Worst gift in the pile: 2023 NBA Play-Ins

hawks over heat

From your mouth to the ears of the gods, but I am not optimistic.

the heat have kicked the hawks ass so thoroughly the last few years that my guard is way up tonight. something feels fishy

a hawks win here would be a big surprise. boring but:

Lakers 7
Wolves 8

Heat 7
Hawks 8

trae moving the ball very early this game trying to counteract miami blanketing him

hawks r rolling wow

17 assists on 20 fg for the hawks and getting really good looks.

yeah ball is popping and theyre faster to the 50/50s

meanwhile miami looking like a 1990s offense

theyre up 20!

saadiq bey is not shy

these udonis haslem slo mo shots are pain personified

this is out of hand

few bad trae possessions and miamis back in range

Lowry gave them some life too

Hawks should've traded Trae while he was still cooking.

lol

haha just yank him off the bench during a timeout

the score is masking what a complete clown show of a half that was from the heat. i think they scored 0 points on like 9 fast breaks.

strus completely losing the ability to shoot is puzzling to me

heat def not looking like they give a shit about this, which i think is down the road the problem with these play-ins unless a team wins a series sometime soon

conversely i think capela is the only hawk who is actually playing well?

i guess the box score doesn't bear that out but he is contributing to the heat getting absolutely destroyed on the boards

if the hawks could make a free throw this wouldn’t be a competitive game. the heat are getting murdered around the rim on both ends

The Hawks have grabbed the offensive rebound on 38.5% of their missed shots. That might win them the game if the Heat don't start securing the glass.

— Kurt Helin (@basketballtalk) April 12, 2023

kyle lowry gives a shit

to be overpowered by the muscle of the hawks is really bad

57-37 rebounding advantage for the hawks, 19-5 on the offensive glass. wild

kyle going nuts

i want to bludgeon him until he stops this

not sure who woke up grandpa but i don't appreciate it

lol

this is a completely appalling performance. i guess the upside is that it hastens the demise of a dead end season

the heat take a really blasé (honestly arrogant) approach to seeding and in 2 of the last 3 years it’s really come back to bite them in the ass

capela looking like 01 shaq out here

clint capela’s impact in this game is basically the argument some people make for rodman being an inner-circle guy

two heat guys running into each other and losing a rebound in the process only for john collins to pick it up and get an and 1 was a fitting bow for that game

rebounding thing is out of control lol

atl just controlling this game after losing 14 of 16 to the heat wild stuff

happy news for the celtics heat always give them trouble

yet another bam adebayo "what is it you would say you do around here?" performance when it mattered

hawks went away from their trae centric offense and it worked crazy to think about

cut to shaq saying "hey kenny, hey kenny" before dropping a dr evil quote in 2023, perfection

Quinn Snyder looking a bit odd these days

https://images.app.goo.gl/Q6GAbFR8EhcMtkww7"> https://images.app.goo.gl/Q6GAbFR8EhcMtkww7

Or not if the image doesn’t post.

i thought the hawks looked better prepared for the heat’s defense against trae (go figure) but no coaching really matters when there’s a +20 offensive rebounding difference

quin looks like he's on an unnecessary ozempic regimen

yet another bam adebayo "what is it you would say you do around here?" performance when it mattered

weird court cant say i recall that

tough loss for the boston sports media

pic.twitter.com/MvKKjiBNAF

— Jared Weiss (@JaredWeissNBA) April 12, 2023

lol

i think he'll be shielded by the teams injuries yet again. but yeah 4 years of those guys and nothing to show for it is not good. i guess give it one more shot idk

i mean they kinda have no choice

well, ingram still prob has real trade value. but feel like they won't be doing that

lakers pick swap really didn't end up working out for them either

would any one of us have NOT drafted Zion with the first overall pick? obv the pels get a free pass on making that pick. what's hard to say how much better a different team would have managed his injury issues since then. a lot of rehab outcomes are down to how the player handles them.

yeah he was the only pick to make given the upside but some of the bigger concerns about him have come to fruition. the underrated one is how long it seems to take him to recover and ramp up, that's not going to get better.

big flaw is that they had kevin durant russell westbrook james harden & serge ibaka on their team and made the NBA finals one time cuz sam presti put a roster from the stone age around them. but maybe his ability to identify & develop role players has changed...

― J0rdan S., Thursday, April 13, 2023 2:11 PM (thirty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

tbf they made the finals as a very young team had injuries then lost a squeaker to the warriors and that was it, if you wanted to take issue with prestis roster construction choosing russ over harden was his biggest offense, still quite obviously an absolute master of the craft tho

"Went 18/36, it had to have an affect."

Scottie Barnes heard DeMar's daughter yelling pic.twitter.com/wQ2lRT8Z9B

— Yahoo Sports Canada (@YahooCASports) April 13, 2023

amazing lol

would any one of us have NOT drafted Zion with the first overall pick?

― more difficult than I look (Aimless), Friday, 14 April 2023

i was a pretty big zion skeptic at the time but it wasnt a view that was widely shared.

you don't want to understate how hard it is to build a contender as a small market team, and when it starts with the klutch mafia conspiring to steal your best player well it is going to be an uphill battle

I was a Ja guy instead of a Zion guy because I'm a contrarian. Per the other thread, that take hasn't aged well either, for other reasons.

amongst the nba hardcore the consensus on zion was a potential mvp with extremely high injury risk but you gotta take the chance, if people had known how good ja would be that risk mightve been enough to push him to 1 idk

peak healthy zion has also generally confirmed the belief that he was is that good when not injured, so it's not like it was a crazy take

i think i'd still take a 100% healthy zion over a 100% healthy ja

(but the injuries exist and it looks like he's never going to be 100% for more than stretches so obv ja should have been the choice)

crazy thing is i dont think weve ever seen close to full power zion, and sadly prob never will

and hes still been dominant when hes played

on offense with the ball in his hands yes

its honestly good enough which is crazy but without the injury history and worries he prob wouldve been out there moving around a lil more

"We've got to be available. We've got to do what we need to do off the court in terms of preparation, in terms of getting treatment, in terms of getting the right sleep, the right type of hydration, having the right type of diet."

- CJ McCollum after Pelicans play-in loss pic.twitter.com/VkrCcAcIUN

— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) April 13, 2023

its true hydration is important

“gentle reminder to drink water”
— cj mccollum

Tbf, if I was a millionaire living in New Orleans my diet would be terrible

ok i want jokic to get it again

“A lot has been said, and a lot of people haven’t been happy about how the whole thing has been going on, about how people keep bashing each other and all that stuff. Where was all that [sympathy for me]? People kept bashing me the last two seasons, putting me down. But now other… pic.twitter.com/Z7QHqSJ1bu

— NBACentral (@TheNBACentral) April 13, 2023

amongst the nba hardcore the consensus on zion was a potential mvp with extremely high injury risk but you gotta take the chance, if people had known how good ja would be that risk mightve been enough to push him to 1 idk

― lag∞n, Thursday, April 13, 2023 4:09 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

and the consensus was more or less right, tbh I would still probably take zion’s next 5 years over ja’s even considering injury risk. zion is already knocking on the door of being an elite elite dude it’s just a matter of staying on the floor. I’m much lower on ja than the consensus but to me he’s like an evolved derrick rose, a really good player but overvalued as a max guy imho

lol embiid is such a baby

it’s only because I have a soft spot for philly that I don’t completely hate him. had a long talk with my dad last night that I was going to have to root against them in the first round it pains me to have to do it

lol

I'm not going to defend Embiid - he obviously wants an MVP very badly - I just want him to shut up about it after he wins.

i want embiid to get it because i don't want to hear him talk about it for the rest of my life if he doesn't

yes. also just worry about having energy in the 4th quarter of a tight game 6 or 7 coming up.

https://theathletic.com/4408252/2023/04/14/nba-playoff-preview-celtics-bucks-nuggets-grizzlies/?source=user_shared_article

hollinger picks the ILH bowl celtics vs nuggets

lets do this

strus has remembered how to shoot

miami has 12 points "all strus"

23 point strus half

This is shaping up to be a good finish. Hasn't been more than a couple points either way since I started watching in the 2nd.

its strus world baby

strus time

congrats to heat they have played it in

fun game, liking the play ins so far, warts and all

I should have told you guys how emotionally checked out and over the Wolves I was, there's no better guarantee they would than that this season.

That they would win

its happening ITS THE OFFS BABY THE 2023 NBA PLAYOFFS

predix

lakers over twolves
thunder over pellies
thunder over twolves

raptors over bulls
hawks over heat
heat over bulls

― k3vin k., Tuesday, April 11, 2023 2:52 PM (four days ago) bookmarkflaglink

sorry should be heat over raptors for the second one

― k3vin k., Tuesday, April 11, 2023 2:54 PM (four days ago) bookmarkflaglink

went 4/6 for the ins, now it’s time for the offs!

mil > heat 5
bos > hawks 4
sixers > nets 5
cavs > knicks 6

denver > twolves 5
grizz > lakers 7
warriors > kings 6
suns > clips 6

oops