I know the feeling! I had a run of posts a couple of weeks ago where I was just missing or mis-typing things! No worries.
2023-2024 General NBA Season Thread
- Thread starter BigSoxFan
- Start date
Appreciate it! About 2 years old. Must have had interesting upbringing. Didn't know how to climb stairs, didn't know how to eat out of a dog bowl, would only drink out of toilet bowl and thinks it is perfectly acceptable to casually walk into the shower when we are in there....he'd flip it up by smashing his paw on it so all the food would be in midair for like 8 seconds then eat sprawled out on the floor. He initially lunged toward all the dogs on the street and our cats. I wanted to name him Draymond but the wife shot it down.
Nets, Raptors, Bulls & Hawks are firmly in NBA purgatory. None of them have the alpha to drag them out of it.
Move veterans for picks, play youngsters & try to strike, in the next few years, when there are NBA yard sales (Wizards summer '23, SAS 2 years ago, Pacers summer '22, etc)
Ha. I wanted to name my first kid "Ortiz" if it was a girl but my wife was firmly a NO.
BUT when we got our Black Lab during COVID, it was "Big Papi" and I wasn't hearing anything other.
I did watch the game live, and while some of the calls were borderline, there didn't appear to be any that were just plain wrong. Toronto did challenge one of them, which was upheld because of course it was, largely on the "he slightly grazed him" standard of review that foul calls get. And then having lost that, couldn't call for a review on a slightly sketchier call against them a minute later. The flagrant was legit - Quickley led with his elbows trying to do a crossover and got Barrett right in the teeth, it was a pretty solid blow, although not if you went by Toronto's announcers. They always say "what do you want him to do!" on those kind of calls, but I mean, you brought your arms up to head height and then swung them across your body to do the crossover - you're responsible for where your arms go. Don't hit a guy's face with force.
The bigger issue is that you can't ask for a review of a non-call. There were definitely 2 or 3 TOR possessions where it looked like contact was made under the basket but there was no call. I think once on a made basket where there should've been an and-1, and once or twice on a miss amid a scrum around the basket. We'll see what the L2M report says, but my impression is that this was on the edge of what is normal NBA refereeing, with no decisions that were egregious, but all of the judgment calls just happening to favor the Lakers.
Is Jarred Vanderbilt the worst offensive player in the league? He is a hell of a defender, but is shooting 7% from three for the year and 37% overall. With a ridiculous usage of 9.2%
They keep sticking him in the corner as a spot up 3-shooter. He's either bricking those, taking a couple dribbles in to take, and miss, a more difficult shot, or passing out which fucks up the set bc the flow should result in an open corner 3. He's been really really awful since he's gotten back from injury.
Another example of a player at $4MM is a great piece at the very end of a rotation/10th man that can play a situational role (Brissett for Boston this year)
I realize $50MM contracts aren't going to break any team BUT the coach is somewhat forced to start playing them more and incompatible situations.
You start littering your roster like the Lakers have with these type of contracts and all they have to deal is filler
Vanderbilt is highly skilled though unlike Brissett who is a hustler/grinder. He's def a rotation player but has to get his 3-pt shooting up over 30%. It shouldn't be this hard IF he puts the work in as these are all uncontested corner 3's he's either missing or passing up.
His upside is that of a poor man's Lamar Odom without the crack pipe or Kardashians.
TOR believes Scottie Barnes is the guy. Of course, there's a really big difference between being a really good player and The Guy.
Haha, thanks for this. The answer is unfortunately pretty generic but it's the same way I handle sports bets: Knowing your resources. And what do they do? I'm no Arnold though.
The crux of it comes down to if I have a question posed to me or I'm curious about it, I think about where I can get that kind of data from. The question is always: Where have I been able to answer a similar question based on similar criteria before? And for me, quarter splits of any type are easiest to search on Statmuse. From there, it's just knowing how to type what you get back in Google and back to Basketball Reference to confirm the data and do some math. Although not true to this example, data dumping and coding is a huge part of what I believe in as well so I can create my custom data.
If those don't do it, and I'd say they do a good 80% of the time as a guesstimate, I find a lot of statistical inquiries are similar, so check them. After all: It's often a race vs. me against the other people who do this stuff in like a Shams vs. Woj rivalry but it's for stats. If they win, you save yourself the work. Knowing what other pages will give you good content, not only to use but to build upon, is helpful when it comes down to stats like this. My feed is curated with really specific follows of writers, stats, and stats companies*. So that way, when a narrative inevitably happens somewhere, I'm either building it or I'm finding it before anyone else.
It goes back to a core value I was taught at MLBN and NHLN when doing stats like this for a job professionally: You want all the answers, yes, but that's not enough. You want to be thinking about how to answer what's going to be asked before it DOES get asked. That also ties into one of my core principles of life and ultimately statistical measure: Stay two steps ahead so that when you inevitably fall behind one, you're still ahead of everyone else.
*Sharp bettors and SoSHers of course too because yeah.
Clipps shot 19 free throws (6 in the 4th quarter). Lakers shot 16 (4 in the 4th)
I need to see AI and @Brand Name go at it in a cage match...
My money is on Brandy since ChatGPT is rubbish when it comes to sports data
My money is on Brandy since ChatGPT is rubbish when it comes to sports data
6 great weeks and the Clippers are ready to sign up for another 3 years of the Kawhi show. Good for him, it's pretty decent money considering he's played just 219 games (including playoffs) in 4.5 seasons with the clippers and this deal is for his age 33, 34 and 35 seasons. Gotta assume Paul George is next. In for a penny, in for a pound.
Yeah this to me is like the Celtics giving Brown the super max (you don't have to be super excited about it to know it's the right move). The only interesting part is that the Clippers are offering this now, and not 6 months ago (or whenever Kawhi became extension eligible). It's the correct way forward, retaining Kawhi (and presumably George) gives them a higher ceiling than any player or draft pick they could acquire in the short and medium term, plus they don't fully own their own 1st rounders until 2030.
The Clips just have to hope that the injuries were a string of bad luck and that they're not predictive, because they really haven't seemed to diminish him. Currently, he's 10th in PER, 13th in win shares, 10th in Box Plus/Minus, 13th in VAR, 21st in PPG, and is shooting 51/43/87. He's still really, really good.
It's a no-brainer for 50 games a year plus the playoffs, no? They really have no choice but to go this route. It's not like he isn't still a real good player.
Sure, but that's not exactly something they can put in the bank - he's had one full playoff run in 4 years (and that one season ended in disaster, blowing the 3-1 lead to Denver in the bubble). If his next 3.5 years look like his first 4.5 in LA, this will be a terrible deal. It doesn't feel very likely, but it's definitely better than the alternative, so kudos to them for just getting it done. It's worth the risk to see if it works out, and stranger things have happened. Grant Hill played just 135 games over 6 years from 2001-2006 (ages 28-33), then played 378 games in the subsequent 5 years from 2007-2011 (ages 34-38).
Would you have tried to trade Leonard? Absent trying to get a haul from Presti, I struggle to see what alternative the Clippers had. But I also agree that availability is an issue for Kawhi.
He is having a great season tho...
No, I wouldn't have traded him absent a monster deal that no one in their right mind would offer for a star as unreliable as Kawhi (Presti has the assets for that sort of move, but he'd be a fool to make that move for someone like Kawhi when he already has an alpha in SGA). This is the move the Clippers had to cross their fingers and make.
In an alternate timeline a mediocre LAC season might have seen a trade like that. Presti has all these decaying assets and no obvious target. Leonard is a player who can fit next to just about anyone too imo.
That said, for those who haven't seen him play much this season, he looks like whatever he did over the off-season turned back the clock a bit. The Clippers are kind of scary at full strength (sorry @ElUno20 ).
It isn't like they are the Suns or even Warriors or Lakers....this core is really freakin good and a top tier contender in the WC.
Are you trying to suggest that context matters even for Darko? Say it ain't so.
*if healthy. It's both sad and boring to discuss, but that's it. Their ceiling might be greater than any of those teams (not a given, considering the list above includes two of the last four champions and those groups still have the same stars), but the Clippers have greater injury concerns than the Suns, Warriors, Lakers, or really any playoff team. Every discussion of the Celtics title hopes seem to revolve around keeping KP healthy, but KP played 27 more games than George and 55 games more than Kawhi over the last 4 years. I hope they stay healthy because I like watching them and it's fun when the Clippers are better than the Lakers (and because the Kawhi/George duo mirrors what Boston has been doing with the Tatum/Brown duo over the last few years), but I am not holding my breath.
Stop bringing rationality to it! I watched the game and as in any game there were a few calls that could go either way, but nothing egregious. People pointing to FT differential as proof of bias is just so lame.
But mostly I'm replying to say -- love that dog! (the cat, meh...). Very cool.
Went to Sixers - Hawks. Jalen Johnson iced the game in overtime with a corner three right in front of the Philly bench. Lots of fun.
When your owner has a net worth of $112 billion, $150 million seems to be not that big of a deal.
Marcus hurt again, out 6 weeks.
I kind of laughed when everyone called KP injury prone, but ignored the fact Marcus has been falling apart physically the past 2-3 years. Dude is always hurt, he’s logged so many high-stress miles physically and played injured so often, I don’t think he has much time left as a starter tbh. He’ll be a great bench energy guy, though, if he can accept it as a role.
I kind of laughed when everyone called KP injury prone, but ignored the fact Marcus has been falling apart physically the past 2-3 years. Dude is always hurt, he’s logged so many high-stress miles physically and played injured so often, I don’t think he has much time left as a starter tbh. He’ll be a great bench energy guy, though, if he can accept it as a role.
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Marcus hit a 3 point shot immediately after hurting his finger, which is crazy:
View: https://twitter.com/Ballislife/status/1745113702154531035?s=20
View: https://twitter.com/Ballislife/status/1745113702154531035?s=20
https://www.xe.com/currencyconverter/convert/?Amount=25000&From=USD&To=RSD
Rajaković should pay the fine in 2,670,634.2 Serbian Dinars.. If the NBA really wants the money they would have to go to a currency exchange
Bobby Portis mik'd up in layup line tonight....
Ernie Johnson: What has to be fixed defensively?
Bobby Portis: Not much.
Ernie Johnson: What has to be fixed defensively?
Bobby Portis: Not much.
Kyrie putting on a show in Dallas. 38 pts still in 3Q and singlehandedly stopping Knick runs. He's got 20 already in the 3Q.
Nah, he should pay it in sports-betting account credits, since that's the only currency the league seems to value.
Is this the year of the win-win trade?
Raptors-Knicks so far looks good for both sides, as all the principal players involved have been good, notwithstanding some tough west coast losses for Tor.
76ers-Clippers is turning into one of the more interesting trades in years, although the "win" status for Philly depends a lot on who they are able to add at the deadline.
Stretching a bit further...
Celtics-Grizz: yes, it's been a year from hell for Memphis and Smart has been hurt. But it's looked really good at moments and bodes well for the future, the pairing of him with Ja and Bane. C's have obviously been delighted so far.
Blazers-Suns: similar to above, hasn't been fun season in Phoenix. But Jurkic has played better than Ayton, and they got desperately needed supporting assets out of the deal. Meanwhile, Portland got the younger, higher-upside player, so it aligns with what both franchises are trying to do.
Blazers-Bucks: I guess this belongs as well, although so much of "win-win" is contingent on how far MIL goes in the postseason.
Raptors-Knicks so far looks good for both sides, as all the principal players involved have been good, notwithstanding some tough west coast losses for Tor.
76ers-Clippers is turning into one of the more interesting trades in years, although the "win" status for Philly depends a lot on who they are able to add at the deadline.
Stretching a bit further...
Celtics-Grizz: yes, it's been a year from hell for Memphis and Smart has been hurt. But it's looked really good at moments and bodes well for the future, the pairing of him with Ja and Bane. C's have obviously been delighted so far.
Blazers-Suns: similar to above, hasn't been fun season in Phoenix. But Jurkic has played better than Ayton, and they got desperately needed supporting assets out of the deal. Meanwhile, Portland got the younger, higher-upside player, so it aligns with what both franchises are trying to do.
Blazers-Bucks: I guess this belongs as well, although so much of "win-win" is contingent on how far MIL goes in the postseason.
Marcus has been pretty bad overall tbh. Terrible three point shooting, horrible turnover to assist numbers (4:3 YUCK), injured most of the season, etc. Maybe he fits with Ja and it all turns around, but his play without him has been largely of the Bad Marcus variety. And I don’t think his injuries are going away without a reduced role.
Blazers-Cs: I'd say both sides are extremely happy with this trade thus far, not even including what PDX should get for Brogdon.