philly fans would riot in the streets if they don't pay butler, the crowds love him and he's playing like a stud this series, i doubt he leaves if they lose
I see, thanks. Always wanted to watch more hockey but never ended up getting into it. I'll try and watch the rest of the playoff, hopefully they're entertaining. Also I'd beg to differ, 10 years ago or so I chose the Sabres as the team I'd support, they've constantly sucked all this time. Guess teams are close except for them :( But I guess it also speaks for how balanced the teams are that an expansion team did so well in the first 2 seasons, compared to the last expansion team in the NBA (bobcats/hornets) who barely played in the playoff and still haven't won a series from what I remember.
I feel like the sport is being played at such an elite level that the teams are all much closer in skill than are the teams in basketball. There's not much room for hockey teams to get way better anymore imo. Also, in the NBA, one player can dominate a game or even a series. That simply doesn't happen in the NHL.
The NHL has upsets very often and there is far more parity. There were 6 upsets in the first round which is crazy though--definitely not the norm for the best regular season team in the league to be SWEPT. btw they were also the best regular season team OF ALL TIME lmao
@giga I don't follow hockey that much but I know there was a big thing about a super favourite Lightning team getting swept by an 8th seed, but I saw that the other 1st seed also lost in the first round. Is it a thing for NHL playoffs to be closer or was that a once in a lifetime occurrence as it would be in the NBA?
Oh yeah I agree, that's why I specified I was talking about potential. It's far fetched to think that the series with Indiana made Celtics favourites, but I did think that it would give them the moral boost to play a bit better than they are. Still didn't expect them to be at their peak ofc. Also saw a closer series cause of Bucks inexperience but they're definitely surprising me in that regard. Very curious to see them in the conference finals.
the celtics have been a mess the entire season and beating a pacers team (and mind you pacers threw some games) without their best player didn't change that. you can't judge a team from their success last year when having kyrie + hayward changes their way of playing, tatum thrived last year by being the dominant ball handler and go to person in the clutch, but we've seen all year that they gave that duty to kyrie and tatums been slumping as a result, rozier regressed, smarts in an out of injury, their offense is virtually non existent especially with how unengaged hayward plays at times.. this team was always getting bounced in the 2nd round and are lucky they drew the pacers in the first
Driving down to Philadelphia for Game 4 was one of the best decisions I've ever made for watching a sports game. Greatest game I've been to other than the Blue Jays 2016 WC win against the Orioles at Rogers Center (née Skydome). Wells Fargo Center was also as loud as any game I've been to, behind that same Blue Jays game.
Philadelphia has some good fans too, had a great conversation with a guy in the row in front of me and some other fans after the game was over. Met some Raptors fans that came down from Toronto as well
And watching people begin to leave Wells Fargo Center after Kawhi hit that dagger three late in the fourth was really satisfying to see lol
Need to win Game 5 tonight. I think we'll pull it off
Also Boston's down 3-1 to the Bucks lol, and that Houston/Golden State series has been really fun to watch as well. Same with the Nuggets/Blazers series. 4OT? Are you kidding me? Crazy
Well I mean, ofc if you see them now the Celtics are a mess, but they'd have the potential to be as good as the other 3. Plus in the first round it looked like they were gonna find themselves and playoff Kyrie had arrived. If you're talking about what we saw from the regular season, then yeah, they never had a chance. Again, really thought they'd solve their issues.
-Despite the Celtics building the wall on Giannis he's still managed to get decent stats and with Middleton and Bledose being good supporters they managed to get a 3-1 lead, gonna be interesting to see them play against in the conference final for sure. Really thought the Celtics would step up their game but I guess I underestimated the Bucks. Horford's been good so far tho.
-Denver is a bit too Jokic dependent, he's great ofc but they literally play him all game, which can be a problem with the spurs series going to 7 and the Portland series seemingly headed the same way. For portland Kanter is playing much better defensively, than I expected him to, taking into account the injuries as well. Also if they get Seth 3s going it can be a big weapon for them.
-Toronto really need the bench to start playing better, can't always go to Leonard, Gasol has been awful with the 3 ball which makes Toronto's offense much less efficient and that's a problem, especially with siakam not playing 100%. Embiid is a monster when he gets it going and it's good for Philly that Simmons is playing less offense but more efficient, especially with butler playing great. Still think Toronto has this, unless Philly becomes more consistent. Roster wise the 76ers have the upper hand honestly.
-In that regard is amazing how they're still not finding a uniform way of calling those situations. Some (competent) journalists talked about how when harden uses a stepback the natural motion becomes going forward on the shot, which is true, and the referees talked about how you have to defend going sideways basically. To me that's bs, the landing zone should not, in any case, be invaded cause it is dangerous, but I can't allow a player to have a landing as wide as Harden's. Imo the landing zone should be formed when the player jumps and be vertical to that spot, it should be the shooter's responsibility to stay in it, if he doesn't (or if he blatantly kicks as many do, And from way back, Reggie Miller used to do it for example), it should be an offensive foul.
-That said, despite having an eye injury Harden is still playing great, which speaks for how good he really is. Also some of the misses are due to him changing his motion to draw for the foul, but a 3 point foul is such efficient for his game that it's worth risking the miss, which is crazy and definitely a reason to look into all those fouls he draws (most of which are offensive fouls anyway, like when he grabs the defender's arm). Till he keeps flopping and abusing the system he deserves all the hate he gets, but he's still an elite guard and should get recognition for his skills.
- Curry has been playing badly (also got an injury so half an excuse), but we could really appreciate how good and how important KD is for this team. He got hated for joining a strong side with all stars, but he's the one dragging the team when needed, he's been unstoppable from midrange, with defenders in the face and all, and very good defense wise. Also shutout to Thompson's top notch defense and Iggy showing up in the clutch.
I've been watching the playoffs and just noticed there's a thread about it here so i'm just gonna say all I have to say about it even if no one cares: - These are by far the most entertaining playoff we've had in the past decade, even if the Warriors end up winning again, we'd still have witnessed a very open East where all 4 teams that made it to the semis could have gone to the finals; a very enjoyable series between Denver and Portland, which included a 4 overtime game; a clash between the Warriors and the Rockets that's been pretty balanced so far; some pretty good round 1 games from series that were supposed to be sweep or close to it (the clippers taking 2 games in the bay, Denver and spurs going to 7 games and having real close ones, plus Dame going off against the thunders and making the closest matchup of the 1st round end 4-1).
-The refereeing of the Warriors/Rockets series has been sh*t, but it didn't influence the outcome, there's been blown calls for both teams, including some landing zone fouls not called for the warriors in a game where the Rockets complained for what was, imo, an offensive foul.
