2015-2016 NBA SEASON: THE FAREWELL TOUR

[kisada]

Well whatever the defense is, they should make those buckets.
They should not let the eastern conference play in playoffs anymore. They are really too weak.

so if the defense is one of the top defenses of the past couple years, no matter how good they were and no matter that GS was 73-9, if the other team just wants to then they will score?

honestly i hate GS more than any team i've ever hated in my life but a good defense is a good defense because they marginalize the other team's scoring options. there's no such thing as simply just making those buckets. and you should give them credit for that.

[Akiyama]

LeBron won't ever live this down if the team goes out like this, but I'm sure they'll at the very least win Game 3.

Still, everyone was like "LeBron is 9-0 in Game 2's following game 1 losses blah blah"

@Kisada: I don't think people give GS credit for being good defensively is part of his point.

[Shimbo]

Game 3 Strat.. Tell The Cleveland Players they are in a Championship 7 game series...

This is a clinic on both sides.. how to play ball and how to fail.

[Detzu]

so if the defense is one of the top defenses of the past couple years, no matter how good they were and no matter that GS was 73-9, if the other team just wants to then they will score?

honestly i hate GS more than any team i've ever hated in my life but a good defense is a good defense because they marginalize the other team's scoring options. there's no such thing as simply just making those buckets. and you should give them credit for that.

I'd give them credit if Cavs wanted to fight. They just look like they want to lose.

[notorious bum]

Lebron and Kyrie need to hero ball to win these games, this is exactly what everyone should have expected. Even with GS giving away the ball, their biggest weakness, these teams are separated by raw shooting talent, depth, and teamwork, which GS stands above the rest.

"They are who we thought they were, damnit!"

[Gredival]

What Cleveland needs to do is import this kid to boost morale

[Detzu]

Lebron and Kyrie need to hero ball to win these games, this is exactly what everyone should have expected. Even with GS giving away the ball, their biggest weakness, these teams are separated by raw shooting talent, depth, and teamwork, which GS stands above the rest.

"They are who we thought they were, damnit!"

The sad part for Cleveland is that Golden State is actually a better matchup for them than OKC.

[Sho]

LeBron is suffering a much worse fate than Iverson.

[Gredival]

LeBron is suffering a much worse fate than Iverson.

LeBron got to team up with two sidekicks and got two rings out of it (one of them through tremendous luck). Pretty sure Iverson would trade places for that in a heartbeat.

[notorious bum]

Iverson was arguably more hated/stigmatized throughout the country, as well.

[Iono]

cuz practice!

[tyven]

I'm so sad that AI never won a ring

[notorious bum]

edit: boo, this ain't updated.

[Krandor]

Lebron and Kyrie need to hero ball to win these games

Also with this, Kyrie is not play well at all these first two games. 12 of 36 shooting, 1 of 7 on 3s, and getting straight beat down on D.

With how he performed in the first 2 games hero ball is the last thing he should be doing.

[Andalusian girls]

fuck outta here with the Bron was lucky to beat San Antonio nonsense or using Iverson as an analog with him in any way-- A.I. was the epitome of the And1 generation that nearly made basketball an unwatchable stream of low-efficiency iso fuckery with his career 42%-31% shooting splits sub-2:1 assist-turnover ratio and i-get-a-lot-of-steals-because-i-gamble-constantly defense but hey look at my dope crossover game. he was lucky to even get to a single finals as the #1 option and only did so because the East back then was even more terrible than it is today (5 straight Western champs getting there with a 20-6 record).

anyways

Kyrie and Love have been hot garbage on both ends, abused on defense and low-efficiency black holes on offense. i think it was Zach Lowe who leaked there was some internal debate among the Warriors coaching staff where some of them were actually more concerned with last year's iteration of the Cavs because Dellie+Mozgov drastically improve the starting-5 defensively, and their offensive limitations ensured Cleveland's offense would be funneled into a massive dose of Bron bullyball. i thought Love and Irving would prove that wrong with the diversity of their offensive attacks but as Kisada said Golden State is snuffing out almost every initial Cav's action and neither of the supporting members of the big 3 are making good plays once that breaks down.

i'm not sure what they do. their offense was not good with Love but it absolutely collapsed without him in the 2nd half so i doubt his concussion will prove a blessing in disguise. Mozgov regressed and hasn't been getting enough reps to insert with hope of him replicating last year's performance (a twin tower tactic they had to abandon anyways). they could try going small with 21 Shump Street + Jefferson's cadaver but no one's ever been able to out-smallball Golden State. certainly looking like the WCF was the real championship round.

[Valisk]

The Cavs are so overmatched, it's embarrassing. Can't believe I predicted Cavs in 6.

Ty Lue needs to do something completely outside the box like playing Kyrie and Love off the bench against GS's 2nd unit. I don't think it will change anything, but they need a completely new approach. The GSW are killing them with poor to mediocre play from Steph and Klay. Unbelievable.

[kisada]

personally i've never really been sold on the idea that a lebron/kyrie/love combo was really the right archetype to beat GS. but cavs sure are making things way easier for GS by losing discipline and resorting to too much iso ball. i mean, that's kind of why GS is such a great defensive team, in that they take away so much of what you want to do you're basically just flailing your arms at the end of the buzzer. but to me, if you're basically finals bound every year like the cavs are, shouldn't you be building schemes and rosters that won't be exposed to that the moment the offseason begins?

[Sho]

fuck outta here with the Bron was lucky to beat San Antonio nonsense or using Iverson as an analog with him in any way-- A.I. was the epitome of the And1 generation that nearly made basketball an unwatchable stream of low-efficiency iso fuckery with his career 42%-31% shooting splits sub-2:1 assist-turnover ratio and i-get-a-lot-of-steals-because-i-gamble-constantly defense but hey look at my dope crossover game. he was lucky to even get to a single finals as the #1 option and only did so because the East back then was even more terrible than it is today (5 straight Western champs getting there with a 20-6 record).

anyways

I now know what triggers you.

[Gredival]

fuck outta here with the Bron was lucky to beat San Antonio nonsense

Weren't they literally bringing the trophy out for SA the first SA-MIA finals cuz it was 30 secs away from being done in G6?

[Andalusian girls]

I now know what triggers you.

going from the ultra-efficient Bulls triangle or the classic majesty of a Stockton-Malone pick'n'pop or the fury of a rumbling Suns fastbreak with Charles leading the charge to endless iso possessions with Iverson and Carter and Kobe and McGrady were dark times my brother.

the terrible thing is it was all Jordan's fault. kids saw what he did at the end of games and thought that's how the game should be played

Weren't they literally bringing the trophy out for SA the first SA-MIA finals cuz it was 30 secs away from being done in G6?

yes and then LeBron sank a deep 3, Kawhi choked away 1 of his free throws when intentionally fouled, James bricked, Bosh made the most important rebound of his life and Ray Allen hit one of the clutchest shots in Finals history to send it to overtime, which Ray sealed by stripping Manu's last second shot and preserving Miami's 1 point lead.

and then of course there was a game 7 where San Antonio dared Bron to shoot by going under every screen and he responded by bombing in 5 3's on his way to 37 of his team's 95.

San Antonio came as close as you can come without getting there but Miami played their hearts' out and earned that one like a motherfucker. because they were hated people act like it's an accident but if that had been some scrappy underdog making every big play to decide a razor tight series it'd be a Lifetime movie.