NBA playoffs 2018: Will the Celtics be Raptored?

[Maithanet]

2 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

It’s why the old heads thought this team couldn’t win in the postseason. And it’s why they went and got Durant, which is confusing  considering he didn’t take a single shot in the final 3 minutes and 40 seconds, and he passed up a good look on the final play.

Durant was taking some bad shots though.  He forced a lot of challenging contested shots, which is unlike him and very unlike the Warriors.  27 points on 24 shots isn't terrible, but it's way below his usual efficiency.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

22 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

Durant was taking some bad shots though.  He forced a lot of challenging contested shots, which is unlike him and very unlike the Warriors.  27 points on 24 shots isn't terrible, but it's way below his usual efficiency.

I feel like the Warriors in general have been taking bad shots more often since Durant joined the team. They don’t move the ball like they used to, it’s just that they’re so overwhelming that you don’t notice it that much.

[Relic]

9 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I feel like the Warriors in general have been taking bad shots more often since Durant joined the team. They don’t move the ball like they used to, it’s just that they’re so overwhelming that you don’t notice it that much.

Well...Durant is probably the best Iso player in basketball, so...

[Maithanet]

2 minutes ago, Relic said:

Well...Durant is probably the best Iso player in basketball, so...

Right.  Surrounding Durant with good shooters who play defense is an incredibly effective offense.  It just might not be better than what the Warriors were doing before, when they were using Curry to reinvent offensive spacing. 

[Jaime L]

8 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

Right.  Surrounding Durant with good shooters who play defense is an incredibly effective offense.  It just might not be better than what the Warriors were doing before, when they were using Curry to reinvent offensive spacing. 

I could see that potentially being true in the regular season, but not the playoffs. Curry and Klay provide the promise of the transcendent heat check every game but there's always been the long cooling off periods where they hit a number of possessions in a row where they can't manufacture an easy look. And they're so good, they often don't need easy looks to be efficient...but when defenses get locked in during the playoffs and things get tight late against elite teams, you need that safety valve and that's what Durant provides.

What was striking about last night was Durant, who'd been unguardable all playoffs wasn't getting to the same spots on the floor (as you noted in your previous post) and was settling for contested 20 footers and lower percentage pull up 3's. Have to give the Rockets a ton of credit for how locked in they were defensively. They weathered a vintage Curry heat check and still held the Warriors under 100 points. Normally don't think of the Rockets this way but that was a gutty fucking performance. 

And I'm glad because we get a lit AF game 5. 

[Maithanet]

11 minutes ago, Jaime L said:

I could see that potentially being true in the regular season, but not the playoffs. Curry and Klay provide the promise of the transcendent heat check every game but there's always been the long cooling off periods where they hit a number of possessions in a row where they can't manufacture an easy look. And they're so good, they often don't need easy looks to be efficient...but when defenses get locked in during the playoffs and things get tight late against elite teams, you need that safety valve and that's what Durant provides.

Durant can indeed take pressure off Curry, because teams can't ever afford to double him anymore.  But there's only one ball, and Curry's utilty as a player is 100% on the offensive end, because he's a mediocre defender. 

I'm not saying that the Warriors aren't better with Durant than without him, that would be crazy.  But a Durant led attack centered around him going 1v1 against a defender who knows no help is coming (because you can never leave Curry, Thompson, etc) might be less effective than a Curry centered offense that underutilizes Durant's versatility.  Every team that has played the Warriors has to pick their poison, and a lot of teams would rather deal with a Durant ISO than the free-flowing back-screen ballet that the Warriors were running in the pre-Durant era, and are still quite capable of running now. 

[sperry]

The other thing about the Durant signing that pisses me off is the blatantly violating the spirit of the salary cap rules, but not the letter of the law. Durant is taking below market compensation because the Warriors owners are getting him access to fish-in-a-barrel top VC deals that your average investor, even one of comparable wealth to Durant, would have no chance of participating in. That's an issue the NFL is going to need to deal with. Max players need to be playing on max contracts, or else your salary cap is actually killing competition rather than enabling it. The most likely way to deal with this is to implement a rule that a player who receives a max offer from any team must be paid the max by the team that ultimately signs him.

[Rhom]

1 hour ago, sperry said:

The other thing about the Durant signing that pisses me off is the blatantly violating the spirit of the salary cap rules, but not the letter of the law. Durant is taking below market compensation because the Warriors owners are getting him access to fish-in-a-barrel top VC deals that your average investor, even one of comparable wealth to Durant, would have no chance of participating in. That's an issue the NFL is going to need to deal with. Max players need to be playing on max contracts, or else your salary cap is actually killing competition rather than enabling it. The most likely way to deal with this is to implement a rule that a player who receives a max offer from any team must be paid the max by the team that ultimately signs him.

So the ARod not being allowed to play for the Red Sox approach?  Wouldn’t that be more of a NBAPA problem?

[sperry]

5 minutes ago, Rhom said:

So the ARod not being allowed to play for the Red Sox approach?  Wouldn’t that be more of a NBAPA problem?

No. That was a problem in baseball for the players associaion, because there was no salary cap. It wasn't a zero sum game. In basketball, the salaries are a zero sum game, so it's not a players association issue. It's a competition issue because the system is specifically designed to cap the number of top players on a single team.

[Week]

1 minute ago, sperry said:

It's a competition issue because the system is specifically designed to cap the players income number of top players on a single team.

Fixed.

To be clear, not snark at you -- snark at the owners and league.

[Maithanet]

7 minutes ago, Week said:

Fixed.

To be clear, not snark at you -- snark at the owners and league.

I disagree.  You can definitely argue that the players should be getting a larger share of the total NBA pie, but the NBA is reliant on putting a competitive product out there for people to watch.  If the Warriors have 5 Hall of Famers on their team (and Iguodala is getting close), that isn't good for the NBA at all.

[Week]

18 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

I disagree.  You can definitely argue that the players should be getting a larger share of the total NBA pie, but the NBA is reliant on putting a competitive product out there for people to watch.  If the Warriors have 5 Hall of Famers on their team (and Iguodala is getting close), that isn't good for the NBA at all.

Players are already underpaid -- max contracts don't allow all players to make what they are actually worth. Durant taking less than a max contract makes him more underpaid than he would otherwise. 

Anyways, no need to further derail -- not a big deal -- there is no player base in professional sports that is paid what they deserve other than some veteran baseball players.

[briantw]

5 hours ago, Maithanet said:

The Warriors offense just fell apart in the 4th quarter.  They scored 34 points in the 3rd quarter and only 12 in the 4th!  They went ice cold from three, and had some turnovers, and the Rockets were right back in it. 

I'm pleased that this is a real series, although even if the Rockets win game 5 I'll still expect the Warriors to advance. 

Guess Curry was hurt again in the fourth.  Fully healthy in the third, though.

[Maithanet]

8 minutes ago, briantw said:

Guess Curry was hurt again in the fourth.  Fully healthy in the third, though.

People say Curry looks hurt when he is unable to get separation against bigger, slower defenders, something that he never struggles with when healthy.

I assume you're trolling Warriors fans because their stars lack Lebron's almost superhuman durability? 

[briantw]

2 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

People say Curry looks hurt when he is unable to get separation against bigger, slower defenders, something that he never struggles with when healthy.

I assume you're trolling Warriors fans because their stars lack Lebron's almost superhuman durability? 

No, I'm poking fun at the way the media protects Curry in a way they don't with other stars.  Every time he has a bad game, he's hurt and everyone in the media bends over backward to defend that fact, but then when he has amazing games sprinkled in between there's no mention of his injury.

Fact is, most players are a bit hobbled by this point in the season.  If LeBron had choked away the fourth quarter like that, hobbled or no, he'd be getting crucified by the sports media today.

[Maithanet]

4 minutes ago, briantw said:

Fact is, most players are a bit hobbled by this point in the season.  If LeBron had choked away the fourth quarter like that, hobbled or no, he'd be getting crucified by the sports media today.

Maybe, but I think that's because the Warriors are going to win the title this year, and sportswriters don't want to go on record burying Curry and then look foolish two weeks later.  If the Warriors lose this series, this game will definitely get attention.

[briantw]

11 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

Maybe, but I think that's because the Warriors are going to win the title this year, and sportswriters don't want to go on record burying Curry and then look foolish two weeks later.  If the Warriors lose this series, this game will definitely get attention.

I think the media treats him with kid gloves because he looks twelve and acts like a five year old whenever something doesn't go his way.  

[IamMe90]

36 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

Maybe, but I think that's because the Warriors are going to win the title this year, and sportswriters don't want to go on record burying Curry and then look foolish two weeks later.  If the Warriors lose this series, this game will definitely get attention.

An enormous amount of fans on the internet do this too, though, despite the fact that he is playing full minutes, practicing on off days, and having amazing games sporadically. It's not just media who have an incentive to report things the right way. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

6 hours ago, Maithanet said:

I'm not saying that the Warriors aren't better with Durant than without him, that would be crazy.  But a Durant led attack centered around him going 1v1 against a defender who knows no help is coming (because you can never leave Curry, Thompson, etc) might be less effective than a Curry centered offense that underutilizes Durant's versatility.  Every team that has played the Warriors has to pick their poison, and a lot of teams would rather deal with a Durant ISO than the free-flowing back-screen ballet that the Warriors were running in the pre-Durant era, and are still quite capable of running now. 

This. So much! Having Durant takeover late in tight games with ISO ball is fine. It's the reason they needed him. But I've been noticing that they're doing this all game, and that has to negatively affect his teammates' rhythms. They need to go back to the offense where the ball is a hot potato until it finds an open shooter.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

3 hours ago, Maithanet said:

People say Curry looks hurt when he is unable to get separation against bigger, slower defenders, something that he never struggles with when healthy.

I assume you're trolling Warriors fans because their stars lack Lebron's almost superhuman durability? 

 

2 hours ago, briantw said:

I think the media treats him with kid gloves because he looks twelve and acts like a five year old whenever something doesn't go his way.  

Brian is right, but for the wrong reasons. Curry does get special treatment that other superstars never get. He's often refereed ti as "adorable." He's got a perfect family. He's wholesome. He's over-achieving for his size. Etc. All the narratives about him are positive. I rarely hear someone criticize him, and yes, when he's playing great he's healthy and when he's not he's hurt. People keep viewing him like the younger player who was always hurt. That really isn't the case these days. I know he missed like 5 weeks, but that was a random knee injury. His ankles, which many thought would doom his career, have been relatively good over the last few seasons.