Yes. A billion plus 1.
The pick and roll with Giannis and Lopez exploiting dwarfish Heat defenders was as reliably unstoppable as any play you're going to see in NBA playoff basketball. Every time they went away from that— usually to something involving Holiday or Middleton generating the offense— it felt like a gift to Miami. I don't understand sometimes why teams don't just run the same advantageous play into the ground in these situations.
So crazy and terrifying that Philly could have had him for just money and years (judging by all reporting that I've seen, and his "Tobias Harris over ME?!")
Yeah, what a truly epic fail. That's when you just take your GM out behind the shed and shoot him.
This is where I'm at. All the front-running chirping they do, yet complete silence after they (always) lose, with obviously the main star Dillon Bricks leading the way. Really is awesome even if it's the Lakers beating them.
It’s crazy to see how good Philly is right now despite ALL of their fuckups in recent past.
This is where I'm at. During the season you want to keep exploring all your options, but when you need the W, you run what's working. Over and over and over until the other team finds a way to stop it. Then you adjust.
I do think that Mil can win the next three games if they wise up, force-feed that mismatch and stops screwing around. Miami HAS to go small to score points. They need to roll out Bam, Jimmy and 3 smaller players, both for the 3-ball and for the spacing to give Jimmy room to operate. There's no way in hell that lineup can reliably defend Lopez and Giannis.
I think what impressed me most, relative to other "guy went off" games of the past 10 years, is that most of those other games were:
Don't forget that the Bucks could also have a super-cold game from 3, Giannis' back could act up...a lot of the surprises that can happen are bad for Milwaukee.
Butler hit a ton of midrange jumpers, showing that you can still win that way in the NBA. Maybe not reliably, game after game, but I love seeing guys go off from that area of the court in an age when basketball is all threes and drives to the rim. I personally prefer basketball when teams utilize the entire court to score and not just use certain areas.
Trading Mikal Bridges for Zhaire Smith, drafting Jahlil Okafor…those are 4 MASSIVE whiffs. It’s impressive that they are as good as they are really
The Heat would be a pain (although the Knicks would be favored imo), but this also reflects poorly on the Bucks once again.
I just re-watched the ending— it's really amazing. At one moment you have:
Just goes to show you how many assets you can gather + cap space you can create by openly tanking for 3-4 seasons (or was it longer?)
I knew there were more I just couldn’t think of them at the time. The Bridges one, kid from Philly whose mother worked for the Sixers, is kinda hysterical in hindsight.
13-17 from 3 in this series, remarkable considering his arc over the last few seasons.
Sixers also traded Jrue Holiday for Nerlens Noel, a Philly buddy just reminded me.
The Warriors still need to win a game on the road to play that winner.
We've seen the "limited Embiid" movie before, and it's not a great one for the Sixers. The Celtics will probably be able to get up in him with single coverage with lower risk, and the knee will be in constant danger of getting worse.
Yes, but Fox is hurt. I don't think Sac can win this if he's very limited or unavailable.
Is it silly that my hope for the Sixers series (assuming they get there) is Embiid plays albeit with limited mobility, rather than sitting? If he sits out, I fear the dynamic where the C's let up a bit, Sixers play faster (on account of the smaller lineup) and with more urgency (b/c they know it's an uphill climb) and catch us flatfooted.
This reminds me of the 2018 Pats being 3-5 on the road having beaten no one and going on the road in Arrowhead to win the AFC. For veteran championship teams it may just not matter.
What makes it even worse is that they didn't really choose Harris over Butler, they chose Simmons over Butler. See: https://nba.nbcsports.com/2022/05/12/report-76ers-felt-they-must-choose-between-ben-simmons-and-jimmy-butler/.
The sixers were set up to hit a home run in that draft and managed to turn it into a dribbler back to the pitcher. I wonder if Mikal’s Mom still works there.
The whole idea of a Knicks-Heat playoff match makes me giddy. I wonder if Jeff Van Gundy can be persuaded to make a guest appearance wrapped around Bam Adebayo’s leg.
From 2013 to 2018, they picked 11 (Carter Williams), 3 (Embiid - note PHI also picked Jeremi Grant in R2), 3 (Okafor), 1 (Simmons), 1 (Fultz), and 10 (Bridges).
Right, but 3-5 on the road was merely subpar for playoff teams (4 playoff teams that year were 4-4 on the road and the Patriots and Seahawks were 3-5). Only 4 NBA teams had fewer than 14 road wins this year; the others were the Pistons, Rockets, and Spurs. (Or, to put it another way, of the teams who made it to the Round of 16, the next worst road teams were the Hawks, the Heat, and the Suns at 17-24. A road record of 11-31 is much worse than a 3-5 road record.
The Warriors nearly went down 3-1 and still have to prove their road record this year wasn't just regular season resting BS.
All of your statements are absolutely true. But I think they have absolutely zero bearing on what happens from here. I hope I am wrong and the Dubs are incapable of winning on the road because a Finals rematch terrifies me.
That's kinda weird for just a stretch of his LCL. Rad can speculate better than I can, but it sounds like there's something else going on like an accompanying meniscus tear.
