Tag Archives: basketball

Is Thompson the Best Catch-and-Shooter in the NBA?

Just over a week ago, on NBA Countdown, Jalen Rose was discussing the upcoming game between the Warriors and Bulls. While doing so, he asserted that Klay Thompson is the best catch-and-shooter in the NBA. Is he right?

Before we can answer that question, first we need to determine exactly what a catch-and-shooter is.

The NBA defines a catch-and-shoot attempt as “any jump shot outside of ten feet where a player possessed the ball for two seconds or less and took no dribbles”. That’s a reasonable definition. To ensure that only real catch-and-shooters showed up in the rankings, I tweaked the requirements; this list is limited to players who play at least twenty-four minutes a game while attempting at least three threes per game. This leaves us with fifty-eight players in the NBA who qualify as true catch-and-shooters.

How does Thompson rank under those parameters?

The answer? Very well, but not the best.

He’s eleventh in effective field goal percentage (eFG%) with 61.4%. He’s behind superstars such as Stephen Curry, Damian Lillard, and Kawhi Leonard, well-known three-point specialists including J.J. Redick, Khris Middleton, and J.R. Smith, and guys who you wouldn’t expect to be there like Jerryd Bayless and Patrick Beverley.

Thompson is tenth in catch-and-shoot three point percentage, again behind Curry, Leonard, and others. Again, he’s in the top fifth of the league, but he’s not quite the best.

However, Thompson is able to maintain his efficiency over far more three-point attempts than others. He leads the league with 6.3 catch-and-shoot attempts per game, 0.9 more than his closest competitor, Wesley Matthews. Matthews is closer to ninth place Curry than he is to first, showing how efficient Thompson is.

Similarly, Thompson leads the league in catch-and-shoot three-pointers made per game, with 2.8. This time, second place Curry is closer to eleventh place than he is to first.

Although we can’t say that Thompson is the most efficient catch-and-shooter in the NBA, his ability to maintain a relatively high level of efficiency over so many attempts speaks to his immense proficiency at catch-and-shooting.

In the end, while it’s not cut-and-dried, it’s a reasonable assertion to make that Klay Thompson is the best catch-and-shooter in the NBA.

How Did the Warriors Beat the Spurs?

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I don’t think anyone was expecting the utter devastation the Warriors wrought upon the Spurs. I don’t think anyone was expecting Stephen Curry to explode for thirty-seven points in only twenty-eight minutes. I don’t think anyone was expecting San Antonio’s point differential to go down a full point. I don’t think anyone was expecting any of this.

The important question is: How did this happen?

The answer, simply, is that rather than running their usual motion offense, the Spurs decided to try their hands at running a bakery. The problem is that the only pastries they knew how to cook were turnovers (mostly apple ones). All (bad) jokes aside, the Spurs continually hemorrhaged possessions last night, giving the ball to the Warriors in a variety of ways.

Naturally, the multitudinous turnovers were a problem for San Antonio, but the fact that it’s bad to turn the ball over isn’t enough to explain the blowout. After all, it’s not like Golden State took particularly good care of the ball; it had twenty-one turnovers to San Antonio’s twenty-six (which is eighth-most out of 1348 team games played so far this season!).

In fact, just turning the ball over alone doesn’t matter all that much. Take a look at a graph:

In this scatter plot, the x-axis is turnovers per game while the y-axis is winning percentage. As you can tell from the relatively even scatter of the graph, there’s only a very weak negative correlation (the r is -.36) between turnovers and winning percentage.

If turnovers don’t inherently affect winning, then why did they hurt the Spurs so significantly against the Warriors?

When a team turns the ball over, that often leads directly to a fast break, a facet of the game in which the Warriors excel. In fact, Golden State leads the league in fast break points with 20.7 per game, an impressive 2.76 standard deviations above the mean. To illustrate that number, take a look at a scatter plot of NBA teams and how many fast break points they have per game:

Look how far the Warriors (the star in the upper right corner) are away from everyone else. In fact, they gap between them and sixth place is larger than the gap between sixth place and thirtieth!

Golden State is so aberrant in this regard, that, as shown by the following box plot, it qualifies as an outlier:

As we can tell, Golden State’s offense relies a lot on fast breaks, and we’ve already covered how turnovers often lead to fast breaks. Now let’s take a look at San Antonio’s defense.

The Spurs allow 11.2 fast break points per game, ranking sixth in that category. As seems to be customary between these teams, two strengths are in direct conflict.

In this case, the Warriors’ strength won out. They scored nineteen fast break points, about two points under their average, but roughly eight points more than the Spurs’ average.

Now, one important aspect of a fast-break is the “fast” part. The Warriors rank first in the NBA in pace, while the Spurs are the eighth slowest team in the league. Since Golden State was able to take control of the pace of the game, San Antonio was out of its element. It didn’t help matters that the Spurs’ average age is 30.5, the oldest in the league by over a year. In fact, that’s likely a significant part of why they play so slowly.

Anyways, to sum it up, the main reason the Warriors were able to dismantle the Spurs on Monday night was because they were able to take control of the pace of the game through forcing turnovers. Those turnovers allowed them to score plenty of fast break points, erasing one of San Antonio’s biggest strengths.

Here’s a bonus question: Did this game provide a blueprint for how to beat the Spurs?

I’ll put it simply: Do many teams have a guy who can do things in transition like this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oJqRjJo3Oo

Yeah, I didn’t think so.

And aside from the otherworldly talents of Curry, the Warriors, as we’ve discussed, have a lot more going for them that other teams simply don’t have.

But even the Warriors haven’t figured out the formula to beating the Spurs. San Antonio had nearly double its usual turnovers and Tim Duncan was sitting out. There were plenty of other factors that contributed to the blowout that are unlikely to recur all at once.

Although this clearly is not a death knell for the Spurs, it could be a chink in their formerly unbroken armor, and perhaps particularly skilled teams will now be able to exploit it.

Notes From Bulls-Warriors

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Last night, in addition to the Knicks-Jazz game, I watched the Warriors and Bulls square off in Chicago. Here are a few observations from the game.

Derrick Rose looked spectacular. His performance hearkened back to his MVP season in 2011, not only in what he did, but in how he did it. His first four baskets came on a twisting layup, a wild bank shot, a floater, and another banker.

Rose finished with twenty-nine points, many coming on those same sorts of ridiculous shots that barely anyone else in the NBA would even bother attempting.

The Warriors have become a spectacle. Throngs of fans show up early to games when the Warriors come to town, hoping to see magic happen. Stephen Curry is at the center of it all, but even so, it was surprising when the Bulls fans filling the United Center let out a mildly disappointed “Oh” when he missed his first three-point attempt.

The Bulls did one particularly strange thing early in the game. Many teams like to trap Curry on pick-and-rolls, knowing that to let him free is an invitation for a swished three-pointer. That trapping leads to four-on-threes for Golden State, but those are preferable to giving up an open shot to Curry.

While it makes sense to trap Curry, the Bulls strangely decided to trap Klay Thompson off a pick-and-roll, leading to a four-on-three led by Curry. Why in the world would they choose to do that? One has to assume that it was a gaffe of some sort, perhaps a miscommunication between the two defenders.

Shaun Livingston had a very nice game. He shot six-for-eight, scoring twelve points with five assists over sixteen minutes. Livingston, despite being a point guard, is 6’7″, and he used that size to his advantage last night, posting up smaller guards with ease.

Adding to his value, unlike most 6’7″ players, Livingston can defend point guards. Even better, he fits in well with Golden State’s whirring machine of defensive perfection as he’s able to switch seamlessly with all the other similarly sized players the warriors have (click here for a breakdown of Golden State’s switching capabilities on defense).

Midway through the second quarter, Rose dove at Curry’s knees on a closeout, leading to three free throws. I don’t know about you, but I never realized that Steph Curry was actually Rob Gronkowski.

The Warriors ended up destroying the Bulls 125-94. This win is a big boost for Golden State; after smashing the Cavs apart in Cleveland on Monday by thirty-four points, beating another top contender in the East by thirty-one is a something to be proud of. Even better, it comes on the heels of a poor three-game stretch consisting of a pair of road losses to the Nuggets and Pistons sandwiching a home win against the Lakers.

This victory sends the Warriors home for a three-game stay at the Oracle Arena against three playoff teams, including Monday night’s matchup against the Spurs, which promises to be one of the best games in the NBA this season.

Notes From Wizards-Clippers

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I’m in DC right now, and a couple of nights ago, I took the opportunity to see the Wizards square off against the Clippers in the Verizon Center. Here a few observations from the game.

There were a couple of strange things that occurred during the game. For instance, at one point in the second half, plastic cows attached to mini parachutes were dropped from the rafters. Why? I think it had something to do with a Chick-Fil-A promotion, but honestly, I’m not sure.

The halftime show was immensely enjoyable. A pair of goals were set up at the free throw lines and a three on three game of soccer was held. The fun part was that, since each player was encased in a plastic bubble, it was impossible to get hurt, so the game was spent watching the players ram into one another. Always a pleasurable experience.

During the pregame warmups, I had a good time watching Josh Smith practice his free-throw shooting. Sorry Josh, even sinking sixty free throws in a row won’t make up for this travesty:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCDDPH2mirQ

The game itself wasn’t overly exciting. Despite the absence of Blake Griffin, the Wizards were unable to take a single lead. The Clippers opened up the game on a 13-2 run and didn’t look back.

Cole Aldrich, of all people, had a solid game. He produced thirteen points, six rebounds, three assists, four steals, and a block over twenty minutes. Aldrich’s main contributions to the game were the four times he tried and failed to throw down a big dunk, leading to plenty of taunts from the stands.

DeAndre Jordan was particularly entertaining for a couple of reasons. One, whenever he has a big dunk, he hangs on the rim for a moment, letting his lengthy limbs loose:

Two, Jordan has a magnificent deer-in-the-headlights look whenever he goes to the free throw line. On his first two attempts, his anxiety, nervousness, and dread were plain to see:

As expected, he missed those free throws, although he rallied to make three of his next four to finish the night with a solid three of six at the line.

Throughout the night, the Wizards were discombobulated on offense. There were many possessions that ended late in the shot clock with a contested heave from John Wall. Even when a Wizard had a wide open three-pointer, more often than not, the shot clanked off the rim.

There was one notable near-achievement from a Wizards player: Jared Dudley, a starter, nearly earned a thirteen trillion. He played thirteen minutes, and recorded a grand total of zero points, rebounds, assists, steals, blocks, and fouls. The only thing keeping Dudley from a historic performance was one measly turnover. Alas. Better luck next time, Jared.

It’s indicative that I talked more about the sideshows, both literal and figurative, from the parachuting cows to DeAndre Jordan’s gangly legs, than about the game itself. I guess it was just that kind of night.

Still, despite the uncompetitive game, I had a good time, and it certainly was a…

This article can also be found at Jock Journal.

Notes From Warriors-Bucks

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Last Saturday night, the Warriors’ 24-game winning streak to open the season was ended, on the road, against the Bucks.

It was a spectacular game. I was cheering for history, and I never gave up hope until the Warriors were down eleven with ninety seconds to go. How could I? Golden State’s smothering defense can force turnovers and Steph Curry can rain threes, erasing even a double-digit lead in a minute or two.

The atmosphere at the game was electric. That phrase is overused, but in this case, it’s completely true. It’s only December, but the fans were cheering like it was a Game 7. The Bucks even handed out shirts reading “24-1” on the front.

Greg Monroe was impossible to defend. The Warriors couldn’t go to the so-called Death Lineup (or as Curry calls it, the “Uh-Oh Lineup) thanks to Monroe’s punishing post-up game. He pushed through defenders all-game, throwing in lefty layups and floaters on his way to 28 points on a mere sixteen shots.

Giannis Antetokounmpo was unstoppable as well. Despite taking only 11% of his team’s shots, the Greek Freak was a force all game, compiling eleven points, twelve rebounds, and ten assists for a triple-double.

Even Michael Carter-Williams managed to put his shooting woes behind him, shooting seven out of ten from the field and scoring seventeen points. He played tenacious defense, racking up five steals, resulting in fast-break chances for easy points.

Most impressively for the Bucks was the poor shooting night they inflicted on Curry. The early favorite for MVP shot only ten of twenty-one from the field, including an awful two of eight from three-point range.

This inefficiency was not limited to Curry. The team as a whole only shot 40.9% from the field and 23.1% from three. The Warriors even managed to miss eight free throws.

Some people have decided that Milwaukee has managed to figure out the formula to beating Golden State. Let’s work through that formula together to see one, if it has any basis in fact, and two, if it will work in the playoffs.

First, this game was in Milwaukee. Assuming Golden State earns home-court advantage throughout the playoffs, an opponent will have to win in Oracle Arena to eliminate the Warriors.

Next, this game was a back-to-back for the Warriors, which contributed to their lackadaisical play early on. In the playoffs, there are no back-to-backs.

On top of that, Golden State’s game the night before was a double-overtime game in Boston. The Warriors’ best two players, Curry and Draymond Green, played an exhausting 47 and 50 minutes, respectively. After the draining game against the Celtics, the Warriors flew to Milwaukee, arriving at their hotel at around 3:00 AM.

Finally, Harrison Barnes, the starter at small forward and the fifth member of the Lineup of Death (alongside Curry, Green, Klay Thompson, and Andre Iguodala), sat out his eighth straight game due to a sprained left ankle.

To recap, the formula to beating the Warriors is to play them at home, after they played a double-overtime game the night before and got to their hotel at three in the morning, have one of their starters out with an injury, and force the best shooter in NBA history and his team into an uncharacteristic poor shooting night.

Sounds pretty easy to replicate. The Warriors are doomed.

Notes From Knicks-Sixers

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Last night, I watched the sloppy Sixers-Knicks game in its entirety. Here are a few observations from the game.

First off, the viewing experience of watching the Knicks on MSG is made five times as enjoyable thanks to Walt Frazier’s entertaining phrasing. According to this article from ESPN, Frazier acquired his massive vocabulary by reading the New York Times’ Sunday Arts & Leisure section and writing down whatever words that caught his eye. After he wrote down the words, Frazier then studied how each was used in a sentence using a method he calls “linking and thinking.”

Anyways, last night, Frazier produced a few classics in “shaking and baking,” “wheeling and dealing,” and “moving and grooving” before moving on to more eclectic ones, such as “swooping and hooping,” “hanging and banging,” and “slamming and jamming.”

Carmelo Anthony looked awful last night. Even in a game against the sorry Sixers, he’s just been off. Anthony missed layups and chucked up badly off-target three-pointers. He finished with twelve points off of sixteen inefficient shots in a subpar game. I don’t know if this is a trend (I sure hope not), but it’s something to keep an eye on as the season progresses.

In last year’s draft, Nik Stauskas, a shooting guard, was taken by the Kings 8th overall. He started exactly one game for them, the season finale against the Lakers. Over the summer, Sacramento traded him to Philadelphia in a salary dump so they could open up extra cap space to sign the eight superstars who were all lining up to come play for the Kings.

Putting aside the hilariously lopsided deal, that put Stauskas in Philadelphia, on a team that didn’t care about winning whatsoever. The trade allowed him to play more minutes which would give him a larger opportunity to work through whatever issues he’d dealt with in his rookie season. Accordingly, his playing time has increased by nine minutes per game.

He didn’t have a big game or anything last night, with four shot attempts over twenty-four minutes, but one thing I noticed was his lightning-quick release on his three-point jumper. It was almost Curry-esque.

Last of all, let’s talk about Young Kristaps, who put up seventeen points, ten rebounds, and four blocks over thirty minutes in a customarily spectacular game.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNWqhxNV-Yk

Despite his height, Young Kristaps has a lovely jumper he used twice from three-point range, nailing both shots. Nothing about his shot seems forced; it’s natural and he’s able to smoothly catch the ball and rise up for a graceful shot.

Young Kristaps had a couple of impressive passes last night. Early in the game, he reached around his defender to deliver a nice pass to Robin Lopez for a layup. Later on, Jose Calderon and Young Kristaps ran a pick-and-roll. Calderon passed it to Young Kristaps as he came around the screen, and Young Kristaps started to drive towards the basket, but instead hit Calderon with a behind-the-back pass. He had another fine pass to Calderon where he spotted that the point guard had a step on his defender and lofted the ball over to him for an easy layup.

I can’t believe we’ve gotten this far into the article without mentioning a single one of Young Kristaps’ thunderous dunks. He had one where he drove lefty into the lane on Nerlens Noel and rose up for a tomahawk slam and another where Derrick Williams lobbed the ball up to him from behind the three-point line for a monstrous alley-oop.

Young Kristaps blocked four shots last night, but we’ll focus in on one. In the middle of the opening quarter, Isaiah Canaan drove to the basket with Young Kristaps moving along with him. Now, one of the concerns about Young Kristaps before the draft was that he was too thin to survive in the NBA. Although that’ll go away as he gets older, it was a problem in this case as, on his way to the rim, the 6’0″ Canaan rammed into the chest of the 7’3″ Young Kristaps, pushing him back. Despite this, Young Kristaps’ arms are some long enough that he was able to envelope Canaan, blocking the shot with ease.

Along with collecting four blocks, Young Kristaps picked up only one foul. This is a marked departure from Summer League, where across four games and 82 minutes, he picked up seventeen fouls, including a game with seven fouls in only 22 minutes. Working on his trouble with fouling was a high priority for Young Kristaps entering the season.

The problem was that Young Kristaps was often committing fouls due to his aggressiveness on defense. To measure the worth of his aggressiveness on defense, I used Young Kristaps’ SB/F (steals+blocks/fouls), a new statistic I made up to measure whether or not a player’s tenacity on defense is a positive, was a .647 during Summer League. So far this season, he’s improved it to a .881.

Using statistics from basketball-reference.com, there have been 276 games played so far this season, with roughly 2208 steals, 1435 blocks, and 5741 personal fouls across all 276 games. That works out to a league-average SB/F of .634, so, to my surprise, apparently Young Kristaps was roughly average during Summer League and has been exceptional so far this year.

Now that Young Kristaps can play aggressive defense while still staying on the floor, that combination, along with all of his other talents, makes it look like he’ll be a star.

Thanks to Young Kristaps, for the first time in a decade, Knicks fans, there’s a reason for hope.

I noticed I wrote “Young Kristaps” a lot this article, so here’s a quick explanation for why I call him that, rather than Porzingis. In the 2015 NBA Draft Diary, I wrote:

That’s it. Maybe as a compromise with myself I’ll alternate Young Kristaps with YK. I guess we’ll figure it out.

Super-duper quick pick for Thursday Night Football: Detroit +2 over Green Bay. Neither team makes me feel any good about betting on them, but Detroit’s been playing better lately so that’s as good a reason as any.

Welcome to the Suck Bowl

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The NFL has the Super Bowl. The NCAA has countless bowls, covering an eclectic array of classics like the Cotton, Orange, and Rose, and shameless advertisements including the GoDaddy, Hyundai Sun, and Nova Home Loans Arizona. The NBA? Well, it has the Suck Bowl.

Tonight in Philadelphia, two team with a combined record of 2-32 will square off. In one corner, there are the Lakers, whose Stone-Age coach’s stubborn dismissal of common sense has them at 2-14. In the other, there are the Sixers, whose New-Age general manager’s continued plea to “trust the process” has the team at a dismal 0-18.

These are two teams heading in similar directions, but it’s always intriguing to map out how each got to where they are.

Let’s begin with the Lakers, a team that is dysfunctional enough that it allows Kobe Bryant to airball at least four shots a game and whose coach, Byron Scott, recently said: “Our guys get along. They just don’t trust each other”. And no, I’m not sure how that makes any sense, but remember, this is the same guy who seemingly believes that two and three are equal, based on his insistence that his team not shoot too many threes.

Anyways, way back in 2012, the team traded for stars Steve Nash and Dwight Howard. The team was expected to be great; however, Mitch Kupchak, the team’s general manager, apparently forgot that defense is as important as offense en route to a disappointing 45-37 season.

Despite their final record, the Lakers were still in the playoffs as the seventh seed, so there was still hope for their season. Then they got whipped by the Spurs by an average scoring margin of 18.75 over a four game sweep.

In the offseason, Howard fled to Houston, ending the team’s hope that he would be its bridge from Bryant into the future. Instead, the Lakers extended Bryant’s contract by two years for 48.5 million dollars, condemning the team to mediocrity or worse for the foreseeable future.

The next season, Los Angeles went 27-55 and Bryant played in a mere six games due to injury. There was a bright side to the team’s awfulness: a high draft pick resulting in Julius Randle, a power forward out of Kentucky. In addition to Randle, the Lakers nabbed Jordan Clarkson, a guard, at 46th overall.

In the 2014-15 season, the Lakers went 21-61, the franchise’s worst record throughout its entire history. Adding to the dismal display, Randle broke his leg in his NBA debut, immediately ending his season, and Bryant again suffered through various injuries, playing only 35 games. However, Clarkson had a sparkling rookie season, excelling in March and April once he received playing time, with averages of 17 points, 4.7 rebounds, and 5.7 assists over the last two months of the season.

Another ugly season led to another high draft pick, and with the help of some luck in the lottery, the Lakers were able to draft D’Angelo Russell, a star point guard, at #2 overall.

That’s where the team stands. It’s got an aging star who’s not a star any more (and is retiring after the season) and a couple of young studs. The team sits at an ugly 2-14, but there’s plenty of hope for the future.

In Philadelphia, there’s also hope, but the team took a far different path to get it.

The story of the present-day 76ers team began in 2013, when Sam Hinkie tore down the team to tank for a high draft pick. The team finished 19-63, but only got the third pick in the draft, with which they took Joel Embiid. Later on in the first round, the Sixers traded its 10th overall pick to Orlando for the 12th pick and a 2017 first rounder (which led to some hilarious awkwardness as I discussed here), and selected Dario Saric, who can’t come to the US until at least 2016.

After another horrific season at 18-64, the Sixers again had the third overall pick, and again took a big man, this time taking Jahlil Okafor out of Duke.

As Philadelphia stands now, it has a ton of solid players on its roster, from Nerlens Noel to Robert Covington to TJ McConnell to Nik Stauskas to Tony Wroten to Isaiah Canaan to Jerami Grant. It has a wealth of future draft assets (as Business Insider details here). It even has a couple of 2014 first-rounders coming in the future when Embiid finally makes his debut and Saric comes over from Turkey.

It’s clear that Hinkie is pushing all his assets into the future while imploring the team’s fans to “trust the process” and, despite the agonizing state of the present-day team, the plan is nearly guaranteed to work. Zach Lowe wrote over the summer that “if Philly is really willing to do this for five, six, or seven seasons, it almost cannot fail. It will either land a superstar or draft so many good players that they will gather a solid NBA team.”

Until that glorious future, however, Sixers fans are stuck with the current team. Despite its numerous quality players, it’s winless at 0-18. The team isn’t as bad as it record shows, though, as Philadelphia has had a lead in the fourth quarter of each of its last five games, only to fritter it away, resulting in agonizing loss after agonizing loss.

Tonight’s game against the Lakers is especially important, because, if the Sixers lose, they’ll set a record for the worst start to a season in NBA history. Luckily, Philadelphia is favored by 1.5 points, but if they lose again tonight, another shot at a victory may not come for a while.

Will the Sixers Win Before the Warriors Lose?

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According to ESPN’s Basketball Power Index, the Warriors are favored in 65 out of their remaining 67 games. The only two games the Warriors are the underdogs in are its road games at San Antonio. That’s it.

The first of those two games is in the middle of March, the Warriors’ 68th game of the season. Now, Golden State will almost certainly lose before then, but the question is: When?

The Warriors don’t face a tough game until December 5th, the team’s 21st game of the season, when they’ll play the Raptors on the road. Even then, they’ll still be heavy favorites against a Toronto team that just lost Jonas Valanciunas to a hand injury.

It’s worthwhile to note that the Raptors gave the Warriors a serious scare when the teams last played, on November 17th. In that game, at Oracle Arena, the visitors barely lost by a score of 115-110.

Assuming Golden State gets past Toronto, the toughest game the team will face until Christmas is a road matchup with the Pacers. On Christmas Day, the Warriors will host the Cavs, which could be a challenging matchup. However, due to the league’s best home-court advantage, Golden State is still likely to cruise to a victory.

We need to fast-forward almost a month, to January 18th, for the next serious threat to Golden State’s perfect record. They’ll play Cleveland on the road to begin an imposing weeklong stretch that includes road games in Chicago and Indiana and a home game against San Antonio.

If I had to bet, I would guess that the Warriors lose their first game of the season during that stretch, between January 18th and 25th. I have to agree with ESPN: the Warriors don’t look like they’ll be losing any time soon.

However, although the Warriors have been dominant through the first month of the season, they still have a close competitor in making history and it’s not who you might think.

The 76ers are almost as bad as the Warriors are good, with an 0-15 mark to start off the season. They’re four losses away from passing the atrocious 2009-10 Nets for the worst start in NBA history. This could be the most riveting storyline of the next month or two: will the Sixers win before the Warriors lose?

Now that’s a far more compelling question. The next good chance Philadelphia has for a win is in a week, when they’ll play the Lakers at home on December 1st. However, if they can’t end the streak then, they’ll only have one quality shot at a victory in the next month, when they play Brooklyn in the Barclays Center on December 10th.

After that, the next solid opportunity the Sixers will have for a win is a couple of road games against the Kings and Lakers on December 30th and January 1st, respectively. If Philadelphia still doesn’t have a victory after that, well, they’ll have to wait more than a month for another winnable game, when they host the Nets on February 6th.

I think the losing streak will end against the Lakers next week. It’ll actually be quite dramatic. Assuming the Sixers lose their next three games, they’ll sit at 0-18 heading into the game. To avoid the ignominious accomplishment of owning the worst start in NBA history, that Lakers game will be a must win.

To answer the original question, it seems as though the scheduling gods want Philadelphia to win before Golden State loses. However, if the Sixers keep on losing and the Warriors keep on winning, each team setting a new record each and every game, an amazing game will be set for January 30th.

On that date, the Sixers could be 0-45 and the Warriors could be 46-0 when the two teams meet for the first time this season for a game in Philadelphia. Although the odds are a million to one against it, if Philadelphia managed to get its first win by handing Golden State its first loss, well, that would just be awesome.

Catching Up on the NBA

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My picks are already looking awful. Anthony Davis and Bradley Beal have been hurt. The Pelicans have been plagued by injuries. Washington has been average at best. Without Corey Brewer’s miracle three-point attempt to send last night’s game to overtime, the Rockets would be an atrocious 4-8. Nothing at all has been working out as planned so far.

Well, almost nothing. The Warriors have been customarily dominant. If you follow basketball at all, I’m sure you’ve seen amazing stats lauding the team for their historic achievements, but here’s one you probably haven’t heard: the Warriors are currently on pace to go 82-0, shattering the 72-10 mark set by the 1995-96 Bulls.

All jokes aside, Steph Curry has been insane. I’ve watched a few of Golden State’s games so far, and every time he takes a shot, it seems to be almost a technicality when it goes in. A couple of weeks ago, the Warriors were down to the Clippers late in the game, and Curry just took over and Los Angeles couldn’t do anything to stop him.

Curry’s the clear frontrunner for MVP at this point and he’s way ahead of the pack. Who can challenge him? LeBron is resting for the playoffs, Davis has been hurt, John Wall hasn’t been great, Kevin Durant has been hurt, and James Harden has been an inconsistent player on an inconsistent team. Blake Griffin and Russell Westbrook are my 2-3 behind Curry, but who’s next? Honestly, it might be Andre Drummond. That’s just weird.

In other news: Young Kristaps is everyone’s new favorite player. Young Kristaps has been surprisingly great so far for the Knicks. For all the talk about how he’s a project and how he’s a year or two away, he’s been really really good. Earlier this week, he put up a 29-11 double-double on an efficient 17 shots. He’s been able to shoot threes effectively (including an almost game-winner against Charlotte that was just after time expired) while being a force down low. He’s thrown down a few monstrous put-back dunks (including this beauty against the Raptors) and has been able to serve both as a stretch-four when on the court with Robin Lopez and as a more conventional big man when playing alone.

I think it’s hilarious what’s been happening in Brooklyn so far this season. They’re absolutely, unequivocally atrocious and seem OK with it. That’s a perfectly reasonable thing to do. After all, tanking has worked in the past and the Sixers have been happy to lose again and again over the past few years in the hopes of landing a franchise player. However, the so-called “brain-trust” in Brooklyn seems to have forgotten one important detail: They don’t own their own pick. So while Brooklyn’s incessant losing will likely result in the acquisition of a franchise player, that franchise player will be heading to Boston as part of the Pierce-Garnett-Terry trade from a couple of years ago. While we’re here, I can’t get over how lopsided that trade was. Exploring the ramifications of that horrendous trade might be worth an article in the near future.

Anyways, as we can see, the NBA isn’t lacking in storylines. We haven’t talked at all about the competitive Rookie of the Year race or the exciting young teams coalescing in Orlando and Minnesota or Kobe Bryant’s quest to miss the most shots in the history of the NBA. We’ll discuss all of this, and more, in the future, but for now, let’s just enjoy the impending bloodbath between the Warriors and Clippers on national TV tonight.

The 2015 NBA Draft Diary

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Hello all, and welcome to the 2015 NBA Draft Diary. This is our second straight year recording the draft in this format (here’s last year’s: https://sushionsports.wordpress.com/2014/06/27/the-2014-nba-draft-diary/) and it should be as great as the last one.

Although I doubt this draft will reach last year’s hilarious high when Zach LaVine couldn’t hide his dismay at having to play for Minnesota, there’s a similar amount of doubt about what will happen.

Last year, no one knew what was going to happen at the top between Andrew Wiggins, Jabari Parker, and Joel Embiid. This year, Karl-Anthony Towns is the consensus number one pick, but the next few picks are muddled.

The Lakers are able to dictate what will happen for the rest of the draft from their perch at number two. They get to choose between a wealth of talented players; Jahlil Okafor, D’Angelo Russell. and Kristaps Porzingis are all options at their pick.

Philadelphia, at number three, could be trapped if the Lakers take Russell. That’d leave them with a choice between the two big men, Okafor and Porzingis, when they already have Nerlens Noel and Embiid, or reaching a little to address a need.

The Knicks, at number four, are hoping that Russell drops to them, as he’s a good fit for Phil Jackson’s fabled triangle offense. Of course, Isiah Thomas has talked about trading the pick for a veteran in a win-now move. Wait, did I say Isiah Thomas? Whoops, I meant Phil Jackson, although it’s easy to get the two confused, especially if Jackson trades away this pick. Let’s hope he doesn’t make that trade for the sake of all the scarred Knicks fans at the Barclays Center tonight.

The most important quality teams are looking for in this draft is positional flexibility, meaning that they want a player who can defend multiple positions on the defensive end. Why is this? Well, the Warriors just won the NBA title in part because of a switching machine on defense. Draymond Green is getting a max contract this summer in part because he can defend all five positions credibly. Justice Winslow, a wing, and Willie Cauley-Stein, a big man, are both highly ranked players who can defend multiple positions at elite levels, particularly Cauley-Stein.

My personal favorite player this draft is Frank Kaminsky. To me, he seems to be exactly what NBA teams are looking for nowadays, big men who can shoot threes, run the floor, and play decent defense. Kaminsky can be one of the first ever stretch-5s.

There’s one important domino yet to fall: DeMarcus Cousins. His screwed-up team, the Kings, and its screwed-up owner, Vivek Ranadive, are considering firing George Karl four months after they hired him. If they trade Cousins, either because they side with Karl against him or because he gets fed up enough with their BS that he finally demands a trade.

Anyways, the draft is about to start, so let’s end this bloated introduction and begin!

7:35: Adam Silver opens up with the same type of speech that he gave last year, going through the reigning champions and where players integral to their team were drafted.

7:39: As expected, Towns is selected first overall.

7:39: Now the real intrigue begins. As we discussed earlier, what the Lakers do here will set the tone for the rest of the draft.

7:40: Apparently the Timberwolves are the first team to ever have three consecutive first overall picks on their team, with Anthony Bennett, Andrew Wiggins, and now Towns.

7:41: In its congratulations to Towns on its Twitter, Kentucky used this hashtag: #succeedandproceed. Calipari definitely isn’t shy about his team-building strategy.

7:45: The Lakers take…

7:46: D’Angelo Russell.

7:46: Can’t quibble with that pick. Okafor is the most NBA-ready player in the draft, with a developed post-up game, but the Lakers already have an elite post-up threat down low in Julius Randle. Also, if they took a defensive sieve in Okafor, along with creaky old Bryant and Randle, they might somehow be worse at defense than they were last year. Taking Russell also allows the Lakers to shift Jordan Clarkson out of the starting lineup into a role as a sixth man where he’ll be valuable instant offense off the bench. Russell just works better for the Lakers on so many levels.

7:50: Also, thinking more about Okafor, the Lakers could just look across their stadium at the Clippers. DeAndre Jordan was unplayable for swaths of time in the playoffs because he couldn’t shoot free throws. Okafor, while not as bad as Jordan, is still only a 51% free throw shooter, making him a liability. To me, that’s significant enough of a risk that it’s tough to look past it, especially because Jordan is an elite defensive center while Okafor, well, is not. Because of this, it wouldn’t be as surprising as it might otherwise be if he dropped a little in the draft.

7:52: Conspiracy Theory Alert: Maybe the Lakers didn’t take Okafor because they have a wink-wink agreement with Kevin Love to come to Los Angeles and won’t have a starting spot for Okafor.

7:53: Philadelphia’s pick is in. Let’s see what Sam Hinkie does…

7:55: Okafor.

7:55: There are a couple of ways to spin this: either Hinkie is seriously worried about Embiid and decided that he needed another big man, or he’s just sticking to his overall strategy of taking the best player available, believing that talent will work itself out in the end.

7:56: In the crowd, a Sixers fan was holding up a sign, reading “#trusttheprocess”. At this point, that’s really the only thing Philly fans can do, but that’s depressing nonetheless.

7:58: I guess Okafor’s woes on the defensive end could be less glaring when playing next to the defensive force named Nerlens Noel. That’s a bright side, I guess.

7:59: Ooh! Just thought of another positive: Okafor’s poor free throw shooting won’t become a serious problem in the playoffs because the Sixers won’t make the playoffs any time soon.

8:00: Jalen Rose’s team needs for the Knicks is “Everything”. Ugh.

8:02: The Knicks take Porzingis.

8:02: Some Knicks fans in the crowd appear to be pleased but most seem extremely upset.

8:03: C’mon Knicks fans, look on the bright side: At least Jackson didn’t trade the pick. That’s a positive, isn’t it?

8:05: This pick is risky, obviously, because they’re taking a foreign player, but more importantly, it’s just a really bad fit. Carmelo Anthony is most valuable at power forward but Porzingis’ natural position is at the 4.

8:10: Orlando takes Mario Hezonjav, another Eastern European, fifth overall.

8:11: Another risky pick and another bad fit. Hezonja is a shooting guard, but they’ve already got Victor Oladipo, an established player who’s still young and getting better, at that position. It just doesn’t seem worth it to me. I would have rather seen them go with Justise Winslow here, as their only weak spot in their starting lineup right now is at small forward and teams can always use an elite defender, particularly when that player can defend multiple positions.

8:17: Willie Cauley-Stein to Sacramento at sixth overall. Interesting pick. Cauley-Stein is a center, just like Cousins, but at least he’s flexible and an amazing defender, making him a fit pretty much anywhere. Still, it’s curious that they’d pick him when it might offend Cousins enough that he’d insist on being traded.

8:24: Another interesting pick as the Nuggets select Emmanuel Mudiay with the seventh pick.

8:25: My favorite thing about Mudiay is that he realized that the NCAA is corrupt and unfair and blew them off to go play in China while getting paid for his services. Hopefully more players will follow his lead instead of playing for free in the NCAA.

8:27: By taking Mudiay, Denver is saying, quite clearly, that it’s done with Ty Lawson, its star point guard. He’s been on the trading block for months, and is now almost certainly going to be traded before too long.

8:29: Stanley Johnson is taken by the Pistons eight overall. He should be a nice fit at small forward, playing on the wing next to Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, shooting threes off passes from Brandon Jennings.

8:36: This is somewhat ominous for Charlotte. Last year they also had the ninth pick and the player they drafted, Noah Vonleh, has already been traded away.

8:37: The Hornets take…

8:37: FRANK THE TANK!!!!

8:41: I actually really don’t like this pick for Charlotte. They’ve already got Al Jefferson at center, who, while oft injured, is still a force on the offensive end. Kaminsky is going to be forced to play power forward, but that negates one of his biggest assets: his ability to shoot threes while being able to play center defensively. It’s a poor fit and this poor fit might submarine Kaminsky’s career

8:42: Rose makes the good point that the Hornets just traded for Spencer Hawes, another guy who can play center and shoot threes, while trading away Lance Stephenson, who’s an elite defender, to get him. Then, in the draft, they turn around and draft someone who can play center and shoot threes, in Frank Kaminsky, while passing on an elite defender, in Justise Winslow. Not a good sign as to the quality of Charlotte’s brain trust.

8:43: And the Heat take Winslow tenth.

8:44: It’s a good pick because, as I’ve repeated again and again, when you’re taking a guy like Winslow, it’s never a bad pick. It’s really that simple.

8:50: The Pacers select Myles Turner eleventh overall.

8:52: This pick is intriguing because it signals that Indiana is moving away from Roy Hibbert and the grinding defensive mentality that they’ve relied on for years.

8:53: Apparently, Turner can hit threes, another harbinger of offensive change for the Pacers.

8:57: The Jazz take Trey Lyles, the third Kentucky player picked today.

9:00: Here’s my problem with this pick: Utah has Rudy Gobert, an elite defensive player, who’s pretty much Tyson Chandler in his prime. Similarly to Dwight Howard’s teams in Orlando and in Houston this season, Chandler’s teams in New York and Dallas won when he was surrounded by three point shooters while he worked alone in the paint on both ends of the floor. Lyles can’t shoot threes, cramping up Utah’s spacing and preventing them from becoming the elite teams that Howard and Chandler’s teams were.

9:04: Phoenix takes Devin Booker, the fourth Kentucky player taken today, thirteenth overall.

9:05: It’s a good pick. Booker’s a shooter and can play off of Brandon Knight. Booker also fills Phoenix’s weakest spot, at shooting guard.
9:11: With the final pick of the lottery, the Thunder take Cameron Payne, out of Murray State. He’s a point guard, as is Russell Westbrook, so it’ll be interesting to see who the Thunder have play off the ball when they’re on the court together.

9:18: Here’s where the Nets would’ve picked if they weren’t totally incompetent. Instead, the sixty-win Hawks will add another asset to their deep team.

9:19: Atlanta takes Kelly Oubre. He’s a good defender and he plays small forward, so he’ll be able to replace DeMarre Carroll, who’s likely going to be leaving the Hawks in free agency.

9:26: Never mind, Oubre is headed to Washington, with Washington’s pick and two second rounders going back to Atlanta. He’ll be a good fit for Washington as well, phasing out the aging Paul Pierce, although Otto Porter Jr. broke out in the playoffs and I’m surprised the Wizards don’t want to explore what they have with 2013’s third overall pick.

9:27: Terry Rozier goes to the Celtics 16th overall. He’s an elite scorer but he’ll be in a dogfight for minutes at guard with a few other players.

9:33: Rashad Vaughn is taken by the Bucks. This is the first player I don’t know enough about to have a genuine opinion about him. He plays shooting guard, but Milwaukee already has Michael Carter-Williams, Jabari Parker, and the Greek Freak, and all three of those guys can play shooting guard. Perhaps Vaughn will come off the bench and act as depth for the team instead of being an important part of it.

9:39: Houston takes Sam Dekker with the 18th pick.

9:40: Dekker’s good, but I can’t claim to love this choice. In normal lineups, Trevor Ariza plays small forward and James Harden plays there when the Rockets go small. Still, Houston doesn’t have any holes in its starting lineup, so I guess it’s worth it for them to get a player who can be valuable off the bench.

9:46: Washington, picking for Atlanta, takes Jerian Grant. The Hawks already have Jeff Teague so I’m not sure why they need him. Maybe Atlanta will play more small ball, with Kyle Korver at small forward, Grant playing shooting guard, and Teague running the point.

9:48: Wait a second… Now, Grant is apparently going to the Knicks for Tim Hardaway Jr. I really like Grant and I’m ambivalent about Hardaway. I think this is ultimately a downgrade for Atlanta and a very nice trade for Phil Jackson and the Knicks..

9:53: Delon Wright, from Utah, is taken by the Raptors with the twentieth pick. He’s not going to start, not while Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan are on the team, but he’s like Lou Williams in that he’ll be instant offense off the bench.

9:55: I’m extremely excited for the upcoming interview with Phil Jackson. While this last trade was rock solid, I’d like to hear an explanation for his choice of Porzingis.

9:58: Jackson just called Porzingis “Young Kristaps”. I think I know what I’ll be calling Young Kristaps for the rest of his life.

10:00: Jackson pretty much just said that since Young Kristaps is athletic and willing to work, he’ll be fine. I’m dubious, and besides, I’m not exactly happy about waiting the year that Jackson admitted it would take for Young Kristaps to develop.

10:00: The Mavs take Justin Anderson. He’s the guy whose absence proved to be the undoing of Virginia; once he got hurt, the Cavs lost in the second round to MSU. It’ll be interesting to see where he plays, though, because he’s a forward and Dallas’ two forward spots are already filled with Chandler Parsons and Dirk Nowitzki.

10:06: Chicago selects Bobby Portis. There’s no way he’ll ever see the light of day at power forward with Joakim Noah, Taj Gibson, Nikola Mirotic, and Doug McDermott all ahead of him on the depth chart.

10:14: Rondae Hollis-Jeffersonn goes to Portland with the 23rd overall pick.

10:15: I like this selection for Portland. He’s not a good shooter but with Damian Lillard on his team, he won’t be asked to ever be a big part of the offense. Hollis-Jefferson’s specialty is defense and he’ll be a useful piece for the Trailblazers off the bench.

10:18: The Cavs are up next and the decision they have is fascinating. If they can choose a good shooting guard, such as RJ Hunter, then their only comparative weakness in their starting lineup will be shored up.

10:23: Cleveland takes…

10:23: TYUS STONES. Well, Tyus Jones, but he’s earned his nickname when he hit clutch shot after clutch shot in the NCAA championship game. Great pick for the Cavs. He’s small, but he can score, and he might be able to carry Cleveland’s offense in limited minutes off the bench, a unit that simply wilted in the playoffs when LeBron sat.

10:28: Never mind, Jones is headed to Minnesota for the 31st and 36th picks in the draft. Jones will act as bench depth on the Timberwolves. It’s a good trade for the Cavs as they’ll get dirt cheap players to act as depth while not tying up much cap space.

10:29: The Grizz take Jarell Martin from LSU. I’m confused. Memphis really needs a guard who can shoot threes, but Martin shoots threes rarely, and when he does, he usually misses, only hitting just over a quarter of his threes this past season. He’s another power forward but the Grizzlies don’t have a serious need for one with Zach Randolph safely the starter at that position.

10:33: The Spurs take Nikola Milutinov, the first player in this draft whose name I have never heard. Normally I would say that I’d never hear his name again, but this is San Antonio we’re talking about, so I assume Milutinov is about to be a Hall of Famer with a string of eighteen consecutive seasons of averaging 25-12 every night.

10:39: The Lakers take Larry Nance Jr. We’re officially on a streak of players who I’ve never heard of.

10:46: RJ Hunter goes to the Celtics at 28th overall. As a Nets fan I was hoping Hunter would last until the next pick. As a basketball aficionado, I was hoping that he’d drop to thirtieth where Golden State could add to their wealth of shooting talent. In Boston, just like Terry Rozier, he’ll scrap for minutes with all the other guards there.

10:48: Rose’s Team Needs for Brooklyn? Speed and athleticism. That seems accurate to me. The Nets are exceptional at everything except for running and jumping, but since those two traits aren’t needed at all while playing basketball, they’re looking very good for the future.

10:51: The Nets take Chris McCullough, a power forward from Syracuse. I’ve seen him mentioned as a sleeper in a couple of different places and I’m happy with that pick. He’s a useful player and he could become a starter on this sorry Nets team.

10:57: With the final pick of the first round, Kevon Looney is taken by the Warriors. He adds size and rebounding to the champions and will be valuable off the bench for them.

We’ve finished the first round, a round that will help define the league for years to come. Who will be the defining star from this draft? Towns? Okafor? Russell? Young Kristaps? No one yet knows, but whatever happens, it’ll be fun to watch.