Topic: 2019 NBA Pre-Season - page 265. (Read 921585 times)

We can always look at the stats on how the warriors perform when Draymond is out vs when he is in. honestly, I think Draymond may not be the heart and soul of the team but he is a big help for the Warriors, his experience in the playoffs is very important. Draymond is not a big man but he can defend a big man and with him on the floor, Curry, Thompson and other shooters will have an easy job.

I just really don't think that the Warriors will win in the playoffs without Draymond Green.

Just don't forget that the Cavaliers won a championship before because they capitalize when Draymond was suspended. that's how important he is to the team.

Just as expected, he will come back when playoff comes.

TBH, I also expect them to at least go out of the top 3 in the West, but it turns out that they don't solely rely on KAT that much to the point where anybody from the team can step up and can get some wins even without him. Well, they're one of the best defensive right now in the league, and that helped them stay on the top 3. I guess another reason is that, the lead between the top 3 and the 4th seed Clippers is too much that it wasn't enough for them to go out of top 3. Whether they will be facing either the Suns or the Pelicans, they have a chance in beating any of them. I don't see the Pelicans beating them especially they don't have Ingram and as for the Suns, they might have the offensive power, but they still have many problems especially on defense.

They have been since the start of the regular season.

I saw on a Facebook post that the players want him to be fired and find a new coach because of his inconsistency, lack of communication with the team, many changes on the starting 5, etc. etc. I mean there's many problems, but they choose to let him be the coach at least for this regular season. I will not be surprised if they will be firing him this off-season especially with their current performance and standings.

Playoff picture is ready!
https://www.nba.com/news/2024-nba-playoffs-standings-and-bracket-updates


For those who are new or confused, it's actually simple when it comes to the play-in tournament.

The number 7th and 8th seeds will battle, whoever wins gets the 7th spot in the playoffs.
The number 9th and 10th seeds will battle, and whoever wins gets a chance to battle the loser of the 7th and 8th seed battle to get the 8th spot in the playoffs.
This means the 9th or 10th needs to win twice if they want to enter the playoffs. And the 7th or 8th seed needs to lose twice to exit the playoffs.

That's why all teams below the 8th seed are trying to achieve that or higher so that they only need 1 win.
But we have seen miracles happen, In 2022 Pelicans were the 9th seed to beat the Spurs and Clippers to enter the playoffs. Maybe it can happen again. So don't lose hope if you are a fan of the team that is in 9th and 10th seed.

The best things that would happen to the Lakers are: first, New Orleans needs to win against the Warriors; they need to beat the Warriors so the Warriors will go down in the seeding. Next, Phoenix needs to beat the Sacramento Kings too, and with that, Sacramento will go down in the seeding. Lastly, the Lakers need to win all of the remaining games they had, which are the Pelicans and Grizzlies. The Grizzlies should be an easy win for them, and the and the Pelicans are 50-50 since Brandon Ingram will be suiting up (of course it's the Lakers LOL) after missing some games. But I think the Lakers can win this if they manage to set the tone early and are healthy.

With that, the Lakers will be the 8th seed, and they can escape either the Sacramento Kings or the Warriors since it will be 7th vs. 8th, and they should win their play-in so they can get the 7th seed and escape the Warriors and Kings. If they manage to manage the 7th seed, they can face either the Wolves or the Thunder in the first round.

I'm not convinced he's the "heart and soul". The Warriors can remove him from the rotation now and we probably won't notice the difference. The point I'm really getting at with the comparison is that Jrue Holiday is still playing better than Draymond Green. If the latter can get a $100M 4-year contract then the former can do the same. We don't know how the talks  between Celtics management and Jrue's agent went but it's possible that Draymond's contract was also used as reference during the negotiation.

He had a lot of games already and he should have adjusted with the Bucks and he is a experience coach. So I don't see it as a reason for Rivers not to bring out the best of the Bucks. Nevertheless, he has history of choking and if my chance they are going to face the Heat, then maybe it will haunt him again.

I think the roster of the Bucks is better last season, not saying the Lillard is bad for them, but what Holiday can bring to them, the defense and basketball IQ and then they have one tough defender in Grayson Allen that can shoot from the outside as well.

We are too hype with what the Heat had achieve last season that's why we think the team that they'll face might likely struggle. Well, maybe let's consider it back to square one as those teams they beat will also make an adjustment,  in fact the Celtics and Bucks made a big move this season and they really improve because they are the number 1 and 2 teams in the East, while the Heat is still rank at the bottom in the playoff standing.

You can really trust this man, no doubt about that, and what I like in the first round in case they'll advance from the play-in, the Miami Heat are gonna be the underdog, which means juicy return for the series odds if they win.

Yes, he can always use that word "adjustment" because he is still new to the team, but the fact that the old coach was fired and he was the replacement, that pretty much said how big the expectation from the management, and coach Doc Rivers has to deliver, he wasn't able to deliver in the regular season, now he has to deliver in the playoffs.

Bucks probably hoping now that they will not face the Miami Heat, because if they'll face... I don't know what would happen to the Bucks. honestly.

It's Jimmy Buckets time, last playoffs, he made these two popular teams (Bucks + Celtics) cried.

Maybe Bucks fans should try to understand that Rivers is there new coach so maybe he's in adjustment period and maybe try to see if which of his players are good on the system he tries to implement on their team. But once their player can adopt the system brought by their new coach then provably that we can see Bucks to became more scary. They should not forget that Rivers is experience coach and also a champion so provably that he can bring something good to the team. If they would have a bad campaign and bad early exit then maybe we can't see Rivers to last long on Bucks but I doubt this will happen and we know Bucks rosters still good and its just they need to perform well and adopt on the new changes happen on their team.

What the Bucks are thinking was the playoffs, they know that they can be in the playoffs but it would be different with having Doc Rivers due to his experience and having won a championship before. Yes, he was criticized but if he can bring the Bucks even in the championship, that will be eliminated by the success he made. I think the management are just willing to gamble, and this coming playoffs is going to be the test that the team should pass, because if they will have an early exit, that would mean Doc Rivers stay aren't gonna last.

Yeah, Miami has proven it already last season as they go to the finals but lost to the eventual champion Nuggets. But the team are different now although Butler is still there and so we can't count them out.


Even coach Rivers has been criticized as well with how he handles the Bucks. And all we all know that he was a replacement coach but is doing worst than Adrian Griffin. And we also notice that to the Lakers as they have Ham, but there's not much of a difference than Frank Vogel stint with the Lakers.

Yes indeed, Miami make it happen and with how the current selections of those teams that competing in the West side for sure all of them are capable to beat one another, even the play-in teams who will have that hardship to move forward if given a chance they are very much capable, though we know that the defending champ still got an intact cores and they are still have that edge having that experienced from the last season's title.

In terms of coaching issue, more on the players and how they will play along each others, especially if you have those known stars who act as a main leader, it's tough to control but you need to adjust and play with the flow.

Still the Denver Nuggets in the West, all roads lead to them, OKC, Wolves, they are not going to be the team to bet. Nuggets as defending champion still has the advantage mentally against these teams. OKC and Wolves are still very young team, they don't have the experience yet. Clippers have Kawhi who has been in the finals and won, but they are so inconsistent too. While the Nuggets of Jokic/Murray are the next best duo behind Tatum/Brown. But the basketball IQ of Jokic though, no body right now can match him maybe Lebron James, in terms of play making and decision in crucial moments. And it's the primary reason why they become a NBA champion.

I would rather see the Warriors vs the Kings. The Warriors has a good record against them, and they have been teaching Sacramento a thing or two last season and this season as well. And a Phoenix vs Lakers could also be very interesting, AD and Lebron against the big 3 of the Suns. And then we have the trash talking Booker against his defender and so that is going to be a intriguing matchup. But we will see how everything will turn in the standing. Last couple of games for this 3 teams and for sure they are going to push themselves to win that remaining games.

Just to stretch this post, here is the news about Karl Anthony Towns of the Minnesota Timberwolves.
Sources: Timberwolves' Karl-Anthony Towns expected to return Fri.
https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/39923850/sources-timberwolves-karl-anthony-towns-expected-return-fri


I think the Timberwolves will be alright. KAT had been playing like a shooting guard ever since Gobert came to their roster. He mostly just waits outside for a kick-out pass because of his high efficiency at the three-point line. So chemistry will not be a trouble for them. It's actually a good addition because they will stretch the floor again and the scary Naz Reid will have more opportunities to be open in the three-point line again. We saw that guy a lot of times go hot and never stop. He did it against the Warriors and the Lakers both 6/8.
And Antman will have more space to do his paint attacks again. The trouble that I only see is in defense if KAT is not mentally prepared yet.

No matter who makes it to the Western Conference Finals, I don't think Denver is ready to lay down yet. They are still very dominant in the west and all roads to a championship will lead through them. Feels like a Denver/Boston series coming in June.

I feel like Lakers are having a coaching problem, and it is not even about Ham being a good or bad coach, it is about the fact that the team doesn't look like they care about him or listen to him at all. I get that it may not be all that simple to make changes, but you have to realize that we are going to see a lot more changes if they start to respect the coach. Wherever Lebron goes, whichever team he is on, after a while he becomes the coach and that's what I believe we are seeing here again.

In the end, playoffs are always a bit questionable and even the 8th seed could go to finals, we have seen it very recently with Miami for example, so we should not really consider anything done yet, lets see how the playoffs will go.

Quite interesting to see these 3 teams having exactly the same standings with only 2 games left. This could change anytime and we might not going to see the Lakers and the Warriors play against each other in the play-in tournament.
The Lakers might going to play against the Kings and it will not be a good match up for them as the Kings were undefeated against the Lakers in the last couple of years, and also Davis did not win against Sabonis his entire career. So, the Lakers are in huge trouble now.
The Warriors are also not in good hand against the Phoenix as they are 1-3 against them and only won the last game with only 1 point difference.
Well, things are getting interesting in the last 2 games for both the play-in teams and the top seed teams.

Possible but they'll have a very though journey in the first round.

The wolves might have to take on the Phoenix Suns which is full of stars, Durant, Booker, these two are very experience in the playoffs, they have a good run before even when Durant was still new to the team, they just fall to the Nuggets which is bad, but they were not swept unlike the Lakers.

With the wolves, ANT will be tested, and honestly, I don't see him a tough guy in the playoffs as I've seen some games where he made mistakes in clutch times, so how much more in the playoffs where the pressure is high.

Honestly, I thought the Wolves might go down in the standings a lot after KAT got injured. To my surprise, that didn't happen, and they are still at the top of the standings. If KAT is indeed fully healthy by the start of the playoffs, then I would expect the Wolves to make a deep run in the playoffs. They have a good chance to make it to the WCF.