WMC 24-25: Seasonal Highs And Lows!

those guys just wanted to beat one another no matter what the stakes were

even the 2010 ASG looks watchable compared to the embarrassment that is the ASG now. this new generation of NBA stars are the definition of soft

 

Yea, it's been years since I watched the ASG. I think 160 points by one team had me saying no mas to that charade.

2006 East beat West 122-120. The next year: Las Vegas: 153-132. That's probably when the ship sailed for me. In 2017, when I looked and saw it was a 192-182 game, I knew I wasn't missing a damned thing. Hell, I watch regular season games more for the D than the O, and, as a Laker fanatic, it's just sad. As you know.

 

most of these stars these days grew up being friends with each other thru various camps summer leagues

 

Sometimes I think what the NBA needs is to go to the Olympics and get the hell beat out of them by numerous teams. Get us back to the drawing board. We are kind of becoming a p**** league.

Push the 3 point line back, reward the great shooters but make it much more difficult. Bring back strong centers, bring back the mid range. And still let the great outside shooters like Curry flourish but limit it to the greats. Let guys play defense on guards.

 

that's part of it, but i still contend that it's just wiser not to play hard in those games. who wants to get hurt in an allstar game? players just gradually realized this. i also think the people are saying that bad play drove the fans off, but it's possible that the fans caring less about the allstar game also drove bad play. it would be interesting to look back at media treatment of the allstar game and see if the narrative surrounding it changed before or after the games got so bad. i'm betting before, but i don't know. in other words, if announcers mentioned the allstar game mvp with reverence or referred back to plays in the game or its outcome, etc., maybe everyone would care more, including players. but if everyone's like "psshhhh...congrats on your stupid allstar game win/mvp", i mean...

agree mostly. i think lumbering, immobile, and/or unskilled big men needed to go. the league's better off without greg ostertag. i also think hand-checking needed to go. the game wasn't intended to have defenders grabbing ballhandlers the whole way down the court. that was ridiculous, tbh.

the three point line has needed to be pushed out for years, but it would require the court expanding, which the league won't do (despite the players just getting larger all the time).

i think simply doing that would change the game a lot for the better. the other thing i'd want to do is crack down on taken charges. the league's gotten better about that recently, but during the battier heyday, you had a s***ty product with all the sliding under airborne players going on. again, think about how the game was intended to be played--were we ever supposed to reward stationary defenders? no! in fact, the rules are written such that "legal guarding position" says nothing about not moving. but that stupid interpretation (which still lives in the minds of most fans and announcing crews, btw) set the game back 20 years. some of the most exciting plays in basketball are dunks and blocks and the various attempts to get each. rewarding guys for standing in the lane and falling down cut down on both.

rant's almost over, but i'm old and not working today: the last change would be to stop rewarding offensive players for not trying to score. again, the league is improving here, too, but dwyane wade and manu ginobili ushered in an era of foul-hunting instead of trying to legitimately score that harden elevated to a grotesque art form. just terrible to watch. once more: no one intended for players to try to get free throw attempts. you're supposed to try to score, and FTAs result when someone breaks the rules when attempting to stop you, not when someone couldn't get out of your way while you hunted for their body or arm on a drive. get off my lawn.

so yeah, three things, only one of which really requires an actual change (bigger court/longer 3pt). the other two are just ideological (and accurate) shifts in interpretation of rules back to their original intent.

problem is that i think most fans seem happy with the portland trailblazers being able to win or lose by 40 on any given night to any given team because nassir little's feeling it.

 

Proof the all star game is broken


But people still care...

... just not enough to sit down for two hours and watch a boring game

 

i wonder which metric drives the ad revenue, as that's the one silver will be using to inform his decisions.

 

Attention spans are shortening. We are definitely in a “What have you done for me lately” world.

 

Game? Pffffft that was a not a care in the world shoot around in uniforms of some non binary design.

Worst all star game ever!!!

 

It’s was all about Little Mac. Both the skills comp and the three point contest were really, really awful.
I really don’t understand why and how that skills competition has lasted. They have changed it up so many times and yet it’s still boring to watch.

 

A lot of discussion around the lackluster All Star game this week has started with "well I don't blame the players because the incentives...". I absolutely blame the players. Of all the solutions that have been thrown out to improve the watchability of the All Star game and even the regular season, the simplest is for the players to care more. They could decide tomorrow that they care more about winning any given game because every game is a competition against the other guy. They talk about how much they idolize Kobe only to stay up on a Twitch stream until 2am and then sit out for the week with a sore ankle.

There are plenty of problems with the modern game; ridiculous pro-offense and anti-physicality officiating, load management, over-importance of the three-point shot, too many uniforms, etc. The core problem with the league is the players don't care about the games very much. I don't care if it "makes sense" to minimize risk of injury, it makes the product I consume worse so I blame them for it.

 

lol, so don't consume the product. it's a bad product. if you stop consuming it, it will go away. yay capitalism.

 

Funny things is fans of their respective teams don't want their guys going all out or even playing I the All Star game (see this forum with Lebron this year in fact).

Fans of the game do mind but without the threat of relegation like European leagues the incentives are aligned for the playoffs and fans understand this as well!

 

Great D and


Goblin looks lost...

 

My WMC is on me. I didn't know the game was at 12:30. I thought the game was at 6:30.

 

Can't the basketball gods give the Lakers a break with injuries.

They traded the cursed item in Brick away and they play hard, don't give up: whatever has happened this year they've basically fought every game - if a team deserves a break from injuries it's this one post-trade

 

how can a NBA team be this bad at shooting 3s? dear lord it's ridiculous

 

It's ridiculously bad. But, we have some real shooters. Some nights I can see us lighting the sky on fire from 3.

 

Why didn’t Ham challenge lebron’s clean block on kyrie?

 

My WMC?

Dlo still being injured. We absolutely NEED him to win all these games down the stretch

And then leBron hurting his ankle

We need to stay HEALTHy man this is the only thing that will stand in our way to make the playofsf!