2021-22 NBA "REGULAR" SEASON THREAD

what if they lose to toronto in the 1st round

all the evidence is currently pointing to the Grizz being the best team in NBA history

Nugs mascot hit a back to the basket two hand blind overhead shot from half court

some crazy jocking for position in the east both the bucks and celtics have rested their starters in the last few days

lakers threw away another huge game and chance for them to get in

we love to see it

how do they not fire pelinka if they finish *outside the play in*

Trae Young has eliminated the Knicks from playoff contention two years in a row. pic.twitter.com/0XvqJyzP2O

— StatMuse (@statmuse) April 1, 2022

the suns bench worries me

cam johnson has been out for a month this was his first game back but he was balling before that. javale is a solid C backup, something they didnt have last season. cam payne has proven himself to be a pretty valuable change of pace guy, craig isnt great but isnt gonna hurt you in any way, shamets there for spacing and hes hitting 38% on about 5 3pa per game. i think their bench is as good as any of the contenders.

having said that... i dont really know what it is about this suns team but i just dont fully believe that they are as good as their record indicates.

really? I do for sure. the most consistently great team in the league this year, and aside from the celtics the best second half team as well. they have the top-line talent, the quality starters, and quality bench guys. extremely wel-balanced championship quality team imo

the suns are a greater than the sum of their parts team via not having a dominant star which makes them vulnerable if any starter isnt playing at 100%. and they are very reliant on an old and historically injury prone cp3 to keep the offense moving

yeah i mean if they face the bucks again it’s not even an argument that they won’t have the best player on the floor. could also be true for a few match ups in the west tho i def expect them to make the finals

cam johnson is good. cam payne’s shooting numbers this year are ghastly and i think he played way over his head in last year’s playoffs. javale, torrey craig… how much do you really trust those guys in meaningful playoff games. shamet? i feel like they have 6 guys honestly, prob 7 on some nights. it’s a great 6 but it’s a concern for me

suns are def not winning on star power i feel like whats made them easily the best team this year is they're really deep in quality guys like you can take issue with their bench which is nkinda the nature of benches in general but bridges ayton crowder johnson is just better than anyone elses 3-4-5-6 guys, then they play really good basketball their execution is elite which can get lost in or sort of subliminally folded into the argument about whos got talent, playing good is important, theyre really good defensively especially when they dig they can shut you down, and theyve been dominant in crunch time aka the chris paul effect which prob has as much to do with the high defensive peak as chris paul but def chris paul too

theres def a tendency to discount teams like this i think because theyre so rare, pistons team that crushed the favored lakers comes to mind, the spurs who were one shot away from winning back to back rings, but also relying on deep team play and execution is harder than just having a guy who can get you a bucket

anyway i like the suns, theyve been crushing everyone all year which is usually a pretty good indicator, i wouldnt say theyre any sort of huge favorite but id put my money on them

this is def a 2014 spurs revenge tour kind of season for the suns, i believe in them

also their D is the kind that gives giannis problems long arms swarming moving fast and so forth, in the halfcourt he prefers a more deliberate environment

feel like i was remiss in not mentioning the suns vibes as a contributing factor, obviously a very high vibe

the vibes are elevated

hoisted vibes

also their D is the kind that gives giannis problems long arms swarming moving fast and so forth, in the halfcourt he prefers a more deliberate environment

tbh it was giannis that exposed the suns, ayton was overwhelmed by him all series & their wing defenders are too small, bridges and crowder had no shot of defending him. if the suns have any fatal flaw it might be that. giannis averaged 35-13-5 on 61% shooting and go to the line 17+ times in half the games, he pretty much did whatever he wanted all series and in particular single handedly shut down the budding narrative of ayton being one of the best centers in the NBA. maybe ayton went in the lab and figured some shit out but i just don’t think he has the foot speed to stick with giannis. luckily for the suns there’s nobody in the west who is physically overwhelming like that, and the guys who can get to that level of production (jokic & luka) aren’t on good enough teams

i agree with all yall really i do... it may be that i dont really believe in chris paul to get you all the way over the hump? or maybe its that what weve seen this/last season is their peak? like they dont have another untapped gear to go to that other teams do? i admit it could be im just lying to myself and in denial cos ive got homer feelings for my boys.

they are a great team but not a historically great team, very beatable imo. which also makes the playoffs really intriguing, not dissimilar to last season where you could make an argument for 5-7 teams.

suns are 46-1 this season when leading after 3 quarters, seems p good idk

injuries have become a pervasive enough factor in recent years that even for very good teams winning your ring often hinges on which direction your luck breaks

suns were up 2-0 on the bucks and very nearly won a third it’s certainly possible they take it this time. my questions about their depth are irrespective of the bucks match up it prob doesn’t come into play there since the bucks don’t have a great bench themselves. i just think the suns get pretty thin prettt quickly if anyone gets hurt, they escaped damage from the cp3 injury last year bcuz they got a bunch of teams with equally worse injuries & cam payne went sicko mode which i just… idk. i wouldn’t wanna be back in that position if i was them

the problem with leaning on info from last years sun bucks series besides the fact that it was very close is the suns are better this year and the bucks are worse

the suns are pretty clearly much better than they were last year

if it all ends with cp3 pulling another hammy what can you do but laugh and move on with your life

otm also suns will have the famous Pissed metric on their side

tbf i think there is an argument to be made that the bucks are as good or better than last year but its not something thats just obvious they way it is with the suns

both conferences are kinda stacked this year, or at least theoretically stacked, so who knows what the match up will be

Iirc the big difference maker in last years finals was switching Jrue from Booker to CP3, once the Bucks did that they never lost again. To me it looked like Holiday wore him out and as a result the Suns looked totally gassed by the end of every game.

I mean who knows with Milwaukee. I think they’re the best in the East but idk by how much. I do know that they haven’t really been at full strength at all during the regular season so if they are better we wouldn’t know it yet

the things that could make them better are imo jrue has been really good offensively this year and he was a disaster in the offs last year just didnt feel like he had enough time to mesh with the team seemed pretty shook, and then giannis has expanded and rounded out his game a little including not being so weird at fts, whether all that leads to better team play who knows but it def could

also coach bud realizing that you can put giannis in more actions and use him as more of a big man situationally could be big, at least if he remembers the finals last year

i think a rematch would be close, last year it took the bucks realizing they were by far the stronger and more physical team and i could see that being slightly muted this time around. the suns on the other hand need to show that they have another gear to get to.

Also feels like the Bucks haven’t been taking the regular season seriously while the Suns very much have

thing is usually teams try to start getting serious towards the end of the regular season and the bucks havent put their foot on the gas, if theyre really just waiting to do that it seems like a pretty big mistake, you need those reps, unless youre the kobe-shaq lakers, although tbf that behavior did eventually come back to haunt them

Yeah that worries me too

kd scored 55 kyrie 31 and they lost to the hawks to drop to 10th place

everyone was assuming theyd be the 7th seed but the 8th seed just became more likely, also the no seed

there were definitely some matchups the bucks were able to exploit in the finals last year and giannis found another gear which is a big problem for any team, but the suns did look like they were going to steamroll the series at one point and iirc it took giannis sort of improbably catching fire from the FT line to put them over the edge. giannis has improved in basically every aspect but I don’t think you can count on him shooting 19-21 from the line in an elimination game again

I do think suns/bucks would be the coolest finals I hope we get a rematch

that’s prob true xp tho his FT shooting to me seems sustainable i just think he’s shooting them with better form and confidence. but also the amount of FTs he was shooting in that series was a symptom of the fact that they couldn’t guard him. i think you could just as easily say that the suns can’t put him on the line 17+ times in three games and expect him to miss enough of them for the suns to win the series

like, they actually have to figure out a way to guard him

my buddy in Milwaukee is at a wedding that's in the same hotel the Mavs are currently staying at. they just watched the Duke/NC game with the entire team lmao

another god awful loss by the jazz tonight sheesh

on zach lowe’s podcast tim mcmahon was adamant that donovan mitchell was not gonna finish his contract out in utah and may ask out as soon as this summer

certainly why would anyone be on the jazz