Budenholzer was asked about it in his presser and admitted that they made a choice - let Tatum and Brown beat them or let another Celtics player have easy looks. He acknowledged it didn't work but if people are suggesting that he should have seen Granite having his best scoring night as a pro in game seven of the ECF semis, I simply cannot agree. Grant is clearly a good shooter but it says something that it took this long, and this game for him to score 27 points in an NBA game.
Bud has his title and no one can take that away from him but OTOH, Cs looked like they were going to the rim at will when Lopez wasn't on the floor, and it's not like MIL has a lot of defenders who can recover when they are in rotation (missing Middleton here as well).
Not sure what you are talking about. We're just discussing the fact that GW took basically 18 uncontested (or lightly contested) 3Ps. I've never seen that before; don't you think it's worth discussing?
People haven't left GW that wide open since the beginning of the season, that's one reason why.
We are responding to the initial post which was overplaying it.
Teams were also not as focused on getting the ball out of Tatum and Brown's hands before the playoffs.
100% this. The Bucks dared Grant Williams to beat them in a Game 7 and beat them he did. He was nails.
They might have also been hoping that if the C's missed 3s early, they'd start driving into Giannis and Lopez. Didn't happen. And I think Lopez's entire 1st q run killed him.
7/18. And he wouldn't have jacked as many 3s as he did if the game wasn't a blow out.
The bolded is generally true because higher utilization normally requires taking tougher shots. There is literally no reason to think that relationship holds when you aren’t being defended. Guys don’t shoot worse on FT when they get fouled more in a game and there’s no reason to think a player’s ability to make uncontested threes declines as he is given more opportunities to shoot them.
This makes no sense. You don't see Grant scoring 27 because no one gives him 18 WIDE OPEN 3 point shots a game. Sure, maybe he only scores 20 if we replay this game tomorrow and Celtics only win by 19 instead.
It makes sense if you are the sort of person who can live with your choices even when they don't work out. I think Budenholzer is a fantastic NBA coach but I get that others do not. That said, I think the sentiment expressed upthread about Bud having the luxury of last year's title will make acceptance of his strategy easier.
Rather than blame Bud, I credit the fact that the Celtics have a better, deeper roster. The Celtics have several players who can guard Giannis one-on-one. The Bucks don't have several players who can guard Tatum one-on-one. There's only so much an NBA coach can do with inferior players.
We would absolutely be responding differently if the Celtics had lost. 100%. Nailed it.
Much appreciated.
This is just to say
I didn't know Grant was working with @LethalShooter, Chris Matthews, who also helped Bobby Portis go from 36% with the Knicks to 47%in his first year with the Bucks.
Lethalshooter alsoworking with Grayson Allen but no video of those workouts after this game.
+1
Sorry but he was ass in games 3-6 regardless of the points. Anyone saying otherwise is a fan boy.
Do Tatum and Brown catch a break by not having to go 15 rounds with Giannis?
The whole team caught a break with no Middleton. Makes Giannis easier to "guard" so much that one can guard him.
He played like 19 seconds in the 4th quarter game 4 comeback. He had an up and down series. Overall he was a huge factor. But it was up and down.
See games 1, 3, 4, 5, 6 for proof.
He was the 5th option on offense I could give a fuck if he goes 0-1 from 3 or scores zero points. Trying to slowdown Giannis was the game plan. Same goes for Horford, was Al shitty? no
Maybe his defensive responsibilities, where he acquitted himself quite well most of the series, had something to do with a couple of bad offensive performances.
He was on both ends. But ok.
But not all of the series. It's almost like he had some bad games and some good games. Crazy, I know.
OK he didn't show up every game and guard Giannis...right let's keep on going back to PPG
