₦airaland Forum

The playoffs just began in the eastern conference.

D. Mitchell and J. Murray once again capitalizing on both teams' awful perimeter defending.

mattfeuter:
Who do you have coming out of the East?

That's a hard one. Those 4 teams look like they're built to play each other. I won't underestimate the Raptors though, I think they'd be in the conference finals at least. Heat/Bucks is anybody's game, but if I'm to put my money, I'll cautiously pick Bucks.

mattfeuter:
Ahaha

This is just wishful thinking, the Rockets live and die by the three. Remember last year game 7 of the WCF, they blew a 15 points lead and missed 27 consecutive 3s.

How about that for a stat line

I trust the Lakers perimeter defenders to make life difficult for them

birdman:
Clippers and Rockets have a good shot. Clippers are too deep. Rockets have multiple Lillards as in bad defense but miracle 3s

For the Rockets, the recipe is to allow less than 20 threes per game. The Clippers have depth yea, but let's be honest, their depth ends with Lou and Harrell. Shanmet and Jamychal Green are not players anybody should be scared of. And we've seen how inefficient Lou has been against us so far. And with all that "depth", they can only play 10 guys a night. The Lakers go 10 deep too, especially when Rondo returns.

And I hope PG stinks up the joint too in a couple of games

chic2pimp:
LOOL.....I legit thought the Lakers would put them to bed way earlier than they did. Credit must go to the Blazer's players who put up such a good fight without their Best player.

It's an elimination game, why do you think they'd go down without a fight?

It's hard to accept that there's a team in the NBA that can beat a team having LeBron and AD in a 7-game series.

chic2pimp:
CJ and Melo going toe to toe with Bron and AD. You love to see it.

Yea. We do.

Come on Pat, you can do better

mattfeuter:
You still don’t get it. I doubt you will.

Then let's agree to disagree.

mattfeuter:
Yes it won’t end it but it’ll hurt the powerful
Rich white billionaires pocket and also bring more awareness to police Brutality.

For example, 4 years ago when kap protested by kneeling, the NFL turned a blind eye, even trump called him an ( SOB) and he was ultimately blackballed from the league.

4 years later, after George Floyd was killed, the NFL MvP Patrick Mahomes (New face of the league ) led the way by protesting and guess what happened ? The league issued a statement, an apology to kap and even provided funding for the blm movement. It might be little but it is a step in the right direction.

Do you now see how these things work?

And talking about emotions, I’m not in the nba but my spirit hasn’t been well since I saw that footage. It is extremely disturbing and heartbreaking. Things affect people differently.

Never Underestimate the power of a protest/boycott.

A temporary boycott will do all these things you've mentioned. But what does an abandonment of the season do? Virtually the same thing.

Also, It's one thing to boycott, but what will be the terms for a return. Are they going to return when police brutality and social injustice has ended for good? If so, they can as well call it quits for basketball for the next decade.

mattfeuter:
Most times , I agree with you but I’m surprised at the highlighted.

Bruv, I don’t care if the NBA loses money or what not, an unarmed black man got shot 7 times and he’s now paralysed and fighting for his life.

Eff the nBA and eff basketball. . . I’m sure ( God forbid ) if it was a family member , you wouldn’t share this sentiment.

Bro. NBA are not the police, they are not the senate, they are not the judiciary. And the NBA are certainly not the ones who shot Blake. Whether the players play or not, life will still go on. Their refusal to play won't end police brutality. So it's best they put emotions aside and look for a long-lasting solution.

birdman:
Bro calm down. Look at it this way: if they never played, there would be no leverage for players to skip games. The fact that they returned to work gives the opportunity to choose the terms of work.

This is a marathon battle. Emotions are not enough, they fade. After you cry, dry your eye and execute strategy. If u say your strategy is to not play at all, cool. What are your next steps?

For me, just staying home is useless. The fact that the players are active has amplified their voice. You cant block out lebrons comments on national tv right sfter a game. Just my thots...

Just to add im not against ending the season. Its up to the players on this one. But it is going to be painful either way

I was actually on the side of them going to the bubble, so let's get that one clear. What I have a problem with is guys taking one stance and then supporting the exact opposite later.

As you said, what's the next move? Did they boycott this game with the view of boycotting the the entire playoffs? What was the aim of the boycott exactly? To me, the boycott should be to put pressure on the Wisconsin government to begin prosecution of the officer who shot Blake. Any other thing would be exaggerating the powers of the boycott. Getting the government to prosecute that officer alone would be a huge step in the fight against social injustice.

And if the players are thinking of boycotting the entire playoffs, especially in view of completing it on a later date, that would be foolhardy. The NBA shouldn't be the one to suffer in all of this. They worked so hard to get these guys in the bubble in the first place, and it would feel counterproductive to now cut it short. My advice is that they should take a few days off and continue the season. Let's be honest, just as people are working hard in support of social justice, there are also those who are working hard to truncate their efforts. Ending the season will not make a difference. They shouldn't be the once to lose in all of this.

This is why I literally shut my ears whenever these sport folks wade into these issues. He was virtually against players not playing two months ago. Is he now supporting the players' boycott because he doesn't want to be seen as the only black man who is against it at this heated moment, or is he in support because he truly believes that the boycott can do some good?

I always knew a drubbing was looming for this Dallas team. It has taken so long.

Giannis DPOY. Congrats to him. Perhaps this is going to be a compensation for losing the MVP to LeBron

etidy:
Excuses, curry dislocated his finger in game 2 against the Houston rockets last season, yet he closed out the
rockets without Durant and Demarcus cousons with Mr triple single triple stinking the joint and javale being his best center..
Nobody gives curry the same leeway, why should we give Lillard

A further attestation to curry's greatness was that klay wasn't 100% fit for the rockets series last season has he suffered a right ankle sprain against the Clippers in the first round.

Lol. Is it the same series that Curry averaged 24 points we're talking about here? Dame is also averaging 24 points against the Lakers who are a much better defensive team than that Houston team. No one's saying Dame is better than Curry, so let's quit the comparisons.

Afromentalist:
It was obviously coming. He was bereft of ideas on how to manage the 76. Next in line is MDA except the rockets get to the Conférence finals, which I doubt. But Brodie is coming and it could chang me a lot of things for them.

I don't know how much say he had in building his squad, but I'm quite certain that he knew he wouldn't achieve anything with that Embiid/Simmons duo. Which brings me to ask the question, did the front office force him to make do with that duo? If so, any other coach that comes in and sticks with this same team is also destined for doom. One needs to go, and dare I say, I'd keep Embiid and get a true point guard that can give me 22 and 8 at least.

Brett Brown fired

How am I just seeing this?

mattfeuter:
Actually my point is,

Max has always been a prisoner of the moment.

True that

mattfeuter:
I.e Max Kellerman

2 good games and he named Dame as the best player in the bubble. . . By far

He must have forgotten that there are levels to this. . . .

There's something you people are failing to see in all this. The Lakers were a top 3 defensive team in the regular season for a reason. Even Steph would have struggled against the Lakers defense I can assure you that. So let's give some props to the Lakers team instead of bashing Dame and the Blazers. And the man has been playing with a dislocated finger since game 2.

Lest I forget, another masterclass from LeBron. You can feel he's inching closer to that playoff mode. The efficiency is much better. Today he shot 83% from the field (10/12) and 80% from 3 (4/5). Still facilitating at a high level, the best passer in the league bar none.

Gotta give kudos to Gary Trent Jr. He's such a feisty defender. You don't want him guarding you. The only thing is that he usually guards LeBron who's bigger and stronger than him. He stripped the ball off Kuzma twice.

Logo LeBron!

birdman:
They arent. But you cant play hero ball every night. Blazers need to be able to win games without Lillard transforming into an intergalactic shooting star.

Lol. But we all knew that is how they play didn't we? That is exactly what the whole world saw that made them suggest that they'd be a threat to the Lakers and anybody. That's exactly how they played in the seeding games.

I was assured that "Portland isn't an archetypal eighth seed".

Houston are almost impossible to beat when their threes are falling.

I have a feeling LeBron will have a 15 point triple double game in an easy win tonight just to get the haters talking again. I swear that man does this sh*it intentionally

Today, Miami completes the sweep. Both Bucks and Lakers go 3-1 up. I have no clue how OKC/Houston would pan out. Very tricky tie. But if Houston go 3-1 up there's no coming back from that for OKC. So it's a must win game for them. I think I might go with OKC for this.

Khanben:
No athlete peaks at 21 yrs old whose natural life span ends in their 30's, unless they become lazy and their work ethic drops. History shows that a large majority of athletes peak in terms of performance in the mid and 20's.
Luka still has a lot to improve and IMHO he has not even gotten to that stage where there is complete synergy amongst his athletic ability, Basketball IQ and experience.

Who told you that? Might not be 21 per se, but 22-23. If you watch soccer you'd know what I'm talking about. There are a lot of players that did pretty well at their very young ages, playing in big clubs, but as they approached their mid 20s they became inexplicably bad, and then they got shipped off to smaller teams, and they remain in smaller teams till they retire.

There are also some who peak in their late 20s to early 30s

chic2pimp:
Funny enough I kind of see where you are coming from. You feel Luka is very close to His Ceiling which might very well be the case. I on the other feel He still has another 3-4 years of improvement left before plateau sets in (on the offensive end).

I think it's quite unrealistic to expect another 8-10 years of constant improvement. If however He makes me eat my words and that happens, then we are looking at Far and away the greatest offensive player of all time. Savour the moment fellas.

What I think will happen though is that by the time He plateaus, He would have gotten to such a High level all He needs to do is either maintain it or suffer an ever so slightly dip in form. He can then start working to improve the other side of His game. Whilst I don't He'll ever become a Great Defender , I reckon He can become a Good to a Very Good One.

In addition, His fitness levels would have improved massively and the Boy to Man body transformation would be complete. All in all, We are looking at one scary prospect here.

Yea. I think he's very close to his peak, but the numbers will remain the same or slightly better. He can't get much better than this in my opinion. He could score 30 ppg in 2 years time, but that doesn't equate to improvement. And one thing about the NBA is you can't have it all. He could go up to 35ppg but only at the expense of his assists and rebounding. And depending on how fast he grows, he could get way bigger than he is right now, which would only make him adapt to another style of play.

etidy:
Peak at 21yrs or 5 years of professional basketball?
Did you see his jump from year 1 to year 2 in the NBA?

This can not be peak Luka unless he's lazy.
If anything his defense, decision making, pacing, overall efficiency and shooting will improve.

The guy nearly averaged a 30 point triple double effortless (not Westbrook style) this season.
Wow.
As long as he's not Injured, lazy, doesn't allow the hype to get to his head, not screwed over by his front office. Omo this guy has multiple mvps and titles in him.

You're still doing the same thing

His first year in the NBA was about adaptation and knowing his role and gaining the trust of his teammates and coach, which has resulted in him being handed a much more important role this season. These attributes were already there. This dude won euro league and Liga ACB MVP for heaven's sake.

Unless you're one of those who think a player is better because he scores more points. This year Westbrook is averaging 27/8/7 or so, but he's better this year than his 30 point triple double season. Same with LeBron, he's better this year than his 27 ppg season last year.

etidy:
Bro that's the dangerous thing about Luka, he can still improve.
He's just freaking 21yrs old. Second year in the league.
When I see people put him and zion in the same sentence, e dy always vex me.
Luka is the heir to lebron's throne.

I need to see him vs LeBron in the NBA playoffs before LeBron retires.
This guy is special

Improvement is not really about age, it's more about exposure and experience. Luka is 21 but has been playing professional basketball for about 5 years. How are we sure he hasn't reached his peak?