SNY.tv: NBA players decide to resume playoffs, but strike/protests to continue Thursday

Robert Silverman has a good piece up today.

I should probably add that of the crimes they do manage to solve, in a significant portion they are wrong, with life destroying results.

*** venerates these bastards, showers them with money, and their performance at their most basic task doesn’t rise above the level of abject failure.***

Did you cut and paste this from the Knicks POBO 1999-2020 thread?

@ Mr. Walsh,
I got themes I like to work with.

Spending future assests to move up for a questionable draftee seems, uh, very Knicksy actually. Warriors will want more than Lavine (our 2023 1st?), Bulls will want at least our 2021 first not the mav’s. I think Rose would rather trade picks to get an established player, but I suspect we just draft at 8. There’s too much uncertainty to make big moves.

Random and disparate thoughts.

Terribly torn about that Silverman piece. I’m totally with a walkout that ends the season for a few reasons. Yet one of the reasons we (and many, many others) are continuing to have heated discussions about the situation is that the players are using their platform to energize us to engage. If they all just go home, yes they can speak up at local rallies and have interviews, but it won’t have the same impact. A part of me thinks they can do more from within the bubble than from outside it (especially in the midst of a pandemic).

I’ve said it before, I just don’t want LaMelo. Not for a team that can’t shoot already. Brilliant kick-outs to… who exactly? If the driver can’t shoot the whole thing is easy to defend. And you don’t need a wizard to throw lobs to Mitch.

And Knew Your Knicks, it’s “in,” not “from.” Your version is giving me a headache trying to imagine it.

It keeps making me laugh, so thank you.

Although now I’m sure Jowles will correct my lack of imagination with a link to page X of Joy of Sex Volume 22.

After hearding of the McMillan/D’Antoni news, I visited Indy Cornrows (Pacers blog) and people out there were jubilant about the firing and thrilled about MDA. The fans who posted there were almost unanimous on 2 things, after the sweep:

1) Nate had to go;
2) Trade one of Myles Turner or Sabonis to the Warriors for the #2 pick;
3) Resign Oladipo (contentious point, it depends on the price).

Even if the Knicks get Wiggins back, an offer from the Pacers may be difficult to top.

***No, it is actually a well publicized debated topic, with ideas ranging from police abolition to divesting towards community services.***

I don’t see much ambiguity to any of the interpretations of “defund the police”, and the “debate” isn’t really a debate. Everybody promoting #defundthepolice has the same goal (radical police reform), and the same implementation policy (repurpose the police budget and resources into other agencies). Even the “abolish the police entirely” op-Ed says to “cut the funding in half and the police force in half”, which isn’t really abolishing the police at all. I think that people want to find hypocrisy and ambiguity in the hashtag, but there doesn’t seem to be much. Perhaps there is a better phrase or slogan out there, but in the words of Bobbi Flekman, “money talks and bullshit walks”. If you take away the funding, the police have no choice but to change the way they do business.

(Anyway, as everybody has expressed here for many years already, Wiggins was always destined to be a Knick at some point, so the FO has Fate on their side)

How has Tyreke Evans never ended up on the Knicks? Maybe that was what his suspension was for – to keep the Knicks from fulfilling their destiny.

I’m not a Brodie Van Wag fan, but kudos to him for this:

https://twitter.com/JeffPassan/status/1299106574141722624

Btw, I’ve read that the idea to play an hour later was not Manfred’s, but Mets Prez Jeff Wilpon’s.

America venerates these bastards, showers them with money, and their performance at their most basic task doesn’t rise above the level of abject failure. Americans think the cops keep them safe because the police have benefited in decades of free propaganda worth trillions of dollars from TV and film. Americans are Rodney King, still bruised and beaten, standing at a podium surrounded by the people who beat him almost to death, begging people to love the police.

there it is…Eazy-E, won’t you step up to the stand
And tell the jury how you feel about this bullshit?

and, absolutely no doubt – the guns have got to go…whenever i think of our love affair with guns i always hear that NIN beat and bowie tells us all how afraid of americans he is…i know he wasn’t necessarily talking about our society’s penchant for violence, but, that’s definitely what comes to mind when i think of how the world must view us…

it would take at least a generation or two to clean out all the guns here in the states…

If that’s the deal for Beal, Washington would be crazy not to take it. Idk maybe Oladipo/Turner for those picks is a better fit?

One thing is for sure, though, no one needs to involve the Knicks and their dreck roster in these talks.

I mean, I think there’s a scenario where everybody is happy (except for Knickerblogger):

Randle + Smith + #2 to Indiana.

Turner and Oladipo to Golden State

Wiggins + Minnesota’s 2021(/2022) pick to New York

wiggins just has so much potential though, and he’s only 35…no doubt the mecca would bring the very best out of him…

***The Knicksy thing would be just Wiggins***

I guess we could throw in the #8 if that makes Indiana feel better…

There are differing ideas posted here. Abolishing, destroying and rebuilding, and simply diverting money so police departments “have no choice”… these are all different ideas.
I agree with some ideas and not all, as do most of you. But if we do it wrong, and end up underpolicing, and people die… that’s real dead people, likely minorities. I’ve seen it.
I’m with all of you that we need real systemic change to policing. So what then? Cut funding? Then you end up with bitter angry cops without resources – we all remember watching The Wire.

I think you need real reform. A year is minimum for training. Training should include combat training, De-escalation tactics, psychological testing, basic social worker skills. Preferably people with mental illness and addiction issues can be diverted towards specialized police/non-police divisions that deal with only that. Again- Unions should be abolished, there should be outside evaluators looking through each department for the bad cops, and severe punishment or expulsion for those who enabled them. Maybe a mass firing and careful rehiring in each department.

Donnie Walsh:
I mean, I think there’s a scenario where everybody is happy (except for Knickerblogger):

Randle + Smith + #2 to Indiana.

Turner and Oladipo to Golden State

Wiggins + Minnesota’s 2021(/2022) pick to New York

I don’t see this deal being good. Minnesota’s pick might not be anything special. So we trade a short reasonable value contract more for a millstone of a contract and a quite possibly middling pick? Instead we could just have cap space in the summer of ‘21.

I think abolishing the police carries with it genuine policy differences compared to a mere defunding (except when the defunding is designed to eventually lead to abolition, like in starve the beast Republican strategy). Defunding of course implies taking away money from departments and even disbanding and reconstituting departments into smaller outfits. What I take “abolish” to mean in comparison to this is simply: get rid of police departments as an arm of the state, entirely. That doesn’t mean we don’t, say, have investigators for homicides, or that we can’t have some kind of armed officer corps respond to bona fide violent emergencies. But the police’s function would be distributed across different organs of the state, and its footprint would be small enough (since it’s obvious that other trained professionals like social workers should do important public safety no matter whether defunding or abolition happens) that they wouldn’t have the resources to put people out on patrol, and the fragmenting of their duties makes it more difficult for them to unionize.

Another alternative to mere defunding is full community control of police, which is what the CPAC legislation in Chicago intends to engineer by creating a citizen’s council that has final say on policy, budget, misconduct cases, etc. This kind of thing can also lead to abolition, insofar as the citizen’s council is intended to be an adversarial force for the police department that also has the power to change their policy and their budget.

I don’t think a mere cutting of funding is enough either–the police have routinely shown that they will kill you with whatever they have (including their arms and knees) for the smallest of reasons. It’s not a training issue. Violent individuals are often attracted to policing, and in any case there are serious structural issues that turn otherwise nice people into murderers or their abettors. Police need to answer to someone else, whether that’s the citizenry or the state.

The Knicks are finalizing deals for Mike Woodson, Andy Greer and Dice Yoshimoto to join Tom Thibodeau’s staff as assistant coaches, sources tell ESPN.

Woodson, we know, for good and for ill. Greer is a longtime Thibs assistant, in both Chicago and Minnesota. Yoshimoto was also with Thibs at those stops, but I believe primarily as a video coordinator.

Pretty happy with the assistant coaching list. Seems to be heavy on likeable “player’s coach” guys (Woodson, Payne), since Thibs is, uh, not really that. Do we have any info on what Yoshimoto is like?

Alan: Yoshimoto was also with Thibs at those stops, but I believe primarily as a video coordinator.

With Thibs’s emphasis on film this is probably an important job in his mind

Basketball returns tomorrow

I had somehow blocked the entire Beno Era out of my head, Brian, so thanks for putting it back.

I literally forgot his name. I just knew Woody was a real dick to some foreign point guard on the team. I thought maybe Prigs, at first, but Woody loved Prigs, so I had to look it up and saw it was Beno.

Wow, one of the concessions that the players got from the owners is that the league will use their arenas as polling places. In an era of gross voter interference at the polls, that’s huge.

Arenas as polling places is a great idea.

I wonder how it will work. Since arenas are so big, you could have way more voting machines and the ability for more people to wait in line than at a typical polling place. Will these arenas serve as polling places for multiple districts or just the immediate district they’re in?

If they could serve as polling places for multiple districts where thousands of people could be processed to vote, it could conceivably tip the scales in places like Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Florida, etc. Its an amazing idea.

Silky Johnson, Fleet Admiral of the Tank Armada
Violent individuals are often attracted to policing

Violent individuals are often attracted to policing…
The Honorable Cock Jowles: The fact that this is something up for debate in American society — hard for me to swallow.

I believe this because of first-hand experience. I wish that there was another word other than “violent” but it’s appropriate. People that are officious do too.. If 1 in 1000 police officers are bad, that means there’s about 800 bad police officers (800K police in the US). On the flip side, how many officers would turn in a colleague who voiced but never acted on bigotry? On the potential of doing something really bad? How many would stand by while it was happening? I’m a white male. I’ve had many dozens of “non-traffic” encounters with police. I’ve only had one encounter which was positive: a cop that coached Little League with me found my father, who had Alzheimers, wandering down the street in our town and he called me. As a victim of break-ins, car thefts, pickpockets, yada, yada, they’ve never lifted a hand to help me.

Donnie Walsh:
I mean, I think there’s a scenario where everybody is happy (except for Knickerblogger):

Randle + Smith + #2 to Indiana.

Turner and Oladipo to Golden State

Wiggins + Minnesota’s 2021(/2022) pick to New York

I’d want a bit more back for taking Wiggin’s contract but I’d be pretty happy with this trade. Potentially getting two lottery picks in next year’s draft, which is already being hyped as a good one, is huge even if one is top 3 protected. And Wiggins only has 3 years left on his deal; it’s a lot of money but 3 years isn’t crippling.

I’m not sure why Indy would do this though. I’m not sure why they’d blow up their team for the 2nd pick in a bad draft. Also, who’s the Smith that they’re getting? I’m drawing a blank.

Also, who’s the Smith that they’re getting? I’m drawing a blank.

Dennis Smith.

But yeah, I agree that while I think Indiana will definitely trade Turner, I don’t think it will be for the #2 pick. Who there would even fit in with their needs of a wing who can shoot?

Wiggins and Barrett at the forward spots would be interesting, at least.

But yeah, I am so firmly on “Get Barrett to the forward spot” bus that I fear the same thing. Barrett at the 2 is no good for anyone, least alone Barrett.

I believe this because of first-hand experience. I wish that there was another word other than “violent” but it’s appropriate. People that are officious do too.. If 1 in 1000 police officers are bad, that means there’s about 800 bad police officers (800K police in the US). On the flip side, how many officers would turn in a colleague who voiced but never acted on bigotry? On the potential of doing something really bad? How many would stand by while it was happening?

I posted this yesterday, but I’ll repeat it here because the thread got kind of abandoned:

In my hometown (Fort Lauderdale) there was a cop who got caught on video shoving a kneeling woman to the ground. He got suspended. It turned out he had something like 80 complaints of excessive force against him in just two years, and he never faced any form of discipline. No suspension, no write-up, no reprimand, no re-training, NOTHING AT ALL.

Every cop who knew about this cop’s history and enabled it was a bad cop. This is a guy who had several excessive force complaints filed against him PER MONTH and nothing was done. Every supervisor, every partner, every colleague this dude worked with likely knew about his violent streak and nobody said shit.

This kind of shit is why people use “ACAB” type language, and why people are fed up with police in general.

The Mavericks announce Kristaps Porzingis has been dealing with a meniscus tear in his right knee since Game 1 of the playoffs. “Further treatment options are being explored,” but regardless they say KP won’t play in the rest of this series.

Yup. We still got a really shitty package for him, but the idea of having to give that guy a max contract… man.

(And, yes, a few days ago I was whining when KP was putting up 30-point games. But the kid is a ticking time bomb.)

Well, that was always the main worry with Porzingis and the #1 reason to trade him. Don’t know how serious a meniscus tear is (they seem kind of common in the NBA) but KP still hasn’t made it through a season without injury.

His knees are terrible.

but that upside though

STEVEN MILLS YOU SHREWD BASTARD

Do you believe that:

-Most police officers are bad people
-Most police officers are good people but poorly trained
-Most police officers are good people but just not particularly intelligent because smarter people who would make good police officers don’t want to do the job
-Most police officers are good at their job and good people but are part of a corrupt system of policing

Do you believe that
-We don’t need police at all
-We need police but for a very limited function
-we need police to do most of what they are doing now but that they need to do it better

That 2021 Mavericks pick just became untouchable.

You have to hope Doncic loses a leg to think that pick will be anything better than a #15 overall.

They’re poorly trained, the requirements are too low, and the system is wildly corrupt. Every cop who knew but did nothing about the one is Ft. Lauderdale is a bad cop, which means they are all bad cops, basically. Good/bad person doesn’t enter into it. Good people do bad things all the damn time because we’re not binary.

Some type of law enforcement is necessary. What we have isn’t law enforcement, it’s legalized gangs. The solutions will be local and varied. One size fits all isn’t a workable approach.

Do you believe that…

Z-Man, I can’t answer any of those questions because I think they mostly miss the point. It’s not good vs. bad, or smart vs. not intelligent. I don’t know where I rank on either of those, but I do know that I should be the poster boy for gun control — there were probably two people I would have considered shooting just on my drive to get the lad this afternoon. Put anyone under the grind and tension of constant threat and nonstop dealing with (often) the worst people on the planet, day after day, year after year, and things are likely to go badly. To cherry pick from the points that I think matter, I do think they’re poorly trained, and that they’re part of a corrupt system; and we need the police but for a limited function, and they need to do that limited function a lot better.

See, I just don’t see constructive discussion from either side on the matter. I see reactionary slogans, not earnest problem solving.

In my view, the problem is about laws themselves as much as it is about law enforcement. For example, drug laws.

oh yeah, if thems my choices – i’m going with:

-Most police officers are good people but just not particularly intelligent because smarter people who would make good police officers don’t want to do the job
-We need police but for a very limited function

i don’t have a whole lot of familiarity with police folks, thankfully haven’t needed them in my life much…i did though get picked up and detained (literally – i was the wrong “white” guy they were looking for) once…one officer was a black guy, another a white guy, and a white female…

they kinda of fucked with me for a few hours until they asked me an actual question and then quickly realized i was the wrong person…they actually threatened me as they were releasing me…it was such a bizarre situation…that shit haunted me a for a few months…

i don’t think they were particularly evil…they damn sure weren’t that smart…mostly they just reminded me of jocks from high school that were simply action starved adrenaline junkies…

The Mavs set a record for highest ORtg of the modern era this year and their offense was still better with KP off the floor. They’ll be fine without him. And it’s not unreasonable to assume that Doncic will spend the offseason learning how to shoot from downtown. If he ever gets to like 38% from deep he will win multiple MVPs. He might do that without the deep ball.

Maybe an audit of Trumps reelection committee is in order. Seems the trump Wisconsin maga kid has got a sudden defense team from a Trump connected law firm. I’m surprised they didn’t have him speak at the convention.

I know I’m back on my bullshit with the book recommendations, but Dark Money by Jane Mayer. Dark Money by Jane Mayer. Dark Money by Jane Mayer.

The section where she describes the “non-profits” that helped organize the Tea Party town hall fiascos in 2010 had me livid. Paying people to help plant “citizens” throughout the public meetings, instructing them to stand up, make a scene, and then sit down quickly so they would be able to continue disrupting the candidates’ speeches and Q&As.

The GOP is paying people to create chaos. There is no doubt about it. We just don’t know exactly who, to whom, where, when, or how much, because, haha, Citizens United. We only know the “why.”

You don’t need to pay people to create chaos.

People like Alex Jones and Donald Trump engage in “stochastic terrorism.” You demonize people to the point where it motivates your followers to go out and commit violence. You don’t need a lot of them to take action, just a few. Statistically most people aren’t actually going to pick up the AR15 and go on a killing spree, but a few will.

Tucker Carlson’s rationalizations of Kyle Rittenhouse’s murders were textbook stochastic terrorism.

You don’t need to pay people to create chaos.

quoted: for truth

in case you all have not noticed – the rules for politics have been about the same since folks first cast stones – if you ain’t cheating, you ain’t really trying…

there is but one true objective to politics: win…and, after that – try to avoid getting killed or incarcerated in the process…

takes some serious commitment, I’ll give them that…

Holy shit, Chadwick Boseman died. That’s so fucked up.

Every fucking time you think this year can’t get any worse…

The GOP is paying people to create chaos. There is no doubt about it. We just don’t know exactly who, to whom, where, when, or how much…

Not only do I believe this 1000%, but there’s some shades of COINTELPRO tactics to this shit (not saying the feds have a hand in any of this). The GOP knows that most of this country needs serious reform and evolution on so many things that threaten the (white) establishment. So instead of figuring out how to adjust such needs that could appeal to traditional republican values, they just want to sow division to hold onto their control at all costs. It’s sickening, and I’m bout fed up with the bullshit.

Sorry yall I’m a bit raw right now. The lead star in one of the best movies to represent the African diaspora (even if from a fictional story base) in my lifetime just died. He also played Jackie freakin’ Robinson – I’m a member of his foundation that his wife Ms. Rachel founded after he died: i became a JRF scholar in ’95 my senior year at Stuyvesant… winning a scholarship from them after Spike Lee came thru in the 11th hour to donate more money so some of the other finalists like me could have a shot at that scholarship.

Standard shit from the ratfucker’s playbook is to accuse the other side of the shit you’ve been doing. Your side eats it up and it insulates you from criticism. So when the movement conservatives started accusing the left of paying people to protest lo these many years ago, well. They kind of gave away their game didn’t they?

***Tucker Carlson’s rationalizations of Kyle Rittenhouse’s murders were textbook stochastic terrorism.***

Ann Coulter says “I wish Kyle Rittenhouse was my President”.

Aubrey Huff calls him a “national treasure”.

And soon Mbudge will be here to inform us that Carlson, Coulter, and Huff are right because there was no mention of #metoo at the DNC, and that All Buildings And Businesses Matter, and fuck lives altogether.

The Honorable Cock Jowles: I know I’m back on my bullshit with the book recommendations, but Dark Money by Jane Mayer. Dark Money by Jane Mayer. Dark Money by Jane Mayer.

The section where she describes the “non-profits” that helped organize the Tea Party town hall fiascos in 2010 had me livid. Paying people to help plant “citizens” throughout the public meetings, instructing them to stand up, make a scene, and then sit down quickly so they would be able to continue disrupting the candidates’ speeches and Q&As.

The GOP is paying people to create chaos. There is no doubt about it. We just don’t know exactly who, to whom, where, when, or how much, because, haha, Citizens United. We only know the “why.”

In addition to Dark Money, I would recommend Evil Genuises by Kurt Andersen ( of Spy Magazine* among other magazines), which expands and elaborates on the theme of Dark Money on how the right systemically and with great calculation stole the country with the Dems abetting as useful idiots
* Spy Magazine was one of the first publications to troll Trump.

I really want us to target Kyra Lewis Jr. He seems very mature and self aware for the youngest sophomore in the draft. He may not be can’t miss but I cant imagine him not being at least a solid NBA PG with his overall profile.

I went straight from vacation to the start of 2L so haven’t been around for a bit. Shout out to everyone dealing with our resident boot licking fascist sympathizers. The strike was one of the coolest and most powerful things I’ve ever seen in sports and while I wish more came of it, I think the players made a reasonable decision under the circumstances and getting arenas to serve as polling locations is a legitimately significant win.

So Porzingis, huh? Is it good if a 7’3″ guy has the exact same injury history as Derrick Rose, down to the ages at which Rose suffered the injuries? Asking for a former friend.

Apparently the Knicks have scoured a 5’11 29 year old Argentinian point guard named Facundo Campazzo who plays in Madrid. Some highlights are here:

https://www.postingandtoasting.com/2020/8/29/21405323/the-knicks-have-scouted-veteran-argentine-point-guard-facundo-campazzo

I have to say that of course highlights don’t show the bad aspects of a player, but he still seems better than DSJ (sorry, Dennis) and he might be fun to watch.

As bad as I want Vassell or maybe Nesmith on the wing, if Obi is still there at 8- I’m taking him and moving on from Randle. Or..what about offering the 8th pick for Bagley? Then maybe packaging the 27 and one of the Dallas picks to move up for Lewis?

Yeah, saw that Campazzo tidbit but it seemed pretty thin. After Prigs, I will always have time for an Argentine pg.

DRed:
Timmy has a player option for 19 million for next year.It’s going to be interesting to see what he does.Maybe we can bring him back a 3rd time!

Tim Hardaway Jr just became the 2nd offense in the Mavericks’ offense next to Luka Doncic. If he opts in, he has a chance to be the Tobias Harris of the 2021 free agency class.

I’m still taking OKC to win this series.

Lu Dort shooting OKC out of the game not how I saw this one going

Melo coming through for Portland!

This 4th quarter is more exciting because I was thinking the 3rd quarter was the fourth.

BTW yall, October 5 is when I tie the knot with my sweet tulip – just 5 weeks away!

Congrats!

Rip Cliff Robinson. Dude could fill it up.

Good Luck Cdiggy!

The Knicks are in a good position relative to many teams this coming year. They have a profitable television station and an owner willing to spend on the team and they have significant cap space. Good deals where they take on money should be available to them. I don’t know if Horford/Harris is the best deal for them but it’s gotta be looked at. Philadelphia is likely to be motivated for change, so that’s a plus.

Bleacher Report had an interesting article about possible trades for lottery teams. They open up with a fascinating one about the Warriors using their trade exception to acquire James Johnson, so that they could pair him with the #2 pick to get an expensive player (their trade exception cannot be paired with a pick and the pick is the real asset). I was, like, “Huh, that’s a very well-thought out trade proposal. Well done, Bleacher Report, I will keep reading this article….”

And then….

New York Knicks receive: Malik Monk, 2020 No. 3 pick

Charlotte Hornets receive: Mitchell Robinson, Reggie Bullock and 2020 No. 8 pick

As per usual, the Knicks were gut-punched at the lottery. They not only failed to climb the ladder, but they slipped from sixth to eighth. This reverses their fortune—at the expense of Robinson, who’s loaded with upside but hasn’t averaged 24 minutes in either of his first two NBA seasons.

This deal wouldn’t go down until draft night, because it’s contingent on LaMelo Ball getting past the first two picks (as he does in the latest mock from B/R’s Jonathan Wasserman). The 6’7″ point guard caught the eye of the Empire State, and the interest may be mutual.

“Multiple teams believe Ball and those in his circle prefer that he lands in New York,” Ian Begley of SNY.tv reported.

Ball is a risk-reward prospect, but he might be the best player in this draft. He’s a preternatural passer, and his aggressiveness in pushing the pace could give this young team an identity. He needs work with his shooting, shot selection and defensive motor (if anyone can keep it revved, maybe it’s Tom Thibodeau), but those can theoretically be coached up. If Ball hits, he’s going to be a marquee star.

The Hornets, who already have Devonte’ Graham and Terry Rozier in the backcourt, might opt against gambling on the young guard, especially if it means adding a building-block big man and retaining a top-10 pick.

Robinson can transform the frontcourt (career 14.0 points, 11.1 rebounds and 3.6 blocks per 36 minutes) as a two-way, above-the-rim force. The Hornets only have one center under contract for next season, and it’s the decidedly average Cody Zeller (career 16.0 player efficiency rating—worlds removed from Robinson’s 22.8 mark). The No. 8 pick could answer Charlotte’s need for an impact wing with Devin Vassell or Isaac Okoro.

I was in the midst of throwing my laptop across the room when I realized I could just close the website and come here to complain about it, instead.

Thanks, everyone!
Tnfh: Class of ’95 here.

Brian: I feel that article you quoted about that possible trade is basically trolling us. It’s like BR has been reading KB and knows that:
1. The board universally panned Malik Monk.
2. We love Mitch.
3. I posted a long entry about that family friend that knows the Ball clan.
3a. My coworkers have trolled me about us drafting LaMelo in large part due to Lavar (not bc they care whether he’ll be good or not).

(Don’t ask me how BR knows about 3a. I’m just suspicious… lol).

good for you cdiggy, that’s beautiful ya’ll pushing through with your plans…shoot, 20, 30 years from now you’ll have a very cool story to tell of your wedding…

from what I can remember of your posts it seems you both have been working to make a life together for at least a few years now…

I wish you the very best 🙂

reference football, I think it’s part geography/virus and a whole lot about money – including high school ball…

not sure what’s going on at the moment with the pac-12 and players wanting a new situation – but, I don’t think it’s ever been more clear that in some circumstances: “amateur” athletics is a bunch of bullshit…

nice…

Not the finest moment for OAKAAK Marcus Morris

I feel like Luka should shoot 88% from the line like Manu. Only problem in his game.

Luka is unfairly good at this sport

That Kawhi dude is pretty good too.

lebron 09

The only people on the planet that can stop Luka Doncic are Donnie Nelson and Mark Cuban.

Well, Boban was a plus 16. Happy about that.

Also, someone might want to do a wellness check on JK47 after Justin Dunn pitched 6 innings of one hit ball.

jamal murray is out of his mind..

No guard in this draft was even close to having the freshman season shooting/advanced numbers Murray had – .590 ts, .194 ws40, 9.5 bpm, .402 3pt% – and it’s not like he’s been all-world until now.

The closest player in this draft to him shooting-wise is Vassell, who had impressive freshman numbers but on lower usage. Vassell clearly doesn’t have Murray’s handle, but he might be a better overall defender.

Murray has been very up-and-down since the Nuggets made him the starting PG when he was 20 years old. He hasn’t really improved much since then, and though he’s streaky, his shooting numbers have been rather pedestrian. The Nuggets had to give him a $160,000,000 extension still based on his upside, not his actual production. It’s the problem with having 19year olds in the lottery that take time to develop. The ones that breakout young, and the ones that flop completely are the easy ones to decide on, but the Murrays and Porzingises of the league really out their teams in a tough spot come extension time.

I wouldn’t bank on a career 32% 3 point shooter and 73.7% free throw shooter becoming one of the game’s elite marksmen.

I guess, but 38pts on 28 shots is pretty good. Especially when the second option is THj.

Maybe Doncic is never a good shooter. And I hope being saddled with THj’s player option prevnts the Mavs from getting a proper number two (aside from the oft injured and wildly overpaid KP). The Knicks pick relies on Doncic having no backup of note.

Totes McGoats as Totes McGoats:
2020 is a nasty mf…

It’s being reported that the great legend John Thompson has passed

Sheesh
It’s just too much this year

Many great memories of Big East Basketball in the 80’s. ( sorry for the indulgence in Boomer nostalgia)
Aside to Z-man ( off topic) You may be interested in the podcast Nice White Parents. If not you will at least be amused by the 5th episode.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-book-of-statuses/id1524080195?i=1000486589125

geo:

was gonna try out samurai jack (i’ve never watched the cartoons, i like the animation though), but read some not so great reviews…just looking for something “fun”, not too deep…any ideas???

There are quite a few games on Switch that can be seen as all time video game classics, as they are quite fun and very accessible. For example Zelda Breath of the Wind and Super Mario Odyssey, also Animal Crossing is pretty chill too. There are smaller sized strategy/puzzle games like Slay the Spire and Snipperclips that I like in small doses. I also personally like to play rhythm games on switch, feeling this is a nice portable platform, although the music tastes vary from game to game, a few examples like Lumines, VOEZ, and Cytus Alpha.

TheClashFan:
Hey, Robinson Cano is hitting .369.Any chance the Mets can trade him and, say, Edwin Diaz to Seattle for Justin Dunn and Jarred Kelenic? Kelenic’s just a prospect…he might never amount to anything…

What’s that, you say? NFW?

Ha! He would rake in a year where injuries and opt outs are taking hold..Diaz has kinda rebounded too. But this would be the funniest “re-trade” ever LOL

Same goes for universal gun ownership — when the United States has three times the number of firearms per capita (~120 per 100k) as the #2 country (Serbia), you bet your ass that every cop on the street is going to treat a random citizen as though they’re ready to blow a hole through a cop’s head to avoid whatever charge is lurking in their vehicle or on their person. That’s in part why I’ve been held at gunpoint by cops. That’s in part why innocent people keep getting shot in the streets. Perverse fucking incentives, indeed.

IMO you missed one thing that is relevant.

Almost every time we have violence and looting and the local government does little or nothing about it or even worse tries to justify it as the only legitimate response to injustice, gun sales go through the roof. People assume that if the police, national guard, Feds or whoever else that should be protecting them, their family, their property, their businesses, etc… are not going to do it, they need to protect themselves. So they buy more guns. The last report I saw said gun sales were up 72% recently. The same response has repeated itself for many years. It’s like clockwork. Every single time.

Those are the same guns that eventually fall into irresponsible hands, criminal hands, the hands of teenagers with psychological issues etc…

We are in an endless loop of violence begetting fear, begetting more guns, leading to more violence, leading to more policing mistakes, leading to more violence, leading to more guns etc.,.

Now people are trying a different route. They’ve come to realize they don’t have to live in or near cities anymore. They can go rural and escape it all. So those with money to invest in new businesses, jobs that allow them to work remote, etc.. are packing their bags and leaving the cities. That will make those economies worse and cause other problems.

The problems are much deeper than than the guns and bad policing alone.

I’m probably a classic boomer, old white liberal. But I found this article a bit eye opening.
https://theconversation.com/vigilantism-again-in-the-news-is-an-american-tradition-141849

Starters: Kira, Bullock, RJ, Wood, Mitch
Bench: Frank, Randle, Dotson (at a bit over min), Wooten

Should Knicks pick up Knox’s 4th year option?

I know he’s still young, but you can’t disregard the fact that Kira has put up two seasons of terrible advanced stats, like worse than Knox stats. Plus, Haliburton ate his lunch when they went head-to-head this year.

What Ess would do:

1. If we stay at 8, just take Vassell. The two things we need most are shooting and defense, so there ya go.

2. Take Tyler Bey at 27 as your scrappy stretch 4. He likely won’t start but will grow into the role.

3. Target James Johnson in Minny. Maybe trade Randle for him and a 1st, or if they don’t go for Randle, just take him into cap space. Either way, we should get either their mid-first this year or their 2021 first for taking JJ.

4. Offer VanVleet a 3-4 year max. Solves the point guard issue.

So now we have VanVleet/Vassell/Barrett/Johnson/Mitch with Frank, Bey, Wooten, Knox, and DSJ on the bench, plus the Westchester guys. We also have the extra Minny pick, our 2nd rounder this year, and loads of other picks in the future.

What’s key is that we won’t be too good next year, so we will get a high ‘21 draft pick.

The Honorable Cock Jowles:
The gun lobby and the police unions are two damn good places to start.

No argument there,

Unions are an intellectual dilemma for me. On the one hand I hate the greed that requires they exist, but on the flip side unions often go too far in the other direction and either commit economic suicide for their business/industry or protect workers to an extent that destroys moral and quality.

I once quit a very good job for heath reasons. I took a union job at NYCOTB just to pay for my healthcare while I figured out what I wanted to do next. NYCOTB must be the only bookie in history to go bankrupt. lol

It’s too long a conversation to get into all the union abuses, but I saw employees that were stealing from the till of other employees to fund their gambling during work hours (you are not allowed to gamble during work, let alone steal from other employees) get protected by the union. That’s how bad it was.

One guy I knew wanted a management job or to be transferred to a branch nearer his house. For years they refused both. In what was clearly jest, one day he threatened to blow up the home office. He was reported by his manager. They forced him to go for a psychological evaluation, He was quickly cleared, but his old manager didn’t want him in her branch anymore. So the union helped promote him to manager and sent him to his home branch. It was comical. Everyone that worked their ass off that wanted a promotion or to work at their home branch was joking that they need start stop working hard and start threatening to blow things up.

I think Kira at 8 is a reach. I’d much rather grab Nesmith or Vassell. I love Kira’s game but I’m not as convinced he’ll be a starter in the NBA. If we want him, we should absolutely trade down for him. I don’t think any team loves him enough to take him that early.

I don’t really want Toppin either. His numbers are fantastic, but his shooting might be a mirage. If so, he doesn’t really have a place in the NBA. Moreover, I don’t know if he shoots enough threes to keep a defense honest.

I really think Nesmith is going to light up the league from 3 and in today’s NBA (and especially for the Knicks) that makes him a worthy pick at 8.

FWIW, I put the formula for this article: Counting The Baskets into Excel and got the following results:

NBA 3pt% projections
Vassell .360
Toppin .343
Nesmith .383
Lewis .360

The same formula is also used for these projections if you want some idea of how accurate it is: 2017 Prospects. I haven’t checked to see the variance or how accurate it is. But thought it would be fun to see how the players project based on some formula.

The formula uses FT%, 3PTA/40, 3p% to get project the results.

A few more names and 3p% projections:

S. Bey .362
T. Bey .325
A. Edwards .363 (he’s helped a lot by his FT% & taking 9 3s/40)
Cole .361
Okoro .322
Haliburton .365

Early Bird:
A few more names and 3p% projections:

S. Bey .362
T. Bey .325
A. Edwards .363 (he’s helped a lot by his FT% & taking 9 3s/40)
Cole .361
Okoro .322
Haliburton .365

Can you put the numbers in for Tyrell Terry? He’s at 2.5 3PM/40, 6 3PM/40, 40.8% 3PT%, 89.1 FT%.

I’d imagine he’d grade out pretty well and he’s quickly becoming my favorite PG prospect in the draft. He’s the best shooter at the position, He clearly has a great basketball IQ, and he’s a very competitive player as well. I’m not sure he’ll be able to defend anybody at the next level, but I watch him play and I think he’s one of those Steve Nash/Trae Young/ Steph Curry types that everybody is sleeping on for one reason or another. He’s short and slight, but his rebound numbers are around what you would expect for a 6’4″ point guard so there’s a chance he plays bigger than his height. He can create his own shot off the dribble and he can shoot it off the catch, too. I think in today’s NBA his skill set is too valuable to not draft in the lottery, and I probably take him at 8th overall if I’m the Knicks. Maybe you can trade back and still acquire him while getting a guy like Patrick Williams or Aaron Nesmith, but he’s good enough to go top 10 in this draft I believe.

I also think it would be irresponsible to draft a guard/wing/forward who has shooting issues this year. For my Knicks specific big board, I have guys like Nesmith, Vassell, and Terry very high up, and I’d go as far as saying I would put a priority on landing two of those three if I were running the Knicks’ draft this year.

advanced stats in college don’t mean much…. i’ve probably stated this a million times but a lot of shooting and scoring efficiency in college can be a mirage…. it doesn’t translate all that well…. that’s why if you’re depending on TS% you’re going to look at someone like lonzo ball and think he’s the next iteration of stephen curry when he’s nothing like that….

volume matters… it actually matters more…. in the nba you need to be able to score in a variety of ways and in a variety of situations….. if you are limited… then you will be even more limited in the pros….. lonzo is a perfect case study in this because he went from shooting a lot of 3s in college and hardly getting in the paint to having even bigger problems in the pro’s…..

If Terry somehow falls to 27, I’d love to grab him there (based on a number of mocks he won’t be). His lack of athleticism and size worries me a lot because his high BB IQ doesn’t mean anything if he doesn’t have the tools to capitalize on it. His rebounding and steal numbers look solid, so maybe it’s not as much of an issue as I think.

The mock draft at NBAdraft.net has the Knicks taking a 6’5” French PG prospect in the draft. And it’s not from 2017! (And If you read the draft profiles of Ntilikina and Hayes (both written by Stephanos Makris) back to back, it reads as if he just used the find-and-replace tool on the 2017 one and replaced Ntilikina with Hayes, and right with left.

Maybe he was like “I was mostly wrong with the Ntilikina one, but this time I’ll get it right”? (Knicks fans better hope so if the mock is accurate).

Doesn’t mean a thing, but Randle’s career 3P% matches their prediction exactly, to the tenth. Weird.

Terry would be a great get at #27–every model I’ve seen has him ranked higher than he goes in most mock drafts.

There is truly no consensus as to where he’ll go (Tankathon has him at #21 with Givony having him at #44 right now, just for example) so I have no idea how realistic he’d be at #27. It’s hard to imagine a player I’d prefer with that pick if he is available, though.

I will say that everyone seems to agree Paul Reed will be available, which I don’t understand at all. We should absolutely draft that guy assuming Terry is off the board.

It was pretty depressing watching Edwin Diaz cough up another game and then on the same day seeing that Justin Dunn pitched a very nice game for the M’s. Steve Cohen is about to buy the team though, so it’s probably likely that better times are ahead.

I got a Switch Lite as a Christmas gift and I’ll often fire it up before I go to sleep. Super Mario Kart is my jam, I just get in a trance playing that ish. Kinda want to try hacking my way through an RPG next.

need to head into work in an hour or so, doing mornings, early afternoons at the house, and late afternoon and evenings at work…lot of people back to work now in the warehouse i work…i’m starting to get a little apprehensive about using the bathrooms and even the copier machine…whatever…

gonna start scheduling more vacation time soon…for some reason – i don’t really wanna do 5 to 10 days in a row…i like just doing 4 or 3 day work weeks…

anyways – point of the story: i’m getting ready to start drinking and wanted to say: prost

i took the day off…going to get my flu shot but going start tippin’ a few as well after that…not sure if the alcohol will be a bad mix with the vaccine…

I’m going to reiterate this one, and maybe I’ll look like an idiot in 2-3 years but I’m going to stand on this one:

I would pick Tyrell Terry with the 8th overall pick. I think he is the safest point guard in this draft, I like his fit in a modern offense, and I think his shooting gives him the highest ceiling in the draft of any point guard not named LaMelo Ball. He’s very useful enough off the ball that you could stick him next to a high usage wing, and you do not need to let him dribble for 10 seconds every possession for him to be useful. He’s not Steph Curry and he’s probably not Trae Young either, but maybe he’s Jose Calderon with more defense and that is a very valuable player to have under team control for 7-9 years. He doesn’t have the funky form issues that Vassell and Halliburton give you out of the gate and his game makes him a better bet to soak up higher usages considering he’s a better ball handler than the two. Kira Lewis Jr has similar size and defense issues but is a worse shooter. Aaron Nesmith is a real weapon; a guy who could be JR Smith without the maturity issues, and he’s one of the best shooters to come out of the draft, but you have to squint to see him offer value as a shot creator or one-on-one defender. Give me Tyrell Terry over all of those guys, or just get him on the team if you think you can snag one of those guys at 8 and land him in a trade up or at 27.

not sure if the alcohol will be a bad mix with the vaccine…

better than disinfectant – it cleans well and it won’t directly kill you from ingesting it…might wear out some of your organs over time – but, hell it ain’t like we’re built to last forever anyway…

Name is Bron – James Bron: I’d think about offering RJ for Nesmith

WHAT?

WHAT?

First I’m presuming we draft Kira. If we’ve got a speedy guard, I don’t want SFs and SGs collapsing. That won’t happen with Nesmith but it will happen if RJ doesn’t improve his 3FG%. But even if he does, there’s a big difference between a wing shooting 40% versus 35%.

RJ’s serviceable on defense but nothing special. He will be an elite rebounder which is valuable for initiating transition. Ultimately his value will be to create for others. I was at MSG this season and I was struck by just how slow he looked. He’s got no burst nor acceleration. He’s strong as an ox though and there is the potential he develops enough of a feel to draw double teams. BUT even then he’d have to up his FT% for that to happen. It’s a bad sign when there are so many “ifs” attached to a player.

So why do I hesitate? I picked Jaren Jackson and Luka as the top 2 picks in that draft in that order. I think I’ll end up being right about the two of them but very wrong about the order. Val has been playing his career best so it might be some time before Jaren moves in as a natural stretch 5. My concerns about Luka was his outside shooting and his ability to create against more athletic defenders. He had an NBA ready body in Europe so it boiled down to his athleticism. Luka is strong and has a super elite feel for the game which you don’t teach. It turns out it doesn’t matter who is guarding him.

Maybe RJ with a more spaced floor could leverage his strength and be in the mold of Luka? Not as good but still very productive? Very possible. I just think Nesmith being a better overall version of Buddy Hield is more probable. Kira/Nesmith > Fox/Shield

Kira/Nesmith/Wood/Mitch would make a dynamite young and cohesive core. I think we’d still have enough money left to pursue a quality starter wing in the next 2 years. Maybe we could cobble a deal involving the two Mavs picks and another pick to land one?

I don’t understand the Nesmith love. Sure he projects as a reasonably good shooter…and that’s about it? It would be insane to trade RJ to move up to get him and I’m not even crazy about RJ.

He has the profile of a guy I might target at #27, and even then there might be guys I’d prefer. Trading up to get him would be the ultimate sucker’s move.

Miami is remarkably good. I don’t think it was just Indiana’s coaching that made them lose 4-0 to Miami.

So, about 30 minutes after my last post here, my wife and I took our little dog (on a leash) for a walk. About 10 minutes into it we were attacked by what appeared to be a loose pit bull coming from the back yard of a house across the street from where we were walking. I snatched up our little Maltese in time but got caught just above my right elbow when the attacker leaped up and snapped. I kept spinning around as it circled and attempted to jump at our dog until a woman came from the house to retrieve it.

It’s a minor bite, and we did call 911 and had animal control come out. I’ve been assured that the dog’s shots are up to date, but I’m gonna have to call the doc tomorrow and see what he says.

Meantime, I now can claim to have been attacked (sort of) and bitten by a pit bull. So, there’s that.

that sucks…time to lawyer up and get compensated for the pain and mental anguish you’re going through

That sucks, Clash. I don’t know if you should automatically lawyer up, but if the injury is severe, do it.

Brian Cronin:
That sucks, Clash. I don’t know if you should automatically lawyer up, but if the injury is severe, do it.

Nah, to quote the Black Knight, “It’s just a flesh wound!” Actually, it really is, though it did break the skin and bled just a bit, I was pulling up and away and just got nipped. I just gotta check on the rabies thing.

The fact that the dog owner lied about what happened has really pissed my wife off, though. They claimed that they opened the door and it just burst out at us. Nope, they were playing with it in the backyard…

hey bc – so make me feel jealous…tell me you have all your comic books entered somewhere and neatly cataloged…that’s been a dream of mine for at least 10 years now…

were you able to ever read the: Books of Doom…man, just the title makes me smile…

I wish to stress I wouldn’t trade RJ for Nesmith unless we draft Kira at #8. I recognize I’m much higher on Kira than pretty much everybody else. I want one of my wings next to Kira to rate to be an elite shooter who plays average defense and is a high IQ player. Nesmith meets that criterion.

RJ has higher ceiling than Nesmith but if Barrett falters next year we have him on the books for 3 years taking a large chunk of cap and he won’t have any trade value. I’d rather take the more sure thing and use that cap to fill in the rest of the starters. Like I say, Kira/Nesmith/Wood/Mitch as starters and have some cap for the 5th. Maybe Frank will shoot 38% from 3 next year and be a candidate. Maybe some unhappy wing on another team wants out and we have the space to take him into that cap space giving up some picks. How does a Kira/Mitchell1/Nesmith/Wood/Mitchell2 starting lineup strike you?

That sucks, Clash. I’ve been bitten by all kinds of things, and it always sucks. Glad you’re all right, and sorry as well for the trauma to Lady Clash. Good thing is if you need the rabies shots, they’re easy nowadays. Five shots in four visits, basically like flu shots.

Jimmy Butler is a big -time badass

Shit, sorry you were bitten clashfan. As a pit bull owner myself, I can tell you that a) they are the greatest dogs in the world if they are allowed to be their natural selves, and, b) I wouldn’t want to be bitten by one because they are strong as fuck. Sorry you ran into one that wasn’t properly restrained/trained/loved.

Sorry about that Clashfan. I got bitten by a bull mastiff once. It sucked. Still have two faint puncture scars in my arm.

I dropped the fact that Jimmy Butler was an all-time great shooting guard tonight in a conversation on Zoom just for the hell of it. Everyone was like, no fucking way dude, and then like, wait a minute. If I were internet savvy I would do that Kombucha girl meme with that as the tagline. Might actually kill on twitter.

Good playoffs so far. Enjoying watching Chris Paul a lot. Obviously enjoying Lugentz Dort even more. Where the heck does Paul fit in the all time point guard rankings if he never makes a finals (has he made the Conference Finals more than once?)

Westbrook singlehandily coughed this one up…

Kind of strange how James Harden didn’t get the ball at the end of this game. With Chris Webber on this one too.

Donnie Walsh:
Shit, sorry you were bitten clashfan. As a pit bull owner myself, I can tell you that a) they are the greatest dogs in the world if they are allowed to be their natural selves, and, b) I wouldn’t want to be bitten by one because they are strong as fuck. Sorry you ran into one that wasn’t properly restrained/trained/loved.

Yeah, we love dogs and don’t blame it. The neighbor told animal control that a friend is visiting from out of town with her dog. So, they were out back with it, in a strange neighborhood (to the dog) with lots of walkers/bikers/joggers, etc. And, they didn’t have it restrained. Not so smart.

Heat bring the D intensity of the 90ies…without dirty fouls and cheapshots but intense as hell.
And the refs didn’t spoil the game.
Goran ballin. Jimmy out of this world. First I love for obvious reasons the second because of his game…but man i don’t like the Heat.
This is a good test for Giannis, the Bucks and Budz also. Make or brake. I hope it goes to game 7.

the thing that stood out to me about the Bucks game was that Giannis only took 12 shots.

My guess:

1. Minnesota: Ball
2. Golden State: Edwards
3. Charlotte: Wiseman
4. Chicago: Avdija
5. Cleveland: Toppin
6. Atlanta: Haliburton
7. Detroit: Patrick WIlliams
8. Knicks: Vassell
9. Washington: Okongwu
10. Phoenix: Okoro
11. San Antonio: Poku
12. Sacramento: Saddiq Bey
13. New Orleans: Hayes
14. Boston: Nesmith

Detroit still has Rose under contract and Weaver comes from OKC where they love freaky athletic wings.
I think we will pick either Hayes or Vassell — going to go out on a limb and say they’re going to wait another year to pick their primary ball handler of the future. Plus Zanin is presumably in the war room and he’s also from OKC.

if Hayes isn’t picked by us, I’m not sure who takes him. Washington needs a defender inside and Okongwu fits well there. PHX wants wings and Okoro fits in as a defender. I think SA will either take Hayes or Poku – given their depth at guard I’m going Poku who will really benefit from their development system. I’m thinking Sac will sign and trade or do something with Bogdanovic and then pick up his replacement. New Orleans gets the heir apparent to Jrue and Lonzo. And Danny Ainge will get the best shooter in the draft.

It would be pretty Wolvesy to do the following:

1) draft Okogie (SG) at #20 in 2018
2) draft Culver (SG) at #6 in 2019
3) trade for Russell (PG) for a 1st round pick with minimal protections in 2020
4) select a ball-dominant PG (Ball) with the #1 overall in 2020

Maybe they’re just assuming that the league won’t be able to contain them playing four PG/SGs and Towns down low, even though Towns spends a ton of time outside the arc.

I mean, when you’re that bad, you pick BPA and deal with the consequences later, but they’re in a shit situation of their own making — they have $104M in committed salaries next year, including James Johnson’s $16M player option (although they rid themselves only of Dieng’s $17M salary to get Johnson, which is a win). The incompetence is staggering.

hey may not have enough fire power to be considered serious contenders now, but they have some very good veterans, some very good young pieces for the future, and you sort of know Riley is just one trade away from opening a window for a title run with this group before rebuilding it again with the young pieces.

Their title window is about 2 years long. Iguodala is 36, Dragic 33, Butler 30, Crowder 29, Olynyk 28, and then their young players, aside from Adebayo, are not all that good (yet).

The Heat have already traded their 2021 and 2023 firsts, so they can’t send anything out until 2025. The good news for them is that they have $82M in committed salary next year and Olynyk’s $12M player option should be tradeable. They’re not losing much — I don’t consider their expirings (Dragic, Hill, Leonard, Crowder, Haslem, Jones) critical to their success. So yeah, this offseason is probably going to determine whether they can push past the Bucks and Raptors in the East. If Riley can pull another superstar out of his ass, he’ll deserve the Exec of the Year trophy back in his hands.

There’s a reason Durant didn’t want t play with Westbrook anymore.

I would have agreed with you when he left OKC, but the more we get to know Kevin Durant, the more I realize that Kevin Durant’s worst enemy is Kevin Durant.

Right now, he piles up numbers, but he tries to do too much.

The only way I agree with this is if you’re saying that he needs to learn how to shoot from deep. It is, on the offensive side, the only flaw in his game. The turnovers can always come down, but he’s got good company at the top of the TO leaderboard.

Again, it’s really hard to criticize the linchpin of the league’s best-ever offense.

The Honorable Cock Jowles: The only way I agree with this is if you’re saying that he needs to learn how to shoot from deep. It is, on the offensive side, the only flaw in his game. The turnovers can always come down, but he’s got good company at the top of the TO leaderboard.

Again, it’s really hard to criticize the linchpin of the league’s best-ever offense.

That’s the thing. He’s already a good 3 point shooter even though you’d never know it by the stats. The problem is he takes way too many bad 3 point shots given his shooting skills at his time. He doesn’t stay within his circle of competence. That’s part of over-aggression he needs tame to learn how to maximize his game.

He’s brilliant going to the basket and making passes off penetration, but he forces way too many terrible passes that lead to terrible TOs. He has to learn that you don’t have to something great on every play. Sometimes the right thing to do is simply dribble back out and start over of just make a simple pass to start it over.

I’m not sure he’ll ever be a good defender, but it might help if he laid of the Twinkies and dropped 15 pounds.

We are talking about a special talent here that imo has some very easy to correct clear flaws that are the difference between being a great player and being Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Lebron James etc.. great.

***The turnovers can always come down, but he’s got good company at the top of the TO leaderboard.***

He wasn’t even at the top of the TO leaderboard. His TO% was 30th in the league, better than 20 point guards.

Come on Jowles that was a little dishonest, I don’t agree with a lot of what Strat says but Miami has got one of the best developmental staffs in the league. There is no one who saw Bam turning into a better version of Draymond Green, they are one good guard away from being a serious title contender and if Dragic keeps playing like this they are in the mix this year. It sucks that two of the best developmental staffs are in the East, if Toronto or Miami had Mitch he would probably be Anthony Davis…

These are empty words. Sometimes being bad is an opportunity to make the team better. See: Hinkie, Sam. Riley had a 39-43 team least year, which is the purgatory zone. The fact that Butler forced his way off of a team that lost to the world champs by one wild shot? Not really relevant to Riley’s genius. Opportunism is great, but it’s not 12D chess.

Yeah, I gotta disagree with you hard here. I don’t think Butler chose Miami over Philly bc of South Beach. There was no super friends connection for him to go there either. He isn’t from Miami. Miami was a worse team than Philly last year yet Butler chose them. Do you think their culture, their history of development, Riley, Spoelstra, etc…had anything to do with that?
Even though Butler was on a better team last year he saw that bc of the culture Riley has created there that he would be a better fit and have a better shot to win it all in Miami than in Philly? Do you trust Riley’s ability to draft, develop, sign or trade for another star in the next year or two to pair with Butler cause I sure as hell do.

You’re acting like butler choosing Miami (a worse team) over Philly (a better team) was some sort of personality quirk or anomaly. But I think the evidence is pretty clear Butler chose Miami bc he believed in the organization more than he did in Philly.

The Heat have hardly ever had to tank and yet the worst they usually are is your definition of purgatory. If the worst the knicks were over the last decade was a few seasons where we only won 40ish games and were a low playoff seed, I would be happy as a clam.

For all of your intelligence, you really adhere to the championship or tank idea. Yes, it makes sense to tank sometimes (when you’re all ready shitty) but being a decently good team year after year reaps its own rewards. Competence entices good players. Development means you can have later first round picks and still have faith that you will add good players to your…

I would’t mind having the runs The Grizzlies (2009-2019), the Blazers (2007-), the Pacers (1989-) and the Heat (2003-) have had (the Thunder is an outlier, since they drafted 3 HOFers in a row).

They basically didn’t tank for a decade-plus (except for the Heat in 2007, after Wade was done for the season) and have had competitive teams, with cores that reached at least a Conference Finals. The Pacers were legitimate title contenders in 2012-2014. Memphis and Portland could have almost Thunder-like with good drafts in 2009 and 2007, but it was not meant to be.

Some people can’t be happy with a 2nd-round team, even though winning is very good. It’s funny knowing that you can win a home game against the top dogs of the league almost every year.

Isn’t patient rebuild to get you to deep in the playoffs on an annual basis, where one year things may fall into place. That’s essentially the Ewing era Knicks. To me championship or bust = swing for the fences to get that perennial five player which often means banking on getting that player (Lebron, Durant, Giannis, Leonard) when they become available. Maybe it’s just semantics on my part.

Butler did say (on a recent JJ Redick podcast) that the “accountable” culture at Miami was there. (He claimed that no one was steering the ship in Philly, and that led to him leaving, despite the one-bounce-away ending.) And yes, Butler alone did not make them a contender this year, but he’s the key reason they are. So Riley deserves credit for his salvaging of the inexplicable glut of mid-level, high-priced veterans he’s signed over the years, including Dion Waiters, one of the worst contracts of this century.

I would take the Heat situation over the Knicks’ situation, obviously. They have cap space, a cheap rising star, a legit max player, and a number of value contracts. The projected cap of $109M means that if they’re somehow able to flip Olynyk for cap space, they’ll have almost $40M to play with. That is, indeed, a great place to be.

I’m just saying that Miami should not be considered a poster child for success for the unforeseeable Butler signing, as they hovered in mediocrity for years until a disgruntled superstar landed on their doorstep. Riley has done a few things right since LeBron left, namely keeping Spoelstra at the helm, but trading the 2018 and 2021 firsts for Goran Dragic was not one of them. Signing Olynyk, Johnson, Whiteside, Johnson and Waiters to massive long-term deals were not among them, either.

Riley is great because he’s built an incredible organization there.
#1 is that he resisted the urge to replace Spoelstra when the big 3 was there and Lebron was asking for a change. Spoelstra is easily one of the 3-4 best coaches in the league. They’ve built an unbelievable development program there – literally everybody not named Dion Waiters that they touch turns into an asset. They give away picks because they believe in their development program to continue to churn out productive players despite lack of premium picks – Kendrick Nunn, Josh Richardson, Derrick Jones, Bam, Herro, Duncan Robinson, etc.

It’s basically the Knicks strategy except with a good development program. “We can give away picks but they’ll be bad picks because we’ll be so good”. For the Knicks we give away picks that end up in the lottery. For the Heat they give away picks that are at worst in the teens. And then they still get cheap young contributing talent because of their development staff.

Worst was having a cute little chickadee I was holding rip a cuticle out of my finger. I’m still proud that I didn’t crush the little fucker like a kleenex.

bless you raven, i needed that…

shit dink, swans are aggressive as hell…it’s funny how things change over time…i used to love to take the kids to some nearby ponds to feed the ducks (and even swans)…a couple of years ago – they started posting signs around the different ponds saying don’t feed the birds – it messes up their environmental routine or something…

that sucks, i always liked feeding the ducks…fuck feeding pigeons or seagulls – they’re both like rats with wings…

it’s funny, whenever i’m hanging out in certain areas of monterey (especially the lake by the dennis the menace park) i’m always super apprehensive when those pelicans fly overhead….those things are like flying buses – i ain’t trying to get shit on by a pelican…

i did get clipped once by a bird (supposed to be good luck – yeah right) – at the time was wearing some old school “od green” fatigues – that is a stain that does not come out…

I was bitten by a ring-tailed lemur once.

for real???

Yeah, I’m a huge fan of dogs (I have a lab – they are the breed that bites the most), but Pitbulls are a whole other thing. I would even suggest that maybe you were lucky it wasn’t worse, ClashFan.

They can be sweet like all dogs, but their jaw power and athleticism is off the charts. It’s like owning a pet Great White Shark! And it seems like only a matter of time before a Pit goes off on someone or something. I saw one literally end some poor girl’s small dog at a dog run once as if it was fetching a ball… really brutal stuff.

Love pits, also terrified of them unless I know their owner’s capacity as a trainer and “alpha.” Rotties and German shepherds too.

I’m just saying that Miami should not be considered a poster child for success

Since 95-96, Miami has made 19 playoff appearances and has missed the playoffs only 6 times. They’ve won 3 championships, made 5 finals appearances and have gotten to the second round 11 times.

They are far from mediocre.

I don’t want a dog to accessorize with my outfits – I want a “real” dog

🙂

i’ll be honest – i have little to no desire to care for any living creatures other than the kids and mom…everything else in the world is on its own…actually – i do enjoy taking care of the plants in the garden…what’s nice – if i forget about them for a few days and don’t feed/water them – they don’t die…i love plants…relatively low maintenance and they eat carbon and poop oxygen…how great is that…

i don’t know cdiggy, like we really need a greater reminder that there is no such thing as amateurism – particularly in regard to college football…it’s definitely shining bright right now…

i’m interested to see the outcome of the grievances/demands that some of the pac-12 players have put forth…i haven’t heard much about it the last month or so…

very good chance the big 10 is gonna end up playing football this year, at least some of the schools will…

i’m not such a big fan of the ncaa especially when it comes to b-ball and football…

trump is an absolute next level troll…that fucker has got it down to a science…been a long time since i’ve felt hatred for an individual i’m not even directly connected to – but, yeah, i hate that asshole…

The Honorable Cock Jowles:
Riley is a superstar whisperer. He drafted Wade, lured Shaq from LA and engineered space for three max players to play at a discount together. He deserves all the credit for their successes. He must also take responsibility for a roster that looked like this:

Whiteside $25.4M
Tyler Johnson $19M
James Johnson $14.4M
Waiters $11.5M
Olynyk $11M

All for a 39-43 team.

Should we say that it was his poor management that led to that position? Or should we give him extra credit for somehow getting out from under those contracts without selling the farm?

If the debate is whether he is below, above or average…I think the track record suggests above…as part of the assessment of that…sure he gets credit for assembling the roster whether it is via whispering in someones ear or trading or drafting them…and has to be held responsible for shitty moves…but show me one GM that is in the pantheon of “above average” or “great” that doesn’t have a blemish on their record…

Riley is objectively a successful GM. I don’t think the man is a genius or anything, but the Heat have been consistently good over a long period of time. 3 titles, 5 finals, 7 conference finals, and 19 playoff appearances in 25 years, only 2 really bad teams.

I wonder… What is your price to move Mitch? Would the Warriors 2020 #2 AND their Minny 2021 first do it?

ess-dog:
I wonder… What is your price to move Mitch? Would the Warriors 2020 #2 AND their Minny 2021 first do it?

Man, that would be really tempting and that’s without knowing what kind of protections are on the Minny pick. If this were a better draft I’d do it 100% but with this crappy draft it depends on bit on the protections.

EDIT: Yeah, I’d do that. The Minny pick is only top 3 protected next year and unprotected in 2022. No brainer.

i have a buddy who keeps pits….they are wonderful animals…i can go months without seeing them, but, as soon as i show up – they instantly recognize me and it’s all love…

he had this one pit years ago named chico…at the time chico was getting old (maybe like 8 or so) and packing on the pounds…him and i were in the front yard playing tug with some rope…we were having fun…

at one point i leaned over chico, who was getting old and kind of fat – in the blink of an eye chico leaped up and grabbed my lips with his teeth…didn’t squeeze, didn’t bite, nothing – he let go right away, he was being playful…

i just stood there in shock for a while at how fast and high he jumped and how deftly he grabbed my lips with his teeth…it freaked me out pretty good…i’ll never forget that…

Boston’s D is very impressive

That was a bullshit flop by Smart. I hate that prick. (would like him on my team tho…)

Smart is taking over

Toronto has no go to guy…

I hate to say it, but the Celts are gonna be a tough out.

FVV is sucking this game

fvv….is killing his offseason negotiating leverage…

Finally FVV hits one.

fvv hit that after he saw my post…

Danny Ainge also a good gm. Galling.

Kemba earning that contract in crunch time

oy vey!

“I was responding to the posts by a certain resident anti-tanker, who essentially said, “See? Tanking is dumb and the Heat show that.””

In the last 20 seasons…

Miami – five losing seasons, only once back-to-back.
Boston – six losing seasons, only once back-to-back.
Toronto – nine losing seasons, four in a row and five in a row with a winning season and a .500 season in between.
Milwaukee – 10 losing seasons, five in a row and then four in a row.
Knicks – 17 LOSING SEASONS, nine in a row and seven in a row, five seasons of less than 25 wins.

Tanking is dumb. If it weren’t, the Knicks could never have been as bad as they’ve been. Yeah, yeah. The Knicks have been run like crap and traded away 1st round picks. They’ve still been terrible for 17 out of the last 20 years in an era where you can’t trade away back-to-back 1st rounders and have been one of the worst teams in the league 25% of the time…and have virtually nothing to show for it.

This isn’t hard. If you suck, you shouldn’t do stupid things to try and suck slightly less. But you also shouldn’t do stupid things to suck even more. That’s because tanking for success is inherently luck-dependent.

Mike

If the Knicks ever actually tanked and just avoided dumb FA signings and trades, they’d be just fine right now.

Alternative, also accurate statement.
.

I am very surprised that Boston is 6-0 in the playoffs (and Miami is 5-0).

I guess Malone could be fired if the Nuggets lose. That’s dumb.

I’ve come to believe that there are only two reasons to fire a coach:

1) gross incompetence
2) Gregg Popovich is available.

This is one fugly basketball game.

I haven’t watched much basketball on tv over the past few years, is 3 seconds still a rule?

What the fuck were the Nuggets doing taking a shot with 4 seconds left and a full shot clock?

I blame Beno.

But yeah, seriously, that was insanely stupid. Maybe Malone should be fired.

Not going to do a lot to repair the Mitchell/Gobert relationship, that’s for sure.

***just saw the garden will serve as a polling station for the election…***

I have no idea what kind of down-ballot effect this may have, but it means nothing for the presidential race.

Milwaukee, Detroit, Atlanta, Miami, Orlando, Phoenix, Philadelphia, Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, and Charlotte are the arenas that can have a real effect on the nation.

Marcus Smart gives me hope for Frank. He didn’t break .400 fg% until he was 24 and has only been average from three the last two years. Smart just seems like much more of a physical freak though, which shows in his steal numbers versus Frank’s.

Btw I didn’t realize that Frank has consistently been raising his ft% and it’s now .864! Not that he gets to the line much, but that bodes well for his overall shooting. Now we just need a Kemba-type to stick next to him.

Elam Ending would have fixed that finish. It’s still weird to me that it’s satisfactory that the end of a basketball game can turn into a game of keepaway. It should be basketball from wire to wire.

There’s one argument that really vexes me: “It’ll cheapen the buzzer-beater.”

Like… what?

Donovan Mitchell is going to ink a max deal with Utah:

Mitchell and the Jazz will finalize a max extension when free agency opens in mid-October, league sources told Yahoo Sports.

***how in the world did you come in that close of contact to a ring-tailed lemur to get bitten…***

It was at a zoo (and I was the zookeeper).

Which reminds me, this isn’t an animal bite story, but along the same lines. A few years ago I was swimming in the ocean at night and I felt something bite into my foot and drag me backwards. I had no idea what had gotten me. I reached down and pulled out a fishhook. I swam to shore where there was a flashlight bounding around the beach. I emerged from the surf and handed the hook to the fisherman. He stared at me wide-eyed and said “oh shit, I thought I’d hooked a seal or something.” I turned and disappeared back into the water. (He seemed relieved it was only a human and not a seal, which probably would have come with a fine and been a bitch to cleanup after.)

noble,

When reality is too awful to handle, the imagination becomes a source of comfort.

Donny, we probably know each other.

Your story reminds me of the longest protracted battle I can remember, with a gigantic triggerfish almost as big as I was that wanted me dead while I was snorkeling in the South Pacific. Took about five very long minutes of beating his attacks off with my flippers before I got away. Never bit me, but not for want of trying. Turns out they have a pugnacious reputation, but still.

Which then reminds me of being bum-rushed by a beaver while swimming in an upstate lake. Not sure what my epitaph would have been, but someone could have had fun with it.

I emerged from the surf and handed the hook to the fisherman. He stared at me wide-eyed and said “oh shit, I thought I’d hooked a seal or something.” I turned and disappeared back into the water.

oh have we reached the point in knickdom where everyone quietly agrees to post only the as their favorite incarcerated netflix memechild?

Clash, Mother Nature’s a bitch, no sexism intended. And rarely appreciative.

PT, feeling a bit Martin Brody there? I thought Donnie was doing a very nice job of channeling Hemingway. Admittedly the old, washed-up version, but still.

The more I watch these payoffs, the more convinced I become there isn’t a legitimate championship caliber team in the NBA right now. There are several very good teams that would be contenders in most years, but no one that has both the quality and depth on both sides to beat a LOT of the champions of the past. The closest thing to it is probably the Clippers, with the Celtics and Bucks fairly close behind if a 3rd player steps up. But even the Clippers look shaky unless Paul George is playing his absolute best ball and they are healthy. I really don’t think this Lakers team is all that good even with James and Davis, but the rest of the league is so “meh” they have every chance to win it all.

d-mar:
Toronto players like Siakam and FVV are getting a little exposed so far in the Boston series.

You think playing with Kawhi might have benefited them a bit?

IMO, Kawhi is the best big game two way player in the NBA since Jordan. He has 3 gears.

1. Regular season.
2. Playoffs.
3. It’s time to take over from the slackers and win the game.

The answer is yes. 🙂

“Zookeeper” isn’t as awesome as it sounds. I was a student, with access to a barely accredited zoo. And obviously I wasn’t very good at it, because the animals all attacked me (except the potoroo, which I lost).

WARNING: If you didn’t watched “Watchmen” yet, watch out for spoilers henceforth. I would never say a word, but I don’t take responsibility for other posters’ behaviour.

*haven’t

howdy leonam, you’re absolutely right – al has been super fortunate to have the opportunity to dive deep in to some of the most amazing screen work (and the folks involved in that process) ever done…like in forever…and, he’s able to relay those experiences in a way that we can all relate to – which is a whole other freaky skill unto itself…

although, as cool as that is, being up on a stage playing music in front of folks may be an even cooler experience (just guessing)…dealing with big numbers on wall street must be a serious adrenaline rush some days…

still though – zookeeper, working with all kinds of animals…man, that is the definition of a dream job…i always wanted to care for the rhinos, they seem pretty chill and relatively easy to get along with…

for a while when i was in between jobs – had this idea about becoming a park ranger…unfortunately, i couldn’t navigate the hiring process – that and – to be honest, i know jack-shit about the outdoors 🙂

in my whole 14 years in uniform – i spent maybe two weeks sleeping out in “the field”, and, most of that was spent inside some control center module loaded on to the back of a truck…

took the kids fishing for years – we still haven’t caught nothing…yeah, skill and aspirations don’t always match up…

For those who like your star to rescue the Knicks fantasies extended, Dolan pal and Friday Night Knicks musician Robert Randolph tweeted that 85% chance The Spider is on Knicks next year.
https://twitter.com/rrtfb/status/1301248355901767681

okay then KYN, hands where we can see them buddy 🙂

okay leonam, you win…just finished the interview with trent, atticus, damon, dustin and al – yeah, you’re right – we’re going gonna have to move al’s gig up ahead of even a zookeeper…

what a cool room trent was in…gonna go through the watchmen soundtrack now…tried the first episode of the series and it didn’t really grab me – NIN though, that definitely gets my attention…

i really like that notion of having the score going “against” the on screen imagery…

that’s one of the things that stuck out to me the most while watching some of those ariel pink vids…it creates a really unbalanced and almost disorienting feeling…do i go with my eyes or ears…

Giannis looks like the 7’5″ avatar that I’d make in NBA Live ’96 who dunked on everyone and never missed around the rim.

Also if they lose this series I got 10 bucks that sez Giannis gets traded to GSW for all the picks they have in the cupboard.

I love that Milwaukee is still boycotting.

RIP Tom Seaver. My idol as a kid.

no way middleton makes all 3…

edit: middleton, no problem…

rotten way to end the game…

I’ve been rooting for the Bucks, but am starting to come around on the Heat. The end of that game was not the most cerebral confrontation as they go…

I guess they were probably fouls but that’s a shitty way to end a game, especially after all the fucking timeouts

You’d never see those kinds of calls late on a game in the 90s. Those were real ticky-tack… ESPECIALLY that foul on whoever guarded Middleton on that 3. That’s a no-call.

When reality is too awful to handle, the imagination becomes a source of comfort.

I can attest to this since maybe 8 years old… lol.

the legend of lou dort grows…let’s go thunder…

Tom Seaver was a hero of mine too.

luguentz dort, pac-12 defensive player of the year – and, undrafted…

they’re out there, we just got to start finding them…

man, Covington is a valuable player

I’m not sure the refs are helping Houston to put it mildly.

I learned recently that Chinese still can’t watch the Rockets and aren’t supposed to use the name “Rockets”. So sometimes they call the team “404” for the message you get when a web page isn’t found.

this is totally setting up for a Paul game winner at the buzzer….

Some of the refereeing in both games has been iffy

Yeah, kind if uneven too.

Become on, he moved into it.

man these refs suck…

damn, rockets win…

What a game

Scott Foster trying so hard

good thing they had all those time outside to draw up that gem of a play

I love close game 7s as much as the next guy, but man, I feel like if the Nuggets, Jazz, Rockets, and Thunder ALL want to go home so badly, they should just be allowed to leave.

Didn’t Dort go out of bounds before the timeout was called?

Why in the fuck didn’t Chris Paul shoot the technical? Gallo is a great free throw shooter, too, but how is that not Paul’s spot there?

Refs really fucked up those two games, but to their bennefit it looked like consistent unintentional two-way fuckup and no rigging odour felt in what decided the games.
Towards the end teams also played way down to match the refs level…not on D tho. All in all good games to me, several standard devations better than stinker of a game by Jazz and Nugs the other day.

The Heat are a pleasure to watch. Butler is a great overall player, but he’s really not a legitimate #1 scorer. He’s more of a #1a or great #2. But they have a good mix of inside scoring, outside shooting, penetration, and most importantly they get a lot of ball movement. They are almost like a less talented version of the great Spurs teams. They play offense the way it’s supposed to be played and play solid hard defense. I’m still not fully convinced they are talented enough to even beat the Bucks despite being up 2-0, but at least they are demonstrating basketball can still be played properly and successfully if you give a great coach some unselfish players that play as a team.

Holy heck. Is that his first head coaching job?

When are they changing the team name to the Brooklyn Durants?

Will be interesting to see how good he is when he gets back on the court.

Holy crap..Steve Nash! I’m not gonna kill this move because he is a PG who was a bit of a basketball savant. But Jacque Vaughn staying on as his lead assistant? It probably should be the other way around, at least for this year. Good luck to them..I guess

Interesting hire by the Nets – I kinda like it.

Thinking about Devin Vassell after watching Covington basically do everything last night against OKC. Their physical profiles are very similar (Vassell is though to be in the 6’6″-6’7″ range with ~7′ wingspan, Covington was measured at 6’6.25″ and 7’1.25″ wingspan at the combine) and statistically speaking their stats over the first two years of college were quite similar too (with the caveat that Covington played at a small school and Vassell played in a much tougher conference. I definitely would not be sad with Vassell.

I put Spoelstra right behind Pop in the ranking of modern day coaches. (and fuck Phil Jackson, he never coached a team that didn’t have at least one HOF’er on it)

If Miami makes the Finals, that would be quite the capstone for Spoelstra’s career.

***I see this, actually. There’s clearly a lot of buy-in from their players. Culture matters.***

I remember Riley used to have the Charleston retreat for the Knicks every summer. They’d black out the windows of the gym down there, and basically not interact with anybody but themselves to build team chemistry. He probably loves this whole bubble thing. It’s in his wheelhouse.

Newest mock. My major takeaway is that the Celtics picked a crappy year to have a ton of picks. Has us taking Hayes. I honestly can’t remember a draft as topsy turvy as this one.

https://theathletic.com/2037121/2020/09/03/vecenie-2020-nba-mock-draft-7-1-a-mini-update-based-on-what-im-hearing/?source=emp_shared_article

A few mocks have us taking obi or vassell. So not only pgs but if I’m swinging for the fences alexseij is a strong contender.

to be fair — I once said Steve Nash had a better chance of landing a head coaching gig than Patrick Ewing.

Pop had 19 consecutive seasons of at least three of Robinson, Duncan, Manu and Parker, plus Kawhi for six of those. In 2013, Spo had a roster that has 26 total All-NBA selections and should have another at the end of this season. Jackson deserves his rings.

For the 6 seasons after LeBron left, Spoelstra’s teams averaged 42 wins. And yes, they still had Wade, but he was in his mid 30’s and declining.

I just give him a lot of credit for keeping his teams very competitive year after year, they really haven’t had a major down year since 2007-2008

Just so we’re all clear…

Professional sports team hires white guy (Steve Nash) with ZERO real coaching experience to be their head coach while passing over a black guy (Mark Jackson) who has a WINNING RECORD as a head coach.

And everybody is just fine with it? Some allies you guys are.

Mike

They didn’t just pass over Mark Jackson (who’s a bigot who may have burned too many bridges to ever coach in this league again), but Jacques Vaughan, who has experience as both a head coach and as head coach of this team, and who will now be asked to be Nash’s lead assistant and hand-holder.

There’s a history of former point guards being hired as head coaches without any time as an assistant — see also Doc Rivers, Jason Kidd, Zeke, our own Derek Fisher, and Steve Kerr. At a minimum, though, the optics on this aren’t great, regardless of what Isola says.

Yes, the Nets literally asked Durant who he wanted as the coach and he said “how about my best buddy at Golden State? Can we get him?” And so they did it. They would’ve hired a platypus if that’s what Durant wanted. Christ, they fired a perfectly good coach because that’s what Durant and Kyrie wanted.

Speaking of coaches, how do people feel about Budz at the moment? He is seeming really rigid with his minutes distribution and defensive assignments in these playoffs. Obviously, a great coach, and we’d have been lucky to have hired him instead of Fizdale, but he is… stubborn.

It does strike me that they might want to let Giannis play a few more minutes, at least.

And d-mar, yes, huge fan. Will check it out.

Re: Budenholzer…I think (and one of the analysts mentioned this on the broadcast) the regular season and playoffs are different animals and Giannis’ game doesn’t seem to translate as well in the playoffs…and I guess you can point some of the blame at the coach for not adapting but I also think their roster gets exposed in a short series against the better teams…if you’re counting on Marvin Williams as a key cog in the wheel..well…not sure that is going to work out well…I think Miami has a better roster…

JK47: Imagine trying to get through life with a brain as primitive as this

JK47

I don’t think it is possible..what I do think is that the sometimes that Russian AI program/bot has an algorithm glitch and the shit that is supposed to go to facebook or politico or yahoo…gets sent here based on some key word association…cuz that can’t actually be a real human…

watching the get-together at the grace lutheran church (trying remember the lutheran story)…what a stark contrast to what occurred yesterday – watch some of that too…probably need to unplug in awhile – but, how enlightening to hear the citizens of kenosha speaks…

always good to hear when people speak to data…numbers don’t really don’t lie, people lie though – they do serve purpose though…

100% – GET RID OF THE GUNS – not sure if that should mean all guns, but…let’s at least start – something…here, here’s $1,000, i’ll take that old m16 off your hands…

– there just has to be federal compiling and review of police data involving cases of shootings and discrimination…which will work terrifically – up until the point, we get some really terrible leadership on top…in that case, hopefully one of the other two branches can protect it…

but, the same story keeps getting told – there’s history and data available to more successfully prevent these events…there’s just no wide spread action plan towards its utilization…

poor joe breathing hard…hang in there brother – god has given you purpose…valar dohaeris…

god bless joe -got a word in there for us crazy folks…

And everybody is just fine with it? Some allies you guys are.

all your race are belong to us

mike

What’s your favorite Mark Jackson story?

You pick:

-telling Festus Ezeli’s teammates that Ezeli was happy they were losing, because it inflated his prospective contract value
-banning Jerry West and Jim Barnett from practices because ?????
-conspired to turn his teammates against John Stockton, which led to his retirement
-refused competent assistant coaches so he could try to keep his job
-had Steph Curry hop on his busted ankle while in a church service because injuries can be healed by expelling Satan through hopping
-prayed for Jason Collins when he came out because god hates the Nets
-told the media that he didn’t need extra preparation for playoff games
-told Golden State players that the front office was rooting for them to lose so it would make Mark Jackson look bad
-and of course, cheated on his wife with a stripper, was blackmailed, and also was a “minister” at the same time

If you listen to him on ESPN, you can conclude one of two things.

(1) he is deliberately dumbing down his analysis because (a) TV producers don’t believe that fans want to hear actual basketball discussion, even though Thinking Basketball and Coach Nick and other analytical YouTube content is among the most popular on the internet and/or (b) he’s keeping his Super Top Secret Basketball Thoughts under wraps so as to not give his future coach rivals any inside information about what he actually thinks

(2) he coaches via gut feeling, vague platitudes and the other “trust me, I used to dribble for a living” nonsense that comes out of his mouth as a TV “analyst”

Choosing option 1 may suggest that you are prone to believing that a really, really fuckin’ dumb person is performing that way to play 12D chess, when in fact, they are experiencing the symptoms of dementia and may have had a series of mini-strokes, making it difficult to walk down stairs without assistance, pronounce simple words off a teleprompter, or bring a glass of water to one’s lips…

Also Steve Nash looks like the perfect scapegoat for KD’s conspiracy plan.
Conspiracy Theories on their finest!

Giannis had 29 points on 18 shot attempts, with 14 boards and just 2 TOV. He’s been pretty dominant, although he should be playing every available minute for the rest of the series. If he fouls out, so be it.

If you want to talk about what his coach needs to do, it’s find a way to make Matthews, Williams, Connaughton, Korver and DiVincenzo shoot better than 5-20 from the floor in 70 combined minutes.

He wasn’t dominant to my eyes.
Dominant means to get the ball and your opponents to shit their pants instantly.
Easy buckets and constant defense terror.
Giannis seems like he needs better shot/FT/post moves to be Playoffs Dominant.
He looks like an ordinary all Star.
Not Like the MVP.

I kind of agree with KYN. I know it’s the hated eye test, but the Bucks look like they’re playing a regular season game while the Heat are playing playoff basketball. Since we’re tossing conspiracy theories around today, I wonder if leading the walk-out (and dealing with all the likely crap that came after) has them still a bit shell-shocked.

Would be a shame, as they’re one of the teams I’m left rooting for right now, plus winning it all would really give them a platform for talking about it all.

to me…dominant superstar means, in fucking crunch time… you either (a) can get your shot off whenever you want and usually make it , see Leonard, Kahwi or Curry, Stephen or Davis, Anthoy or (b) get one of your team mates a solid open look, see Paul, Chris or (c) both, see The King Lebron…Giannis ain’t in any of those categories…no jumper…mediocre handle…not a great passer…

Okay, sorry, I need to disassociate myself with where this is going. I absolutely think Giannis is a dominant superstar. As Jowles said, 29 and 14 ain’t bad. I do feel he has another gear that seems missing except on occasion this series, and even then he’s getting 29 and 14. I think they need him to get up to 38 and 18, which I absolutely think he can, because he’s a dominant superstar,

Giannis is averaging more PPG this playoffs than Steph Curry ever has. His >40 points per 100 possessions is more than Kawhi has ever averaged.

Robert Horry

I didn’t know what to think when 538 had the Celtics up near the top for most likely to win the title, and by far, but man, they are looking like a championship team. Kemba was such a great get for them. The anti-Kyrie, from a team perspective.

who wins celtics or heat in the next round? That could be a seven gamer…

It’s weird that the 2nd round in the East could be basically over before it even begins in the west.

WTF is Rebekka Harlow doing on TNT, looking all fine in a mask, acting like she don’t even KNOW us?

anti-kyrie for sure

how did they leave him that open??

Seemed like a screen from Gasol?

WAIT I MUST BE A COUPLE MINUTES BEHIND, WHAT?

WHAT JUST HAPPENED

really a great pass from lowry, who was awesome all night. jaylen brown almost blocked that three from like six feet away. pretty fun game all around.

That has to be one of the most amazing set plays I’ve ever seen in a situation like that. Nick Nurse should take a bow.

Mets walk off the Yanks on Tom Seaver day and Celts get shocked by a 3 at the buzzer. Good sports nite for the Z-man!

The Nugs need a nap!

I’m happy that OG hit that shot. I really like this Raptors team.

Given there were 0.5 seconds left and he had Tako Falls on him, I thought Lowery’s pass was every bit as impressive as O.G.’s shot. That pass was Bradyeseque( though Tatum looked like he used to play free safety for the football Giants).

Giannis game ain’t ready for domination in the Playoffs.
It was clear even from the National Teams World Cup.
When the game is loose he’s unstoppable but when the Ds are zones or pseudozones he’s in Real Trouble.
I expect him to have Serious problems against serious Ds of Miami, Toronto, Boston and Clippers.
F(uck)orget the numbers. He ain’t dominant yet during the playoffs.

Kawhi’s game makes you wanna be a better man.

Brian will save us from RSI at some point….

The difference between watching Oklahoma City run their inbounds play in the final second of their game and Toronto run theirs was like watching two different sports altogether. And Boston is a team of good defenders, as opposed to the Houston players who, lets face it, don’t make their money on that end of the court. Which leads me to ask, why was Gilgous-Alexander inbounding in that situation instead of Chris Paul? Nurse wisely had his veteran leader and PG in charge of making the play happen yesterday. Whereas Donovan had a kid, who, in kid fashion, tried to inbound the ball to Steven Adams 25 feet from the basket in a catch-and-shoot situation.