2024 NBA OFFS AND INS

its time

Are they really in or just playin

someone is going to win the nba playoffs

thats why they play the games

murphy jones ingram nance out there together is so much arms

Zion such a gifted finisher

its amazing he powers though multiple guys then does an insane layup

bron looking pretty old, which makes sense since hes the oldest guy

the pelicans were doing good but now the lakers are doing good well you know what i always say basketball is a game of one team doing good then the other team doing good

it is a game like that

"life's like this"
--avril lavigne in her hit song about hoops "complicated"

avril knows what up

lil behind here incredible slowmo shot of lebron winking, sports emmy worthy

ok im caught up now

lakers are getting open shots too easy pelicans are over helping

bron gotta get out of the way

ingram real bad last two games since he came back

nuggets will win the NBA playoffs

that happened already

this game is not good sorry no offense

we are a people who thirst for novelty sorry k3v

zion showed up but the rest of the pelicans are on bourbon street celebrating mardi gras

lebron james

the oldest man in the world

Prob shoulda rolled with the team without Ingram and eased him back in

yeah

zion trying to win this game tho

i wish i could talk to someone at tnt to tell them how much i hate reggie millers commentary even if it wouldnt change anything it would be nice to let them know how i feel

a sternly worded letter about how Reggie Miller sucks

It’s sad that he brings down the goat harlen

breaking out my future predictions notebook just to make a note about zion. a decent dog candidate

the pelicans are in the game baby

ok this is getting interesting

Zion taking the Bron assignment is encouraging

plaicans figured out to not play ingram or cj

weirdest team in ages as far as awesome role players paired with unreliable stars

They have flexibility which is nice

ZION

bron waiting for the double instead of just going against alvarado

Joseeeee

being a pels fan is fun I should do this more

alverado thumbs up from me what a guy

very cool guy for sure

Our special boy is really doing it this is what we dreamed of

oh no

damn what’s up this is bad

Oh no!!!!!

he didnt look injured

he threw the towel really hard must be something

its ok jose can just get guys dunks every time

i was just going to post that the thing about zion is i don't think he can do this in every game or even the majority of games but it's pretty spectacular when he does

lakers lucky af, i can't wait for the nuggets to run them in 5 games

yeah having to play the nugs isnt much reward

hoo ok cj

they should have waited til Zion was better before they started playing again

otm

ad fouled with .6 on the 24 pels cant catch a break

yeah atrocious iso by lebron that got bailed out

cj had ad all over him shouldve tried for the 4pt play

a couple of unrelated observations:

1) as a lebron respecter who has rooted for him at various points of his career, it’s a pretty surreal experience to see him just genuflect to the nuggets on live TV after winning a playoff game. once in a lifetime feeling to see lebron, a laker, say that about the nuggets

2) it’s cool that there’s something of a real rivalry between the two northern california teams

I think I have to root for the warriors here

alex len getting post season minutes over here

"this is a game of mistakes" --steve kerr

new this is a game of dropped

warriors should do something

kings faster to the ball

the warriors have some Hall of Fame players, but as a team they aren't good enough to control games any more

I have watched this so many times and I'm really amped up

Playoffs bay bay

pic.twitter.com/lwEV8XSCo5

— I Think You Should Zipline (@Billy_D2411) April 16, 2024

thats the stuff

not watching the 9-10 games, what happens in there is none of our business

its not a place of honor

rip warriors

honestly, i have no idea what the warriors’ path back to the playoffs is

yea this has gotta be it for that squad, was a hell of a run boys

bob myers knew exactly when to gtfo

heh

I’m getting emotional this is the end

the golden state war has ended

It is a time of sadness

i think klay could leave or take a hometown discount to stay, hard to see what teams would want dray on that contract, but despite that it def feels like the end of the dubs ever striking fear in the league with this group again

good night sweet prince* (the golden state warriors basketball organization)

klay 3-29 from the field, 2-18 from three in the warriors last two elimination games

Hardest part to watch for sure

Pretty much all the warriors issues from the season wrapped into one game

Light the beam

Kerr still had no idea what his best lineups were. Bad lazy turnovers. Slow and old. Klay hot/cold (cold when it matters). Young guys good but not great. Leaving people open for three all night. No spark.

It’s better the lakers face Denver early with a fresher Lebron. I think they embrace the underdog roll and anything can happen. Nugs in 6 imo

its like i always say go lakers

i call them the lackers

go lackers

what if this has been a long con and minnesota moved the team to LA, knowing they would get an NBA franchise again and that someday they would need the lakers to eliminate the nuggets from the playoffs?

prob what happened

meanwhile hard to imagine a better outcome for OKC whose possible match ups now are the kings or a pelicans team whose two best players are injured

getting the one seed was nice for them

man I just realized klay went 0/10 for 0 points :(

not great stuff

thunder-kings would make for some fun games

thunder might just wreck them tho

he shot so bad AI thinks he's on a crime spree

Twitter’s new AI-powered trending tab thinks Klay Thompson is being accused of vandalizing houses with bricks

This comes after shooting 0-10 against the Kings pic.twitter.com/kslNH4nQJ8

— Culture Crave 🍿 (@CultureCrave) April 17, 2024

lmao jesus christ come on

not the 'offs but lifetime NBA ban for Jontay Porter

damn what a dummy

makes one wonder how many more there are out there

made thread for offseason 2024 NBA OFFS EASON

no zion vs kings boo

👎

first hammy injury ever where the guy didnt immediately grab his hammy

built different

This looks like 90s EC basketball.

Pat Riley hoops defined 90s EC basketball.

i think the heat are very comfortable playing embiid. the way to crack the heat is to continually pass the ball ahead of their rotations, this is why the spurs were able to break them and why they can't beat denver. but joel's style is very slow and stationary, the heat can load up on basically every half court possession and he is not a very good passer. and the zone slows him/them down even more

philly should theoretically be able to put embiid at the nail and bust the zone all day but yeah the deliberate pace works against that

and the bad passing

bad seems a lil much but hes def not great

heat are the best at the zone too

announcers just mentioned the harden/dm beef dang that seems like years ago

philly should theoretically be able to put embiid at the nail and bust the zone all day but yeah the deliberate pace works against that

― lag∞n, Wednesday, April 17, 2024 8:11 PM (two minutes ago)

for sure. but in order to do that the guy at the nail has to make instant shoot/pass decisions before the zone sets and embiid just does not play fast enough. he should be able to play pop a shot against the zone but he wants to jab step four times before every jump shot

Embiid, lol!

woof embiid

heat-sixers played on national TV in philly like a month ago when embiid was still hurt and they put batum at the nail and he was shredding the zone bcuz the second he caught the ball he was turning and getting into shooting position and either shooting basically a free throw or he was passing from out of that same stance. actually wonder if nurse tries this in the second half bcuz the zone is suffocating embiid

they need to do something especially considering embiids current conditioning situation

anyone who has watched the heat this year knows this game will be tied before the 6 min mark of the 3Q, so we'll go from there

lol

Bob Myers is not good on tv

he attempts a self depreciating schtick but you cant really tell hes doing it then he has to say hes doing it

sorta weird that he’s also like the quasi GM of an NFL team rn

what, does he know things about football

joel is already gassed

ya

good note from doris that embiid was sucking wind after his pregame workout

not a great sign

Good thing he came back.

crazy that jovic was in the g league earlier this year now hes starting in the ins

sixers making a run w joel sitting

He's not helping out there.

yeah that felt noticeable

he just drove down the lane against a guy who was planted still ready to take a charge and he went to eurostep around him classic joel but instead he kinda just got the ball stolen from him

theyre putting him on the perimeter instead of working through him at the elbow like normal, prob smart at least the other guys have more room and hes not tempted to play around with the ball forever

doris laughing at how gassed he is

joel has been much better this half finding shooters

yeah hes looking to pass

batum feeling himself

He's more of a decoy now than anything.

game got good

just really hoping these teams beat the shit out of each other for 6 more minutes. an overtime wouldn't hurt!

if this is what philly is ive decided im not afraid of them

celtics will just move joel around a lot on d let him shoot and hell be gassed by the second quarter

i agree, i think they're throwing their fastball right now and it's not exactly terrifying

aside from joel theyre not a very physical team even

i wanna say that embiid would at least put some miles on zinger’s body but he isn’t playing with any physicality tonight

they just put horf on him

jimmy doing the thing he did in the knicks series when he got hurt which is stand in the corner and don’t move 1 inch every offensive possession

tight game

lol why are miami doing a handoff at halfcourt

dats not the shot you want in my strict analysis

batum doing stuff

yeah he saved them

I don't think the Knicks should be worried about these Sixers either.

The best thing I can say is that it's nice that the Sixers aren't the team that cracked down the stretch for once.

to my considerable chagrin I can’t stream anything on this flight I’m on but I’m following the play-by-play on the NBA app and it seems like “MISS T Herro 28’ 3PT - blocked” is not what you want in that situation

even people who arent watching the game can agree that shot wasnt it

kevin pro tip take the planes that have tvs on them

I’m really not the best planner

lol dumb ending whatever

one down now i am a lifelong bulls-hawks fan

fun game. both of those teams are mortally wounded

i refuse to acknowledge or memorialize this so-called game of bulls and hawks

giannis embiid and butler all hurt red carpet rollout for boston

thats fair xp

listened to the thinking basketball playoff preview pod today and the main guy put philly in his contenders tier uh oh, the other guy was like boston will lose two games before the finals

i think we can put to bed the idea that having time off bcuz of injury was some sorta silver lining for embiid, like he was come back healthy and energized. when he doesn’t play he gets out of shape and he isn’t gonna play his way into good enough shape during the playoffs, the guy we saw tonight will not be giving boston hell in the ECF even if philly gets there we know how this goes he isn’t built like that

yeah he wouldve need to come back way before he did

boston still has that gene where i could see them blowing one game in every series but honestly they shouldn’t lose more than 2 games

It would be an amazing accomplishment just to get to the ECF imo.

curious to see how focused the celtics are, they have gear on defense that they rarely got to this season but when they did it was pretty crazy, if theyre locked in on that end they could get seriously rolling

they lost those back to back games to atlanta then fell behind big after 1 to the pelicans and proceeded to absolutely vaporize them the rest of the game in a very serious way

wow bulls

This line up is so emblematic of the hawks season

Don’t get me wrong I’m happy to see Mo Gueye get some minutes

we can all use mo gueye

Thanks for taking out Caruso, Drummond

hawks back in this in two minutes

last game was old school now were back to contemporary ball 15 point leads disappearing in seconds

sorry the Bulls can't be in the actual playoffs

still adjusting to the idea of coby white being good ive doubted him his whole career and it worked out so well for me until this season

Trae just does the dumbest shit

he doesnt seem super engaged in the game

he wants to get traded to the spurs, already thinking about it

idk if the spurs should do that but maybe feel like lakers tho

lebron will hold out for cp3 instead of trae

(i wont rehash that trae-to-sa thread, ive cooled on the idea bc i dont think i like trae, hes a lil bastard)

https:twitter.com/shamscharania/status/1780793382346121413?s=46&t=XlsbhgknQH65_CH00_uPqw

well shit

He’s not reliable is the thing. Dumb shot in really crucial situations

damn

Miami Heat star Jimmy Butler is feared to have an MCL injury in his knee, sources tell @TheAthletic @Stadium. The injury could sideline Butler for an indefinite period. MRI to come. pic.twitter.com/jD8n1WkkBT

— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) April 18, 2024

looks like the bulls are going to win the game

butler might be done

hopefully is just a sprain not any sort of tear

i mean he is 34, has been very hard on his body, and had noticeably lost a step this year

he is getting old and has trouble staying healthy he could still have some productive time left tho

so excited for saturday, me and the drummer in the band i'm in are going to a friend's brewery to watch, he's kind of made it a wolves destination (does a lot of on-site podcast with the dane moore show - went there to see craig kilborn once haha), anyway should be a great scene of some hardcore wolves fans, they are also having a pizza food truck, i'm jacked up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

super fun to have a team with high and realistic expectations in the offs!

hell yeah

lot of people picking the suns over the wolves cause of the head to head results but i saw a video that convincingly argued that it was all just 3pt variance suns hit a bunch of 3s they usually miss and wolves missed a bunch of 3s they usually make, also the wolves have been a good team and the suns havent, so im liking the wolves

the suns look much better on paper than they've lived up to this season. they have no flexibility in their roster. they will live or die on 3s.

yeah who knows, will be interesting. i'm really trying to enjoy this once ever 2 decades ride as a wolves fan.

wolves had soooooo maaaaany unforced turnovers in the last game, just ridiculous, i cannot fathom it could be that bad again

xp oneale really opened them up a bit for positional flexibility.

suns def a better team of late but they are still figuring it out. interested in what lineups gonna work best for them. is nurk playable in the offs? maybe against gobert. can suns throw a small ball lineup together that can run gobert off the floor? beal/gordon/book/grayson/durant? that lineup has only played 54 minutes together 137/110 offense/defense splits. could swap oneale for gordon/grayson for defense. but not sure KD is up for playing the 5 long stretches.

lmao

He’s so locked in, Jon https://t.co/KSkAUXsdeQ

— Wolves Lead (@TWolvesLead) April 18, 2024

nothing cheerful about the offs

mconley11 is following @seriousvids

lol

really hoping this series is the ant coming out party for casuals, would love to see him cook the creaky ol suns

that would be nice

yeah i mean you can talk rudy in the playoffs, small ball lineups vs bigs, is KAT full strength etc etc but there's really no path forward in the playoffs for the wolves that doesn't involve Ant playing his ass off

happy for m@tt and the wolves, have always had a soft spot for them from the KG to the love days and beyond. and even after the game 82 thing there were no hard feelings

I am behind enemy lines in LA for the next week

what the streets need is another nuggets sweep of the lakers so we can put them to bed for good

its true

the lakers will be in the playoffs every year and sublime will play coachella every year long after we are gone

i'd like to think that getting swept out of the playoffs would end espn talking heads fantasy takes about how the lakers can make the finals but somehow i doubt it

thanks k3v - i was rooting for the nugs last year and i really enjoyed going to a game in denver

Jimmy Butler in the comments:

“Kelly Oubre we throwing hands.”

lol pic.twitter.com/zRdZkog8od

— Brady Hawk (@BradyHawk305) April 18, 2024

i like that jimmy is lighthearted even during sad times

really hoping this series is the ant coming out party for casuals, would love to see him cook the creaky ol suns

― Lavator Shemmelpennick, Thursday, 18 April 2024 18:49 (three hours ago) link

i'll be cheering for the creaky ol suns and even i kind of hope this is what happens

would love to see supernova ant, feels good for basketball

going to be hard for ant to go nuts its just too easy to load up on him and make the other guys try to beat you particularly with kat coming off injury

more likely minny wins with defense like they have all year imho

yeah, totally. suns finished the season better than i expected, but even during the final 10-game gauntlet they would lose focus and not show up, i would never count on them to win a series after watching them all year.

suns-wolves sending up just about all the red flags possible, everyone picking 1 team when it’s way closer to a 50/50 series, favoring the offensive team over the defensive team, favoring the old team over the young team, the pelton/haberstroh types still say that early season play is more predictive of playoff success than end of season record…

feels like everyone is overweighing the fluky last game of the season

wait are people picking the suns to win?

i'm a suns fan tbc, but is it good in the playoffs to have the worst 4th qtr point differential in the league by a huge margin? seems like it's not good: https://www.teamrankings.com/nba/stat/average-4th-quarter-margin

the team thats really getting the pundit love due to a late season run is dallas, people seem to believe that their defense is just actually very good now which doesnt make much sense to me but i guess well see, hope kawhi plays

I like Dallas's chances to get beat by OKC

i want another barn burner clips-mavs where luka averages a 30pt tripdub and loses

just read something that said kawhi got a shot in his knee two weeks ago aiming to be ready for the playoffs crossing my fingers

I like to watch james harden play in the nba postseason he does funny stuff very excited

kyrie guarding him could be a real test of his desire to play as bad as possible in the playoffs

Lol yeah can’t believe we’re about to get a kyrie harden face off. what an insane thing the superstar shuffle of the past decade has been

Fun matchups all around I feel. Hoping kings make it cos I’d rather see Fox than a Zion less Pels squad. If Zion is ok then they are pretty fun to watch

yeah feel like only the 1-8 matchups and nugs lakers have strong faves, the nbas parity era is good

Now we’re talkin

pic.twitter.com/IRvgaM8tKe

— Antonio (@ayyrod_) April 18, 2024

that’s just math baby

kev, please tell the Nuggets to strangle the Lakers in 4 uncompetitive games. Thanks.

cant wait to meet this "locked in ad" fella

Rui>MPJ [citation needed]

convenient how "ad is locked in" and "ad won't bend the knee" could mean he badly wants to be a champion or that he has injured knees

what if jokic is locked in too, what if other guys are locked in it could swing the series

Top Gun taught us that locking in is not always even necessary

Tonight is Jonas Valanciunas' *eighth* play-in game. He has been a part of the play-in all five years it has existed.

— Christian Clark (@cclark_13) April 19, 2024

this feels spiritually correct

he likes to play in

"lets play it in" --jonas valanciunas

jonas val-"in"-ciunas

heat up big

on the halftime show michael wilbon makes the point that the celtics were the only team michael jordan never beat in the playoffs. no idea what this has to do with anything. great stuff

is mj going to make some noise in the playoffs finally this year

if mj cant do it no one can which is why the celtics have never lost the playoffs

were down by 30 to a team without their best player

A lot of Bulls big wigs in the house tonight ... they know the magnitude of this.

— Joe Cowley (@JCowleyHoops) April 19, 2024

is it somehow a greater magnitude than last year when they had the same finish with the same roster?

bulls shd be incentivized to blow it up next year bc they lose their pick if it's out of the top 10 next year

bulls bigwigs realizing the bulls are bad

this commercial that pretends that market price on a restaurant menu means they wont tell you how much the dish is if you ask is driving me crazy they cant get away with it

will be funny if both teams thatre missing their best players win tonight

lol i was perplexed by that commercial too thats not how it works

death by alvarado has to sting especially bad

kings are, sadly, still not a serious team

feel like they should not be losing to the Pels minus Zion

they’re pretty banged up, they’re being forced to play guys on the perimeter who shouldn’t have this level of responsibility in a de facto game 7. pelicans have lots of guys to throw at the one kings player who can dribble (fox)

i really do not enjoy playoff sabonis tho like you have to have more to your game than just bashing your shoulder into a brick wall on 30 possessions per game

yeah I know this is a settled question at this point, and I know there are a few similarities, but a playoff setting really exposes the lack of variety of his offense that puts him 2 or 3 planes below jokic

one of the many roster holes the kings should be looking to plug is backup center. im sure a more defensive minded player of at least average backup quality would end up closing a lot of games for them

it playoff time folks kicking off with the series everyone loves magic-cavs

yeah I know this is a settled question at this point, and I know there are a few similarities, but a playoff setting really exposes the lack of variety of his offense that puts him 2 or 3 planes below jokic

― brony james (k3vin k.), Saturday, April 20, 2024 1:29 AM (eleven hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

i mean he is baby jokic and adults are generally better at basketball than infants

welcome to the offs my friend

cavs & magic getting chippy already which is nice because the basketball is not very good

orlando is getting bullied in this half they do not look ready for prime time

Gotta settle in for sure

Increasing doubt about Kawhi Leonard’s availability for start of Clippers’ playoff series vs. Mavericks on Sunday. https://t.co/6YUC2kSvFn

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) April 20, 2024

jfc man

just looked up jalen suggs' 3 pt % over his career
21-22 .214
22-23 .327
23-24 .397

man this game is brutal lol

cavs have missed their last 16 threes and are up by 8. that seems like it means something

this game is not great

there should be a hat nba players are allowed to wear a lil beanie that way if your hair is fucked up and you dont want everyone looking at it you can wear the hat

hahahaha

lol

sam perkins wore a durag in a game once and the nba immediately banned it but it should be ok

Magic barely over 80 points lmao please get this team some shooters

Remember that one year they wore karate headbands?

the league banned those too then came out with their own official ones but no one wanted them anymore i guess

what’s happened with franz is really puzzling… they need a lot more shot creation too esp from the guard spot

yeah 28% from three for the season is real bad

the cavs are one game closer to their ultimate goal winning a single playoff series

Hang the banner

Props to the wolves for wearing white unis at home

those are their best ones too

both teams are wearing excellent uniforms today

atmosphere at the brewery is hyped, standing room only, getting a little buzzed let's go

get em

this is such a stylistic series, wolves winning so far but i think they gotta be better on offense still

offense better now

nickiel alexander-walker is a playoff guy

27-14 rebound advantage for minny

cant be giving rudy post touches this is the playoffs be serious

kat having a good game

this place is fuckin rocking right now

nice

ant wrecking kd that was sick

again!

hes got kd on skates

is there some reason theyre not blitzing him afraid jaden mcdaniels gonna beat you

NAW BABY

ant doing this all on jumpers

suns having a rough game cant buy a shot and so forth but also just like generally whats their deal what do the suns do whats their plan

I just started a NAZ! REID! NAZ! REID! chant that took over the whole bsr

lmao

ILH just to keep it 💯 I'm day drunk

hell yeah thats the life

this is a blowout

Anthony Edwards is my Lord and Savior

now the wolves cant buy a shot good thing they were up 25

isaiah thomas in the game

Luka Garza time baby!

Wolves back

Congrats ums!

I just settled in to the Sixers game after doing a memorial service all day. I’m drained and going to zone out on some hoops.

every minute harris is out there is a win for the knicks

He used to be a jack of all trades, now a jack of none.

deuce mcbride <3

thats cool that the knicks have a bunch of their old guys in the house i enjoyed that montage

suns having a rough game cant buy a shot and so forth but also just like generally whats their deal what do the suns do whats their plan

― lag∞n, Saturday, April 20, 2024 5:57 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

making shots! this is why they are not serious

happy for m@tt

Ohhhh shit what happened to Embiid

he dunked

crazy sequence

That play was so sick, but when is he going to figure out he is not 6’6”

Sheesh it’s all falling apart

cant believe theyre depriving us of the embiid walking to the lockerroom footage how are we supposed to make a diagnosis

ok small clip gingerly under his own power, inconclusive

kinda agree with stephen a here tho even if hes not injured how is this all supposed to work hes out of shape cant throw down thunderous dunks without pain

well hes back

he's back! I wonder if he's the best NBA player that always looks like he's in pain

Just came back expecting them to announce Embiid out with an ACL until next playoffs and instead he’s back, lol.

What’s Scott Foster got against Maxey?

That Embiid bounce pass was sweet.

hart is playing scared

both of these teams feel shorthanded, the sixers are basically a two man team and the knicks only have 1 guy who can reliably do stuff w/ the ball

there's a dude with a knicks buckethat sitting next to the home bench who looks exactly like a kyle mooney character

deuce is prob the best defensive matchup vs maxey, has the hot hand, and isn’t afraid to take it to the rim - he should stay in

need to create more shots for divencenzo

he hasn’t played much, idgi

there's a dude with a knicks buckethat sitting next to the home bench who looks exactly like a kyle mooney character

― Clay, Saturday, April 20, 2024 8:29 PM (six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

spike lee

Embiid short on a bunch of jumpers in his normal wheelhouse.

hart embraced my tough love and showed me!

i do get playing off of him, but he’s a 34% shooter, not a tony allen out there

not sure about this philly zone tbh

josh hart seeing the face of god

ok that was just absurd

Embiid wtf you doing

crowd chanting fuck embiid i think

they sure are

no foul??

they kind of surrendered, that was weird

Looked like a couple of times they tried to foul and there was no call.

Classic Joel Embiid playoff game pic.twitter.com/TdzGp3ubUV

— Nate Duncan (@NateDuncanNBA) April 21, 2024

11 points of that was the first quarter, classic embiid playoff game

there was obviously some crazy 3 point shot making by the knicks in crunch time but one thing that seems clear is that the sixers offense in crunch time is gonna have to run thru maxey. embiid could barely get his jumpers to hit rim and the knicks have two big guys who can bang with him one on one. maxey meanwhile was getting to the basket at will

hart might not shoot like that every game but neither will brunson

Knicks could definitely take the Sixers but also not too worried because they had to make some sick shots to do it, while Sixers didn’t seem to play particularly well, though some of that obviously due to Knicks D. At least that’s my story for game 2.

That too.

it's really amazing how no matter what the sixers do the result doesn't change

happy the nuggs got it back to 3 by halftime — if they can avoid foul issues in the second half, gordon should play backup 5 and hopefully they can grind it out

cmon theyre gonna win this by 15

I too act hurt to save face

Denver putting the Lakers to bed

meanwhile I'm feeling ~sensational~

awoo 56 pic.twitter.com/7jVxxvWsGL

— /r/Timberwolves (@r_timberwolves) April 13, 2024

dlo still bad in the playoffs i guess

just don’t think dlo and taurean prince are gonna cut it vs this team…

somehow dlo was +2 in 41 mins

watched the second half of suns-wolves

there was the classic element of some of the wolves role guys playing out of their minds while phoenix’s role guys didn’t really show up so i don’t wanna go overboard. but for all the talk about how this was a horrible match up for the wolves it looked the opposite in this game. the wolves had enough guys to throw at the suns’ big 3, they didn’t seem very bothered in individual on ball defense and that’s before you even get to the gobert component.

alexander walker might be the key to the series bcuz if he can do enough offensively to be on the floor it gives the wolves three real wing defenders to always be matched up with phoenix’s guys. NAW had more minutes than conley today the suns need that to go in the opposite direction big time. if the wolves can score enough, as they did today, with ant as the de facto PG playing with mcdaniels, NAW and gobert then the suns are gonna lose the series. you assume booker will just have some better games but this match up actually seems horrible for beal, the wolves have guys who are athletic enough to check him. we’ll see what it all looks like when NAW and naz and others go cold but if you went just off that game you’d be more hard pressed to figure out what match up advantages phoenix has

and if ant is the best player in this series then it’s a wrap. phoenix can’t win if the other team has a player that plays the same position as their 3 best guys and is better

gosh is embiid okay

naw and mcdaniels are good role players, the suns are going to have to make them miss but i dont think they have the personnel to do that

nuggets have beat the lakers nine times in a row

Anthony Davis, hands on his knees, can’t make it past half court. LeBron James watches Nikola Jokic as he runs right by him.pic.twitter.com/TAudJcedBb

— Harrison Wind (@HarrisonWind) April 21, 2024

this lil push-off is soooo disrespectful lol

heh

jokers endurance is his secret weapon you dont think of him being a high motor player because hes slow but he is

Daring lebron to do the chase down block and beating him to the spot

boston celtics baby

appreciate the celtics for letting me know off rip that i WILL be able to find some time to run errands this afternoon, tipping my cap thank you boys

lol

1 vs 8 seed matches are famously the most skippable ones, after all

i do think the heat can keep one of these first two games close and potentially nick one. i think the other game in boston will be a 20 point blow out where boston shoots 50% from 3. and i think they’ll smoke the heat in both games in miami. this entire rivalry from the heat’s perspective rests on inflaming the insecurities of the celtics fanbase during home games and they prob have enough junk pitches to throw to do that for one of these games

recommend guarding sam hauser

this series is essentially a trade asset showcase for the heat

the deep wing threes from zinger are crazy

yeah theyve been using him that way all season when he has time its a real nice shot but when he rushes them its usually a miss

this series is essentially a trade asset showcase for the heat

― slob wizard (J0rdan S.), Sunday, April 21, 2024 1:01 PM (nine minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

what do u want from the spurs for duncan robinson, we can finally make this happen

celtics were pretty geeked up first half see if they settle down here

its nice to play the heat and not have caleb martin turn into michael jordan

the only thing i have to say about the second half is they’ve been showing extended close ups of porzingis sitting on the bench and he looks a lot like my first long term boyfriend

haa

boston celtics baby

jayson tatum triple double gotta love it

good to see the celtics play their best style of ball, spreading it around, out of the gate

i dont see how any eastern conference team is getting past them

yeah weird things would have to happen

the only thing i have to say about the second half is they’ve been showing extended close ups of porzingis sitting on the bench and he looks a lot like my first long term boyfriend

― slob wizard (J0rdan S.), Sunday, April 21, 2024 2:56 PM (forty-three minutes ago) bookmarkflaglin

aww

the point about the wing threes tracks, he and brook lopez both routinely take these 27 footers that when they go in are pretty demoralizing

wow clips up big here

getting chippy

thats what we like

harden cooking

wow mavs getting absolutely wrecked rn

praying 4 a mavs collapse in this series, i need the petulant luka gifs

Honestly no matter who loses in that Mavs Clips series there's going to be salt and I'm here for it

lmao just turned it on what is happening here

love Stephen A.'s suit btw

the shot of dazed stone faced mark cuban was funny

8 point second quarter

luka got down into a defensive stance on harden looked like the first time hed ever done it

if the mavs were to lose this series to a kawhiless clips it would necessitate the punditry turning on luka just cause theyve gotten way over their skis with this third of a season of the mavs with their new guys, they never asked themselves is daniel gafford the missing piece for a contender does that makes sense is pj washington a defensive stopper

Mavs need to do something about Zubac

yeah hes killing em

back 2 back 2 back 2 back 3s between the two teams to close the 3rd

great 3rd quarter, got to watch Kyrie make a ton of amazing plays while still being down by 20+ the entire time

ha

Clips have been calling great plays out of timeouts

ya ty lue is good particularly with tactical stuff like that

Just don’t see how the Mavs are gonna make a deep run with two guys taking 90% of the shots, you need them to be on their A+ game all the time and if they’re not you dig a huge hole

They can probably beat the Clippers though. Not saying they will but they could

yeah its not the good style of ball

refs trying to get the mavs back into the game but its not working so far

i’m not taking tons away from this game. the mavs played a bad half — really just one incredibly bad quarter — otherwise the game went mostly how we thought this series would go

yeah pretty flukey tho i was considering the mavs a pretty strong favorite if kawhi didnt play but now im not so sure, also maybe kawhi will play idk

richard jefferson says “the thing about seven game series” is that the team that loses game 1 actually has the advantage, because they are forced to adjust. gotta love it

much to think about

jefferson in a mock black turtleneck: what if i told you that losing was the key to winning

lol

think about it this way, winners have a lot to lose [folds hands behind head, leans back in chair, crashes to a horrible demise]

bucks-pacers is the round 1 series i’m most excited about

yeah should be a good one

indy cant put the ball in the ring

it feels like the bucks may have taken the characterization of this series personally

i guess it's still dame time

in particular dame is trouncing halliburton, he’s gotta raise his game up a lot

Was wondering when Dame was gonna have a game like this

it’s fun that dame has 35 at the half that’s fun stuff

Didn’t really enjoy that 3rd

cmon its fun

lillard 35 points in the first half zero in the second not sure ive seen that before

Barring injury I wonder if something like that’s happened before

prob not just getting 35 in the first half is super rare to start with

crazy thing is most points in a playoff debut for Milwaukee was 36, he just needed one bucket lol

lillard 35 points in the first half zero in the second not sure ive seen that before

new orleans is making a game of this! okc looks their age rn.

which youth comes youthful exuberance too, okc going on a run.

also crowd shots remind me that i cannot countenance that okc has a team still after all these years, absolute frauds

*with youth

uh oh Thunder

this is a scrappy game

smh could the pelicans really not come up with anything better

shai came through

yeah weak just give cj the ball play

pelicans late game offense is ghastly

the pels had a chance between like the 3 min and 1:30 min marks before okc realized they needed to be letting shai iso every possession but they couldn’t score either

Love watching herb jones play defense. Love watching trey murph shoot rainbow threes from 5 feet beyond the arc.

not sure what that last possession was supposed to be but poking the ball away might've saved the game

yeah that was a good play, okc def wasnt ready for playoff intensity lat night which stands to reason since they havent been there before, see if they do better next time

looking at some clips of the mavs clips game and this is prob obvious but the clippers are so much more physical, mavs are pretty soft

Mavs have to find a way to make things easier on their offense, they got crushed despite Kyrie making a ton of circus shots

one thing that happened repeatedly in that game was luka or kyrie getting swallowed up by the defense kicking it out to a role play who then had a small advantage but couldnt do anything with it, didnt seem like they wanted to pop the quick three which after watching the celtics all year now looks weird to me so they drove and took a weak floater or smthn or just reset with a short shot clock, i think the mavs two dribbly shooty guys need to get off the ball faster to put the role players in better spots but thats not really their style

mavs could maybe run some offense no thats crazy

of the three game 1s that went in the complete opposite direction of the commentator consensus — MIN/PHX, MIL/IND, DAL/LAC — i think i feel best about DAL/LAC still going the way ppl thought (dallas as slight favorite). the first half of that game is basically a write off to me, that was one of those games i left feeling like i learned nothing

if kawhi doesnt play dallas should win the series if they dont thats bad

of course they are down a game now which some experts might consider and advantage but i actually think is a disadvantage

i do disagree that we learned nothing from that game tho clippers played really good defense theyve got a plan and the players to execute it, ty lue is going to absolutely dominate kidd here

mavs having zero players who can hold up on zubac has got to be worrying for them i mean hes a good player but hes not a star he shouldnt be dominating in the playoffs like that, and it wasnt a matter of him being hot dallas just couldnt deal with his physicality he was putting gafford in the basket and the livelys smaller than gafford, they could try going small and spreading him out but he is capable of punishing you on offense

im sure we will see the mavs go small with more shooters kleber at center thats a move kidd is familiar with its def worth a shot but theyd need to to really work well on offense since theyre already the softer team to start with

we know that some percentage of game 1s are always at best meaningless and at worst point is in the opposite direction of where the series is actually headed. if i had to bet on one of these game 1s falling into that category i’d put it on mavs clips

i had it as mavs in 7 so imo it’s a close series to begin with, mavs prob played the worst quarter any team will play all playoffs i’d just take a bit of a breather before i went too overboard

omg just looking at the box score here and franchise savior daniel gafford had zero rebounds in 14 mins, zubac had 15, lively had 4

zubac career playoff averages are 7/7 and like 1/3 of those games are against the mavs he likely just played his best game of the playoffs. don’t fall into the game 1 trap you’ve watched too much playoff basketball there’s a big hole in the ground right there just step over it

i mean that fine its just heuristic tho it doesnt say anything about the issue at hand which is a series between two team

the mavs didnt just randomly play a bad quarter they def missed some shots they couldve hit but the clippers were kicking their ass, clippers showed up mavs didnt, harden outplaying kyrie and luka wasnt on anyones bingo card which is why i still say the mavs should win this series, but thats why they play the games

the disrespected team came out and played harder/better in game 1 and there are 6 more games left stop me if this general concept seems familiar to you…

i dont think the disrespect index was that high in this case

i’m more fascinated by what happened to the pacers. i saw discussion on twitter about how they’ve been hurt by trading hield … you have to assume they’ll shoot a lot better at home but you do look at their roster and wonder who among neismith, nembhard, toppin, sheppard etc is making threes on the road. i’m wary of falling into the game 1 trap with this one but for as tattered as the bucks roster has been all season, their role players (portis, cannaughton, beasley in particular) looked a lot better and a lot better as shooters than whatever indiana is able to roll out there

the thing about that game to me is getting shredded by a giannisless bucks is just not a great look, its hard to win if you cant play defense at all

they also can’t let dame get off 10+ threes per game *and* let the bucks force the ball out of halliburton’s hands consistently. unless dame shoots 25% from three the rest of the series that’s just a math equation that won’t end in indiana’s favor

from a very simple strategy POV if you force the ball out of halliburton’s hands what are you afraid of? if the pacers role players aren’t hitting open threes the answer is basically myles turner long range bombs and siakam’s just overall game getting you from 2 point range. but i think the bucks can live with those outcomes, indiana would win win a few games the bucks aren’t a juggernaut obv but over the course of the series that’s playing on milwaukee’s terms majorly

pacers role players are as a group good three point shooters so that should come around but if it doesnt theyre toast

interesting dynamic where dame is better without giannis due to being more comfortable just doing whatever he wants on offense, obvs not the best situation if youre the bucks, unless giannis happens to be out

are the sixers making up illnesses and injuries to try to gain a mental edge? hmm, makes yo uthink

theyve got em right where they want em

Tyrese Maxey will not be as shootaround and is questionable to play tonight in Game 2 with an illness.

— Tim Bontemps (@TimBontemps) April 22, 2024

i largely buy the “series doesn’t start until the home team loses” thing in a close match up but based on how embiid looks i find it hard to believe that philly will win 4 in 6, it feels like they need to go all out tonight

i mean 4 in 5, sorry. if the lost tonight. already need 4 in 6!

unless dame shoots 25% from three the rest of the series

that is definitely on the table

Trying to psych myself into thinking the Sixers can win this series is exhausting.

yeah tough sitch cause they can but the knicks have all the juice

It's especially difficult having to imagine the next couple days/weeks of people talking about the Knicks' heart.

that is annoying

Sixers going to start initiating their offense from the logo.

knicks just committed an obvious basket violation?

Did they give them FTs?

it wouldve been a goaltend idk there wasnt a close shot of it but it looked like bogy went through the basket and knocked the ball off the rim, possible he just hit the net and got the ball clean i guess

No way that is a T.

yeah donte worked the refs

counterpoint not smart to push people just cause theyre close to you

cavs are wrecking the magic again

ah yes the NBA TV series

not watching any more of that tell you what one game was enough

so far josh hart is swinging this series for the knicks

caleb martin award front runner right now

lol

knicks fans should save their rude chants for special occasions

brunson has really be not good so far this series

john starks is working the refs like crazy on the baseline

lol

embiid didnt cross halfcourt last possession then still got cooked by donte on the other end

i feel like embiid plays brunson very well. like brunson wants to play this methodical dribbling into the midrange style and embiid looks very comfortable just hanging off him w/ help on ball. brunson can’t get to the rim and ends up with a bunch of contested mid range fadeaways

brunson has really be not good so far this series

― lag∞n, Monday, April 22, 2024 9:07 PM (seven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

15-47 at the moment if my calculations are correct

he might need be a lil more decisive take quality middies instead of settling for bad ones

i'm very skeptical of his overall game working in the playoffs

hes done before tho

whoever gave the sixers massage therapist a very sparkly engagement ring just got their money's worth; that thing really got featured as she worked on his knee

lol

embiids been coasting all game lets see if it worked and hes got something left in the tank for the fourth

theyre letting starks walk in parts of the baseline where normal fans arent allowed lol

brunson was the only guy in the east last year who singlehandedly went toe to toe to jimmy check his stats in games 4, 5 and 6 of that series he was going nuts

they have been talking on TV about how he’s been bad vs philly this year so i’m sure that is part of it but i think he also looks tired and run down. he has been the knicks entire offense as they’ve played hard as hell every game for months now. possible thibs coaching has sapped his legs

Orlando score more than 85 points challenge

he also looks tired and run down

― slob wizard (J0rdan S.), Monday, April 22, 2024 9:36 PM (one minute ago) bookmarkflaglink

yeah gotta have at least something to do with it, the thibs way