what is going on with AD? he looks fat af

did he do the wrong PED's because twitter got in his head that he's too soft or something?

I have a bigger picture NBA question that I want to ask, I was talking with my friend and we both agreed that overall interest in the league seems down. Not looking at ratings or anything (obviously covid timing/the teams playing at the end had big impact on this) but just general anecdotal experience. Less and less of my friends ask me about the NBA now (although as you get older, this is just reality) but also on twitter it doesn't seem like the league is as "hot" or culturally relevant as it was 2-5 years ago where it was kinda peaking in that sense.

Some reasons for this could be...

1. As previously said, last few years we had a Bucks/Suns finals and the bubble finals with the Lakers/Heat wasn't very compelling. None of the conference finals were that compelling in either of those years.

2. I just think some of the fever pitch interest the league seemed to have had a few years ago has died down on social media, maybe there is only so many things you can say about LeBron or KD, maybe the newer stars just aren't as polarizing (Giannis, Doncic, Jokic), maybe because of player empowerment era just went too far and the novelty of guys rapidly switching teams has worn off (I told my friend don't really care about Lillard trade speculation, that "where is this guy going" stuff kinda been done to death by now)

3. NBA really hasn't benefitted from the proliferation of gambling at the state level the way football has. Doesn't lend itself well to fantasy/DFS unless you are a diehard follower/enthusiast.

4. Load management, I mean at some point I think everyone realizes these games don't mean **** for another 6 months and it is hard to take much from them. The season is too long, also think the increase injuries and overall fragility of everything has made the league less worth analyzing from a macro perspective.

It just feels like it is trending more towards hockey/baseball in terms of being another major American sport with more of a niche following and less national interest, which isn't too surprising but if you read some pieces from 3-4 years ago there was legitimate talk that it could over take the NFL because of concussions, attention spans, marketability of players, etc....All of those thinkpieces turned out to be horribly wrong. Tillman Fertitta actually cited some of that when he bought the Rockets.


Something to ponder considering there won't be a meaningful game for 5 months.

tuff scene for the shadow GM

i'm too dumb to understand what cuban is sayin

Right?

catch-and-shoot 3s can be practiced in the gym, and maybe their shooting percentage is just down in the gym. also, different players maybe, and the unit collectively isn't getting C&S 3s with the previous regularity in game

"Play a game of basketball first, then we can talk."

At the same time, this tho.

Turns out different balls are not the same for every player. Who knew?

It's funny to see Oubre give the "too small" signal when he scores over Seth Currey, when Del Curry is the analyst for the Hornets.

Are the Knicks just awful?

About half the time, yes.

Pacers beat the **** out of the Wizards:

We gotta blow this **** up

Pacers beat the **** out of the Knicks:

We're gonna tank so ****ing hard. Any second now.

There is just waay more content available at a cheaper price, youtube, instagram, million streaming services etc etc. NBA needs to get out of the stupid cable TV bubble and publish their own content and make it easy to access at any time on any platform. League pass is still 480p ffs and the illegal streams are picture perfect 720p+

Heat found another one in Caleb Martin. Dubnjoy must be in shambles over this one

No space for PAB's in HEAT CULTURE!

Seems like Cubes should have data on shot type to directly refute HBob if he’s wrong instead of playing the lolNERD card.

I think that is true, but I also think it is just true that the era of internet/analytic bro b-ball enthusiasts has kinda begun to age out. There is just less to talk about now as well, no one is really that overrated/underrated and there is far less to solve/deep dive than there was like 3-7 years ago. Atleast it feels that way this minute, obviously these things can go in cycles and further evolutions can take place.

Rick Carlisle has covid. He just turned 62 so hopefully he's ok

Even the stupid posters here aren't that stupid.

So I'm doing a deep dive study, a.k.a. a cursory glance , at LeBron compared to Durant in terms of their production and bodacious greatness in the league. There are some strong parallels. Each averaged 20 in their rookie year on low 40% shooting, then basically took over the league. LeBron's streak of 25 ppg seasons at 17 and counting is well-known, but KD is working on his 13th straight himself. Both threw in a couple of 30 ppg season. For Durant, the last nine seasons of 25+ comes with 50%+ shooting. For LeBron, basically the last 13 seasons at 49%+.

Rebounds are very comparable and assists go to LeBron of course, but I'm focusing mostly on scoring. We all "know" that KD is a "way better pure shooter" than LeBron, as evidenced by the FT% and 3-pt.% comparison (not to mention the occasional brick and even air ball free throw by LeBron, which doesn't happen to Durant or Curry), so how is it possible that LeBron shoots a higher FG% than KD? The 3's attempted per game are comparable (until this year with LeBron suddenly thinking he's Curry or something), so it isn't really that skewing anything. Does Bron shoot more layups? Is that it? How is his FG% matching and surpassing Durant's??

Watching LeBron's motion doesn't inspire any thoughts of pure shooter, but maybe like a golf swing, you can have a really doozie yet stroke greatly with it. The FT thing just proves that one is a great shooter and one isn't, though. Seems weird. End of deep dive.

but seriously, what was cuban trying to say?

I don't know what he was trying to say but he sure was being oddly catty.

russ empty stats mount rushmore with iverson kobe and who