lol KC. I kind of am in the middle of Geoff and you wrt Chandler replacing Gallo. Prior to this year he SUCKED imo, but this year he's enjoyed somewhat of a renaissance. I posted this on the Denver SBNation site (and got a mention by GK in his presser /brag), but Wilson's shot locations this year are pretty encouraging. At rim attempts have gone from 3.3 to 5.7/40, and 16-23ft attempts have gone from 4 to 2.4. He's taking much better shots this year over a small sample, and this will need to continue if they are to be successful. Defensively I think it's a wash with both guys being pretty good and different things.

Also during their 15 game winning streak and up until two games ago, it was Chandler going off with Gallo sucking. I don't think that's a good indicator though, because as with most teams they will always have a few players "on" at one time. Not having Gallo gives them one less player to pick up the slack for others... He always brought it on defense though.

Very much so, especially considering the hype it yielded a couple years ago.

itsnotyourfault.jpg

The Knicks haven't really left a lot of ceiling on the table. Letting Lin go was the only really awful decision they've made since the Melo deal.

They've actually done a really good job building around Melo without much cap space considering the Amare albatross. Chandler deal was awesome, they got JR very cheap, Shump was a good pickup, Felton, Novak, etc.

Kidd is whatever, I didn't like that deal but its 3/9. The rest of the old guys are on small deals.

So yeah, I'm pretty happy overall with the FO since the Melo trade and to think they have done a bad job building around Melo with the cap resources left is ridiculous. They've actually done a great job overall, especially considering the worst move was a unilateral Dolan decision (and wasn't even that bad in hindsight).

lol @ talking down to 50+ wins and ~6 th best team itl, nugz fan.

Considering Dolan's work in the early 00's, the Melo deal is like Broglio for Brock.

espn showing all these old school hard fouls, then they showed that little foul on lebron where taj's arm touched his shoulder. looked like a normal foul in today's game.

That I agree with Ray.

F60, perhaps being in the West skews my view of what a successful team is. 50 wins there gets you a nice playoff series against a much better team without home court year in and year out... and unfortunately I don't see that changing any time soon.

Minn
NO
Utah
Portland

Those are all teams that should be in the mix for the playoffs next year, and I don't expect Houston/GSW/Mem to lose much ground. LAL will ldo be there, and at worst SAS gets knocked down to the 3-5 range. In the East you've got Indy looking good for the future and of course MIA, but who else? There are some young teams who might crack the playoffs (WAS/TOR/DET), but they are far behind the up and comers out of the West.

preach it jalen. man, that guy knows his stuff.

What nonsense is Jalen spouting off now twd.

uh, the quote is from tj simers. thats far from "lakerfan propaganda." all that tard does is smash the lakers in the times, even when they were winning titles.

well, the other day during mcdonalds all american game he talked about how as you move up levels you have to be able to do the same moves with less dribbles.

then today just now, he talked about how it is addition by subtraction with gallo, which i wholeheartedly agree with. you don't need 10 guys to get through the western conference. it will make no difference whatsoever imo; denver will be better actually - guys will be tuned to what each other is doing that much more and not looking over shoulder.

each guy plays a tad harder than they otherwise would, gallo replaceable by chandler = better imo.

but gallo's overall uniqueness as a basketball savant will indeed be missed.

train, durant needs to go to a melo-like one dribble pull-up more often. agree or disagree? (and im not talking about from 30 feet out)

the jonas valanciunas song is so awesome

GOT STACKS LIKE JONAS VALANCIUNAS

agree 100%.

there were a handful of times last night where durant tried to get all the way to the cup, the defense anticipated and simply put bodies in the way, and he either turned it over or simply missed (without getting fouled, although he would complain but the replay would show that he just lost control).

on these possessions, and there were at least 4 or 5 of them, very high percentage 6-10 foot pull-ups or floaters were so easily available and i assumed he would take them, yet he turned those down and tried to get all the way to the cup, unsuccessfully.

it is a matter of recognizing when the defense is just a little too set, and the beauty of it for durant, is that the pull-up is literally always there because of his quickness and length. if he ever mastered it the way melo has...

not sure who posted it, but someone said that durant was quoted saying that okc had a bunch of stuff that they weren't showing until the playoffs.

if this is indeed true, i think the thunder stroll into the finals again, no problem.

denver actually is the only team that scares me, just because they have the athletes to slow durant down and they have the style of play to lure okc into a playground match that okc might not be able to win against that particular team.

then again, i've had similar fears in the past with denver, and they always let me down (because i was always cheering for them vs los lakers)

Simmons confirmed reads TZ.

He just said on NBA ESPN pregame show that LeBron is like the queen on a chessboard cuz he can go in so many different directions.

Then he added that he got that "from a reader".

I've basically said exactly that itt.

as for your lakers scherer - truthfully, how confident are you in their prospects?

i think the thunder would beat them, but it could be quite interesting if dwight can turn it up a notch and dominate, and if the thunder DON'T have anything materially new strategery-wise for the playoffs.

and ditto vs the spurs, especially if dwight can dominate, they have an even better chance of the upset than they do vs the thunder imo.

and other than denver, they might be able to beat the other wc playoff teams.

And there's virtually no chance one of his "mailbag" readers would be able to conjure that up. They're like poor man's versions of him.

Livingston, Miles, Ellington, Thompson, Speights vs. Terry, Crawford, Williams, Bass, Randolph

Has there been a worse combination of 10 players playing in an nba game at the same time in this 1st quarter this season?

one more thing about durant - he needs to be more selfish.. on those possessions i was talking about, often times durant would pass it off as well, as opposed to taking probably a 60%+ pull-up like 8 footer.

burke posted previously that durant is a 50% shooter off spot-up (stand-still), and a 25% shooter in iso. so he needs to actually perfect those types of dirk-kobe-melo shots. as great as he is, he actually needs additional practice at those shots because 25% won't cut it. wasn't surprised to see that stat at all though. i've been watching him miss those shots all year.

his over-dribbling leads to so many turnovers because he either dribbles it too low and loses control or it's too far from his body and defenders swipe at it. kobe has this same problem. and they both take too many chances on difficult or unnecessary passes. (kobe 2nd worst in tov's, kd 3rd, harden 4th, rwb 5th)

but that 7-15ft pull-up is always there as you say. he has a tendency to go all the way to cup rather than taking a hard dribble and stopping/popping. but he also catches the ball too far out a lot of times. i mean does kd ever get that low to mid post position that kobe/melo get on the wings? even tho he doesn't post, he needs that position to turn and face closer to the basket.

The way he said "a reader" was in a coy way too.

wat

Celtics #1 option right now is Shavlik Randolph...and it's working!

meh, injuries have ruined this team. if they get in and nash is on the shelf, they have like a 1% chance of upsetting sas. but if nash is back and parker is having trouble with that shin/manu is out, then i think they could upset sas.

basically no chance against healthy okc. i'd need russ to get pissed off in game 82 and punch an opponent or ref to have a shot.

mwp would be important against kd, dont think his loss is as major against sas.