***2021-2022 NBA Season Thread***

[Going Commando]

54 minutes ago, Mr. Sinister said:

Bruh, one I saw was ridiculous. "At least 3 ft "might have been kind.  certainly not one of the happy looking tiny ones you see on Thanksgiving calendars. 

  

Probably wouldnt want to go out there without a rifle... Or maybe a very big sword 

 

You live in the country?  Sounds like you might live in the territory of a big tom.  A big dominant one can keep a harem of dozens of hens.

[The Evil Genius]

2 minutes ago, Momma There Goes That Man said:

what thread am i in?

 

We're in the upside down. A Canadian team won an NBA title and the Blues won the Stanley Cup. What's next, the Cardinals winning the Lombardi? The Rays winning the World Series?

Edited June 14, 2019 by The Evil Genius

[Going Commando]

1 hour ago, Lombardi's_kid_brother said:

Somewhere General Manager Steve McQueen is looking at his three year plan to be good once the Warriors begin to decline and is weeping openly.

 

The caveat was always injury.  Are we pretending that the only reason the championship opened up this season wasn't because Durant and Klay got seriously hurt?

 

And it's only a matter of time before the next super team forms up.

[Going Commando]

Are we also going to pretend that, heading into this series, any of you thought the Raptors had a chance?  I was alone on the "Raptors have a puncher's chance" island.

[Renegade7]

2 minutes ago, stevemcqueen1 said:

Are we also going to pretend that, heading into this series, any of you thought the Raptors had a chance?  I was alone on the "Raptors have a puncher's chance" island.

 

I said gentleman sweep expecting KD to come back to lay waste to their hopes and dreams.  Then I got called out for underestimating the Raptors and overestimating the Warriors without him.  Raptors having home court should've been the first clue this wasn't going to go as most people expected, it immediately raised my eyebrow when I realized it.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

11 minutes ago, stevemcqueen1 said:

Are we also going to pretend that, heading into this series, any of you thought the Raptors had a chance?  I was alone on the "Raptors have a puncher's chance" island.

 

I was reading the posts around the time of the Kawhi thread. Shocking nuanced discussion for this group.

 

You had 14 separate positions, but they were all very nuanced as well.

[Dr. Do Itch Big]

There’s turkeys all over Northern California. At UC Davis they run all over the campus. I don’t know if they are wild. I was in Hercules and they were all over too. 

[Going Commando]

The reason this series was great was because the teams were evenly matched.  And that was only possible because Durant was out.

 

17 minutes ago, Renegade7 said:

 

I said gentleman sweep expecting KD to come back to lay waste to their hopes and dreams.  Then I got called out for underestimating the Raptors and overestimating the Warriors without him.  Raptors having home court should've been the first clue this wasn't going to go as most people expected, it immediately raised my eyebrow when I realized it. 

 

They had just steamrolled the Blazers.  They came into the Toronto series with some arrogance and that got them punched in the mouth in game one.  But the truth is they probably win this series comfortably if Klay hadn't gotten hurt in game two.   If they'd had Durant, it would have been over quick.  We all know it.  And the pattern of the NBA is such that super teams like this one will keep forming up in different cities, and they take the competition out of the league unless injuries derail them.

 

I don't like having to wait for injuries to happen to produce an enjoyable competition.  It's ghoulish and unsatisfying.  I want a competitive postseason between evenly matched teams to be the norm.  And that will only happen when the league makes it virtually impossible for top ten players on second and third contracts to team up.

[CrypticVillain]

Um... Not only did KD only play one quarter when most thought he'd be back for a few games, but Klay Thompson missed the end of a game, a whole game, and in the middle of making "Game 6 Klay" a thing... the bamma tore his ACL.

Heck yeah, we were saying Gentlemen Sweep...

 

The Raptors still earned this though. I don't want to try to diminish their run. Their players made plays throughout the playoffs. Kawhi Leonard forced his way into being an All-Time great.

[bearrock]

Why shouldn't all max contracts be restricted contracts?  Just institute a rule that allows teams to keep their free agents by offering max contracts.  If you're getting the max, what does it matter who you get it from? As it stands, all top picks essentially become a limited stint unless you're in a major market.

[PeterMP]

14 minutes ago, bearrock said:

Why shouldn't all max contracts be restricted contracts?  Just institute a rule that allows teams to keep their free agents by offering max contracts.  If you're getting the max, what does it matter who you get it from? As it stands, all top picks essentially become a limited stint unless you're in a major market.

 

Because people like to pick who they work for, their work conditions, and where they live and raise their families?

 

There is more to life and even working than making money.

 

Golden State was between awful and good for years (decades) and nobody considered it a destination before they started winning.

 

New Orleans would be a great place to live and be a big star.  It has worked well for Drew Brees.  The reason AD wants out is they've failed to put a team around him.

Edited June 14, 2019 by PeterMP

[bearrock]

5 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

Because people like to pick who they work for, their work conditions, and where they live and raise their families?

 

There is more to life and even working than making money.

 

Golden State was between awful and good for years (decades) and nobody considered it a destination before they started winning.

 

New Orleans would be a great place to live and be a big star.  It has worked well for Drew Brees.  The reason AD wants out is they've failed to put a team around him.

At some point there's a trade off between ensuring the best product from a league perspective and player's right to free movement.  If you're getting paid max money, it seems like an okay compromise to require that you work at a particular location (of course, from a macro perspective, no one is forcing them to play pro basketball.  You can view designated location as the cost of being employed in the NBA as a max player.).  It's far less draconian than NFL franchise system.

 

If someone feels super teams are not a problem for the league, that's a different issue.

[PeterMP]

9 minutes ago, bearrock said:

At some point there's a trade off between ensuring the best product from a league perspective and player's right to free movement.  If you're getting paid max money, it seems like an okay compromise to require that you work at a particular location (of course, from a macro perspective, no one is forcing them to play pro basketball.  You can view designated location as the cost of being employed in the NBA as a max player.).  It's far less draconian than NFL franchise system.

 

If someone feels super teams are not a problem for the league, that's a different issue.

 

If you are very competitive person (which most of these people are) getting stuck on a team that stinks through no fault of your own is going to be make that person very unhappy and generally miserable beyond work and affect their personal/family life.

 

We also don't do that for any other industry.  We don't say for the sake of a competitive car industry, if you started working for a car manufacturer in Detroit, you can't move and take a job with a car manufacture in the south.

 

(And from a very large picture it certainly makes more sense to do it for other industries than sports.  In the grand scheme of things, the NBA and sports in general are pretty meaningless.

 

The number of people that want to say in order for you to make money in your chosen profession you are going to have to live a miserable life (being a very competitive stuck on a bad team for your career due to random chance) so that I can be slightly more entertained always surprises me.

 

The NBA was great this year.  The finals were great this year, and we didn't force somebody to spend their career being miserable in a place they didn't want to be.)

 

It certainly makes much more sense to do this sort of things for things that would have much larger impacts on society (e.g. schools), and we don't even do it there.  To do it for sports, makes no sense.

Edited June 14, 2019 by PeterMP

[bearrock]

6 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

If you are very competitive person (which most of these people are) getting stuck on a team that stinks through no fault of your own is going to be make that person very unhappy and generally miserable beyond work and affect their personal/family life.

 

We also don't do that for any other industry.  We don't say for the sake of a competitive car industry, if you started working for a car manufacturer in Detroit, you can't move and take a job with a car manufacture in the south.

 

(And from a very large picture it certainly makes more sense to do it for other industries than sports.  In the grand scheme of things, the NBA and sports in general are pretty meaningless.

 

The number of people that want to say in order for you to make money in your chosen profession you are going to have to live a miserable life (being a very competitive stuck on a bad team for your career due to random chance) so that I can be slightly more entertained always surprises me.

 

The NBA was great this year.  The finals were great this year, and we didn't force somebody to spend their career being miserable in a place they didn't want to be.)

 

It certainly makes much more sense to do this sort of things for things that would have much larger impacts on society (e.g. schools), and we don't even do it there.  To do it for sports, makes no sense.

Finals was competitive because GSW was missing it's best player for the series and missing Klay for game 3 and crucual stretch of game 6   If KD plays it's a laugher.

 

There are restrictions in pursuing a chosen profession all the time.  You may be able to work in a chosen profession for a chosen company in city X, but not city Y.  If you view NBA as a corporation and individual teams as the divisions in the corporation (which is the way player movement would be viewed as a league health issue), then any employee may have to decide between working where your employer assigns you and finding another job to go live where you want.  If you're miserable living in NO, no one is forcing you to be a NBA player.  

 

Also, as I said, if you don't view super team structure that resulted in GSW in five straight finals and LeBron representing the east for nearly a decade as a problem (and I sense you don't), then the sacrifice that would be imposed on the players don't make sense.  But I believe the health of the league depends on parity and hope for respective fanbases, long term, which is not possible under the current structure for non-major markets unless they end up getting super lucky with injuries.

[Momma There Goes That Man]

 Saw an idea floated for unlimited contracts with max amounts that count towards the salary cap. It think it was that The franchise that drafts a player can pay them whatever they want say $60mil a season but there is a max that will count toward the cap like say $30mil. 

 

It allows teams to go above above and beyond to keep their homegrown stars and actually gives them an advantage over FA suitors without crippling their cap or dealing with this luxury tax nonsense 

[Mr. Sinister]

1 hour ago, stevemcqueen1 said:

 

You live in the country?  Sounds like you might live in the territory of a big tom.  A big dominant one can keep a harem of dozens of hens.

 

North (Of the Wall) Montgomery County, near Clarksburg. Mountainous, high elevation (I mean I come from Waldorf, which reminds me a bit if Florida in its relative flatness), sleepy ass youaintfromroundhere, MD (also known as Damascus).

 

I got lost driving here the first time because google maps gets screwy where my neighborhood is. It's like Skull Island meets Deliverance, with a bit of King of the Hill.

 

Funny thing is, like 15-20 minutes down the road where we used to live is Germantown/Gaithersburg, which is like a multicultural/suburb utopia.

 

But yes,the road I live off of literally goes through the woods, and is in the cut. It isnt uncommon for the yard to have deer, foxes, random dogs, big cats, and wild turkeys on it.

Edited June 14, 2019 by Mr. Sinister

[Renegade7]

Rather see a franchise tag like NFL has.  Its naturally built in to keep a team from holding a player hostage for more then a year or two.  For some players, it's about forming these super teams for rings, you can't pay some players enough to make them stay if they dont want to.

[Mr. Sinister]

1 hour ago, stevemcqueen1 said:

Are we also going to pretend that, heading into this series, any of you thought the Raptors had a chance?  I was alone on the "Raptors have a puncher's chance" island.

 

I said they had a chance if they got game 1 Thats really it. I didnt really think they'd win this series until last Friday, when they handled the Warriors and put them down 3-1. But they outplayed them all series.

Edited June 14, 2019 by Mr. Sinister

[Momma There Goes That Man]

3 minutes ago, Renegade7 said:

Rather see a franchise tag like NFL has.  Its naturally built in to keep a team from holding a player hostage for more then a year or two.  For some players, it's about forming these super teams for rings, you can't pay some players enough to make them stay if they dont want to.

 

That’s fine if they turn down the insane amount of money. The problem is that now the difference in money isn’t enough to make many of them decide to stay. 

 

I hate the franchise tag because it’s tragically unfair to the players. Their contracts are up and should be able to leave if they want but they basically get a giant middle finger and a prison cell for as long as 3 years. 

 

Staying or going should be their choice. Give them reasons to sign a contract, maybe a huge financial difference is enough. Tags just hold players hostage which isn’t right 

[Mr. Sinister]

Yeah the tag is bad.  it is another arm of control by execs that do not want to pay you long term, yet don't want to see you get paid by anyone else either.

[Renegade7]

4 minutes ago, Momma There Goes That Man said:

 

Staying or going should be their choice. Give them reasons to sign a contract, maybe a huge financial difference is enough. Tags just hold players hostage which isn’t right 

 

Normally I agree would with you, but wasn't Kirk the first player to sign the tag in back to back seasons?  I look at it more as an attempt to protect small market teams, I have less of a bleeding heart for the players because of their contracts being guaranteed and amount of collusion they do with each other now. No more then two in a row and same rule of only one player at a time.

[Renegade7]

14 minutes ago, Mr. Sinister said:

Yeah the tag is bad.  it is another arm of control by execs that do not want to pay you long term, yet don't want to see you get paid by anyone else either.

 

As a Wizards fan, I feel at the complete and total mercy of whatever superstar wants to say form a superteam with Beal right now.  We can't give him supermax since he didn't make all-pro, there's nothing we can do if he decides he wants to leave.  I thought it was cute when it came out he was trying to recruit during one of his all-star games, I'm 100% sure they all said "hell no, but if you want to..."

[Going Commando]

1 hour ago, CrypticVillain said:

Heck yeah, we were saying Gentlemen Sweep... 

 

And you would have been right, if not for the injuries.

 

Golden State didn't play well in most of the games and Toronto did.  But they still had overwhelming talent that would have won them this series comfortably if it hadn't gotten hurt.

 

Looking ahead, their short term future is interesting.  Time to bring Boogie back and get him fully integrated into the team's playing style.  If they can keep everyone this summer, then they'll be able to win the championship next summer even without Durant, assuming Davis doesn't successfully form a new super team somewhere.

[SkinsGuy]

4 hours ago, TryTheBeal! said:

 

Adversity builds character.  

 

Well, with the Redskins, you've had 25 years of character building.

 

You must be the most model citizen in the world.

 

[Going Commando]

There is a much easier solution to prevent top ten players from teaming up with each other, but doing so without punishing them for being great: get rid of max contracts and institute a hard cap.

 

Parity doesn't come from keeping superstars locked in to the teams that draft them.  That is an indirect solution at best, as teams can draft multiple superstars, especially via tanking.

 

Let players sign contracts in an open market that isn't defined by artificial exceptions that put almost everyone in a weird place where they are some kind of exception--vet player exception, mid-level exception, max contract exception, etc.

 

Set a hard cap at 100 million and let LeBron James sign a 50 or 60 million per year contract and his team won't be able to sign Anthony Davis too.  It's fair and effective.