waiters was so lol that game - significantly at fault for 2 of curry's 3s, and generally bad on d, and a lol offensive game obviously. him having a game worst -18 was a truthful reflection of his impact

Fatters is due to come back down to earth

a sportsvu titbit on curry this series from ethan strauss:

I would give -1500 if anyone wanted to wager on whether Draymond is suspended because of these plays.

Honestly, the people complaining about riggage are just trolls or miserable people. Yes the refs blow calls. But riggage, give me a break.

Nah.

So those 40 point losses should be 25 point ones. Noted.

Curry's having to work way harder to get open. OKC is being allowed to be really physical with him off the ball. I have to imagine his shooting numbers are going to be artificially lower from having to deal with that.

Every time jwax posts pictures of the Okc crowd I'm reminded of Osis's post about the whole arena smelling like manure and can't help but laugh.

I agree that he probably drove more than OKC expected, but what will "putting him on his ass" accomplish?

OKC is a favorite to win in my book, but not because they are going scare Curry with hard fouls around the bucket. And the old playoff logic of "making him earn it" at the line is obviously a dumb play with Curry.

And if Steven Adams is the player putting Curry on his ass early in the game, then it's really dumb. Having Adams on the floor is way more important than dropping hard fouls on Curry.

probably correct, but it seems like shooting percentages for stars always go down a bit in the playoffs.

refs only rigged in 1st half of q1 and latter half of q4. smart.

Wax with that false bravado shining through but he's like a duck on the pond. At least you'll be a witness.

I haven't read any posts itt since yesterday afternoon

Im assuming the consensus that OKC/durant/rwb sucks and GS won't lose another game

C-

As a neutral in this series, I had to turn it off after the first 15 minutes. It was clear the refs decided ahead of time to call fouls on OKC to tip the scales in Golden State's favor as per usual in these situations. I did watch the 4th quarter against my better judgment.

Doesn't matter. OKC is gonna crush game 6.

Putting someone on his ass doesn't mean getting a flagrant, it's just a hard foul. And let's not act like Steph wasn't throwing balls up a the rim like they were a hot potatoe in games 3 and 4. At worst a hard foul within the rules does nothing and gives Steph a couple freebies, at best it might make Steph think again about trying to take it inside.

I'll take it

Made that on phone while pooping

This is the ridiculous part. The hope that you can physically intimidate Curry just because he is small has been around for about a decade. And it has literally never happened.

If Curry were an NFL receiver, there would be no questions about his ability to catch the ball over the middle in traffic. He is slight, not scared or soft. The idea that he could be soft, yet as effective around the rim as he was this year is pretty LOL. And no players hit the deck more frequently than guards who drive. I wouldn't be surprised if Russell and Curry were among the league leaders in getting knocked to the floor on drives.

All that said, I of course agree that teams with good shot blockers can force Curry into quicker, more difficult shots. And I agree that's exactly what happened in games 3 and 4.

This is wrong too. Do you honestly think that Curry would convert 1.8 pts per shot on interior drives where he is not fouled? Because that's what he is going to do on the drives where he is fouled. Even better once you take the 3 pt plays into account.

If you don't think Steph Curry can be physically or mentally intimidated then we don't have a debate. I guess OKC should just let Steph waltz into the lane because he's tougher than most NBA players and the previous games in OKC where he was throwing up junk and missing lay ups were due to his injury, which he fully recovered from for games 2 and 5.

You're giving up less than a point of expectation to possibly put doubt into a player who's been intimidated into playing worse OR is injured, it's not much of a risk.

What if I told you that players sometimes miss shots inside, not because they are scared or physically intimidated, but rather because of some combination of variance and fundamentally sound interior defense and shot blocking?

Isn't that quite a bit more likely than the idea that Curry pisses himself at the prospect of taking a hard foul?

You have hit it on the head. I don't believe that Curry can be physically or mentally intimidated, and I think that it's silly that you believe otherwise. He of course can be well-defended, and that's exactly what the Thunder has accomplished.