The 2024 NBA playoffs thread

[Hoop Head]

And if one took the exaggeration of the situation at face value... it still doesn't remotely justify gutting the franchise and condemning it's future for a 35 year old. His age alone was enough of a factor to slam the breaks; him being a passive aggressive, gutless, toxic, malcontent are secondary factors

We saw how quickly the wheels fell off CP3 and he was the same age as KD was when he was acquired. It was a repeat of the CP3 deal, only supersized. How anyone thinks it was a good move to go all in on yet another aging star, one who played a position we had filled, just doesn't make sense.

If Bridges needed to be dealt, so be it, but for a CP3 replacement. We needed a PG and we went for an aging, injury prone, malcontent tweener.

 

[Lorenzo]

I think the Twolves will make short work of the Mavs. But my predictions have not been so great as of late.

I’ll be honest, I have no idea how the Mavs matchup in this series. What gives you the idea that the wolves will beat them so easily? Obviously beating Denver is impressive, but most of us have been saying for weeks that Denver was vulnerable. Dallas have been rolling for a couple of months now. I don’t see much of a difference in their playoff games from what they did in the last 20 games of the regular season.

 

[Covert Rain]

First off... when they made the trade they were 30-26, had won 9 of 11 including beating a healthy Celtic team in Boston. Their record when even reasonably healthy was one of the best in the league.

Even if that, good team, wasn't a title contender, they had a boat load of assets at their disposal. they had control of their own draft perpetually.

And if one took the exaggeration of the situation at face value... it still doesn't remotely justify gutting the franchise and condemning it's future for a 35 year old. His age alone was enough of a factor to slam the breaks; him being a passive aggressive, gutless, toxic, malcontent are secondary factors.

They were I believe 30-27 on Feb 9th when the trade went down and to your point they wont 7 out of the last 10. I don't put much stock in that considering they were still barely above a .500 team, Chris Paul was looking old and if i recall was having hip issues at the time. Saying "when healthy" is not much of an argument since the team couldn't stay healthy with Paul on the roster. Wasn't that also around the time Booker was having that groin issue?

 

[Covert Rain]

First off... when they made the trade they were 30-26, had won 9 of 11 including beating a healthy Celtic team in Boston. Their record when even reasonably healthy was one of the best in the league.

Even if that, good team, wasn't a title contender, they had a boat load of assets at their disposal. they had control of their own draft perpetually.

And if one took the exaggeration of the situation at face value... it still doesn't remotely justify gutting the franchise and condemning it's future for a 35 year old. His age alone was enough of a factor to slam the breaks; him being a passive aggressive, gutless, toxic, malcontent are secondary factors.

P.S. I just want this to be the last aging veteran experiment. If we can't get a star in his prime? Pass.

 

[Phrazbit]

P.S. I just want this to be the last aging veteran experiment. If we can't get a star in his prime? Pass.

You won't have to worry about that for a good... 8 years or so.

 

[Covert Rain]

You won't have to worry about that for a good... 8 years or so.

Maybe trading but there is no reason they can't clear salary and go after a big name free agents before that time. They do have options after they decide this experiment is over.

 

[Covert Rain]

This Celtics Pacers series might be MUCH better than I thought.

 

[Cheesebeef]

We saw how quickly the wheels fell off CP3 and he was the same age as KD was when he was acquired. It was a repeat of the CP3 deal, only supersized. How anyone thinks it was a good move to go all in on yet another aging star, one who played a position we had filled, just doesn't make sense.

If Bridges needed to be dealt, so be it, but for a CP3 replacement. We needed a PG and we went for an aging, injury prone, malcontent tweener.

Right… that was a bad trade. Which I and others have acknowledged repeatedly, now. The issue is that if we had to trade Bridges (and probably myltiple of picks) for a young elite PG, who would that be? What team is desperate to get rid of a young elite PG? Maybe Memphis if Ja kept going south? And would you even want to take that risk? I might, but I’d be stunned if that happened. And if not, who else?

The reality is that once it was clear that Booker was nothing more than leak Gilbert Arenas, Ayton was the second coming of Benoit Benjamin and we totally blew the Halliburton puck, the team was in trouble rebuilding a true contender because they were destined to be a 35-45 win team built around Booker/Bridges and probably a 40-50 win team from here to eternity if they had to burn Bridges and picks to get another legit superstar.

 

[Hoop Head]

Maybe trading but there is no reason they can't clear salary and go after a big name free agents before that time. They do have options after they decide this experiment is over.

We won't have cap space until 2027 given Beal's contract, Booker's extension, and the recently re-signed Grayson Allen. Even then, it's doubtful. 3 seasons, at the earliest.

 

[sdscard4]

That didn’t age well.

No sheet
My basketball IQ is taking a beating this season lol
I'm rooting for the damn Pacers

 

[Hoop Head]

No sheet
My basketball IQ is taking a beating this season lol
I'm rooting for the damn Pacers

Stop it! Root for Dallas. Reverse jinx.

 

[BirdGangThing]

pacers doing better than i expected - might even win one? (not tonight of course)

 

[Hoop Head]

Right… that was a bad trade. Which I and others have acknowledged repeatedly, now. The issue is that if we had to trade Bridges (and probably myltiple of picks) for a young elite PG, who would that be? What team is desperate to get rid of a young elite PG? Maybe Memphis if Ja kept going south? And would you even want to take that risk? I might, but I’d be stunned if that happened. And if not, who else?

Looks like Garland is headed to the block. He's a great young PG. Holiday was traded for a quarter of what KD was. Brogdon is available. Lillard also cost less than KD, albeit he's older. Those names good enough? DeJounte Murray has been floated as trade bait and now Trae Young might be moved. 2 more good young PG's. There were options, the Suns and some Suns fans became obsessed with adding KD when he said he wanted to be here but I don't think anyone thought about how different here would look after paying to add KD. We paid a premium for him and the Nets bent us over in those trade talks.

 

[Covert Rain]

We won't have cap space until 2027 given Beal's contract, Booker's extension, and the recently re-signed Grayson Allen. Even then, it's doubtful. 3 seasons, at the earliest.

On the podcast they mention Beal would have to waive his NTC which he would likely do if the Suns were blowing it up. Beal is young enough to still chase a ring after this year and yes they said it would like happen over a few seasons which is better than the 6 years mentioned above. We are limited but still have options.

 

[SeattleCardinal]

The Eastern Finals might be more competitive than I thought!

 

[Cheesebeef]

Looks like Garland is headed to the block. He's a great young PG. Holiday was traded for a quarter of what KD was. Brogdon is available. Lillard also cost less than KD, albeit he's older. Those names good enough? DeJounte Murray has been floated as trade bait and now Trae Young might be moved. 2 more good young PG's.

There were options,

Yeah… none of those are good options when we’re talking about needing an All-NBA level PG. Garland is the best of the bunch, but even there, I think Bridges is the piece that gets moved for him (they wouldn’t be trading in a vacuum) and then we’re looking at Garland/Booker duo that looks a lot like the Garland/Mitchell Cavs… except without the promising big men, in a much tougher Conference. Even if we’re able to keep Bridges and mostly just send picks, a ********* of Garland/Booker/Bridges is still a middling team, likely without picks from here to kingdom come. That team would be a 45-50 win club at best, IMO. Just like we were this year. Likely easier on the eyes, but no different as far end result at the end of the day.

Lillard/Booker duo with whatever else was left wouldn’t be much better than the Blazers had been the last couple years and now we’re talking about another old guy, who’s game fell off a bit this year and was injury prone.

Brogdon/Booker/Bridges three headed snake wins 40-45 games, IMO… if Brogdon actually stayed healthy, which he never does.

Trae Young and Booker might make up the worst backcourt decision makers/defender duo in the league.

With Holiday we likely would have had to give up multiple picks and would be looking at another aging PG bandaid.

holiday Booker/Bridges/Cam/Nurkic is probably more fun to watch than this team was this year, but I’m guessing they’re still around 45-50 wins.

I don’t think any of those guys move the needle in any big way. They’re probably more pleasing to the eye to watch, but likely end up 45-50 win range same way this team currently is, IMO.

the Suns and some Suns fans became obsessed with adding KD when he said he wanted to be here but I don't think anyone thought about how different here would look after paying to add KD. We paid a premium for him and the Nets bent us over in those trade talks.

I think a lot of us were still stupidly hopeful that Ayton could still be an okay 3rd option when we traded for KD. Then he totally checked out of the playoffs and the stupidly hopeful (like me) had egg all over their faces in multiple ways.

 

[Cheesebeef]

On the podcast they mention Beal would have to waive his NTC which he would likely do if the Suns were blowing it up. Beal is young enough to still chase a ring after this year and yes they said it would like happen over a few seasons which is better than the 6 years mentioned above. We are limited but still have options.

He might waive his NTC but until he’s on the last year of his deal, that contract is poison.

 

[Lorenzo]

Indiana blew a chance to win game 1. Up 3 with the ball under 24 seconds with a timeout and they throw the ball away. Then they don’t want to give up a quick 2 so they let Boston shoot a 3 to tie.

 

[Lefty]

If the Suns would of lost the way the Pacers did tonight in a playoff game, this site would of crashed.

 

[Ronin]

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[Lorenzo]

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It is on his shoulders. And the broadcast was calling him out for his predictable coaching before he opted to let the Celtics shoot the 3 to tie the game.

 

[Phrazbit]

Yeah… none of those are good options when we’re talking about needing an All-NBA level PG. Garland is the best of the bunch, but even there, I think Bridges is the piece that gets moved for him (they wouldn’t be trading in a vacuum) and then we’re looking at Garland/Booker duo that looks a lot like the Garland/Mitchell Cavs… except without the promising big men, in a much tougher Conference. Even if we’re able to keep Bridges and mostly just send picks, a ********* of Garland/Booker/Bridges is still a middling team, likely without picks from here to kingdom come. That team would be a 45-50 win club at best, IMO. Just like we were this year. Likely easier on the eyes, but no different as far end result at the end of the day.

Lillard/Booker duo with whatever else was left wouldn’t be much better than the Blazers had been the last couple years and now we’re talking about another old guy, who’s game fell off a bit this year and was injury prone.

Brogdon/Booker/Bridges three headed snake wins 40-45 games, IMO… if Brogdon actually stayed healthy, which he never does.

Trae Young and Booker might make up the worst backcourt decision makers/defender duo in the league.

With Holiday we likely would have had to give up multiple picks and would be looking at another aging PG bandaid.

holiday Booker/Bridges/Cam/Nurkic is probably more fun to watch than this team was this year, but I’m guessing they’re still around 45-50 wins.

I don’t think any of those guys move the needle in any big way. They’re probably more pleasing to the eye to watch, but likely end up 45-50 win range same way this team currently is, IMO.



I think a lot of us were still stupidly hopeful that Ayton could still be an okay 3rd option when we traded for KD. Then he totally checked out of the playoffs and the stupidly hopeful (like me) had egg all over their faces in multiple ways.

You take the lens of each of those potential deals, put it through the perspective of the worst cost and the worst outcome... and they're all still better than our situation after the Durant trade.

There were innumerable other options, the ones listed and others more than we can possibly know; literally, every single year multiple high profile stars move around.

And yet... it is hard to find a potential outcome worse than the one pursued.

 

[Ouchie-Z-Clown]

Sure. But that team played in the NBA Finals and had a 2-0 lead. It wasn't because Chris Paul was so much more awesome than Durant and then Durant and Beal. That unit played a lot better team ball.

We'll never know if that core of young players was kept it would or wouldn't improve with other roster additions. You guys can be emphatic as you want in your opinion but we will never know because that isn't what happened.

That Chris Paul didn’t exist anymore and there was no avenue to getting a new one that didn’t involve trading bridges likely.

And you’re right, we’ll never know.

 

[Ouchie-Z-Clown]

What you say after this doesn't matter considering you also felt the KD deal put us closer to a title. So you were wrong and your judgement was wrong then. Maybe you're wrong about all the rest too, right? It's not inconceivable that how you felt about that team was off since you thought we improved with the KD trade and we regressed.

This is faulty reasoning. “You were wrong once so any other opinion of yours is also wrong.” If that’s the case no one on any sports board’s opinion should be listened to ever. I was right about KJ deal and wrong about majerle. They were close together. Should my opinion about kj have been dismissed too?

 

[Ouchie-Z-Clown]

In a vacuum, yes the KD is better that Mikal and Cam.

I'm not sure if anyone saw that Bridges had limited upside before the trade, even before we had a new owner. I knew he was young, I liked the defense, I like what i saw when he started picking up some offensive skill sets. But did anyone here say we were wasting time keeping Bridges on the roster prior to the finals year and the year after? Once he went to the Nets, yes he was the #1 guy, but here, he was our #3-4 guy, who was pretty good in that role.

I don't think Ayton regressed as much as you want to believe, just looking at stats he didn't waiver much in his last year with us, except his % was down slightly. But I think its more of him not growing and maturing, that was the disappointing part of his development or lack of, while with us. I think he wanted a bigger role, and some of this separation was probably on Monty as well. Maybe even JJ, because the suns got rid of Monty and Ayton still wanted out. I mean, heck, we even soured things with Crowder.

I think we could have re-upped if the Crowder and Ayton relationships were better, and we flipped CP3 for something usable. This would still leave us with some flexibility going forward. I hear all this talk about, oh will this and that team didn't blow it up, look at them, it took them a few years to put it together; see teams like the Wolves, everyone thought the Gobert trade was awful, a healthy Nuggets, what was looking to be a healthy Clippers team. Even the Mavericks kept their core somewhat and re-tooled, how? Because they kept their flexibility and players happy.

Outside of a vacuum, the trade has been a failure. This was an awful season to watch.

You’re wrong about bridges. There was a faction of us that saw his limited upside. Doesn’t mean it was a “waste of time keeping him on the roster” rolleyes, just that we were convinced he wasn’t going to be a legit #2 for a championship team. Some were saying he was going to be a pippen. He ended up better than that group thought, but not by much.

And Ayton definitely regressed. Numbers don’t always tell the story. His effort was awful and his consistency went down the tubes. And he was pretty much a dissident. Just looking at YOY numbers is the worst argument to pose against fans who watched every game. We know the reality.

And talking about reality: crowder. There was no re-upping crowder. Maybe in fantasyland. Monty and jones blew that. It just was what it unfortunately was.

And we absolutely maximized what we could get from Paul. Again what else could we have gotten for him? Jordan poole. That would’ve awful for this team.

Yes, we lost all of our flexibility. And the kd deal is a loser. But people weren’t arguing “we have flexibility!” They were erroneously believing we were still the 64 win team.