the east

#ballislife
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-nba-honeymooners-13-games-in-13-nights-in-13-cities-11547652076

― marcos smart (Spottie), Wednesday, January 16, 2019 12:07 PM (forty-six minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i really want to read this, can any wsj fans c&p?

Yuki and Yumea Nakagawa were married a few months ago at their local city office in Japan and waited until last week before embarking on their honeymoon. They flew to Phoenix from Tokyo for the first leg of their adventure. They were not there for long. The Nakagawas were on the road again the next day, and the day after that, and the day after that for a series of experiences they can’t get back home.

The newlyweds are honeymooning with an attempt to attend 13 NBA games on 13 straight nights in 13 different cities.

They’re going from Phoenix to Salt Lake City to Denver to Washington to Miami to New York to Brooklyn to Philadelphia to Boston to Charlotte to Orlando to Atlanta to Minnesota before they finally head back to Tokyo next week. They know how this sounds.

“Many people think we are crazy,” Yuki said.

But there was no way the Nakawagas from Yokohama were sitting on a beach for two weeks feeding each other chocolate strawberries. Yuki, a 35-year-old surgeon, had the idea as soon as his boss gave him two weeks of vacation, and he began pitching his wife on a trip that could have very well ended their blessed marriage as soon as it began: the NBA honeymoon.

“We have 14 days,” he said. “We can watch 13 games max.”

Yumea, a 33-year-old secretary, did not take much selling. And so they began plotting an itinerary that’s exhausting just to look at. There are few things NBA teams dread more than playing a back-to-back. The Nakagawas are celebrating with a back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back. Their schedule is reprinted on the enormous sign they bring to every game.

“NBA from Japan,” their poster says. “We are Honeymoon!!!”

There have always been fans who make pilgrimages to the holiest sites on their sports bucket lists. But this extreme version of sports tourism has nothing in common with a trip to Lambeau Field or Fenway Park—or a typical romantic getaway. Other honeymoons have massages and unlimited pina coladas. The NBA honeymoon has flights at the crack of dawn to watch the Orlando Magic. What the Nakagawas are doing is like climbing Mount Everest in a T-shirt. It’s tiring, often freezing, occasionally maddening, wildly ambitious, slightly insane and incredibly rewarding.

It helps that they already had some experience with whirlwind NBA escapades. Yuki, who fell in love with basketball watching Steve Nash, is such a basketball junkie that he’s been everywhere from Los Angeles and Oakland to Oklahoma City and Cleveland for games. But when he got two weeks off for a honeymoon, he wanted to take advantage and travel the East Coast, even if it happened to be the dead of winter.

His wife was game. Yumea went with her husband to Memphis last year to see the Japanese rookie Yuta Watanabe in a preseason exhibition. They were in the air longer than they were on the ground. The Nakagawas turned around the next morning so Yuki could make it back for his shift at the hospital. But not even flying around the world for a preseason game could have prepared Yumea for their honeymoon.

“She liked basketball, but she didn’t know the NBA,” Yuki said with Yumea sitting beside him. “Now she knows a lot about the NBA.”

It took months of meticulous planning to get to 13 games in 13 cities in 13 days. They were married the week after the NBA schedule was released in August. They started mapping out the perfect honeymoon almost immediately.

Their starting point was Memphis at Miami last Friday to catch Dwyane Wade before he retires. They splurged on courtside tickets—Yuki buys on the day of the game to snag good seats for cheap prices—and they even managed to get a selfie with Wade himself. They couldn’t have been happier. Yuki and Yumea are very into selfies.

But their marriage was tested early the next morning when the boarding gate for their 7 a.m. flight to New York closed in their faces. They spent the entire day tanning in the fluorescent lights of the Miami airport instead of watching the Knicks play the Sixers. They landed at 1 a.m. at John F. Kennedy International Airport. Their bags landed at LaGuardia Airport. The only silver lining to their misery: At least they didn’t have to see the Knicks.

They went back to the airport the next day—they have become connoisseurs of American airports—to fetch their luggage and finally made it to Madison Square Garden about 24 hours behind schedule. They posed with their sign and promised they would come back soon. But first they had another game to get to.

The Nakagawas took the subway to Brooklyn and shared a bowl of pre-game ramen near the Barclays Center. They apologized between slurps of noodles for not being hungry. It turned out they had lunch at Keens, the iconic, old-school steakhouse in Manhattan, and they were still feeling the effects of all that meat.

Yuki and Yumea walked over to the arena. She wore a knit dress. He wore a towel on his head. “It is striking,” Yuki said. That was the point. He was hoping that wearing a towel around his head would be enough to get them on the Jumbotron.

But it’s hard to miss the newlyweds at games. They’re the ones with the humongous sign saying they’re honeymooners from Japan. When he spotted them in Washington, Milwaukee Bucks center Brook Lopez greeted them with a hearty “Konnichiwa.” NBA players have a reason to be ecstatic when they see a man with a towel around his head: The home team has now won all seven games the Nakagawas have attended.

By the time they left the game in Brooklyn that night, they were already thinking about the next stops on their itinerary. There was Philadelphia on Tuesday, Boston on Wednesday and Charlotte on Thursday, when the Nakagawas are hoping to bump into Michael Jordan. The lovebirds are closing their honeymoon on Sunday night in a steamy way: Timberwolves vs. Suns in Minneapolis. The high temperature is projected to be 10 degrees.

Their flight home leaves on Monday and lands on Tuesday afternoon. Yumea is planning to sleep. Yuki says he’s going straight to work in the emergency room. “No problem,” he said.

They won’t have time for another NBA trip anytime soon. Yuki has to settle for something closer to home instead: He’s going to Tokyo next week to watch the sumo wrestling.

The interesting thing for the hawks will be what they do with Desmond/Lin/Bazemore. They’re all having great seasons and could really help some contenders. It’s yet to be seen if the hawk’s front office can handle a situation like that.

xp thanks dude!

YOUR NON-LUKA ROOKIE COULD NEVER.

ALSO, ALEX LEN, PLEASE. pic.twitter.com/eCK4BpAuJx

— Nekias Duncan (@NekiasNBA) January 16, 2019

len did have some real nice ones last night tho. that was not one of them

trae has this weird dribble, like he's dribbling too high or something, gives him a really wild, uncontrolled (but not actually uncontrolled) look out there that is fun to watch

high dribble if u can control it cld be a good way to get defenders to reach

like if u use tactically one high dribble that makes defenders think youre vulnerable.........but really youre not

cp the master of the high dribble. i was always taught dribble low stay low cos you can make quicker moves that way but saw a clip of CP telling kids how to dribble and he said dribble high and hard... I believe CP.

feel like low is fundamentally sound but high def opens up some other possibilities

len did have some real nice ones last night tho. that was not one of them

― suggest boban (Will M.), Wednesday, January 16, 2019 12:13 PM (thirteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Len is really the ultimate tease. will drop like 25-12 with some blocks then just disappear for a couple weeks.

cp3 is v short for NBA, so even his high dribble still not likely to get swiped. idk how you can dribble high in traffic tho no matter how short you are.

mad skills

gordon hayward does not look comfortable at all on offense

harden has 41 with 7 minutes to go

rox need like 4 more 3 pt attempts to break the all time 3pa record for a game

tense atmosphere in the garden tonight

yeah feels like its dead silent until a shot goes up on either side

lmao harden just hit two more. 59 three point attempts now. record is 61

62

that is some serious hoisting

and they just broke the record for combined three point attempts. was 94 and they just did 95

gerald green fg 5/14, 3-pt fg 5/14

hahha

kawhi looks like the best player in the nba tonight

this game is good. cant belive kyrie missed that layup tho

wow the nets came back and tied it going to overtime.

dinwiddie hit three threes in a row

kyrie made up for missing that layup by making two much harder shots in the next two possessions

KYRIEEEEE

sweet Harden can post up an even more ridiculous stat line

(his +/- is -5 right now)

if anyone is wondering why i'm out on all kyrie criticism, that's fucking why

dude just took over the final few minutes here

that went from being a bad loss for the celtics to a bad loss for the raptors

there was a long discussion on the recent bill simmons zach lowe podcast in which bill was criticizing kyrie for not doing what he just did (taking over a game in peril)

iirc the criticism has been more about his not setting the tone in big games, he concedes that he is a killer late

bill was holding kyrie to a weird standard (not really a surprise); kyrie has been unassailable this season.

harden was ice cold from 3 for most of this game... 5 of 19 now but he was 3 of 15 a minute ago. 11 of 15 from 2 tho

he was holding him to harden's standard which is not realistic for anyone including james harden (probably) xp

but i think also on that podcast they talked about how kyrie has more value in the playoffs than the regular season because he's so good at finishing without relying on foul calls, as compared to harden (which i agree with)

dinwiddie for mvp

yeah that seems right, like picking a random game such as a tough road game in miami and saying the guy didn't show up sufficiently for that game isn't really a "standard"...idk i've watched a lot of kyrie and it seems like he's doing everything he possibly can to play winning basketball this season.

yeah I don't really follow what he's going for, it's very vague. thought his take on kyrie's "leadership" was reasonable tho

xp cad