That seems expensive for 2.8 NBA-standard players

ya it really goes to show how cancerous his long 2's were such that 6 30% 3's a night are a a clear upgrade.

wonder how many long 2's he still shoots. i want to see dem statsssss

It's a great fit around Wiggins and you have space for 2 more stars

AiMc - Are you like this offline, aka real life? Because, I gotta say, it's a little difficult to stomach sometimes.

I don't think there are too many teams that wouldn't be "woeful" after taking away their two best players

At this point Rondo isn't much better than average dude either, Cher.

I don't think surrounding Wiggins with offensive cancers and people who can't shoot can be called a great fit

What I want to know is why are you trying to digest what I post?

Stick to just reading it imo.

Here:



At a similar point last season:

mclovin is just really corny, he cant help it.

no need to be upset

cliffs: smoove cant shoot and is a cancer but has been less of one on detroit

Okay no corny posts for one week.

This post doesn't count obv.

I like your posts

😎

TZ officials are currently investigating trainwreckdog for excessive bullying of AlM

Show your work

Pistons defense is WOAT.

Seriously, super pathetic.

Zero chance the Cs ship off Rondo for just Shump, seriously lol.

I've read the Cs are willing to exchange toxic assets that could help the Knicks in the short run.

Amare (21.7m this year, 23.4m next) for GForce (10.1 for this, next, year after) and CLee (5.25m, 5.5m). Would prob have to throw Bogans' expiring. Basically Celtics are willing to take on more money next year since Amare becomes an expiring, whereas Knicks get 2 ~non useless players (greater than Amare) and a lower lump sum payment next year.

Cs are set to have a huge amount of cap room in 2015-16; if they stand pat, they could have cap room THIS year, provided they don't re-ink Crawful/Bradley. I think they say F it, null out their cap room this, for a blank slate + KO, Sully, Vitor, JLG, 2014 picks, and possibly extended AB. (And whatever they can get for Rondo, prob 2 1sts or so) That's a solid nucleus.

Knicks are facked regardless.

Lmao

This guy knows what I'm talking about!

I personally don't think the Nyets will be able to come together this season.

I like the Pacers to upset the Heat now. Mount Hibbs will be ready and better than ever come playoff time. Top 5 NBA player Paul George will own souls.

Knicks would be pretty great with Rondo. They replace their worst starter with a very good one. Rondo would be a great fit with guys who like to shoot.

Rondo-Smiff-MWP-Melo-Tyson would be so much better than any Shump lineup. Hell I probably even would take on Gerald Wallace.

It's scientific fact that Rondo plays better in nationally televised games (bigger/ more important games per se). So naturally I think Rondo would thrive playing for the Knicks in the ultimate mecca that is Madison Square Garden.

Mavericks
Record: 6-4
Margin of Victory: 3

What I said Then
What I say Now
Heh, I was definitely too low on them coming into the season. Ellis has been great (although he's come back down to earth a little bit the last few games) and the rest of the core guys are apparently ageless. Dirk's turnovers are up a little and his assists are down, but I'm more than willing to chalk this up to sample size, and meanwhile he's shooting a nice 46% from deep at the moment. And while that number should go down, his 2p% should rise, as it's currently at its lowest point since his rookie year. His rebounds are down too, which I think is something more likely to hold over the season, but they have enough rebounding elsewhere for it not to be a serious issue I think.

Team-wide they seem to be doing a great job scoring (which doesn't really come as a surprise), yet they also do a pretty damn good job forcing turnovers (or they've been lucky so far). DeJuan Blair is averaging 3.6 steals per 36 minutes right now, which strikes me as, uhh, somewhat unsustainable. That said, I think their winning ways (or at least staying around .500) is pretty sustainable.

Nets
Record: 3-6
Margin of Victory: -4.78

What I said Then
What I say Now
This appears to be a bad prediction and I feel bad. They've just been awful this far in. And while they look way off the pace, I'm gonna escalate my commitment here and say they're a chance to get it together and, if they do, they're still a potential contender (mostly due to loleast). In fact I'd argue that, injuries permitting, there are some really ****ing obvious fixes to be made (ignoring the fact they have a rookie coach, which I'm not even going to get into):

Brook Lopez
My eyetest hates his defense. It has him as unable to really deal with anyone aside from his direct opponent and his shotblocking presence is more because he can't shuffle his feet near or around the perimeter (and thus never tries to). However over the last few weeks I've come around on this being a me problem, rather than a Brook problem. He knows his strengths/weaknesses, and he defends in a way that puts him in the best position to maximise those strengths (being really big), and that makes him pretty good.

But good god the Nets need to put him in a position to succeed. And basically that means pairing him with a player who can cause havoc on the defensive end by containing PnRs, making elite rotations, weakside defense, cutting off all the little angles inside the 3pt line, etc. And Kevin Garnett is not really that player anymore. He's still a great defender (or at least he was up until last season), but I think he really needs to be the slowest defender on the floor and much more rim-bound than he used to be. Playing BLopez and KG together is pretty much forcing a 6-11 37 year old to defend quicker (often perimeter oriented) players every possession. A quick look through BRef shows that if KG manages to succeed at this task, he'd basically be the first to do so.

KG is not that player anymore, but Andrei Kirilenko might be. He's only 32, he's an historically elite defender who 'does the little things', he's long enough to play the 4 against all bar the biggest teams, and his per 36 stats this season are right in line with his career numbers. So I think, injuries permitting, the most obvious way to improve this unit on both sides of the floor would be to insert AK47 into the starting lineup. That way KG can get plenty of minutes at the 5 next to Kirilenko, Evans and Blatche, and Lopez has a more agile and versatile defender to cover his weaknesses.

Finally I wanna quickly talk about Lopez's offensive game. Cliffs: he's really good. He scores really efficiently with high usage and very rarely turns it over. You can pretty much guarantee a pretty good offensive possession by just giving him the ball in the post. Although I do wanna point out he's basically a massive black hole so far this year (AST% of 2.6% is absurdly low, and less than half his previous career low), and while it could be because his teammates are missing shots, my eyetest definitely has him as a player who pretty much never passes once he catches the ball. For the Nets to really improve their offense, I think Lopez will need to pass more (even though it may be kinda counterintuitive right now).

#FreeLivingston/Plumlee and #ChainAnderson/Terry
That's probably a little disingenuous given Livingston is getting 20 mpg at the moment, but I felt it had to be said. Livingston has been playing really well so far (14/5/4 per 36 on 52% shooting, 18.5 PER, .154 WS/48) - and he's been crushing the eyetest too. He runs the offense really well and his length and quickness make him an excellent defender. Given his size there's no reason he can't play next to DWIL either. He's also one of the very few people on the roster who isn't 400 years old (even if his knees are). Give that man more minutes. Plumlee I'm less sure about, but he's done well in limited playing time thus far, and now is probably the moment to give him extended burn to see if he's a rotation piece for the playoffs.

Meanwhile, Alan Anderson is really bad. There's no way he should be getting 19 mpg. He was bad with Toronto, and he's bad now. His strengths are supposedly creating his own shot (not an issue on this team) and shooting the ball (currently 39% on the season, which is *better* than either of the last two seasons). Terry has been less terrible, and he's a much better shooter, but he's also slightly more of a negative on defense (pairing him with Livingston is intriguing though). I don't really mind playing Terry, but it should be *instead* of Anderson. Giving them a combined 37mpg is just asking for trouble.

Pass the ****ing Ball
This team is currently 20th in assists. Every team below them is either terrible or reliant upon a dominant perimeter creator for an above average offense (OKC). Given the nature of this team, they're pretty much perfectly suited for quick ball movement to create an open shot: Elite low-post scorer? Check. Good outside shooters? Yup. Can those shooters penetrate if given the chance? Absolutely. Instead the offense tends to involve a lot of isos and random PnRs that don't go anywhere. Is problem.

Nuggets
Record: 4-5
Margin of Victory: -1.11

What I said Then
What I say Now
They started out really bad but they've been a bit better as of late. I still retain faith in lol nuggets though, at least until the return of Gallo. Their newfound offensive success seems to be predicated on running again, although they're also not turning the ball over much at all (6th in the league), which doesn't seem sustainable.

So far through the season McGee/Hickson/Arthur have combined for a solid mark of -0.1 win shares per 48. Good job throwing all that money their way. Randy Foye has also been predictably awful to this point, shooting an impressive 34% from the field.

Thankfully, a number of their players have been outstanding. Lawson is awesome, I forgot about DRE, and Mozgov has apparently taken a giant step forward at the age of 27. I have no idea if he's hilariously bad defensively or not, but SSS or no, I'm impressed. I hope for Denver's sake it's somewhat sustainable, as he was pretty bad up until this year.

Pacers
Record: 9-1
Margin of Victory: 9.40

What I said Then
What I say Now
Wow. They've been awesome. In my defense, they have been pretty similar to last season...it's just that Stephenson/George/Hibbert have all drastically improved (at least over this sample). I don't really have much of insight that hasn't already been said, tbh. I'll just add that in the Roy Hibbert Watch, his offense has looked pretty good in patches. He looked very smooth against the Bucks, with some great post moves and what appears to be an improved touch. Long may it continue.

Pistons
Record: 3-5
Margin of Victory: -2

What I said Then
What I say Now
Yup. They're pretty unwatchable imo. I've only watched them once though...probably because I find them unwatchable. As expected, Jennings is shooting the ball 19 times/36 minutes at 38% (for reference, this means he's shooting less frequently than only DMC, RWB, Gay, LMA, Melo, Kyrie and Kevin Love. That's it [among players with >100 minutes]). Some oddities are Drummond taking very few FTs and also the fact they have the worst defensive rating in the league right now.

Something that may be interesting will be the +/- watch for Detroit's players over the course of the season. Particularly as sample sizes increase. Here are some early returns for players with >100 mins played (numbers are per 100 possessions):

	On Court	Off Court	Net
Jennings	-7.5	+1	-8.5
Billups	-3	-4	+1
Smith	-2	-8	+6
Monroe	-2.5	-6.5	+4
Drummond	-6	+1	-7
Bynum	+3.5	-7.5	+11
Singler	+3	-10	+13
Stuckey	-9.5	+1	-10.5
KCP	0	-5	+5

Pretty much nothing can actually be inferred from the above data with a modicum of confidence at such an early stage, but it's kinda fun to look at anyways. It may be more interesting once the sample size increases to look at how well certain players with the rest of the starting lineup, for example.

McLovin is a great poster.

I mean, he's no binkles atm but no one is really.

Hawks own rights to swap firsts with Nets this year (thx JJ!) so if DWill/Lopez get injured and KG really is done then we could get a few lotto balls

i'd love to do that amare deal but there's no way the knacks do it. they are currently seeking the same blank slate that we are. i'd say absolute best case we ship gforce + hump for amare.

in reality c's will likely just eat the gforce deal and ship lee and bass for expirings to whoever will take em at the deadline.

and i'm more excited for 14-15 cap space than 15-16 because of GORDON