IDK about everyone, but I have a personal rule that if you drop 50 you are allowed to talk shit even if your team loses.
Agreed.
Not sure what else Giannis could do. 52 on 26 shots, 16 & 7, 2 & 1, 1TO. Suppose he could sell popcorn too.
There will be some minefields in the West, even the bottom playoff teams. The Jazz showed last season that they can take out a favored opponent. The Spurs will be a tough out. Portland plays hard and have a killer in Lilliard. OKC has two of the best 15 players in the league, and either or both can dominate a series. The Clippers really go after it, and will give a fight even as the eighth seed. The beat the Warriors once this year, in OT, and lost another by a bucket.
Let's be honest, the 2018-19 Celtics would be in a dogfight to make the playoffs in the West. Under .500 record vs. the West this season. Delicate lockerroom. #thetruthhurts
Totally crazy year in the West. We’re 70 games into the season and only *seven games* separate the #1 seed (GSW, DEN) from the #8 seed (LAC). Only 3.5 games separate #3 and #8.
Yesterday I was watching some Bogut highlights from back in the day (pretty impressive showing by the Big Aussie yesterday, btw, given he was thrown into the starting lineup off the plane with zero time to practice) and was shocked at how casually one of the announcers brought up the 2014-16 Warriors' 54-game home winning streak. That doesn't even seem remotely plausible now, for the Warriors or any other team. Kerr's teams reeled off an insane 67-73-67 wins in his first three seasons; this year it's possible no one in the league will win 60. It really is a different league now than it was in 2016.
I could spend a lot of time breaking down the various explanations for the Warriors' waning dominance, but I think the simplest is just that the 2014-16 Warriors caught lightning in a bottle at a time when 2/3rds of the league was playing mathematically losing basketball, and other teams have now caught up, both in terms of gameplanning for it on D and copycatting it on O. See: 2001 Rams or 2007 Patriots.
The "chilling out in the regular season" (especially on defense) argument is also fairly compelling, as is "the core is getting older." The one common Warrior talking point that I always find pretty much BS is the "they don't have the depth they once had; Myers constructed a sh*tty bench." Imho, top to bottom, this year's Warrior team kicks the 2015-16 team's ass in terms of personnel, even factoring in the age-related decline of Shaun, Andre and Draymond. In Game 7 of the 2016 Finals — biggest game in franchise history — their supposedly great bench was so deep that Kerr trotted out broken Festus Ezeli and lumbering Andy Varejão for ~20 total minutes, which effectively handed the Cavs the game. The only other options were similarly lumbering Mo Speights (which I'm glad he avoided) and more super-smallball minutes for Livingston and Barbosa (which I think would have been far preferable, and probably won them the title, but then the KD move doesn't happen, so it's all good).
In any case, I think this year's Looney, Bell, Jerebko, or even McKinnie would all have been much better options for those minutes than anything Kerr had on the bench that year. And that's without considering the fact that relative to that 2015-16 team, they've replaced Barnes and Bogut with Durant and Cousins ... and Bogut.
Overall, not even a close call, personnel-wise.
Imho the league overall is just way better, smarter, deeper, and more balanced than it was in 2015-16. It's really hard to dominate it night in, night out. Ask the Warriors, Celtics, Rockets, Raptors, Thunder, Sixers, Jazz, Lakers or any other team who has scuffled much more this year than people expected them to.
Yesterday I was watching some Bogut highlights from back in the day (pretty impressive showing by the Big Aussie yesterday, btw, given he was thrown into the starting lineup off the plane with zero time to practice) and was shocked at how casually one of the announcers brought up the 2014-16 Warriors' 54-game home winning streak. That doesn't even seem remotely plausible now, for the Warriors or any other team. Kerr's teams reeled off an insane 67-73-67 wins in his first three seasons; this year it's possible no one in the league will win 60. It really is a different league now than it was in 2016.
I could spend a lot of time breaking down the various explanations for the Warriors' waning dominance, but I think the simplest is just that the 2014-16 Warriors caught lightning in a bottle at a time when 2/3rds of the league was playing mathematically losing basketball, and other teams have now caught up, both in terms of gameplanning for it on D and copycatting it on O. See: 2001 Rams or 2007 Patriots.
The "chilling out in the regular season" (especially on defense) argument is also fairly compelling, as is "the core is getting older." The one common Warrior talking point that I always find pretty much BS is the "they don't have the depth they once had; Myers constructed a sh*tty bench." Imho, top to bottom, this year's Warrior team kicks the 2015-16 team's ass in terms of personnel, even factoring in the age-related decline of Shaun, Andre and Draymond. In Game 7 of the 2016 Finals — biggest game in franchise history — their supposedly great bench was so deep that Kerr trotted out broken Festus Ezeli and lumbering Andy Varejão for ~20 total minutes, which effectively handed the Cavs the game. The only other options were similarly lumbering Mo Speights (which I'm glad he avoided) and more super-smallball minutes for Livingston and Barbosa (which I think would have been far preferable, and probably won them the title, but then the KD move doesn't happen, so it's all good).
In any case, I think this year's Looney, Bell, Jerebko, or even McKinnie would all have been much better options for those minutes than anything Kerr had on the bench that year. And that's without considering the fact that relative to that 2015-16 team, they've replaced Barnes and Bogut with Durant and Cousins ... and Bogut.
Overall, not even a close call, personnel-wise.Imho the league overall is just way better, smarter, deeper, and more balanced than it was in 2015-16. It's really hard to dominate it night in, night out. Ask the Warriors, Celtics, Rockets, Raptors, Thunder, Sixers, Jazz, Lakers or any other team who has scuffled much more this year than people expected them to.
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Collin Sexton's last 6 games: 36.1 minutes, .567/.564/.905, 26.5 points, 3.3 assists, 2.5 rebounds. He's up to .420/.413/.836 for the year. He's increased his 3 point volume a ton since February too.
Siakam is at 16.4 points, 6.9 rebounds, 3.0 assists on .542/.350/.771 shooting in 33.5 minutes. He's going to be 25 in April but it's not hard to envision him improving on those numbers next year. Hard to tell what his ceiling is, usually guys are what they are at 25. There's always Jimmy Butler though.
Elfrid Payton had his 5th triple double in a row. In those 5 games, 36.1 minutes, .419/.364/.818, 15.6 points, 12.0 rebounds, 12.8 assists, 1.0 steal, 2.4 turnovers. I honestly think he could average a triple double for a year if he got 35-36 minutes a game. He's pretty terrible on defense though. For the year, Payton is at 29.5 minutes, .439/.355/.730, 10.8 points, 7.5 assists, 5.5 rebounds, 1.1 steals. They are 1-4 in those 5 games.
Since the beginning of 2019, Josh Jackson is averaging 27.3 minutes, .432/.346/.701, 13.9 points, 4.6 rebounds, 2.4 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.8 blocks in 34 games.
In his first 38 games, he was at 21.5 minutes, .386/.291/.633, 8.7 points, 3.8 rebounds, 2.1 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.6 blocks. He just turned 22 a month ago. I think a lot of us may have wrote him off too early earlier this season.
Siakam is at 16.4 points, 6.9 rebounds, 3.0 assists on .542/.350/.771 shooting in 33.5 minutes. He's going to be 25 in April but it's not hard to envision him improving on those numbers next year. Hard to tell what his ceiling is, usually guys are what they are at 25. There's always Jimmy Butler though.
Elfrid Payton had his 5th triple double in a row. In those 5 games, 36.1 minutes, .419/.364/.818, 15.6 points, 12.0 rebounds, 12.8 assists, 1.0 steal, 2.4 turnovers. I honestly think he could average a triple double for a year if he got 35-36 minutes a game. He's pretty terrible on defense though. For the year, Payton is at 29.5 minutes, .439/.355/.730, 10.8 points, 7.5 assists, 5.5 rebounds, 1.1 steals. They are 1-4 in those 5 games.
Since the beginning of 2019, Josh Jackson is averaging 27.3 minutes, .432/.346/.701, 13.9 points, 4.6 rebounds, 2.4 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.8 blocks in 34 games.
In his first 38 games, he was at 21.5 minutes, .386/.291/.633, 8.7 points, 3.8 rebounds, 2.1 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.6 blocks. He just turned 22 a month ago. I think a lot of us may have wrote him off too early earlier this season.
76ers’ had four starters score at least 22 points tonight in 118-114 win at Charlotte. No Embiid. Load management.
Wardell Stephen Curry currently has 33 points on 11-20 shooting including 7-13 from distance as well as five dimes as the Warriors are beating the T-Wolves in Minnesota by 20 part way through the fourth. In the process, he went over 300 made threes for the third time in his career. The Warriors radio guy, Tim Roye (who is the best in the business imho) makes the point that Curry has been so great for so long that he may actually be underrated. That may be true or it may just be that some people dislike his game or the way he carries himself.
All I know is the guy's shooting is so good that we are unlikely to ever see someone this great at it for a long, long time.
All I know is the guy's shooting is so good that we are unlikely to ever see someone this great at it for a long, long time.
Finishes with 36 on 12-21 fg (8-14 from 3). Great to see, since he had been scuffling by his standards since the all-star break (.366 from 3, after .444 pre ASG).
Harden still has the edge on him in total threes made, 316-303, thanks largely to racking up 184 more attempts. Curry has a game in hand, though, and both teams are still playing for seeding, so it could be a photo finish.
More importantly, good bounceback win for the Ws on a road segababa without Cousins. KD had a quiet scoring night with 17 (possibly still recovering from the tweaked ankle?) but dished 9 of the team’s 39 assists. And old friend Jerebko, who had been on the fringes of the rotation lately, stepped up huge in the Nordic hinterlands with 18 points on 10 fga.
I guess I could imagine old school die hards not liking his game, but who doesn't like the way he carries himself? I think he's a great ambassador for the league.
Yeah, seriously. Literally only thing that bothers me about Curry is that chewing the mouthpiece thing.
Marvin Bagley with 24 pts (and counting) in 18 minutes on 11-12 fg (2-2 from 3) in a 103-78 Kings beatdown of the Nets through three quarters.
Man, it's kind of a shame the Kings have no shot at plucking #1, since the mere concept of a five-man unit of Fox-Hield-Zion-Bagley-Giles is deliriously entertaining.
Edit: lol wow, nice job, SRN: Kings had 28 point lead late in the 3rd Q and now it's tied 121-121. Nets timeout with 47 seconds left.
Man, it's kind of a shame the Kings have no shot at plucking #1, since the mere concept of a five-man unit of Fox-Hield-Zion-Bagley-Giles is deliriously entertaining.
Edit: lol wow, nice job, SRN: Kings had 28 point lead late in the 3rd Q and now it's tied 121-121. Nets timeout with 47 seconds left.
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That is crazy. I thought BKNY had essentially conceded this game.
D'Angelo Russell is damn real. Wow. 44 points on 17-33 shooting and 12 dimes. RHJ takes the ball and throws up an over the head circus shot to win it with ~ one second on the clock.
Lol, Nets win with a 45-18 fourth quarter. I guess that's the difference between being a playoff team and a non-playoff-team. Good thing the Kings were already (effectively) eliminated from the playoff hunt, as otherwise that would have been an epically brutal loss.
D'Angelo Russell: 44 points (23 in the 4th quarter), 12 assists, 4 rebounds, 4 assists. LOLakers!
D'Angelo Russell: 44 points (23 in the 4th quarter), 12 assists, 4 rebounds, 4 assists. LOLakers!
Indiana also making a comeback against the Clippers after having been down 16 late in the 3rd to now be in a two-possession game with 6 min to go. Doug McDermott continues his bizarre reverse split year with another huge road game. He's shooting 50% from 3 on the road this year...….and 31% at home.
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Reminder again that the Lakers traded him in a salary dump so that they could eventually sign KCP and Lance Stephenson.
MagicLinka ladies and gents...
I think SRN shortchanged D-Lo. Love the picture too...
Lakers basically gave back one of the lotto picks that Ainge stole. Happy for Brooklyn.
Forgive me if these posts aren't your thing but I figured most of you people here would enjoy this. Bogdanovich slipped again right at the end too.
That is absolutely not the reason Russell was traded. It has been pretty well documented what occurred.
Do the exact details matter? It was a horrible transaction. The kid is better than any other young asset they have had in years.
Today he is. At the time of the trade nobody on his own team would even speak to him and no other GM made a reasonable attempt to acquire him which refutes the claim that he had any trade value.
Still....if you could move Russell with Mozgov's contract to open up space for Paul George are you saying you wouldn't do it? The problem of course was that they didn't lure George along with LeBron.
What Russell did was stupid but there was literally nobody, outside of a bunch of kids on the roster, who was worth keeping around if they couldn't forgive him. And presumably Ingram and Randle would gotten over it while the newcomers in Ball and Kuzma weren't involved.
In short, if you have a choice between keeping Corey Brewer, Jordan Clarkson and Larry Nance Jr. happy or keeping a 21 year old kid who, in his second season, had already started to show signs of elite scoring capability, you do the former every time.
Per this article, the Lakers offered the Pacers Clarkson, Randle and the 27th and 28th pick. Who knows if that is accurate but the question is that if the trade is to effectively give up Russell with Mozgov bolted on to get George, why not deal with Pacers directly. They may well havetried but nothing clearly got done.
The problem with trading away good young assets to give yourself a shot at being able to sign a star is, short of backchannel assurances, a team is concentrating their risk around getting the free-agency process right. Short of say Golden State, few teams have the luxury of losing that bet and still being ok.
That wasn’t the choice though. The Lakers made that move to bring in LeBron and Paul George......and that’s a choice you make every time knowing what you knew at the time. Magic miscalculated big time by not feeling he needed to move any assets for George.
SI did a nice trade grade at the time. They favored the Nets (A grade), but it made complete sense for the Lakers (B-, who not only salary dumped but added Kuzma/Lopez).
https://www.si.com/nba/2017/06/20/lakers-nets-trade-grades-brook-lopez-dangelo-russell-draft-pick
Didn't the Lakers get Kuzma out of that deal too? I'd rather Russell but Kuzma takes some of the sting away. I think Russell is very underrated though.
You are right but I still think either keeping him or dealing him directly for George was the way to go. Hindsight of course but I am just not a fan of dealing away young assets without a strong sense that you can nail a follow on move.
Kuzma was the 27th pick and he has far exceeded what anyone thought he would do. At the time, that pick was seen as not very valuable.
I do too but some people really like Kuzma. I think Russell could be someone like Damian Lillard, Kuzma is Marcus Morris.
I am actually a Kuzma fan. And his development does soften the blow of the trade. However, as you point out, most people would much prefer Russell to him any day.
Random observation but there seems to be a chance that no team ends up with 60 wins this year. When was the last time that happened in an 82 game season?
Milwaukee is the only team that can realistically get there. They are 53-18. So 7-4 in their last 11 gets it. That is obviously well below their season record to date. However, they are 3 up in the loss column to Toronto. So if Toronto drops a couple games, Milwaukee may have nothing to play for the last several games.
Edit: 2000-2001, to answer my question. The Spurs led the NBA with 58 wins.
Milwaukee is the only team that can realistically get there. They are 53-18. So 7-4 in their last 11 gets it. That is obviously well below their season record to date. However, they are 3 up in the loss column to Toronto. So if Toronto drops a couple games, Milwaukee may have nothing to play for the last several games.
Edit: 2000-2001, to answer my question. The Spurs led the NBA with 58 wins.
If they didn't trade Mozgov, they weren't getting LBJ from a cap perspective IIRC. Mozgov's contract was ridiculous: $15.2MM-$16.7M for 3 yrs.
And IND wasn't taking that contract with or without Russell.
Some interesting Harden stats:
He is on pace to score 2,800 points this season, something only Wilt (4 times), MJ (twice), Kobe, Kareem and Bob McAdoo (wow!) have done.
He is on pace for 750 made free throws, something only seven players have done, all once (Wilt, West, Robertson, Jordan, Durant, Barry and Adrian Dantley) and Harden would be the first guard to do it since Jordan in 1987. He is on pace for more than 850 attempts,and at 87 percent shooting from the line, he has the highest shooting percentage out of anyone with that many attempts.
He joins Oscar, MJ, Tiny, Westbrook and Iverson as the only player to average at least 30 ppg and at least 7.5 apg in a single season.
Will join himself from last season as the only player to average at least 10 3PA and 10 FTA per game.
He is on pace to score 2,800 points this season, something only Wilt (4 times), MJ (twice), Kobe, Kareem and Bob McAdoo (wow!) have done.
He is on pace for 750 made free throws, something only seven players have done, all once (Wilt, West, Robertson, Jordan, Durant, Barry and Adrian Dantley) and Harden would be the first guard to do it since Jordan in 1987. He is on pace for more than 850 attempts,and at 87 percent shooting from the line, he has the highest shooting percentage out of anyone with that many attempts.
He joins Oscar, MJ, Tiny, Westbrook and Iverson as the only player to average at least 30 ppg and at least 7.5 apg in a single season.
Will join himself from last season as the only player to average at least 10 3PA and 10 FTA per game.
The order of operations doesn't matter. The Lakers traded Russell, Mozgov, Clarkson, and Nance, released Deng, and renounced Randle and Lopez to open up cap space. That cap space was subsequently used on Lebron, KCP, Rondo, Stephenson, and Beasley. Everything outside of the Lebron signing was a clear miscalculation on their part. That's three very talented young players out and just one true max guy in.
Russell was a former #2 pick two years into his career at the time of the deal. If he wasn't meshing with the locker room, trade the other guys (e.g. Nick Young). It's disingenuous to say that he wasn't an All-Star talent then and had less value than Ingram and Lonzo. It is the job of a front office to identify which players can be developed and which can't and to maximize their value. They clearly didn't do that. Kuzma was a nice save on their side of the ledger, but it doesn't swing that deal back to their side.
Having a plan to get Paul George and not getting Paul George doesn't make the initial plan sound. It indicates the opposite. Russell and PG also share an agent and we can all connect the dots there. They needed to do everything in their power to secure PG when he was available rather than moving pieces with value in the hopes of luring him in free agency. This is the same reason the Knicks got killed for trading KP. If the Knicks get Irving and KD as expected then it is in some ways defensible, but if they blow it is a franchise-altering mistake.
The Lakers shouldn't get any kind of pass for the past two years. They added the 2nd best player of all time to their roster and ended up worse than they were before. That is mind-blowing.
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And he’s finally playing like himself again. He’s dished out 10+ assists in 3 straight games now that everyone’s healthy and he has shooters around. I mean, I enjoyed January for the sheer absurdity of it, the once in 15 years kind of run thing. But I enjoy his normal game far more.
I think it really helps his MVP case; he did what he had to do for his team to pick up wins when they were dealing with significant injuries, and now that he has a healthier supporting case, he is reverting to the correct way to play with those guys and pick up wins that way. He has shown a remarkable ability to understand what is required from him a night-to-night basis.
None of us on the board thought that signing KCP, Rondo, Stephenson, and Beasley was a good idea. But that has nothing to do with the actual trade of Russell - LAL was trying to do something with cap space so they could field a team around LBJ plus keep their cap room for next season.
However, I can't find the numbers anywhere but I am reasonably certain that LAL could not have opened up two max slots without getting rid of Mozgov's salary. Without the two max slots, who knows if they get LBJ?
As for the bolded, I can't find any figures so I'm not sure how it would have worked for LAL to acquire PG in a trade since IND wanted the #2 or Ingram. And even if there was some way forward where LAL could have traded for PG, gotten rid of Mozgov to create a salary slot for LBJ, I'm not sure they would be in any better shape than they are now as it would be LBJ, PG, Russell, Ball/Ingram, and not much else around them.
Reasonable minds can differ, but in my opinion a Lakers team with Russell/PG/Lebron is 2nd in the West right now. Of course the variables there are whether or not Russell develops the same in LA as he did in Brooklyn and whether they have the same coach and system, but on pure talent that team is a contender.
The list of players, since the turn of the century, who have averaged 20 points, six assists and two 3-pointers made per game before the age of 25? Stephen Curry, James Harden, Baron Davis, Gilbert Arenas, Damian Lillard, Booker and Russell.
Russell's a pretty interesting talent but IMO someone's going to offer him the max and it will be interesting to see if he becomes worth that.
Here's an article discussing PG salaries: https://elitesportsny.com/2019/03/18/brooklyn-nets-dangelo-russell-and-the-narrowing-point-guard-market/
57 points and he was 9-22 from inside the arc. He got most of his points via the three where he was 9-17 and hitting all 12 of his FTA. He also had eight dimes.
The counter is that the Rockets lost to Memphis. I think the games during this stretch are largely just playing out the string so I don't hold it against them but I can see the Harden critics pointing to the result as a mark against him.
Wow, didn't see it, but just hate-glancing at the boxscore, it looked totally insane. 57 points on 39 fga (9-17 from 3, 12-12 ft), and unofficially it seemed like 30 of them came in the last 6 minutes of regulation and OT.
Grizz pull it out on a last second FT in OT by Valanciunas (cosmic justic for Harden tying it with three FTs at the buzzer at the end of regulation), but still.
I'm actually pretty okay with Harden as MVP over Giannis now, since my one caveat in the case for Giannis was if the Bucks tailed off while the Rockets closed strong, which has basically happened. Meanwhile, George and the Thunder have really tailed off of late, to the point where I might even consider Jokic or Embiid (or even Curry?) for #3 if OKC doesn't finish in the top half of the bracket.
Grizz pull it out on a last second FT in OT by Valanciunas (cosmic justic for Harden tying it with three FTs at the buzzer at the end of regulation), but still.
I'm actually pretty okay with Harden as MVP over Giannis now, since my one caveat in the case for Giannis was if the Bucks tailed off while the Rockets closed strong, which has basically happened. Meanwhile, George and the Thunder have really tailed off of late, to the point where I might even consider Jokic or Embiid (or even Curry?) for #3 if OKC doesn't finish in the top half of the bracket.
Why did OKC retire Nick Collison's jersey? Never averaged more than 9 points and 7 rebounds. Played 10 years for them.