2019-20 NBA: 2nd Half

[Lawful Metal]

6 minutes ago, sabremike said:

If Pat Riley didn't make just about the biggest coaching blunder in NBA and allow John Starks to take and miss 865 3 point attempts you wouldn't have beaten the Knicks.

There's a reason he was missing.

 

[Pete]

6 hours ago, hammerva said:

The stories of the Bulls pre-Jordan was pretty cool.  The "traveling cocaine circus" as I think they called it and being so irrelevant that the NASL team was out drawing them.  

That speaks more to hot indoor soccer was at that point than how bad the Bulls were. To the point where the Kings had to move to Sacramento because the Comets were such a white-hot draw (even outdrawing the Chiefs at least once).

[sabremike]

24 minutes ago, Lawful Metal said:

There's a reason he was missing.

 

Was talking about the game 7. The game 6 Starks nearly won it singlehandedly.

[MavsFan77]

4 hours ago, Lawful Metal said:

Hakeem and the Rockets would have beaten Jordan and the Bulls in 94 and 95.

How can I get a spot in this fantasy world in which you live? If Jordan hadn’t been forced out of the league there’s no way in hell Houston wins either of those titles let alone both of them.

Regular season records are meaningless too so don’t try throwing that stat you used a few posts down as proof they would have dominated. Hell they only went 1-1 against the Bulls teams that didn’t have MJ (94 and 95). That’s pretty damn embarrassing. 

[Lawful Metal]

The bulls couldn't do shit against this:

 

[Lawful Metal]

52 minutes ago, MavsFan77 said:

How can I get a spot in this fantasy world in which you live? If Jordan hadn’t been forced out of the league there’s no way in hell Houston wins either of those titles let alone both of them.

Regular season records are meaningless too so don’t try throwing that stat you used a few posts down as proof they would have dominated. Hell they only went 1-1 against the Bulls teams that didn’t have MJ (94 and 95). That’s pretty damn embarrassing. 

You leave out the fact that the Jordan Bulls were actually in the playoffs in 95 and LOST TO THE FUCKING MAGIC IN THE EAST SEMIFINALS. 

Edited April 20, 2020 by Lawful Metal
Bulls lost in the semifinals ... WITH Jordan

[MavsFan77]

54 minutes ago, Lawful Metal said:

You leave out the fact that the Jordan Bulls were actually in the playoffs in 95 and LOST TO THE FUCKING MAGIC IN THE EAST SEMIFINALS. 

And??? Jordan hadn’t been training to play as he’d been busy playing minor league baseball for most of the season.

If he’d played a full season instead of 17 games that series would’ve been played in Chicago for 4 of the games as there’s no way the Bulls are still a 5 seed (or behind Orlando period). But say whatever comforts you, and fits your pathetic narrative.

What’s next a short essay about how Harden is somehow better than Mike, and how he and Westbrook could’ve won more titles than Mike and Scottie? 

[Brian Fowler]

The 95 Bulls, as constructed, were extraordinarily weak up front. Grant had left and they hadn't gotten Rodman yet. That's would've been, easily, the most vulnerable team of the Jordan era in that hypothetical. (Well, except maybe the last one, where Pippen started on the injured list, came back, hurt his back and could barely move in the playoffs, and Dennis was clearly mentally checking out.)

It's real hard to bet against an in-shape MJ with Scottie team, but it's also real damn hard to see how they would've defended Shaq or Dream that year.

As much as I love that GP/Kemp Sonics team, I always thought it was kinda a shame the Rockets couldn't have won the West and then made Jordan take the damn title back from them. (Which I'm sure he would have)

[Lawful Metal]

33 minutes ago, MavsFan77 said:

say whatever comforts you, and fits your pathetic narrative.

I mean, that's what you're doing. 

Jordan did not play badly in the 1995 playoffs.  Still the second highest points per game in the NBA that year.  Hakeem scored more. 

Bulls would've won it all if they weren't a 5 seed. 

The Rockets were a 6 seed, dude. 

Rockets had to be the #3 seed, Utah (with Stockton and Malone), the #2 seed, Phoenix (with Sir Charles), the #1 seed San Antonio and MVP David Robinson, and the #1 seed in the East, the Magic (with Penny and Shaq). 

Hakeem was better in virtually every single category than Jordan was over more games. 

Spoiler

You can keep making excuses, but I think you're underestimating the heart of a champion.

(and underestimating how pissed off Hakeem was that David Robinson won the MVP)

[MavsFan77]

2 minutes ago, Lawful Metal said:

I mean, that's what you're doing. 

Jordan did not play badly in the 1995 playoffs.  Still the second highest points per game in the NBA that year.  Hakeem scored more. 

Bulls would've won it all if they weren't a 5 seed. 

The Rockets were a 6 seed, dude. 

Rockets had to be the #3 seed, Utah (with Stockton and Malone), the #2 seed, Phoenix (with Sir Charles), the #1 seed San Antonio and MVP David Robinson, and the #1 seed in the East, the Magic (with Penny and Shaq). 

Hakeem was better in virtually every single category than Jordan was over more games. 

  Hide contents

You can keep making excuses, but I think you're underestimating the heart of a champion.

(and underestimating how pissed off Hakeem was that David Robinson won the MVP)

So let me see if I have this straight. A guy that only won titles in the two years Jordan missed either all of or 75+% of the regular season had the “heart of a champion”? I won’t deny Hakeem is easily in the top 3 centers in my lifetime, but to try to pass that off is laughable at best.

And he should’ve put up better numbers than Mike did in those playoffs. As I’ve already pointed out Jordan wasn’t at full strength or as prepared as he’d normally be. What great center did Hakeem have to dominate for those numbers when he was playing against Utah and Phoenix? And the Barkley part of the argument is silly.  What was he going to do against Hakeem? Plus you’re leaving out the fact he had Clyde Drexler by his side which gives them more talent than Utah or San Antonio. 
 

Also I wasn’t trying to fit a narrative. I was stating a fact that the Bulls would have been a one seed if they had a full season of Jordan. How’s that deniable? 

[Lawful Metal]

17 minutes ago, MavsFan77 said:

So let me see if I have this straight. A guy that only won titles in the two years Jordan missed either all of or 75+% of the regular season had the “heart of a champion”? I won’t deny Hakeem is easily in the top 3 centers in my lifetime, but to try to pass that off is laughable at best.

The fact that you don't know this automatically disqualifies you from having any opinion about the championship Rockets teams.  

Jordan was so bad he averaged 31.5/6.5/4.5 with 2.3 steals and 1.4 blocks and eFG% .506, which is very close to his career numbers.  BUT JORDAN PLAYED BADLY. 

Bulls lost 2 home games to the Magic, including getting closed out in Game 6 in Chicago.  BUT IF ONLY THEY HAD HOME COURT ADVANTAGE.

I'm not leaving out Clyde Drexler.  I'm saying that Hakeem and Clyde would have beaten the Jordan Bulls in 1995.  

You can probably make a better argument about 1994, but Vernon Maxwell was one of the few who could get into Jordan's head on defense.  Mainly because Mad Max was a lunatic who would probably fight Jordan if he could.  

 

 

[Lawful Metal]

7 minutes ago, Brian Fowler said:

As much as I love that GP/Kemp Sonics team, I always thought it was kinda a shame the Rockets couldn't have won the West and then made Jordan take the damn title back from them. (Which I'm sure he would have)

The Rockets fucked up when they changed their jerseys after winning back-to-back titles.  Who the fuck does that?  And that hideous court.  Clyde was on the decline, and couldn't take up the slack when Seattle throttled Hakeem with double and triple teams down low.  And after 96 they traded for Barkeley and that just about ruined Hakeem's championship window. 

 

[MavsFan77]

11 minutes ago, Lawful Metal said:

The fact that you don't know this automatically disqualifies you from having any opinion about the championship Rockets teams.  

Jordan was so bad he averaged 31.5/6.5/4.5 with 2.3 steals and 1.4 blocks and eFG% .506, which is very close to his career numbers.  BUT JORDAN PLAYED BADLY. 

Bulls lost 2 home games to the Magic, including getting closed out in Game 6 in Chicago.  BUT IF ONLY THEY HAD HOME COURT ADVANTAGE.

I'm not leaving out Clyde Drexler.  I'm saying that Hakeem and Clyde would have beaten the Jordan Bulls in 1995.  

You can probably make a better argument about 1994, but Vernon Maxwell was one of the few who could get into Jordan's head on defense.  Mainly because Mad Max was a lunatic who would probably fight Jordan if he could.  

 

 

Where did I say Jordan played badly??? I said they’d have had home court (and thus not played Orlando in the semi’s) if he’d played the entire season. Plus his numbers might have been even higher if he’d been in his traditional shape.

Yeah winning two games in Chicago against a guy playing only his 27th game of the season (the game six you brought up) is the same as beating a Bulls team at full force. Okay buddy.

What a joke that is too. Clyde wasn’t worthy of carrying Scottie’s jockstrap (at that age), but yet they’d somehow beat the Bulls. You should be a comedian.  

Maxwell would’ve fought the entire Bulls team I’m sure, but that still wouldn’t have given the Rockets a title that year. 

And you’ve still yet to make one good argument for why the greatest player in the history of your team couldn’t make it to the finals any of the other years Jordan was playing a full season, let alone win a title during them. Oh wait there’s no excuse for Hakeem. Especially considering the 97 and 98 Jazz teams only had incredibly old Stockton and Malone. 

[Lawful Metal]

 

6 minutes ago, MavsFan77 said:

And you’ve still yet to make one good argument for why the greatest player in the history of your team couldn’t make it to the finals any of the other years Jordan was playing a full season, let alone win a title during them.

You're changing the argument.  We're not talking about the 96/97/98 teams (although I addressed it with my response to Fowler re: changing to those awful pajama jerseys away from the championship ones / Clyde being kinda washed / trading for Charles Barkley etc.)  Hakeem also made the NBA Finals in 1986, before Jordan even sniffed getting out of the first round, so whatever.  

1995 Rockets were a team of destiny -- they came back down 2-1 to the Jazz, came back 3-1 to the Suns, beat the Spurs in 6 and swept the Magic, who just beat Michael Jordan and the Bulls.  And, as Fowler said, there's literally no one to guard Hakeem on the Bulls. 

[Brian Fowler]

46 minutes ago, Lawful Metal said:

The Rockets fucked up when they changed their jerseys after winning back-to-back titles.  Who the fuck does that?  And that hideous court.  Clyde was on the decline, and couldn't take up the slack when Seattle throttled Hakeem with double and triple teams down low.  And after 96 they traded for Barkeley and that just about ruined Hakeem's championship window. 

 

Didn't they try to stop the change after winning the titles, but the NBA wouldn't let them because they were already printing the new merch?

Those pinstriped but not really things were an abomination.

[SorceressKnight]

7 hours ago, Lawful Metal said:

 

When people say "Hakeem should have been drafted over Jordan" thing, that does not mean Hakeem was better than Jordan. 

Rather, it means the same thing that people who know basketball have always known: If you know there's two sure things in the draft, and one of the sure things is a center and the other sure thing is a guard, you always pick the sure-thing center.  Jordan was the better player, but Houston still made the right pick, if that makes sense.

(Besides, easier to use that to torture you with the What If they didn't go into there: Hakeem said in his biography the Rockets were tantalizingly close to a deal at the 1984 draft-  Ralph Sampson to Portland for Clyde Drexler and the #2 pick, which Houston would have used to pick Jordan.)

11 hours ago, supremebve said:

You can't make a strong case, or even a weak case, that any basketball player ever is anywhere close to as famous as Michael Jordan.

 

17 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

I love Magic, but there's no way in hell he was as famous globally at Jordan.

I'll give you both of those in the 1990s, no one was as famous as Jordan globally.

But that's the problem with some of the claims- between using Michael Jackson as the claim and saying Jordan, himself, paved the way for the NBA, it's basically saying "Jordan was even the most famous player globally even in the 1980s." That claim is just as false-  in the 1980s, Jordan was basically just a dunker who's teams may or may not have been able to win with him, and it wasn't until Phil Jackson installed the triangle offense/Pippen got drafted/Jordan learned to trust the rest of his team that the Bulls made it over the hump- and when they did, THEN Jordan became the most famous athlete (and in the 1980s, it'd be Magic or Bird for "most famous.")

In the 1990s, Jordan became the most famous athlete in the world. In the 1980s, though? Jordan was just Dominique Wilkins in snazzier sneakers.  

Edited April 20, 2020 by SorceressKnight

[Lawful Metal]

Vernon Maxwell FTW

[MavsFan77]

13 hours ago, Lawful Metal said:

 

You're changing the argument.  We're not talking about the 96/97/98 teams (although I addressed it with my response to Fowler re: changing to those awful pajama jerseys away from the championship ones / Clyde being kinda washed / trading for Charles Barkley etc.)  Hakeem also made the NBA Finals in 1986, before Jordan even sniffed getting out of the first round, so whatever.  

1995 Rockets were a team of destiny -- they came back down 2-1 to the Jazz, came back 3-1 to the Suns, beat the Spurs in 6 and swept the Magic, who just beat Michael Jordan and the Bulls.  And, as Fowler said, there's literally no one to guard Hakeem on the Bulls. 

I won’t disagree with Fowler, but who on that 95 Rockets team was gonna guard Jordan or Pippen? They gave up 25 ppg to Penny Hardaway so you can’t tell me Mike wouldn’t have torched them for 30+, and Pippen wouldn’t have got let’s say 22-25 too. Plus Mario Ellie damn sure isn’t scoring 16 a game when he’s guarded by one or the other of that duo. 

As for being a team of destiny I love how you fail to point out two of their four wins in the finals were by two points each. So it’s not like they smoked the Magic. 

Also (not that it matters) the Magic were coming off of playing Indiana for 7 games not the Bulls. And what does Hakeem making the finals in 86 while the Bulls were still a bad team prove? Did he beat the Celtics? 

Edited April 21, 2020 by MavsFan77

[Lawful Metal]

7 hours ago, MavsFan77 said:

So it’s not like they smoked the Magic. 

They swept them. 

Just stop. 

[MavsFan77]

56 minutes ago, Lawful Metal said:

They swept them. 

Just stop. 

You keep making it sound like they’re an all time great team. They’re not. So you should stop.

Or you could try to explain how those two wins are so convincing, oh wait you can’t. But you can post 8,000 memes about your boy Harden, and how (in his and your minds only) he should be in the running for his fifth straight MVP award. 

Or better yet post more nonsense from guys about trash talking MJ when they’re career losers, and the wins you love bragging about netted zero NBA titles.

[Brian Fowler]

That '95 Rockets team is weird. They're both a serious candidate for the worst champion ever (not only a sixth seed, but they went 17-18 down the stretch after trading for Drexler) and for the best playoff run ever (every single team they beat won 57 or more games and was a top three seed. No team ever had that tough a successful title run ever.)
 

They're an enigma. We'll likely never see a team like them again.

[ohtani's jacket]

The first two episodes were all right. Not sure how they're going to draw this thing out to 10 episodes unless they're holding back on a lot of the behind the scenes footage. It's a topic that's been covered in documentaries before so none of it is new. The interesting part is the behind the scenes stuff like Stern schmoozing with Jordan. 

If it had been the modern NBA, Pippen would have forced a trade. 

[ohtani's jacket]

On 4/20/2020 at 2:37 PM, Brian Fowler said:

I love Magic, but there's no way in hell he was as famous globally at Jordan.

The NBA exploded in popularity due to the rise of satellite TV. At that time, Magic was just as famous as Jordan. Depending on your country's jumping on point, folks had seen Magic win the MVP in 1990, make the finals in 1991, shock the world with his HIV announcement, make his comeback at the 1992 All Star game and play at the Olympics. Jordan went on to become an icon, and the most popular player in the history of the game, but Magic was a big deal in the early 90s especially with the AIDS scare. 

Edited April 22, 2020 by ohtani's jacket

[ohtani's jacket]

On 4/21/2020 at 12:55 AM, Lawful Metal said:

 

Of course you'd draft Hakeem over Jordan. There was no guarantee that Jordan on the Rockets, or even Jordan on the Bulls for that matter, would have been anymore success than Drexler was in Portland. Hell, you can see on the documentary that a huge part of Jordan's success was that the Bulls locked Pippen into an awful contract. People assume that whatever team Jordan landed on it would have won multiple championships. We all know how fickle sport is. 

Having said that, it helps that Hakeem has the titles to justify the pick. And Hakeem was the greatest. At their peaks, I would rather watch Hakeem over Jordan any day of the week. 

[Lawful Metal]

3 hours ago, MavsFan77 said:

You keep making it sound like they’re an all time great team. They’re not. So you should stop.

Or you could try to explain how those two wins are so convincing, oh wait you can’t. But you can post 8,000 memes about your boy Harden, and how (in his and your minds only) he should be in the running for his fifth straight MVP award. 

Or better yet post more nonsense from guys about trash talking MJ when they’re career losers, and the wins you love bragging about netted zero NBA titles.

Stop nuthugging Jordan MAVSFAN.  You're not even a loyal fan.  You're the worst.  Jordan never played for the Mavs.  Jesus Christ. 

And I never denigrated MJ.  Certainly not.  Jordan is the best ever.  Everyone knows that except some idiot LeBron stans.  However, saying that Dream is up there with him, and saying that the Championship-winning Clutch City Houston Rockets teams that matched up extremely well with the Jordan Bulls and actually won the title when Jordan was playing in the playoffs, would have beaten the Bulls is not some controversial hot take.  The Bulls could've beaten the Rockets, sure.  But the Rockets could've beaten the Bulls, too.  We'll never know, mainly because the Jordan Bulls lost to the fucking MAGIC and denied us the chance to see what would have happened. 

The Rockets' second championship is the sweetest because they overcame so much adversity from the regular season to damn near losing the first two series before dominating.  And the GOAT Michael Jordan was playing in that playoffs, and they still won. 

Harden should have been in the running for MVP for his 5th straight year.  There hasn't been a scorer like him since .... Michael Jordan.  And he's the only player that's been in the running for MVP for the last five years in a row too.  But this again is another non-sequitur.  

Finally, the only person I posted that was trash-talking MJ was Mad Max, and if you were any kind of basketball fan, you'd kinda know that's like, his thing.  Or maybe you'd be the kind of idiot to talk about his dead daughter and think you're safe in the stands (or behind a computer monitor).