NBA Thread 2011-12

[gunnar hendershow]

Miami was up 2-1 last year!

[Meacon Keaton]

The feel of the series is different than last year. I hope I'm wrong, but that's my gut feeling.

[naiwf]

So you can hate Durant for being determined to take a game tying shot when he took that terrible runner into two men?

Durant may be there best player but Russel Westbrook is a 2nd team all NBA guy one of the best point guards in the league. He has that creative freedom from Brooks and his teammates. He's an incredible athlete and player. He missed a great shot to tie the game up. It happens. No shot is guaranteed. Every time any superstar player doesn't get the final shot and make it I feel you take issue with it. He has the liberty to take it and I guarantee you every player on the team was more than happy with the 3 pt shot he got when he was totally wide open. Sucks that he didn't make it but he is still one of the best point guards in the league and he deserves that kind of leeway.

Westbrook could have taken the easy two, and they could have either played defense or fouled. He didn't NEED to take a 3 there, but he was going to do it regardless of what the defense gave him. In short, his decision making sucks and he's going to rob my man Durant of at least one ring in his career. That's why he annoys me so much.

[rocksta]

So you can hate Durant for being determined to take a game tying shot when he took that terrible runner into two men?

Durant may be there best player but Russel Westbrook is a 2nd team all NBA guy one of the best point guards in the league. He has that creative freedom from Brooks and his teammates. He's an incredible athlete and player. He missed a great shot to tie the game up. It happens. No shot is guaranteed. Every time any superstar player doesn't get the final shot and make it I feel you take issue with it. He has the liberty to take it and I guarantee you every player on the team was more than happy with the 3 pt shot he got when he was totally wide open. Sucks that he didn't make it but he is still one of the best point guards in the league and he deserves that kind of leeway.

Westbrook could have taken the easy two, and they could have either played defense or fouled. He didn't NEED to take a 3 there, but he was going to do it regardless of what the defense gave him. In short, his decision making sucks and he's going to rob my man Durant of at least one ring in his career. That's why he annoys me so much.

I'd bet a decent sum of money that the decision to prioritize for a 3 was made by Brooks, his coach. You can't fault his decision making for that. And he's going to rob Durant of a ring? They wouldn't be here without him. Rob him of a ring? Jesus comon now.

[naiwf]

I'd bet a decent sum of money that the decision to prioritize for a 3 was made by Brooks, his coach. You can't fault his decision making for that. And he's going to rob Durant of a ring? They wouldn't be here without him. Rob him of a ring? Jesus comon now.

You'd lose a decent sum of money. There were 48 seconds left when the possession started and it's generally time to go for the quick two and play defense or foul and extend the game. If you miss that shot and Miami ends up scoring on the next possession, you lose. Couple that with the fact that Westbrook is a terrible three point shooter (29% for his career) and he made a horrible decision. There's simply no way you're going to diagram a play for him to shoot a 3 at all costs, but it doesn't matter what play is called when Westbrook decides he's going to shoot it. That's how you can rob your team of a title.

[Quom]

I'm with naiwf on this. Threes are rarely if ever drawn up in late game situations (unless you are into the foul and instant time out stage with like 5 seconds left). Although I can't remember this easy two or where it was from. If it was a long jump shot it probably wasn't for him to take either, it's likely what would have been drawn up was for penetration or a mid-range jumper. I'd trade a two for a three if it's a step inside the line.

Also Durant had a shitty fourth quarter and I think you are being way too hard on Westbrook. It's like getting annoyed at Kobe because he's 'costing' Gasol a ring. Fisher launched a couple of really questionable shots, some of which were early in the 24 whilst OKC were up. The whole team had a crap fourth quarter. Their biggest issue by far was the lack of presence on the boards. There was a play where they had three players under the glass, none of which boxed out and Miami's sole player pulled down an offensive board.

I'm chalking it up to a really shitty quarter, only person I am laying blame upon is Brooks for not controlling the team and calming people down. It was erratic and silly plays and guys being out of position that cost them. Miami picking off passes was brilliant for them as it seemed to make some OKC players try to make up for it which disrupted any structure the team had.

[Meacon Keaton]

Yeah, I wanted to chalk it up to their youth, but can't when Fisher looked like he had never been there either. That falls on coaching.

[naiwf]

I am being hard on Westbrook because I hate seeing the # 2 option not know his role. If he would simply accept being "Pippen" and stop trying to be "Jordan", OKC would be up 2-1 or 3-0. I'm not comparing this team to the Ewing Knicks and saying this is their only opportunity, but if John Starks had just stopped shooting bad shots (2-18, 0-11 from three) in Game 7 because they went down in Game 6, they may have won a title for the first time since '73 by now. Yeah, Riley should have benched him but coaches are reluctant to do that. If Miami gets over the hump this year and Westbrook keeps being Westbrook OKC's "dynasty in the making" may go the way that Portland's did. It wasn't long ago that people saw the Blazers being the team to beat before Brandon Roy's knees and Greg Oden's body fell apart. OKC may have to eventually jettison Harden or Ibaka because of payroll issues and I just don't want to see this team end up like the Shaq/Penny Magic did because of egos.

[Quom]

To me Durant wasn't open. You can't pass a ball to a player who has two defenders on him or is standing with a player on his shoulder ready to pick off a pass. Westbrook was no more suspect than any other player on the team, including Durant. None of them were playing hard enough and all lapsed at various points. I also don't think Durant on the high block is the same as Ewing. You pass to Ewing in the low post and you are guaranteed at least one point (either he scores or is fouled) Durant to me doesn't give you that from where he was positioned.

That's on Brooks, not Westbrook. If a player isn't in an advantageous position you can't give him the ball. Most of the time in the fourth he was on the weak-side with two defenders within reach, you kick him the ball, they close and he has no-one to pass out to for a shot, Miami was picking off good passes all game, let alone cross court ones. I sort of hope Westbrook does leave, just to avoid people criticising him in this situation. Because to me, even Rubio or Stockton would have shot rather than making passes that gained them nothing. I'm not saying this as a Westbrook fan, I'm saying it as a fan who believes that teams win games. Westbrook wasn't playing for himself, besides a couple of mistakes (which were also made by most of the team Harden, Fisher etc) he wasn't jacking shots that didn't exist or playing for himself.

To me OKC is the most complete team. Durant may be the star, but he's far from the sole reason they have got this far. They have received decent production offensively from a number of sources and the team is playing at the best when they focus on whoever is open taking the shot rather than putting Durant in some sort of God position. I'm really not a fan of hero basketball as I think it fails more often than it happens. But if you want that Brooks is who you have a beef with rather than Westbrook. Reggie Miller/Rip Hamilton/Ray Allen all cop shit for failing to make their own shots, yet in close games plays were run to get them the ball. Do you really think Westbrook would still be on the court after ignoring a directive to get Durant the ball on a play set up purely to get him free?

I'm amazed your head didn't explode during Shaq/Kobe.

[naiwf]

I'm amazed your head didn't explode during Shaq/Kobe.

At least they won 3 rings together. They probably should have had 5 or 6, but Kobe was a d-bag of epic proportions and nearly killed his legacy until Memphis bent over and traded them Gasol for a bag of chips. I'm still amazed they lost that year to the Pistons. I guess the basketball gods didn't want to honor Malone's scavenger hunt for a title.

TBF, I'm not saying Durant should have ended up taking that shot with 30-45 seconds left. I'm simply saying Westbrook had a lane after they double teamed him, and Westbrook pulled it back out to take the tying three instead of making it a 1 point game. At worst, they should have ended up having to go for a game tying three out of a timeout later on. Instead they lost the game there because he ran too much clock and missed the shot.

[Tyrone]

Great start for OKC

[gunnar hendershow]

You pulled a sahyder there, thanks.

[The Buscher]

These refs are so bad it's laughable.

[naiwf]

The officiating here is the drizzling shits. This is Lakers/Kings "The Fix Is In" bad. Wade commits a clear path foul that doesn't get called, Heat players routinely go over the back and Miami still gets the benefit of touch fouls. I hate the NBA sometimes.

[Meacon Keaton]

It's so much more tolerable if you aren't watching!

[naiwf]

It's so much more tolerable if you aren't watching!

David Stern makes it so that we don't want to watch. WWE is less scripted than the NBA playoffs.

[Benjamin]

I saw naiwf post and so hoped it had something to do with Westbrook and his eleven straight points

[Panni]

Get Fisher out of the game...I don't understand his purpose right now.

[Tyrone]

^At least he didn't miss a lay-up/dunk with nobody in front of him..

[naiwf]

Get Fisher out of the game...I don't understand his purpose right now.

He's there to get fouled by Battier, not get the call and slow up a 5 on 4 fast break so LeBron can get a lay up when they don't call the other foul on the opposite side of the court.

Westbrook is playing well tonight, but I don't think it matters when it's 8 on 5.