denver is tough for me i don't think they have the horses if porter is out and murray is still not fully at his peak. the clippers had proof of concept last year w/ no kawhi tho i think the reggie jackson/terrance mann show was prob a fluke ultimately to that degree
― J0rdan S., Tuesday, 4 January 2022 19:14 (two years ago) link
not sure how anyone could trust the nets at this point. weve got ~2 seasons of evidence now that their big 3 likely wont be playing at the same time when it matters.
― Spottie, Tuesday, January 4, 2022 2:14 PM (three minutes ago)
this is fair and might be a fatal flaw of theirs that said KD is arguably the no 1 playoff player right now and that has to carry a lot of weight. they may have won the title w/ harden on 0.5 hamstrings last year if they got past the bucks
― J0rdan S., Tuesday, 4 January 2022 19:18 (two years ago) link
the nets big 3 being healthy for the offs isnt out of the question at all, only one of the three thats fully injury prone is kyrie and hes had a lot of rest lol, tho the cause of that rest may actually put the title out of reach
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 19:24 (two years ago) link
kd has missed like 3 full seasons
― Spottie, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 19:30 (two years ago) link
and a chunk of last season
its true but besides those big injuries he played a lot
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 19:34 (two years ago) link
kyrie is the one where you just never know if youre about to lose him for two weeks
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 19:37 (two years ago) link
i hear any argument against the nets that boils down to "this whole situation is too volatile and for 100 diff reasons i just don't see this resulting in a title." for me, i think last postseason went about as bad as could be expected for them in terms of injuries, outright losing kyrie and losing harden for a significant chunk and having him be severely hobbled and largely ineffective when he came back. but they handled it way better than i expected, i would have said they were dead in the water under those circumstances but they ended up taking the champs as close to the brink as you possibly could take a team. if their injury luck is in any way better than it was last year, that makes them dangerous to me, based on what we saw KD + crippled james harden + random guys do.
of course if they lose KD it's a wrap for them but that's true for any team that loses their best player in the playoffs for any significant amount of time
― J0rdan S., Tuesday, 4 January 2022 19:37 (two years ago) link
yeah i mean theres a def non zero chance they have their 3 guys healthy for the offs and if that happens theres a very good chance they just crush everyone
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 19:40 (two years ago) link
you guys believe way too much in james harden
― Spottie, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 19:49 (two years ago) link
yeah that's all fine and wonderful but the playoffs are a different game
― J0rdan S., Tuesday, January 4, 2022 1:53 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink
right generally speaking the best teams tend to do the best in the playoffs iirc
― auld gang syne (k3vin k.), Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:14 (two years ago) link
unless its the jazz or various other similar teams
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:17 (two years ago) link
eh only one team can win per year. generally you just want to be good to maximize your chances
― auld gang syne (k3vin k.), Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:18 (two years ago) link
only one team can win and its not the jazz
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:20 (two years ago) link
right as history has shown with the jordan bulls lebron heat giannis bucks etc
― auld gang syne (k3vin k.), Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:24 (two years ago) link
generally if you don’t win your first year or two as a good team tom you can’t win ever
― auld gang syne (k3vin k.), Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:25 (two years ago) link
some teams just have fatal playoff flaws that are pretty obvious
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:26 (two years ago) link
― Spottie, Tuesday, January 4, 2022 2:49 PM (thirty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink
im not one to minimize hardens many playoff failures but it is worth noting that he came very close to some might say one cp3 hammy away from winning it all already and i do think that the nets version of harden (more passing less hoisting) is more playoff sustainable
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:27 (two years ago) link
yes until in retrospect it turns out the playoffs are as probabilistically determined as everything else in life
― auld gang syne (k3vin k.), Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:27 (two years ago) link
xp
of which your interceding post demonstrates an astute understanding
― auld gang syne (k3vin k.), Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:28 (two years ago) link
the problem with stats isnt so much a problem with stats as it is a problem with philosophy
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:29 (two years ago) link
anyway rudy gobert the player in which the jazz scheme is largely built around is easily exploited by any good team with then motivation to, maybe some day lottery balls with drop from heaven and change this fact, but probably not
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:32 (two years ago) link
the best teams tend to do better in the playoffs but the teams in the east have kevin durant and the giannis this is an important thing to remember
― J0rdan S., Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:35 (two years ago) link
the playoffs are a different game is something that is said often but unlike many axioms its also true
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:37 (two years ago) link
― lag∞n, Tuesday, January 4, 2022 3:32 PM (three minutes ago)
also they can't defend the perimeter at all it's actually quite a bad way to build a team for the playoffs can't just have guys knifing into the paint at will 50 times per game
― J0rdan S., Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:38 (two years ago) link
it wouldn't shock me if the jazz came out of the west especially depending on how injuries shake out. but i don't think they can beat the bucks or the nets they just don't have the high end talent, imo, and are too exploitable based on how they're constructed, think that would be a pretty clean finals for either of the east teams
― J0rdan S., Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:42 (two years ago) link
upgrading their perimeter defensive talent would definitely help but part of the problem there does imo go back to gobert in that in the modern game you want a center who has the ability to rotate out to the perimeter and gobert does not so they built this old fashioned D where everything is funneled to him in the paint which teams can render inoperative by going small, then as weve discussed they dont even have the strategic counter of gobert taking advantage of a small team by dunking on them on the other end since he has zero ball skills
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:42 (two years ago) link
the funny thing about the money ball nba era with all the high variance hoisting where over matched teams have a prayer is dunks are still dunks baby, shots that you shoot 99% on are very low variance, start letting teams get to the rim and you could play a hundred series and never win
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:48 (two years ago) link
stats guy: a bounce here and bounce there can swing a series between what are ultimately teams with razor thin edges
me: the famous basketball rim is soul death for defense
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:54 (two years ago) link
the jazz are basically a very nice sports car you only can drive in good conditions and they have an additional problem which is that there are almost no improvement candidates on their roster. donovan mitchell has been having basically the same season for a couple years now.
― call all destroyer, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:55 (two years ago) link
mitchell could still improve or just have a great year and theyd still need to solve the gobert problem which is unsolvable
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:57 (two years ago) link
prob the best approach to the gobert problem is to surround him with great dynamic defenders but unfortunately the jazz are very far from that
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 20:58 (two years ago) link
mitchell doesn't need to have better years than he's having for them to get high seeds. they're made to punish bad teams and collect regular season wins. and it could still work for a playoff run too with some health, matchup luck, a mitchell hot streak, etc. but they haven't made it easy on themselves by going all-in on very specific ways of playing offense and defense.
― call all destroyer, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 21:00 (two years ago) link
if they were to somehow draw four rounds of opponents decimated by injuries it wouldnt even count imo, much like the lakers bubble championship
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 21:05 (two years ago) link
ben simmons for conley/ingles works in the machine
― reggae mike love (polyphonic), Tuesday, 4 January 2022 21:07 (two years ago) link
i think ultimately we can look at this through the lens of karma, having one of your main guys not be able to do anything good with the basketball summons cursed vibes
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 21:07 (two years ago) link
the celtics were spared this hex via bill russell being a great outlet passer, and from all that happening in the beforetime
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 21:08 (two years ago) link
also he started the corona virus xp
― Spottie, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 21:08 (two years ago) link
otm
― lag∞n, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 21:09 (two years ago) link
simmons and gobert offense is a nightmare concept
― Clay, Tuesday, 4 January 2022 21:10 (two years ago) link
the jazz *do* have a player in mitchell who can score against loaded up playoff defenses making crazy contested shots and can get to the rim/foul line. that's not nothing... he shot 43% on 11.5 threes per game last playoffs. the issue to me is that he's still not better at that than steph or booker, so even at the high end they get trumped by the dubs and suns, and those other teams are better constructed and more malleable than the jazz. they're in a tier below the suns and dubs for me who are prob in a tier below the east teams
― J0rdan S., Tuesday, 4 January 2022 21:14 (two years ago) link
https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/32994009/perfect-fit-us-golden-state-warriors-reclamation-former-no-1-pick-andrew-wiggins
― Spottie, Wednesday, 5 January 2022 18:18 (two years ago) link
Thanks for posting that :)
― reggae mike love (polyphonic), Wednesday, 5 January 2022 19:27 (two years ago) link
klay back 2moro
After 941 days away from game, Warriors’ Klay Thompson announces he will make season debut Sunday against the Cavaliers in the Bay Area. https://t.co/3M9nORJXcL— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) January 8, 2022
― lag∞n, Saturday, 8 January 2022 22:08 (two years ago) link
bless
― Spottie, Saturday, 8 January 2022 22:08 (two years ago) link
I didn't find out til today that he actually uses his boat to get to and from Chase Center.
― Fetchboy, Saturday, 8 January 2022 23:13 (two years ago) link
Clearing my schedule. Also, got more dubs tix for 1/20 (a friend's school had a block for a fundraiser)! Looking forward to some balling.
― DJI, Sunday, 9 January 2022 00:01 (two years ago) link
The most underrated klay moment by far pic.twitter.com/ancICb1OHl— Jared Gross (@jaredmgross) January 8, 2022
― Spottie, Sunday, 9 January 2022 01:06 (two years ago) link
lmao
― lag∞n, Sunday, 9 January 2022 01:27 (two years ago) link