Forty years later I still don’t understand why the Knicks didn’t stick Red with that bucket of bolts.
The Nation's Tears (C's Edition!)
- Thread starter Kliq
- Start date
It almost feels like Philly fans are taking this worse than the Lakers cult members.
Sixers, Bucks, and Heat fans have been the ones melting down the most.
It’s amazing.
Lakers fans have a recent title, as do the Bucks (and many of them have some mixed feelings given that they almost universally love Holiday). The Heat lose some bragging rights despite feeling like they have an edge over every team in the east because they haven't won in the Jimmy era, but ultimately nothing is denting their feeling of superiority. This just kills the Sixers, in part because the Celtics are their biggest rivals, in part because they haven't even come close to accomplishing anything, and in part because of their connection with several key Celtic players.
I'm happy to see everyone in that group unhappy, but I especially root for bad times for the Sixers. Until the fruits of The Process (Embiid) are gone, they deserve nothing but injuries and early playoff exits. The basketball gods demand nothing less.
They call the Celtics "C-bags"? That's legitimately hilarious in how pathetic and sad it is. I had a good laugh, thank you.
They should - Lakers were never getting Tatum as we all know. And some Lakers fans still think Ingram is better than Brown (you can see in the replies below that tweet), but either way the player would have been shipped out for AD. And they won a championship, so fine. They got what they wanted. I think, in time, our side of that draft will prove more fruitful for longer (hopefully multiple championships), but right now it's 1v1.
Sixers fans, on the other hand, watched their team blow two #1 picks in a row while they were asked to patiently await "the process" that has been a complete, embarrassing failure to launch. Meanwhile, Boston picked behind them and got their franchise cornerstones and a championship. If they hadn't hit on Maxey, I think there'd be some Jonestown vibes happening for Philly fans.
In the eight Embiid years the Sixers have gone farther than Boston in the playoffs once, and one year they both lost in the ECSF. And six years Boston went further. And now Boston has the banner.
Embiid is getting very close to having one of those rare ringless MVP careers.
Edit: “very close” is probably overstating it but in my defense he plays great but he moves like he’s about fifty.
Embiid is getting very close to having one of those rare ringless MVP careers.
Edit: “very close” is probably overstating it but in my defense he plays great but he moves like he’s about fifty.
He's a great twitter follow right now. And this really cracks me up...Haslem really said "Dallas is deeper.." and the first player he mentioned is Dante fucking Exum. Lol, he should be banned as analyst/performer/clown forever if that's what he's bringing, Celtics hate or not.
View: https://twitter.com/Obrissy/status/1803117033263169913
So many weird takes by the media. Kyrie has a good series against Minnesota (which followed a crap series against OKC) so now he’s better than Jaylen and Jayson was lol wut? But the Exum thing is hilarious; I was irrationally anxious all through the finals but I assure you I didn’t sweat a drop over Dante Exum.
is it common for there to be such a big skew between the media takes and the betting odds? it must be, because the media are idiots, but i also feel like they typically choose the betting favorite when it’s a decently large gap. too lazy and averse to going on Espn to check.
Philly fans being the only ones in the world who dislike Al Horford will never get old. You signed a 5 to play next to your all-world 5, how did you think it was going to work out?
Hmmm.... ESPN now gets boatloads of money from booking sites.... Booking sites want people to make losing bets so they make more money.... ESPN likes money above all else, and what's good for the sportsbook is good for their ad revenue. I think it's as simple as them in cahoots and it feels like it should be illegal
I doubt these predictions were coming from on high, just because they fit so perfectly all the usual ways in which the media are bad at talking about basketball / sports.
- Overly focused on the "best player on the court" idea
- Overly focused on crunch time
- Over emphasize highlight type plays when talking about player skills, hence how you get chuckleheads saying Kyrie is the second best player in the series.
- Over index on the narratives they already have cooked up out of thin air, in this case that the Celtics always underperform / choke / aren't good enough at this level.
I don't think it takes a conspiracy to get dum dums like Perkins and Stephen A Smith to pick the Mavericks.
I hear yeah, but I really think people need to start thinking of places like ESPN as businesses over sports commentary or the NBA solely as just a sports league, especially once gambling became involved. SAS had Perk on his pod after the C's won, and they had logical takes. Perk and RJ are much different on the pod Road Trippin than NBA Tonight. I think we can agree that ESPN directs them to make their points, and I'm absolutely positive every morning they have meetings before the shows to decide whose going to make what crazy take to make sure they're in there, and who picks what side, no matter how tough to argue. It's not a far stretch for them to be told to push the Mavs narrative for betting purposes. Despite most of the shitty takes, they aren't really dumb enough to have so many people pick the Mavs over the Cs like they did without some direction. Outside of Boston no one will remember their picks in an effort to make ESPN more money
I do think the cynical play for them is to just move on to the next take. And if you launch enough takes without doing post-mortems it sort of overwhelms the typical viewer’s memory faculties.
Exactly, it's the Twitter mentality. That's why I think it would be crazy if ESPN wasn't taking advantage of it with its betting partners. Since it's apparently legal it would almost be malpractice not to take advantage
Media taking odd positions because it means more money for them is nothing new.
Embiid is going to have to have a LOT go right, both in terms of health, roster, and opponents to win a title in Philly. It's possible, but not looking great.
I’d almost bet on Orlando or Indiana to put it together before Philly does… and then you also have Milwaukee and New York.. without even mentioning Boston who are just getting to their primes.
Philly will be opening up a lot of cap space shortly once they renounce those holds on Tobias Harris and Buddy Hield and Batum. They could certainly restructure their surrounding roster around Embiid and Maxey in a pretty big way, so not willing to count them out of becoming a serious contender again. And sometimes oft-injured players are able to put together a healthy season and playoff run (Anthony Davis, Kawhi). All the more reason I'm glad the Celtics pulled it off this year, as there are never guarantees of success in future seasons.
Agreed overall, but Philly building around Maxey and Embiid is basically another double heliocentric offensive team, like Dallas. Even if they land the most obvious and good wing available, possibly Paul George, is anyone worried about going up against a team whose three best players by playoff time are a smurf guard, an out of condition big, and the invisible man? I'm not.
Agreed that it is possible.
I’m surprised that the 2002 title isn’t similarly widely seen as illegitimate. They would have lost to the Kings but for literally criminally corrupt officiating.
So Embiid's best chance is to sign the right guy(s) and then have to play against a historically good BOS team and then play someone coming out of the West?
Yes teams can get out mistakes but if PHI doesn't hit this off-season, they have to wait until BOS can't afford the team anymore; hope other EC teams don't find/acquire another superstar; hope that the teams in the WC don't get take too many steps forward; and hope that Wemby doesn't become a MVP in the next two years (as we all think he might be).
Plus Embiid has to stay healthy.
They got a LOT riding on this summer, or, if they somehow kick the can down the road, next summer.
Agreed. Orlando, Pacers, & Knicks are headed in the right direction. The NYK/Pacer front offices have proven themselves to be very sharp. It will be interesting to see how both teams round out their rosters.
As far as Philly, Morey wisely took advantage of the OKC ownership group and has milked the Harden deal into a Lifetime Achievement Award. They are way too leveraged to a 30yr old Embiid's knees, ankle, foot, migraines, fitness, etc
The odds are Joel will age poorly while Philly will be forced to pony up MAX contracts for his declining years.
A purgatory team like Utah should try to capture 76er future draft assets by offering Lauri/Clarkson, etc
https://www.foxsports.com/nba/joel-embiid-player-injuries
He's 30, in 3-4 years, he'll come to Boston as "new Al Walton" to play 20 mpg and help Brown, Tatum and White win more titles.
I think what I’d ask Wright is if he thinks Dallas would beat Indiana in a seven game series. Because I’ve just watched both those teams and I have my very strong doubts.
Why would a sports book business care who wins? The point is to set the odds to clear any outcome (to make money being a broker)??
If there are wise guys employed by the book to bet against "irrational" markets, that could be a source of profit.
But is that a major component of any of their businesses?
BTW: as in 2008, the toughest out was not the finals. Cleveland in 2008, Indiana in 2024.
I don't know how this works so someone correct me but I read somewhere that they don't actually set the odds to clear any outcome. The books have their own models and predictions and will tack the line to those predictions even in cases of lopsided betting, as was the case here where apparently 70pct of the money or something came in on Dallas for the series but the line never really moved past Boston -220.
I'm sure plenty here can opine on this better than I can, but I'm pretty sure a significant % of the bets this series were on the Mavs.
Vegas doesn't automatically move the lines to get it close to 50/50 on each side if they feel the market is being irrational.
I wrote the same thing recently about the bolded. Indy would struggle to stop Dallas for sure, but Dallas would also struggle badly to stop Indy even without Haliburton. I think that it would be 6-7 games of 130-125, and I have zero idea who would win. Indy's offense is elite.
Nick Wright is a fellow Syracuse Newhouse grad. He has natural talent. But he had decided to use ot to become a caricature of a sports analyst. It's embarrassing.
Yup. Game 1 I think was 80% at some point on the Mavs? And Mavs were much higher than 50% of the bets to win the series as well. Not sure what the Game by game numbers ended up.
If Vegas runs their models and disagrees with the public, they are going to bet against the public, not just move the line in response.
Yeah, it makes sense. Vegas should have excellent models since they can afford good people. If your models are good, you make more money in the long run setting the line to the model as opposed to setting the line to get 50 / 50 on each side. And Vegas has the advantages of time and volume to get that sweet central limit theorem limiting their variance.
Somebody needs to investigate how these ESPN talking head morons influence the way people bet on the ESPN bet app.
So much money poured in on Dallas based on what these guys say
So much money poured in on Dallas based on what these guys say
If I was a risk manager at Disney/ESPN or any public co. responsible for the gambling chunk, I'd try to manage it so my ROI was pretty fucking locked in. Maybe I salt the position a little or I have to if I can't easily lay off or readjust points or ML, but taking on the same uncertainty as the public, (this assumes a transparent market for info) is not the goal of risk management. Further if investors understand the risks you are taking, (you're betting and not managing risk) for little real reward they may kill your stock valuation. Real money. Risk/reward seems out of line.
Thats my take
Thats my take
It does feel like a large % of sports journalists (non-athlete types) come from Newhouse.
If you work in that field it's probably overbearing.
ESPN's Orange/Boeheim ball-washing has always been over the top.
As a Cuse grad myself, Nick Wright is an embarrassment, probably the worst in the business.
Pretty sure like, 75% of people working in sports media either went to Syracuse or Medill (Northwestern).
Journalism is EXTREMELY fraternal in that sense. 90% of the people that work on the Globe for instance, went to like, four or five colleges (Emerson, BU, BC, Northeastern, Syracuse).
Once you accept that the purpose of the media is to get people's attention, and one of the best ways to get people's attention is to get them outraged over the idiocy of what you said, the media gets a lot easier to understand.
It's such a weird idea that playing a really difficult conference slate makes you "more prepared" and thus more likely to win the Finals. In that Ringer article about teams that faced in easiest paths to the Finals, I think all of the least-challenged teams in their list won the Finals except for the '84 Lakers.
The path the Celtics took in '22 was brutal and by the time they got to the Finals they were exhausted and beat up. I'm not sure "being tested" is a recipe for success.
Drake lost a cool $500K on the Mavs. Tears! Drake loses half a million bet on Celtics vs. Mavericks in NBA Finals (tribune.com.pk)
This. No one remembers anyone who picked BOS, except perhaps Lowe, but in this case only because he repeats it like every time he talks about the Cs ("I picked them when the season started, I picked before the playoffs started, and I picked them in the Finals").
