Everything Playoffs 2024

[The Great One]

SGA finally playing aggressive. This is how he should play.

OKC's coach needs to stop fucking around. Staple Giddey's ass to the bench. Start Joe. Wallace and Wiggins as the first 2 players off the bench.

[slaw]

Nice win for OKC. That’s a gritty comeback game for them.

Dallas looked gas late.

[3inthekeon]

SGA finally playing aggressive. This is how he should play.

OKC's coach needs to stop fucking around. Staple Giddey's ass to the bench. Start Joe. Wallace and Wiggins as the first 2 players off the bench.

Giddey is a clutch crunch time inbounder. Only redeeming quality in the playoffs.

[Maury]

Doncic is such a whiner. Don’t know if he’s ever lost a game because of anything other than officiating.

[3inthekeon]

If the Raptors didn't move up to 4 to grab Barnes in 2021 and ended up with Giddey at 7, imagine how the posters calling for his scalp now would be reacting.

But Presti is smart, so free pass for him.

[DanH]

I am curious why you always have the axe to grind with certain posters like golden and I am not excluded from this special attention from you, always going out of your busy day to start a rabbit hole of a discussion.

Yet people (I can pinpoint two) with strongest opinions about this particular topic regarding this “coaching does not matter shit” you seem to find away to go around it. Haha.

It’s not necessarily golden arguing about coaching matters in general but more about Nurse as a coach which we already know he will always not a big fan of that guy.

Some arguments are nuanced and worth having. Others, less so.

[DanH]

Hobbled core players in the Celtics series? I recall Lowry having a sore ankle, but that ended up being a nothing burger... he was spectacular. Hayward was out for the Celtics. But what I do recall was Ibaka and Gasol getting played off the floor by guys like Daniel Theis and rookie Robert Williams. Also remember Nurse being saved by the Lowry to OG miracle shot, or else Raps would've been swept. Just like Nurse's reputation was saved by the Kawhi 4-bounce miracle. Those player miracles are great coaching, right?

And the Knicks missing Randle are somehow a good team, but the Sixers having Embiid and Maxey are not? I thought high-end talent is what wins in the playoffs. Nurse had that, plus he didn't trust his bench (nothing changes).

And nobody ever puts Butler in the same category as legit MVPs, yet Spo has helped him to beat guys like Giannis and Tatum in the playoffs, because guys like Duncan Robinson, Jae Crowder, Caleb Martin, Gabe Vincent and Butler himself punch above their weight. Not always, but at least Spo demonstrates the ability to coach up, way more often than Nurse. Again, Nurse has zero... yes, zero, playoff success since Kawhi left. That's elite?

I mean, high end talent is a huge factor in whether you win. Including how your high end talent plays, and Embiid has fallen short there his whole career, it's hardly a Nurse problem. That said, your high end talent also has to have good stuff around it, and with Embiid just coming back from injury he and Maxey couldn't drag that roster to success against a much deeper (at the time, even sans Randle) Knicks squad. Without OG they look really thin but with him there they were a force.

Yeah, Spo coaches Jimmy Butler led teams - ie good teams with an excellent player (who is underrated because he doesn't play as hard in the regular season) - to success. Same as Nick.

I'd argue Spo is maybe the best coach in the league and a notch above Nick though. Still wouldn't expect him to carry a flawed roster to any real success. Same with the mess that is the 76ers and Nurse.

Zero playoff success since Kawhi left? Either you accept nuance into the discussion and recognize that a hard fought 7 game series with a tough comeback, along with a similar comeback in the 76ers series with an injury riddled roster, are relative successes, or you dispense with context and give him the playoff series win he achieved against the Nets. Fine with either way, just don't cherry pick what nuance you want to consider to paint Nurse in the worst possible light.

Yeah, success in sports relies on luck sometimes. Crazy. Glad you figured that out, no one else ever has. Again though - if you want to dive into the luck discussion, you need to write off most successes and failures of basically all coaches ever.

[A.I]

If the Raptors didn't move up to 4 to grab Barnes in 2021 and ended up with Giddey at 7, imagine how the posters calling for his scalp now would be reacting.

But Presti is smart, so free pass for him.

They do need to trade Giddey. I don't think he is a bad player or they made the wrong choice drafting him, but its an awkward fit. Giddey is mainly a playmaker that needs the ball in his hands. They already have Shai, Williams and now Chet. Giddey also isn't a good shooter so he kind of got phased out on a team that became the #1 seed and is in the Playoffs where mistakes have to be limited.

Giddey is young so they could get something back for him in a trade.

[golden]

I mean, high end talent is a huge factor in whether you win. Including how your high end talent plays, and Embiid has fallen short there his whole career, it's hardly a Nurse problem. That said, your high end talent also has to have good stuff around it, and with Embiid just coming back from injury he and Maxey couldn't drag that roster to success against a much deeper (at the time, even sans Randle) Knicks squad. Without OG they look really thin but with him there they were a force.

Yeah, Spo coaches Jimmy Butler led teams - ie good teams with an excellent player (who is underrated because he doesn't play as hard in the regular season) - to success. Same as Nick.

I'd argue Spo is maybe the best coach in the league and a notch above Nick though. Still wouldn't expect him to carry a flawed roster to any real success. Same with the mess that is the 76ers and Nurse.

Zero playoff success since Kawhi left? Either you accept nuance into the discussion and recognize that a hard fought 7 game series with a tough comeback, along with a similar comeback in the 76ers series with an injury riddled roster, are relative successes, or you dispense with context and give him the playoff series win he achieved against the Nets. Fine with either way, just don't cherry pick what nuance you want to consider to paint Nurse in the worst possible light.

Yeah, success in sports relies on luck sometimes. Crazy. Glad you figured that out, no one else ever has. Again though - if you want to dive into the luck discussion, you need to write off most successes and failures of basically all coaches ever.

What high-end talent did Thibs have vs. Nurse? Don't say Brunson, because you're specifically the guy who told me that "if you think Jalen Brunson can be a first option, on the level of Pascal.... then you are evaluating basketball wrong." And if you do say Brunson, then who coached him up and put him in a position to succeed as a high-level talent?

And are you really going to count Nurse beating the Long Island Nets in the bubble as Nurse's lone legitimate playoff series conquest? Really? You have really low standards for elite, is all I can say. Since you've asked me to choose my criteria for success, I'll go with results, just like Nurse would (he wrote the book on winning everywhere).

So 1 chip + 1 big asterisk 1st round series playoff win is a much worse resume than: Rivers, Lue, Vogel, Carlisle, Bud, Kerr, etc... Would love to see how you rank Nurse within that group, and why?

[DanH]

What high-end talent did Thibs have vs. Nurse? Don't say Brunson, because you're specifically the guy who told me that "if you think Jalen Brunson can be a first option, on the level of Pascal.... then you are evaluating basketball wrong." And if you do say Brunson, then who coached him up and put him in a position to succeed as a high-level talent?

And are you really going to count Nurse beating the Long Island Nets in the bubble as Nurse's lone legitimate playoff series conquest? Really? You have really low standards for elite, is all I can say. Since you've asked me to choose my criteria for success, I'll go with results, just like Nurse would (he wrote the book on winning everywhere).

So 1 chip + 1 big asterisk 1st round series playoff win is a much worse resume than: Rivers, Lue, Vogel, Carlisle, Bud, Kerr, etc... Would love to see how you rank Nurse within that group, and why?

I think I've made my mea culpas on Brunson and told you it was a good call on your part, no? Offensively Brunson is a big star at this point. But OG is also a huge star defensively and that's always underrated, and him missing is largely why the Pacers have any life at all this series.

Yeah, maybe Thibs "coached up" Brunson, but then so did Nick with Pascal. Not a surprise. And how much of that is coaching (for example, is Dwane Casey responsibly for what Kyle Lowry became? I think not.)?

I mean Rivers has maybe the longest record of underperforming or embarrassing playoff teams in history. If you want to list off the 5 or so best coaches in the NBA and say Nick is right around the bottom of that list, I'd say you are about right.

I do love that you say "I'll choose results" and still can't resist throwing in the asterisk indicating that you do not actually choose that.

[slaw]

Doncic is such a whiner. Don’t know if he’s ever lost a game because of anything other than officiating.

If he made his free throws last night....

[golden]

I think I've made my mea culpas on Brunson and told you it was a good call on your part, no? Offensively Brunson is a big star at this point. But OG is also a huge star defensively and that's always underrated, and him missing is largely why the Pacers have any life at all this series.

Yeah, maybe Thibs "coached up" Brunson, but then so did Nick with Pascal. Not a surprise. And how much of that is coaching (for example, is Dwane Casey responsibly for what Kyle Lowry became? I think not.)?

I mean Rivers has maybe the longest record of underperforming or embarrassing playoff teams in history. If you want to list off the 5 or so best coaches in the NBA and say Nick is right around the bottom of that list, I'd say you are about right.

I do love that you say "I'll choose results" and still can't resist throwing in the asterisk indicating that you do not actually choose that.

Hard to give Nurse credit for "coaching up" a 58-win team, when they were a 59-win team the year before.... with no superstar talent and less elite defenders.

But still, all playoff success with Nurse keeps going back to the chip season when he was gifted a GOAT defensive squad and injury luck... and he's been put on the pedestal ever since. He's had no playoff success since. I mean, it's even worse than that. Last 4 years he's missed the playoffs entirely and flamed out in the first round twice. That's way worse than Rivers, who also got the Sixers into the 2nd round, every year he coached.

[DanH]

Hard to give Nurse credit for "coaching up" a 58-win team, when they were a 59-win team the year before.... with no superstar talent and less elite defenders.

But still, all playoff success with Nurse keeps going back to the chip season when he was gifted a GOAT defensive squad and injury luck... and he's been put on the pedestal ever since. He's had no playoff success since. I mean, it's even worse than that. Last 4 years he's missed the playoffs entirely and flamed out in the first round twice. That's way worse than Rivers, who also got the Sixers into the 2nd round, every year he coached.

I mean, we all saw the difference between regular season and playoff success here and could see that coaching was one of the things holding them back (making winning series longer, losing series shorter). We didn't switch coaches to get more regular season wins.

Yes, team success is mostly about having a superstar. Coaching is a factor. No coach was taking the recent Raptors deep in the playoffs. And few coaches will completely tank an Embiid-led team (and few seem likely to be able to take one deep either, considering Embiid's fairly unique limitations as a superstar).

[golden]

Analytics be damned...

[A.I]

Analytics be damned...

While he can hit a 3, its crazy how effective and unguardable he is just taking 2s.