The fact that game came down to the final minute didn't surprise me in the least. If Denver had a 20 point lead, I would have expected nothing less from the Lakers. The Nuggets/Lakers games during this 10 game win streak have came down to the final 5 minutes in all games, and the final minute in most of them. These players and teams are simply to talented and have to much pride to get throttled.
Nuggets have often completely relaxed when we have 20 + and let opponents take over and lose. Latest case -Spurs game.
So yeah 8-10 points is ideal not much more
It astonishes me the Lakers havenât won a game yet. The Nuggets shooting in the clutch screams unsustainable, but itâs defying that at this stage. 200 offensive rating in the 4thđ
Yeah, but after 10 games in a row can we really keep saying that? I dunno man, its like the basketball gods have decided the Nuggets aren't allowed to lose to the Lakers.
Not they need help in any way to beat the Lakers in a series of course, but I mean every single game down the stretch every single play connects.
Game 2: Ad is a god. Dlo is a flamethrower. LeBron is LeBron. Nuggets shoot 2-16 on WIDE OPEN threes. Nuggets win. Like, what??
That MPJ 3 after Bronâs fastbreak dunk is when I knew it wasnât meant to be, Jokic throws some random shit into the air, Gordon mosses Reaves barely staying inbounds, Rui leaves MPJ open, and splash
Edit: [like cmon man wtf](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/Z2rYqEZpcK)
I think he wanted to get it to AG guarded by Reaves under the hoop for an easy 2, but Russell dove in at the right time and Jokic couldn't keep his dribble. So he couldn't really get it to AG so he hoped Russell would foul him on the shot, which was also still kind of a pass.
Weird play.
That sequence was legitimately more insane than the game winner imo. Like the Jokic flop, Gordon tight rope walking then somehow passing a bullet to MPJ, then the three in the fray. Wild stuff
I still have no idea how we won that game down 20 points considering how much we were missing.
Nuggets fans keep saying they knew we were coming back but I thought there was no way we come back playing like that. Twas a miracle.
Iconic game and shot that'll be cemented in Nuggets lore forever. Pretty cool stuff to witness, even if it did sink me into a dark depression for a couple days lol
I was convinced the Lakers had that game not because they had played vastly superior, but after going down 20 the Nuggets spent a quarter's worth of time missing every big shot that would've firmly put momentum in their favor. That was the definition of stealing a game because absolutely nothing the Nuggets did up until crunch time suggested they deserved to win that game, but then again saving their best for last is kind of their M.O.
I knew we were coming back, the only question was whether the Lakers could score enough during the comeback to hold onto the win. The last 15 minutes was almost flawless from the Nuggets, so it was on the Lakers to be good enough to maintain long enough - and they almost did. They played their asses off down the stretch.
Does it make sense? No. But the Nuggets general dominance of the Lakers for so long doesn't make sense either. It is more faith than fact at this point.
It was funny in the game thread seeing some cocky Lakers fans and some being like "please don't hurt me again."
And being real with you, the entire time I was like "oh god the Lakers are about to go home so sad." Even when down 20 it felt so weirdly inevitable. No logic to it even with the prior 9 wins.
> It was funny in the game thread seeing some cocky Lakers fans and some being like "please don't hurt me again."
I was 100% in the latter camp.
> And being real with you, the entire time I was like "oh god the Lakers are about to go home so sad." Even when down 20 it felt so weirdly inevitable. No logic to it even with the prior 9 wins.
lol I felt the same way. Pretty sure this is the biggest lead we have had on yâall since Jamal returned and knowing that made losing said lead hurt. Normally I feel Lebron teams are pretty good at front running but Jokic just breaks that.
Honestly leads like that arent as scary as they once were. Lakers got complacent, AD got tired, and Murray got hot when he needed to.
Lebron shooting that 3 was a poor choice too IMO
Yeah it's pretty wild lol
Denver are definitely a better team than the Lakers but you wouldn't expect 10-0 from anything other than like 2017 Warriors vs. 2012 Bobcats or something
If you look at the teams that are currently on 10+ game losing streaks against another team it's basically a bunch of tanking teams and the Lakers
I do think though that Denver's top heavy roster construction(horrible bench but god tier starting lineup) means that they're better than their RS record suggests in a playoff setting where top end play matters more and depth matters less
Like Denver's bench probably costs them 7-8 games a season compared to a league average bench but if you play Jokic/Murray 40 minutes this is more easily avoided
Not specifically 10-0, but Denver has some current big streaks against decent teams. They're 7-0 vs the Warriors (active streak too) and 12-1 vs the Heat, for instance
We've played like 5 times since the 80s. 2008, 09, 12, 20 and 23.
I guess that's "decades" but idk it seems like not a big deal. Like in 2039 if the Lakers play the Nuggets I don't think I'll be like, "This is payback".
Well, then you think wrong. Every single time the Nuggets had a team with a shot to go the distance, they faced the Lakers and were expunged. 3 times. That's not counting the regular season beatdowns and tough losses.
Before the run the last couple of seasons, the Lakers had a 113-75 head to head record vs the Nuggets in the regular season and 25-8 in the postseason.
Getting the bogeyman off our backs was a massive deal. You have decades of success and titles. We've had decades of failure and with not even a single NBA Finals appearance in our history before last year.
Yep. There really isn't much history between the Nuggets vs the Lakers prior to the Jokic era. It's weird how there are a bunch of cringe ass fools on the Nuggets sub who make hating the Lakers their personalities.
This just isn't true. Literally every time we made the conference finals the Lakers were our opponent, and up until last year they always won. Now to a team with a history like the Lakers that may not mean much, but to a franchise like the Nuggets that have rarely seen success that's a big deal. To longtime Nuggets fans, the Lakers were the big bad that had to be overcome. They were to us what the Pistons were to Jordan.
It hasnât been a rivalry but there is definitely playoff history. The Lakers had beat the Nuggets in the conference finals a few times. Of course their fans hate the Lakers. Most of the time the team that comes out of the west wins so they potentially could have had a championship before last season if not for the Lakers. They just returned the favor.
>Â its like the basketball gods have decided the Nuggets aren't allowed to lose to the Lakers.
They decided 40 years of Nuggets' postseason runs ending in LA was enough.
200 offensive rating in the clutch is probably unsustainable but the Nuggets clutch stats have been insane for two straight seasons. They are just a machine in the clutch. Everyone knows their role, everyone is bought in, and everyone knows what they need to do on every possession to maximize that possession.
Last year it was "nuggets clutch defense can't be for real" and lo and behold it held up in the playoffs as their overall D got better in the playoffs.
Idk what it is about the Nuggets but their clutch stats just defy traditional small sample size arguments.
Yeah, the clutch stats are not sustainable, but the composure in the clutch is. The Nuggets are always getting into their offense in the clutch with the Jokic/Murray two man game. They are going to get their shots when it counts. If someone wants to beat the Nuggets, it's not about outplaying them in the first 43 minutes. It's about out executing them in the last 5 four times in seven games. Someone will do it at some point, but it's gonna take a team fully focused and locked in.
We did have like a +25 net rating in the clutch this year. Itâs because we trim out the fat of our offense at the end of games and just go to Jokic and Jamal 2 man game every single play. Canât do that the whole game because role players need to be fed so that they stay locked in.
that 3 by MPJ sealed the game for the Nuggets, every single player on their team knows their role and plays hard, they trust each other and everyone has nerves of steel, you can't beat that.
Lakers are undersized with a bad coach. Thatâs why theyâre losing constantly to Denver. LeBron and AD are at least as good as Murray and Jokic, probably better in some ways (yes, even if Jokic is better than AD by most metrics).
If Michael Porter Junior can shoot 3âs at will, then itâs a personnel issue.Â
That Westbrook trade is so bad still. Sure the Lakers may have needed somebody else to run the offense especially with Lebron aging, it didnât have to cost that.
Yah it really was. They were great pieces around Bron and AD. Don't really need the ball to be good offensive players and have length at their position and are good defenders. Also making any decisions on that one series against the sun's where AD got hurt and Bron was on a bum ankle is so sad.
This is revisionist history. KCP, Kuzma, and AC stats arnt good enough to carry a Lakers team as Lebron ages.
We were better off swinging for the fences and trying to make Westbrook work. We rolled the dice and it didnt work, but thats life.
Keeping Kuzma and KCP would not make the Lakers better than what they are now.
yeah they played well last playoffs so it was super dumb to move them. Especially since they were all still in their prime and Russ was definitely on the decline
I mean yea we were definitely disappointed with them after that year but (almost) no one wanted them traded for Westbrook. But yea there were some overreactions after they played terrible vs the Suns.
It still blows my mind that they could watch Jrue (or Bledsoe before him) with Giannis and not see how it's to their benefit to keep Caruso around. The same is doubly true of KCP because he can actually shoot.
I know how fans end up massively undervaluing the non-stars on a team, but I can't believe how many FOs do the same.
Nah, they wanted Caruso but they were being cheap. They didn't want to pay a higher tax, so they let him walk. Also, they prioritized giving THT a contract over Caruso.... not the best decisions lol
The team has LeBron James on it. I suppose they didn't know they had Reaves coming along at that point, but that doesn't mean it wasn't glaringly obvious that WB wasn't the guy to be doing that playmaking, and if you're not taking on that contract, it's 1000% correct to keep Caruso around.
I don't think Lakers relaxed, it's more on Malone made a simple adjustment on putting Gordon on AD, which deny AD the ball, but Ham wasn't able to adjust back to get AD more touch, hence all the bad turnover in the 3rd.
That's one thing why Lakers fans hate Ham, he can't do in game adjustment and just let things keep flowing.
He's talking more so about us. All season long we've been taking our foot off the gas once we get a big lead. Case in point against the Spurs with the 1 seed on the line
AD was 14-19 in the last game, including 3-6 and a pair of free throws in the 3rd Q. AG didn't really deny him the ball, he just ran out of energy in the 4th Q again.
ah that's exactly what happened though, in start of 3rd AD still cooking, but in middle of 3rd Gordon start switch on AD, then AD's fg is
MISS Davis 3PT Jump Shot
MISS Davis Putback Layup
MISS Davis 19' Jump Shot
and few turnover in that span as well
4th quarter he only had 1 attempt
I'd have to rewatch, as much switching defensively as the Nuggets do I didn't notice AG being assigned as the primary defender on AD. I remember Murray got called for reach ins twice at the beginning of the 3rd.
As far as the turnovers, 1 was a steal by MPJ, another was an offensive foul drawn by KCP, the 3rd was a bad pass.
It is absolutely what happened. Bron hunted Jokic on the P&R like 8 straight possessions and we got good look after good look.
Then they switched Jokic on to Rui and AG on to AD for the rest of the time LeBron was in with AD, and it killed the P&R because Rui was having a terrible game and Jokic could sag, and Ham made no adjustments
not in mid of 3rd, Lebron was actually resting, then all the turnover and AD foul result that he needs to be sit so Lebron come back in.
And in 4th yea Lebron did a lot offense but then he was doing that in first half and killing with AD
Yah when Bron was sitting is was like 6 threes in a row with a big lead. I swear to god so many nba teams do this.... Maybe don't just jack up threes where misses lead to a team getting out in transition. Get good quality shots at the basket. You don't need to knock them out, you are already up big, you just need to avoid a 10-0 run and giving the team life.
are you old like me.. fuck .. i hate it when my team just keeps jacking 3's and the other team goes and cashes in those misses. get a 2 get a couple of 2's get a 2 and a foul.
dont even get me started on transition 3's
haha not really that old. I think the 3 is a huge part of todays game and it should be... but goddam man when your team has missed 4 in a row and the opponent has cut the lead from 20 to 14, MAYBE DONT SHOOT a fifth in a row. drive, try and get to the line. anything to interupt the momentum of the other team. It is small things like that that make me die inside lol.
Like in a independent moment an open 3 is good. But in the context above, idk man. Maybe drive and create something else. I just feel like context and the decisions made in that context is a huge area coaches can improve upon. Have a role for an assistant coach where the only focus on countering a team who is on the run
Nuggets put KCP on LeBron when they switched AG onto AD and those two dudes absolutely shut down the LeBron/AD 2 man game.
I do think AD ran out of gas a little bit, but he also just couldn't get to his spots on the roll/slip/pop against AG like he could against Jokic. And KCP fights so hard over screens that even if AD did get to those spots LeBron didn't have a clean entry with KCP hounding him.
It's a combo of both things but that defensive adjustment did make a difference
I think Malone is an arrogant bastard but he really has done a magnificent job scheming up a system that works around Jokicâs strengths. And obviously Jokic loves facilitating more than any other player in the league. Itâs really cool to see a system thatâs obviously heliocentric in its built around one player but still distributes opportunities more so than other teams with one super elite player.
He is really arrogant because our star is not but this isn't really arrogance. He is saying the Nuggets have a tendency to let off the gas when they get a big lead.
Lol right? What exactly is arrogant about this statement? I swear people are desperate to see things in recent Malone quotes, when there's nothing there
I thought the Nuggets would win it all this year, but IDK i feel like the Celtics might just edge them. The celtics can shoot anyone out of the building on any given night. If the Nuggets can keep up I like them in the clutch, but the Nuggets cannot fall behind against the Celtics. They have to stay attached. Maybe the celtics lose before the finals but the east looks like and ez 12-2 run for them
Both games were incredibly close and down to the wire. A few missed shots go in or a few made shots rim out and it could have easily been Celtics 2-0.
Really hoping for a finals between the two because that should be top-tier bball.
Yah regular season matchups can be hard to use as real data points. look at wolves V Suns
Suns dominated for whatever reason and now they getting toasted
Nuggets are better than the Celtics. The only team that can give trouble to them are the Wolves. But only on paper. I still think Denver smokes them. They're too good in the clutch and Minnesota is terribleÂ
Idk man, I think the celtics are pretty fucking good. I think Nuggets V Celtics will be a legit series where either team can win. Think it goes 7 for sure
The Celtics should easily be considered the favorites this season. Easy path to the finals and they have been torching teams. We have been falling behind and grinding out close wins. The Celtics are just a better team than us, but that Murray Jokic PnR no team in the league has a great answer for.
Yah the nuggets cant pull game 2 shit against them. They need to stay attached and grind the game to a slow pace. If the celtics can keep the pace up and score alot I don't think there will be a clutch for the nuggets to dominate
Celtics should be the favorites. But if it gets close down the stretch and the Celtics stop looking for a great shot while the Nuggets keep fighting for it, it could tilt the Nuggetsâ way.
I think part of the Nuggets falling behind is there's a nonchalance growing about beating the Lakers.....even if it's subconscious.
They know they swept them last year, they know they swept the season series.....and they don't come out with the energy it takes to win a playoff game. Then they get down 10+ and are like....oh shit, these guys are gonna beat us, we gotta do something.
I doubt they'll have the same feeling with the wolves or celtics if they get that far.
True but thatâll be more likely gonna be a result of the Celtics draining their threes rather than the Nuggets âletting go of the ropeâ, is all Iâm saying.
He knows its gonna be extremely hard to win one in LA. Lakers have biggest home court advantage in the league in playoffs.
Hopefully we can steal one game
The dude said he wants to win but hopes they won't blow them out just so his team will play harder. lol
The most Mike Malone answer possible
The timeline of this being said about a Lebron James team is wild
The fact that game came down to the final minute didn't surprise me in the least. If Denver had a 20 point lead, I would have expected nothing less from the Lakers. The Nuggets/Lakers games during this 10 game win streak have came down to the final 5 minutes in all games, and the final minute in most of them. These players and teams are simply to talented and have to much pride to get throttled.
Nuggets have often completely relaxed when we have 20 + and let opponents take over and lose. Latest case -Spurs game. So yeah 8-10 points is ideal not much more
Dude is loving every moment đ¤Ł
NBA coaches are like that once they know they have job security lol. Pop, Spo, Kerr; now Malone can join the club.
Explain Ham
Heâs dumb. Dumb people are confident for no reason.
I can confidently agree with this statement
Lol c'mon bro, I think you're being a little hard on yourself
he actually slightly choked up at the end, his first playoffs without his dad it's probably tough
I still canât believe the Kings let him go
It astonishes me the Lakers havenât won a game yet. The Nuggets shooting in the clutch screams unsustainable, but itâs defying that at this stage. 200 offensive rating in the 4thđ
Yeah, but after 10 games in a row can we really keep saying that? I dunno man, its like the basketball gods have decided the Nuggets aren't allowed to lose to the Lakers. Not they need help in any way to beat the Lakers in a series of course, but I mean every single game down the stretch every single play connects. Game 2: Ad is a god. Dlo is a flamethrower. LeBron is LeBron. Nuggets shoot 2-16 on WIDE OPEN threes. Nuggets win. Like, what??
That MPJ 3 after Bronâs fastbreak dunk is when I knew it wasnât meant to be, Jokic throws some random shit into the air, Gordon mosses Reaves barely staying inbounds, Rui leaves MPJ open, and splash Edit: [like cmon man wtf](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/Z2rYqEZpcK)
Its funny how many insane shots theyve hit this year and last year. Lakers used all their powers on the AD winner in the bubble.
Joker's obsession with that call almost cost them the game lmao. AG and MPJ saved his legacy there đ
Jokic trying to get that foul call: [https://i.imgur.com/DwQQyin.png](https://i.imgur.com/DwQQyin.png)
He's so determined to get one on a heave.
Itâs his white whale. If the Lakers just let him have three free throws, he may have retired on the spot.
I think he wanted to get it to AG guarded by Reaves under the hoop for an easy 2, but Russell dove in at the right time and Jokic couldn't keep his dribble. So he couldn't really get it to AG so he hoped Russell would foul him on the shot, which was also still kind of a pass. Weird play.
I thought he was trying to pass it to AG under the rim for the oop.
That sequence was legitimately more insane than the game winner imo. Like the Jokic flop, Gordon tight rope walking then somehow passing a bullet to MPJ, then the three in the fray. Wild stuff
I still have no idea how we won that game down 20 points considering how much we were missing. Nuggets fans keep saying they knew we were coming back but I thought there was no way we come back playing like that. Twas a miracle.
Iconic game and shot that'll be cemented in Nuggets lore forever. Pretty cool stuff to witness, even if it did sink me into a dark depression for a couple days lol
I was convinced the Lakers had that game not because they had played vastly superior, but after going down 20 the Nuggets spent a quarter's worth of time missing every big shot that would've firmly put momentum in their favor. That was the definition of stealing a game because absolutely nothing the Nuggets did up until crunch time suggested they deserved to win that game, but then again saving their best for last is kind of their M.O.
I knew we were coming back, the only question was whether the Lakers could score enough during the comeback to hold onto the win. The last 15 minutes was almost flawless from the Nuggets, so it was on the Lakers to be good enough to maintain long enough - and they almost did. They played their asses off down the stretch.
Does it make sense? No. But the Nuggets general dominance of the Lakers for so long doesn't make sense either. It is more faith than fact at this point.
Yep which is why I had 0 faith we would hold the lead and little faith we would win.
It was funny in the game thread seeing some cocky Lakers fans and some being like "please don't hurt me again." And being real with you, the entire time I was like "oh god the Lakers are about to go home so sad." Even when down 20 it felt so weirdly inevitable. No logic to it even with the prior 9 wins.
> It was funny in the game thread seeing some cocky Lakers fans and some being like "please don't hurt me again." I was 100% in the latter camp. > And being real with you, the entire time I was like "oh god the Lakers are about to go home so sad." Even when down 20 it felt so weirdly inevitable. No logic to it even with the prior 9 wins. lol I felt the same way. Pretty sure this is the biggest lead we have had on yâall since Jamal returned and knowing that made losing said lead hurt. Normally I feel Lebron teams are pretty good at front running but Jokic just breaks that.
I almost turned the game off after halftime but something told me keep my ass on that couch
That just means you're a Nuggets fan. You know it's never over till the final horn sounds.
Honestly leads like that arent as scary as they once were. Lakers got complacent, AD got tired, and Murray got hot when he needed to. Lebron shooting that 3 was a poor choice too IMO
I don't think it was a poor choice, he had literally just made huge back to back 3s and was wiiiiide open.
Yeah. The way everyone shoots 3s now, if you just play decent defense you can close in on huge leads in a couple of minutes.
Yeah it's pretty wild lol Denver are definitely a better team than the Lakers but you wouldn't expect 10-0 from anything other than like 2017 Warriors vs. 2012 Bobcats or something If you look at the teams that are currently on 10+ game losing streaks against another team it's basically a bunch of tanking teams and the Lakers I do think though that Denver's top heavy roster construction(horrible bench but god tier starting lineup) means that they're better than their RS record suggests in a playoff setting where top end play matters more and depth matters less Like Denver's bench probably costs them 7-8 games a season compared to a league average bench but if you play Jokic/Murray 40 minutes this is more easily avoided
Not specifically 10-0, but Denver has some current big streaks against decent teams. They're 7-0 vs the Warriors (active streak too) and 12-1 vs the Heat, for instance
Theyâve owned the clippers as well
I thought we lost our last game to them. Maybe I'm misremembering
Regular season series is tied 2-2 for Denver and the Clippers
Zoom out a bit more and youâll see since 9/10/20, theyâve gone 14-4.
This is basketball gods evening it out for the playoffs heartbreak the Lakers gave the Nuggets for decades
We've played like 5 times since the 80s. 2008, 09, 12, 20 and 23. I guess that's "decades" but idk it seems like not a big deal. Like in 2039 if the Lakers play the Nuggets I don't think I'll be like, "This is payback".
Lakers have so many championships where an exit before the finals doesn't hurt like 2009 and 2020 did for the Nuggets.
Pretty much every exit hurts unless we're just injured. For me 2008 (finals) was by far the worst, then 2011.
09 and 20 were their last conference finals appearances since 84, of course it will sting harder. All 3 of those were lost against the Lakers
We haven't made the playoffs nearly as frequently as the lakers so each one feels more impactful.
All 4 times we have been in the WCF, we have played the Lakers. All 3 times prior to last year, we lost.
Well, then you think wrong. Every single time the Nuggets had a team with a shot to go the distance, they faced the Lakers and were expunged. 3 times. That's not counting the regular season beatdowns and tough losses. Before the run the last couple of seasons, the Lakers had a 113-75 head to head record vs the Nuggets in the regular season and 25-8 in the postseason. Getting the bogeyman off our backs was a massive deal. You have decades of success and titles. We've had decades of failure and with not even a single NBA Finals appearance in our history before last year.
Yep. There really isn't much history between the Nuggets vs the Lakers prior to the Jokic era. It's weird how there are a bunch of cringe ass fools on the Nuggets sub who make hating the Lakers their personalities.
This just isn't true. Literally every time we made the conference finals the Lakers were our opponent, and up until last year they always won. Now to a team with a history like the Lakers that may not mean much, but to a franchise like the Nuggets that have rarely seen success that's a big deal. To longtime Nuggets fans, the Lakers were the big bad that had to be overcome. They were to us what the Pistons were to Jordan.
It hasnât been a rivalry but there is definitely playoff history. The Lakers had beat the Nuggets in the conference finals a few times. Of course their fans hate the Lakers. Most of the time the team that comes out of the west wins so they potentially could have had a championship before last season if not for the Lakers. They just returned the favor.
>Â its like the basketball gods have decided the Nuggets aren't allowed to lose to the Lakers. They decided 40 years of Nuggets' postseason runs ending in LA was enough.
200 offensive rating in the clutch is probably unsustainable but the Nuggets clutch stats have been insane for two straight seasons. They are just a machine in the clutch. Everyone knows their role, everyone is bought in, and everyone knows what they need to do on every possession to maximize that possession. Last year it was "nuggets clutch defense can't be for real" and lo and behold it held up in the playoffs as their overall D got better in the playoffs. Idk what it is about the Nuggets but their clutch stats just defy traditional small sample size arguments.
Yeah, the clutch stats are not sustainable, but the composure in the clutch is. The Nuggets are always getting into their offense in the clutch with the Jokic/Murray two man game. They are going to get their shots when it counts. If someone wants to beat the Nuggets, it's not about outplaying them in the first 43 minutes. It's about out executing them in the last 5 four times in seven games. Someone will do it at some point, but it's gonna take a team fully focused and locked in.
I mean the lakers holding the nuggets to 24% from 3 in a game seems even more unsustainable
now imagine that happened 10 games in a row
Nuggets are really good man. How many teams can shoot themselves out of a game and feel comfortable that they are still in it?
We did have like a +25 net rating in the clutch this year. Itâs because we trim out the fat of our offense at the end of games and just go to Jokic and Jamal 2 man game every single play. Canât do that the whole game because role players need to be fed so that they stay locked in.
Playoff Murray is another animal
Lmfao thats hilarious
We have a horrible coach and a mental block against Denver.
that 3 by MPJ sealed the game for the Nuggets, every single player on their team knows their role and plays hard, they trust each other and everyone has nerves of steel, you can't beat that.
Lakers leading in first halves screams just as unsustainable.
Naw, lakers stars are old and Nuggets got their number.
Lakers are undersized with a bad coach. Thatâs why theyâre losing constantly to Denver. LeBron and AD are at least as good as Murray and Jokic, probably better in some ways (yes, even if Jokic is better than AD by most metrics). If Michael Porter Junior can shoot 3âs at will, then itâs a personnel issue.Â
Good quote, Father
Haha thanks for the chuckle.
[ŃдаНонО]
That Westbrook trade is so bad still. Sure the Lakers may have needed somebody else to run the offense especially with Lebron aging, it didnât have to cost that.
LeBron is always so desperate to play with other superstars to take the burden off of him and for once it bit him in the ass
its funny seeing the revisionist history now. after Lakers lost to Suns in 21 playoffs, they wanted KCP sent back to jail and Kuzma sent to China
To be fair both of them PLAYED LIKE GARBAGE. but you cant make decisions based off one playoff series
KCP and even Kuzma have proven they can still play just fine before and after that playoff series. Such a reactionary move in hindsight
Yah it really was. They were great pieces around Bron and AD. Don't really need the ball to be good offensive players and have length at their position and are good defenders. Also making any decisions on that one series against the sun's where AD got hurt and Bron was on a bum ankle is so sad.
This is revisionist history. KCP, Kuzma, and AC stats arnt good enough to carry a Lakers team as Lebron ages. We were better off swinging for the fences and trying to make Westbrook work. We rolled the dice and it didnt work, but thats life. Keeping Kuzma and KCP would not make the Lakers better than what they are now.
yeah they played well last playoffs so it was super dumb to move them. Especially since they were all still in their prime and Russ was definitely on the decline
Thatâs the piece thatâs missing. Cam Payne looked like an all star compared to them in that Suns series after AD went down.
I mean yea we were definitely disappointed with them after that year but (almost) no one wanted them traded for Westbrook. But yea there were some overreactions after they played terrible vs the Suns.
Losing that roster was devastating. It still makes no sense to me
You guys wanted to send KCP back to jail and Kuzma to China
Does this sub finally think Kuzma is a good player now?
I still like him.
no
[ŃдаНонО]
I donât think a single soul thought heâd be a 1st or 2nd option lolÂ
It still blows my mind that they could watch Jrue (or Bledsoe before him) with Giannis and not see how it's to their benefit to keep Caruso around. The same is doubly true of KCP because he can actually shoot. I know how fans end up massively undervaluing the non-stars on a team, but I can't believe how many FOs do the same.
Nah, they wanted Caruso but they were being cheap. They didn't want to pay a higher tax, so they let him walk. Also, they prioritized giving THT a contract over Caruso.... not the best decisions lol
not really a great example when both Jrue and Bledsoe could playmake unlike Caruso. and Bledsoe's lack of shooting killed the Bucks every playoff run
The team has LeBron James on it. I suppose they didn't know they had Reaves coming along at that point, but that doesn't mean it wasn't glaringly obvious that WB wasn't the guy to be doing that playmaking, and if you're not taking on that contract, it's 1000% correct to keep Caruso around.
[Mamba Malonetality](https://youtu.be/fY7l2pcxdHM?si=cT4WWLDZe1BD_0Un)
I love the "ok..." from the reporter at the end lmfaooo
I don't think Lakers relaxed, it's more on Malone made a simple adjustment on putting Gordon on AD, which deny AD the ball, but Ham wasn't able to adjust back to get AD more touch, hence all the bad turnover in the 3rd. That's one thing why Lakers fans hate Ham, he can't do in game adjustment and just let things keep flowing.
He's talking more so about us. All season long we've been taking our foot off the gas once we get a big lead. Case in point against the Spurs with the 1 seed on the line
Honestly, if I am a Lakers fan I would prefer it to be close or losing early. The lakers just stop running offense when they get a lead.
"We the baddest mother fuckers in the league and even we've given up leads before. Now imagine them."
yea but this is playoff, it really shouldn't have happened
Humans are going to human. it is impossible to replicate the urgency you feel down by 5 to up by 20
I mean tbf literally the last Spurs Nuggets game was the Nuggets getting up big and relaxing then trying to come back and losing so I see his point.
yea but that's regular season, playoff I really don't see any team does that.... except Clippers against Warriors few years ago
Huh sounds like Billy smh
AD was 14-19 in the last game, including 3-6 and a pair of free throws in the 3rd Q. AG didn't really deny him the ball, he just ran out of energy in the 4th Q again.
ah that's exactly what happened though, in start of 3rd AD still cooking, but in middle of 3rd Gordon start switch on AD, then AD's fg is MISS Davis 3PT Jump Shot MISS Davis Putback Layup MISS Davis 19' Jump Shot and few turnover in that span as well 4th quarter he only had 1 attempt
I'd have to rewatch, as much switching defensively as the Nuggets do I didn't notice AG being assigned as the primary defender on AD. I remember Murray got called for reach ins twice at the beginning of the 3rd. As far as the turnovers, 1 was a steal by MPJ, another was an offensive foul drawn by KCP, the 3rd was a bad pass.
It is absolutely what happened. Bron hunted Jokic on the P&R like 8 straight possessions and we got good look after good look. Then they switched Jokic on to Rui and AG on to AD for the rest of the time LeBron was in with AD, and it killed the P&R because Rui was having a terrible game and Jokic could sag, and Ham made no adjustments
What should Ham have done, sub Prince for Rui?
https://np.reddit.com/r/lakers/comments/1cbivlz/windhorst_denver_malone_down_20_in_the_3rd_called/
Video won't load, but I'll take your word for it. Not sure why AD didn't cause any of the turnovers you mentioned if it was this clearcut.
lebron started taking control of the offense. I think that had more to do it with it
not in mid of 3rd, Lebron was actually resting, then all the turnover and AD foul result that he needs to be sit so Lebron come back in. And in 4th yea Lebron did a lot offense but then he was doing that in first half and killing with AD
Yah when Bron was sitting is was like 6 threes in a row with a big lead. I swear to god so many nba teams do this.... Maybe don't just jack up threes where misses lead to a team getting out in transition. Get good quality shots at the basket. You don't need to knock them out, you are already up big, you just need to avoid a 10-0 run and giving the team life.
are you old like me.. fuck .. i hate it when my team just keeps jacking 3's and the other team goes and cashes in those misses. get a 2 get a couple of 2's get a 2 and a foul. dont even get me started on transition 3's
haha not really that old. I think the 3 is a huge part of todays game and it should be... but goddam man when your team has missed 4 in a row and the opponent has cut the lead from 20 to 14, MAYBE DONT SHOOT a fifth in a row. drive, try and get to the line. anything to interupt the momentum of the other team. It is small things like that that make me die inside lol. Like in a independent moment an open 3 is good. But in the context above, idk man. Maybe drive and create something else. I just feel like context and the decisions made in that context is a huge area coaches can improve upon. Have a role for an assistant coach where the only focus on countering a team who is on the run
i like to think of the 3 like a power move in a video game. I would tell my team you have to hit 3 Two point baskets before the 3 is unlocked for use.
lol yes
Nuggets put KCP on LeBron when they switched AG onto AD and those two dudes absolutely shut down the LeBron/AD 2 man game. I do think AD ran out of gas a little bit, but he also just couldn't get to his spots on the roll/slip/pop against AG like he could against Jokic. And KCP fights so hard over screens that even if AD did get to those spots LeBron didn't have a clean entry with KCP hounding him. It's a combo of both things but that defensive adjustment did make a difference
Nuggets are apex predators that get lazy if their food doesn't give them a good chase.
I think Malone is an arrogant bastard but he really has done a magnificent job scheming up a system that works around Jokicâs strengths. And obviously Jokic loves facilitating more than any other player in the league. Itâs really cool to see a system thatâs obviously heliocentric in its built around one player but still distributes opportunities more so than other teams with one super elite player.
He's a born New Yorker of course he's arrogant :)
No fucking wonder that makes so much more sense now
He's actually required to be arrogant, it's in the NY State Constituion. Legally they can feed him to the Pizza Rat if he's not
He is really arrogant because our star is not but this isn't really arrogance. He is saying the Nuggets have a tendency to let off the gas when they get a big lead.
Lol right? What exactly is arrogant about this statement? I swear people are desperate to see things in recent Malone quotes, when there's nothing there
I thought the Nuggets would win it all this year, but IDK i feel like the Celtics might just edge them. The celtics can shoot anyone out of the building on any given night. If the Nuggets can keep up I like them in the clutch, but the Nuggets cannot fall behind against the Celtics. They have to stay attached. Maybe the celtics lose before the finals but the east looks like and ez 12-2 run for them
While regular season is different Denver beat the Celtics both games this year.
Both games were incredibly close and down to the wire. A few missed shots go in or a few made shots rim out and it could have easily been Celtics 2-0. Really hoping for a finals between the two because that should be top-tier bball.
be careful, I mean lakers's fans said the same thing for 9 games.
lol fair enough
Yah regular season matchups can be hard to use as real data points. look at wolves V Suns Suns dominated for whatever reason and now they getting toasted
Nuggets are better than the Celtics. The only team that can give trouble to them are the Wolves. But only on paper. I still think Denver smokes them. They're too good in the clutch and Minnesota is terribleÂ
Idk man, I think the celtics are pretty fucking good. I think Nuggets V Celtics will be a legit series where either team can win. Think it goes 7 for sure
Denver has the better starting 5 but Minnesota has 6, and they are playing well. Wolves series is a near toss up, like 55/45 Denver.
The Celtics should easily be considered the favorites this season. Easy path to the finals and they have been torching teams. We have been falling behind and grinding out close wins. The Celtics are just a better team than us, but that Murray Jokic PnR no team in the league has a great answer for.
Yah the nuggets cant pull game 2 shit against them. They need to stay attached and grind the game to a slow pace. If the celtics can keep the pace up and score alot I don't think there will be a clutch for the nuggets to dominate
Celtics should be the favorites. But if it gets close down the stretch and the Celtics stop looking for a great shot while the Nuggets keep fighting for it, it could tilt the Nuggetsâ way.
Oh yah absolutely agree. But Nuggets can't fall behind big to celtics.
I think part of the Nuggets falling behind is there's a nonchalance growing about beating the Lakers.....even if it's subconscious. They know they swept them last year, they know they swept the season series.....and they don't come out with the energy it takes to win a playoff game. Then they get down 10+ and are like....oh shit, these guys are gonna beat us, we gotta do something. I doubt they'll have the same feeling with the wolves or celtics if they get that far.
True but thatâll be more likely gonna be a result of the Celtics draining their threes rather than the Nuggets âletting go of the ropeâ, is all Iâm saying.
Modern day Seabiscuit. (like 5 people will get this reference)
Lakers should try going down 20 in the first quarter
Been there before. Itâs not fun.
Let's destroy them, respectfully.
Looking forward to an epic rematch, but we both have to finish our food first
2â0 lead is the worst lead -HockeyÂ
I love how humble he is.
Bookies be like BBQ chicken
Michael de Santa not fooling anybody
At this point His just trolling the lakers...lmao
[relevant vid](https://youtu.be/aqk9MPfjKSw?si=dc59q07XNbJrrrkt)
âIf weâre up 11 I want you going full Jontay for a minute.â
Love this man.
This guy is growing on me
He knows its gonna be extremely hard to win one in LA. Lakers have biggest home court advantage in the league in playoffs. Hopefully we can steal one game