NBA Catch Up, and 5 NBA Questions I Had That May Never Be Answered!

It's been too long since I've posted anything, in fact the whole world has drastically changed since then. Not to worry I have been working on several entries and should have a few ready to publish in the coming days. In fact keeping up with the times has been part of my issue, as the shifting landscape of the NBA often meant my writings couldn't keep up with the changes happening week to week in the association. Of course, that all came to an abrupt end on March 12th when Rudy Gobert tested positive for covid-19 and the league and all it's operations halted to a standstill. Since then, there's been nothing but time to reflect on the season and what a shutdown would mean for 2019-2020 in the association.

But first, I will summarize some of my notes from earlier unpublished entries with thoughts on some of the happenings since the end of January. Namely, Kobe Bryant, trade deadline fall out, and the surprisingly competitive all star game.

The Tragic Passing of Kobe Bryant

So much has already been written about this and covered in numerous tributes, so I'll be short. This was an incredibly jarring event for me. An "I'll always remember where I was..." moment for certain. While I was never a huge Kobe Bryant fan throughout his Lakers career, for various reasons. I always respected his ability as a basketball player. More so than his skills, abilities and acumen as a basketball player, I respected his drive, tenacity, work ethic and attention to detail. Kobe was certainly a flawed individual, but he constantly sought improvements on and off the court, and I can respect that. What stuck out to me in the coverage surrounding his passing was how great of a father he was. Perhaps this is because I knew how great of a basketball player he was already, regardless I found this touching. Unfortunately, I think that we missed out on was a more relate-able personality of Kobe Bryant. Many of us can concede that we would never be able to do the things he could on the basketball court, regardless of how inspired we became. His athleticism was in that 'special' categorization. However, we could aspire to love our families, and be as as involved in our childrens' development as Kobe was in his daughters'. Even more tragic than his own passing, in my opinion, was the passing of the young girls who were also in that helicopter that morning. Young people who never got the years that Kobe received to pursue their dreams, to experience life and all it's limitless possibilities. I feel for everyone involved in this accident, but I feel for those girls and their families in particular.

The Trade Deadline... Much Ado About Nothing?

When I last discussed the trade deadline I had the opportunity to appear on David Tingley's podcast,"On Guard for Three", it was a great experience. We went over many different player destinations, rumours, team needs, etc. I would encourage you to listen to that if you have any interest in my thoughts on basketball in general. You can find it on apple music, spotify and many other places you get your podcasts. At the time it seemed very significant, but the weeks that followed suggested otherwise in my opinion. (An now especially, is anything in sports significant?) Discussing it now with the benefit of time to see the results serves to suggest the changes were not all that impactful. While the Robert Covington trade seemed to have had an immediate impact on the play of the Houston Rockets, the micro ball style was becoming increasingly difficult to sustain. D'Antoni's short rotations and defensive rebounding limitations could be fairly questioned over the course of a grueling playoff run. It seemed obvious to me that teams like the Clippers and Celtics were just as equipped to play small ball as the Rockets, perhaps more so. Neither Morris brother was seeming to have an impact on either of the Los Angeles franchises. Marcus Morris was certainly the preferred option of the two, but his playing style didn't seem to mesh all that well with the current make up of the Clippers. If he was satisfied to move the ball, play defense and take the open shot, it could have been a positive but he has more of a hold the ball and try to make a play mentality. He seemed to take the ball out of the hands of people more skilled at creating a shot than he was. Igoudala's importance seemed to be grossly overvalued as he may have still been playing his way into game shape, but he hardly represented an upgrade in his limited time with the Heat. Frankly, it looked like James Johnson was playing with renewed ability after he was banished from Miami to Minnesota. Potential impact players like like Gallinari, Rose and Thompson never ended up moving. The center position appeared to be the big loser of the deadline with max salary all star center Andre Drummond going to Cleveland in what amounted to a salary dump. Not to mention Clint Capela also being deemed expendable by a Rocket roster, that while I questioned their championship pedigree, was certainly showing a higher ceiling with Capela out the door. Will this be a continuing trend in a league that seems to value pace and space, shooting and defensive switching. above all else I'd say yes.

The Elam Ending All Star Game

The weekend was pretty solid in my opinion. The dunk contest likely should have ended in a tie. Both guys seemed to have run out of their best prepared dunks. An were both deserving of their 50's in the finals. The 3 point shootout was a bit gimmicky, but was impressively none the less. Th marquee game itself was by far the most competitive all star game I can recall watching in my lifetime. The first 3 quarters were pretty typical all star game fare, so there's little of note to mention there. However, the Elam effect was incredible.Setting a goal of 24 points in the final quarter, (a fitting tribute to Kobe Bryant) created a pre-decided final score for the game and it became clear that both teams were in it to win it. What was of interest to me was how difficult it became for the best players in the world to score! There has long been an adage that good offense beats good defense every time, however in this case that hardly seemed to be true. Perhaps it's well organized offence that beats great defense. Lebron and Kawhi appeared to be the only guys that could create their own shots off the dribble down the stretch. Even more surprising was how insignificant Giannis was offensively down the stretch for the team that was specifically named after him! Instead 'team Giannis' appeared to be slowing the play down and looking for mismatches on the block. Electing to either post up Joel Embiid as their number one option. Or targeting the perceived weakest defensive link on team LeBron, posting up James Harden with Pascal Siakam repeatedly with predictably meager results. Players were switching all of the high ball screen activity, producing little in the way of exploitable mismatches. Gritty plays by the likes of Kyle Lowry and Chris Paul became of great importance, something you'd have never expected out of an all star game. So while it was somewhat jarring to see the best players in the world struggle to get into an offensive flow it was pretty incredible to watch the players compete at such a high level, neutralizing each other in so many ways defensively. One great example of this was Giannis' block on a Lebron post up turnaround, which only fueled LeBron to body Giannis up moments later on the block, forcing the Bucks superstar into a turnover. It remains to be seen how this will impact the years to come, but the format change had proven incredibly effective on this year's game!

The 5 Biggest Questions of the 2019-20 Season, Asked and Answered!
Obviously this is way down the list of important issues in the world today, but I miss basketball. I miss playing it, I miss watching it, I miss thinking it, analyzing and predicting it. With so much down time surrounding the Corona virus crisis it's been a great opportunity to rewatch old favourite television shows and movies, this got me thinking. What sets movies and television apart from live sports is the law of  diminished returns rewatching something presents. For example, some movies and television are almost elevated when I rewatch them, though the law eventually kicks in. This is almost never the case for a sporting event. What's more, in many cases because of longstanding tropes, conventions and cliches we know how a movie or television series will end, even if we're seeing it for the first time. In movies you almost expect the underdog to win, because that is the Hollywood ending were conditioned to root for. In many cases this does little to diminish the enjoyment of the art itself. This is very much less the case for with sports, for me the single greatest value of sports is the sense of not knowing. The need to watch to the very end because you never know what might happen. Even after years of watching the Cavaliers and Warriors battle it out in the NBA championship, who could have predicted the Raptors title run in the spring of 2019! This is why no amount of old games will make up for what I'll be disappointed in missing out on. (which I understand and believe is necessary, in these times, don't get me wrong.) Also, shouldn't ESPN,and all the other sports dependent content programming networks out there be releasing whatever archival footage and documentaries they've got. If they're holding on docs for summer, now's the time. That 10 hour basketball documentary, let's see it. Any 30 for 30's you've got banked, let's get em out. The Last Dance Bull's documentary. No better time!

For a 2020 season that seemingly had so much to offer, it's incredibly unfortunate we will miss out on so much of it. I've gone ahead and thought of 5 of the biggest questions I had hoped the season would answer. In light of my pessimism that the season's resumption seems less likely every day, I've gone ahead and answered each question myself. I'm hoping I'm wrong and that all of these questions get their opportunity to be answered the right way, on the basketball court.

5. Could the Simmons/Embiid 'Process' have survived another setback? 
'Trusting the process' in Philadelphia has taken on new meaning in the last 3 seasons, gone are the expectations of incremental growth and asset development. Instead, the expectations are rightfully heightened and the assets have all been liquidated for veteran help in the form of Tobias Harris, Josh Richardson and Al Horford. Despite this, the Embiid/Simmons pairing continues to present questions. Is there a less compatible duo on a contender in the league? Being the loudest. Even Westbrook and Harden have seemingly found a way to co-exist without sacrificing much in the way of optimizing their skill sets. Simmons is an incredibly gifted player in transition, when aggressive and not afraid to draw fouls, he's nearly unstoppable. Unfortunately, Embiid's limited conditioning rarely allows the Sixers to push the pace, and play with the tempo that would allow Simmons to maximize his potential, Instead Philly often slows it down and lets Embiid work in the half court. On the other hand this makes sense as Embiid has the potential to be the most dominant player on the court on a nightly basis. However, this style almost entirely neutralizes Simmons brilliance and accentuates his inability to space the floor as a shooter in the half court. Both are great defensively, their issues mainly have to do with the offensive end of the court The last change up available to the Sixers might be a coaching change to see if a new voice or philosophy can unlock the potential that still seems untapped. Perhaps it's more Richardson ball screens with Simmons as the screener, so he can be a Draymond like play-maker out of the pick and roll. If the season continued the Sixers would likely have suffered a second round exit, all but assuring the release of Brett Brown from his coaching duties. Regardless, if the playoffs don't happen and the Sixers don't have a seemingly inevitable setback, I think they'd still be wise to move on from Brown before breaking up the their seemingly incompatible, yet talented, twosome.

4. Could Zion have Actually Win the Rookie of the Year?

For me, this question doubles as a query as to what team was going to lock down the 8th playoff seed in the West. The upstart Memphis Grizzlies held the position as we headed into the final stretch of the season. Behind the galvanizing play of first year standout Ja Morant, the Grizz had surprised everyone over the first 3 quarters of the season and the Rookie of the Year award appeared to be all but locked up for Morant. Not so fast though, Zion Williamson burst onto the scene after missing much of the season with a knee injury. In his limited play, Zion has more than lived up to the hype, despite his conditioning still catching up with his skill and talent. Zion was putting up numbers on par with some all time greats debuts, scoring over 20 points in each of his last 10 games before the break. What's more, the Pelicans were winning during this stretch and he was a big part of that. That said, I think the narrative of him being a transcendent talent, as well as the Pelicans making a move for the 8th seed would have been enough to push Zion passed Morant, regardless of how fair that truly it. But, both of things had to happen. He had to continue to be must see TV and the Pelicans had to push passed the Grizz for the 8th seed. While the Grizz had a daunting schedule down the stretch, conversely the Pelicans had a relatively easy schedule to close out the season. So it's worth noting that this was a very real possibility and both the race for 8 and the ROY would have increased the drama of the final few regular season games. The Pels had the better team and likely would have prevailed. The hype around Zion would have still been novel and the narrative would have been enough to secure him the votes, despite him appearing in less than have as many games as Ja. Unfortunately now I don't think we'll get  to see this and the award should go to Morant, but he's such a competitor, I think even he would have liked to have seen this play out.

3. Could the Raptors Defend Their Title?
As a Raptors fan I think there was a feeling of relative relief heading into the season. After years struggling to get over the hump in the playoffs, they finally did it and more! But the sense that the Raptors should count their blessings, thank Kawhi, and politely recede from the championship conversation, despite being the champs was a bit much. The prevailing notion was that long time Raptor Kyle Lowry had finally performed in the playoffs and should simply serve as a happy placeholder of the NBA championship now that Kawhi had left and taken their status as a legitimate contenders with him to LA. There was a lot of negative conjecture; would the Raps be a playoff team? Would they blow up the team and start over, now that the media had decided their run was over? Like most champions, the Raptors had other ideas. It's been an incredible run given the limited expectations. Nick Nurse has proven himself to be among the games elite coaches, always motivating his guys to play above themselves and stay in every game despite an increasing league wide suggestion that regular season games are only marginally more than meaningless. Pascal Siakam continued to emerge as the go to guy. The Raptors brass continued to find and develop talent from unlikely sources in the form of Chris Boucher and Terrance Davis. Not to mention, veterans Lowry and Ibaka have had a revival of sorts, refusing to fade away as their career trajectories may have suggested they would. Fred Van Vleet has played like a guy who wants to get paid, and Norman Powell is finally playing like a guy who is getting paid. This is a squad that exemplifies the importance of continuity, identity and trust. Something that 'superteams' full of talent don't always find the means of unlocking. They have great ball movement, they work hard for each other in their defense rotations, they push the ball in transition, and they play to the final whistle - they really are a joy to watch! Do they have the talent of Milwaukee, Boston or Philly? Maybe not, but they still have one of the most complete teams in the league, something no one was saying 6 months ago, so why couldn't they win the East? I don't think they would beat the Bucks in the Eastern Conference final because I think the Giannis match up is a difficult one for them and I believe the Bucks 3 point shooting will be much improved over what it was last year. Frankly, I just think it was the Bucks year.

2. Who would have Won The Battle of L.A.?

This was one of the biggest looming questions of the season. Both sides appeared to downplay the significance of their cross town rivalry throughout the season, but that was just because the heavyweights needed the stakes to match their collective egos. The regular season is beneath the likes of Kawhi and LeBron. So while the Christmas Day showdown gave us a preview of what was to come, it was but a glimpse of what could have been. Both team's seemed to play the regular season as if they always had another gear. For the Lakers it'd been putting LeBron in the post and watching him play at a super human level of efficiency. For the Clippers it's been their rock solid record when they have their best 5 in the lineup at the same time. In addition to the heavyweight match up that pits the two top seeded LA teams against each other, these teams present some all time individual match ups as LeBron and AD would have been matched up with PG and Kawhi on numerous possessions throughout the series. Would Montrezz Harrell be able to cover AD, possibly presenting a matchup problem for the Lakers off the bench. Would Lou Williams be an X factor? Could LeBron post Kawhi Leonard up and work out on the block? Would the little brother Clippers be playing against the crowd, despite playing in their 'home' games? This seemed destined to be the Western Conference finals that had everyone saying things like, "this is the real finals"! Disrespect that I will get to with my final thought. It had all the glitter and star power to be a historic series for the ages. even a Rondo versus Beverley match up has a bit of combativeness, that draws viewer intrigue. But what would have happened? I'm not convinced of the Clippers next gear. All season they've hung their proverbial hat on this notion that when all their guns are firing they'll be unbeatable. An while this may be the case, I haven't seen a healthy enough Paul George often enough, to believe that to be the case. In a reversal of fortune, Davis has actually looked healthier than PG for the better part of this season, and has just been playing at a higher level this season than George. Conversely, the Lakers have shown the ability to take it to another gear throughout the season, and they present matchup problems for the Clippers in my opinion. While the Clips may be able to keep LeBron off the block, and Kawhi can likely even match his output for the series to be honest. They really don't have a match up for AD. I'll answer my own question from above. I don't think Harrell, Morris or George are big enough to cover AD, if AD wants to attack the rim. I think the size of Lakers would ultimately be too much for the Clippers and I'd take the Lakers to win the battle of Los Angeles in a historic 7 game series!

1. Were the Bucks Going Overlooked? 
I'll answer this one right away. Yes1 I feel this is really something to be considered, as I feel the Bucks are likely the biggest losers of everyone if the season doesn't have a conclusion. Their historic season will be forgotten to history. The all time best point differential; a still possible, albeit unlikely, 70 win season; a favourite to come out of the East an possibly win the title. First in points per game, with the 7th best offensive rating. They had the best defensive rating in the league. They have the best player in the league leading the way and they have a roster that can play a myriad of different ways. That said, I didn't get the sense that people took them as seriously as we maybe should have. The Bucks show have been the understood favourite, perhaps not overwhelmingly, but the favourite. We have a tendency to want to see something before we buy in. We've seen LeBron and Kawhi both elevate their games and subsequently their teams to championships in recent years. The jury is seemingly still out on Giannis. I think this is understandable, but it's wrong. I think Giannis has continually taken steps forward throughout his career. He knew this was the next step, and I'm not willing to count him out. Consider that Giannis should have been well rested with a reduced work load compared to say, Lebron. The path to the finals in the East was comparatively easier than the road in the West. The Bucks have the ability to play Brook Lopez, allowing them to match up with the Lakers. Or have Giannis slide up to the 5 and go small vs. the Clippers or whoever else. The Bucks have been playing with an edge all season long, whenever they've been challenged, they've answered the bell and I think they are being overlooked in the narratives about the season. This was their season, they would have won the title, and if we don't have one it's going to hurt them the most. The Clippers will likely get a healthier Paul George back for next year. They'll continue to develop trust and continuity with their top guys who have still played limited minutes as a collective unit, largely due to George's injury related absences. The Lakers will surely find a way to bolster their depth, as one or two wing players sacrificing their numbers for a chance to play with LeBron and AD seems very possible. Those teams are very good, but I'd contend they have flaws and were certainly beatable for a well oiled machine like the Bucks. With Giannis' future somewhat hanging in the balance, this could end up being an all time "what if?"season for a Bucks franchise that doesn't often get to entertain such thoughts all that often.