Game Thread 2017 NBA Championship - Cavs vs Warriors

[BlazerDuckSeahawkFan94]

Vonleh has no place in this thread. Its the NBA finals, cone on. This dude might not get a second NBA contract

Idk about that, he really started looking promising the last couple months of the season. He looked confident and playing in the starting lineup really helped him do what he does well, defend, and get put back dunks.

 

[Scalma]

Nah in twenty years we will hear about the Warriors dynasty as being such a great thing in the NBA because... the NBA is a bunch of horseshit

It's really no different than the bulls of the 90s. The NBA will be fine.

 

[illmatic99]

Idk about that, he really started looking promising the last couple months of the season. He looked confident and playing in the starting lineup really helped him do what he does well, defend, and get put back dunks.

Hes garbage. Three years in the league, plenty of chances to grow, minimal improvement. We saw more from scrubs like TRob

 

[Scalma]

Idk about that, he really started looking promising the last couple months of the season. He looked confident and playing in the starting lineup really helped him do what he does well, defend, and get put back dunks.

Vonleh was great with Nurkic. He'll definitely get a second contract unless he has some catastrophic injury next season.

 

[illmatic99]

Vonleh was great with Nurkic. He'll definitely get a second contract unless he has some catastrophic injury next season.

He did average a career high in points and rebounds this year. All the way up to 4.4 and 5.2.

 

[TBpup]

Man you are asking a lot.

Ask for a little and that is just what one gets. Aim for the stars and if you get the moon, you still accomplished more than most.

Vonleh has no place in this thread. Its the NBA finals, come on. This dude might not get a second NBA contract

21 years old and one of the top rebounding PF's per minutes in the league. With Dame, CJ and Nurk, you don't need another guy who needs a ton of shots. You need someone how can finish, will battle for extra possessions, can switch out on D and provides a physical presence. Sounds a lot like Noah.

 

[Strenuus]

Hes garbage. Three years in the league, plenty of chances to grow, minimal improvement. We saw more from scrubs like TRob

damn, you change three years to five years and that's meyers.

And Vonleh is already better than Meyers.

 

[Cippy91]

He knew..

 

[Minstrel]

73-9 last year and Durant joined them after losing to them.

Total bitch move. And history will see it as such.

Nah. People said the exact same thing about James after The Decision and now he's a hero. Players choosing to play with talented teammates will become the norm.

 

[Minstrel]

That's...what?

The math beggars the imagination.

 

[Cippy91]

Nah. People said the exact same thing about James after The Decision and now he's a hero. Players choosing to play with talented teammates will become the norm.

I agree with this. Lebron paved the way for this behavior with the move to Miami with that special announcing it. Won a couple titles and went back to Cleveland. Ever since that big names are always rumored joining forces. Nobody giving David west shit and he hopped to the spurs and then to the warriors. KD and Russ just don't go together. I always said KD needed to get out of okc if he wanted a title. Let's say we have the same situation as tonight, replace curry with Westbrook. No way KD gets those 7 points back to back to back with Westbrook on the floor.

 

[Chris Craig]

Fucking warriors

 

[TBpup]

Still predictable....and seems like it's still boring. Still not watching.

 

[OSUBlazerfan]

really puts a downer on this offseason. Literally nothing the Blazers can do to compete with GSW even with a pipedream of adding butler/pg13

 

[EL PRESIDENTE]

Nah. People said the exact same thing about James after The Decision and now he's a hero. Players choosing to play with talented teammates will become the norm.

James formed championship teams. Durant joined them already premade to get easy rings.

 

[Minstrel]

James formed championship teams. Durant joined them already premade to get easy rings.

Yeah, so basically the same thing. Talented players choose to play together to win rings.

Ringzzz.

 

[EL PRESIDENTE]

I agree with this. Lebron paved the way for this behavior with the move to Miami with that special announcing it. Won a couple titles and went back to Cleveland. Ever since that big names are always rumored joining forces. Nobody giving David west shit and he hopped to the spurs and then to the warriors. KD and Russ just don't go together. I always said KD needed to get out of okc if he wanted a title. Let's say we have the same situation as tonight, replace curry with Westbrook. No way KD gets those 7 points back to back to back with Westbrook on the floor.

LeBron didn't join the Celtics.

 

[EL PRESIDENTE]

Yeah, so basically the same thing. Talented players choose to play together to win rings.

Ringzzz.

The Warriors already won a ring. Miami or Cleavlanf never did and were never on a path to do so without LeBron

 

[Cippy91]

LeBron didn't join the Celtics.

For one I am not a Lebron hater, I think when all is said and done he will be 2nd greatest of all time and obviously not a warriors fan. I think it's very similar, the only thing people argue is that KD joined the competition. I mean okay sure but Lebron started this. They gathered bosh up and won a couple titles. "Big three" concept.

 

[EL PRESIDENTE]

For one I am not a Lebron hater, I think when all is said and done he will be 2nd greatest of all time and obviously not a warriors fan. I think it's very similar, the only thing people argue is that KD joined the competition. I mean okay sure but Lebron started this. They gathered bosh up and won a couple titles. "Big three" concept.

Well, and the warriors were 73-9 without him.

 

[Minstrel]

The Warriors already won a ring. Miami or Cleavlanf never did and were never on a path to do so without LeBron

The details differ a bit--no two situations will be identical. The concept is the same though--forming a superteam both for success and because you think you can play a certain way. Watching tonight's game, it's pretty obvious that Durant's happier playing alongside Curry even apart from the winning. Curry and Durant play together and they both get theirs organically. Westbrook was going to get his and share the ball only as a matter of form.

 

[ripcityboy]

Well. On the bright side, we will have more time to talk about about the draft. Well, it isn't exactly Kingspeed level of positivity, but at least I am trying,

 

[EL PRESIDENTE]

The details differ a bit--no two situations will be identical. The concept is the same though--forming a superteam both for success and because you think you can play a certain way. Watching tonight's game, it's pretty obvious that Durant's happier playing alongside Curry even apart from the winning. Curry and Durant play together and they both get theirs organically. Westbrook was going to get his and share the ball only as a matter of form.

The Warriors super team was already there and set up to win championships. It wasn't formed, he joined an exsisting one. The other squads would fall apart if LeBron wasn't there. The Warriors would not. Huge difference

Kevin Durant is not an integral piece for the Warriors to be a NBA Championship level squad. Lebron is absolutely necessary.

 

[TBpup]

• Swept by the Spurs
• Lost to the Mavs
• Beat the Thunder
• Beat the Spurs (lucky bounce out to Ray Allen)
• Lost in 5 to the Spurs
• Lost to the Warriors (Cavs decimated by injuries)
• Beat the Warriors after Bogut was hurt and Green was suspended for Game 5
• On the verge of being swept by the Warriors

Record in the Finals is well under .500 and if not for some freak bounces, injuries and suspensions, LeBron could quite easily be 1-7 in the Finals.

Admittedly, he gave a heroic effort in 2015 when Love and Irving were out and he is putting up big numbers this series. However, the Cavs went 0-8 down the stretch of a very tight ball game while the Warriors went on an 11-0 run. Where was he?

He's still no where near Jordan for me in terms of being the Greatest.

 

[Minstrel]

The Bulls were the favorites in every Finals they appeared in. Of the four (about to be five, most likely) series James' teams have lost, he was the underdog in all of them except for the series against the Mavericks (which is a black mark against him).

I don't think you can really compare Finals records without accounting for that. I mean, the series when he was swept by the Spurs--who did he even have on his team? The rest of the starting lineup was Larry Hughes, Sasha Pavlovic, Drew Gooden and Zydrunas Ilgauskas. That's like if Jordan dragged the Dave Corzine edition of the Bulls to the Finals to get smashed by the Showtime Lakers.

People talk about the teams James has engineered for himself, which is fair--but they don't talk about the quality of opponents he's faced. The Spurs of 2013-2014 and the Warriors of 2015-2017 is a pretty insane run of excellence to go up against. I wouldn't put any of Jordan's Finals opponents on par with those Spurs and Warriors teams (pointing out, ahead of time, that the Lakers team that the Bulls defeated was in full decline--not remotely the class of the Showtime version of the '80s).

 

[Haakzilla]

 

[Scalma]

He did average a career high in points and rebounds this year. All the way up to 4.4 and 5.2.

Look at his numbers in march and April when he finally got 20+ mpg and played with a real center.

March: 22.8mpg, 6 ppg, 7 rpg, 54% shooting
April (without nurkic btw): 30mpg, 8.7 ppg, 9.1 rpg, 57% shooting

No reason why Vonleh couldn't make a significant jump next season.

 

[TBpup]

Look at his numbers in march and April when he finally got 20+ mpg and played with a real center.

March: 22.8mpg, 6 ppg, 7 rpg, 54% shooting
April (without nurkic btw): 30mpg, 8.7 ppg, 9.1 rpg, 57% shooting

No reason why Vonleh couldn't make a significant jump next season.

Very good points. In March, that equates to 9.5 ppg/36 and 11.1 rpg/36.
In April that comes out to 10.4 ppg/36 and 10.9 rpg/36......both of those without having a single play run for him and likely the highest percentage shooter on the team over that period. That is quite a bit of production given that he had the same amount of offense run for him as they did for Festus Ezeli.....none.

Add to that he is probably the Blazers best defensive big when switched out onto the perimeter which because of how the Blazers play defense, is almost every single time. That is invaluable.

And he is just barely old enough to have a beer.

 

[SIeepwalker]

I'm sorry but if someone thinks what KD did is the same as what Lebron did, that person in dumb.

 

[illmatic99]

Lebron is averaging a 30 pt triple double on incredible efficiency and is very clearly the best player on the floor every night. Look at +/- yesterday for example.

Give him the defensive coverage that KD is getting out there with guys running away from him to guard Steph/Klay and Bron would be averaging 40+. Can't believe people still denigrate him.

Put any top 30 player in KD's position, and GS would still be up 15-0, or at worst 14-1 in the playoffs.