2021-22 NBA "REGULAR" SEASON THREAD

i think of dirk too but the cuban mavs are sort of their own beast

(don't really fit the paradigm of either a consistently well- or poorly-run org)

i think you could broadly draw a dividing like between guys like giannis, dame, and ja who were underdogs/unknowns/small school players for most of their lives/careers up until being lottery picks and prob still felt doubted well into their times in the NBA and guys like zion and anthony davis who were top 5 recruits and the best players on the most storied college teams and were mega hyped as no 1 overall picks before they even stepped into the league. the loyalty shown to the franchises that believed in the first group vs the loyalty shown to the pelicans by the second group is pretty stark and if you wanted to draw conclusions about the individuals involved based on that you probably wouldn't be crazy.

but the bucks, blazers and grizzlies were all committed to some sort of longterm vision of building around those players in a coherent, measured fashion. across multiple front offices, the pelicans have, via ownership directive, made tons of irrational and shortsighted moves in a misguided effort to "win immediately" and have given off a general air of incoherence and incompetence. i mean, the stuff david griffin has done since drafting zion has followed no logic, he traded jrue for assets but now basically has no young players left on the team while still being bad, he's hired 3 different coaches. to me the overarching dominant factor beyond any notion of individual loyalty is franchise incompetence coming from the ownership level which causes the GMs to do stupid shit from jump street and for the stars to be like, why would i have any trust in this franchise to put me in a position to succeed

yeah, there's a lot of narratives stacked on top of each other here. Like Zion, Brow was crazily hyped and preordained for stardom. But he did still give the Pels 7 years, and if they had actually put a team together around him, we might think of him in the Dame/Giannis group. Otoh I just looked it up and they did go to the second round the year immediately prior to the trade request or whatever it was, not that their ceiling was any higher than that

yah good points jordan. we can add jokic and maybe even steph to that group.

lagoon is such a hater, jj’s apartment is really nice!!

imo zion will never be a positive player on a winning team, this was forseeable, and the pels shouldnt have drafted him.

i also think the brow/zion comparisons are weird. brow was there for a long time, aside from injury very high level play, multiple all star appearances, got them to the playoff etc

zion has played like what 35 games or something?

i dont think thats fair to zion. he played 61 games (out of, what, 72?) last year and averaged 27 ppg

zion played 61 games last year scored 27 points a game on 60% shooting and lead the league in paint points, he was 20 years old, all things considered prob one of the most talented players to ever set foot in the nba, as to whether he can stay health and keep his head screwed on who knows

lol xp

i think you could broadly draw a dividing like between guys like giannis, dame, and ja who were underdogs/unknowns/small school players for most of their lives/careers up until being lottery picks and prob still felt doubted well into their times in the NBA

yeah this probably matters a lot because I see this sort of thing a lot in real life, for a lot of people the mentality you develop at 15-19 sticks with you. like Giannis was absolutely not a sure thing, he had a ton of holes in his game and was so physically odd, I remember when he ran during his rookie year he always looked like he was gonna fall over. a lot of Bucks twitter thought they should've drafted Shane Larkin instead. of course after a couple months he was the consensus best guy in the draft but still, what are the odds he would turn into the guy he is today? 1 in 400? idk. Zion otoh was absolutely one of those "dude will dominate unless he gets hurt" guys, maybe the surest thing since LeBron

really hope zion gets it together the nba needs him

I’m skeptical that much of this Zion stuff has to do with playing in New Orleans or the pelicans organization per se.

only one way to find out (zion to boston)

New York City has a plan to phase out the vaccine mandate in the coming weeks, Mayor Eric Adams says, at which point Brooklyn Nets star Kyrie Irving would be cleared for home games.

Spokesperson adds that current rules remain in place.

— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) February 23, 2022

nets fortunes about to change drastically. theyll get kd back soon, ben will be activate and kyrie 'unshackled'

yeah they have a window now well see if they can uh open it

i really don’t think they have a chance to win the title this year

yeah seems pretty unlikely tho im not ready to totally count them out

i’m still allowing for the fact that KD looked like the best player in the league in the playoffs last year & nearly dragged a broken down team to the finals. but i think their supporting cast is worse than last year, their road will be tougher, and between injuries and kyrie vax business they’ll have a team that will basically have played what like 10 games together before the end of the playoffs? and that doesn’t even get into the particulars of simmons situation wrt the playoffs. it doesn’t seem realistic to me

er, end of the season

yeah all reasonable and theres not even any guarantee they get all their guys back, but on the other hand they could still make some noise, take a series from pretty much anyone

btw saw a headline that simmons is planning on being back in some number of weeks? whats the hold up here he got his trade

wld be cool if he got hugely fat

idk if this was just speculation or actual leaked info but ppl have been saying they weren't gonna play him until KD was back at the earliest

dont want to have him out there having to score points i guess lol my lord

wouldnt want to put the pressure on him to put the ball through the hoop ring or anything like that.

Can’t sit him in crunch time if there’s no one else to play.

i cant really see the nets doing it either but no one looks unstoppable in the east this season so really woudlnt be surprising if they got to the ECF. altho they need to get going quick and get out of the play-in mess.

btw saw a headline that simmons is planning on being back in some number of weeks? whats the hold up here he got his trade

― lag∞n, Wednesday, February 23, 2022 3:23 PM (thirty minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

speculation that makes sense to me is that immediately playing for a different team hurts his chances to get his withheld pay from the sixers

nurkic now out for at least a month with plantar fascitis so the tank is most definitely on out there. i cant see dame coming back this season now. door is open for the spurs/pels/kings...

Why not two and let's sit the lakers
iwant2believe.gif

ESPN Sources: The New York Knicks and guard Kemba Walker have agreed that the four-time All-Star will be sidelined for the remainder of the team’s season. Story: https://t.co/P98Qf8uJB6

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) February 23, 2022

why not just release him? sheesh hes only 31

what in the fuck. is he a stroke risk or something? why would you broadcast to the league that you are a team that would treat an immensely lovable team player this way? Fucking knicks man

this knicks season is really something

i guess from the knicks POV they have guys like quickley, grimes and reddish who need minutes, but i feel like kemba could still find some time in there somewhere. i thought they were still trying for the playoffs. i mean, they're certainly not tanking. idk, something is not clicking there organizationally. they could buy him out but i assume they want to keep his contract around as an expiring for the offseason to fit into a trade if they need it & then if he's still on the roster at the beginning of next season they'll revisit a buyout. but if i'm kemba i'd rather be playing, idk. seems more useful than "working out" for next season

i know it goes against narrative but i’m just going to note that three teams in the past year have had a chance to play kemba and they’ve all been like “yeah we’re set”

yeah hes not good any more is the saddest part.

he's sporadically good, like i feel like he could be good energy off the bench when you need to shake things up but i guess he'd feel like that was a step down? idk

Sources: Jamal Murray is set to return in the month of March. The team wants Murray to feel comfortable in not rushing the return but the medical staff is ready to clear him in this time table pic.twitter.com/kpkLuWE2UT

— Jack Settleman (@jacksettleman) February 23, 2022

these playoffs could get interesting with all these guys coming back or possibly coming back or joining a new team. the nets, clippers, nuggets, lakers(?), bulls, bucks, 76ers, dubs, etc.

maybe someone will surprise us but i still wonder how far you can really go if you're having key players getting less than 20 games in before the playoffs. i'd prob put the bucks, dubs, and bulls in a different category of that group bcuz they've had their teams together for some part this season before injuries, but the group of nets, clippers, nuggets, 76ers who are either hoping to bring guys back from major injuries after a year of not playing or trying to frankenstein new teams together in 1.5 months before jumping into the playoffs... maybe i'm being too rigid but it just seems like a really tall task to expect any of those teams to make the conference finals. some will prob win their first round series and then who knows, maybe the match ups fall right or there's more injuries... the 76ers in particular will have immediately big expectations. it will certainly make the playoffs more interesting but the clock is ticking, i just don't know if you can jump into playoff basketball with so few games under your belt from either a health or fit perspective

yeah. i don't feel like you just go from major injury to deep playoff run without getting a full season under your belt.

Idk the Nets looked pretty good in the playoffs last year despite not playing much in the regular season

east was a little weaker last year, they’re gonna be like the 6-8 seed this year, they’re gonna be fitting Ben frickin Simmons in, bench is weird, idk there’s a lot working against them (they have kd so they could make it happen of course)

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/02/unfortunately-its-time-to-let-kyrie-irving-play-in-nyc.html

ben simmons should fit in pretty easily. kyrie and durant are an established partnership and he fills a position of need next to them.

id be more worried about the harden and embiid pairing - theyre ball dominant stars expecting to win the east without a good supporting cast. and they are both very petty

I'm sorry I cannot just drop it and not for the foreseeable future. pic.twitter.com/MOB2R4Pe14

— Spike Eskin (@SpikeEskin) February 24, 2022

sixers fans need to get over it