Timpf has been concerned about the Laker's unathletic perimeter defenders all season
General NBA season thread: 24-25 edition
- Thread starter RorschachsMask
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He's been harping on that for a couple of years now. It's definitely one of their problems. The Lakers now have a point differential of -4.2. They're one game (two losses) behind the Warriors who have a point differential of +5.8. 10 point difference per game for these two teams (basically the difference between the 08 Celtics and league average), and just one game in the standings.
Apparently all the Wolves needed to get right was a few games against LA teams. They beat the Clippers on Saturday, blew out the Lakers on Monday, and are nearly doubling up the Clippers at halftime right now (59-32).
Athletic has an article on the arms race in practice facilities: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5965981/2024/12/05/nba-practice-facilities-arms-race/. Here's a preview:
more at the link.
The Cleveland Clinic Global Peak Performance Center, designed by the architecture firm Populous and expected to open in 2027, will escalate the most visible NBA off-court competition of the last decade to more garish and more player-friendly heights.
Since 2014, with basketball operations departments and team payrolls expanding, 20 of the league’s 30 franchises have opened new practice facilities. It has been an unrelenting contest of innovation and one-upmanship, with most of the participating clubs claiming new advantages in athlete care, roster retention and free-agency recruitment. In recent years, the price tag to build a standalone training center has typically ranged from $70 million to $90 million, according to figures cited by the teams, usually paid for by the franchises themselves.
“This is an arms race of sorts,” said Nic Barlage, the CEO of Rock Entertainment Group, an umbrella company for Cavs owner Dan Gilbert. “The NBA … is built off of innovation and evolution and leveraging all the amazing resources that we all have across the league.”
The new facilities share similar hallmarks. All of them feature two full-size basketball courts, allowing each team to operate more efficiently. Most of them, in conjunction with partner health care systems, boast state-of-the-art imaging equipment; in some cases, if a player suffers an injury during practice, he doesn’t need to leave the building to receive an MRI or X-rays. Training and recovery amenities include cutting-edge weight rooms, cold-plunge tubs and high-altitude simulation chambers. Chef-staffed kitchens offer fresh, healthy food.
more at the link.
I think I was the only person on the board that thought the Pacers were a play-in team going into the season.
I don't know if I ever made a real prediction, but I've said here a couple of times over the summer that they look more like the 2021 Hawks (surprise run to the ECF, led by a young offensive superstar who happened to be a complete liability on defense, followed by 3 straight play in trips) than a team on the rise and ready to compete with the top of the conference. I didn't foresee their current disaster (you can make a pretty good argument that outside of Philly, they've been the most disappointing team in the league), nor did I see Haliburton crumbling like he has. He looked like a darkhorse candidate for 1st team all-NBA at this time last year (through 12/5/23 he averaged 27/12/4 with just 2.4 TOs on .674 TS and had just beaten Boston in the first round of the IST), right now he shouldn't even be an all-star (averaging 18/8/3 with 2.0 TOs on .559 TS).
Middleton will make his season comeback against the Celtics on Friday according to The Athletic.
Bucks are 9-2 since they last played the Cs against mostly unimpressive opponents, but thats part of being in the East these days.
Will be interesting to see if/what he can give Milwaukee.
Bucks are 9-2 since they last played the Cs against mostly unimpressive opponents, but thats part of being in the East these days.
Will be interesting to see if/what he can give Milwaukee.
Ja Morant ejected on one of those fouls that the refs totally weren't going to call anymore preseason, and then reverted right to whistling for total bullshit.
View: https://twitter.com/CourtsideBuzzX/status/1864875996446331053
(Memphis held on and won the game)
View: https://twitter.com/CourtsideBuzzX/status/1864875996446331053
(Memphis held on and won the game)
Phoenix is 11-2 with Kevin Durant, and (after losing to 14th place Pelicans tonight) are just 1-7 without him. Good news I suppose is that when Durant is on the court, he's been as good as ever on offense, and defensively is putting in effort like I haven't seen since he played with the Warriors. Bad news is that they are just awful without him. Booker should been able to take his extremely successful olympic run and gotten better (he just turned 28 in October), but he's been underwhelming.
To be fair, the Pelicans are getting healthy and their lineup tonight didn’t resemble the one that was 4-18 entering the game.
Next up: "kawhi is killing it on the stationary bike, so look out for the Clippers."
Have to give IME credit, he walked straight into a shitshow and quickly turned Houston around. Impressive.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31Pmr19aPDE
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31Pmr19aPDE
And they are set up better than anybody in the league to go for it in a year or two. Young good players and plenty of picks
They're OKC, if SGA was the 15-20th best player in the league and not a top 5 guy. It's a pretty good place to be, and they emerged from the Harden trade (less than 4 years ago) in far less time than it took the Thunder to recover from Durant leaving. Obviously it's easier when you can trade your MVPs for assets and not watch them leave as a FA.
Yeah, the relevant timeline comparison is probably PG leaving OKC, since they got assets and SGA then. Houston still comes out looking great from that though.
Trading the Nets back their picks to get Phoenix's also looks great. The East is bad, the Nets are better than expected, and any Durant injuries will send Phoenix plummeting in the competitive West.
Added to the Suns angle is the idea that Houston actively wants to try and use those picks to trade for one of Durant or Booker if/when the Suns decide to re-set. Being able to offer PHO its own picks back is REALLY valuable in that context.
Yup, you can hold them hostage as the only way to rebuild post-Durant: trade us Booker, and you can have a future again.
ESPN did a top players under 25 list and the interesting question to me - which team is currently better set up for the future: OKC (maybe best short-term), HOU (4 guys on the list and potential break-out players in Eason and Thompson), ORL (two of the top 5 plus talent behind them), or SAS (best player). In addition, HOU, SAS, and OKC have lots of draft assets.
I think in general, I'd put HOU "last" among those four, because the better top-end talent still matters much more in the NBA than depth. Sengun is excellent, but I doubt he ever reaches "real MVP candidate" territory (no knock, that's hard to do) and the rest of their guys feel like they have sub-All-NBA ceilings due to their weaknesses. (They're still only "last" though, because the majority of the league would be thrilled to switch places with them; their position is still excellent...)
ORL is the most "settled" of those 4 teams, with lots of guys locked in long-term, and fewer draft assets. But Paulo might end up as the best player on any of these teams (Wemby would need to get hurt, but he's a 7-4 string bean, so *knock on wood* that could certainly happen) Franz is also awesome, and the defense around them is menacing.
Wemby probably ends up as the best player on any of those teams, they'll eventually be able to look for another star via trade, and if Castle can solidify his jumper, he'd join that 25-under-25 list VERY high.
But OKC has both two top-10 under 25 guys AND a guy who's going to get MVP votes for the foreseeable future, who is only 26. Plus a bucket of picks and a GM you KNOW will look for a high-impact trade.
Man, reviewing that PG / SGA trade 5.5 years on, it's just absurd how much of a heist it was. At the time (summer 2019), SGA had just finished a rookie season that got ROY votes, but it was George for:
SGA
Gallinari (salary ballast)
2021 1st, MIA's (18th; Tre Mann; traded to Charlotte in the Gordon Hayward salary dump that netted them two 2nds)
2022 1st, LAC's (12th; Jalen J-Dub Williams; finished 2nd in ROY, likely all-star this year, instant starter for them)
2023 1st, MIA's (18th; Jaime Jaquez; pick was traded back to Miami for Miami's 2025 1st-rounder top-14-protected plus a 2nd, if it doesn't convey next spring it becomes 2026 unprotected 1st)
2025 1st-rd swap rights with LAC (looking like it'll convey, currently #21 - I don't think there are protections)
2026 1st, LAC's
And they're a Harden injury away from getting a lottery pick from the Clippers either / both of the next two years. And we know what George gave the Clippers. For 4 unprotected firsts, one protected first (that they got back anyway), and one pick swap, all attached to a player who was better than the one they sent away by a year or so after the trade.
That is nearing Parish/McHale trade or Bill Russell trade territory as a top NBA heist of all time. And at the time we all agreed that it was a price the Clippers had to pay in order to get the Kawhi package... but man, maybe we were all wrong. Good christ.
It's always interesting examining how teams like Boston/Brad put it together over the last few years. Now we'll see if OKC can finish it off, loved the Caruso/Hartenstein(pricey) additions this summer.
Houston needs a few more deals; they don't have the talent right now to overtake Boston/OKC. They'll have to trade picks, young players, & make some GFIN trades. The final mile is the toughest.
Can't stand Ja's act -- what a poseur -- but he's 100% correct in this case. I'm also tired of Jenkins forever outraged act on the sidelines. But I really wish every time this BS call is made -- which is waaaaay too often -- both player and coach went insane like they did. I'm 100% sympathetic to the refs and how fast the game it is how so many calls are 50/50 situations and....basically it's an impossible job to get right. This call is not one of those. It's an easy non-call and yet time and time and time and time again you see it made.
Maybe if there's a freak-out each time refs would begin to think twice about those lazy calls.
Yeah, people forget how scared teams were of AllThePicks trades after the Nets fiasco. No one (iirc) had done it since then.
Presti thought he was getting an absolute haul just with the picks. Terrible work by LAC; very desperate.
PG and AD reopened the pick floodgates in the summer of 2019, and we've had a lot of AllThePickz+players deals since, but it was not standard at the time.
Except insofar as Presti had the Clippers over a barrel, because of Kawhi, so he could not only ask but insist for the moon.
I guess -- OKC wasn't getting that return for PG from anyone else, so there was a bit of a game of chicken, which Presti definitely won.
As was the case with Billy King, LA got really, really desperate and was exploited.
I loved loved loved the VanVleet signing. It gave them stability and allowed the youngs to be put in an easier position to succeed.
Last 40 seconds of overtime was insane. Lakers up 1 with the ball, Daniels picks off Davis trying to find LeBron, Bron does a chase down block. Given Hawks ball but LA challenges and wins. Inbound goes to Davis who gets tied up. After the jump ball, goes OOB off LeBron. Trae three for the lead. LeBron misses a three at the buzzer for the win.
Trae remains a really hard to assess NBA player. His field goal percentage is awful this year and he may be the worst defender in the entire NBA. He probably has no real trade market because of his deficiencies and his giant contract.
But he also has games like tonight where he is an entire offense onto himself and can outplay other teams star players and win you a game.
But he also has games like tonight where he is an entire offense onto himself and can outplay other teams star players and win you a game.
It was pretty close. Regardless the best part of that sequence was Daniels straight up swiping a lazy AD pass. Four more for the Great Barrier Thief. Dude is a menace.
Just waiting for the inevitable bail out trade. I mean they may not have another draft pick until Bronny has grandkids but it’s coming.
In the Pritchard thread an insightful comment was made that Lebron should be phasing his career out ala Big Al, instead he logged 43 minutes last night in an OT loss. 39 pts, 10 reb, 11 ast, 2 stls & 3 blks. When he plays a game at this high level it should be an automatic win. Instead he has to leave it all on the court to lose to the Hawks.
Over the years, I have become a Lebron fan and am certain the Atlanta crowd had a great time last night. LeBron gave them a game to remember and Atlanta squeaked out the W. He deserves kudos for his effort. He’s carrying the playin bound Lakers and has to be retiring at seasons end.
Yup - LeBron is just an absolute warrior. And while he and Klutch bear a lot of responsibility for the situation he is in, it's still kind of pathetic how bad the roster and roster fit around him is. Since it's the Lakers I'm ok with that, of course.
They have continued to draft pretty well, but the clownshow GM/ownership combo simply hasn't done what they need to get a roster around him to match his capabilities.
They have continued to draft pretty well, but the clownshow GM/ownership combo simply hasn't done what they need to get a roster around him to match his capabilities.
Unfortunately Doc is going to have to wait at least two more games to get to the .500 mark as Bucks coach.
LeBron had a roster of some really quality players coming off the title, like KCP and Caruso.
LeBron wanted Westbrook, so they dumped those guys.
Everything since is downstream of that. GM and ownership have done a pretty good job given that starting point, imo.
I think it's really, really hard to know what was going on in all of those discussions, honestly.
Certainly, as I noted, a ton of blame falls on Klutch/LeBron. Westbrook is more his than anyone else's, imo....and, they went along with it. I completely understand the power LeBron has and I don't personally think you fully let others off the hook.
Caruso wasn't really related to Westbrook---they offered him a smaller deal to save on lux tax. That's 10000000% on the owner. The difference between their offer and what he took doesn't impact Westbrook.
They also have a pretty bad record on extensions and details...they gave away cap and exceptions in AD trade for no reason; they extended THT in a way that hurt flexibility; ditto the past two summers. I just don't see the case the GM/ownership are even average----what they are is successful at recruiting LeBron, who enbled AD, and they've been doing a series of churning moves ever since, with some draft wins, some ok to bad trades, and no big-picture view of how to put a team around LeBron that can shoot and defend. He's part of the problem---and not all of it, imo.
Like I started wtih, though, it's almost impossible to be sure who did what under the hood.
Certainly, as I noted, a ton of blame falls on Klutch/LeBron. Westbrook is more his than anyone else's, imo....and, they went along with it. I completely understand the power LeBron has and I don't personally think you fully let others off the hook.
Caruso wasn't really related to Westbrook---they offered him a smaller deal to save on lux tax. That's 10000000% on the owner. The difference between their offer and what he took doesn't impact Westbrook.
They also have a pretty bad record on extensions and details...they gave away cap and exceptions in AD trade for no reason; they extended THT in a way that hurt flexibility; ditto the past two summers. I just don't see the case the GM/ownership are even average----what they are is successful at recruiting LeBron, who enbled AD, and they've been doing a series of churning moves ever since, with some draft wins, some ok to bad trades, and no big-picture view of how to put a team around LeBron that can shoot and defend. He's part of the problem---and not all of it, imo.
Like I started wtih, though, it's almost impossible to be sure who did what under the hood.
Damn that is just brutal luck for the magic. Banchero missed just 12 games over his first two years and Wagner missed just 15 over his first 3 years.
On the plus side, even if they go 0 for their next 10 or so, they'll still likely be in play-in territory.
Edit - they may lose their next 8, but then have Detroit, Toronto and the Jazz to start 2025.