NBA 2023-24

[MrX 709]

Nikola f’in Jokic

[aggie08 21414]

This is just stupid, Nikola. Drives me crazy when Shaq concedes that Jokic is the best "big man" in the league when making a case for someone else as MVP. Mother fucker, he's the best basketball player on the planet, and it's not close.

[Radical Larry 28528]

 

[Baboontyme 2807]

Is there a player in the NBA that would not say that Joker is the best player in the NBA? This guy is unbelievable. 

[Baboontyme 2807]

Man I don't hate on anyone. But Denver is putting Watson on Rudy and Rudy is calling for the ball deep in the post but no one will pass it to him. 😭😭. Edit nvm that's Justin Holiday and it was a switch. 

Edited May 15 by Baboontyme

[MNLonghornFUKM 8799]

And just like that aaron Gordon back to earth and KCP wakes up

[ztejas 43262]

KCP is so fucking cold.

I like how LA won that "title" and then they were like "yeah nah we don't need any of these guys that helped us win this shit"

Edited May 15 by ztejas

[Braff Zacklin 13406]

Minnesota's offense doesn't seem quite right without Conley, but I wouldn't say the T-Wolves are playing poorly ... Jokic and Denver are just too good right now.

[LTtxfan 48952]

Receives his MVP Award... And then just kicks ass!!!

[aggie08 21414]

"I'm so good at basketball. This is all so easy for me. Give my opponents more defensive awards. I don't give a fuck. I'll personally make the Gobert trade seem stupid."

[MNLonghornFUKM 8799]

It’s Just a damn cheat code. Every possession can be ran through the leagues Best passer, smartest player, best touch around the rim biggest tub of fuck and there’s nothing you can do when he gets the ball. Every pass is perfect whether it’s 96 ft off a rebound or behind the back in a traffic of defenders.

I’d have taken the odds to the bank of a wolves win 3 hours ago if you told me Murray, MPJ and Gordon wouldn’t touch 20 points. Rudy and kat having good games?!

Oh Ant laid a turd.

I don’t even want to watch game 6. Denver’s just too good in a best of 7

[Michael Knight 12878]

1 hour ago, ztejas said:

KAT has quietly been really damn good.

dude was -17

[Chewbacca 7729]

By far the most fun I've ever had at a game. Just wow.

[Dutchrudder 11113]

They said after game 2 that only 5 teams had ever comeback from being down 0-2 while having homecourt advantage. Looking like #6 is gonna happen Thursday night. Hell of a turnaround and if the Nuggets win a ring this year, it's going to shut up a lot of haters. 

[Fastbreak 3956]

Jokic is the best player in the world by a pretty big margin, but Brunson is the most valuable player IMO. The knicks would be in Cancun right now on Ted Cruz’s yacht without him (and would have been cheering for some lottery luck as they would have been a bottom dweller).

[aggie08 21414]

2 hours ago, Fastbreak said:

Jokic is the best player in the world by a pretty big margin, but Brunson is the most valuable player IMO. The knicks would be in Cancun right now on Ted Cruz’s yacht without him (and would have been cheering for some lottery luck as they would have been a bottom dweller).

You think Denver is a playoff team without Jokic?

[ChiTownDoc 21097]

7 hours ago, ztejas said:

I don't think anyone is beating this motherfucker. Again.

I mean, Jayson Tatum is the rest of the league's hope?

31 and 12 dimes through 3Q on 12/16 shooting.

I think he's already one of the 10 greatest players ever. 

First player ever to account for 70+ points of offense with zero TO’s in a playoff game.  Against the DPOY and a team that took the first two from you at home.  Just absolutely insane.  
I agree on top 10 especially at his peak.  3 more years like this and you have to go top 5-6.  Barring injury we already know his game will age well.  

[Derka 5932]

what’s crazy is that the explanation for the turnaround in this series is literally just that jokic decided to take over. fans who don’t regularly watch denver won’t know that all he does in the 1Q and 4Q of every game is initiate offense and get his teammates involved, particularly murray. whenever denver has a key possession late in a game, 9/10 jokic will call a play to get the ball in murray’s hands, usually clearing out one side so that jamal can go to work 1-on-1 and either score or create. in general jokic never even considers looking to create his own shot, he just wants to play floor general, and if he has to do so he will reluctantly take on the role of primary scorer. that’s jokic’s game. he’s the only superstar i’ve ever seen who has the ball in his hands at the end of games who never ever ever forces anything or thinks he has to be the one to take the big shot.

that all changed after denver got down 2-0 with some key players being a bit hobbled. jokic heard the call that he needed to go ahead and be the totally dominant force that can be any time he chooses to do so. instead of everyone else getting going and jokic intelligently picking his spots, jokic is just coming out of the gate like a battering ram and submitting the wolves to his will. he’s doing the same thing in the 3Q and crunch time as well. he’s going directly at the wolves and making himself the primary focus, and not only can they not stop him, and not only is it making life easier on his teammates, but that big serbian fucker is just beating them up physically as well. it’s wild, the way he’s got this shaq-like domination in him, yet he prefers to play the role of magic until his team needs him to be shaq (mixed with equal parts sabonis and bird). jokic is truly 1 of 1.

Edited May 15 by definitely not derka

[MNLonghornFUKM 8799]

what’s crazy is that the explanation for the turnaround in this series is literally just that jokic decided to take over. fans who don’t regularly watch denver won’t know that all he does in the 1Q and 4Q of every game is initiate offense and get his teammates involved, particularly murray. whenever denver has a key possession late in a game, 9/10 jokic will call a play to get the ball in murray’s hands, usually clearing out one side so that jamal can go to work 1-on-1 and either score or create. in general jokic never even considers looking to create his own shot, he just wants to play floor general, and if he has to do so he will reluctantly take on the role of primary scorer. that’s jokic’s game. he’s the only superstar i’ve ever seen who has the ball in his hands at the end of games who never ever ever forces anything or thinks he has to be the one to take the big shot.
that all changed after denver got down 2-0 with some key players being a bit hobbled. jokic heard the call that he needed to go ahead and be the totally dominant force that can be any time he chooses to do so. instead of everyone else getting going and jokic intelligently picking his spots, jokic is just coming out of the gate like a battering ram and submitting the wolves to his will. he’s doing the same thing in the 3Q and crunch time as well. he’s going directly at the wolves and making himself the primary focus, and not only can they not stop him, and not only is it making life easier on his teammates, but that big serbian fucker is just beating them up physically as well. it’s wild, the way he’s got this shaq-like domination in him, yet he prefers to play the role of magic until his team needs him to be shaq (mixed with equal parts sabonis and bird). jokic is truly 1 of 1.

That’s just it…how do you stop one of the best scorers in the game who doesn’t even look to score and is arguably a better passer? Who just so happens to be 7’1 385 lbs? He’s literally a 100 overall 2K create a player and the rest of us are 55 overall rated. The fucker had a 12:0 assist to turnover ratio at one point. And none of his supporting cast wasn’t exactly lighting it up either

I’m out of ideas. Outside of blitzing the fuck out of him with NAW, jaden, ant and Conley and playing some sort of zone to block off the cuts from the blitzers guy.

I felt Denver had troubles when we constantly switched ant and Jaden on Jamal in game 2. Do that to joker with Rudy and kat. Joker vs Rudy is backing down. Rudy vsnkat js receiving the bball and has time to build a campfire and survey what to do with it. Every wolf just “guarding their assigned guy” isn’t working

[Aqua Buddha 14501]

 

[Pam Cummings 9560]

Just woke up from a week long coma. Did Minnesota sweep, or did it take 5 games?

[Mitch Cumsteen 18523]

No words for Jokic last night. An all time performance from an all time great. 

But Minnesota without Conley was completely constipated on offense. Edwards was consistently doubled off every screen. They put Jokic in the action and he doesn’t even look at Rudy. He just sags and makes Edwards take a tough shot or pass to someone who can’t shoot. Gobert is such a non factor on that end and the only guy who can spread the floor is KAT. And he was his typical non assertive, can’t post up a smaller guy, self. Reid was in foul trouble. It’s not an accident when McDaniels is wide ass open at the three point line.

I would try benching Gobert and going small with Reid. They can’t stop Jokic with Gobert, they might as well try to make him work on defense and make him move to expend some energy. I don’t think it matters though. He’s just too great. 

[Mittens 8148]

11 hours ago, Macklemore said:

Peacock, which is the worst streamer out there, is going to host most of the games — just watch.

100% this is the worst part about the whole deal. The fans just lost hundreds of weeknight games.  I'm honestly rooting for this to fail so hard and the viewership numbers to drop like a rock.  

[aggie08 21414]

That rebound where he bats the ball to his throwing hand while turning around, without ever putting two hands on it, into an immediate full court pass to Murray is absurd. 

[MNLonghornFUKM 8799]

No words for Jokic last night. An all time performance from an all time great. 
But Minnesota without Conley was completely constipated on offense. Edwards was consistently doubled off every screen. They put Jokic in the action and he doesn’t even look at Rudy. He just sags and makes Edwards take a tough shot or pass to someone who can’t shoot. Gobert is such a non factor on that end and the only guy who can spread the floor is KAT. And he was his typical non assertive, can’t post up a smaller guy, self. Reid was in foul trouble. It’s not an accident when McDaniels is wide ass open at the three point line.
I would try benching Gobert and going small with Reid. They can’t stop Jokic with Gobert, they might as well try to make him work on defense and make him move to expend some energy. I don’t think it matters though. He’s just too great. 

I know.

Gobert was 7/7 and it felt like he wasn’t even there just because of how joker obliterated him on defense.

[MNLonghornFUKM 8799]

That rebound where he bats the ball to his throwing hand while turning around, without ever putting two hands on it, into an immediate full court pass to Murray is absurd. 

Incredible. Right in the bread basket

[MNLonghornFUKM 8799]

Like WTF do you do?

He’s nash/ magic, dirk, Hakeem and Shaq all rolled into one.

[Derka 5932]

i wonder if the kids 20 years from now who never got to watch jokic play will know that it took jokic until ~june 2023 before he was given his due respect, or if the scores of fans, pundits, and players who insisted for years that jokic wasn’t special will all just pretend like that never happened and that we all just loved and appreciated joker from the jump the way we did with mj and lebron.

Edited May 15 by definitely not derka

[Dutchrudder 11113]

11 minutes ago, definitely not derka said:

i wonder if the kids 20 years from now who never got to watch jokic play will know that it took jokic until ~june 2023 before he was given his due respect, or if the scores of fans, pundits, and players who insisted for years that jokic wasn’t special will all just pretend like that never happened and that we all just loved and appreciated joker from the jump the way we did with mj and lebron.

He won 3 of the last 4 MVP awards, and if not for a racially charged attack by Kendrick Perkins' and some dumbass media members, he would have a MVP 4peat running right now. I think plenty of people have recognized and understand how good he is on the floor.

I agree he isn't on the same level of hype or media attention as MJ or Lebron (both in sports and non-sports media), but I think that has more to do with his personality and media approach. He's not a firebrand, he doesn't stir up controversy to steal the spotlight, and he doesn't make shitty comments about his teammate's performance or his "next team" to drive more discussion about himself. He's just built differently in that regard, and I think that has a lot more to do with the lack of media coverage and exposure, because he's just not that juicy of a story. Jokic is certainly as talented as those guys, but he has the personality of a businessman. He clocks in, does his job while daydreaming of riding horses, clocks out, and goes home to his wife and kids. I really like that about him, and I think it helps his team on and off the court. Must be nice knowing that your team's best player is not creating distractions or picking and choosing who gets traded next. Team stability is an underrated quality that Lebron and KD never seem to appreciate. 

[Kermit 3128]

Dude is putting together a postseason for the ages. It’s been an awesome series, and I feel bad for Ant, who had a shit game last night. Hopefully this series can go seven so that those two can Bird/Nique their way to an epic finale. Feels like this is the Finals regardless.

[Derka 5932]

2 minutes ago, Dutchrudder said:

He won 3 of the last 4 MVP awards, and if not for a racially charged attack by Kendrick Perkins' and some dumbass media members, he would have a MVP 4peat running right now. I think plenty of people have recognized and understand how good he is on the floor.

 

he still never got his proper respect until last year. there was always a line of fans, pundits, and players eager to tell you why embiid or giannis or luka is better, or to leave jokic out of their top five current players, and things like that. he’s been as good as lebron ever was for years now, and lebron’s only question was, “is he has good as/better than michael jordan”, not, “am i as an espn/fs1/etc nba analyst going to put devin booker or jayson tatum ahead of nikola jokic on my top 5 players in the nba heading into 2022”. 

lets call it what it is: it’s a big, slow white guy with seemingly zero personality who plays in the mountain time zone, so people either downplayed and downgraded everything he did, or truthfully for a lot of people they just straight up never watched his games yet still had an opinion on him. people in this thread are talking about him being a top 10 player ever (as they should be) when the reality is that two years ago that devin booker/jayson tatum stuff was actually happening. it really took until last year for everyone to just admit that he’s the best despite him having been the best player for 4-5 years now. i’m not sure there’s ever been a more dominant player in any sport ever who got less respect than nikola jokic did up until about a year ago.

[Derka 5932]

2 minutes ago, Kermit said:

Dude is putting together a postseason for the ages

something people don’t realize is that his postseason numbers are better than his regular season numbers because he doesn’t actually play a ton of minutes during the regular season.

career: 31.2 mpg

2022-23: 33.7 mpg (48th in the league)

2023-24: 34.6 mpg (28th in the league)

vs

2023 playoffs: 39.4 mpg

2024 playoffs: 40.0 mpg

 

in other words, the man puts up mvp numbers year after year despite playing way fewer minutes and taking way fewer ft’s than his competition for mvp, and then he goes into the playoffs and plays way more minutes, sees his usg go up, and yet all of his efficiency numbers stay at their elite levels, if they aren’t actually improved! it’s seriously a privilege to witness this kind of greatness.

bottom line, nikola jokic is the most unicorn unicorn that has ever unicorn’d in nba history. 

[Vic Mackey 46927]

.

[MNLonghornFUKM 8799]

.

That whole work week off between Monday-> Friday really fucked us last week. Who gives a shit if the other match ups have to catch up.
Gave Denver a whole week to heal, study, chew and stew on hot takes like this, remind them who they are and gave us wayyy too much publicity.

[Macklemore 2871]

Like Hakeem, Joker did not get love and admiration for the same reasons: not an American, English not the first language, humble personalty and both did not play in NY, LA or Boston. It took both of them to win their first championship before getting the recognition they deserved.

[Pam Cummings 9560]

Only thing that can stop a Joker is a 👽 

[Dutchrudder 11113]

Interesting stats:

[Kermit 3128]

40 minutes ago, BeardIP said:

Wait, are you derka? 

It’s definitely not Derka.

[Chewbacca 7729]

14 minutes ago, Dutchrudder said:

Interesting stats:

Zubac and Nurk are the only ones big enough to bang with him.  They play him tough. And Nurk always gets up to play against the Nuggets.

[Derka 5932]

50 minutes ago, BeardIP said:

Wait, are you derka? 

defintely not.

[Braff Zacklin 13406]

8 minutes ago, Chewbacca said:

Zubac and Nurk are the only ones big enough to bang with him.  They play him tough. And Nurk always gets up to play against the Nuggets.

I thought Gobert defended him as well as anyone could. Jokic is just too good, especially when he goes beast mode like the third quarter last night.

If one is a fan of the sport above all else, it's a joy to watch, even if it's at the expense of one's own team. And if it weren't for SGA, one could confidently state that the best point guard in the league is a huge, slow-moving, 7-foot white dude from Serbia who plays center.

It's incredible to watch.

[Chewbacca 7729]

1 minute ago, Braff Zacklin said:

I thought Gobert defended him as well as anyone could. Jokic is just too good, especially when he goes beast mode like the third quarter last night.

If one is a fan of the sport above all else, it's a joy to watch, even if it's at the expense of one's own team. And if it weren't for SGA, one could confidently state that the best point guard in the league is a huge, slow-moving, 7-foot white dude from Serbia who plays center.

It's incredible to watch.

Rudy played well last night, but Jok can back him down at will.  He's just not strong enough to stop it.  And honestly, while I love seeing the Wolves put Rudy on an island, the most effective way to play Jok is for KAT to be the primary defender and have Rudy cover AG and help on Jokic.  But that results in KAT being in foul trouble a lot of the time because he's not like Rudy where he can play good defense without fouling most of the time.

[MNLonghornFUKM 8799]

We gotta have 2 guys on Jokic instantly tomorrow night. Get the ball out his hands asap.

It’ll probably backfire. What else can one do? He gets the ball with 2-3 seconds to survey or make eye contact with AG, MPJ to go back door because the balls coming….notjing good can happen

Hell even play Luka Garza tomorrow. He’s 100X better on offense than kyle anderson is.


We haven’t learned anything from last year and that’s to pounce on the non Jokic minutes. I think I read Denver’s +5 the last 3 games. Guys need to let it all hang

[Derka 5932]

the ball does not stick:

 

[MNLonghornFUKM 8799]

So literally every possession lol

[ChiTownDoc 21097]

1 hour ago, Chewbacca said:

Zubac and Nurk are the only ones big enough to bang with him.  They play him tough. And Nurk always gets up to play against the Nuggets.

Those two specifically were who I thought OKC should make a big push for.  Not max players at all but a TON of value in the playoffs, especially if you need to go through Denver...

Edited May 15 by ChiTownDoc

[Kermit 3128]

37 minutes ago, definitely not derka said:

the ball does not stick:

 

Jesus, Brunson. Throw in a pass every once in a while. 

[boknowstecmo 216]

2 hours ago, Kermit said:

Jesus, Brunson. Throw in a pass every once in a while. 

To who? I think he's the only player left on the team. 

[chainsaw 9836]

Are we watching the final season of Inside the NBA?

[ztejas 43262]

3 minutes ago, boknowstecmo said:

To who? I think he's the only player left on the team. 

Yeah seriously. Have you seen who that guy is rolling out there with?