***Official NBA Thread***

[duffer]

Must say, Atlanta are probably my favourite tea to watch. They play hard, go strong to the rim have a stud shooting guard and some nice young bigs with Horford, Smith and Marvin Williams. If they can keep this core together then we could see a very nice team developing.

Also, rumour has it that Detroit is now actively shopping Rip in order to improve their potency up front. Since his groin injury Stuckey and AI have been rolling pretty well and the thought is now move Rip while his value is still high and see if they can get a solid big to complement Sheed, Amir and McDyess as well as a role player guard who can score the ball. Would be really interesting to see what they can come up with.

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

Must say, Atlanta are probably my favourite tea to watch.

Distinct lack of Mookie Blaylock killing them IMO.

 

[nightprowler10]

really! i saw the game and i thought they were physical but i actually felt they weren't physical enough when compared to a team like the celtics...

I'll have to agree with this assessment.

Sheed, Amir and McDyess

For a second I thought my NBA dreams had come true and reality was in fact a horrible dream.

 

[duffer]

Distinct lack of Mookie Blaylock killing them IMO.

Haha, that brings back a lot of memories.

Also waking up this morning messy as, if anyone thinks they're having a rough morning imagine spare a thought for Charles Barkley who was arrested for DUI on New Years:

And to top it all off:

Former Phoenix Suns player and NBA star Charles Barkley told police he was in a hurry to receive oral *** from a female passenger when he ran through a stop sign drunk early Wednesday, a police report states.

The report, released late Wednesday by Gilbert police, details how Barkley not only made candid references to his impending rendezvous with an unnamed woman for oral ***, but also how he at least half-seriously implored a civilian police employee to help him get out of the DUI bust.

LeBron's right, Chuck is stupid.

 

[Mister Wright]

Been following the Bucks v Bobcats this afternoon. And at halftime, of the Bucks' 56 points, Redd had 28 of them. Amazing.

 

[Anil]

partisan commentary is just horrible...i am watching the nuggets vs thunder in oklahoma city on a local channel and the nuggets squeaked through against the league's worst team 122-120, the way the commentators were presenting it, you could be forgiven for thinking it was an all-time classic where in reality, it was two defenseless teams trying to outshoot each other and the only exciting moments were when durant put the thunder ahead from downtown with 2 seconds left and 'melo returned the favor in the final 2 seconds...

 

[duffer]

partisan commentary is just horrible...i am watching the nuggets vs thunder in oklahoma city on a local channel and the nuggets squeaked through against the league's worst team 122-120, the way the commentators were presenting it, you could be forgiven for thinking it was an all-time classic where in reality, it was two defenseless teams trying to outshoot each other and the only exciting moments were when durant put the thunder ahead from downtown with 2 seconds left and 'melo returned the favor in the final 2 seconds...

I watched it too. It wasn't the highest quality game ever but it was pretty damn exciting down the stretch with all the lead changes and big shots. That game was as good as it gets for the Thunder though, felt bad for ther fans when Melo's shot fell.

Didn't thin the Nuggets defended too badly, it's the type of thing that can happen to you against teams that chuck it up continuously they'll have a night once in a blue moon where the shot will fall. They landed 58% of their shots and 61% from behind the arc, on a normal day both of those would be around 40% when you consider where they took a lot of those shots. Fun game to watch though.

 

[Anil]

I watched it too. It wasn't the highest quality game ever but it was pretty damn exciting down the stretch with all the lead changes and big shots. That game was as good as it gets for the Thunder though, felt bad for ther fans when Melo's shot fell.

Didn't thin the Nuggets defended too badly, it's the type of thing that can happen to you against teams that chuck it up continuously they'll have a night once in a blue moon where the shot will fall. They landed 58% of their shots and 61% from behind the arc, on a normal day both of those would be around 40% when you consider where they took a lot of those shots. Fun game to watch though.

yeah the fact is the horrendous commentary took all the fun out of it for me...it was a score-fest and those are usually fun to watch...denver made a few stops in the 4th qtr but overall they weren't very good on the defensive end...

 

[duffer]

Got this off another forum but I thought it was pretty interesting. Sort of a visual view of how teams have fared against the top and bottom teams in the league so far and of how hard the schedules have been till now.

Capital letters are home games and small letters are away games. Read the table across, not down. Teams are sorted by winning percentage, so W's toward the left mean you beat someone good, and L's toward the right mean you got beat by someone bad.

A few things stand out:

1) Some teams have had a really easy schedule. Look at how many of Orlando, Cleveland, and San Antonio's games are from the bottom half of the table.

2) Portland is for real. Lots of wins against legit teams.

3) Utah has a couple of big wins against Denver and Portland, but they have very few quality wins other than that. The Spurs, too, have very few wins over good teams.

4) Most good teams have some losses to bottom teams showing that even the best take nights off. The Cavs, Spurs (with the exception of the Bucks games), Magic, and Nuggets have done the best at taking care of bad teams.

 

[Johnners]

Although I know it hurt, but after just watching the highlights of Cavs win over the Bulls, how freaking good were some of LBJs assists NP10?

EDIT: Feel for Oklahoma so much, Melo draining a ridiculous 3 under pressure to win it for the Nuggest after Durant had just put Thunder ahead with 2 seconds left.

 

[Anil]

Although I know it hurt, but after just watching the highlights of Cavs win over the Bulls, how freaking good were some of LBJs assists NP10?

why would it hurt? yeah if lebron stays healthy through the rest of the regular season he is a lock for mvp...

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

why would it hurt? yeah if lebron stays healthy through the rest of the regular season he is a lock for mvp...

np10 is a Bulls fan...

 

[duffer]

For a second I thought my NBA dreams had come true and reality was in fact a horrible dream.

This is a cool story. Gives scrubs like us some hope Saw him play, he made Donnie's other young guys like Anthony Randolph and Bellineli look pretty mediocre.

 

[Johnners]

Celtics having a bit of a rough patch!

 

[ohtani's jacket]

Yeah, the Celtics are slumping. Some bad losses. Rivers needs to be smart with his rotations since the bench situation is unlikely to improve.

 

[Anil]

the cavs and the lakers(after their loss to the hornets) have identical records and are now leading their respective conferences...

 

[duffer]

Celtics having a bit of a rough patch!

Rondo is now being doubled teamed and their bench has been found out. Guys like Rondo, Tony Allen, Leon Powe and Glen Davis all overachieved during their huge run and are now playing at more their level. They are starting to feel the impact of James Posey leaving for his big payday.

Also despite the media being whipped in a fenzy on how intense the C's are right from game one till the end, playing with that intensity almost always results in burnout especially when you consider that guys like KG, Allen and Pierce are 32,33 and 31 respectively.

They desperately need more depth especially at the 2 and 3 positions but the problem is any possible pieces they have which would be attractive (expirings, trade exemptions etc) are all essential for their rotation (Rondo, Powe, House,Cassel, Davis). They've also got a couple of bad contracts for guys like Scalabrine etc and 3 max contracts on their books which are hard to move. If Danny Ainge can pull something off without giving much up then he's a genius.

 

[Anil]

pretty intense game in cleveland between the cavs and the celtics, the cavs leading 61-56 in the 3rd...

 

[duffer]

Bron is single handedly destroying the C's. This is frigging awesome. Delonte showing how to shut down Rondo as well, such an awesome defender at the top of the key. 83-68 now.

Pistons-Nuggets and Mavs-Suns also on today. Awesome day.

 

[Johnners]

So annoyed that I'm basically limited to highlights, would have loved to watch Cavs vs Celtics, especially seeing as LBJ destroyed them by all reports. Without seeing anything other than highlights, am I to assume that what he is doing this season is really something special? Or is it say on par with his last season, only the team has improved and that's why they're top of the conferance standings, and equal top in the league?