chris paul da gawd
NBA 2019-2020
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) and Jamie (@Vault Dweller) are here to talk about United's dreadful home defeat at the hands of Big Ange's Tottenham Hotspur. Should this have been the end of Ten Hag? How long does he actually have left? And does Nik finally want ETH out?!
Seen just the highlights but it seems it was a great game. Great game by Paul and what an awful last offense by Westbrook, what was he thinking.
Two Game 7s in the West, nice.
Rooting for Denver and OKC. Paul vs LeBron would be good fun.
Rooting for Denver and OKC. Paul vs LeBron would be good fun.
Jimmy Butler is awesome. Miami Heat is awesome. Would love it if they beat Milwaukee.
Heat in 6. Better coach and they're possible the single worst matchup in the league for the bucks. Unless the bucks shoot lights out for 4 games, Heat in 6
Dragic is fun to watch. His floaters look like failed alley-oops, strange but very satisfying to see.
Giannis needs to be better. CP3 doing what he does.
Still reckon Bucks will do them in 6 or 7 but it is true that there is no worse matchup for them than the Heat. Budenholzer’s obsession with giving minutes to everyone on their roster is crazy, choose your 7-8 and stick with them. You don’t even have that deep of a team.
Mitchell v Murray will be very interesting tonight. Murray has been insane since Game 4 after horrific 2 and 3 (and great 1). 50, 42 and 50 on high efficiency, wow. Wouldn’t be shocked to see him go 6-17 for 17 points tonight. I have more confidence in Mitchell having a great game but Murray has better players next to him so they may win anyway. Porter has gone from incredible in seeding games to borderline unplayable in playoffs though.
I can’t believe how bad Westbrook was at the end of last night. The Rockets have had a bizarre series. Three blow-outs and three close games where they’ve collapsed at the end. Should already be through to the next round.
Most ridiculous sequence by Smart in the opening 4 minutes of 4th quarter here. Boston were down 10, he hit 5 threes in a row including one +1. Ridiculous shooting. They are up by 4 now.
Well you don’t want to go into a close game at the end of fourth quarter against this Thunder team. If you get there you are pretty much dead. Basically the opposite of Westbrook & Durant team that you pretty much knew you were going to beat if you were within 3 points with 3 minutes to go in a playoffs game.
Celtics are running away with it although it was a really close game.
What a wild ending to the Jazz-Nuggets series. I feel for Mitchell - maybe Conley should've passed it to him on the last possession, but can't really fault him for that with only a couple of seconds on the clock.
It'll go down in history anyway, as the 12th team to blow a 3-1 lead, and for this:
It'll go down in history anyway, as the 12th team to blow a 3-1 lead, and for this:
Denver - Utah was an amazing series. One of the best I’ve seen.
There's a video showing that after Harris has poked the ball away from him, Mitchell had stayed down on the floor and was later to position himself on the break after Nuggets had missed the layup.
Probably the best first round series.
Someone in this thread was going after the nuggets after the second loss and about how soft they are . I said at that time that people overreact a lot here . They are a very solid team , second round is probably their level but really good team
Wait, were they not soft? They got blown out in game 2 and 3, they looked like scared chickens. The moment they put some effort in it things turned around. That plus Harris being back for game 6 and 7.
Should have been a +1 for Gobert at I think 44 seconds before the end, which could have given Utah a one point lead. Could have changed the momentum of those final plays...
Strange game though, both teams were clearly exhausted which doesn’t bode well for Denver in the next round. Their shooting in the second half was so poor.
Strange game though, both teams were clearly exhausted which doesn’t bode well for Denver in the next round. Their shooting in the second half was so poor.
This is what worries me as well. Murray needs to be lights out and Jokic needs to contribute a whole lot if they just wanna stay in games with the Clippers who'll have had almost a week more off.
Fecking hell, just checked that the first game is on Thursday already. That's only one day off for Denver.
Officiating throughout the series was nothing short of shambolic. That should have been a +1 for Gobert considering Plumlee smacked him across the face.
Then on the last possession for Utah before Conley's shot, Gobert went out of bounds when he caught that rebound, if that shot went in, it would have been a proper PR nightmare for the NBA.
Clippers in 6 although if they'll be too relaxed or play too much isolation they could be in trouble. Doc should put more trust in Zubac, especially in this series cause Harrell will have all sorts of trouble with Jokić defensively.
It will only go to 6 if Clippers are relaxed and underestimate Nuggets. If they are fully focused it’s done in 5 or maybe even a sweep. Whoever was winning this series was always going to be a fodder for Clippers.
Agree Harrell can’t defend Jokic. Zubac should be all right doing that. Beverley and George will give Murray a lot of trouble though.
Rockets v Thunder tonight will be super interesting. I would normally prefer Thunder to win but Rockets would give Lakers a better series for sure. By the looks of it we may end up with Bucks v Heat being the only truly competitive conference semifinals over 7 games, shame about Raptors losing last night as they played really, really well for three quarters only to be undone by freak series from Smart.
Agree. 2 times Clipppers turned it on they swept Mavs away. On the other hand they showed they can blow away their big leads quite easily. They're still not playing to their full potential and that's a scary part.
Btw is Beverley fit for the 1st game?
At what point can we admit though that they might've played to their full potential already and their ceiling is just not as high as people think it is? If you don't do it in the playoffs, when else are you gonna go full potential?
I just think their potential is in the arsenal they have, they assembled a really good team, deadly both in offense and defense. Too much mixing in regular season has cost them imo and they're still finding themselves chemistry and playing together wise. Saying all that you must excuse me cause I'm a casual NBA fan so I might be wrong on all accounts.
This! They've showed their ceiling more than once this season, the question is whether they can keep up that level of play consistently m
This is the problem when you don't put the necessary work in regular season like you have won 2 3 titles in a row. You just can't turn it on and off when ever you want. Even Warriors in 2018 couldn't turn it on that easily and could be eliminated by the Rockets and could lose some games against Lebron too.
The Clippers, their potential is to sweep everyone on their path, they're so deep it's just ridiculous. Reggie Jackson is their 7th, 8th best player and he hit a lot of big shots for them against the Mavs. But because they didn't put the work to build the chemistry they can't turn it on every game.
There is no team basketball play on their team whatsoever. It's just a lot of players taking turns playing iso basketball. Whether it's Lou Williams, PG, Jackson and others. And they have the ultimate wild card in Kawhi. I don't know what Doc Rivers is doing there but I don't see any coaching in Clippers. Just iso, iso, iso. It looks like the only thing he has to do is to keep them mentally sharp, specially PG.
You just said what I meant in a way better and more articulate way.
Compared to Mavs it was in turns ugly to watch their offense tbh. As you say so much isolation, too much compared to the way ball worked in Dallas offense which was a joy to watch at times. It's one thing to see Kawhi play iso but when it's their only option most of the times it's a worry.
That's what what one commentator here said during Utah-Denver game exactly said, cant remember which one. Clippers are acting like they've been their already, already won the title so now they can mix it up in the regular season. Plus all the hype around them, they bought into it and sometimes act like title will just come to them.
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Nuggets in 7 again.
Not really , it's pretty lazy stuff to say a team is soft because they lose games . These teams are pretty close and so you can have off days when nothing just goes for you . It says nothing about the mental toughness of the team .
You seen unable or unwilling to acknowledge that I'm referring to the manner in which they were losing games. Giving up the moment Utah started making shots, they got scared, putting their heads down, no heart. Not to mention the way the played their defense for the majority of the series.
Not totally sure about that. Our record with both in playoffs decided by 5pts or less was 15W 14L. Not amazing but still positive. Our current team is great in crunch games though. Paul in particular is amazing.
I agree on the 'soft' thing - it's a "soft" way of arguing a loss. Kind of a copout. But not as bad as "wanted it more".
A - Why did they lose?
B - They were soft.
A - What? What do you mean?
B - The other team just "wanted" it more.
A - What? These are all mega superstars who compete at a super high level and intensity yet now for some odd reason they don't want it?
B - Yeah.
A - Why did they lose?
B - They were soft.
A - What? What do you mean?
B - The other team just "wanted" it more.
A - What? These are all mega superstars who compete at a super high level and intensity yet now for some odd reason they don't want it?
B - Yeah.
When they have full team available and actually need to step it up they are great. The last two games against Mavs for instance, both were not even remotely close. I mean they crushed them by 43 points scoring 154 in game 5, it doesn't get any more dominant than this.
They beat Mavs quite comfortably 4-2. First game was close, their other 3 win were extremely comfortable and game 4 loss was a bit of a freak, on a normal day they win it 9 times out of 10. It's not like they sucked against Dallas, this was a comfortable victory.
You are always going to cruise a bit in regular season when two of your best players are Kawhi (often rested) and George (often injured this year). They haven't had their entire roster available for more than 10 games I bet.
Looking forward to a possible Beverley Lebron matchup in WC final.
Yes they are great, but I responded to a post saying "they haven't played to their full potential yet and that's the scary part". I'm gonna argue that those two games against the Mavs was their full potential. That's how good they can be.
Completely disagree. First of all the point is that when they turn it on they will destroy everybody, so the two blowouts are expected. The question is CAN they turn it on when ever they want and I think the answer is no.
The first game Mavs were going to win it if KP was in the game. A ridiculous call from refs that destroyed Mavs chances.
Their other 2 wins are are the blowouts, not much discussion there, that's the way Clippers should always play.
And the last game wasn't comfortable at all. All Mavs players aside Luka were missing open shots. It's not like they were bad shots or the Clippers were defending them, they were wide open and they were missing. THJ at one point was even afraid to take the shot. He was there wide open and he couldn't even take the shot. It was that bad from the Mavs and they still made comeback. Kawhi crushed them but that was Kawhi not the Clippers. If your the Clippers you should close that game in the 3rd quarter.
And on the top of that let's not forget that KP was out the last 3 games. So all you had to do was to deal with Luka and you couldn't do that.
And look, I'm a huge fan of this Dallas team and you just can't find a bigger Luka fan than me but I thought they Clippers would sweep them. There is no worse match up for Dallas than the Clippers. The Mavs, their best quality offensively is their ability to take shot from the perimeter. The Clippers have, or on the paper should have the best perimeter defense in the league. So they should be able to deal with Mavs offense but they couldn't. As i said even in the last game they were missing wide open shots. And the Mavs have no defense in them so I expected Clippers destroy them every game which again was not the case. The Clippers are the worst match up for them in league.
They have the best defensive unit on the court on paper and they couldn't hold Luka who was playing on one ankle, with his second best player out and the role players missing wide open shots. That's not acceptable. They switch everything, they think they are so great defensively and on the court we are seeing something else. That's why I say I don't see any coaching from Doc Rivers. There is no team offense, just iso plays every time with players taking turns and there is no team defense from them, just switching everything and expecting your players be great one on one defenders.
And resting your players is one thing, do not putting the work is another. Kawhi is Kawhi every time. He's not the problem, the problem is the other Clippers don't take it seriously. Last year Kawhi had his games out but every other Raptors were working hard on the court and Nick Nurse was coaching. Completely opposite from Clippers.
At the end I think there is no team that can challenge their depth and I think Kawhi will ultimately take them to win it all but they are lucky, because this year we have a lot of good teams but no great teams. I think last years Warriors or Raptors would beat them.
By last years Warriors, do you mean the crippled version? Or the most OP team in history that is them fully fit?
I think the Lakers are gonna beat them this year.
I think the Lakers are gonna beat them this year.
The team that swept Portland. No KD and no bench (or you can say not that good of a bench).
Yeah I think the Lakers can beat them too but I have Clippers as the favorites.