( ( ( ( ( nba bubble ball 2020 ) ) ) ) )

shaq was listed at 325 as a 27 year old in 1999... zion is listed at 285 now and prob won't even put on much more weight as much as he will just replace fat for muscle over time. he'll prob hit 300 once he's that age but he's going to be much more lean than shaq was at an older age even tho he's much pudgier now. you can tell zion's frame will be able to hold muscle & we've never heard anything negative about his work ethic. i'm not going to judge his physique too harshly post-injury and post-pandemic... btw he put up 23-7-5 in 25 mins tonight and was physically dominating everyone on the court in the crunch time lmao

If you think Zion is gonna have a healthy career at 6’6 300, ok! Shaq not a great comparison for that

This isn’t a moral question. For however long Zion’s career lasts his absolutely insane physical presence will make him a great player. But if you ask me, 6’6 290 pound nba players have an expiration date

derrick white! wow.

lebron is 6' 8" and likely played at or around 300 pounds for most of his 20s and is gonna play 20 years

zion's problem isn't weight it's just the composition of his body... if he puts in the work to get in better shape i don't see why he wouldn't be able to carry the weight. as a senior in high school (two years ago) he was in good shape. if he can stay healthy (no evidence yet he's particularly injury prone) and able to work out consistently i'm absolutely placing my bet on "zion is a dominant 15-18 year player in the NBA" and not "zion washes out of the nba before 10 years"

there's a group that is like the shawn kemps and larry johnsons ... and another that is like the charles barkleys and karl malones. zion feels like the latter to me

lebron played at 300? really??

during the heat years i def remember windhorst type ppl talking about how bron was playing at about 300 even tho the heat were listing him at 250 or w/e

he def made an effort to slim down the second go round in cleveland tho... remember the first few months were super weird bcuz he couldn't finish at the rim even against big guys who sucked at defense

that's crazy, i mean i trust windy et al on all things lebron but i just don't remember him ever looking that big

there's stuff online where ppl speculate about leborn playing as high as 295... idk it never seemed crazy to me

reddit thread where lebron says on rj & channing frye's podcast that he's weighing 295 https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/6nnzbm/lebrons_weight/

bleacher report article w/ matt moore citing scuttlebutt

https://bleacherreport.com/articles/1751682-evolution-of-lebron-james-post-game

lebron was big in his heat years... i bet he was playing at 275-280. 300 prob a bit much but there was a point where he was built like a defensive end

275-280 makes more sense to me

i cld see it bron is huge

philly is going to escape with a 1-point win over the spurs

god and the spurs gutted out that 4q to be in a position to win. last 10 seconds were not ideal.

there's a group that is like the shawn kemps and larry johnsons ... and another that is like the charles barkleys and karl malones. zion feels like the latter to me

Zion is built like a football player, he’s fucking HUGE, there’s no comparison for him.

This is when Charles Barkley was considered a fat guy


https://www.gannett-cdn.com/-mm-/c30bdb6c33f7916a017d27f400468892461a707e/c=11-0-292-374/local/-/media/Montgomery/2014/06/15/0615aucol.jpg?width=280&height=374&fit=crop&format=pjpg&auto=webp

in other fat player news, i feel like the jazz gradient uniforms make everyone look like they have wide hips

you can also be built like blake griffin or amare and barely have a 10 year career it’s pretty random

Has the solution to the mystery of Blake griffin’s injuries never occurred to you

The 300 pound guy with the 45 inch vertical may have more in common with Blake Griffin than you think

brow is crazy

Larry Johnson is the player that reminds me a bit of Zion. Dude could shoot for a big guy.

That UNLV team looked like men playing with highschool kids, I still can't believe Duke got them that second time.

This dude was 22 at the time.

https://media.gettyimages.com/photos/basketball-final-four-unlv-versus-georgia-tech-moses-scurry-picture-id162034746?s=612x612

The 300 pound guy with the 45 inch vertical may have more in common with Blake Griffin than you think

― Matt Armstrong, Monday, August 3, 2020 11:39 PM (four minutes ago)

sure but again even if that's considered a pretty bad outcome, blake will end up playing 13+ years in the league

ultimately i just think some guys have bad knees and others don't. maybe zion does maybe he doesn't but one minor knee surgery doesn't tell us much yet.

I loved Nikola Pekovic. I rooted for Nikola Pekovic. But I knew what would happen. That much weight in nba basketball doesn’t last. Look at the statistics for 7 footers over 300 pounds.

Realistically, I don't think anyone on ILH, if handed the #1 pick in the last draft, would have spent it on any player other than Zion. Too gifted, too unique, too exciting to pass up for anyone else.

There’s something to be said for drafting a guy with the understanding that you probably only get 5 years from him. The trailblazers got one healthy season out of Walton and it was a title.

I loved Nikola Pekovic. I rooted for Nikola Pekovic. But I knew what would happen. That much weight in nba basketball doesn’t last. Look at the statistics for 7 footers over 300 pounds.

― Matt Armstrong, Tuesday, August 4, 2020 12:30 AM (one hour ago)

ok but pekovic played in europe for 6 years before he came to the NBA. im reading his wikipedia.... he was first team all euroleague at age 23... zion is 20. and this is before we even get into the obvious athletic differences between the two

the idea that zion is going to play 5 years in the NBA... i'm not sure what that's based on. there would have to be something medically wrong w/ his knees like on a brandon roy level but we've never heard that about zion

the precedent i guess is like andrew bynum? i really don't put zion in that category

philly is going to escape with a 1-point win over the spurs

― call all destroyer, Monday, August 3, 2020 10:49 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

The mojo around this team is so bad right now. I watched the Butler interview on Reddick's podcast again this week and it just convinced me that the team needs to be blown up: trade Simmons, fire Brown, bring in shooters to space the floor for Embiid seems like the smartest move I guess. Not going to happen though, which is discouraging.

unless they make a run this year you gotta think brown is gone at least

they have a good shot of beating the celtics in the first round considering theyve got 3 guys bigger than the celtics biggest guy

the way the celtics supporting cast was assembled this year, not great!

We'll see. I would love to play the Celtics because I hate them and it will be easy to get hyped to exorcise their recent losses to them. But I think the Sixers would find a way to lose.

celtics are def a better team but the matchup is not great for them

the precedent i guess is like andrew bynum? i really don't put zion in that category

6' 6" nose tackles play at like 325-330... i think zion can hold 280-300 and jump around and be fine. he just needs to trade fat for muscle and get in better shape conditioning wise. i would be worried if we knew a. there were off court concerns about his work ethic or mentality b. he had something structurally or medically wrong w/ his knees. otherwise i'm willing to roll the dice on him making his body work in the longterm

there's a great clip in hollinger's most recent athletic article of shake milton and embiid blowing a defensive assignment vs indiana, arguing about it as they inbound the ball and walk up the court, and then tj mcconnell stealing the ball from milton and passing it to TJ warren for a wide open 3

i guess until we see them lose there will be ppl who delude themselves into thinking the sixers will do anything in the playoffs, but we watched them for a whole year and i think we can feel safe in saying that moving simmons to the 4 and putting milton in the starting line up isn't a panacea that's suddenly going to fix all the structural problems w/ the team/franchise. if they get a 3-6 w/ boston they'll be lucky to win 2 games

to start the second half of the spurs game they ran a bunch of postups for embiid, and he scored on a few of them and i think passed out once for a 3. san antonio couldn't do anything against it.

then they got away from it and the spurs got back in the game and almost won. they'll be a tough out for boston if embiid is the best players for 5 or 6 games in a row. but what are the odds of that happening?

They've been terrible at the end of games for years (thinking of the especially painful Game 2 v. the Celtics a couple years ago). Some of it is construction in that they don't have a guy who can create his own shot off the dribble, which is what you want. But some of it is just terrible execution and/or coaching.

I am just so stunned how good Toronto is this year.

their defense is sick and offense good enough

to start the second half of the spurs game they ran a bunch of postups for embiid, and he scored on a few of them and i think passed out once for a 3. san antonio couldn't do anything against it.

then they got away from it and the spurs got back in the game and almost won. they'll be a tough out for boston if embiid is the best players for 5 or 6 games in a row. but what are the odds of that happening?

― call all destroyer, Tuesday, August 4, 2020 12:31 PM (thirty-four minutes ago)

yeah i'll take the under on that

the plan also goes out the window in any game where you can put fouls on embiid early

6' 6" nose tackles play at like 325-330... i think zion can hold 280-300 and jump around and be fine. he just needs to trade fat for muscle and get in better shape conditioning wise. i would be worried if we knew a. there were off court concerns about his work ethic or mentality b. he had something structurally or medically wrong w/ his knees. otherwise i'm willing to roll the dice on him making his body work in the longterm

The thing about being 300 pounds is that your knee ligaments don’t become bigger. This is why the only 300+ nba player who didn’t have a shortened career (or play himself out of the league) was Shaq

Here’s a question about his work ethic: there was a 4 month quarantine and he showed up out of shape
― Matt Armstrong, Tuesday, August 4, 2020 1:34 PM (thirty-one minutes ago)

eh... he also missed most of "training camp" for some personal matter. i'm not going to judge him too harshly for being out of shape right now. people are really hysterical about him... i was just listening to the 1 day old windhorst/marks/goldsberry podcast and they're all talking about how zion shouldn't even be playing, he looks awful... meanwhile the same night he goes out and puts up 23-7-5 in 25 mins

you might be right about zion, he also levitates in the air unlike anyone who has ever carried that weight. the dude is not tractor traylor

On a summer camp field trip to NYC in 1998 a friend and I saw Tractor Traylor in the Nike store and exchanged "What's up"s. Our camp then went to see improv group Chicago City Limits that night and they based a long form sketch around it.

40 year old jamal crawford played 6 mins today before pulling his hammy ._.