The NBA Thread

[Robby P]

It must be exhausting to be a Lakers fan. What a bunch of drama queens.

[MadMan]

It must be exhausting to be a Lakers fan. What a bunch of drama queens.

Makes it easier for me to hate them, especially since D-Fish is gone now.

[chrisnu]

Eric Gordon's coming back. If he's free in your league, the time to pick him up was yesterday, because he's going to be playing for a contract.

[slqrick]

Another blowout for the Knicks under Woody. Fun game to watch tonight, and nice to see Melo get his groove back.

[shaun]

2.5 games behind Philly/Boston with 15 to play, 9 of them against playoff teams. They're playing great but still likely only a 7/8 seed. I'm cautiously optimistic though.

[chrisnu]

Kobe Bryant: 7-25
Andrew Bynum: 10-15

God damn it, Kobe.

Of course, part of this is Mike Brown's fault. He's turned Ramon Sessions into yet another guard who walks the ball up the court, passes the ball to Kobe and stands in the corner. This wasn't happening before he supposedly learned the plays. They run nothing but isolation plays for Kobe, Bynum and Gasol.

Brown's substitution patterns are also unbelievably horrible. You don't play Steve Blake, Matt Barnes, Metta World Peace and Josh McRoberts at the same time, let alone for extended minutes. And he's playing 33-year-old, sixteenth-season Kobe 39 minutes a night.

[Ezee E]

Bynum's FG% should be much higher then Bryant simply for the sake that Bynum doesn't do outside shots except when he wants to get benched.

With that, if the Nuggets lose to the Bobcats tomorrow... I may just sell my Nuggets/Magic tickets.

[chrisnu]

Bynum's FG% should be much higher then Bryant simply for the sake that Bynum doesn't do outside shots except when he wants to get benched.

I can't remember watching someone throw up so many bricks, but I didn't watch much of Allen Iverson in Philadelphia post-MVP season. Seriously, who shoots 5 three-pointers a night if you're making less than 30% of them? Kobe is at MJ on the Wizards level of efficiency right now. Rapidly approaching one point per shot. Jordan had been out of the league for three years, of course.

Also, congratulations to Steve Blake on getting torched by Derek fucking Fisher.

Ok, done bitching now...

[Derek]

Bynum's FG% should be much higher then Bryant simply for the sake that Bynum doesn't do outside shots except when he wants to get benched.

Kobe's FG% should also probably be higher than 28% if he's going to take 10 more shots than anyone else on the team. Metta World Peace's 3/13 didn't help matters, but as much as I worry about the Lakers going deep in the playoffs, Bynum and MWP's inconsistency and Kobe's chucker antics should prevent them from getting anything further than the 2nd round.

[Ezee E]

Kobe's FG% should also probably be higher than 28% if he's going to take 10 more shots than anyone else on the team. Metta World Peace's 3/13 didn't help matters, but as much as I worry about the Lakers going deep in the playoffs, Bynum and MWP's inconsistency and Kobe's chucker antics should prevent them from getting anything further than the 2nd round.

Kobe will manage to somehow get it together in the playoffs and torch the Grizzlies with an astounding 60% percentage. Ugh.

And you know who else puts up those numbers, if not worse... A couple Knicks that were former Nuggets.

[Robby P]

It is fascinating how Kobe Bryant gets a complete pass from the media when he plays like shit but LeBron James gets scrutinized for every little mistake he makes.

[shaun]

Flops are fun.

[youtube]kk2_Zck7BGs[/youtube]

[EyesWideOpen]

It is fascinating how Kobe Bryant gets a complete pass from the media when he plays like shit but LeBron James gets scrutinized for every little mistake he makes.

Because he has rings. Kobe is a shooter and people tend to forget that when you're a shooter sometime you have off nights where you're gonna miss a ton of shots. Jordon did this all the time but people seem to look back with rose colored glasses and forget about that stuff.

I love when people complain that Kobe shot them "out" of a couple of games. Well on the opposite end he's shot them "in" hundreds so I think it's an ok tradeoff.

[Robby P]

Kobe's been shooting 40 percent from the field over the last 30 games. That's a lot of off nights.

[Benny Profane]

It is fascinating how Kobe Bryant gets a complete pass from the media when he plays like shit but LeBron James gets scrutinized for every little mistake he makes.

5 - 0.

[EyesWideOpen]

Kobe's been shooting 40 percent from the field over the last 30 games. That's a lot of off nights.

Shooting 40% is not an off night especially when you're expected to take the majority of the teams shots night in and night out. Shooting 25%-30 is.

[Robby P]

5 - 0.

I think it has more to do with how the general public doesn't like LeBron James and wants to see him fail where as for whatever reason people don't have the same animosity toward Kobe, despite the fact that he's kind of a scumbag.

[Ezee E]

He is a career 45% shooter. Down a whole 3% this year... Nothing had really changed. He just has a lousier cast around him.

[chrisnu]

Shooting 40% is not an off night especially when you're expected to take the majority of the teams shots night in and night out. Shooting 25%-30 is.

40% aren't his off-nights, that's his average. Here's what his shooting looks like over the past two months (29 games):

> 50% - 5 games
45-50% - 4 games
40-45% - 5 games
35-40% - 5 games
30-35% - 3 games
< 30% - 7 games

[chrisnu]

Grant Hill may miss the rest of the season after having surgery to repair meniscus tear to the right knee. It may be time to hang them up. It's been a good run. I definitely didn't expect him to last five full and productive years in Phoenix.

[DavidSeven]

Kobe is a shooter and people tend to forget that when you're a shooter sometime you have off nights where you're gonna miss a ton of shots. Jordon did this all the time but people seem to look back with rose colored glasses and forget about that stuff.

Michael Jordan was a career 50% shooter and never shot below 46.5% in any complete season with the Bulls. He did this while never playing with a legitimate post scorer (which opens up shots) whereas Kobe currently plays with two and of course played with Shaq early in his career. It's not rose colored glasses; Jordan was objectively a more effective scorer than Kobe.

[DavidSeven]

He is a career 45% shooter. Down a whole 3% this year... Nothing had really changed. He just has a lousier cast around him.

The cast isn't lousier though because it's basically the same squad (-) Odom (+) Sessions. The difference is that Phil Jackson and his triangle aren't there to keep Kobe in check. He's running wild on Brown's iso-schemes. His last super-chucker phase also came at a time when Jackson wasn't coaching the team.

[chrisnu]

His last super-chucker phase also came at a time when Jackson wasn't coaching the team.

Even then (if we're talking about the '04-'05 season), he scored 0.6 less PPG while taking 3.3 fewer shots. He was converting his three-pointers at a more efficient rate, and he was getting to the free-throw line more often. He hasn't been this inefficient offensively since his second season in the league, when he was coming off the bench.

[Ezee E]

Nuggets were 2-17 from 3P, and still manage a win. Poor Bobcats.

[slqrick]

Knicks were kind of dead on arrival tonight, but no one can say Melo didn't do all he could to carry the team. He's playing out of his mind right now.