Topic: NBA Thread: Brought To You By The Tampa Bay Raptors Of Toronto

[broodwars]

You know, one of these days I'd like to see some documentarian do a deep-dive into why the Eastern Conference is such a colossal joke every single year. Every year, without fail, the Eastern Conference is dominated by 1-2 teams, with a severe drop-off after that. Meanwhile, the Western Conference is a meat-grinder. Every year. Without fail.

Right now, only the top 5 teams in the Eastern Conference have a winning record, closed out by Boston at 10-8. The 6th ranked team, Atlanta, is 10-10. Meanwhile, in the Western Conference the top 10 teams have winning records, closed out by San Antonio at 11-10. And 11 & 12 aren't far from reaching .500 records. Yeah, there's a lot of season still left, but that's just SAD.

Every time this happens, I feel ready to sign on with those people who think we should scrap the East-West system altogether for the playoffs & just play the Top 16 ranked teams by overall record.

[Adrock]

The Heat should be better, but they’ve been ravaged by injuries this season. They have time to turn it around though they did just lose Myers Leonard for the season.

Otherwise, I don’t think it’s a secret.

West coast is warmer. That matters to players on their day off. Also, it depends on ownership. For example, the Clippers were never going to win anything when Donald Sterling owned the team because he didn’t want to spend any money until what, 2012. Now? Steve Ballmer is the wealthiest team owner in the league by far. It doesn’t matter that the Clippers was the worst run team for like 30 years. They’re in Los Angeles AND Ballmer will likely spend whatever the CBA will allow to put together a competitive team. That’s attractive to the best players.

It’s a shame the Knicks have been terrible for 20+ years because James Dolan f-ing sucks at owning the team. It may not be warm, but it’s New York. Superstars can expand their brand there though they likely view it as NBA purgatory.

[Shaymin]

Neat bit of history last night: Fred Van Vleet dropped 54 on Orlando for the most points ever scored in a NBA game by a player who wasn't drafted.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Dubs had a close one against the Celtics last night.

I feel like we couldn't pulled it off if we had Wiseman and/or Looney.
Without Curry AND Draymond on the floor, our squad was playing fuckball out there. I feel if they can get into the groove of playing Warrior ball, which focuses on ball movement and people constantly in motion trying to get open, when the stars are and aren't on the floor, and also play to try and help Curry get open, even if only for a split second, we would see more wins in close games out of this team.

[broodwars]

I would be remiss not to mention that just before the Corpse of Dante Exum was traded to the Rockets as part of the Harden trade, he got injured again & isn't expected to return to the court until March at the earliest.

Getting rid of him to get Jordan Clarkson might be the best trade the Jazz have made since the 90s.

https://www.cbssports.com/nba/players/playerpage/2135530/dante-exum

[Adrock]

The Sixers are currently down 27 points at home to a Blazers team playing without Lillard, McCollum, Nurkic, and Collins. Carmelo Anthony has 22 points. WHAT YEAR IS IT?! I get they were in Charlotte last night, but woof, they couldn’t have asked for a better opponent on the second night of a back-to-back.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Well, Curry sat out an entire 4th quarter today against the Mavs.
Oubre led the team with his a Career High 40pts.... he was 7-10 from the 3pt line!!!

and I go tot watch it on a 20ft screen using my Oculus Quest 2.
It was GLORIOUS.

[Adrock]

and I go tot watch it on a 20ft screen using my Oculus Quest 2.
It was GLORIOUS.

Yeah, well, I cracked my iPad screen tonight so you know, same thing.

Reggie Miller dropped some nice trivia tonight. Apparently, LeBron James has the most 25 (or more) point games in NBA history. Tonight was his 800th. That’s bananas. He also passed Wilt Chamberlain for third all-time in field goals made. I’m rooting for James to eventually get that elusive all-time scoring leader spot.

[broodwars]

Oh hey, speaking of random NBA stats that only exist to fill air time and inflate egos, the Jazz recently set an NBA record for 11 straight games of 15 3 point shots or more made. The previous record holder was the Houston Rockets at 10 games.

[Adrock]

I know you’re joking. I’m merely trying to give Reggie Miller a little bit of credit for saying something mildly interesting because his basketball commentary sucks.

I like fun stats. While I’m rooting for James to eventually get the all-time scoring record, I eventually want someone to surpass him then someone else to surpass that person and so on. That’s how this should work. The positive records shouldn’t last forever.

[broodwars]

I know you’re joking. I’m merely trying to give Reggie Miller a little bit of credit for saying something mildly interesting because his basketball commentary sucks.

I like fun stats. While I’m rooting for James to eventually get the all-time scoring record, I eventually want someone to surpass him then someone else to surpass that person and so on. That’s how this should work. The positive records shouldn’t last forever.

No one's catching Stockton's Assist & Steals records. The modern NBA's simply not built to replicate the unique set of circumstances that led to those records in the first place, because no player plays a nearly 20 year career anymore. The game is just too fast and too scoring-oriented for those kind of careers, and the role of the point guard position has radically changed since Stockton's day.

For anyone to catch Stockton's Assists record, you'd need a top-of-the-league passer to just happen to get paired up with an all-time scorer early in their career & then play in a system built to generate assists for nearly 20 years. The Steals record is much more likely, though I just don't see anyone matching Stockton's Steals numbers for as many years as he played. Nash & Kidd put in valiant attempts on those records, but even they couldn't come close.

I remember the NBA championing Jose Calderon as the next John Stockton shortly following Stockton's retirement. Does anyone even remember Calderon? 

[Adrock]

I like how this wasn’t about the Jazz then you made it about the Jazz again.

I acknowledged the difficulty of overtaking the assist record:

In a semi-recent interview, Steve Nash said he wished he shot more three pointers. My first thought was yeah, you and John Stockton. Then again, if Stockton shot more, he may not be the NBA all-time assist leader by something like 3,700 assists. I mean, records are made to be broken. This one seems insurmountable to me.

I guess there’s no telling what the future holds. I think eventually the steals record will be broken. Steve Nash was nowhere close. He’s currently 226 on the all-time steals list. Chris Paul, however, is seven and the highest ranking active player (LeBron James is 13). He isn’t catching Stockton, but he could have based on skill. Paul just missed too many games. I guess that’s your point. My point however is Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s all-time scoring record seemed untouchable once upon a time (he’s held it for over 30 years). LeBron James probably takes that record in 2023 because he has the longevity and lack of injury history to do it. Some kid currently in junior high could be the guy who dethrones Stockton.

[Adrock]

Another one of these for me. I begrudgingly choose the Celtics because they have a worse record. They pulled out a win, and it was a good, close game in the second half. The Celtics came back from 12 down. Kawhi Leonard missed two shots to tie right at the end. Whomp.

[broodwars]

Well, the Jazz won their 3rd straight with a win over Gordon Hayward and Co. in Charlotte...but this one cost us. Mike Conley is now out with a right hamstring injury, so we likely won't have him for our upcoming games against the Pacers, Celtics, and Bucks. Those games were going to be rough as it was.

As for the records thing, I only brought up Stockton because records may exist to be broken, but with the current construction of the league I just don't see some of the records ever being broken.

- Scoring's likely to be broken. Lebron doesn't have to average that many points over the next few seasons to break it.
- No one's touching Wilt Chamberlain's rebound record. Dwight Howard is the closest active player, and he's still 10,000 rebounds short.
- Blocks & Steals will get broken someday, though they will require players with exceptional longevity.
- As we've covered, no one's touching that Assists record

[Adrock]

Curse these overlapping games. I stopped watching Warriors vs. Mavericks in the third quarter. That was one hell of a finish.

[Adrock]

Lakers almost got swept by the Pistons. LOL.

Play fuckball and go to double overtime against the worst team in the league by record without three of their key players. This is one of the ugliest games (any team) I’ve watched this year. Both teams had over 20 turnovers. Like did y’all feel like playing basketball? Was the ball covered in COVID-19 and HIV?

[BlackNMild2k1]

I'm upset I missed the Warriors game.
Saw the highlights and Curry was carrying the team, and we only lost by 2. Looked like one of those games where if we had a center, it might've changed the outcome by giving us some low post lobs and a few offensive rebound second chance attempts.
Not to mention we were also missing Paschal who use usually worth enough points to have tipped the game to our favor.

[Adrock]

The Thunder are weirdly good this season despite Sam Presti’s best efforts to tank again, this time by trading Chris Paul, Dennis Schröder, AND Steven Adams. They’re only two games from the eighth seed in the West. How is this even possible?

Unrelated: The Pistons traded Derrick Rose to the Knicks because Tom Thibodeau is dead set on another early-2010s Bulls reunion tour. Maybe he’ll dust off Luol Deng for one last ride. In all seriousness, the Knicks are surprisingly okay thus far. They’re currently only a half game from the eighth seed in the East since the Raptors decided to get their act at least partially together.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Draymond getting MEME'D to infinity and back for last night.

Chance to tie the game, need to get the ball to Steph. Inbound ball to Draymond with no shot clock and 8 seconds left in game. Draymond pulls up from Logoland fucking a terrible shot at the backboard in good of a foul with 5 seconds left on the clock.

Entire Stadium, Dubnation, announcers, everyone watching at home, and both teams looking like ::swaggyP??.gif::

[broodwars]

Well, that was a wild one tonight with Celtics vs. Jazz. We REALLY need Mike Conley back as soon as possible to get this offense back under control. I'm getting really tired of Jordan Clarkson just chucking up 3s every chance he gets (and missing most of them when he's playing PG). Hell, the entire team is a little too in love with chucking up 3s for my taste.

At least the Jazz finally get a few days off to rest before having take on the Bucks on Friday. There have been a lot of back-to-back and 3-games-in-4-nights lately.

[Adrock]

I'm disappointed I didn't watch Hawks vs. Mavericks. The Mavs were down by 10 when I checked the score so I didn't bother.

Bucks vs. Suns was also close. There just isn't enough time in the day to watch these games.

LOL Lakers. Almost lost to the Thunder again. It look a game tying three pointer from LeBron James at the end of regulation then a LeBron James steal at the end of overtime to squeak out a win. They keep playing fuckball for three quarters. Fell behind by 20 in the first half. I'm not even sure this wouldn't have been close if Anthony Day-to-Davis played.

[Adrock]

Saw this neat-o bit of trivia: Zach LaVine and Coby White are the first teammates in NBA history to each have 8+ three pointers in the same game.

Steph and Klay = frauds confirmed.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Saw this neat-o bit of trivia: Zach LaVine and Coby White are the first teammates in NBA history to each have 8+ three pointers in the same game.

Steph and Klay = frauds confirmed.

I'm gonna need that fact checked....
There has to be a game where they at least got close to that stat, and this new stat was created just to give them one all to themselves.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Over the last 15 games, Curry pulling the Warriors up from the gutter and putting himself in the MVP race conversation (not sure who's actually talking about it right now, or who was being mentioned, but Curry out here trying to start the convo)



we may not have won all the games, but the majority of the last 2 weeks have all been close, and Curry put the team on his back in nearly every one of them.

[Adrock]

Best thing I did for myself today was I stopped watching the Lakers **** around in the first quarter (falling behind 20 to 2) and put on WandaVision instead. Again, they decided to start playing basketball in the second half.

Elsewhere in the Association, the Pistons beat another playoff-caliber team (Celtics). Here’s a bit of neat-o trivia: Blake Griffin hasn’t dunked since 12/14/2019.

Also, Rudy Gobert dunked ALL over Giannis Antetokounmpo tonight/last night. Everyone gets dunked on, but oof. A little revenge from when Antetokounmpo dunked on Gobert last month. He did also block a weak Gobert layup later in the game so maybe that evens things out. 🤷�♀�

Here’s a bonus bit of neat-o trivia: The Bucks have not beat the Jazz in Salt Lake City since 2001. FRAUDS.