22-23 NBA Season Thread

[GDAWG]

 

[DG_ThenNowForever]

31 minutes ago, FiddySicks said:

Also, and I’m not sure if the judgement is clouded due to the way his life ended, but this idea that some have that Kobe is above Lebron is pretty head scratching to me. I wouldn’t even put Kobe close the top 5. 

 

Mine is LeBron/MJ/Russell/Magic/Kobe. And then you get into Kareem, Shaq, Bird, and maybe more modern guys like Dirk and Steph. Who knows. But Kobe is probably at least a top ten.

 

And yeah, Mamba Mentality flourished big time after he died. It was a different conversation about his legacy before the crash, but I get it too. Death has a way of lionizing someone, especially among people who looked up to him.

[Germanshepherd]

Excellent trade for the Lakers, can’t write them off anymore. 

[Gary]

2 hours ago, GDAWG said:

 

Like I said a few posts back, love his energy. I have a great feeling about him

[DG_ThenNowForever]

17 minutes ago, Germanshepherd said:

Excellent trade for the Lakers, can’t write them off anymore. 

 

D-Lo is a knucklehead, but not a gamebreaking knucklehead like Russ. Huge addition by subtraction.

[FinsUp1214]

This trade doesn’t excite me at all in the short term for the Jazz, but it does clear up a lot of cap space and add one more first round pick to the treasure trove we have now. Feels like Ainge and Co. may be content to fade down the standings a little from here on out, which feels weirdly okay considering they’ve overachieved significantly this year. They almost made my profile pic obsolete from the start!
 

Also, I’m really going to miss Conley. He was absolutely beloved here. 

[DoctorWhom]

The Celtics just beat the 76ers with their leading scorers being 

Malcom Brogdon
Derrick White
Blake Griffin
Grant Williams
 

All while missing Robert Williams, Al Horford, and losing Jaylen Brown in the 3rd to a head injury.  

 

....woof. 

 

[Rockstar Matt]

10 hours ago, OnWis97 said:

I think a lot of the LeBron hate is fueled by two things: Jordan fandom and Kobe fandom.

 

I can speak on this with experience because I used to hate LeBron simply owing to my Kobe fandom. Honestly, once I grew up a little more in my early 20's and let my love for the game come through a bit more, I couldn't help but to appreciate and become a fan of LeBron. He's been an exemplary ambassador to the sport, and like others have mentioned, you couldn't ask for a better on and off of the court face of the league that LeBron has been throughout his whole career.

 

I still think people gloss over the fact that LeBron was the most hyped player I've ever seen come into the NBA, or any sport for that matter (it's not even close, really), yet he's somehow lived up to and surpassed ALL expectations. I somewhat feel bad for those that get so caught up in being fans of other players or just hating LeBron that they can't sit back and appreciate LeBron's greatness. Like Jordan, he's a 1 of 1. We'll never see anyone quite like LeBron ever again.

 

5 hours ago, FiddySicks said:

Also, and I’m not sure if the judgement is clouded due to the way his life ended, but this idea that some have that Kobe is above Lebron is pretty head scratching to me. I wouldn’t even put Kobe close the top 5. 

 

Kobe's my all-time favorite player, but I agree with this. LeBron is better than Kobe ever was. I also find the all-time rankings stuff really silly purely because it's impossible to adequately compare different eras. They each had different rules, different basketball philosophies, different competition and various degrees of skill sets. If you were to take players like Wilt, Bill Russell and Oscar Robertson, with their exact skill set and athleticism as it was in their time and put them into today's modern game, they'd get destroyed by random bench players due to how much the game has progressed. Skills that made them unique and special players in their time are now expected skill sets that modern players develop while they are still children.

 

I much prefer to compare great players against other great players in their era, however you want to quantify that. For example, where would LeBron rank among the players that played the majority of their careers in his era? Without question, he'd be number one. For players in my lifetime more specifically ones that I've watched, LeBron is the best player I've ever seen. All-around brilliance in the court. Offensively and defensively. He's a pass first guy, already top 4 all-time in assists, top 10 in steals all-time and he just so happened to become the league's all-time leading scorer. 

[who do you think]

Russell is nothing. Generic scoring-and-nothing-else guy that gets kicked around from crappy team to crappy team until he loses something physically and disappears. Shareef Abdur-Rahim with Instagram hair.

 

Somehow Minnesota scores Conley and a few second rounders out of this. I don't know what Conley's going to do for the Wolves, but it won't be anything they couldn't have accomplished without that dumbass Gobert trade.

[TrueYankee26]

KD to PHX?

 

 

[LMU]

Ishbia channeling his inner Stan Kroenke.

[DG_ThenNowForever]

Wow.

 

Didn't expect that!

 

EDIT: Can we go ahead and contract the Nets now?

 

What a nothing franchise.

[PittsburghSucks]

 

[FiddySicks]

Let’s :censored:in go. That’s rad. Good for the Suns. 

[DoctorWhom]

Well at least the Nets will have the 1st round picks of another team, instead of giving all theirs away. 

Nets have finally embraced the rebuild,  and did basically what the Celtics did to them about a decade ago.  

 

As for the Suns , it's a steep price, but is KD. And this is probably their best chance to win a ring since the Barkley era. 

Assuming they can stay healthy, they might just be the best team in the West now. 

At least on Par with Denver. 

KD

CPIII

Booker

Aeyton

 

That's not a big 3, that's a big 4. 

[Dynasty]

Phoenix is going all-in (again).

 

At least one franchise in that city is relevant.

[who do you think]

That's a very good haul for Brooklyn. In the short term they'll be devoid of a franchise guy but they'll play decent basketball and keep chugging along until the next round of superteam candidates become available. The Nets' lot in life is basically competing with the Lakers and Heat (and eventually Las Vegas) for disgruntled small-market stars in search of bigger markets or otherwise more favorable (warm weather/nightlife/laid back local fans and media) destinations.

 

Meanwhile Phoenix is gutting their franchise to try and win with a 37 year old Paul, the always-overrated Booker, an overpaid center who'd rather be playing video games, and a 34 year old KD leading the charge. Bold strategy, Cotton. Fortunately for them there's a void at the top of the west that no one else seems particularly interested in filling. Denver is a guilty-until-proven-innocent team at this point.

[Guest]

27 minutes ago, who do you think said:

That's a very good haul for Brooklyn. In the short term they'll be devoid of a franchise guy but they'll play decent basketball and keep chugging along until the next round of superteam candidates become available. The Nets' lot in life is basically competing with the Lakers and Heat (and eventually Las Vegas) for disgruntled small-market stars in search of bigger markets or otherwise more favorable (warm weather/nightlife/laid back local fans and media) destinations.

 

Meanwhile Phoenix is gutting their franchise to try and win with a 37 year old Paul, the always-overrated Booker, an overpaid center who'd rather be playing video games, and a 34 year old KD leading the charge. Bold strategy, Cotton. Fortunately for them there's a void at the top of the west that no one else seems particularly interested in filling. Denver is a guilty-until-proven-innocent team at this point.

 

Can the Suns for sure beat Dallas, though?  

[Guest]

8 hours ago, DG_ThenNowForever said:

 

Mine is LeBron/MJ/Russell/Magic/Kobe. And then you get into Kareem, Shaq, Bird, and maybe more modern guys like Dirk and Steph. Who knows. But Kobe is probably at least a top ten.

 

In no particular order, my top 4 would be Kareem, Chamberlain, MJ and Russell.  Kobe is probably top 12 for sure.

[who do you think]

6 minutes ago, sayahh said:

Can the Suns for sure beat Dallas, though?  

 

Can the Suns beat the underachieving .500 bitcoin team that just traded for the single most overrated and internally disruptive player in the entire league? Probably.