Mitch Cumsteen

That's less than ideal.

I don't think Elko's strategy is that complicated. He's throwing as many bodies as humanly possible at the problem and seeing who sticks. Run off the absolute worst ones and then throw even more bodies at it. I get that's it's mostly bread in / bread out, but what are his other options?

All true, but for them to review that call and still get it wrong... that was something. For sure. They had so many possessions in the fourth where they were forcing bad shots and he was on a bit of a heater. They weren't getting a better look than that. You gotta shoot it there. It wasn't like they could run the clock out. Denver was going to get the ball back with plenty of time. If Lebron passed on that shot, people would be killing him today for being a pussy.

I don't enjoy Reggie on any level. I saw him at Summer League a few years back and he was a complete dickhead to some kids there. And his understanding of situational basketball is embarrassing. That ridiculous bullshit the other night when he suggested that someone intentionally miss a free throw up 3 was mind boggling. Last night he was suggesting that the Lakers take a timeout when there was no reason for it. And on top of all that, his voice grates on me. He's my least favorite announcer right now, by far. In his defense, it was an atrocious call. I couldn't believe they overturned that. Now you can just smack a guy in the head after the ball leaves his hand? And as much as I enjoy watching Lebron and the Lakers squirm, I'd much rather this be a long series with more compelling games like last night. That was playoff basketball at its absolute best. The best part by far though was Anthony Davis after getting Ehlo-ed, falling into the Denver bench and not being able to get up because he was stuck in the Nuggets dogpile around Murray. I almost felt bad for him. That's gotta be the worst feeling.

https://sports.yahoo.com/report-warriors-waive-cp3-spurs-152206480.html There's no chance the W's pick up that option and I can't imagine a team is going to sign on to pay him $30 million in a trade. So one way or the other Chris Paul is going to be on the market. He's probably more inclined to go ring chasing with his butt buddy Lebron anyway, and as much as I have been a CP3 hater all the way back to when he was at Wake and punched that dude in the junk, I would hold my nose and grudgingly kick the tires on him.

I think I'm more intrigued by this NO/OKC series than any of the other ones. Really interesting matchup. New Orleans is really a bitch of an 8 seed. What a reward for OKC as a number 1 seed -- catching a 49 win team in the best western conference I can remember with key guys missing a lot games throughout the season. They really have a very well put together roster, even without Zion. Herb Jones is probably the best perimeter defender in the league and is going to make SGA work for everything. And the Pels have decent options for guarding Williams as well. As much as OKC relies on those two guys creating offense on their own, it just seems like tough sledding. And then you have Valancuinas pounding them on the offensive glass and beating up Holmgren on the inside. New Orleans likewise is super iso heavy. It's McCollum and Ingram taking turns playing one on one, and OKC has great counters with Dort and all their length. I think this series is going to play out a lot like game 1 - it's going to be ugly, low scoring-ish, and whoever gets good shots down the stretch and doesn't turn the ball over is going to win.

I was at the best stop a couple of weeks ago with my son around breakfast time. We killed some boudin ball in a biscuit, which was spectacular of course, and picked up a bunch of shit to go. This morning the boy asks if I’d make it for him but we were out of the canned biscuits and I was too lazy to make them from scratch. So he said, “how about a boudin and egg taco?”

Dumb challenge when you could have had Holmgren jumping it.

This could be a tough series for okc. The Pels have some really solid perimeter defenders in Murphy and especially Jones, and then Valancunius is a load underneath. This isn’t a great matchup for the Thunder. It would be much worse if Zion were healthy.

All that’s fair. It was more about counting roster numbers next year and conveniently lumping those three together because they were in the same draft class and on similar contract and development timelines. But certainly, Sochan has shown much more than the other two. That said, his shooting is a problem regardless of the improvement. It was eye popping how open the floor was with him out of the lineup. I don’t think it’s going to get fixed unless he totally breaks down that idiotic side spin release and starts over. It’s beyond me that someone who had both parents who played college ball wouldn’t get that fixed like when he was 10 years old.

I’ll be that guy and say it was more than a bit concerning how wide ass open the receivers were. But otherwise? Yeah, this program hasn’t been in better shape since 2004 and you can make a good argument that we’re better off now long term than then.

Posse East took up my fake id and pinned it up on their wall when I was a freshman in 1988. Assholes. Haven’t been back since. Go crown or go home. #neverforget

Chicago is without Lavine, Ball and Patrick Williams. I can’t blame any of that on Donovan. That’s a lot of talent they’re missing.

Regarding Sheppard, it's also a matter of next year's draft class being much deeper/better, so it probably pushes him down a few slots if he comes back. But anytime you can go first round, much less projected in the top 15 -- or even better top 10 -- you gotta go. You're an idiot if you don't. He's one of the guys I'm really high on but I do wonder how much of his projection is based on his brother. I mean, a 2-3 inch taller version of Jalen Williams is an extremely enticing prospect. He was also playing on a veteran team so he wasn't featured as much as you would probably like to see. So just like the rest of them, it's a difficult evaluation. The interviews and workouts will be critical for him but it's probably going to come down to how much you believe in his shooting.

I don't know that I've ever seen an NBA draft as messy and unpredictable as this one. I suppose there will be a little more clarity once the lottery goes down, but probably not much. Iin the meantime here is a consensus draft that takes input from the Athletic, ESPN, The Ringer, Tankathon, Yahoo, and a bunch more of them. I do think it's most likely that Sarr ends up number 1. I think that scouts will look at all the other guys and say fuck it, let's default to drafting the biggest most athletic dude with the highest upside. But who knows? Each guy has some serious flaws, including Sarr. Risacher was thought to be maybe the safest prospect who at worst case would be a serviceable three and D guy, but his shooting has gone into the toilet over the past several weeks. And people are wondering which part of his season is the aberration. Topic got hurt just when his team stepped up in class and has been slow to recover from something that was perceived to be minor. Another guy with suspect outside shooting. You also wonder if he can guard anybody. Dillingham is undersized and a poor defender. Clingan is not really built for the modern game. Sheppard is undersized and white athletically limited. Buzelis can't shoot. Castle can't shoot, either. Cody Williams was injured, often invisible, and has a sketchy 3 point shooting projection. Ron Holland is yet another guy who can't shoot. One guy who I kinda have my eye on is Jared McCain from Duke. He's one of the better shooters in the draft, a surprisingly decent rebounder for his size, and probably a better athlete and defender than given credit for. I think he's going to shoot up the board as we get closer to the draft. I'm interested to see where the older guys like Dalton Knecht, Devin Carter and Terrance Shannon go. In this draft in particular, teams may opt for more established prospects earlier in than we've seen in the past.

Riiiight. I'm sure Washington fans would rather play Oregon State than Michigan or Ohio State. I'm sure Rutgers fans (if there are any) are pining for the days when they played UCONN and Temple instead of Penn State and Wisconsin. And hello? A&M is a regional school. Oklahoma is a regional school. Arkansas is a regional school. We are all for playing those regional schools. There's just little upside to playing Baylor, TCU, Cougar High, etc.

I would like to motion that we NOT create a separate playoffs thread and just keep this one going until the off season.

Disregarding that, there is no way that putting a cap on someone's ability to earn money off of their own name, image and likeness would stand up in court. The NCAA already tried this and the Supreme Court took a giant shit on them.

Your first time watching the eastern conference in the last 20 years?

Don’t worry. We’re sure to be less obnoxious over the next ten or so years.

Of course the regular season needs to be cut to probably 50 games, but that’s never going to happen. They aren’t going to give up the revenue. Call it a gimmick if you want, but so what? You want more competitive compelling games or less of them? You want more teams tanking or less? You want to have more stars playing meaningful games and having a chance to make a run or less of them? Maybe the warriors didn’t belong in that game last night, but tell the Sacramento fans that game was meaningless. That’s probably their biggest win in close to 20 years.

I like the play in, a lot. You get fewer teams tanking. You get meaningful games with teams jockeying for seeding. You get a chance to still make the playoffs if your star gets hurt early in the season but comes back. You get competitive win or go home games. I really don’t understand the criticism.

Highway 6 running both ways like a motherfucker right about now.

Get back to me when you’ve taken the Donkey Lady Road shortcut from Blanco to Military.