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2023 - 2024 Dallas Mavericks Season Thread - I'm watching, just like you guys


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Posted
Hurt vs injured applies here - is there anyone important actually missing games? Full disclosure I’m ignorant on the subject but Dallas is actually missing a key rotation player, and one just came back from missing basically the whole first round. 
If you want to just talk hurt, I don’t see Murray or Jokic  getting the shit beat out of them every night like Luka. Joker’s scratches on his pasty ass arms don’t count. 
Murray has a calf strain. He needs to be able to get separation off the dribble to be effective. He did it in game 3, but couldn't in games 1-2. KCP has a bad hip and he's the primary defender on Ant.

Without those 2, the Nuggets are fucked. They looked ok in game 3 but we'll see going forward. They are walking wounded at this point.
Posted
40 minutes ago, Etexhorn13 said:

Hurt vs injured applies here - is there anyone important actually missing games? Full disclosure I’m ignorant on the subject but Dallas is actually missing a key rotation player, and one just came back from missing basically the whole first round
If you want to just talk hurt, I don’t see Murray or Jokic  getting the shit beat out of them every night like Luka. Joker’s scratches on his pasty ass arms don’t count. 

let's be real.  it was a blessing in disguise he couldn't play.

Posted
15 hours ago, Drew said:

Dallas seems to be struggling with it more than any other in the west.

Wow, if I didn’t know better, I might suspect that a league with a notorious history of officials putting their thumb on the scale for and against marquee players and teams has allowed Dallas, and Luka Doncic especially, to get mauled late in the season and into the playoffs.

  • Haha 1
Posted (edited)
4 hours ago, Rex Kramer said:

But clearly you know better than to lend your support to an asinine conspiracy theory against Luka. Thank God. 

Of course I’m not. I mean, it’s not as though *two* former referees specifically implicated by Tim Donaghy in *allegedly* fixing games against the Mavericks (including both games 5 and 6 of the 2006 NBA finals) are now occupying VP level operations roles supervising officials. That would be absurd, right?

Edited by Bozo_Casanova
Posted (edited)
4 hours ago, Rex Kramer said:

It’d be quite absurd. Thankfully you’re not going there. 

Of course I’m not. It’s ridiculous on its face. 

BTW- did I say two referees who were specifically implicated? I meant *four*.  There are four former referees  implicated in *allegedly* rigging games now in senior roles overseeing NBA referees as part of the NBA referee development and performance group (out of four members), but only three of them were specifically implicated in fixing playoff games against the Mavs. And it’s not as though the Mavs were unique- one was  also involved in the notorious Game 6 of the 2002 WCF between the Lakers and Kings, and several other infamous officiating disasters. 
How silly of me.

Well at any rate I’m not paranoid enough to think there’s something systemically wrong here.

Edited by Bozo_Casanova
Posted (edited)
3 hours ago, Rex Kramer said:

I read this and my eyes glaze over. Is there a source for this other than an admitted convicted degenerate’s word for it?

Oh it’s all speculative of course, but the Donaghy thing is a pretty huge red flag, and can we honestly say it’s been fully addressed? Despite the NBA’s line (which you have accepted and repeat above, and that’s fine), it’s tough to imagine that he was unique, particularly given his background, and there have been multiple investigations by ESPN a d others that suggest it’s not. 

There’s no equivalent in the last 90 years of pro baseball or 70 years of pro football. And look, I don’t even think a conspiracy theory is required. People’s motivations and biases can be all over the place beyond money. They may be actively collaborating with mobsters like Donaghy, who made very little compared to his partners, or they could be merely putting their thumbs on the scale for other reasons- Marc Cuban and Robert Sarver (Suns) were both unusually public about calling out uneven officiating and many people have argued they both paid the price for it. You can decide whether that makes sense to you or whether there was a corruption issue beyond bias.  You can decide whether it matters that so many of the same names that always seemed to pop up in poorly officiated games in that era were from  Delaware County Pa, and that they were all longtime friends and associates across generations, or that some of those associations include mob ties. 
 

All that said, you are correct. No matter how much smoke there is, I can’t point to the fire. But after watching NBA basketball for the last 45 years I don’t think there’s anything stranger to me than the idea that the four people overseeing the development and performance of NBA officials are Mark Wunderlich, Eddie Rush, Bennett Salvatore and Joey Crawford. 

Edited by Bozo_Casanova
  • Hook 'Em 2
Posted (edited)

The fact that Scott Foster skated by after his connections to TD were exposed without a legitimate inquiry should tell you all that you need to know about how Stern felt about this stuff. While there hasn't been anything concrete, when there is enough smoke around this stuff generally there is some element of truth. I find it very hard to believe TD was the only official gambling during that time period.

Scott Foster-Tim Donaghy links

Edited by ITHorn
  • Hook 'Em 1
Posted (edited)

I'm not sure that PJ Washington going off is necessarily due to coaching, but I'm glad it's happening. If Luka and Kyrie wake up offensively, these games could be blowouts. I suspect OKC will win tonight, just how it goes, but man a win would be massive to go up 3-1. OKC sports radio is insufferable. They're acting like Luka is living at the fucking line or something. He had 10 free throws on Saturday, the same amount as SGA. Oh, and its clear as day that the OKC strategy is to have Dort beat up on Luka as best he can, and he's getting away with all sort of shit. I get that Luka whines too much, but fuck, this series he's right, Dort is all over him, and getting away with a bunch of stuff. 

Edited by 'stache
Posted

Yeah, I think that two things can and probably are true: Luka does complain quite a bit and he also takes a lot of contact that doesn't always result in FTs. 

  • Hook 'Em 1
Posted
2 hours ago, ITHorn said:

The fact that Scott Foster skated by after his connections to TD were exposed without a legitimate inquiry should tell you all that you need to know about how Stern felt about this stuff. While there hasn't been anything concrete, when there is enough smoke around this stuff generally there is some element of truth. I find it very hard to believe TD was the only official gambling during that time period.

Scott Foster-Tim Donaghy links

Exactly.  Foster and Donaghy talked every day, multiple times a day, and the NBA didn't even investigate him.  They just pretended it never happened when Donaghy went to jail.

Posted

Wtf, now OKC radio guys calling Luka a ball hog. I knew he was high in assists, looked it up, and he’s number 2 in the league in assists per game. What the hell are they talking about?

Posted
7 minutes ago, 'stache said:

Wtf, now OKC radio guys calling Luka a ball hog. I knew he was high in assists, looked it up, and he’s number 2 in the league in assists per game. What the hell are they talking about?

Thunder homers are morons. Truly an insufferable media contingent on the level of Aggie football homers.
It is known. 

Posted
52 minutes ago, 'stache said:

Wtf, now OKC radio guys calling Luka a ball hog. I knew he was high in assists, looked it up, and he’s number 2 in the league in assists per game. What the hell are they talking about?

Maybe change the station? Switch over to Traber and Eshbach. Traber routinely rips the Thunder to the point the organization no longer allows players to appear on that station.....and I believe they're the flagship station. 

The stat he was reporting today about Giddy being on the court instead of Wiggins and Joe was glaringly bad. And why Hayward is on the court at all is a mystery. The dude is horrible. One of Presti's worst decisions as a GM. 

Posted
4 minutes ago, Sweetnsourpoke said:

Maybe change the station? Switch over to Traber and Eshbach. Traber routinely rips the Thunder to the point the organization no longer allows players to appear on that station.....and I believe they're the flagship station. 

The stat he was reporting today about Giddy being on the court instead of Wiggins and Joe was glaringly bad. And why Hayward is on the court at all is a mystery. The dude is horrible. One of Presti's worst decisions as a GM. 

Traber's the one who said it! Granted, his comment was essentially "We all know Luka's a ballhog, right? But you don't hear Kyrie complaining about it, which says a lot about the team." So he's essentially contradicting himself in his own backhanded compliment, because if Luka was a ballhog, Kyrie would probably have expressed frustration by now. Traber also went on to say that Luka makes Kyrie seem likeable. That one is at least consistent with his style. He did then trash Giddy "Why does that guy see the floor at all in this series!!!!" The Morning Animals, however, were insufferable, and I only listened for like 10 minutes.

Posted
Why was that a free throw on the inbound foul?
If you commit a foul before the ball is inbounded the other team gets a free throw and possession
Posted (edited)

Lu, I am your father. -Darth Luka

2 minutes ago, Etexhorn13 said:

This mother fucker Dort just bulldogs his way to the paint looking to get bailed out. 

He’s the player I hate playing against and also wish was on my team. 

Edited by Firemans4Horn
Posted
1 minute ago, cafe society said:

two things:  first, in 2006, Stern made a phone call,  Second, Dort is doing stuff to Luka that would get him locked up off the court.

2006 was absolutely payback for all of Cuban's(rightful) bitching about the refs.  They still hold that against him.  He exposed the absolute incompetence of NBA refs. 

Dirk paid for it and now Doncic is as well.  I believe it is part of the reason stars don't want to come to Dallas.

1 minute ago, 'stache said:

I’m sort of liking this no call shit, it’s going both ways, so both fan bases can bitch, lol.

Dort definitely got fouled there but so did Luka.

Posted
3 minutes ago, dcar00 said:

 

Dort definitely got fouled there but so did Luka.

Luka was cracking me up at the end. Telling the ref hes getting hit on the arms, legs, everywhere.  Dort does seem to trip a lot of people with his big ass feet 

  • Haha 1
Posted
What's been the biggest surprise of this series so far? 
For me, one thing that is a surprise is that Jason Kidd is outcoaching Daigneault. 
Yes that's the biggest surprise. But Kidd has always adjusted and managed player personnel well from game to game so maybe it shouldn't be that surprising. Second biggest surprise has been PJ's ability to shoot the 3. Where's that been...
Posted
3 minutes ago, gsoda3 said:
7 hours ago, Sweetnsourpoke said:
What's been the biggest surprise of this series so far? 
For me, one thing that is a surprise is that Jason Kidd is outcoaching Daigneault. 

Yes that's the biggest surprise. But Kidd has always adjusted and managed player personnel well from game to game so maybe it shouldn't be that surprising. Second biggest surprise has been PJ's ability to shoot the 3. Where's that been...

PJ's scoring and Kyrie's clutch play are the difference in the series IMO.  Kyrie just seems to know when he has to make a big shot.

Posted
7 minutes ago, 'stache said:

Why the ever living fuck in TNT giving Draymon a platform? That mother ficker needs to be forced into an early fucking retirement.

this. also, it was fine with the 4 guys.  do we really need a 5th guy

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