No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

[Sexual Chocolate]

Already a week in to the new season and no thread means this Warriors-only watcher is taking matters into his own hands. It's not merely because we're good this year and I'll need to gloat every now and again.

Bucks' legend Michael Redd has just announced his retirement, as did Allen Iverson, Grant Hill, Tracy McGrady,and Jason Kidd prior to the season starting. Kidd now takes the reins as head coach of the Brooklyn Nets.

Is there going to be a third successive championship for the Miami Heat?
Are the Clippers going to prove once again that they're the best team in LA?
Will we have to suffer more dodgy refereeing at the end of the regular season to ensure the Lakers make the playoffs?

Hope this sort of thing will be a regular occurrence this season.

[Incandenza]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Huh...I swore I started a thread, but I can't find it now.

Don't worry, I don't think any amount of friendly calls will get the Lakers into the playoffs. The opening week had a few pleasant surprises, but last night's game against Dallas is more of what I was expecting. They just don't have a reliable inside defensive presence at all, and if the shots from outside aren't falling, then they don't have much hope.

Predictions:

Finals - Heat 4-3 Thunder

MVP - Kevin Durant
ROY - Victor Oladipo

[Sexual Chocolate]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

When Russell Westbrook's ridiculous 3-pointer put the OKC Thunder a point ahead with 2.3 seconds left, following fourth quarter double digit leads for Golden State, I was sure the entire basketball-watching nation was laughing heartily at the young pretenders from Oakland, with our unsustainable streaky shooting, nervy fourth quarter ball-handling and questionable decision-making. But then Andre Iguodala, a man seemingly at the peak of his powers, emerged to sink a buzzer-beating bucket and send the home crowd into raptures.

Last 20 seconds of the game

Not so random things:

* 4-0 so far at home.
* I've had a crush on Harrison Barnes since well before last year's playoffs.
* I still miss Monta Ellis. Never fancied him, though. Tattoos aren't really my thing. And the sexual harrassment lawsuit wasn't becoming.
* OTF really couldn't care less about the NBA at this time of the season. Still on page 1 of Sport, though.

[Cal Alamein]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

THAT was insane.

You'll find a few Warrior fans here. I come from the Al Attles, Rick Barry, Bill King Franklin Mieuli era. Haven't given much of a crap about NBA at all, but I got into them during last year's playoffs.

I know there's treason there for old Sonics fans, but the dream final for me would be the OKC Thunder v. GS Warriors.

and yes, I know that conference-wise it cain't happen.

[Incandenza]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

It's a bit of a shame that the Warriors are moving across the bay just as soon as they seem to be getting regularly good.

[Incandenza]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season



Bill Walton and Larry Bird visit Eugene V. Debs' house in Indiana.

[ursus arctos]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

That's great.

I wonder if Bird is going to catch considerable flack from Indiana conservatives.

[Cal Alamein]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

It is impressive that the house was declared a national landmark knowing the knee-jerk paranoia over anyone proudly declared socialist.

[Incandenza]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Derrick Rose tore the medial meniscus in his right knee in Friday's game against the Blazers, and is having surgery to repair it today. He is out for the season again. His previous knee surgery was on his left knee. You hope for the best, but fear the worst with a guy with two major knee surgeries, especially someone like Rose, who relies on quick and explosive movements as he goes to the basket.

[Incandenza]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

And the Lakers just announced that they've signed Kobe to a contract extension. Crazy day.

edit: 2 years, $48.5 million. The mind boggles. I sure hope that Kupchak has a big plan that no one else knows about, because right now it looks like they'll have Kobe next year, and still a bunch of journeyman players, and possibly a decent draft pick. They aren't getting a max FA also, unless Jim Buss is ready to start burning money.

[Sexual Chocolate]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Still beat the Warriors quite easily on Friday, though, albeit with GS missing Curry and Iguodala limping out with a hamstring injury.

Curry was back for the Portland game on Saturday, which I went to, and he looked rusty and forced the issue too often.

Warriors were in control until a fight broke out towards the end of the third quarter. Couldn't really see what happened at it was up the other end. I joked to my girl that we got the best of the ejections, losing only Draymond Green while Wesley Matthews and Mo Williams got tossed. I shouldn't really but I quite like Mo Williams. The way he reads the game and carries himself. He's a bad motherfucker.

Not as bad as LaMarcus Aldridge though, who should've been thrown out too from the TV replays I saw the next day. D Lee couldn't handle Aldridge after that. Pumped up, unplayable. Easily the difference as all our bad habits conspired to defeat us.

Once Klay Thompson committed his sixth foul, we were finished. Shame, but it'd been a while since I'd been to a game so enjoyed the experience nonetheless.

Portland look a good team this year.

[Flynnie]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

NBA signs multiyear deal with BT Sport

Great news for the Brits (and us future Brits) here. 7 games a week, some games streamed, and it's for more than one year.

[Incandenza]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Paul George is a mean man. And the Blazers won that game. Apart from Indiana and Miami, the Eastern conference is garbage right now.

[jason voorhees]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Warriors down 27 midway through the 3rd.

Watching Steph Curry is like a NBA version of Shaolin Soccer.

[Incandenza]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

For those who don't know--the Raptors were up by 27 in the third quarter, 18 in the fourth, and they lost to the Warriors by 9. The fourth quarter score was 42-15. The Raptors did not have a single defensive rebound in the final quarter. No defensive rebounds!

More:

Because the Warriors are never out of a game, no matter how desperate the situation might be.

Oh, you think that abandoning the paint is a hyperbolic overreaction, do you? WELL EAT NUMBERS, DOUBTER:

In the 4th quarter, the Warriors’ offensive rating was 207. Two Hundred and Seven. Over two points per possession…
— Kevin Draper (@kevinmdraper) December 4, 2013
The Raptors would literally have been more effective on defense if they’d simply allowed Golden State to make their way to the rim unabated in the fourth quarter. At least that way, they’d only have surrendered two points per possession.

I don’t know what to do with that information. I want to take it out to dinner, maybe take it dancing. You know, show it a good time. Make sure it understands that there are good people in the world, and it’s okay to be so MIND-BOGGLINGLY AWESOME. Seriously, over two points per possession? That’s like…

No. You know what? I don’t even have a ludicrous metaphor or simile for how ridiculous the Warriors were in the fourth quarter on Tuesday. Just look at the shot chart. Look at it, and marvel at its beauty. It is the way to Enlightenment. Only through it might one pass into heaven.


DO YOU SEE? DO YOU SEE?!?

Here, here’s another way to approach Golden State’s fourth quarter: their effective field goal percentage in the final frame was 89.47%. There are 13 players shooting that well from the free throw line this season, minimum 20 free throw attempts. THIRTEEN.

Here's a condensed video of the second half:

If you don't want to see the whole thing, just skip ahead to 4:20 and watch the two Steph Curry three pointers. He's from another planet.

[Sexual Chocolate]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Cheers for posting that Incandenza.

I have to shame-facedly admit that with three minutes to go in the third, with the Warriors down by 23 or whatever it was, I stopped watching and went back to the bird's place, even though she was happy to stay at mine until the end of the game.

[Incandenza]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

A good article on the Knicks' decade of horrible decisions in trading away first round draft picks:
http://www.sbnation.com/2013/12/13/5206658/knicks-trade-draft-picks-history-james-dolan-hook

Here's the Knicks situation. They traded their 2014 first-round pick in the Carmelo Anthony deal. It will go to either the Nuggets or the Magic, depending on where the Knicks finish in the standings. It is not protected; even if the Knicks land the No. 1 pick, they are not keeping it. They also traded their 2016 first-round pick. In the 'Melo deal, they gave the Nuggets a swap option, which just means that if the Knicks were due a better pick in 2016, Denver could take that and give New York their own pick.

But then the Knicks went ahead and hilariously included that pick in the Andrea Bargnani deal this summer. If the Nuggets are better than the Knicks in 2016, they get the Knicks pick, the Raptors get the Nuggets pick and the Knicks get to watch the draft over cheese and wine.

[Sexual Chocolate]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Was refraining from posting here while the Warriors 10-game win streak was in effect, for fear of jinxing them, as if my gloating could outweigh the team's skill or something.

The loss to Brooklyn was irritating because many of the calls in that tedious third quarter seemed to go against us but these things happen when you're playing against established veterans and we evidently didn't do enough to win.

Nets squad contains:
Kevin Garnett
Joe Johnson
Andrei Kirilenko
Paul Pierce
Jason Terry
Deron Williams

And yet they're 14-21 in the East. Jason Kidd might as well suit up and show them how it's done.

[Flynnie]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Well, in that same vein, somebody might want to put on a suit and show Jason Kidd how it's done, because he sucks ass as a coach.

[Sexual Chocolate]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Aye, evidently so. Still, he's finding his feet and it takes time for a new squad to gel and various other football cliches that might be applicable. Not that I really care whether they keep him around or not.

[Flynnie]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

It's been a while since I heard Kidd talk but at the time people were claiming he was Maury Wills-bad.

[Magik]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Whatever you think about Dennis Rodman's North Korean escapade the line up makes me feel young again: Kenny Anderson, Vin Baker, Doug Christie, Craig Hodges, Cliff Robinson, Charles Smith and Eric “Sleepy” Floyd. Not bad...

More here - http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2014/jan/07/dennis-rodman-roster-north-korea-team

[caja-dglh]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

[Sexual Chocolate]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

Magik wrote: Whatever you think about Dennis Rodman's North Korean escapade the line up makes me feel young again: Kenny Anderson, Vin Baker, Doug Christie, Craig Hodges, Cliff Robinson, Charles Smith and Eric “Sleepy” Floyd. Not bad...

More here - http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2014/jan/07/dennis-rodman-roster-north-korea-team

Clifford Robinson was my favourite Warrior when he played for us. Think it was only for two seasons, though. Before he joined GSW he'd made the playoffs every year of his career. Was the only one playing defense in a mediocre team that contained another favourite of mine in the underrated Speedy Claxton.

[Weiro]

No Kidding - 2014 NBA Season

I'm almost sure that Cliff Robinson is the answer to a good quiz question, something like being the last active player from the 1980's before he retired.