nba playoffs aka the 'offs (which includes the 'ins) 2021

it's never a good sign when like the second quote from your subject appears 2500 words into the article

― J0rdan S., Friday, June 4, 2021 2:29 PM (forty-nine minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

wow, so this really starts with 4 paragraphs about the prehistory of earth doesn't it

Admittedly Bird was an amazing rebounder and hustle player and Doncic doesn’t have that xp

It’s like the opening screen of a video game in which you have to choose your character, each of whom comes with a different set of pros and cons. Do you want the tiny quicksilver thief (Kyrie Irving) or the burly crafty woodsman (James Harden) or the tall ethereal phantom (Kevin Durant)? Choose carefully — your survival depends on it. Somehow, Brooklyn figured out the cheat code that allows you to pick all three.

Every time Durant shoots, the neurons firing inside him are the same neurons that have been firing since he was a boy — and when they fire he can feel the past and present pulsing as one, the action on this court merging with every other court he’s ever played on, with every court out there in the world, on every continent and in every timeline, and the backspins on all the balls are rotating in perfect synchronicity, and when the shot finally drops through the hoop all the shots drop through together, the whole vast catalog of shots that he or any other player has ever taken and made, all the way back to the very first ball that ever thunked into the bottom of a peach basket. And still, Kevin Durant’s galaxy brain rises, out of the arena, to heights where whole cities overlap, whole cities and their teams, high enough that everything starts to make sense, all ideas start to cohere, and running on an N.B.A. court is just running up the old hill, and he is sprinting in an official game but also sprinting through drills, and he has been working for so many thousands of hours that soon Aunt Pearl will have to come over to the rec center and bring him a sandwich — and he is already very high but is determined to go higher, all the way to the origin of everything, the place where all points converge, and then if possible higher than that, up to wherever an asteroid comes from.

yes if only we could crack the code of how they pulled this off (trading all their dudes for harden and clearing a lot of cap space for kd and kyrie oh shit i solved it)

xp

certainly SOMEONE is already very high

makes me miss free darko

Luka is somehow a great shooter who sucks at free throws. I can understand why Lebron and Giannis aren't great at them but Luka really should shoot 80% there.

on the plus side i got a new dn there

the weird thing about Durant is he has the body type of a promising but skinny one and done rookie who will need to "grow into his body" but he just stayed the same and became dominant anyway

where does cp3 fit in the convo if the suns win this year? is he considered the second-best pure point behind magic?

― the mai tai quinn (voodoo chili), Friday, June 4, 2021 3:07 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

unless the suns miraculously win the title this year cp3 is destined to be underrated for reasons that have been well covered/litigated, but to me he’s clearly a top 20 player of all time (and third best PG after magic and steph), definitely not in the lebron echelon tho

that makes sense to me, clearly cp and his zero finals appearances are not in the lebron echelon

there’s not really a cumulative stat that’s accepted widely like WAR is in baseball, for several legitimate reasons, but for example paul is essentially tied for 9th in all time win shares on bkref. his combination of production and longevity are pretty rare. the playoff bad luck is what it is

unless the suns miraculously win the title this year cp3 is destined to be underrated for reasons that have been well covered/litigated, but to me he’s clearly a top 20 player of all time (and third best PG after magic and steph), definitely not in the lebron echelon tho

― k3vin k., Friday, June 4, 2021 3:02 PM (eleven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

this seems about right. a title or finals appearance would cement it.

i think his lack of mvps/individual dominance will keep him out of the top 20 all time imo

point guards are so hard to compare to other positions tho

surely his status as #1 Little Bastard will never be in jeopardy

i think his lack of mvps/individual dominance will keep him out of the top 20 all time imo

― class project pat (m bison), Friday, June 4, 2021 7:55 PM (eleven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

sigh I mean he could have won in 09 imo, he’s also been a clear top 5-7 player for a ton of seasons

thats legit nice but the nba is 4000 years old and he has to compete with like a lot of dudes who were also top 5-7 dudes for a long time

surely his status as #1 Little Bastard will never be in jeopardy

― Clay, Saturday, 5 June 2021

isiah thomas is also in that conversation

thats legit nice but the nba is 4000 years old and he has to compete with like a lot of dudes who were also top 5-7 dudes for a long time

― class project pat (m bison), Friday, June 4, 2021 8:14 PM (seventeen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I mean you can run the numbers a hundred different ways and he’s always up there. he’s 11th all time in seasons with PER>24, just to pick one. choose your metric and he’s a top 15 player, you just have to decide how much you want to dock him for the postseason stuff

would be pretty great if both the morris brothers get bounced from the offs in back to back days

both LA teams too

markieff had a pretty dirty hit on cameron johnson's head yesterday

clippers losing ground with luka on the bench is not what i would recommend for them

boban-zinger tallest twin towers ever?

they’ve got a couple inches on shaq/ilgauskas

Dikembe / Yao

oh yeah good call looks like they win by an inch

wowww at that Kawhi dunk

this series i feel like luka is playing amazing and everything else about it is whatever

was rooting for a game seven but maybe who cares idk

yeah i don't think i have that much affection for this series.

whatever happens looks like another playoff classic in the making for paul george.

playoff paul

he was good in the playoffs until he left the pacers haha

4q kennard sighting?

pg has played a lot better since he was called out here and elsewhere

he must lurk during games, good strategy tbh

Kawhi step backs are kinda new right? Don’t really remember him doing too much of that dance with the ball and step back thing before.

What happened to josh Richardson?

He was terrible in Philly last year. I was ambivalent about the trade for Seth Curry (defense), but Seth Curry's offensive game is so much more advanced than Richardson's. Richardson wasn't much of a ball handler, shot terribly, and his defense didn't make up for either, let alone both.

mavs absolutely must win game seven in order to preserve the all road series

game 7 is definitely a must-win

idk gonna wait and see what magic says

Will Luka get to the second round by eliminating Kawhi and the Clippers? Must-see TV tonight!

— Earvin Magic Johnson (@MagicJohnson) June 4, 2021

He was terrible in Philly last year. I was ambivalent about the trade for Seth Curry (defense), but Seth Curry's offensive game is so much more advanced than Richardson's. Richardson wasn't much of a ball handler, shot terribly, and his defense didn't make up for either, let alone both.

he had the ball in his hands a lot in miami and played a lot of minutes and has never seemed to be able to adjust to being more of a rotation player

lmao magic

wow look at how much thinner harden is here

I can’t wait for the reigniting of the Harden-Giannis rivalry. pic.twitter.com/Vr3QLuMBMJ

— Jac Manuell (@TheJManJBT) June 2, 2021

I’ve never understood why Seth Curry just goes from team to team making literally every open shot I ever see him take