If you have championship ambitions, you'll have to beat the best eventually. It doesn't matter whether we face GSW in the 1st round or in the conference finals.
I had to stop reading those articles when they kept referring to Westbrook as elite offensively. He's been anything but this season.
They're probably gonna end up with the 4th seed, and maybe even advance. After the top 3 there is a huge fall off out west. But unless there are injuries, they're gonna get sent home in 5 games in the second round.
I am sure they will be active at the trade deadline in an effort to add 2 players. The problem is that they have limited assets. They feel they have to go all in to convince George to resign so I could see them offer multiple picks for a player like Tyreke Evans or Quinn with the Knicks.
I can see the Thunder offering Josh Huestis, Alex Abrines & Raymond Felton for Anthony Davis or DeMarcus Cousins.
Dun forget Marc Gasol is also on the radar, it's time for him to ride someone's coattails in order to contend.
ROCKETS They have a 2018 2nd rounder coming from a prior trade. The Stepien rule has also been modified as well. The Rockets can offer their 2020 1st rounder if they choose to do so. Your point stands though, the Rockets do not have a lot of draft picks/considerations at this point. It is a big reason that the Rockets have not added anyone else. We have to hope that there are good buyout options and a team that is tanking is willing to move a low salary player like Marqeese Speights or Luke Babbitt or Troy Daniels or Mario Chalmers for a 2019 second rounder.... or a team will take a 2020 future #1 pick for someone like Devin Harris or Thabo Sefolosha. THUNDER They now under the updated rules can offer up their 2022 and 2024 1st round picks. You are correct they do not have the option of any first rounders earlier. Trading picks that far in the future is dangerous (ask Brooklyn and Charlotte) but the Thunder may be that desperate. If you are the Thunder and you can add Tyreke Evans and another secondary piece to Westbrook/George/Adams/Anthony for two future picks, do you do it?
Not sure if this was posted here yet. Are we gonna expect PG13 to leave and go to LA off-season still?
http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/21906021/zach-lowe-10-things-like-including-warriors-thunder-nba The Thunder are coming It took two dozen games (not that long, really), but the Thunder have discovered some fundamental truths about themselves -- mostly that Carmelo Anthony has to be a 3-point-gunning third option. Oklahoma City is 12-3 since Dec. 1, and Melo's stutter-stepping, ball-stopping isolations have dropped from about 7.5 per game before then to 3.5 since, according to Second Spectrum data. His post-ups are down, too. Anthony is jogging into trail 3s at the rear of Russell Westbrook's manic fast breaks, and he still gets to cook if he gets the ball late in the shot clock. (Note to Melo: any number higher than seven or eight does not constitute "late.") Westbrook has absorbed most of the load, and he's finishing at the rim with MVP explosion again. A Westbrook spread pick-and-roll barrage, peppered with pindowns for Paul George, was always the road map. It's hard to find much "spread" with both Andre Roberson and Steven Adams on the floor, but Westbrook doesn't need much. Billy Donovan is smartly mitigating the Roberson effect by having him set more screens for Westbrook -- about seven per game since Dec. 1, up from 4.5 before, per Second Spectrum. There is so much work left. The Thunder haven't landed on a fifth crunch-time player; right now, it's Roberson by default. Donovan is figuring out how to stagger his three stars. The lineup data on that is mostly discouraging, but still noisy -- and hard to parse -- at this stage. The bench is thin. Patrick Patterson hasn't looked the same since offseason knee surgery; he has barely played alongside Adams. Jerami Grant has been solid as a backup center, but Raymond Felton is Raymond Felton, and Alex Abrines is fading to the edges of Donovan's rotations. Are they really riding with Josh Huestis when it matters? You know Sam Presti is going to find one more guy around the trade deadline. Also a problem: Oklahoma City still has only one crunch-time set -- a wing "Hawk" pick-and-roll in which Anthony screens for George before flipping around and screening for Westbrook as George curls around the opposite side. Opponents are, umm, onto that one. Westbrook remains statuesque, hands on knees, whenever someone else has the ball. This isn't a 60-win juggernaut waiting to bust out. But they could play the rest of the season at a 50-win pace, and be an absolute pain in the ass in the playoffs.
They aren't good enough to beat SAS, HOU, or GSW. May be able to take out Minnesota. They aren't deep enough to hang with the good teams.
Not that surprising. They have too much talent to be mediocre. Still not sold the can be a top 10 offense though.
What does @RocketsTruth have to say about that? I thought the elites love Westbrook. Giannis walked out of bounds and took a game from Russ.
