Getting my feet back on the ground
Hand-up - I forgot how to watch basketball. Didn’t happen overnight, and is not a result of reps. I have a healthy, enduring relationship with NBA League Pass and I can go around and name the 8-10 bench rotation “key contributors” for the Blazers and the Jazz. And yes, there’s been more than a handful of nights where I’ve had a conversation with friends that is just naming forgotten NBA players from the mid 2000s. Can I offer up Jarrett Jack to get the ball rolling?
Instead, I’ll simply be honest. I forgot how to watch basketball when I started to watch solely from the mindset of a Daily Fantasy player as well as a gambler. Let me be clear - this is not a gambling hit piece. Man, I love a good gambling sweat. And there are those out there that do a really good job looking at basketball from multiple perspectives at the same time. For me, I struggle. I found myself arguing for the 2Los Angeles Lakers to feature D’Angelo Russell MORE during the stretch run last year because it resulted in high assist usage and more 3pt opportunities for Austin Reaves and Rui Hachimora. Tough look for your guy.
I’ve played, watched, and loved basketball my whole life. I am also 5’3’’. I’m not coming into this with a professional perspective, or from a place of pickup dominance. Instead, I’m aiming to simply share something different. Let’s create a space dedicated to the beyond the boxscore discourse, focused far less on O/Us and salary standouts. In my mind's eye - I’d love to call this ‘Rewarding the Little Guy’, but that’s kind of hard to do when I stand a foot shorter than the littlest of little guys actively playing. Instead, we’ll call it ‘The Casuals’. Come from a short time, or stay for the entirety of this drivel. We’ll keep it casual.
Things that happened that mattered: We’re through week one, and there’s a lot that happened! While there are things to say about the Lakers -- love the start for JJ and Anthony Davis -- and there are things to say about the Celtics -- Tatum can shoot again! -- I’m going to go a different direction.
Chet Holmgren and the OKC Thunder - Oh Boy
The Oklahoma City Thunder are already a different basketball team than last year. Going into the season, there were two reasons to believe that they would compete for a championship. Young players would continue to get better, and they added depth to improve wing and interior defense in Alex Caruso and Isiah Hartenstein. With Caruso and Hartenstein, the time will come. AC is slowly being worked into the rotation. Hartenstein is out to start the year, but he’ll carve out good minutes as a backup big in matchups that matter.
The temperature check on those acquisitions hasn’t felt important because man - Chet Holmgren has been awesome. Getting “revenge body” post breakup vibes to start the year. Last year Chet averaged 7.9 boards a game. Small sample, but already at 13.9 rb/gm to start the year, including a dominant 25 point, 14 rebound stomping of the defending MVP in Denver on opening night. He followed up that performance with dominant yet efficient performances in wins against the Bulls and the Hawks. Beyond the boxscore, he looks like his mental approach to the game has taken a massive leap in year two. He’s consistently putting himself in winning positions on the offensive end of the court, and finding spots to attack confidently. He’s also taken a second year leap defensively and as a playmaker. In Sunday’s win against the Hawks, the score was 88-89 to start the 4th quarter. They won 128-104, including a 22-7 run to put the game to bed. During that run, Chet was 3-3 from the floor for 6 points, 2 rebounds and 4! blocks. He is already a different player than the individual who was bullied off the court by Jonas Valacunias in last year's play-offs.
It’s not too early to sound the alarm bells for the Denver Nuggets
The Nuggets are 0-2, including a loss to the Clippers. I wish I could use this section to talk about how it must’ve been “the wall” at the new Intuit Dome that was catastrophic to the Nuggets shooting, but this game was played in Denver. Nikola Jokić had 41 points. He even made 7(!) 3’s, going 7-12 from beyond the arc. When Joker is making them from behind the arc, he’s an unstoppable force. So how’d they lose? Let me introduce you to the Nuggets bench!
Russell Westbrook: 19:07 min, 2 points on 0/8 shooting with 2 assists, 1 rebound, 2 steals, 1 block
Julian Strawther: 16:12 min, 8 points on 3/5 shooting with 3 assists, 2 rebounds, 2 steals, 1 block
Dario Sarić: 11:14 min, 0 points on 0/2 shooting with 0 assists, 2 rebounds, 0 steals, 0 blocks,
Peyton Watson: 11:46 1 points on 0/3 shooting with 0 assists, 0 rebounds, 1 steal, 0 blocks
The Nuggets front office went in the year insistent that their hypothesis of building the bench through the draft was going to work. I’m not going to say that Strawther and Watson are always going to be non-factors. In fact, I actually like some parts of Strawther’s game and think he should be given ample room to grow into the role. But the Nuggets simply can’t be a hope & pray team. This front office needed to do more to provide options for Coach Mike Malone. Instead, they went out and got Russell Westbrook.
Russell Westbrook the human is an awesome dude. He’s authentically himself. He wears his emotions on his sleeve, and never shies away from criticism. He does a bunch for South L.A. through his charity.
Russell Westbrook the basketball player is not a winning player. He hasn’t been since the original KD, Harden, Westbrook iteration of the Thunder and even his two co-superstars didn’t believe in their core to get over the hump and win a title. At a certain point, we have to acknowledge the hard reality that any meaningful minutes he plays in today’s NBA are losing minutes for his team. He cannot shoot from distance, and his presence on the floor will make life harder for everybody. He takes the ball out of the hands of other shot creators, and will stunt the development of Watson and Strawther in a meaningful way. I wanted Russ to find a role as a veteran presence on this Nuggets team, and the opportunity was there. But he’s found himself as a core member of the rotation, dependent on nightly to make a meaningful difference and that casts him in a role we’ve seen him fail in time and again. His failure isn’t so much on him as the Nuggets who have failed him and failed to put together a winning roster.
The “my team is way better when I’m great in my role” Derrick White award of the week
Derrick White is my favorite NBA player. He’s not the best shooter, or passer, or defender on his team. But he is the best at doing exactly what is needed to win at the exact right time. There are countless moments in the NBA Finals run where Derrick White showed up. There were chase down blocks, timely threes, and many many many extra passes to open up an even better look. His contributions made a run in the eastern conference last year were a primary reason the resistance looked so inferior. This year - let’s look for other Derrick White’s! Figured we’d make it easy to start, and keep it close to the namesake. Winner of this week’s “my team is way better when I’m great in my role” is Derrick Lively! Come on up Derrick. And don’t worry, he knows the files aren’t actually in the computer (shoutout to all the male models).
Lively is already an incredible disruptor on the defensive end, and his positioning and prowess is growing on the offensive side. I’m not sure how long the Mavs will be able to keep him out of the starting lineup. He has the ability to operate out of the dunker spot and from the top of the key in pick and roll. When he matched up in the opener against San Antonio, possession after possession Wemby looked lost when. Obviously there are more splashy stars on Dallas, but the ability to run pick and roll with Luka and distribute on the short role is deadly with the shooters on the Mavs. We know what the top end talent can do, but the continued improvement and development of Lively is the primary reason Dallas won’t just be a contender to return to the finals, but win it all this time around.
It’s early in the season - but it’s a bit interesting:
Bilal Coulibaly! Movement, handle, and offensive flow have changed when he has been on / off the floor. Still needs to get better finishing at the cup, and some polish in the midrange and he could develop into a very interesting player. In his first three games, he has shown he can distribute and the three point shot has started to drop. This was a guy who simply looked lost on the court last year. The athleticism flashes were tasty, but his lack of handle and awareness looked like really large hurdles. This is a quick year over year progression, most likely helped by the French Olympic experience. He gives me shades of a younger Dejounte Murray on some of those offensively challenged Spurs teams. Don’t get me wrong, the Wizards are going to be really really bad this year, but the progression of Coulibaly is something to get excited about.
As an aside...Paolo Banchero is awesome. Can’t wait to see more.
I wish I was friends with an NBA coach so they could explain it to me question of the
Well there is the Russell Westbrook question...but I can hear the objection for witness badering from defense council.
Instead - I’ll ask about Scoot Henderson. It is clear he wasn’t ready last year for the Blazers, and I supported his early season demotion to the bench. But what’s the logic this year? The team isn’t very good. My favorite prospect Shadeon Sharpe is out to start the year. Instead of seeing if there is any potential of a Simons & Scoot backcourt working out by surrounding them with length and defense in Jerami Grant, Toumani Camara, or Deni Advija, we get a starting lineup that includes all three wings. I get highlighting some of the vets, including Ayton, to explore trade potential but haven’t we proven these guys aren’t a part of the future? They’re clearly on a different timeline. Why haven’t we turned over the keys to Scoot and Donovan Clingan and see what they can do in a system built around their strengths. Explain it to me like I’m five! Or maybe just explain it to me?
There’s so much good NBA - get this garbage off my TV: Johnny Davis - even on a really bad Wizards team, let’s just acknowledge he doesn’t have it. Might be the secret tanking weapon, so I’m already mentally preparing myself for more Johnny.
