The 2022 National Basketball Association (NBA) Playoffs Thread

he exposed chris paul for having a stylist lol

big game for the bucks here theyve been playing like butt and now middleton is injured

They should be fine this series so long as Jrue plays like he did in the regular season

just winning the series isnt enough at some point they need to play good

They played pretty well during a bunch of their marquee matchups vs. other good East teams but yeah they haven’t put together like, 2 weeks of good basketball

i would love to see the rip through be eliminated from the NBA…

the john collins beer can three point celebration was amazing

heat on a 20-0 run, maybe they best stretch i’ve seen them play all year. playing insane defense.

PJ Tucker is lockdown on the perimeter 🔒

MIA 68 | ATL 68
All tied up in Q3#NBAPlayoffs presented by Google Pixel on ESPN pic.twitter.com/XcjZoQEHOU

— NBA (@NBA) April 23, 2022

Giannis only has 10 and the Bucks are winning by 19, looks like they figured something out

they seem to be a bit better defensively without Middleton out there

real nice win by the hawks crazy finish playoff basketball baby

heat had trae locked up until they didnt

that looked like it was going to be warriors-nuggets game 3 but it was actually nets-celtics game 1 which is a game that is one shot short of a sixers-raptors game 3

lmao Thanasis just dunked on them, this is going baaaad

feels like a “took that personally” meme situation in chicago

whats jaxon hayes doing here

he’s gotta be ejected right

i’m cracking up at the ref being 1 foot away and not calling anything

a technical on crowder lmao. gotta love it

nba officiating at its best!

did they just say they want jaxson hayes to be their pascal siakam? lol

lol what does that even mean?

hate how national broadcasters always give absurd compliments to random players

uhh they learned everybody's name of course they're gonna show it off

can jaxson hayes even dribble?

1) i want jaxon hayes to be like the 40th best player in the nba?
2) i want jaxon hayes to develop a killer spin move?
3) i want a version of jaxon hayes that does not assault the police?

Suns playing some crazy defense right now

aytons got 21 points thats a lot

lol

Caught up with a limping Kyle Lowry on his way out of the arena. He said his left hamstring issue has him, "pissed the f--- off," and he plans round-the-clock treatment heading into Sunday's Game 4. When I asked if he could miss time he said, "No, I'm Wolverine," with a grin.

— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) April 23, 2022

are the Pels really gonna do this again

it appears the answer is no

chris paul pretty good imo

CP went into god mode again. insane that a little 6' bastard can get his shot in the paint any time he wants everyone knows what hes gonna do and yet.

really impressed w herb jones

Paul with 28 assists and no turnovers over the last two games???

idk how he does it kudos to him tho

really impressed w herb jones

― jammin on the dud (Spottie), Saturday, April 23, 2022 1:56 AM (six hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

best rookie defender since duncan some are saying

*he is 23 years old

seems like were finally seeing what the achilles injury took from kd, he doesnt do that much besides pull up from the elbow anymore, his mobility explosiveness etc just arent what they used to be and no one noticed cause he was papering over it with insane skill and bbiq, but now with the celtics selling out on him every play its starting to show, guess well see what he has tonight, everyone calling him the best player in the league already starting to rethink things

otm, when his jumper hits he still looks otherworldly but its pretty striking how rarely he’s just taken it to the cup in these first two games. give C’s d some credit for that too

you can tell the way theyre defending him theyre not that worried about him getting to the rim theyre getting up on him with a kind quasi double team with guy in his driving lanes waiting to make the late contest but not really any rim protection so if he had the ability to beat that admittedly tough set up open layups would be there for him but he has just not done that at all

also been showing what an imperfect fit kd and kyrie are theyre so similar besides kds height they dont have any have plus physical attributes theyre both weak and skinny with average motors

i do think with simmons and some moves the nets could still have something next year, tho counting on kyrie simmons and kd to be present healthy and engaged has got to be a way under 50% proposition

I’d be interested to see the data on Kd drives per game over the years cos to my eye this is just who he’s always been. His preference has always been to pull up at his spots.

i mean yeah but not like this think he has one dunk in two games

He seems a little off physically

he is old and tired, lotta miles on those legs

i think on zach lowe’s podcast from yesterday he said KD had 6 drives in game 2 which was one of his lowest numbers of the season & i’d bet if you looked at the other games it would be almost all games vs bad teams where he generally wasn’t trying

Kevin Pelton has an article about this very thing today, though it doesn’t address the proposition that it is Durant‘s own passivity/limitation/decision-making that are keeping him out of the paint, rather than Celtics D

According to Second Spectrum tracking analysis, an average shooter would be expected to post a 36.5% effective field-goal percentage (eFG%) on Durant's attempts through the first two games, based on the location and type of shots and the distance of nearby defenders. That's the lowest quantified shot quality (qSQ) for any player in the postseason.

In part, Boston has done this by keeping Durant away from the basket. During the regular season, 36.5% of his shot attempts were scored as coming within the paint according to NBA Advanced Stats. Just five of his 41 attempts in the first two games (12%) have come from the paint as the Celtics have done a terrific job of showing help on Durant during the rare occasions where he has gotten an edge on his defensive matchup.

Of course, Durant has been known to feast on difficult shots. His qSQ was second-lowest in last year's playoffs, ahead of only Julius Randle, which didn't stop Durant from posting a 57% eFG when factoring 3s as 1.5 field goals to account for their added value. Durant isn't an average shooter, after all.

Second Spectrum's quantified shooter impact (qSI) metric measures how a player performs relative to the difficulty of their shots for an average player. Among everyone with at least 100 shot attempts in the 2021 playoffs, Durant's 14.8 qSI ranked second behind Seth Curry. They flip-flopped places during the 2021-22 regular season, with Durant (13.7) edging out his new teammate Curry. That's dropped to a -2.3 qSI in the first two games of the series, which ranks 37th of 55 players who have taken at least 25 shots.

To some extent, that's an indication that Durant will shoot better going forward. However, it's likely also a testament to Boston making those shots even more difficult than they look in the tracking data

yeah its a combo of the two imo saw a clip where the celtics chipped him three time on a play where he was just trying to set a pick