2019 NBA Playoffs Poll

[33anda3rd]

Shout out to Boston, too, by the way.

With Giannis, when he gets two feet in the paint moving toward the rim, you're usually cooked. Yesterday when his first foot hit the paint the defense collapsed. Barring a reliable mid-range jump shot that he can shoot over the top of defenders he is then rendered much less productive.

[BottenFieldofDreams]

Man............. I just can't get on board. I'm happy that one of them will go home unhappy.

My hope is that they all don't decide to be on the same team before the WCF. Regardless of if they face the Blazers or Nikola 'the only superstar that swims in a t-shirt' Jokic.

[Jocephus]

Scott Foster, the referee most reviled by the Houston Rockets, has been assigned to call Game 2 of the Western Conference semifinals against the Golden State Warriors Tuesday.

http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/2663 ... ing-game-2

[33anda3rd]

Here's a great way to fix all this flopping. Take measures that empower referees, and empower them to make the right calls, while holding them accountable.

1. More technicals. Too many players get away with too much drama on the court. Draymond turns every (correct 95% of the time) foul call against him into a three-act play of cathartic anger towards the refs. Clapping, jumping, running, screaming at them. T him up. If it's 30 seconds in to game 7 of the NBA Finals, T him up. If the ref has had Harden do that thing where he is palms up, showing up the ref on the floor for the 3rd time in a 4-minute stretch, T him up. I'm not saying every time a player complains or shows emotion, that's gonna happen. I'm saying when a player goes out of his way to show up the referee repeatedly, or makes a long drawn-out show of displeasure with a call, T him up. This season they said they'd crack down and the first month there were a bunch of Ts then it just kind of stopped. This is not ok, ever:

2. Hold refs accountable. They have the replay stuff and ref review. If you were a player and were in a slump where you shot 20% from the field and kept turning the ball over you'd get a little extra time on the bench. Set a baseline of performance. You must get this % of foul calls, out of bounds calls, traveling calls, etc. correct. Fall below that and progressive disciplinary action, including 1- and 3-game suspensions, will occur.

3. Stop The Flop. Use replay in-game. Allow teams like 4 challenges per game. James Harden snaps his head back like he got punched in the face and there is no contact, yet the ref calls a foul? Ask for a review. Let the ref say "sorry, there was no contact, dead ball, opponent to inbound at the site of the infraction, and also James Harden receives a warning (the equivalent of a yellow card) for flopping." Harden hooks a guy on purpose, anchoring himself to the floor, then throws up a hopeless three, and the ref calls a foul on the defender. Opponent challenges. Review. James Harden is called for an offensive foul for initiating illegal contact on the play, dead ball, opponent takes the ball out at the site of the infraction. Treat these yellow cards almost like Ts. You get 8 of them, you're suspended a game. You accumulate 30 of them in a season, you're suspended two games. These can be issued after the game by the league office. Now, Harden, who could probably rack up 10 of these yellow cards in one game, needs to use his lovely floater and his brilliant step-back three and stop being a flopper and a ref manipulator. Same with every other player living off of ref manipulation.

In this:

1. v Josh Hart. Personal foul, with the argument that a Flagrant 1 is in order for excessive unnecessary contact.
2. v Curry. No call. That ref needs discipline, it's right in front of his face. 1 point for flopping.
3. v whichever Dubs guy that is. Correct no call on the floor, 1 point for flopping.
4. v Russ. Offensive foul with the butt or no call. Followed by a post-mortem 1 point for flopping.
5. v Clips, I mean, that's just comedic gold. Good no call by the ref. Twitter makes you a meme.
6. v Wiz, the offensive foul is not enough. Dragging a guy to the ground by his arm is a Flagrant 1, maybe a 2.
7. v Pels, offensive foul.
8. v Bulls, offensive foul on the same dangerous play that needed not occur that far from the play. Flagrant 1 would be reasonable.
9. v Zaza, foul
10. v LeBron who is literally going "what are you doing here guy?", either offensive foul or traveling take your pick, 1 point flopping post-mortem
11. v Dallas, offensive foul, 1 point flopping post-mortem.
12. v Clips, great no-call by the refs, 1 point flopping post-mortem
13. v Jazz, offensive foul and a T for BSing the ref on that one
14. v OKC, LOL that's meme worthy, throw him a point for the flop after the game
15. v D'Antoni, wind sprints all day next practice, don't care if it is coming off a b2b, and I guess I forgot to tell your teammates they had to be here.

Take away all this. And for the love of god, don't let a kid growing up idolizing this phony MVP believe that this is how real stars play.

[Socnorb11]

Good post, 33.

[BottenFieldofDreams]

The second thing I would do to improve the NBA is move the bitxhing at the refs offscreen. Appoint a captain who alone can address the refs somewhere/some time off screen. Then throw t's around liberally. Maybe you get three words or something. It used to just be Kobe, then it was all the Clippers, now it's every goddam player in the league. It's so unappealing. Doesn't hockey do something like this?

[33anda3rd]

The Onion Gets It

[33anda3rd]

The second thing I would do to improve the NBA is move the bitxhing at the refs offscreen. Appoint a captain who alone can address the refs somewhere/some time off screen. Then throw t's around liberally. Maybe you get three words or something. It used to just be Kobe, then it was all the Clippers, now it's every goddam player in the league. It's so unappealing. Doesn't hockey do something like this?

Yeah, make it the head coach. That way there is no relationship--positive or negative--between the ref and one player on each team. Who would the Rockets designate anyway if it were a player? Harden? Same thing as now. The Pistons? Blake?

[33anda3rd]

When the autopsy is done on Houston's season, I hope one thing that gets pointed out is that they traded Lou Williams (one of the best pure scorers in the game), Montrezl Harrell (who had a monster year this year and is LAC's 2nd best player after Lou), Patrick Beverly (a ferocious defender/competitor) plus like 2-3 more pieces for Chris Paul, then they took Paul, the best PG of his generation, and put him in a role where he's mostly playing off the ball.

The guys Houston traded to LA because they wanted to beat the Dubs are the guys who were the only reason the Clips beat the Dubs in two games. Houston had what they needed, they were just impatient and fell into the trap of Paul's superstardom.

That is one of the most colossally stupid trades in recent NBA history once you factor in the neutering of Paul's game by playing him off the ball.

[Jocephus]