Its not surprising to me, him and DeRozan are both SGs and they didn’t work out in Chicago. Watching them take turns at the offense, long twos and contested midrange twos galore. It’s ugly
On a Sacramento forum, I read a comparison made by a King's fan. Maybe I got a thing or two wrong, but roughly something like this. Chicago (2023- 24)........Sacramento (2024 - 25) Vucevic...............................Sabonis..................... Pat Williams........................Keegan Murray......... DDR.....................................DDR.......................... LaVine.................................LaVine....................... Coby White..........................Monk........................ Ayo Dosunmu......................Keon Ellis................. Sabonis, Murray and Ellis could/should be considered better than their respective Chicago counterpart with Coby White probably better than Monk. So the Kings have an edge over the Bulls (2023 - 24) at several positions, but DDR and LaVine are a year older and Sacramento is in the Western Conference. Chicago (2023 -24) finished the season 39 - 43 while the Kings are currently 36 -40.
So SAC goes 3-3 the rest of the way to match 23-24 CHI? Count me in. Reaaallly doubt they can do it though. Losing to WAS hurts soooo much; it wasn't even the second night of a b2b or sth. Had they won, they probably wouldn't need to beat PHX in the final game to get the 10th spot. Now they have their upcoming 4 games within a 6-day span...
Zooming out a bit: Stone should NEVER get rid of the future swaps with PHX and DAL. The lottery odds have become so spicy that the ten worst teams of any given season can have their picks land between 1 and 11 rather easily. OKC gets a top 6, top 7 pick from PHI in so many simulated outcomes lol, and that swap is protected. Our two swaps in 2027 (PHX) and 2029 (DAL) aren't.
If we get lucky and land top 3 this year and in both 2027 and 2029, we would have top 3 picks in 5 of 9 years. Didn't even count Amen in 2023. Spurs- and Warriors-esque dynasty. The Rockets draft dynasty
Ja Morant hits the game winner on a lucky middie that was aimed dead on at the side of the rim, touches every part, and bounces in. Miami drops a half-game back from Phoenix. Booo.
A while back, in one of these threads, I gave the remaining schedules for Sacramento, Dallas and Phoenix. Even though Sacramento at the time had a lead of a few games, I didn't have faith in them to clearly pull away from Phoenix and Dallas. Even though the standings will twitch a bit over the rest of the season, they shouldn't change too much. Tankathon Western Conference and Eastern Conference 1. Utah 2. Washington 3. Charlotte 4. New Orleans 5. Philadelphia 6. Brooklyn 7. Toronto 8. San Antonio 9. Portland 10. Chicago 11. Miami 12. Phoenix 13. Sacramento 14. Dallas
Lakers loss gives us some breathing room and hopefully keeps them in that 4/5 matchup and away from our bracket.
I honestly don't get why everyone wants to play the Nuggets in a potential 2nd round series. No one has an answer for Jokic but our particular weakness defensively is in the post. Sengun is much improved on that end but excels more in a help position, he's not going to stand up Jokic or push him off the block. Our great defense is on the wings and the perimeter and we have good defensive rotations on drives. We get destroyed when good post scorer can just go 1on1 in the paint. I actually think we match up significantly better with the Lakers or Warriors. We had single digit losses to both at full strength since the all star break. We would have won both games if just one of Jalen or FVV shot the ball well. To beat the Nuggets we would have to completely change our typical defensive gameplan AND have great shooting performances. For the lakers/warriors we just have to play our normal game and we will win any game Jalen OR FVV is scoring well in.
For some of us, it isn't about who the best second round matchup is, it's about the fastest way to eliminate the Lakers and Warriors from the playoffs. If the Nuggets are healthy, I agree the Rockets would have a much better chance against the Lakers.
it's because anyone who watches the nba consistently knows that playing the lakers and warriors is essentially playing 5v8, on top of adam silver pulling some additional shenanigans. at least with denver, we know that while jokic will obviously kill us (he kills everyone anyway), we won't have a huge uphill officiating battle to overcome. at least a puncher's chance.
I’ll gladly take the Nuggets for various reasons: 1. No Warriors and no Lakers who as has been mentioned will get the whistle, it will be ugly, it will be very frustrating and they will live at the line. No thank you. 2. Playing former champions should give us a bit of extra juice. 3. You are going against one of the best if not the best player in the NBA over the last 5 years and match him up with our own All-Star in Sengun. I feel Jokic provides the best test for him, especially because of the comparisons. 4. Similarly, Murray would provide a great test for Green, a similar player in terms of sometimes looking like THE star and other times not playing up to his level. Like Green, they have doubted Murray and for good reason given the struggles. Murray also handles the ball a ton and would be a nice cross match for Amen, but also Jalen at times to guard. 5. At least that series would be pretty basketball. Plus Westbrook is a serious x factor, because his costly turnovers and wild play could definitely work in our favor and make it a competitive series.
Rockets are 5-3 vs the Nuggets in their last 8 games. The Nuggets are basically Jokic, a great coach and a bunch of frauds. They are much easier to beat IMO than Lakers or GSW since those teams are the golden children and you are 5v8. The best scenario is both GSW and Lakers meet in the first round and one of them is taken out. I am sure Lakers and Warriors feel the same way, they are like 2-6 and 0-8 vs Nuggets so they would also rather we take out the Nuggets first and then they feel like they have the edge in talent and experience over us.
