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stopped reading thereunderstand the Spurs recent ownage of the Thunder which brought the series to 1-1
I don't, but tbh a psych degree is virtually useless anyway. Having a psych degree doesn't give anyone the ability to read minds or delve into the thought processes of people.
What I said about Kobe is pure speculation - I'll happily admit that. But it's somewhat grounded in the dynamic I see on the court between him and Bynum.
Just look over Bynum's game log for a second - http://www.nba.com/playerfile/andrew...ame_stats.html
Loss to OKC. Bynum 10-15, Kobe 7-25
Loss to Memphis, Bynum 11-16, Kobe 7-15 (this one isn't as bad)
Loss to Houston (by 3), Bynum 7-11, Kobe 10-27
Loss to Utah (by 4), Bynum 12-14, Kobe 3-20
The trend is still evident even when you guys are winning -
Win in Memphis (barely - by 5), Bynum 15-18, Kobe 11-25
Win in MIN (by 3), Bynum 11-15, Kobe 11-26
I promise I'm not trying to go out of my way to make Kobe look bad. I've literally picked these games randomly (looking for games where Bynum missed only a couple of shots and appeared to have far less shot attempts than he probably should have had based on the flow of the game), and Kobe's stat line pretty much speaks for itself.
I'm trying to make sense of those stat lines. What kind of person allows his big man to go 12-14 while he shoots 3-20. I didn't watch that game specifically, but like George Karl would say, if you're consistently going 12-14 or 10-15 or 11-16, you need more shots.
Kobe can plainly see how efficient and dominant Bynum can be in the low post, and what does he do in respone? He's averaging the highest FGA in his career since the '05-'06 season @ 23.4 FGA per game (compared to Bynum's anemic 12 FGA per game).
I know you're a hardcore Kobe fan but....you do notice this trend right?
stopped reading thereunderstand the Spurs recent ownage of the Thunder which brought the series to 1-1
Not a hardcore Kobe fan ...hardcore Lakers yes. Sure Kobe shoots too much always has I just don't. Don't like arm chair psychology ...doesn't matter why Kobe shoots too much only that he does ...
Westbrick will doom the Thunder, everybody knows it
Spurs in 6.
Thunder have flaws the Spurs have the personnel to exploit. Will be a tough series and might be dependent on how much help the refs give OKC, but in the end Spurs in 4.
I think this criticism is overblown.
He's 47.7% from the field this season.
Yes, Durant is slightly above @ 50% this season (TS% tells a similar story, Durant TS% = 60 compared to Westbrook TS% = 55), but Westbrook isn't exactly a liability on the offensive end. He's arguably one of the top 10 or 15 players in the league right now. If you're going to criticize West"brick" for shooting 47.7% from the field when there's a better option available (Durant), why not make the same criticism about Dwayne Wade, for example?
I think people are falling into the trap of confirmation bias when it comes to Westbrook. They've heard this "Westbrick" meme go around, and so they tend to remember his key misses while conveniently forgetting the fact that he's still fairly efficient from the field.
1-1? You started a thread with that ? Spurs are 2-1 this year against OKC. We favorably matchup against them.
Westbrook's regular season FG% isn't what got him the nickname Westbrick. His performance during the 4th quarter of WCF games last year did. In the playoffs when he's facing a team that has quality big men who stop him from finishing at the rim, his efficiency plummets.
OKC s struggle against experienced teams and even though they're talented as the WCF remains as their ceiling, they made WCF last season but neither of the two they conquered in the prior rounds was an experienced team like spurs/lakers/mavs tbh
They absolutely can beat them. This reminds me of the Cavs-Magic in '09. The Cavs were the favorites, they had the next one and people were ready to anoint them because they had pre-determined that it was "their time". When in reality, the Magic had handled them for a few seasons running. Yet that was largely ignored. Fast forward three years and we have the West version of that.
The Thunder overwhelm most teams with their explosive offense, but the Spurs aren't one of those teams. Not only do they not overwhelm them, but the Spurs actually have far superior scoring depth. Many claim this doesn't mean as much in the playoffs, but that's only true if your rotation is going to drastically change; I don't believe the Spurs' will. They'll continue to play 9-10 guys for more than spot minutes. And it's not like the Thunder's stars can play much more than they did in those two defeats. So I don't buy that that advantage will be mitigated to a large extent.
The other thing the Spurs have in their favor is, their greatest weaknesses are their lack of a closing PF and defending bigs who are proficient with their back to the basket (particularly those with girth). But against the Thunder, who generally close with Durant at PF, the former is irrelevant. The Spurs can simply slide Leonard -- who's defend Durant well this season, by the way -- to PF and play Jackson at the three. The latter is also irrelevant, as the Thunder don't have a single big who fits the description I talked about.
Most impressive about the Spurs wins over them this season is that they came without Ginobili. While the Thunder, as usual, weren't missing a key player.
Not to mention Memphis took OKC to 7 games.
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