Pistons on a back to back and travelled overnight to Brooklyn. Even terrible teams win this game.
2016-2017 NBA Game Thread
- Thread starter Kliq
- Start date
Great 538 piece today on some of the stuff you guys have been discussing in here: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/can-the-warriors-break-basketball-again/
It beats his earlier strategy of trading away Harden and replacing his minutes with a fully cooked Derek Fisher and Reggie Jackson.
He is fine as a rotation guy and its not even Presti's fault. Bennett hamstrung that team by not taking advantage of (paying for) that core and the team had an over matched Brooks coaching. No wonder Durant bailed.
Meanwhile he clearly came ready to play tonight.
In other news, watch the Bucks. Greek Freak and Jabari each had 27 points in a win over the Pacers.
He was there but OKC ran an iso-heavy, hero offense. What a difference playing with unselfish players makes.
Dubs found a second quarter groove that was based on D (like last season) and ball movement. Then again, against a b-t-b road OKC... so discounted, but they're showing a glimpse of what they can become.
[/ignoring KD/Westbrook sideshow}
[/ignoring KD/Westbrook sideshow}
This. 100% this. I was watching this game and thinking how awesome it would be to have Durant doing his stuff on a team that hadn't just won 73 games.
The EC will be even less interesting. Cavs have literally no threat barring a Cousins to Boston trade or something.
Realistically it went from there being four teams that could win the championship to three--and god forbid something like Kawhi getting hurt happens.
Brooks was low-key one of the league's worst coaches.
That play=why I love the NBA.
Lakers running the Dubs off the court by the way. I don't think LAL are all that terrible this year.
Maybe the best one of the year. I can't wait to see the menes. Nance used West's face for leverage.
LA may have a decent young core. They definitely will finish with a better record than the Nets.
Still (extremely) early but Ingram hasn't made much of an impact. Wonder if the Celtics will come to view getting the 3rd rather than 2nd pick as a blessing in disguise
Still (extremely) early but Ingram hasn't made much of an impact. Wonder if the Celtics will come to view getting the 3rd rather than 2nd pick as a blessing in disguise
Lou Williams (!) looking like a really great add. I can't even believe he is only 30 years old.
Who am I to call you out Klay?
You actually didn't have a bad start last year. You began the year shooting 17-43 in three's, roughly 40% which is a tad below your career avg. You are beginning this year 9-46 just under 20% so no it isn't the same as last year. Don't worry though I'll be here watching to see how well you adapt.
As far as this team goes it isn't hard to see how they have completely lost their edge on the defensive end without Bogut and Barnes (and to a degree Iggy and Klay who aren't the same yet this year on the defensive side). Their legacy will be defined by their playoff performance but how this team learns to gel during the course of the season is going to continue being interesting to see.
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Its too early to make a decent assessment of any team.
As was pointed out upthread, Bogut is 31 years old and has a long injury history (he missed last night's Portland game due to "personal reasons") so expecting him to be their defensive anchor was a gamble anyhow. That said, based on the horribly small sample size of six games, its clear they miss his presence in the interior. Pachulia is ok but he is nowhere near the defender that Bogut is and when opponnents funnel players into the middle, they are able to get easy buckets by rolling their bigs to the rim to catch passes/lobs. That didn't happen against peak Bogut.
One other thing, if the Warriors shoot 30% versus their team average of 40% all season they are going to lose a lot of games. However, if you believe that Kerr & company are reasonably well prepared and that mean reversion is a thing, they will be just fine.
As was pointed out upthread, Bogut is 31 years old and has a long injury history (he missed last night's Portland game due to "personal reasons") so expecting him to be their defensive anchor was a gamble anyhow. That said, based on the horribly small sample size of six games, its clear they miss his presence in the interior. Pachulia is ok but he is nowhere near the defender that Bogut is and when opponnents funnel players into the middle, they are able to get easy buckets by rolling their bigs to the rim to catch passes/lobs. That didn't happen against peak Bogut.
One other thing, if the Warriors shoot 30% versus their team average of 40% all season they are going to lose a lot of games. However, if you believe that Kerr & company are reasonably well prepared and that mean reversion is a thing, they will be just fine.
They didn't just lose Bogut, they lost Ezeli as well; and for most of last season Ezeli did a good job filling in as a rim protector when Bogut was out/limited.
The Warriors might have problems, but last night didn't teach me that much. This is a very un-analytical assessment but some nights it just isn't your night, and last night everything was coming up Lakers. The Warriors (Curry in particular) missed a bunch of open shots and the Lakers managed to get what I felt was a disproportionate of loose balls. I think the Warriors did give up defensively in the second half, but I find it hard to take anything away from that game other then that the Lakers are going to be a little bit better than people expected.
The Warriors might have problems, but last night didn't teach me that much. This is a very un-analytical assessment but some nights it just isn't your night, and last night everything was coming up Lakers. The Warriors (Curry in particular) missed a bunch of open shots and the Lakers managed to get what I felt was a disproportionate of loose balls. I think the Warriors did give up defensively in the second half, but I find it hard to take anything away from that game other then that the Lakers are going to be a little bit better than people expected.
Agreed. I would add that that Walton's institutional knowledge of both squads makes the Lakers a more formidable opponent than other teams. I really like D'Angelo Russell's game, Lou Williams is a great sixth man and Nance Jr. continues to impress in a traditional big sort of way. I agree that the Lakers are likely going to outperform expectations this season with their three plus bigs and army of two guards.
Late to this but it's interesting to me because I remember having a conversation with my brother thirty-something years ago or so regarding really really good NBA players who seemed totally overlooked by the media. Mychal Thompson (pre-Lakers) was at the top of the list. (I recall that Greg Ballard was another.)
The Lakers really made the right choice with Russell over Okafor! Bugger.
I think the sixers will be around the worst team again, esp with Noel and Simmons (and bayless) out and Embiid and Okafor on minute restrictions. And looks like Lakers baring a big change could well finish outside the top 3. Not too high though and that means likely two more good picks for them.
Embiid is keeping the haters quiet enough. But they really miss Noel when he's out defensively. What I do see signs of is that Okafor could be a nice piece off the bench. Against second units he's even more difficult to stop and easier to hide defensively.
I think the sixers will be around the worst team again, esp with Noel and Simmons (and bayless) out and Embiid and Okafor on minute restrictions. And looks like Lakers baring a big change could well finish outside the top 3. Not too high though and that means likely two more good picks for them.
Embiid is keeping the haters quiet enough. But they really miss Noel when he's out defensively. What I do see signs of is that Okafor could be a nice piece off the bench. Against second units he's even more difficult to stop and easier to hide defensively.
Harden had his fourth 30 point/15 assist game of the season last night. There were only 3 of those last year.
He has a very legitimate chance of leading the league in both scoring and assists.
He has a very legitimate chance of leading the league in both scoring and assists.
and turnovers. Although Russell Westbrook may have a chance at leading the league in all 3 too.
Zach LaVine has progressed so nicely as an offensive player, dropping a career-high 37 tonight. A guy with his limitless athleticism adding so much polish to his offensive game is a scary thing. Also at the 1:10 mark of this video KAT delivers one of the all-time live mic moments:
DeMar DeRozan is having an incredible start to the season, averaging 33.7 ppg as 2 guard that doesn't shoot threes. That is crazy. Other weird statistical anomalies so far this season: Andrew Wiggins is leading the NBA in three-point percentage, having made 12-18 threes so far; Avery Bradley is averaging almost 9 rpg and Devin Booker is averaging more ppg than LeBron James,.
DeMar DeRozan is having an incredible start to the season, averaging 33.7 ppg as 2 guard that doesn't shoot threes. That is crazy. Other weird statistical anomalies so far this season: Andrew Wiggins is leading the NBA in three-point percentage, having made 12-18 threes so far; Avery Bradley is averaging almost 9 rpg and Devin Booker is averaging more ppg than LeBron James,.
The TNT crew weighed in on the election. No earth shattering opinions but at least they took a crack at it. ESPN would never do that.
Pop had a word or two as well: http://deadspin.com/gregg-popovich-blasts-donald-trumps-election-in-lengthy-1788886905
Pop is just a quality human being. It's not hard to see how he could easily become a father figure for so many players.
Stan Van Gundy on Trump
http://deadspin.com/stan-van-gundy-on-trumps-victory-we-have-just-thrown-1788776765
http://deadspin.com/stan-van-gundy-on-trumps-victory-we-have-just-thrown-1788776765
Steve Kerr on the election
Quite different than what we got from NFL coaches who make their living off of black labor.
A new career high 47 for Andrew Wiggins tonight. The Baby Wolves are as advertised; not very good but really fun to watch because you just kind of get excited when some of their guys do good stuff. Reminds me of the Thunder with Durant/Westbrook/Harden when they were only winning 30 games but you just KNEW these guys were going to be good.
I always loved this player. He's still only 21 and seen his scoring avg go from 16 to 21 to now over 26 per game. He has finally gone from having great potential as a 3-point shooter with good mechanics, quick release, etc to someone capable of being a 40%+ shooter from out there.
If you look at the playoffs game-by-game you'll see that Love wasn't a difference maker in ANY of their wins so I'd have to say yes they do win last year without Love. He was an afterthought in the finals against Golden State often times being relinquished to the bench in favor of better matchups and in his two big games against Toronto the Cavs won each by 30+ points.
Ummm, you are clearly forgetting something:
In all seriousness the "Do they win the championship?" argument is dumb, especially when the team won a close Game 7, there are so many seemingly unimportant plays that could have decided it. The Cavs were not looking to build a team for the future when LeBron came back, so at the time Love for Wiggins was the right move, especially because LeBron didn't really want anything to do with Wiggins. I think it is also fair to speculate that Wiggins wouldn't have developed at the same rate being the 8th man on Cleveland.
Different also from Phil Jackson's riff, channeling Pat Riley, about Lebron's "posse".
You are obviously forgetting that the most important play in the series for the Cavs involved Kevin Love. . . . (see below).
Real question is whether they could have won two years ago with Andrew Wiggins instead Love.
The play:
In my clipps defense, you don't break your fall by pulling a guy's neck down with you