And the Suns themselves have been playing some damn aggressive and physical defense.

Point is, it can be done. You just need the right personnel for it. Suns have it currently, Pistons have it.

Rockets seemed to have lost their edge a bit after the loss of Brooks and FVV though.

Pistons, Rockets and couple more teams are also playing physical. I really dont know why there is an agenda against OKC for the last two years this much online. People really cant see how this feels targeted hate for no reason. As a Laker fan I’m used to casual hate but seeing an underdog franchise hated this much for doing everything right feels weird.

The 2nd quarter took like 50 minutes in real time.

Im slightly frustrated that we started this road trip losing 2 games we could have won, but Im more appreciative that we have a team that battle every possession and are competitive and have become a great team.

suns been getting a little touchy feely on D lately.

As an expert myself, barely watching any games because I’m located in Europe - but watching the highlights of some games.

No, Durant is absolutely incorrect.

Impossible

Yeah well kd says this but theres tons of active players that say the opposite? Its not automatically true just cause kd said it 😂

According to this sub, basketball players aren’t experts of the sport and don’t typically have good analysis. They are biased because they played with/against players they discuss. That’s why so many players rank Kobe Bryant so highly. According to this sub.

Reddit hates KD and hates OKC. It makes sense they would hate actual ball knowers.

People always act like playing is somehow a “they’re absolutely right” qualifier but watch/follow any number of players or ex players and they constantly say things that don’t line up with whats commonly accepted. “Wemby is BolBol” “Kobe is top 3” “Gobert isn’t good on defense”

This “they’re a player, they must be right” stuff is pretty silly. You can put value on what they say but they can be wrong just like anyone else

Absolutely fucking not! Be serious.

No!

He just wants to retire in OKC

Just about the fans. Not even saying this to be anti-Durant but he fckin hates the nba fandom LMAO

Durant just loves basketball.

Yeah, his complaints would centre around people playing too risky and stupid, things that risk injury on other players, but not on general basketball physicality.

Unlike redditors

But we sure do Bitch about Durant.

So it’s few things actually.

1. Absolutely they put in effort and continued repeated effort. Caruso is the poster boy for this but it’s contagious for the entire team and one could argue Cason Wallace is somehow even better at it

2. Their team is young and athletic. The defensive side of the ball is much more dependent on that than the offensive end (although obviously important for both but offense can minimize youth more with experience than defense can)

3. They have a skill, and it’s absolutely a skill, of knocking the ball away. Of course the effort and athleticism help but they know how to do it without fouling. Easily the best stealing team I’ve ever seen, it’s a beauty to watch.

4. They have so much depth they can rotate to keep guys fresh where the other team on offense is rarely facing defenders not at ~100%.

5. They are rarely injured since they’re so young. This is more a season advantage than per game advantage but worth noting.

6. They are guard/wing heavy. Their only bigs are Chet and Hart (although Jaylin has been getting more minutes recently). They sacrifice rebounding to gain an advantage everywhere else on defense. And Chet provides paint protection enough solely where they don’t sacrifice a lot there.

Underrated point here

Y’all played defense damn near the same way we did in the playoffs, it was fun as hell. People were more interested in complaining about fouls or our ratings, they missed some fun basketball lol

It baffles me how people will complain that no one plays defense in this league and then turn around and complain about OKC actually playing defense lol

I saw people online the other day flame Sion James for defending someone tough saying “its never been this serious”. He was guarding SGA…

Bitch made ”fans”

“Well it’s about the fairness” btw OKC is ranked 15th in FTA per game and also Ranked 15th in personal fouls called per game. I expected to see them top 5 in FTA and almost dead last in personal fouls called by the way this sub complains.

Fans on here just like to complain lol

One of the biggest points of skepticism for people on the Thunder going into last season was their toughness. People thought that they’d be too soft and it would be their downfall in the playoffs. Now they’re crying nonstop about them being physical 😂 😂

This sub is full of the biggest pansies lmao an OKC player will commit a normal blocking foul and you’ll have dudes in here crying that they’re getting away with murder 😂

Yup. A missed backcourt violation from last night’s 20pt win has 7k upvotes. A missed backcourt violation from a month ago in a 1pt game with seconds left has 1.8k.

This kinda stuff is why I’ll always love KD. He doesn’t give af about anyone’s narrative. Bro just wants to hoop and talk shit to people. Mad respect

This sub loves to whine about every dominant team most years. The hate for the Warriors back in their run was hilarious too

I’m convinced NBA Reddit hates basketball

As a thunder fan this is my ⁹⁄₁₁. First KD post I’ve upvoted in 8 years lol

Lol yeah reddit basketball experts really quiet now

One of the top comments dismisses what he says and just says “kd doesn’t complain” what bitches lol

It’s almost like people are more likely to be vocal in their complaints than contentment. Definitely not the problem with social media or anything

2.2m visitors a week. Just expect all kinds of opinions on r/nba.

Freudian slip for sure.

Had to scroll too far down for this

This is exactly it. There are way too many comments in just this thread from people that think OKC gets unfair treatment from the refs.

Also contributing is the idea that teams should have comparable fouls/penalties no matter the players or styles.

I hate seeing that shit in the discussion around every sport I watch.

Well we saw a missed backcourt in one clip of 48 mins so obviously the whole game was rigged start to finish grrrr 

Well, Redditors know more about the game than KD 🤓

Caruso might genuinely have the quickest hands since Gary Payton. They look like a blur on TV lmao. Idk how the refs are even supposed to officiate him

Same as ever

“The issue isn’t OKCs physicality it’s that no one else is allowed to play physical” shit

He was guarded almost exclusively by Dort all night mind you

He just got back from one and is describing it

Dort was literally his primary defender last night and held him to 19 points on 23 shots.

He got a trip to the fortune chamber. Everybody gets one!

I think most OKC fans don’t really care much about KD since winning a ring tbh. That was probably the sorest part beyond him going to the team that beat them.

I’m long over being mad at KD. My hatred for Draymond kicking Stephen Adam’s in the balls over and over again during the series before KD left, that hatred will never end.

I’ve NEVER implied he was serpentine in any way

It really just appears that way because every single questionable foul is posted all over social media and other teams aren’t. Look at the fouls that Siakam drew in game 5 of the finals last year: https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/1ldiyxz/highlights_all_the_5_personal_fouls_pascal_siakam/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Doesn’t really look that much different than the “inconsistent” whistles that Shai gets, but it got basically zero traction vs any questionable Shai call which gets thousands of upvotes. A team full of all-defensive caliber players know how to play defense better than a lineup not full of all-defense caliber players, I don’t see any world in which those whistles would be equal.

So many teams do tho. They just don’t receive anywhere near the same level of scrutiny. They’re not in the crosshairs having every call and non call hyper focused on and overanalyzed. Just throw on any random pistons or rockets or magic game and you’ll see it

Yeah, exactly. I totally agree. Like are the comments in this thread actually serious? Cause people seem to be completely missing/ignoring the actual argument here.

A bunch of comments are like “Durant obv knows more than all these reddit basketball experts” & “oh people are gonna be salty about this one.” But I think it’s pretty clear that most non-trolls who have an issue with OKC are not complaining about their defense in a vacuum. It’s the inconsistency of how they’re officiated on offense (specifically Shai) vs defense.

And I mean don’t take it from me or you, the reddit basketball experts, take it from the several NBA coaches/players who have complained about it over the last couple seasons.