More Hardwood + Round Holes = Lots of Scoring in Basketball 2K19

[Keyrock]

Everybody is getting hurt. Is there something in the water gatorade?

[Bartimaeus]

Yeah, sounds like Giannis tore or at least damaged his ACL. Ah well, there's always never year. Go Suns!

(e): Although if any team BUT the Suns won the championship now, it would be extremely well-earned after the major injuries to all three teams that aren't the Suns (and while the Suns have had their own problems, they now stand alone in being relatively unaffected in comparison to everyone else).

Edited June 30, 2021 by Bartimaeus

[Bartimaeus]

Actually somewhat miraculously, Giannis has apparently escaped relatively unscathed after the initial reports of a torn ACL - all his ligaments are perfectly in tact. Unsure if he will be able to play for the rest of the playoffs at this point, but that news in of itself is quite wonderful.

[ShadySands]

Trying hard to cheer the Suns on but my dislike of Chris Paul is really, really strong. I like Booker, Ayton, and Crowder but maybe I just hate Paul more.

[Keyrock]

CP3 certainly got his shooting touch back tonight and the Suns are headed to the NBA Finals. 

[Bartimaeus]

1 hour ago, ShadySands said:

Trying hard to cheer the Suns on but my dislike of Chris Paul is really, really strong. I like Booker, Ayton, and Crowder but maybe I just hate Paul more.

Pat Bev appears to agree with you, . As for me, I haven't been following basketball long enough (only the past 5 years or so) to know why I should hate CP3...please give me the basic deets so I can join you and then be mad when the Suns win the Super Basketbowl, .

Edited July 1, 2021 by Bartimaeus

[Keyrock]

I'm just glad that Patrick Beverley is gone from the playoffs. That guy is like a hockey goon, you love him if he's on your team, because he's constantly antagonizing the opposition, and hate him otherwise. He's never been on one of "my teams", so...

Also, CP3 is Lil Wayne's boy. How you gonna hate on Lil Wayne's boy? 

Edited July 1, 2021 by Keyrock

[Bartimaeus]

The only thing I know about Lil' Wayne is that he's a Packers fan, as I've once or twice seen his incredibly bizarre person at Packers-related events, .

[ShadySands]

Chris Paul is the past, present, and future Flop King and is generally hated around the league though that's mostly rumors and innuendo some have come out and said it publicly. You can hop on Youtube and see tons of Paul flops and altercations and even I have a friend of a friend who played in the NBA and he called him the league's Littlefinger. 

[Keyrock]

39 minutes ago, ShadySands said:

Chris Paul is the past, present, and future Flop King

Worse than Manu Ginobili? I've seen Manu take dives like he was playing for A.C. Milan. 

Edited July 1, 2021 by Keyrock

[ShadySands]

Ok, maybe third in line to the throne behind Manu and Lebron. I only put King James so high because it's so ridiculous to see a dude 6'8" and 250 flail around after barely being touched immediately before or after bulldozing his way to the rim.

[ShadySands]

Did not expect that

[Bartimaeus]

Bucks are the first team to ever win both the Eastern Conference and the Western Conference - surprised that didn't happen already. Cool.

I have no idea who're going to win the Finals.

[Keyrock]

Congratulations to the Bucks for winning the Eastern Conference. Hopefully Giannis is healthy for the Finals so they can lose to the Suns at full strength. 

[Bartimaeus]

Maybe I'm crazy, but it almost seems like the Bucks were way less dysfunctional the two games Giannis was out... Maybe not really worth considering, though - I similarly remember that the games Davante Adams was out for the Packers the two past NFL seasons (6 games), the Packers' offense looked bizarrely amazing and better than ever without him - might just be a matter of shaking things up and trying new things, or the opposing team not being prepared against a new-look kind of team, or players knowing they absolutely have to step up and play their absolute best (and rising to the occasion) in order for them to win, I'm not sure.

It's just weird that all of the role players and guys that have been struggling all playoffs (mainly Jrue Holiday and Brook Lopez) have looked like real guys again all of a sudden.

Edited July 4, 2021 by Bartimaeus

[ShadySands]

They do play better team ball with him out. Also, it lets Lopez and the others play closer to the basket since Giannis isn't occupying the lane. That's not to say they're better without him but everyone is a lot more involved and not standing around waiting for him to carry them to the W. If Giannis can share the interior better and they don't resort to throwing up 30 bad 3s for no good reason then I think they'll win.

[Bartimaeus]

On 6/16/2021 at 7:39 AM, Sarex said:

Jokic declined to play for his country in the Olympic games... Kind of sucks considering he would have been part of one of the greatest lineups we had in a long while.

The only thing that really bothered me is his excuse not to play. He should have manned up and said he didn't want to play and left it at that.

Seems like him not playing kiiinda portended things for the Serbian national team, . Serbia was a host country too...

[Sarex]

1 hour ago, Bartimaeus said:

Seems like him not playing kiiinda portended things for the Serbian national team, . Serbia was a host country too...

Yeah, we were missing Bogdanovic too... Either way they should have still won as there were good players left. Not feeling that bad about it tbh, there really is no point in them qualifying if that is the best game they can bring.

[Bartimaeus]

Bucks are constantly absolute trash in game 1s, so this should be positively apocalyptic for the Suns if they somehow manage to lose this one at home.

[Keyrock]

Game 1 went pretty much as expected. The Pu Pu Platter of Bobby Portis, P. J. Tucker, and Brook Lopez trying to guard CP3 wasn't cutting it.

Is it just me or is Budenholzer incapable of making in-game adjustments? Game to game he makes adjustments well enough, but in-game? 

Edited July 7, 2021 by Keyrock

[Bartimaeus]

15 hours ago, Keyrock said:

Game 1 went pretty much as expected. The Pu Pu Platter of Bobby Portis, P. J. Tucker, and Brook Lopez trying to guard CP3 wasn't cutting it.

Is it just me or is Budenholzer incapable of making in-game adjustments? Game to game he makes adjustments well enough, but in-game? 

Here's an interesting comment I saw on reddit about the game: https://old.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/ofhg7b/serious_next_day_thread_postgame_discussion_july/h4cvesl/

But yes, the perception of Budenholzer throughout the last few years in the playoffs has definitely been "he makes good adjustments between games, but he's a clueless buffoon during games".

[Keyrock]

I'll say this, in defense of Budenholzer and the Bucks D. While you can't let CP3 dictate the defensive matchup, actually stopping him from said dictation is much much much easier said than done. CP3 is so skilled and experienced that he will recognize your defense, process the matchups, process every conceivable switch, then implement the best possible adjustment exponentially faster than almost anyone in the league right now. Still, that's a puzzle y'all need to solve because you can reasonably expect CP3 to have 1 ice cold game in a series, 2 if you are really lucky. All the other games he will absolutely torch you if he gets to dictate the matchups.

[Bartimaeus]

Both of these games were winnable if the Bucks could just find their groove in making shots, .

[Keyrock]

We've seen the Bucks come back from being down 0-2 before. Can they do it again? I hope not. 

[Keyrock]

On the bright side for the Bucks, Giannis looked 100%, it's unlikely Mikal Bridges has another game that good, not on the road, anyway, and the Bucks role players should play better in Milwaukee. They need to hold serve at home. They already need to take a game in Phoenix, I can't see them taking 2, so it's critical they win all their home games.