The 2022 National Basketball Association (NBA) Playoffs Thread

rip sixers rough break

76ers are listing All-Star Joel Embiid as out for Game 3 vs. Heat on Friday.

— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) May 5, 2022

Looks like Miami’s gonna get an easy road to the ecf. Usually a good sign for making it to the finals

apparently they're still leaving the door open for embiid to play tomorrow. i think he's gonna play bcuz the series is prob over if he doesn't

apparently he wasn’t even able to look at his phone until yesterday? seems like a lot to do to clear the protocol in time.

That’s horrible

But he's annoying so it's cool.

They can’t list him as anything other than out until he clears the concussion protocol. I can’t tell you whether he will or won’t with certainty, but listing him “out” right now does not necessarily mean he doesn’t play, it means he hasn’t cleared it *yet* https://t.co/f9J5uxA7SC

— Kyle Neubeck (@KyleNeubeck) May 5, 2022

feel like they should have somehow scheduled a lakers game tonight — i miss watching them lose

some no games night content...

just for fun i've been keeping a (subjective) tally of the best player in every game in the playoffs. i haven't seen every game so some of these are based off tweets/box scores, but i've seen some of most of them. in some cases (one major case) i made a judgement call or there really wasn't a great choice, it's also prob weighted a bit towards offensive and box score contributions. but i feel like this more or less maps across how the playoffs have felt. this is what i have so far

5

Giannis Antetokounmpo (r1 g1, r1 g3, r1 g4, r1 g5, r2 g1)
Chris Paul (r1 g1, r1 g3, r1 g5, r1 g6, r2 g2)

4

Ja Morant (r1 g2, r1 g3, r1 g6, r2 g2)

3

Jimmy Butler (r1 g1, r1 g2, r1 g4)
Luka Doncic (r1 g4, r1 g5, r1 g6)
Joel Embiid (r1 g2, r1 g3, r1 g6)
Jordan Poole (r1 g1, r1 g2, r2 g1)
Jayson Tatum (r1 g2, r1 g3, r1 g4)

2

Bam Adebayo (r2 g1, r2 g2)
Jalen Brunson (r1 g2, r1 g3)
Brandon Ingram (r1 g2, r1 g4)
Nikola Jokic (r1 g3, r1 g4)
Pascal Siakam (r1 g4, r1 g5)

1

Bojan Bogdanovic (r1 g1)
Devin Booker (r2 g1)
Jaylen Brown (r2 g2)
Steph Curry (r1 g5)
DeMar DeRozan (r1 g2)
Anthony Edwards (r1 g1)
De'Andre Hunter (r1 g5)
Kyrie Irving (r1 g1)
Jarren Jackson Jr. (r1 g6)
Tyrese Maxey (r1 g1)
Karl-Anthony Towns (r1 g4)
Trae Young (r1 g3)

no games tonight? what the fuck

salute to jordan for that research. you could probably do something similar with game scores or something

was kyrie the only one to win best player in a losing game?

jokic game 3 too

luka shd prob get the nod for the last two games tbf

can you imagine if he and cp3 switched places haha

if jordan poole had to play without steph

Luka has the highest playoff average of all time (until he scores less than 33.5). He was better than Book G1 of this series I'd think, Book's shot wasn't really falling

luka obvs just generally the best player in the series, he is trying to do too much but also his team isnt that good

cp3 on the other hand can rest up for the 4th and bust tired guys asses, its a good system

reflecting upon its actually a great system that gives the suns a pretty big advantage towards winning the chip

Lukas stats are better but he’s not better than Booker imo. He’s got the harden problem where he’s not willing to do anything off ball and then sucks at defense.

cmon be serious luka is much better than book its not close

he has some bad habits for sure, which i suspect could be reduced by having better teammates, but regardless hes still one of the absolutely best players in the world

So is book. I’d probably have them on a similar tier atm. Can luka play a winning style (deep into the playoffs)? Yet to be seen.

i think if you put luka in books place on the suns theyd sweep the playoffs

book is very good but hes not an mvp level guy

i think if you put luka in books place on the suns theyd sweep the playoffs

book is very good but hes not an mvp level guy

he might get a few votes cause the suns are so good

Being the best player on the best team means something

Hardens gonna make $47.3 million next year lmao

You could argue book would be putting up similar numbers to luka if you put the ball in his hands for 80% of the game.
― he was eating Vaseline like it was bunch of cheeseburgers (Spottie), Thursday, May 5, 2022 11:14 PM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

naw he doesnt have the playmaking chops or physicality to do what luka does, luka is basically unstoppable

Being the best player on the best team means something

― he was eating Vaseline like it was bunch of cheeseburgers (Spottie), Thursday, May 5, 2022 11:18 PM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

i dont think so

was kyrie the only one to win best player in a losing game?

Suns were repeatedly hunting Luka on D last game

yes, because he has a uniquely high offensive load and it benefits the suns to wear him down. it doesnt really say much about how he compares to booker.

It’s unclear to me that Booker is more valuable to the Suns than Ayton

haha

we are so close to having the "does MVP mean the most important player to their team or the best player overall?" debate I can feel it

naw

word on the street is embiid won tho, which is fine

he is certainly one of the best players, its just unfortunate he will not get a chance to be sonned by al horford again this year

^ this

cleared protocols

The 76ers say Joel Embiid has cleared concussion protocol, and participated in shootaround. He remains out for the game, but his status could change between now and tonight’s game.

— Tim Bontemps (@TimBontemps) May 6, 2022

he's going to play

he was always going to play

embiid beat the joker? I was not expecting that at all

??? Where are you seeing that

there was a tweet by a sportswriter saying that a bunch of nba bigwigs were gonna be at game 3 in philly, speculating that the award will be given then, obvs not definitive, just "the word on the street" (guy on twitter)

He deleted the tweet