So Long, 141-Day Wait. Welcome Back, NBA: A Definitive Recap Of The Return To Play

So Long, 141-Day Wait. Welcome Back, NBA: A Definitive Recap Of The Return To Play

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by | Jul 30, 2020 | Featured, NBA

Before this article starts jotting down the path of events leading up to the league’s resumption in chronological order, do me a favor. Breathe a sigh of relief tonight as you wind down and turn on your television set, tuning into the TNT network to see everyone’s favorite TV uncles in Shaq, Ernie Johnson, Chuck, and Kenny.

For your patience, you, the reader, have surely earned the treat of witnessing professional basketball on a Turner Broadcasting network again in 2020, for the opportunity to view something so taken for granted in previous times will serve as such a saving grace and distracting agent from what’s going on in the country and world.

Wednesday, March 11, 2020. A date lathered in infamy. The day the world stopped turning, for all basketball fans.

Ticket sales postponed and Mass evacuations of stadiums in mere minutes, with the league’s tumultuous mountains being tectonically shifted by one tweet:

“The National Basketball Association will suspend its season, effective immediately.”

The numbness and uncertainty of sports returning in full force was felt in a variety of ways amongst all franchises, and more questions arose than prominent answers. For a season that is so narrowed down to its final several weeks, just what was to happen to playoff-qualifying organizations if the year was to be canned altogether? And, will we ever return to a shroud of normalcy that includes fans at some point (when it’s safe)?

It took 141 days to come up with that definitive answer. But we can say it with confidence now: The NBA is BACK.

In the time-lapse of four months, we’d never expect hoops to be back in the extent of a socially-distant bubble in Orlando, Florida, and Commissioner Adam Silver should be first in line to receive some of the good words on his work to keep the wheels rolling on such a climactic NBA season that no one wanted to see abolished abruptly.

It’s been a long road to get here, so take a trip down memory lane, chronicling the timeline from the start of the suspension to the first tip-off tonight at 6:30 p.m. ET on TNT, as well as documenting our experiences as NBA fans and beat writers of the game here at Sneaker Reporter.

March 11: During the afternoon of March 11, multiple media outlets commented on the cheeky, foolish behavior of Jazz center Rudy Gobert as the French Rejection decided to make a mockery of the oncoming COVID-19 pandemic crisis by patting several recording devices and phones owned by interviewers during a press conference, only to test positive for the Coronavirus. That ensuing night, medical officials run onto the hardwood of the Chesapeake Energy Arena with pace, urgently persuading coaches and referees to cancel the contest between the Utah Jazz and Oklahoma City Thunder, for fear of Utah’s infection possibility of the Thunder if they were to play them in a 60-minute game. They comply and tell the multitudinous crowd inside the ‘Peake to leave in an orderly manner.

That night, ripples were felt throughout the league as everyone who received the news on their mobile devices inside arenas across the country registered what could probably be impending doom as it related to their favorite team’s 2019-20 campaign. During ESPN’s broadcast of a Dallas Mavericks home game, lead commentator Ryan Ruocco and color commentator Doris Burke sign off for what would be the “last time in a while” in their words.

From a worldly perspective, spectator sports had been put on the backburner as professional soccer leagues shuttered fans from their stadiums as their athletic competitions continued.

The second slot of primetime action after Dallas’ home victory featured the Kings and Pelicans, and as follows, the league decided to postpone that game too. The suspension was enforced just an hour later.

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March 19: Media members and fans alike speculated whether or not if players can stay prepared for a potential resumption with practice facilities still being open up until the eighth day of the season’s suspension. Then, commissioner Silver decided that cleaning protocols were too cloudy to sort out, so further action to close all team facilities was taken. Players would have to find different ways to get shots up, while also keeping their conditioning in check.

Also, a bunch of players took to social media to flex their editing (and dance) skills with a plethora of “Tik Tok” videos. Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Celtics forward Jayson Tatum, Grizzlies rookie guard Ja Morant, Sixers rookie forward Matisse Thybulle and many others got rid of their boredom with creative short clips of them going viral performing signature dance routines or flashy edits popularized by the app.

As a result of this time at home during the nationwide quarantine, ESPN took the initiative to start up an NBA 2K Player’s Tournament, which was won by Phoenix suns star guard Devin Booker. Following that 2K tournament, ESPN decided to keep the live entertainment angle going with a tournament of the shooting game H.O.R.S.E., which was split into two weeks with the winner being Ohio native Mike Conley Jr. of the Utah Jazz.

April breezes by, and fans and players both question ESPN and ABC’s scheduling of Michael Jordan’s “The Last Dance” docuseries, which detailed the 1997-98 season of the soon-to-be three-peating dynasty known as the Chicago Bulls, which was set for release in June after when the NBA Finals was initially supposed to happen. Even LeBron James pleaded the television network to give fans the documentary early, considering that we didn’t have much else to do. And so, they caved in.

Little tidbits of history concealed for nearly 22 years were released to the public, and this ten-part documentary was enjoyed by its viewers as if it was a regular sporting event. So much so, that The Last Dance was the most viewed sports documentary in the history of the broadcasting company.

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April 29: All the questions about the possibilities surrounding a return to play were rocketed with a brand new argument put on the table: an isolated bubble in a secluded area to limit contraction of the coronavirus. Of course, this met criticism at first as this meant players would have to leave the safety of their homes to travel to an undisclosed location to continue their season. There wasn’t even a destination concrete enough for the bubble’s location.

But, lo and behold, Adam Silver rounded up all of his prospect cities, studied the cases of COVID-19 in each town, and boiled the debate into two destinations: Las Vegas and Orlando.

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May 8: Chris Paul, the president of the National Basketball Players’ Association, held a joint meeting – er, Zoom call – with commissioner Silver pertaining to the comfortability levels of the players if they were to be on board with getting back to playing the game they love.

Just like every other major decision that is made, skepticism still raced through the minds of players who were concerned with not just their safety, but the safety of the families of these athletes. Ultimately, the leaders of the NBPA, Commissioner Silver and the NBA Board of Governors reached a general consensus that said players wanted to keep the seasonal ship from sinking, deciding to finish the season and postseason if proper health protocols were to be carried out.

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May 20: Orlando is confirmed to be the bubble sight of the resumed season, with a return date TBA. While there was a flurry of prognosticators who wanted this season canceled due to the worldwide health threat, optimism grew like a rose in the spring the moment Adam Silver got the confirmation to keep the season going inside a secluded part of Florida. And where would there resumed season commence? In none other than the “Greatest Place on Earth”, Walt Disney World, and specifically at the ESPN Wide World of Sports at Disney Springs. Players wanting to chase a championship were ecstatic, while onlookers of the game on the sidelines could not wait to see their teams do exactly that.

And then, the grotesque eight minutes and 46 seconds during the afternoon of May 25th happened.

A slight misunderstanding of a minuscule counterfeit $20 bill led to the unjust murder of George Floyd on the curb of a Minnesota grocery store, inciting massive violent protests and profits of rage that ravaged the city of Minneapolis, leaving it in a boundless blaze. And whilst non-violent protests carried the truths of necessary changes to the American criminal justice system, cities across America shared in the same dismay of the state of rising fascism and authoritarian rule that’s existed over Black America for the 401 years they’ve been on the North American continent like a brooding cloud.

Players didn’t just take to social media; they took to the streets.

This time – enough was enough.

NBA stars from all teams – Jaylen Brown of the Celtics, Malcolm Brogdon of the Pacers, Kyrie Irving of the Nets, and a continuous list of players – voiced not only their displeasure of the governmental inaction to provide equal justice for the killers of Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Elijah McClain, and countless others but their viewpoints of the season’s resumption and if it really took away from the attention and the traction that the Black Lives Matter movement had profusely gained in such a diminutive amount of time.

Lakers backup center Dwight Howard stood at the forefront of the argument, saying that basketball would detract attention from what was occurring around the country.

“No basketball, until we get things resolved,” Howard said.

Many other NBA athletes agreed with the sentiment, and for a while, it seemed like there was a huge pause on a return to NBA action due to the social justice outreach of the players, who realized that the NBA product (that’s 85-90% African-American) would be a shell of itself without Black talent.

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May 29: That pause would turn into a hard play, as Adam Silver shook up the sporting world with a massive “We’re Back” announcement. Silver proclaimed that hoops would (then) officially tip-off on July 31. That date would then shift to official tip-offs occurring a day earlier on July 30.

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June 4: 22 teams were then announced to be confirmed as bubble entrants; the 16 playoff-qualified squads in both the East (9 teams) and West (13 teams), as well as the on-the-bubble (pun not intended) teams out West vying for the final playoff spots – New Orleans, Portland, San Antonio, Phoenix. On the Eastern side, Washington was the only non-playoff team announced to join the bubble in Orlando.

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June 5: The 22-team format would get ratified and approved by the NBPA. It would essentially include three tune-up preseason games, and eight regular-season games to determine seeding for the playoffs. For the outlying teams, the ultimatum of getting within four games of the eighth seed meant a play-in tournament, where the winner gets a postseason berth.

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June 23: COVID-19 testing took place as players and organizations gathered traveling parties to take the trip to Orlando. However, some players, like Lakers guard Avery Bradley, Suns forward Kelly Oubre Jr., and various Brooklyn Nets like DeAndre Jordan, Nico Claxton, Spencer Dinwiddie, Wilson Chandler, and Taurean Prince would say no to the return, meaning new players like free agent Tyler Johnson and the legendary Jamal Crawford would join forces with Caris LeVert for a new-look Nets faction. The NBA also agrees for players to wear social justice messages on the backs of their jerseys.

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July 7-29: Players arrive in Orlando, and immediately get settled into their many hotel rooms on the luxurious Disney Springs property. As the NBA Bubble Life Twitter and Instagram pages documented the daily activities of the campus, which basically looked like a humongous summer camp comprised of fishing lakes, player lounges, Disney attractions, pools, golf courses, and more.

Fans got a clear glimpse of what this abridged brand of NBA Basketball would look like during scrimmages during the final week of July. Surprisingly enough, the optics and audio of the bubble were more than enough to appease the average NBA fan.

And that’s the gist of it when it comes to the return to professional play. We’re in the present day now, with the game between the Pelicans and Jazz set to tip-off in a few.

So sit back, and enjoy yourself as you palate competitive basketball that counts toward something tonight at 6:30 p.m. ET. Hoops are back. Let’s do this thing.

Jul 30, 2020 No Comments
Sneaker Reporter – NBA: The Bubble’s 10 Best Players

Sneaker Reporter – NBA: The Bubble’s 10 Best Players

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by | Jul 22, 2020 | Featured, NBA

So, we’re down to nine days on the countdown until NBA basketball blesses our eyesight.

Meaning that, yes, the NBA hiatus will have accumulated an extensive waiting period of 141 official days.

It’s been far too long since we’ve gotten to actually see an orange ball sliver through a nylon basketball net (unless, of course, you’re in a state whose parks have opened, you’ve personally got some shots up, you own a hoop, played hours of NBA 2k20 or if you’ve passed the time watching a plethora of antiquated highlights) so seeing our favorite professional athletes on the hardwood should serve as a massive heaping of good fortune to come as the resumed season tips off on July 30, 2020.

But if you’ve been remissive of memories of the league’s most prominent storylines, or if you’ve been unable to keep up with our own 22-team countdown we’ve been updating daily in the past two weeks, then do we have the treat for you, fellow reader.

As the NBA’s selected teams continue to prepare for the abridged season, (safely) practicing within the Orlando bubble, some of the world’s best will attempt to guide their teams to one of the hardest, if not the most difficult, title ever won in the sport’s history. Injury, infection from COVID-19, or the added pressure of failing to perform under such tight conditions without the benefit of a home-court advantage. But for the names to be mentioned on this list, it’ll be just another day in the office, considering the things they’ve accomplished up until the hiatus confirmed on the evening of March 11.

Keep in mind: this list is completely subjective and everyone has their own opinion of a top 10. This is ours. And that’s that.

So sit back, find a refreshing beverage to enjoy because it’s hot and sticky outside, and read up on the ten best players in the bubble trying to bring home an NBA championship for their teams.

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10. Devin Booker (26.1 ppg., 4.2 rpg., 6.6 apg., Shooting Guard For #13 Phoenix Suns)

It’s going to take a lot of extra effort besides the usual contributions from Phoenix’s coveted talent for the Suns to even get the chance to sniff the eighth and final seed. But if we know anything about D. Book, we know he’s adept at getting open, usually finishing plays with a silky-smooth stroke that makes water look dry, regardless if he’s always been deterred by a short wingspan.

The lightning-fast 6’6 Kentucky product ethers an advanced scoring skill set similar to the late Kobe Bryant with the way he’s able to make his shot against almost all defensive coverages he’ll see and though his Suns may not win a lot of games, it’s always hard for fans of his expertise to say no when he’s on their television sets.

If the superstar scoring two-guard has anything up his sleeves to get the Suns over the hump, it’ll likely be around an average 30+ point game he’ll have to put up every game, considering the number of shots he’s required to put up if his Suns are to have a shot. Being without a true No. 2 will be the main perpetrator behind that.

Suns forward Kelly Oubre Jr. is a no-go for Orlando due to the newly extended Sun opting out due to concerns of COVID-19 infection, and that’s worrisome for the Suns since he’s having a career year averaging 18.7 points per contest. Floor spacing won’t come easy for Phoenix but with the help of lead assisting man Ricky Rubio and big man DeAndre Ayton, it’ll hopefully allow Booker to display his talents onto the national stage in their eight games in Orlando.

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9. Jayson Tatum (23.6 ppg., 7.1 rpg., 2.9 apg., Power Forward For #3 Boston Celtics)

We’ve begun to experience the birth of a superstar when witnessing the growth of Celtics forward Jayson Tatum, albeit when NBA fans weren’t quite expecting to see such a meteoric rise in offensive productivity and leadership skills when his Cs just acquired Kemba Walker in the offseason of 2019. But now you can say the 2017 NBA Draft worked out quite well for a team sorting through the scouting folders to find its next big thing. Surely, they’ve found it in Tatum.

The penultimate No. 1 guy in Beantown that’ll chariot the Celtics into the title picture, Tatum’s ability to utilize an endless array of dribbles, spins, drives, and sidestep threes puts him in an elite class above a lot of premier NBA superstars. Frankly, you could make the case that he is a top 10 player in the league right now, and we’re not just saying that because of his placement on this list.

When Boston decided to trade down two slots to get Tatum three years ago, they saw him as the perfect complement to a high-scoring backcourt – a lengthy Paul George/Paul Pierce/Tobias Harris hybrid stretch forward that is proficient at knocking down the deep ball and creating separation off the dribble with the help of those long arms that additionally help out on the perimeter when locking up multiple positions.

But since then, his ceiling has rocketed up a few floors since those predictions were printed on paper.

Up until the hiatus, Tatum’s March wasn’t as fiery as his February, where he reached uncharted territory by becoming the first Celtic since Larry Bird to average 30+ points per game in a month. Now, with the sights of championship aspirations and a relatively easy schedule, the Duke man is chomping at the bit to show he’s ready to prove himself as a max-deal caliber player, and his Cs a worthy championship contender.

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8. Damian Lillard (28.9 ppg., 4.3 apg., 7.8 apg., Point Guard For #9 Portland Trail Blazers)

These Portland Trail Blazers are going to be the watch of the bubble, if what they have coming back on paper can absolve their transgressions of repeated losing streaks, leading to them landing at ninth in the West with a last-minute invite to the Orlando bubble. But the simple reason they aren’t lower in the seeding than what they could have been all season: the extravagant, otherworldly carrying of an undermanned roster by Damian Lillard.

Other than going on an absolute tirade in the days and weeks leading up to the All-Star break, Dame Dolla’s season has been something for the books with the way he’s found simplicity to drop 50 whenever he pleases, showing his resolve to get his Blazers to puncture the playoff picture, as they experienced the franchise’s second-highest level of success a season ago making it to the Western Conference Finals a season ago.

The electric guard has an affinity for accentuating himself from the pack of average guards by being a top-tier playmaker who not only reads and reacts to defenses superbly but is quick and explosive enough to create mismatches and space nearly everywhere on the court. And when it’s Dame Time, there’s no one else who wants the ball in his hands. It truly is a thing of beauty seeing Lillard stepback and send missiles from the logo, only to see the ball coat the back of the iron with neither rim nor net move.

His supporting cast is rightfully going to be bolstered come first tip-off as Jusuf Nurkic and Zach Collins return from injuries that have kept them for the duration of the season (Nurkic hasn’t played since March of 2019 and Collins only played 3 games) which should lower Lillard’s numbers, but that won’t quite matter if he can get his Blazers into playoff seeding.

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7. Pascal Siakam (23.6 ppg., 7.5 rpg., 2.3 apg., Power Forward For #2 Toronto Raptors)

Last year’s Most Improved Player had A LOT to be replaced around him as his Raps were supposed to undergo a transitional period of getting a couple down seasons under their belt in order to gather enough bargaining chips to land another All-Star caliber player alongside the 7-foot Cameroonian.

Turns out, fate had other plans. Instead of going through one of those periods, that team from the 6ix is right back into the thick of things, engineering a gameplan to potentially re-assert themselves into the NBA Finals picture as defending champions from last year’s win in six over Golden State. Led by their best player in Spicy P himself, Siakam’s progression from G-League prospect with Raptors 905 to NBA All-Star has been nothing but fulfilling to witness.

It goes to show that championship infrastructure is not altogether upheld by its most integral pieces, but the parts surrounding it. That was the case last year as the team helped Kawhi Leonard fit like a spoke on the ever-turning wheel that was the 2018-19 World Champion Toronto Raptors and quite evidently, history is repeating itself.

Siakam is one of two All-Stars on a championship-defending team. He alone is an uncommonly quick big man who energetically runs the floor and is prone to putting on aerial shows with his putbacks and towering slams while also displaying a keen IQ and proficiency for shooting the long ball.

As a teammate, however, Siakam’s multifaceted approach to the offensive side of the ball is met with his versatility as a defender, and along with other parts like Kyle Lowry, Fred Van Vleet and the rest of Nick Nurse’s deep rotation gives Toronto a better-than-average shot at repeating as NBA champions.

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6. Paul George (21 ppg., 5.7 rpg., 3.9 apg., Forward for #2 Los Angeles Clippers)

Paul George is pretty fond of this time of year, the time where the regular season winds down and his play ramps up. Though his numbers may take a bit of a hit as he is still working out the kinks in the path of finding the ultimate chemistry with new teammate Kawhi Leonard, PG-13 is still capable of transforming into Playoff P when necessary.

And what is George’s X-Factor that he has brought to a Clippers team that’s ascended the ranks to title contention, exactly? Well, take your pick.

Your selections range from his averaged 22 points over the last five postseasons with both Oklahoma City and Indiana, elite footwork and ball-handling skills you wouldn’t expect a forward of his stature to have, pesky on-ball defense with the amenity of hawk-esque wingspan, 40 percent three-ball shooting, or dexterity and court vision when asked to handle guard responsibilities.

We knew that once he was paired with Kawhi Leonard as part of that three-team blockbuster deal that sent Kawhi Leonard from the Raptors and PG13 from the Thunder to Los Angeles in exchange for a bag full of picks for the Thunder and Clippers, LAC’s title window burst open faster than a shaken Cola can. Now, as the teams second (or third, depending on your perspective) choice to take over games, George’s presence almost imminently doubles the Clips’ chances of winning it all in Orlando.

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5. Anthony Davis (26.7 ppg., 9.4 rpg., 3.1 apg., Forward/Center for #1 Los Angeles Lakers)

To put it shortly and neatly: few men can do what Anthony Davis can do on a basketball court. A shoe-in for a First-Team All-Defense slot and nomination for this year’s Defensive Player of the Year waiting for him, Davis’ first season as a Klutch Sports client and Los Angeles Laker has been one of the most profiled and historic seasons to date.

Davis, both dominant in the post on offense and defense, really flashed his athleticism and agility in a Lakers uniform the same way he marveled and dazzled New Orleans fans during his first eight seasons as a pro. Davis is known for not only being a well-rounded shooter that can set defenses ablaze from mid-range and deep off pick-and-pop sets as a roll man, but the Kentucky man is just as aggressive when isolating against opposing wings and centers, opting to take them off the dribble to pull up for a jumper, or show off that gazelle-like footwork around the rim.

And when it comes to swatting shots away, Davis is a savant. He’s rejecting around 2.4 shots per contest, and further contributes to the Lakers average win margin, which is only second to Milwaukee’s.

Other than Dwyane Wade, Davis might be the best teammate LeBron James has ever had, and for the Lakers to overcome the likes of the Rockets, Nuggets, and Clippers in the West, as well as whoever comes out of the slugfest in the East, they’ll need the NBA 2k20 cover athlete to be the MVP candidate he’s played like all year in the isolated, quiet bubble.

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4. James Harden (34.4 ppg., 6.4 rpg., 7.4 apg., Shooting Guard For #6 Rockets)

The league’s leader in scoring is looking to add some championship hardware to his already decorated mantle back home in Houston. James Harden is far and away the most unguardable player in all of basketball, and as a defender, you have a better chance of rolling three dice and having them all land on six.

Harden’s rare proclivity to make some wild off-angle shots with the slightest of stepback (egregious travels at times, if you will) is the stuff of legend, and to be honest, we haven’t a pure shot-maker from all around the floor like him since MJ. In addition, being 6’5 while weighing 220 pounds makes him an efficient rebounder and dangerous slasher if defenders try to hand-check him and force him to his right.

Other than his teammate Russell Westbrook, there really isn’t another guard like him that can draw contact on just about every play, constantly putting the pressure on bigs who get in foul trouble and coaches to consistently change the look of their frontcourt and defensive coverages altogether.

He gets a lot of flack for it but makes up for it at the line shooting around 86 percent from the charity stripe, a considerable contribution to his scoring numbers which could rival or even top Wilt Chamberlain’s single-season record for 40+ averaged points per game in a season.

With an abridged season that has a lengthy layout, expect Harden to take home his third scoring title and if all goes well for the Small-Ball Rockets coached by Mike D’Antoni, a shot at the franchise’s third NBA title could appear in their not-too-distant future.

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3. Kawhi Leonard (26.9 ppg., 7.3 rpg., 5 apg., Forward For #2 Los Angeles Clippers)

Another MVP candidate and favorite due to the way he’s been playing, Leonard is progressing at a historic pace, and if his balanced Clippers team can execute in the bubble, we’re talking about possibly the two most dominant years by an individual player since LeBron’s 2012-2013 run by Leonard as he goes into Orlando with the intention of claiming his second Finals MVP in a row, and third Finals MVP award for his career.

And while the Lakers present he and his Clips with the greatest challenge now a position under them for second in the division, there isn’t much for LAC to be worried about when it comes to comparing starting lineups.

And for one player that’s masterful at preparing his body with Load Management, now you factor in the added resting period of a full offseason and more due to the season being placed on hiatus. That can only signify one thing: a healthy, hungry Kawhi Leonard who is looking to build off his playoff averages of 30.1 points of 49 percent shooting from a year ago being primed and ready to go, with an even better cast than he had in Toronto. That’s frightening.

One of the most gifted and complete players walking the face of the earth, Leonard’s hand size aren’t the only anomaly on the board. Speed-of-light reflexes, instinctive lateral quickness, and gut-checking strength are what set him apart defensively, but on offense, his balance and tenacity to make his shot from all three levels make him one of, if not the world’s, best player. And when things get bleak and the Clippers require his magic, Leonard puts on that signature poker face and gets to work on both ends of the floor, looking like a Michael Jordan re-enactment at the forward spot.

But the fact is it’s all on the shoulders of Leonard as the team’s leader, and he will be the tipping point on the scale of determining whether or not the Clippers take it all the way to a franchise-first title this year.

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 2. Giannis Antetokounmpo (29.6 ppg., 13.7 rpg., 5.8 apg., Forward For #1 Milwaukee Bucks)

Oh, you thought the reigning MVP was going to be left off this list, didn’t you? Of course, you didn’t. As a part of this dominant Bucks team that’s set records in both average scoring margin and total offensive and defensive efficiency in 2019-20, Milwaukee is capable of winning numbers of games without Giannis Antetokounmpo, but those wins are multiplied when the Greek Freak is leading his team to victory.

Milwaukee poses as perhaps the second-most balanced and well-rounded roster set to compete in the Orlando games, and you could either see Giannis as the cherry on top of a league-best sundae, or the entire vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry Neopolitan ice cream base that have given Wisconsin hoops fans the sweet tooth for the past three years.

There’s no wrong answer, considering the goliath-like rise of Antetokounmpo, who has shown time and time again that there’s very little he cannot do on a basketball court. The 7-foot Greek God has a center’s body and wingspan, but the shiftiness and speed of a guard. For the sake of not having a better cliche’ to describe him right now, he’s a freak of nature.

Still, as great as he is and is becoming with his ability to decorate stat sheets every night, his game is still incomplete. Turnovers have been an issue for Antetokounmpo, and he struggles as an outside shooter when halfcourt defenses pack weakside and drive-side. That hasn’t deterred him and his Bucks yet, for they are such a well-oiled machine that is a clear favorite to come out of the East, all thanks to him and more.

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1. LeBron James (25.7 ppg., 7.9 rpg., 10.6 apg., Forward For #1 Los Angeles Lakers)

Daftly explained in a Lakers post-practice press conference yesterday, LeBron James has been asked the same inquiries of ‘How’s it going? How are you enjoying the bubble?’ And James constantly blurts out the same answer:

“I just say it’s 2020. Nothing is normal in 2020.”

And to play his advocate, he has a point.

By any measure, it’s been a good, if not a great year for the King. His Lakers are No. 1 in the West. He’s playing on a Lakers team that will return to the playoffs for the first time in seven years with what Vegas odds are describing as the likeliest champion in Orlando. He’s 35 years old winning the war (for now) against Father Time, both leading his team in scoring and the entire league in assists per game. And he’s paired up with another MVP candidate in Anthony Davis, who can rightfully carry the Lakers to their 17th NBA Championship reign.

And then you throw in the reality of having to be the most prolific and polarizing figure in all of American professional sports, while being looked at to have the most prominent sociopolitical voice that any athlete can have across the world amidst a flurry of prognosticators condemning his play with every step he takes, every move he makes and every word he says in response to the social unrest in this country.

And, though it needs little, if any, mention, James still plays with a heavy heart, for he is playing in his late friend Kobe Bryant’s honor, all while fulfilling the promise to Laker Nation that good times are coming, even if his ride off into the sunset of retirement is but a few years away.

It’s just another day in the life of many people’s GOAT.

Arguably the most well-rounded player the game has ever seen, James’ adept passing ability and vision to see everyone and everything moving on the court shows his prowess and ever-adjusting knowledge as a student of the game. James is still a freight train driving to the rack and is still a clutch shooter in the game’s waning moments.

Three championships, 16 All-Star appearances, two gold medals, three league MVPs, toppled records including being the all-time leader in playoff points while being third all-time in scoring later, he’s in rarified air, still chasing ghosts in his 17th season.

And while he’s still finding ways to put up 25+ points a night, there’s no telling what level he’ll kick up to once the playoffs roll by. “Playoff Bron” is nothing to play with, and if the Lakers get all of what’s promised from the all-time great in the postseason, ring #4 is in the Lakers’ sights.

Jul 22, 2020 No Comments
SR – NBA Bubble Breakdowns: #15 Orlando Magic

SR – NBA Bubble Breakdowns: #15 Orlando Magic

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by | Jul 15, 2020 | Featured, NBA

Happy Wednesday! The countdown until NBA basketball is just about two weeks away and fans who have been fiending for live, professional sports will finally get their wish 15 days from now on July 30. And since we’ve only god 15 days left until the season picks back up, today’s team clocked in at 15 is the first playoff-qualifying team to appear on our Bubble Breakdowns.

The Orlando Magic are an anomaly. In what many prophesized to be a year of recession for a team that’s unlikely to do any major climbing in their conference after being ousted in the first round of last year’s playoffs by eventual champion Toronto, these Orlando Magic sure do pack some moxy. Sitting at eighth in the East with the increasing probability of improving their seasonal mark as the (un)official hosts of the Orlando bubble, the Magic have proven time and time again that what Steve Clifford has brewing only spells good fortune for the organization’s growth.

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Orlando’s Season In Review (30-35, 8th in West)

Magic General Manager John Hammond has been around the block for a while, and knows a thing or two about winning. Just in case you’ve been forgetful of his track record, he was a perpetrator in the decision to draft some guy by the long name of Giannis Antetokounmpo a while back in 2013, all while sculpting the balanced, size-abundant Bucks roster awash with three-level scorers.

Current Milwaukee GM Jon Horst (last year’s executive of the year) has Hammond first in line to thank for the foundation of the roster he’d help to finalize, now with those very Bucks perched atop the East with title contention on their mind this year.

And truthfully, we’ve started to grow accustomed to witnessing this trend of rebuilding franchises hiring prospective executive board members with exceptional eyes when it comes to drafting and scouting, because when you’re pretty good at your job, other businesses and organizations catch wind of your success rate.

We’re seeing it now with the Bulls hiring former Nuggets GM Artūras Karnišovas to be their Vice President of Basketball Operations, who made the decision to take Nikola Jokic on the same draft night that Antetokounmpo was selected back in 2013, as this normalization of rebuilding teams making the first step toward playoff contention by hiring credible employees has become lockstep.

But while the Magic haven’t really had that main slugger as a true No. 1 All-Star caliber talent, you could say they’ve been on this trend before it went mainstream.

Assessing this year, Steve Clifford’s Magic were on the cusp of making it back to the playoffs for a second-straight year, up until the March 11 suspension happened as a result of the anxieties surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic. They’re five games under .500 but are primed to touch the postseason under the effective and not-so-flashy play that garners attention from social media handles.

They’ve had a solid roster to lean on all season, and while they’ve flown under the radar, they’ve really grinded it out on the defensive end and along the way have learned to accentuate each other’s offensive skillset the more they’ve gotten to play this year.

The mantras of grind and work ethic ring through the walls of the AdventHealth Practice Facility, extending from executives and coaches to the players. They’ve worked with what they have, haven’t lamented over shortcoming, and have produced effectively. It’s been a life code for John Hammond to live by, and surely by now its rubbed off on the infrastructure of his organization.

A roster with the likes of All-Star big man Nikola Vucevic, Evan Fournier, Aaron Gordon, Terrence Ross, D.J. Augustin, Markelle Fultz, Jonathan Isaac (who was lost for the season in January with a knee injury but could possibly be a go for Orlando’s resumed season), James Ennis III and Mo Bamba don’t look all that menacing on paper, but they’ll give you a physical four quarters on any given night.

Not only have they posted a top-10 defensive rating among the other 29 teams in the league, but they’ve pieced it together on the offensive end, with the 5th-highest Assist-to-turnover ratio (1.90) in the entire league and the third-least amount of turnovers (12.1 tov.) per game.

They started the year 3-7 but kept their head down and worked, maintaining control of the eighth seed in the East. For their work, they’ve been rewarded as they have one of the more favorable schedules for the season’s resumption.

Even better: Al-Farouq Aminu is all healed up from his meniscus injury sustained back in January, Evan Fournier is recovered from an injury to his right elbow, and certain parts of this Magic team like Markelle Fultz and Terrence Ross were getting into a good rhythm up until the hiatus, which they hope to expand on as the abridged season tips off in two weeks.

Ross was on a tear in the 10 games prior to the Magic having their season put on hold, averaging 22.2 points per contest. The former Washington Husky posted two 30+ point performances in the span of two weeks, the first against Minnesota at home in which he dropped 33 off 52 percent shooting, and the second being a season-high 35 dropped on Southeastern rival Miami’s heads on the road just six days later.

And as for Markelle Fultz, it seems like the former No. 1 overall pick back in 2017 has found his home and a place to not only grow his game but harvest some self-confidence and comfortability, something that he wasn’t quite able to obtain in such a city so critical of minor infractions like Philadelphia.

Factor in the fact that he has a point guard’s coach like Steve Clifford to navigate him through the process of learning how to be a franchise point guard, while also progressively giving him tidbits on how to be comfortable with the fact that the franchise’s success is largely incumbent upon his shoulders.

Positive reinforcement can go a long way and it looked like the DeMatha product needed it after having his psyche affected by constantly hearing the downtalk from an array of Philly media members who condemned his place in the professional rankings due to his inability to remain healthy and mentally intact due to those peculiar shoulder complications, which devastatingly changed his jumpshot.

Clifford provide it in substantiality, and with the guidance of veteran presence coming from Ross and D.J. Augustin, Fultz has been one of the breakout stars in the NBA. He might even be up for nomination for the Kia Most Improved Player award. This year, he’s shown fans as to why the Sixers couldn’t say no when they were on the clock with the first-overall pick three years ago. An ode to the era of wingspan-endowed guards that are long enough to guard multiple positions and score at will both inside and outside, Fultz is a phenomenal athlete that’s threatening on and off-ball.

He has such a natural fondness for utilizing that length to finish over defenders within two feet of the iron, or pull up from deep or mid-range as a pick-and-roll ball handler. His shooting stroke could use some work as he is still a work in progress, but he’s earned a starting spot as Clifford elected to have Augustin come off the bench in the favor of giving Fultz more reps in a starting spot.

But the Magic’s team MVP has to be Nikola Vucevic, right? I mean, how can he not? As the team leader in points (19.5) and rebounds (11.5), Vucevic has earned All-Star honors during this two-year period that’s seen a spike in productivity by his Magic. And just like any system that becomes spacious enough when there is a big man dynamic enough to not only be a brick wall when setting screens but a two-way threat that pops the three-ball like it’s second nature, he has become a luxury for this team that further plots their course to a respectable playoff run.

Some key wins for this Magic squad include one of their wins against teams .500 or better in their victory over the Los Angeles Lakers on January 15, sealed with two clutch layups by Markelle Fultz in the game’s waning minute. Fultz posted a triple-double in the most impressive win of the season, putting up 21 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists as the Magic snapped LA’s winning streak at nine games.

Their other key victory came on March 10,a day prior to the league suspending its season. Orlando was down 17 in the FedEx Forum, with yet another loss against a playoff team looming over their heads like an inescapable dark cloud.

And then, Terrence Ross happened.

The Magic two-guard would proceed to score 18 of his 24 points on the night in the fourth quarter, capping off what could be the most gratifying win of the season as the Magic were on a three-game winning streak, with momentum all but squandered as the hiatus halted everything.

Another moment from the season: (Another) infamous Aaron Gordon snub at the 2020 dunk contest. It seems as if the Orlando Magic might be cursed in the nationally-televised festivities of All-Star Saturday.

Or…it’s rigged…

Considering that they haven’t won a dunk contest since 2008 when Dwight Howard put on the Superman cape and “flew” from the free throw line, Aaron Gordon had the chance to avenge his loss in 2016 during that all-time dunk showcase against Zach LaVine, but thanks to another defeat at the hands of longtime Magic rival Dwyane Wade who served as a judge during the contest, Gordon would be given the score of a “9” after dunking over 7-foot Tacko Fall from the Boston Celtics.

Aside from that forgetful misjudgement, Orlando’s season’s had plenty of ups to counter the downs, meaning they should have all the optimism in the world heading into the Bubble.

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Orlando’s Roster For Season Resumption: Good times are ahead for “The Magic Kingdom’s team”

Nevermind their 7-26 record against teams .500 or better. This Magic team means business, and they play as hard as you could imagine any team fighting for their collective playoff lives.

Though undersupplied at pure superstars and bucket getters that can get theirs within isolation situations, this Magic team can still compete with ferosity on any given night, with much of their offense coming by way of their defense. Tough for ball handlers to get by, both Evan Fournier and Markelle Fultz man the frontcourt.

Fournier (18.8 ppg., 2.6 rpg., 3.2 apg., 1.1 spg), a former first-rounder out of France back in 2012, has taken over the role of being one of the reliable scoring options for a team that’s not too loaded offensively. He is shooting 45% from the field in his career, and 38% from three.

The Frenchman is a skilled guard who uses his strength and handle within the flow of the offense to effectively create his shot, and with the help of Fultz (12.1 ppg., 3.3 rpg., 5.2 apg.) and his ability to get to the rim both off cuts and off the dribble, it’s difficult for any opposing defense to stop the Magic’s backcourt.

At the Forward spot, it’s impossible to ignore the significance of Aaron Gordon’s continuosly improving game. His athleticism, explosiveness and dexterity to finish with both hands consistently was an already molded skillset the moment he walked in the NBA. Injuries have always plagued the former Arizona Wildcat, though he walks into Orlando with little ailment, ready to go.

Evident in what may have been his best stretches of games in his career, Gordon (14.4 ppg., 7.6 rpg., 3.7 apg.) went on a tirade after his disappointment in the Chicago dunk contest, posting averages of 15.4 points, 6.8 assists while shooting 47.7 percent from the field. To cap off his February, he dropped 27 points, grabbed 10 rebounds and dished 4 assists against the Brooklyn Nets on a career-best night for the six-year veteran.

In the other Forward spot lies James Ennis III (6.8 ppg., 4.1 rpg., 1.1 apg.), picked up in the trade deadline in a deal with Philadelphia. The scoring guard/wing hybrid has been a journeyman of sorts, now playing on the eighth NBA team in his career (well ninth, if you count the Perth Wildcats in the Austrailian National Basketball League). Though given a limited opportunity to showcase his expertise, he’s a pure shot creator and helps to stretch the floor with his 41.2 field goal percentage and 30.3 shooting percentage from deep.

He returns to the team after reportedly recovering from the Coronavirus, and looks to get right into team drills the moment he is given the ‘OK’ to do so.

Nikola Vucevic (19.5 ppg., 11 rpg., 3.7 apg., 0.9 bpg.) is the last starter for Steve Clifford’s Magic. As mentioned earlier, he’s not only a strong rebounder and unheralded pro that’s only earned one All Star selection in his career, but one of the more game-breaking offensive juggernauts in the NBA. As great as his footwork and strength are when he is on the block, he too can alter the way defenses play him with his ability to shoot the three-ball, with his fairly-efficient 32.9 three-point percentage.

Orlando has one of the more well-rounded rotations of all 22 teams heading into the bubble to restart the season. Starting off with former starter D.J. Augustin (10.4ppg., 2.2 rpg., 4.6 apg.), who openly accepted his relegation to the bench in favor of letting Markelle Fultz start over him,  Augustin is an experienced scorer who, though undersized, has the potency of taking over an entire offense, and especially so since he was the starter to begin the season. While running Clifford’s halfcourt sets, rarely does he ever turn over the ball, usually opting to the be the lead scorer when needed.

Alongside him is the established perimeter scorer Terrence Ross (14.8 ppg., 3.2 rpg., 1.2 apg.). He is an explosive leaper and slasher with a scorer’s mentality who also assists the Magic with his high energy on the defensive end, and he is just as capable of handling his business when it comes to scoring in 5-out sets.

Additionally, in the second unit lies talented wing Wesley Iwundu (5.3 ppg., 2.5 rpg., 1apg.) who is slightly consistent from deep with his hard-to-contest seven foot frame, but can certainly improve in his role as a 3-and-D wing, shooting at 31.3 percent. Forward/center hybird Gary Clark is also within the second shift of players, as he is a tenacious defender that can affect shots with his 6’6 frame. He is another 3-and-D piece who can draw out bigs to the perimeter as he shoots a little over 37 percent from three-land.

Lastly, first-rounder out of Texas and 7-footer Mo Bamba (5.5ppg., 5 rpg., 0.7 apg.) is a fan favorite who is known for being tree-like when guarding the rim, averaging 1.4 blocks per contest. In his second season, Bamba has also added a proficient three ball to his library, shooting a fiery 35.6 percent.

Other rotational pieces in Cliffords lineup include Michael Carter-Williams (7.2ppg., 3.3rpg., 2.4 apg) a talented point guard who, just like Fultz, is an advanced slasher with the amenity of legth and wingspan benefitting while standing at 6’6, center Khem Birch (3.8 ppg., 4.5 rpg., 0.8 apg.) who is a gifted shot blocker that is a hard-working glass cleaner when boxing out opposing bigs on the boards, and the returning Al-Farouq Aminu (4.3 ppg., 4.8 rpg., 1.2 apg.), who is an exceptional defender that uses his wingspan to his advantage while also finishing authoritatively at the rim as a dynamic roll man.

This roster can win some games during their (literal) eight-game homestand, and with the schedule they have, they’ll have the best chance of keeping their eighth seed in the East.

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Orlando’s Season, At A Glance

Looking at Orlando’s place in the East, and their official schedule heading into the bubble as the season restarts on July 30, it looks to be in their favor in terms of overall difficulty. Take a look.

Sure, there are some games here that are easier than others, but keep in mind that even though Orlando can lose their seeding, it’ll be entirely reliant on the others above and below them (Brooklyn, Washington) to catch up to them as well.

To start off, they’ll do battle with a team that is seeded higher than them in the seventh-seeded Brooklyn Nets, who yesterday may have lost another player in Michael Beasley and continue to be undermanned going into Orlando. After that game, they’ll play a Kings team that isn’t going to be without any of their core pieces, making up what should be an even and competitive matchup. A duel with the Pacers is up next, and the Magic’s gameplan may alter depending on the decision of Victor Oladipo and whether he wants to play or not. To finish off the first half of the schedule, they’ll have to play the Toronto Raptors, the team they were able to steal a win from in the first round of last year’s Eastern Conference playoffs.

To kickoff the second half, they’ll have two difficult games against Boston and Philadelphia. Orlando has yet to beat Boston this year, but Markelle Fultz was able to exact revenge on the team that let him go earlier in the season. They’ll finish the season going against the Nets one more time, and conclude their regular season with one final home game against Zion Williamson’s New Orleans Pelicans.

Within the two years that John Hammond has been an executive for the Magic (2018 to 2020), he’s shown that this franchise is a work in progress franchise.

But if their potential visit to the postseason for consecutive seasons for the first time since the Dwight Howard era is an indication of anything, this “process” is nearing its completion, sooner rather than later.     

Jul 15, 2020 No Comments
SR – NBA Bubble Breakdowns: #16 New Orleans Pelicans

SR – NBA Bubble Breakdowns: #16 New Orleans Pelicans

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by | Jul 14, 2020 | Featured, NBA

We’re making quick strides on getting through this countdown, and since we’re officially at 16 days until the official NBA restart, let’s not make haste and talk about the next team on this list: the resilient New Orleans Pelicans.

How better could the scenario of Orlando get for a young, adaptive Pels team? They’re healthy down the board, perhaps have the easiest schedule among non-playoff qualifying teams, and have the phenom Zion Williamson to lead the charge. What could go wrong?

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 New Orleans’ Season In Review (28-36, 10th In West)

A season that never really got out of the blocks with all issues pertaining to injury woes now turns into a plausible campaign that can boost this Pelicans team into playoff positioning with an extremely favorable schedule.

Call it what you will: a conspiracy of the NBA playing the favoritism game prioritizing Williamson’s skills and the Pelicans’ potential to ease them into the playoffs. Or how about a plan laid by current General Manager David Griffin going as scheduled in the first year of the post-Anthony Davis era.

Nawlins’ team is finally finding its way in an uber-competitive Western Conference and just before the hiatus, they had racked up eight wins in a span of 13 games, looking more and more fearsome the more they play with one another. Now, with an opportunity to capitalize on that momentum built up during the regular season, this Alvin Gentry coached team overflowing with potential now has the golden opportunity to snatch the eighth seed from the Memphis Grizzlies.

And it wasn’t just the delay of Williamson’s debut that slowed the team’s start for this season, but missed time from the likes of Jrue Holiday, Brandon Ingram, JJ Redick, and Lonzo Ball garnered some difficulty in getting some crucial wins for a team that’s needed them down the final stretches of the season. The starting lineup of Ball-Holiday-Hart-Ingram-Favors looked like how any transitional rebounding team would look: talent-deficient, defensively inefficient, and still learning how to play with one another with only a quarter of a season under their belt.

And yet, this new Pels team, pieced together as a result of the eye-opening trade that sent Anthony Davis to the Los Angeles Lakers in exchange for Josh Hart, Brandon Ingram, Lonzo Ball, and the Lakers’ first-round pick, was able to squeeze out a total of 17 wins. That number would drastically improve after the debut of rookie sensation Zion Williamson, who in his debut against the San Antonio Spurs on January 22 scored 21 points off the bench in a minutes restriction, and scored 17 straight points in one of the most electric starts to a professional career that you will ever see.

And then the Zion onslaught on the entire NBA began. In just the duration of a few weeks and 19 games, this lowly Pelicans team, predetermined to meet another fate of another lottery pick year, has made even the highest of teams on the league’s totem pole shake in their shoes. They’re on the Grizzlies’ heels, only 3 1/2 games behind them and with the way Williamson has been playing, you’d like to think it’s only a matter of time until the Pelicans completely catch up to the rest of the qualifying eight in the Western playoff chart.

Averaging a monstrous 25.9 points off 61 percent shooting, the 19-turned-20-year-old has proven himself to be an intimidating finisher at the rim with poised body control and an elite, soft touch within 3 feet. The lefty’s game is a blend of the modernization of the NBA big and the past eras of forwards in the league: A swift and powerful slasher who focuses not only on in-paint footwork but utilizes his strength of outside shooting every now and then to stretch the floor.

Conversely, this Pels team has rallied around their rookie sensation, as the numbers from their integral parts have vastly improved. There was a time not too long ago when we all thought Lonzo Ball to have the league’s most horrendous jumper, inefficient as it was aesthetically unpleasant. In the period of New Orleans’ 19 games with Williamson on the floor, Zo upped his assist numbers with his new Pick and Roll partner, and got hot in the past 13 games, shooting 46.2 percent from deep with 14.2 points per game to add to that impressive statistic.

But arguably the most impressive player on this Pels team has to be their unsung hero and lone All-Star, Brandon Ingram. He may not garner much attention from the national media, since it looks like Zion is hogging that up, but the former Laker that’s found new pastures in less-pressurized environment like New Orleans has proven that he is a force to be reckoned with out on the wing. In what will probably be a Kia Most Improved Player award year that will launch Ingram into the next level of superstardom, the Duke standout has played the best ball of his career, averaging 24.3 points, 6.3 rebounds and 4.3 assists.

Additionally, Ingram’s confidence is glowing, evident in his willingness to want to isolate more and get buckets on his own. Shooting 38.7 percent on three balls on for a combined field goal percentage of 46.7 percent has made Ingram the true No. 1 scoring option for New Orleans. Inconsistency was the biggest curse against the former No. 2 overall pick in 2016, but he’s adjusted in a new atmosphere where he can allow his game to grow gradually without the pressure of being the do-it-all wing scorer in a large market like LA.

Some key wins in the season for this young, impressionable team weren’t just capped off by the thrilling opening to an NBA career for Zion on January 22. The Pels beat down the Memphis Grizzlies 139-111 in a statement win that tightened the Rookie of the Year race between former AAU teammates Williamson and Grizzlies guard Ja Morant, while also letting the Grizzlies know the Pelicans were not to be toyed with.

Some other wins that the Pelicans had this year:

Brandon Ingram scoring a career-high 49 points in a New Orleans win over Utah that snapped a 10-game win streak by the Jazz, in what was a retribution over Ingram missing a game-winning layup as a result of a missed call when Jazz center Rudy Gobert fouled him at the buzzer of their last matchup.

Or the win against the Denver Nuggets on Christmas where, before they even had Zion suit up in uniform as the rookie was healing up from a meniscus tear, the 8-23 Pelicans managed to defeat the #2 seeded Denver Nuggets 112-100, which served as a motivator for a young Pelicans team still without their best player.

There have been a large sum of memorable moments for a Pelicans team that has accomplished so much in such a short amount of time. Throughout the year, many speculated that they were going to lie down and continue to restock for the future, but now that they’re only five games from making it to .500, those speculations are out of the window as playoff visit aspirations now make their way through the doorstep.

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New Orleans’ Roster For Season Resumption: The scheme and schedule is set for this pelicans team to perform, and execute they must.

To put it bluntly…It will be the Pelicans’ own doing that screws up their chances of making the playoffs with such a favorable outlook on their trip to Orlando. They have all the pieces. They have the perfect, spaceous scheme set in stone. And they have arguably the most prolific rookie to grace a floor since LeBron in 2003. It will be really difficult to mess this up, especially when, as a team, don’t have to worry about major injury to not a single member of their players.

The decision of Alvin Gentry’s status is up in the air, in relation to the health risk of traveling to the Orlando bubble in the wake of the rising cases of COVID-19 in Florida, but if all is well for the Pelicans head coach, expect a full-strength organization to potentially blow the roof off of the Orlando bubble on their way to qualifying for the eighth seed.

In the starting lineup, expect to see the starting five of Lonzo Ball, Zion Williamson, Jrue Holiday, Brandon Ingram and Derrick Favors to be rolled out for a majority of their games during the restart. As the starting guard, Lonzo Ball (12.4 ppg., 6.2 rpg., 7 apg., 1.4 spg.) has been selected as the main guy to run Gentry’s offense as a pass-first perimeter scorer and occasional slasher. In such a spaced-out floor awash with wings who can all create off the dribble, he’ll be assisted by his backcourt companion Jrue Holiday (19.6 ppg., 4.9 rpg., 6.9 apg., 1.7 spg.), who you could make the case as their best on-ball defender.

Though he is usually assigned plays ran for him at the two position, he can occasionally direct the offense at the point as well. His natural shot-creating ability has been a skill coveted by the Pelicans during the Anthony Davis days, and he’s seamlessly meshed into this new-look Pels team with his assets coming into the benefit of this young team with his play and veteran leadership.

Alongside Zo and Jrue will be team MVP Brandon Ingram (24.2 ppg., 6.2 rpg., 4.3 apg.) who is easily the purest shot creator on the team. Once things break down, or whenever the Pelicans go 5-out, Gentry will likely give the stretch forward his space to take defenders one-on-one to either make his own shot from deep, within the mid-range or at the rim, where his attempts are likely to be finished at with his 6’7 frame.

Williamson is another threat to set screens and roll, slash, collapse the defense and find shooters around the arc. When the Pels’ halfcourt defense gets stops and steals, there’s very little in this world that can stop the unstoppable force that is a churning Williamson when he gets within five feet of the paint. Which is frightening, of course.

And lastly in the starting lineup lies Derrick Favors, the former big for the Utah Jazz who turned out to be an efficient piece for New Orleans this season. Averaging a little over nine points, 9.9 rebounds, 1.7 assists, and one block per game, he’s slid into the center position with efficacy, utilizing the role as an active roll man, defensive anchor, energetic rebounder and break starter.

The Pelicans’ second and third units will play a huge role in determining how many wins they will get in Orlando. Starting off with backup shooting guard and top-tier marksman JJ Redick (14.9 ppg., 2.6 rpg., 2 apg., 45.2 3PT%), hasn’t missed the playoffs once in his caree and his role focuses on being the integral catch-and-shoot perimeter sniper we know him to be.

Accompanying him in the backcourt will be Josh Hart (10.2 ppg., 6.5 rpg., 1.6 apg.), another Laker export who can both run the 1 and 2 as a primary ball handler, corner shooter and pick and roll defender. That same backcourt can go three deep, with guards Frank Jackson (5.6 ppg., 1.4 rpg., 0.8 apg.) and Nickeil Alexander-Walker (5.1 ppg., 0.2 rpg., 2 apg.) running the same responsibilites.

For the reserves in the frontcourt, Italian shooter Niccolo Melli (6.8 ppg., 3 rpg., 1.3 apg.) will be at the power forward spot to be a perimeter lockdown man and scorer from deep. Behind him will be Kenrich Williams (3.8 ppg., 5.1 rpg., 1.5 apg.), who may not be as an efficient scorer from deep but bolsters their rim protection efforts with his 0.6 blocks per game off the bench. It’s clear that Alvin Gentry formulated this roster to be filled to the brim with shooters, as his other forward in E’Twuan Moore (8.6 ppg., 2.4 rpg., 1.4 apg.) is known for his spot-up shooting abilities.

That second unit will also contain rookie center Jaxson Hayes (7.5 ppg., 4 rpg., 0.9 apg.) out of Texas, New Orleans’ second first-round pick who has been the source of energy off the bench as a lanky defender who can guard three to four positions, lengthy shot blocker and roll man.

Likely to split minutes with him will be another Duke standout on this Pelicans team. Former first-round pick Jahlil Okafor (7.6 ppg., 4.2 rpg., 1.3 apg.), who is experiencing a second wind for his career, has proven himself capable of defending guards on the perimeter as well as useful under the basket as a low-post scorer.

Again, the roster is all here, and the schematics are all set for this Pelicans team to succeed with an easy schedule. Now, they just have to get the job done in this abridged season.

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New Orleans’ Schedule, At A Glance

The conspiracy theorists are all out and about talking about how easy the Pelicans have it during this eight-game schedule. And, though a lot of prognosticators make gripping points, the games still have to be won by the Pelicans at the end of the day. But as favorable as the Pelicans’ schedule is, they might be right.

Barring their battle against the Clippers, this schedule can all but certainly land the Pelicans in the postseason. Starting out with a game against the Utah Jazz and their shaky defensive gameplan, Zion Williamson and Brandon Ingram look to do damage against a team that, if they do qualify for the eighth seed, could likely see them at some point in the playoffs.

A battle with Kawhi Leonard’s Clippers is next, which in reality could be a toss-up considering how well the two teams match-up with one another. After that game will be the final matchup between the Pelicans and Memphis Grizzlies takes place, as Ja Morant and Zion Williamson have the bragging rights of ending the Rookie of the Year award debate on the line. They’ll finish their first-half of the season with a game against another team gunning for the eighth seed in the Sacramento Kings.

The final half of their season starts against an undermanned Washington Wizards team that is still gritty enough to force a close game against them and soon after that, Zion gets his final rematch of the year against those San Antonio Spurs he debuted against. They get one more shot at the Kings after that before ending their seeding schedule against the host Orlando Magic.

The NBA set it up for Zion’s Pelicans to wreak havoc on the war path toward the eighth seed, but like the other 21 teams in the bubble, there are no wins on paper. It’s more than doable for this team coached by Alvin Gentry, but execution and sticking to to the task at hand will ultimately be the answer to whether or not the Pelicans get back to the postseason for the first time since 2017.

Jul 14, 2020 No Comments
SR – NBA Bubble Breakdowns: #17 Portland Trail Blazers

SR – NBA Bubble Breakdowns: #17 Portland Trail Blazers

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by | Jul 13, 2020 | Featured, NBA

Continuing on our countdown list, we’ve officially reached day six for the bubble breakdowns, and this list is heating up quickly. Just yesterday, we mentioned the second of four teams who are within the tight clench in pursuit of the eighth seed in the West, and today, the third team within reach of the eighth seed needs little introduction. In fact, this team, decimated by injuries in 2019-20, was a participant in the Western Conference Finals just a season ago…

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Portland’s Season In Review (29-37, 9th In West)

We expected Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum’s Portland Trail Blazers to take that next leap into superstardom with little in their way to stop them in the West. A trip to the conference finals for the first time since 2000 during their 2018-19 campaign signified the true arrival of Rip City onto the landscape of championship contenders and for a while, many speculated if Portland was next in line to advance to a franchise-first NBA Finals as a result of their progress.

Lillard and McCollum were projected to be the league’s most destructive backcourt with the Golden State Warriors essentially taking a year off while they let Klay Thompson heal from his ruptured ACL suffered in the Finals against Toronto, and a healthy Blazers team with all of their missing pieces including Jusuf Nurkic and Zach Collins was ready to see their championship window opened.

That wouldn’t be the case at all as the season progressed.

Portland started the season with a plethora of questions ranging from who would step up in the place of Jusuf Nurkic, who suffered an infamously gruesome leg injury in March of 2019. Portland has been without four of their best big men and throughout the season, have been forced to plug-in reserves who wouldn’t otherwise be factored within the minutes plan into critical roles at the four and five.

A starting frontcourt composed of Nurkic and Collins molded into Hassan Whiteside and Nassir Little as the season’s gone by. And now, the Blazers find themselves fighting for their collective playoff lives in the NBA bubble. Sitting at 9th in the West, a massive regression and a rather one-sided effort from the likes of Damian Lillard compared to his adversaries pits the Trail Blazers in a tough predicament heading into Orlando.

It’s been a frustrating year for Terry Stotts, to say the least. Injuries have piled up, making his combination of starters, second and additional units a little difficult to piece together. And while Lillard is putting on a historic season, so much of Portland’s issues have stemmed from a variety of causes.

For one, they’ve been abysmal on the defensive end, ranking 27th in total defensive rating. So don’t let that statistic of them leading the NBA in blocks as a team with 6.2 blocks per game confuse you.

One reason as to why they’ve underperformed on defense has to do with their lack of consistent rebounding. Even after trading for Hassan Whiteside to provide a temporary fix to their lack of board presence in the wake of not having Nurkic, Portland currently ranks 27th in the defensive rebounding statistic.

Additionally, while some of the best perimeter lockdown guys in their rotation were placed on the injured reserve as players like Rodney Hood went down early in the season to an injured Achilles tendon, others like Gary Trent Jr. and Anfernee Simons have answered the call in Stotts’ complementary units off the bench. Trent, the Blazers’ 21-year-old, 2nd-year two-guard off the bench earned an opportunity due to those injuries as and he showed improvement as the season progressed. Over a 19-game stretch from January 18 through March 2, Trent averaged 13.5 points on an effective field goal percentage of 60%.

For an offense that’s needed a third scorer at the guard spot, Trent has risen up in a way that no one predicted. As an above-average 3-point shooter (38.8%), he has not only complemented the Blazers’ guards offensively with his sniping from deep but has helped tremendously in his ability to stretch the floor as an off-ball scorer.

So much so, that his shooting from deep has benefitted others within the offense, none more so than Carmelo Anthony, the newly-acquainted Trail Blazer acquired in November to counter Portland’s injury woes. Right out of the gate, Anthony resembled his younger self, averaging 22.3 points per contest on an effective field goal percentage of 62.7 percent with his new team during a three-game winning streak. In his first game, Melo dropped 19 in dazzling fashion as his Blazers secured a 136-119 home rout of the Oklahoma City Thunder.

For a moment, it felt like both Lillard, McCollum and this new-look Blazers team finally turned the corner, finally equipping their third piece. But up until the hiatus, they’ve submitted a subpar record of 20-25 even with Melo in their lineup.

Now, a majority of those losses had to do with the latter: a bevy of injuries to integral parts of the team, defensive inefficiency, inconsistency from starters on offense, and a struggle on the glass. What hasn’t been a thorn in Portland’s side was the tremendous play from Damian Lillard. An effort so good that the five-time All-Star was graced with the honors of being the cover athlete for NBA 2k21 because of it.

To put it into perspective just how groundbreaking Damian Lillard’s 2019-20 season is to Blazers fans, take this scenario into consideration: I’m going to throw out two players at you, and as you compare and contrast the two players, I want to see if you, the reader, can take a guess as to who’s stats these are while looking at the similarities by the time I reveal these statistics.

The first player has a season where he averages 30.1 points per game, 6.7 assists per game, 5.4 rebounds per game off a field goal percentage of 50.4, a 45.4 three-point percentage, 3.3 turnovers per game and a 90.8 free throw percentage.

The second player has a season where he averages around 28.9 points per game, 7.8 assists, 4.3 rebounds, 2.9 turnovers per game, a 45.7 shooting percentage from deep, a 39.4 three-point percentage, and an 88.8 free throw percentage.

YouTube/6Man

Here’s a little hint: one of these players was voted as an MVP at multiple points in his career…

Did you get it yet? Nah? Alright…here’s the answer.

YouTube/6Man

The year that Stephen Curry posted up this stat line was the year he became the first player in NBA history to unanimous MVP in 2016. This was also the season that we all know his Golden State Warriors went 73-9.

It’s wild to think that Lillard this year is putting up similar, almost identical numbers to that of Curry’s repeating MVP season this year, but his 29-37 Blazers are in such a funk that it will be hard for them to get out of. Fortunately, with the way that Lillard had been carrying these Blazers, they’re within the perfect position to challenge for the eighth and final seed.

The Blazers are just 10-21 against playoff teams this year. But four of those 10 wins (Ws against the Pacers, Rockets, Lakers, and Jazz) came in the span of seven days, part of the stretch in which Lillard was playing at a nearly extraterrestrial level.

Whether it was his career-high 61 points dropped on the Golden State Warriors with 10 assists and seven rebounds on January 20, that Pacers game on January 26 (the emotional game played by the Pacers the day of Kobe Bryant’s passing) that Dame dropped 50 points with 13 assists while shooting 60.9 percent from the field and 66.7 percent from deep…

…or the 36-point performance against Houston one night later…

…or the electric 48-point-10-assist supershow he put on in front of a Staples Center crowd during Kobe’s memorial game against the Lakers…

…or his epic 51-point-12-assist night against Utah in a back-to-back…the Weber State product made legendary strides in the Winter.

Lillard became the first player since Kobe Bryant in 2007 to have more 50+ point games in a stretch of seven days or more. This would warrant a fifth All-Star selection from the Blazers’ superstar guard, but he wouldn’t be able to play in the game due to a hip injury.

His season has been so prolific that it wouldn’t be surprising to see him land some MVP votes once the season concludes.

Per NBA.com’s Senior Stat Analyst Jon Schuhmann – “His 36.9 minutes per game lead the league and he’s one of three players in the top six in both points (28.9, fifth) and assists (7.8, sixth) per game. His true shooting percentage of 61.9% is a career-best mark and the third-highest mark among 40 players with a usage rate of 25% or higher.

His ability to shoot off the dribble is one of the league’s most dangerous weapons. Lillard has an effective field goal percentage of 55.3% on pull-up jumpers, the best mark among 139 players who have attempted at least 100. He ranks second with 13.5 pick-and-roll ball-handler possessions per game and the 1.14 points per possession he’s scored on ball-handler possessions is the best mark among 56 players who have averaged at least five per contest.

The Blazers have the league’s third-biggest differential between their winning percentage in clutch games (16-13, .552) and that in non-clutch games (13-24, .351), and Lillard has obviously been their go-to guy down the stretch. He’s tied for the league lead with seven baskets (on 12 attempts) to tie or take the lead in the final minute of the fourth quarter or overtime.”

If he keeps this up in Orlando with consistent rebounders and rim protectors around him, Portland has a great shot of reaching the playoffs for another year.

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Portland’s Roster For Season Resumption: Logo Lillard can only do so much, but now it’s up to his healthy supporting cast to carry the rest of the load.

After everything mentioned, Damian Lillard is the true MVP of this team, undoubtedly. But, no one man goes unassisted in getting a team above-.500. Therefore, the returns of elite rim protectors and stretch bigs Jusuf Nurkic and Zach Collins must help complement the vaunted backcourt of Lillard and CJ McCollum.

It’s imperative of them to do so, considering that, like any other team, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

One of the more consistent starting lineups in the NBA belongs to Terry Stotts’ Portland Trail Blazers. With Dame and C.J. McCollum (22.5 ppg., 4.1 rpg., 4.3 apg.) taking heed of the second-highest scoring backcourts in the league, the forward spots are a bit up in the air. Regular starter Trevor Ariza is taking this time off to tend to some prior family obligations and won’t be present for the Orlando games.

So, Carmelo Anthony (15.3 ppg., 6.3 rpg.,1.6 apg.) is the likely starter at the small forward spot for Portland with Mario Hezonja (4.8 ppg., 3.4 rpg., 0.9 apg.) and Jaylen Hoard (2.9 ppg., 2.5 rpg., 0.3 apg.) possibly sharing minutes with Rodney Hood being out for the season. With Jusuf Nurkic all healed up and ready to go, he and Hassan Whiteside (16.3 ppg., 14.2 rpg., 1.2 apg., 2.5 bpg.) will split reps at center.

Though Whiteside will still have starting minutes, this will give the bench some balance. Currently, it is yet to be seen how many minutes Caleb Swanigan (3 ppg., 4.7 rpg., 1.4 apg.), Wenyan Gabriel (2.4 ppg., 2.1 rpg., 0.3 apg.) and Moses Brown (1.2 ppg., 1.6 rpg., 0.1 apg.) get in the Orlando rotation.

It will take some time for Nurkic to get used to the pace of NBA action with a year sitting on the bench. But when he’s on the floor, you’re talking about one of the most intimidating, bruising big men in all of basketball. Standing at 7 feet tall, the Bosnian Beast was averaging 15.6 points, 10.4 rebounds, 3.2 assists and 1.4 blocks per gameup until his untimely injury just weeks until the team’s deep playoff run in 2019.

Also, getting Collins back helps in bunches, especially since he hasn’t set foot on an NBA floor since October when he injured his shoulder against Dallas. Up until he got hurt, the Gonzaga Bulldog was averaging a little under 10 points a game with 4 rebounds and 2 assists per contest. Of course, those minutes will gradually increase with a bigger sample. Collins was known for his skill as a shooter and rim protector, characteristics scouts find perpendicular to the model of crafting a championship roster in the modern NBA when scouting big men.

Once Zach Collins sits down, expect trusted rookie and former UNC standout Nassir Little to get some burn as well as up the tempo with his ability to push the pace in the open floor. Occasionally, the power forward has shown tendency to pop the three-ball, shooting a 23.7 percentage from deep. Otherwise, he’s a solid roll man and athletic, lengthy defender who is capable of holding his own out on the perimeter.

Finally the guard position will fluctuate in terms of productivity and overall effectiveness. Rookie Anfernee Simons (8.8 ppg., 2.3 rpg., 1.5 apg.) has been a surprise this year and will split minutes with Gary Trent (7.7 ppg., 1.7 rpg., 0.9 apg.) as shot creators and scorers off the catch.

Reminder: if this roster stays healthy, this is a dangerous team. But their strength of schedule will be the ultimate factor in determining if they are able to keep their position in the West and challenge the Grizzlies in a play-in tournament after the seeding games end.

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Portland’s Schedule, At A Glance

In comparison to the other four teams duking it out for the final playoff spot in the West, things won’t be as peachy attaining that eighth seed for the Trail Blazers. At least, that’s what their schedule – the sixth hardest schedule for the NBA restart among 22 teams – says.

Do remember that this Blazers team has only won 10 games against playoff-bound teams all year, and even if healthy in their frontcourt, there’s no guarantee they’ll escape with a victory in each of their games. That’d usually be a non-issue…if you only had like three or four games against teams with winning records.

Problem is, Portland is now forced to go against a playoff-qualifying team in every game they suit up for in Orlando.

Starting off with the Memphis Grizzlies on July 31, they have a shot to actually get within a game of the eighth seed with a win. After that, they’ll try to exact revenge on Jayson Tatum (who dropped 36 on their heads in the last matchup) and Jaylen Brown’s Boston Celtics, who hold the third seed in the East. The battle of the two highest-scoring backcourts in the NBA takes place soon after, as Dame and CJ will play James Harden and Russell Westbrook’s Houston Rockets one game later. Soon after that, they conclude the first half of their schedule with a game against Jamal Murray and Nikola Jokic’s Denver Nuggets.

Things don’t get easier in the second half of Portland’s schedule. Starting out with a game against the Kawhi Leonard and Paul George-led Los Angeles Clippers, Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid’s Philadelphia 76ers await soon after. They finish their seeding schedule with games against Luka Doncic’s Dallas Mavericks and Caris LeVert’s Brooklyn Nets.

As if things could get any harder for the Portland Trail Blazers, there they have it. But if there’s anyone that looks adversity in the eye, and discerns it to help his teammates work toward the common goal while also answering the call to showing the most equinamity under tension, it’s Damian Lillard.

And it’ll take a team effort, for sure. But when it comes down toit, the Blazers only go as far as their superstar at the guard spot. And if the Blazers are to get to the playoffs for the sixth time in a row, it’ll have to be Dame Time, all the time.

Jul 13, 2020 No Comments