Kawhi Leonard

Quick Thoughts: Transactions

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Now that the transactional stampede has slowed down, let’s pause to peek through some of what happened… Nets trade Mikal Bridges to the Knicks for picks and salary slots to be determined Nets trade the picks they own from the Suns to the Rockets for the remainder of the picks the Nets gave the Rockets in the 2020 James Harden deal From the Nets perspective, these are good deals.  The choice was to pair Bridges with whatever star-ish level play they could get (Trae Young, Brandon … [Read more...] about Quick Thoughts: Transactions

A Quick Look At Some Older Stars

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The main question going into the stretch run of the season is whether any team can beat the Celtics.  We’ll come back to that question in a few weeks but, for now, I was interested in the durability of and performance of the old stars in the Western Conference.  While they aren’t quite the top of the conference, the Clippers, Suns, Warriors, and Lakers are riding old stars in a way that NBA team rarely have since the time that the Jordan Bulls, Stockton-Malone Jazz, and … [Read more...] about A Quick Look At Some Older Stars

A Quick Look at Peak SF Advanced Stats

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A few days ago, we did a tweet thread on the career advanced stats for the SFs who made the top 75 and those that likely narrowly missed.  I had a couple of requests for how these players rated at peak. So,  I took the 3 best consecutive years for each of the players.  I also added Bird, Durant + Dr J for comparison/context (did not use ABA Erving).  Anyway, here they are:  -Bird 1984-87: 26.2 PER, .242 WS48, 9.0 BPM, 25.7 VORP -KD 2011-14: 28.2 PER, .275 WS48, 9.0 … [Read more...] about A Quick Look at Peak SF Advanced Stats

NBA Title Teams and Opening Night

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On opening night, the two presumptive favorites, Brooklyn and the Lakers, started the season with resounding thuds.  The Nets were easily handled by that Bucks, before bouncing back with a nice win in Philly.  The Lakers, on the other hand, were beaten by Golden State and then were steamrolled by Phoenix to start out 0-2.  These results got me wondering whether winning on opening night has any relationship to winning a title.  How worrisome is a losing start to eventual … [Read more...] about NBA Title Teams and Opening Night

Can LaMelo Win ROY?

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LaMelo Ball’s recent wrist injury likely ends his season with 41 games played.  He has been the best rookie this season but does his abbreviated season disqualify him from contention?  Well, that really depends on how good the competition is.  In this particular case, most of the other rookies who have played have had dubious value.  Let’s run through the stats of all rookies with at least 1,000 minutes played so far: -Ball, 41 gms, 1,174 mins, 15.9 ppg, .451 FG%, .528 … [Read more...] about Can LaMelo Win ROY?

NBA 2020-21 Awards So Far

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As we approach the halfway point of the season, I thought this would be good time to do awards picks for the season that has been so far.  Granted a lot could change but let’s jump in and take a look: MVP:  Before the season, LeBron James, Kawhi Leonard, and Giannis Antetokounmpo were the safe bets.  They were the best players for the three likely best teams.  They have all been very good so far but Nikola Jokic has been even better.  Jokic leads the NBA in most … [Read more...] about NBA 2020-21 Awards So Far

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