2025-26 Team Developments: Trades / Free Agents / News / Rumors / Ideas

WTF .... Over??? Did not expect that at all!!!

 

i guess i've got to trust the team doctors on how to manage this stuff, but is anyone else doing this with young players who aren't specifically injured?

good chance we lose to SA even at full (non-lebron) strength. why give up this one?

 

Something has to be done

Like what is being said that in the years prior players had no problem with it

But today it's a problem and the NBA is missing teams playing their star players

So the quickest solution is to modify the schedule

 

Just when I start enjoying basketball again they remind me what a bunch of p@#$&+& they are. Weakest, softest era of basketball in my lifetime and I'm old.

 

I am not going to work tomorrow because I will go to sleep after midnight and will be drunk because load management sucks

 

Luka is clearly more comfortable with Hayes. But that's because he's used to play with that lob type center. It takes time to learn to play with a different guy.

I think Ayton is more versatile and brings another dimension to the game. And I want to see how it looks when Luka gets used to that too. He's an elite player so I'm sure he'll get there.

We have a full year to see if it's a matter of familiarity or if Luka indeed plays better with an athletic rim-runner

Luka had 2 "injuries" he recovered from 3 days ago. AR has been carrying the team for a week.

I also don't like us being overly cautious. We ditched preseason, sat Luka for a week for precaution and now ditch a game. I think we need to get used to it throughout the year, the message seems clear

We also have a 5 game road trip coming up

Yup, b2bs are stupid.

I think if they extend the league for 2 weeks they probably have enough days to keep the 82. There's around 14/15 b2bs per team.

As a fan is awful and this will likely be the first game I don't see this year. But on the team management side, I wouldn't hate have a game here and there where you just unleash some role and end of bench players. Give them some reps and a different role. It increases their confidence and helps develop them to cover the lack of practice

Yeah I get that, but I think the players/teams win this one, just because they have all the leverage.
The league tried that injury policy a couple years ago but it didn't hold. They have the 65 game minimum for awards, which helps bevause of pride and contracts/money being associated with all-stars and all-nba nominations. But teams will still manage players every time they can.
No one but a handful of exceptions will play the full season, it's just the reality and there's no way you can force it.

Fact is, in the last decade playoffs have mostly been decided by injuries. Haliburton and Tatum last year, hell even Bron, Luka and AR. Before we had Kawhi, Klay, CP3, Giannis, Curry, Kyrie, the list goes on of Finals or closed series being decided by a star getting injured. Your whole year gets defined by that, so I understand the business decision to make whatever I can to minimize as much as possible that possibility.

Also, the number of torn ACLs in the league has gone up. Plus there's an insane amoint of data at team's disposal that helps predict levels of stress in muscles and tendons, etc etc.

Kobe is my idol. I love that play through all mentality and as a fan is what I want to see. Really value Ant or Mikal Bridges for being real ones about that.
But if I was running a team, I'd definitely do load management.
In a playoff setting, it doesn't matter the regular season. We have a better shot with Luka healthy and finishing 10th than 2nd and not having Luka.
Sure, the West is a juggernaut and every win matters. But ultimately, what decides your success is if your stars are healthy rather than if you finished 1st or 8th

 

yeah, this all makes sense. i just don't know if the data support the idea that not playing tonight saves you the torn achilles. if it does--of course!

it's just kind of a buzzkill when the team looked to be starting to find some winning formulae.

also--is smart playing? bc if i'm sitting someone for injury concerns, it's my 30+ heavy guard who plays balls-to-the-wall every second he's on the floor.

 

Yeah I was literally looking for Smart's thread to say. He was not tagged. If he's playing it's borderline stupid

I mean, I still didn't get his injury, he came back and played 35 minutes straight.
I think he's completely fine and we're just managing his load early season. Hell, I think if it was the playoffs Luka wouldn't sat last week and Bron would be playing.

I think we are overboard with this load management. My read is that probably the team feels if healthy we can make a legitimate run for the title. East is weak so it may get decided in the WCF, improving our chances if it all clicks.

I get it, but anything excessive loses me and I think we are entering that zone.

 

Smart is playing .... not on injured list.

 

yeah, i wonder if folks with the team thought the couple games that got us 3rd instead of 8th last year meant jack because we lost.

but you're losing a TON of context there. usually, the team you face as the 6 isn't last year's conference finalist who's had one of the league's best records for the last six weeks. just bad luck. i'd keep playing the odds that finishing higher means playing inferior teams.

i get that the west is tight and HCA isn't maybe as big as it seems, but man...avoiding the play-in also comes down to a couple games. and we're about to have lost twice to portland.

 

I wonder if they feel Portland isn't going to be a playoff threat to face so we don't need to worry about home court advantage, while San Antonio coming in on Wed very well may be a team we will face and if possible want to have home court advantage if somehow it comes down to Lakers vs Spurs head to head record?

 

It is easy for these dummies to outsmart themselves.