2022/23 NBA REGULAR SEASON THREAD "TANKING FOR WEMBANYAMA"

this right here says that the new york knicks don't have any of the nba's 50 best players. there must be some mistake!!

it was only like 14 hours ago that i watched him do things to jrue holiday that nobody does but it feels like brunson should be in the top 50

my feeling on tatum is that hes the most complete player in the league he can really do everything on both sides of the ball but that hes not as offensively dominant as the guys in front of him and ultimately having a guy who can single handedly shred the opposing defense to the point that it breaks down is just more valuable, however! you have to be able to do it in the playoffs too which everyone on that list has at times had trouble with so idk, i think id prob take tatum over embiid and durant in a playoff series and steph im kind of suspicious of just cause of his age and injury history

and yeah if were talking about a multi year stretch tatum would be higher cause hes still only 19

re: brunson, he prob has a better case for the top 50 than some of the second and third bananas listed ahead of him

if he's your number one guy, it's not ideal, but he's better-suited to be a number one guy than say jerami grant or mikal bridges

lamelo behind a bunch of role players is insane does the ringer even watch ball

trae young down below guys like sabonis and brandon ingram now

― J0rdan S., Tuesday, January 10, 2023 1:19 PM (seven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

sabonis definitely having a more impactful season than trae currently, insofar as they're at all comparable

ingram though, lol

yeah i don't necessarily disagree, it's been a bad year for trae. just interesting to track

it’s just the average of the votes of four dudes so saying whether one guy is 6 or 7th is kind of splitting hairs, tho I do agree I’d take tatum over embiid for sure, but the pyramid gets pretty steep after that and it’d be tough to make a convincing argument for him over any of the top 5. if we’re doing the choosing a franchise player for the next 5 years thing then probably only giannis jokic and luka are ahead of him (among the guys ranked ahead of him on this list, who knows what ja or zion or wemby will look like in a couple of years)

well, i might disagree. but it's not surprising. KAT is down even further. i believe when espn did their rankings preseason both trae and KAT were in the top 15 (ahead of jimmy butler,,. you may be sensing a theme) xp

lamelo behind a bunch of role players is insane does the ringer even watch ball

― lag∞n, Tuesday, January 10, 2023 1:29 PM (seven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

in their defense, the criteria is "a year-round, around-the-clock ranking of the players making the biggest impact on the league right now," and he's been hurt. so maybe he will rise as he plays more?

lol that sentence is ludicrous the ringer is an embarrassment truly

it’d be tough to make a convincing argument for him over any of the top 5

it would be pretty easy to make a case for tatum over KD or jokic, personally. he just destroyed KD in a playoff series 6 months ago and i'd rather have the superstar wing over the superstar big every time. i would point to team playoff success here, when comparing tatum and jokic. i think you could also make a pretty easy argument for tatum over luka! a verified two way superstar SF is just the most valuable thing you can have and i think sometimes that gets downplayed in these discussions

but this playoffs will tell us a lot. the expectations should be sky high for tatum, jokic, and embiid. assuming normal health around them tehy can't ask for anything more in terms of showcasing their abilities to carry a team to a title. giannis, KD, and luka are in slightly different situations w/ less than ideal rosters, to differing extents, compared to boston, denver, and philly. not sure there is anything to say about steph at this point, it's more of a macro historical convo w/ him

one thing about tatums defense in the context of the celtics is their top eight are all plus defenders which is pretty cool come playoff time since theres not really a weak link to hunt you have to settle for size mismatches

that's true. on the other hand, based on what we saw in the playoffs, if he and KD had played one on one i'm not sure KD would've been able to score. but maybe there's something about stamina and how much energy tatum has to burn over the course of a season or a game that allows him to play that level of defense for longer in a playoff game

its because hes 19

in all seriousness tatum played way too many minutes last season and was injured and exhausted by the playoffs, brown too, and theyre doing it again this year yay

lamelo behind a bunch of role players is insane does the ringer even watch ball

― lag∞n, Tuesday, January 10, 2023 11:29 AM (twenty-seven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

lamelo might be the worst defender in the league, next to trae

this list just solidifies that the tier system is a much better way to look at this stuff

in all seriousness tatum played way too many minutes last season and was injured and exhausted by the playoffs, brown too, and theyre doing it again this year yay

― lag∞n, Tuesday, January 10, 2023 1:57 PM (forty-four seconds ago)

yeah tatum definitely seemed gassed by the end of the finals, i feel like maybe he admitted as much. the one thing about that tho is the way the seedings fell gave them as exhausting a second round series as you could possibly have. the heat by contrast barely needed to try in the first two rounds. even if we think the east is really strong again this year it should *probably* be easier on the celtics this time around assuming milwaukee can stay inside the top 3

just based on the way they’re playing now it seems like durant is having a slightly better year (he’s playing great defense this year too), though tatum is more durable and I definitely take the point that last years series can’t be forgotten. they’re close for sure

I know I’m a homer but to me comparing tatum favorably to jokic in terms of body of work is just silly and premature. the on/off stuff speaks for itself and in terms of team success a lot of that is as the term implies dependent on the rest of one’s team, jokic dragging a boobie gibson ass roster to 48 wins in the west last year was a miracle and while this is not necessarily a knock on tatum I’d be very interested to see how the celtics fared over the course of a whole season with brown and whoever their third best player is not playing. but ultimately we are talking about two great players and as we both know our perceptions of great players tends to depend heavily on team success, which is why we can settle this when the nuggets and celtics meet in the finals later this year :)

this list just solidifies that the tier system is a much better way to look at this stuff

― im a beacon of light (Spottie), Tuesday, January 10, 2023 2:01 PM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

tru

lamelo might be the worst defender in the league, next to trae

― im a beacon of light (Spottie), Tuesday, January 10, 2023 2:00 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

it doesnt matter rn tho he needs to be higher hes too good

i'm giving everyone a pass on their lamelo takes this year bcuz that situation is so fucked up i'm not sure how you're supposed to measure him as a player, plus he's been hurt. it feels like one of those things where ppl overhype a player early off potential and then are overly down on him when his trajectory isn't a rocket ship to the moon before coming back around when the situation gets better and he's matured as a player. feels kinda like what happened w/ shai the last few years. the idea of thinking of sports thru the lens of ranking players every day of the year is a relatively new (and probably bad) content farm era of culture way of looking at things

otm

the idea of thinking of sports thru the lens of ranking players every day of the year

"round the clock" even. ridiculous

i will say that i have liked some stuff i read by michael pina, who accounts for 25% of those rankings i guess

i'm totally cool w/ the idea that jokic is the most valuable regular season player in the NBA. if that's the parameters of the discussion i don't really have much ammo or even reason to dispute that, it's a completely legitimate POV. he is the better player than tatum thru that lens. it's when we start to talk about the parts after the regular season that i have to get off the bus. which is why i'm so excited for the playoffs this year

the cool thing about jokic is his game gets even better in the playoffs.

lemme close this tab before i lose a whole work day.....

the thing you worry about with jokic in the playoffs is holding up on defense but hes done it before he has a great playoff run under his belt already so i dont really doubt him imo his place in the top five is well earned, however the nuggets roster being generally defensively suspect isnt that goos when youve got a center who has to really work to hold up on that end, wld be better to have more defensive talent around him

I’d be very interested to see how the celtics fared over the course of a whole season with brown and whoever their third best player is not playing.

― k3vin k., Tuesday, January 10, 2023 2:02 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

i agree that jokic is better but this thought experiment is invalid since brown and whoever are so much better than murray and porter

lamelo is a bad finisher, a bad shot taker and a bad defender. those are three big holes. love the potential but he has work to do.

the cool thing about jokic is his game gets even better in the playoffs.

― im a beacon of light (Spottie), Tuesday, January 10, 2023 2:09 PM (thirty-five seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

very underappreciated point. the other thing about jokic is that while he doesn’t fit the traditional aesthetic model of heliocentrism but he really does the same thing, the offense runs 100% through him whether he takes a shot or not and now that his reputation has caught up with his game he is getting to the line (as a percentage of his total shots) a lot more too. he also shoots like 110% in the paint and the nuggets have been one of the best clutch-minutes teams in the league for a few years running

the thing you worry about with jokic in the playoffs is holding up on defense but hes done it before he has a great playoff run under his belt already so i dont really doubt him imo his place in the top five is well earned, however the nuggets roster being generally defensively suspect isnt that goos when youve got a center who has to really work to hold up on that end, wld be better to have more defensive talent around him

― lag∞n, Tuesday, January 10, 2023 2:12 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

they’re third in defensive efficiency over the last 12 games vs a solid schedule, that’s probably not sustainable but having the 10th or 12th best defense and the best offense is a workable formula imo. also they consistently have the best clutch defense in the NBA which I do not fully understand but am happy is a thing that is true

yeah their defensive ceiling is prob somewhere around 10th, which is good enough to win a title, but still its just a bit of a stretch not ideal

maybe the bigger issue is offense when jokic sits, gotta hope they figure something out with murray at some point

yeah it’s been a consistent disaster though has trended upward over the past couple of weeks. they’ve tried a lot of things with staggering and whatnot that have yielded mixed results

seems like if murray finds a groove and then have time to get used to whatever offense theyre running with him it could be ok, but also that could not happen, and yeah in the playoffs you prob have to have one of him and jokic out there at all times

bored at work so....

zion isnt top ten yet. i'd have booker over ja, jimmy over both

nuggets are weird cause their offense is so built around jokic that when he sits they have to change modes which is hard

i would have ja(h) the most high haha

lol

nuggets are weird cause their offense is so built around jokic that when he sits they have to change modes which is hard

― lag∞n, Tuesday, January 10, 2023 12:27 PM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

its why they shoulda kept plumlee. he can do 60% of jokic

yeah having a guy you can slot in there is good

based on what we've seen the last several years, 10th in defense isn't good enough to win the title. celtics and warriors were 1-2 in defense. the bucks were 10th in defense the year they won but i don't think it's controversial to say their defensive ceiling was/is much higher than denver's. and the lakers were third in defense when they won. bucks were no 1 in playoff defense by a mile the year they won.

warriors were 6 in playoff defense last year but if you take out the bulls who only played 5 games warriors were top 5. denver was 16 out of 16 in playoff defense last year, 13 in 20-21, and 12th in the bubble. they simply have to get a lot better on that side, but also maybe the balance of the scales tip a bit for whatever reason and the no 1 offense can win w/ say the no 8 defense. if denver is willing to bench murray and/or porter down the stretches of games they certainly have the ability to put defensively minded line ups out there in a way they haven't in previous years.

nuggets are weird cause their offense is so built around jokic that when he sits they have to change modes which is hard

― lag∞n, Tuesday, January 10, 2023 12:27 PM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

its why they shoulda kept plumlee. he can do 60% of jokic

― im a beacon of light (Spottie), Tuesday, January 10, 2023 2:28 PM (forty-nine seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is so funny because I had a dream last night that plumlee was back on the nuggets

they could get him if they want

if you pare the nuggets rotation down to murray, brown, KCP, gordon, porter, jokic it looks way better from a playoff POV than anything they've had in the past. i think the question is whether they can get the right combos out there & if you can utilize a wing heavy, switchable looking rotation w/ jokic at center. or if his presence means you have to play a more conservative, straight up style defense that in the end can't keep up w/ the more fully switchable teams. sixers and grizz prob have similar questions to answer. the bucks made it work but they might have the best guard defender, wing defender, and big defender in the league on their team so they're kinda off in their own zone

the brilliance of the celtics is that at the end of the day they have more defensive minded centers but who are also plusses on offense. yet they don't need to play either of them to be good. or they can play both of them.