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NBA 2023-24


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1 minute ago, Braff Zacklin said:

I thought Gobert defended him as well as anyone could. Jokic is just too good, especially when he goes beast mode like the third quarter last night.

If one is a fan of the sport above all else, it's a joy to watch, even if it's at the expense of one's own team. And if it weren't for SGA, one could confidently state that the best point guard in the league is a huge, slow-moving, 7-foot white dude from Serbia who plays center.

It's incredible to watch.

Rudy played well last night, but Jok can back him down at will.  He's just not strong enough to stop it.  And honestly, while I love seeing the Wolves put Rudy on an island, the most effective way to play Jok is for KAT to be the primary defender and have Rudy cover AG and help on Jokic.  But that results in KAT being in foul trouble a lot of the time because he's not like Rudy where he can play good defense without fouling most of the time.

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We gotta have 2 guys on Jokic instantly tomorrow night. Get the ball out his hands asap.

It’ll probably backfire. What else can one do? He gets the ball with 2-3 seconds to survey or make eye contact with AG, MPJ to go back door because the balls coming….notjing good can happen

Hell even play Luka Garza tomorrow. He’s 100X better on offense than kyle anderson is.


We haven’t learned anything from last year and that’s to pounce on the non Jokic minutes. I think I read Denver’s +5 the last 3 games. Guys need to let it all hang

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Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, Chewbacca said:

Zubac and Nurk are the only ones big enough to bang with him.  They play him tough. And Nurk always gets up to play against the Nuggets.

Those two specifically were who I thought OKC should make a big push for.  Not max players at all but a TON of value in the playoffs, especially if you need to go through Denver...

Edited by ChiTownDoc
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7 minutes ago, chainsaw said:

Are we watching the final season of Inside the NBA?

I think their contract runs through next season. And they haven’t lost the NBA yet. They just don’t have exclusive negotiating rights. But it ain’t looking good. 

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6 minutes ago, Mitch Cumsteen said:

I think their contract runs through next season. And they haven’t lost the NBA yet. They just don’t have exclusive negotiating rights. But it ain’t looking good. 

frustrated the wire GIF

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51 minutes ago, Mitch Cumsteen said:

I think their contract runs through next season. And they haven’t lost the NBA yet. They just don’t have exclusive negotiating rights. But it ain’t looking good. 

The CEO of Discovery is a dipshit

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1 hour ago, Baboontyme said:

I honestly get a little depressed for a few days every year when they sign off for the season.

Damn you still got that childlike flame. I respect that. I was fucking Ob. Sessed. with the league from about 2011-2021. I look back fondly but don't miss how ridiculously emotionally invested I was. 

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2 hours ago, ztejas said:

Damn you still got that childlike flame. I respect that. I was fucking Ob. Sessed. with the league from about 2011-2021. I look back fondly but don't miss how ridiculously emotionally invested I was. 

Tomorrow's game for some reason is an ESPN game. Unless this Dallas series goes 7 or if there is a night game on Sunday, tonight will be the last TNT game. Then we gotta deal with Screamin A for the rest of the season. That is severe depression worthy. 

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My sympathy for the TNT crew is going to evaporate if they keep including Draymond in the studio. Fucker is trash and shouldn't be associated with the NBA in any context at this point, imo.

On the flipside, love seeing Vince Carter and find his comments worthwhile. But I mostly watch for the bullshit between Shaq and Chuck.

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1 minute ago, Mitch Cumsteen said:

Corpse of the cavs season still warm and this JB Bickerstaff hit piece comes out. Lol he’s toast  

 

Most of this is stuff Cavs fans suspected going back to last season- it's just out in the open now:

  • Koby ‘berated’ J.B. in his office after the Dec 18th game where Donovan played 45 minutes: “The immediate aftermath of that night was confusing. For instance, Altman was unaware at the time he was scolding Bickerstaff that the coach had asked Mitchell if he wanted to come out, according to league sources, and Mitchell declined. Yet, Mitchell was absent from the court for Cleveland’s next four games due to what the team called a non-COVID illness.”
  • “Multiple league sources have said, for months, that Mitchell did not have great confidence in Bickerstaff, and he was not alone. Several players questioned Bickerstaff’s strategies, game management, practice habits and accountability measures, privately and publicly, throughout the season.”
  • “Allen’s extended absence, which stretched more than two weeks, caused frustration toward him in at least some corners of the organization with teammates and staff members who felt he could have done more to try and play.”
  • “Furthermore, rival executives believe the Cavs will have to seriously evaluate the fit of Mitchell and Garland and ultimately may have to choose one or the other. Should Mitchell decide to stay long term, sources briefed on the matter say Garland’s representation, Klutch Sports CEO Rich Paul, would have a conversation with Cavs officials on potentially finding a new home for the one-time All-Star.
  • “The Cavs seem to be at their best offensively with only one big on the floor, but internally, the franchise believes Mobley’s situation is rare. The focus has been on winning games, not necessarily fully developing his talent, like most players selected third receive in their first few years in the league.”
  • Following last years playoffs: “Multiple veterans in the Cavs locker room grew frustrated with Bickerstaff for treating the Cavs as a young team with much to learn, instead of as a team ready to contend. They were also less than enthused by the Cavs’ offense last spring and into the first part of this season. Mitchell was among them. Players would leave practices and morning shootarounds wondering aloud: “Why did we even do that? What did we accomplish” — so perplexed by the lack of structure and intensity in the workouts.”
  • Bickerstaff’s usage of Mitchell, league sources said, was a reason Mitchell provided when declining an invitation to play for USA Basketball last summer at the FIBA World Cup — a refusal that went a long way toward his exclusion from the Olympic team.
  • With his team down 1-0 in the series to the Celtics, Bickerstaff made an observation about Boston before Game 2 that left members of the Cavs organization perplexed; it seemed as though he was making an unfavorable comparison to his own team.
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4 minutes ago, Dutchrudder said:

Ooof, that was a gut punch for OKC, Luka from 30 feet. 

Yeah, they're hitting that but OKC is missing wide open 3's, even from the good shooters.  You can only do so much when the shots aren't falling.

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57 minutes ago, Aqua Buddha said:

OKC is a good shooting team but they've shot for shit this entire series.  Even the good shooters aren't hitting.

Maybe a good regular season and first round shooting team, but they sure have a lot of possessions with multiple dudes pump-faking themselves out of semi-contested threes. Not a lot of confidently stepping into shots with zero indecision happening outside of SGA.

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On 3/4/2024 at 12:21 PM, Mitch Cumsteen said:

Phoenix / OKC was an interesting watch. The Suns came back from a huge deficit but their execution down the stretch was just horrific. Booker was out so take whatever you want from all that.  I've been trying to size up OKC for the playoffs and a few things stand out:

1. The OKC offense is a bit brutal to watch. It's SGA or Jalen Williams going one on one, or one of them screening for the other. Maybe you get a high screen from Holmgren every now and then, but there is so little weakside action and movement. It's weird because they run so much great stuff out of time outs, but the rest of the time it's iso after iso after iso with the other dudes standing around waiting for the ball at the three point line. I don't know if you can win in the playoffs playing like that. Teams will start to get a bead on how to guard you when you face them several times in a row. Or maybe SGA is just that good of a one on one player?

2. In addition to Nurkic killing them on the boards, he was pushing Chet all over the place. They are going to get pounded inside especially when they start letting more physical play go in the post season. Holmgren was -19 last night. The guy is not a center, at least not yet. With all of their assets, I just can't fathom that they didn't try to get some more beef for the stretch run, even a stop gap. Signing Bismack Biyombo off the scrap heap just isn't going to cut it. They are next to last in defensive rebounding percentage and give up the second most second chance points in the league. 

3. Yeah... the Giddey thing is a problem. Hayward hasn't gotten much run since they traded for him, but he hasn't looked good in the minutes he has gotten. He might be washed. I know they have a roster glut, but OKC may have been better off passing on that trade. Or moving some of those assets for a big.

After the game, Draymond commented on OKC's offense being too iso heavy with the only action being SGA and Williams screening for each other and how it gets easier to defend in a series, and I remembered I posted something similar back in March. On the rare occasions that I turn out to be prescient, I am damn sure going to remind everybody of it. And then I saw the rest of the post and I think Sam Presti should have hired me as a consultant.

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12 hours ago, Message Board User said:

Allen’s extended absence, which stretched more than two weeks, caused frustration toward him in at least some corners of the organization with teammates and staff members who felt he could have done more to try and play.”

i got crushed for reporting this back when it happened, but i went and watched jarrett allen when he was in HS when my school hosted st.stephens on a night when shaka and his wife were in the building. allen acted like an absolute clown who didn’t give a shit about basketball, his coaches, or the fact that shaka smart and his wife were in the building to watch him. allen got T’d up like three minutes into the game for pegging one of our players dodgeball style, after which he hit the bench where he made himself a huge distraction by constantly and loudly joking around, moving around the bench area, not paying attention to the game, etc. my mom (a coach/teacher currently in her 44th year at our school) and i were shocked at how uninterested and disrespectful he was. to this day she can’t believe he made it to the nba based on what an absolute clown he was that night. 

you may also recall that allen really struggled during non conference play of his one season at Texas. he did not show up ready to compete in D-1 ball and only got into game shape around the time the year turned. there are guys in the nba who live to be basketball players. allen isn’t one of them.

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also i’m not shadowbanned am i? because i posted that same AI jokic post that AB did, hours before he did, and my post got zero interaction. @ztejas was 100% right when he said that someone like him or me (aka active hoops board players) would notice pretty quickly if we got shadow banned, and i’m already on high alert lol.

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5 minutes ago, definitely not derka said:

also i’m not shadowbanned am i? because i posted that same AI jokic post that AB did, hours before he did, and my post got zero interaction. @ztejas was 100% right when he said that someone like him or me (aka active hoops board players) would notice pretty quickly if we got shadow banned, and i’m already on high alert lol.

Your posts are visible.

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