MVP contention??? Did I miss something?

In the last three OKC games (he averaged 25/4/7 on nearly ⁵⁰⁄₄₀ splits). His first three games (2 Houston/1 OKC) were pretty bad but he did come back from a lengthy absence (6 weeks).

He’s been to the playoffs four times. His first two postseasons, he performed better than his regular season averages. He was playing hurt (turf toe) vs Minny, played poorly, and didn’t look like the same guy.

Suns fan, makes sense you’re mad

Better than DBook.

Mfers act like they forgot about Jay

Thanks for including us, your a real one lol

I high key think the Pacers will be the same team they have been the last few years, where they do nothing flashy but end up at like 45 wins, and somehow end up in the ECF vs the Celtics or the Knicks again

Every team that missed the play-in has a case to be better than last year.

Washington will get a full season of Trae, ideally 50-55 games of AD, added Dybantsa, their young core of George, Sarr, Johnson, Riley, Coulibaly, Carrington should get better as a whole. Ayton and Middleton fill out the roster nicely.

Indiana is bringing back Haliburton, getting Zubac in their full-time, and bringing back important players like Siakam, Nembhard, Toppin, McConnell, and Nesmith.

Brooklyn lost Claxton but Randle will really help their offense. By the law of averages a couple of their 5 rookies from last year should be better and they added another top pick.

Chicago addressed their weakest position with bringing in Claxton and Powell is a really nice signing. Caleb Wilson looks ready to contribute right away.

Milwaukee is interesting as they obviously lost one of the 4 best basketball players in the world. But Giannis played like 38 games last year. If you get 70 games from Herro, Jaquez, and Ware you could argue that is more valuable than 38 games from Giannis.

I think Brooklyn and Milwaukee will be at the bottom of the conference, but you can spin it they could be putting out a better team over the court of 82 games than last year.

Miami! Who just got Giannis

Everyone was lowkey gunning for the Knicks last year I felt. Esp after the cup. Which I thought was weird since they hadn’t won at that time

I mean realistically, I don’t see any team in the west but us with a favourable match up against the Thunder.

On the other hand, the Wolves scare the bejesus out of me

Wilt it

Healthy Luka absolutely COULD have given problems to OKC.

Yea they would’ve been the 3 seed last year if they didn’t have all the late season injuries. Won’t be surprised by a conference finals appearance even if they aren’t “true contenders”

Well usually 3-7 in the west is like… a win or two difference

I have see people all over the internet trashing the offseason and saying they’re a play in team at best

What does a Knicks flair have to do with the Lakers?

I am a long way away from being invested in the WCF lol. A whole lot has to happen before I really care about it.

I still don’t entirely trust the Wolves - the Naz Reid loss is significant and the Lamelo Ant fit is TBD - and I think the Spurs and Thunder are in no way “inevitable”

First of all, the Spurs/Thunder could slip a bit in the regular season and fall to the 3 or 4 seed. They aren’t as infallible as people are acting, especially the Spurs

If the lakers finish 3 or 4, they could probably avoid the 3 teams you mentioned until the 2nd round at least, so only have to beat one for the WCF

Nuggets aren’t as scary as they used to be. Jokic is Jokic but everyone else is either kind of inconsistent or just bad

Nuggets are a non-factor at this point, Wolves are a tougher fight

Nuggets aren’t even on the same planet as thunder or spurs. If anything you should be putting Minnesota above the nuggets. Jaden McDaniels took joker out to pasture.

AR’s playoffs can be summarized as:

2023: Played amazing as a second year to help the Lakers reach the WCF, and was one of the only bright spots vs the Nuggets

2024: Tough matchup and shooting vs the the Nuggets but played good defense on Murray

2025: Toe injury where he couldn’t even get past Conley who is usually BBQ chicken by 98% of the league, played surprisingly good defense on ANT though

2026: came back early from injury. Bad first game vs OKC but had a good rest of the series. OKC’s defense makes guards look silly so why are we surprised when a guard struggles a bit?

Anyways, if you watch AR in the playoffs he’s not foul baiting and he takes a lot of hits. Anyone saying stuff like that is making lazy statements without actually watching

I hate player fans

Reaves doesn’t even make the top 20 in free throw attempts per game btw. I think your point is moot.

Take your vitriol elsewhere, you seem like a real cunt irl lol

They’re both getting to the line at a similar rate, except Shai does it at a considerably higher volume thus he flops more than Austin on a game-to-game basis, no matter how many more 3s Austin averages per game. We’re talking 48 vs 46% here lol. Shai takes a lot of middies and long 2s while Austin shoots more 3s, but Austin takes a higher percentage of his shots from within 10 ft of the basket.

I guess not lol

He did manage to stay on his feet in most of these clips though which was nice to see.

Ah yes Reeves totally wasn’t the third option next to LeBron and Luka. Remember when he took them to the finals.

He’s not just a foul baiter but it’s a large part of his game, his PPG would change overnight if the league decided to call them differently.