Playoffs - Round 1: Lakers Vs. Denver. Let's Freaking Go!!

This is what happens when the coach doesn't use or develop his bench properly. You need them and they aren't prepared. We have plenty of good bench players that could have been developed. No vision, no plan, clueless coaching. Every minute of training camp, pre-season, regular season needs to be taken advantage of. Gross incompetence.

 

Everyone but Prince looks terrified to shoot

 

Gut wrenching loss, and to lose the way we did hurts even more. A Jamal Murray game winner...smh

I hope our guys have SOME pride left in them...you can't let this team sweep you TWO YEARS IN A ROW.

Get a goddamn win please. Only thing I can feel good about is that we've had this team down double digits 2 games in a row and blown it 2 games in a row...the basketball Gods gotta give us a god damn break and give us a win

 

Win two games at home..problem solved.

 

Like last year I like our chances this year though

 

We are long over due for blowing these guys out in a game. Let's get that done Thursday night.

 

end the misery so spam can be on his marry way back to milw

 

It's going to end very soon, unfortunately.

wish we ended up with OKC. f*** SAS again and again. They beat Denver in one of the last games in the regular season and the Nuggets slid to 2.

We beat OKC in 6. IMO.

just some s*** luck.

 

If we win the championship, Ham will declare he’s not sure how we did it.



but he will proudly declare that we have 50 timeouts remaining going into next season and about 25 Call challenges.

 

I agree with this. Series doesn't have to be over. We certainly aren't the only team to suffer a bad loss in the playoffs.

I have my issues with Ham, but at a certain point you're either built for these moments or you aren't. Have some pride, hit your open baskets, and don't let yourselves get swept by the same team twice.

"Man up" - Byron Scott, probably.

 

let's see how our role players do at home. denver's were very good in denver. historically in the playoffs, role players are better at home. if our stars can keep their level and those things switch, the outcomes reverse. i think it was last year in game 3 that both lebron and AD had bad games, and that was all she wrote.

 

It's baffling how ridiculously clutch Murray is. He's definitely in the GOAT discussion.... against us.

 

Right. I'm expecting us to play better and honestly get a win in Game 3.

 

Very crude but these are the game scores of each player through the first two games vs. last year's WCF. Keep in mind this stat probably does a terrible job picking up defensive impact.

 

that one matches the eye test, too. last year, their stars slightly outplayed ours. this year, our stars are actually outperforming theirs so far, and the role players are falling short. reaves and rui really standing out. the good news is that i don't think the reaves/rui problems are in their heads. both guys have the confidence to get back on track, imo.

 

Yeah Murray was so bad through the first 3 quarters that one can imagine his 4Q scoring barrage not mattering if we got just a bit more out of Reaves and Rui. They were 4-15 through 3Qs. The LFR pod talked about the Lakers not adjusting in the 3rd by potentially running the offense through the guards, but for some reason LeBron doesn't trust that like he did last year. LeBron would act as the screener for entire quarters last year, especially in the Memphis series.

 

i've said in many games that we have way too many possessions that begin with lebron handling up top. that has to be partly by his choice, i'd imagine.

 

My impression in Game 2 was that most of the first half the offense WAS ran by the guards, and they did pretty well.

Then at the start of the second half it felt like a notable change that suddenly Lebron was running the point. I was questioning the change, but to start the quarter the Lebron and AD pick and roll was incredibly effective so I was on board with it.

Then the Nuggets switched Gordon onto AD. That’s when everything changed. We stopped going to AD for the pick and roll, because seems like the gameplan was tunnel visioned on trying to pick on Jokic. So it became much more Lebron and Rui pick and roll, which wasn’t nearly as effective while also pushing AD out to the perimeter.

Then in the fourth quarter the offensive struggles continued, so the team got complacent and started relying on Lebron to be the primary scorer himself. This kept the team afloat during stretches, but it was obviously wearing Lebron down. Keeping DLo out of the game for so long was a bad decision. I would have thrown him back in there earlier and let him run the show for a bit

But yeah overall I think they need to do a better job at balancing the playmaking duties, and not fixate on exclusively trying to pick on Jokic. AD should always be heavily involved in the pick and roll.

 

Not a fan of LeIso, especially at 39 years of age. I wonder what has caused us to forget how to run our offense in the second half. Is it fatigue, is it players deferring to Lebron too much? Is it a lack of offensive game plan? I don't know.

 

I think we've played the same way ever since Lebron signed here. He takes control of the offense whenever he wants, especially in the 4th quarter. That's what he does, he was doing it in Cleveland and Miami.

We all won a chip with that action too.