Can the Nuggets repeat? Will Jokic get the MVP this year? What team will fail to live up to expectations?
Many, many questions to be answered.
I’d strongly disagree there. Spent most of the year playing the wrong lineup; and his in game adjustments and decisions during the playoffs left a lot to be desired. Athletic article last week basically said everyone respected him, nice guy, but does little or no actual coaching.
Great game one in Denver - doesn’t look like Nugs will be able to get away with the sloppiness and long stretches of minutes behind that didn’t matter against the Lakers. Minny are just way bigger, longer and deeper defensively and their coaching staff seems to understand what is required a lot more.
There are a lot of things to talk about, but Minny daring Jokic to shoot 3s effectively was very interesting to watch. Edwards was also phenomenal.
Minny are how favs for the series.
I'm a subscriber of the Athletic currently until my subscription runs out next year. The analysis etc. is very amateurish so I wouldn't be using that to back up my opinion.
Our opinion on this matter differs and that's fine. There is no right or wrong on the subject.
Should be a cracking game between the Pacers and Knicks.
I think the Pacers are for real and fancy them to take a win out of New York.
Try me, I watched nearly all of the Laker’s games this year. Ham is woeful, and he won’t do anything anywhere else [like all LeBron’s coaches who have won precisely zero titles without him (I think Spo is decent, as the exception that proves the rule)]. I can say Ham’s lineups made no sense, his timeout management was poor and the players are leaking to the media he did zero coaching. What’s the counter argument here for him to he retained?
He didn't have a good roster and got them to the playoffs.
He had a 47 win team with a 47.5 game o/u that finished the season 19 - 6 when he leaned into the starting rotation that had been paid for.
In two successive series against Denver he was constantly found wanting on coaching adjustments and clock management. But the team were leading for 80% of the minutes in the series. It’s entirely reasonable to lay blame with the coach in this context.
Having watched Ham for two years I am very confident he will never coach a title winning team. So what is there to talk about? It’s the Lakers, expectations are high.
So you seen him with a less than stellar roster, he got beat by the defending NBA champions and that's enough for you to decide he's no good.
That all sounds pretty reasonable.....not.
Lebron and AD are not stars?
Scraping into the playoffs seems a poor return for two guys that won a ring a few years ago
Have to agree that some of Ham’s lineups had me scratching my head at times
It takes more than two guys to make a championship contender. The lack of depth was a problem.
Like you're largely out on your own here really, there are no Lakers beat writers mourning Darvin Ham. You can't have watched those two series versus the Nuggets and think Harvin coached well
Anyway, RIP to the Clippers era of pseudo-relevancy. Kawhi, George and Harden will have been paid over $300m the last three years for 0 playoff wins. Kawhi has only played in 4 of their last 20 playoff games. Balmer can afford it obviously, but just a terrible, terrible return.
The 25 - 5 run gave false hope for what the team could accomplish because we seemed to forget Kahwi had become a completely unreliable star. No way for them to get better, nothing to do other than run it back with a combo of aging stars who have questions around their motivation at this point.
Have you watched other teams play the Nuggets in the playoffs last year. Nobody could do anything to improve things.
You'll always have a minimum of two of Jokic, Gordon, Murray, Porter and Caldwell-Pope on the floor. Caldwell-Pope should have been held onto by the Lakers. Then you've got Braun and Jackson, there's no let up.
The Lakers couldn't match up against that. Their top two were no match for Jokic and Murray and their other three starters were no match for the Nuggets three.
Then you go to the bench and the Lakers have a weak bench.
Ham was always going to get the blame and it's no surprise he was fired but the first man to go, if he's not gone already, should be the GM.
You say they were no match and yet they established leads in every game, led for the vast majority of minutes, etc.
Ham made poor decisions, struggled with adjustments and the word is out from multiple players that he doesn’t “coach”.
Pelinka should probably be fired also, I have no quarrel there.
If the coach was so bad how did they manage to hang with the NBA champions for so long?
Because it’s LeBron and AD
Thats two players up against better ones in Jokic and Murray.
Knicks take game one but it all came down to a di Vincenzo flop. There was a bump on him but it's never called but he dived and got the call. Pacers stupidly challenged it leaving them with no time outs.
Its horrible to see games ruined by flops.
Anyway a fourth consecutive 40+ points game for Brunson, I think he's gonna be MVP.
Wolves on fire in the first half, up by 26. Naz Reid doing a sterling job on Jokic.
Charles Barkley calling the Timberwolves defense the best he's ever seen and none of the other analysts disagreeing.
Timberwolves look pretty awesome.
Enjoying Murray and his lucky nonsense getting completely shut down. Looking like 4 or 5, which is a massively surprising outcome. Simmons was waxing lyrical on his pod a week ago or so about how Denver were like the 2017 Warriors, undefeatable, just have an aura, etc. Pure nonsense as usual. Minny are just too long, athletic and well coached. And suddenly that’s that. No Denver dynasty, just a great individual season.
Watched Naz Reid eat Jokic alive at times. Fair play to Minnesota.
If somehow they went on to win it all (and I'm not writing off any side with Jokic in it yet) then god help us all who listen to Bill Simmons, he's already having Edwards down as the next Michael Jordan and pushes it weekly!
Gobert/Towns were awful last year but really clicked together this year. Reid and Edwards both also had massive leaps forward this year.
Knicks down by ten at halftime. Brunson got hurt in the first quarter, tried to play on but came out and it doesn't look like he'll be back tonight.
So Brunson came back in the third quarter and we see a 17 point turnaround. He's clearly essential to success for the Knicks.
Unfortunately for him the missed time means his run of 40+ points games is at an end, he only has 15 through three quarters.
Knicks won it by nine. 29 for Brunson after missing nearly a quarter and a half.
Jokic wins his third MVP, I'm sure it doesn't feel great while down 2-0 though.
Shaq is a clown for this
I'm fully on the Knicks train. It's a real buzz.
thoughts on timberwolves vs the celtics if it happens. As a celtics fan I would worry a bit to be honest !! they are a very good team
