Around the NBA - 23-24 Other playoff series

[SunsRback4Good]

The NBA just changed the rules and teams with physical players have an advantage now.

The NBA “Just” changed the rules? We all knew that regular season and playoffs have two different set of rules. Fouls are not called loosely in the playoffs allowing teams to actually play defense instead of calling fouls every 5 seconds. I love the playoffs it’s not a snooze fast like the RS.

[Ghost of Kleine]

The NBA just changed the rules and teams with physical players have an advantage now.

Maybe, but then again, We got bullied by the Bucks back in 2021, and the Mavs too got clear advantages by being really aggressive with us as well. One of the big reasons why so many disliked Ayton but also really liked Nurkic despite his clumsiness and lack of athleticism is that Nurkic was willing to actually consistently play with physicality utilizing his size and too often Ayton would not, and got chided constantly for playing a finesse style instead of capitalizing on his superior athleticism and size. Both players being polar opposites, but our needs remained the same because we were and are a very finesse and mentally soft team. It's really no secret to anyone!

So sure, maybe it's true that the NBA has pivoted back to a more physical and aggressive style of play. With emphasis and favor placed upon the more physical and aggressive teams. But then it's still really up to us to adjust and adapt and evolve accordingly if we want to actually keep pace with the rest of the league. The problem with being such a finesse team is that when our shooting/skill-based offense goes cold and our efficiency struggles, Then the opposition knows that we just don't have the size and athleticism, or physicality and tenacity to beat other teams' top-tier athletes. That's why Ayton was so important to our offensive scheme because he could rely on his size, fluidity, and elite high-end athleticism to create mismatches and get easy high-percentage shots around the basket whenever our shooters struggled offensively. This really helped us in that he could help sustain us offensively in those situations while also being able to switch defensively too.

But ultimately he had to go because he wasn't consistently playing that way enough for us to be truly elite. That's also why so many currently recognize and are pining for more size, length, athleticism, and high-motor physical athletes. But the reality of this team is as I stated, that we're just too small, undersized, unathletic, and a finesse style team that relies on beating opponents with skill and smooth shooting. So the well-known template to beat us is just to play us very physically, beat us up with size and physicality, and because we absolutely are a soft, undersized finesse team, we repeatedly fold against size/athleticism/ and physicality. The fact that the NBA decided to go back to rewarding a more physical, athletic style of play was just incidental really unfortunate timing for us due to the masses' frustrations with so many fouls constantly slowing the game down and making it less exciting.

[Saberestar]

The NBA just changed the rules and teams with physical players have an advantage now.

The NBA “Just” changed the rules? We all knew that regular season and playoffs have two different set of rules. Fouls are not called loosely in the playoffs allowing teams to actually play defense instead of calling fouls every 5 seconds. I love the playoffs it’s not a snooze fast like the RS.

Yeah, the change was right after the All-Star break and it's well documented with FTs per game, points per game and more other stuff.

In the playoffs they are allowing even more physical games.

[Desertfox]

The NBA just changed the rules and teams with physical players have an advantage now.

Maybe, but then again, We got bullied by the Bucks back in 2021, and the Mavs too got clear advantages by being really aggressive with us as well. One of the big reasons why so many disliked Ayton but also really liked Nurkic despite his clumsiness and lack of athleticism is that Nurkic was willing to actually consistently play with physicality utilizing his size and too often Ayton would not, and got chided constantly for playing a finesse style instead of capitalizing on his superior athleticism and size. Both players being polar opposites, but our needs remained the same because we were and are a very finesse and mentally soft team. It's really no secret to anyone!

So sure, maybe it's true that the NBA has pivoted back to a more physical and aggressive style of play. With emphasis and favor placed upon the more physical and aggressive teams. But then it's still really up to us to adjust and adapt and evolve accordingly if we want to actually keep pace with the rest of the league. The problem with being such a finesse team is that when our shooting/skill-based offense goes cold and our efficiency struggles, Then the opposition knows that we just don't have the size and athleticism, or physicality and tenacity to beat other teams' top-tier athletes. That's why Ayton was so important to our offensive scheme because he could rely on his size, fluidity, and elite high-end athleticism to create mismatches and get easy high-percentage shots around the basket whenever our shooters struggled offensively. This really helped us in that he could help sustain us offensively in those situations while also being able to switch defensively too.

But ultimately he had to go because he wasn't consistently playing that way enough for us to be truly elite. That's also why so many currently recognize and are pining for more size, length, athleticism, and high-motor physical athletes. But the reality of this team is as I stated, that we're just too small, undersized, unathletic, and a finesse style team that relies on beating opponents with skill and smooth shooting. So the well-known template to beat us is just to play us very physically, beat us up with size and physicality, and because we absolutely are a soft, undersized finesse team, we repeatedly fold against size/athleticism/ and physicality. The fact that the NBA decided to go back to rewarding a more physical, athletic style of play was just incidental really unfortunate timing for us due to the masses' frustrations with so many fouls constantly slowing the game down and making it less exciting.

Eh... Ayton tried to play physical multiple times, every single time he would get whistled for phantom or ticky tacky fouls. You could see him literally changing how he played to not foul out. For all the hate he got, he was really good at avoiding foul trouble and staying on the floor. That's also why he got limited blocks but still played good defense.

We got bullied by the Bucks because the refs allowed them to be physical without doing the same for us.

[sasquatchBob]

Ishbia should buy Wolves. Trade Reid and McDaniels + 5FRP for Lebron. Then trade Conley for Klay Thompson.

[SunsRback4Good]

Ishbia should buy Wolves. Trade Reid and McDaniels + 5FRP for Lebron. Then trade Conley for Klay Thompson.

He should have done that with the Suns. Imagine a threesome of Lebron, Booker, Klay with Nurkic, Allen, Gordon… that’s a championship in the makings.

[RedIndian]

The NBA just changed the rules and teams with physical players have an advantage now.

The NBA “Just” changed the rules? We all knew that regular season and playoffs have two different set of rules. Fouls are not called loosely in the playoffs allowing teams to actually play defense instead of calling fouls every 5 seconds. I love the playoffs it’s not a snooze fast like the RS.

Yeah, the change was right after the All-Star break and it's well documented with FTs per game, points per game and more other stuff.

In the playoffs they are allowing even more physical games.

They're practically allowing hand-checking again and the Wolves are the biggest beneficiaries being the biggest and most physical team in the league.

Question now really is whether this is a temporary shift i.e. an overcompensation for the last several years of offense-friendly officiating or a permanent one? If it's permanent, teams will need really need to re-orient their rosters.

[garrick]

The NBA just changed the rules and teams with physical players have an advantage now.

Maybe, but then again, We got bullied by the Bucks back in 2021, and the Mavs too got clear advantages by being really aggressive with us as well. One of the big reasons why so many disliked Ayton but also really liked Nurkic despite his clumsiness and lack of athleticism is that Nurkic was willing to actually consistently play with physicality utilizing his size and too often Ayton would not, and got chided constantly for playing a finesse style instead of capitalizing on his superior athleticism and size. Both players being polar opposites, but our needs remained the same because we were and are a very finesse and mentally soft team. It's really no secret to anyone!

So sure, maybe it's true that the NBA has pivoted back to a more physical and aggressive style of play. With emphasis and favor placed upon the more physical and aggressive teams. But then it's still really up to us to adjust and adapt and evolve accordingly if we want to actually keep pace with the rest of the league. The problem with being such a finesse team is that when our shooting/skill-based offense goes cold and our efficiency struggles, Then the opposition knows that we just don't have the size and athleticism, or physicality and tenacity to beat other teams' top-tier athletes. That's why Ayton was so important to our offensive scheme because he could rely on his size, fluidity, and elite high-end athleticism to create mismatches and get easy high-percentage shots around the basket whenever our shooters struggled offensively. This really helped us in that he could help sustain us offensively in those situations while also being able to switch defensively too.

But ultimately he had to go because he wasn't consistently playing that way enough for us to be truly elite. That's also why so many currently recognize and are pining for more size, length, athleticism, and high-motor physical athletes. But the reality of this team is as I stated, that we're just too small, undersized, unathletic, and a finesse style team that relies on beating opponents with skill and smooth shooting. So the well-known template to beat us is just to play us very physically, beat us up with size and physicality, and because we absolutely are a soft, undersized finesse team, we repeatedly fold against size/athleticism/ and physicality. The fact that the NBA decided to go back to rewarding a more physical, athletic style of play was just incidental really unfortunate timing for us due to the masses' frustrations with so many fouls constantly slowing the game down and making it less exciting.

Eh... Ayton tried to play physical multiple times, every single time he would get whistled for phantom or ticky tacky fouls. You could see him literally changing how he played to not foul out. For all the hate he got, he was really good at avoiding foul trouble and staying on the floor. That's also why he got limited blocks but still played good defense.

We got bullied by the Bucks because the refs allowed them to be physical without doing the same for us.

Well the Pacers have a pretty similar kind of player in Myles Turner who loves jumpshots over physical contact so I don't agree that Ayton was the main problem, The Pacers have Siakam, Toppin & Mathurin who have a bit of size and athletic ability so they aren't an all finesse team by any means so they can still win when teams get physical on them.

JJ assembled a finesse team with Bridges, Cam, Crowder, Book, Ayton and CP3 with none of them necessarily very good at finishing through contact or the ability to draw a lot of fouls which led to the kind of routs like Game 7 when the offense just completely broke down because nobody could hit a jumpshot.

[lilfishi22]

The NBA just changed the rules and teams with physical players have an advantage now.

The NBA “Just” changed the rules? We all knew that regular season and playoffs have two different set of rules. Fouls are not called loosely in the playoffs allowing teams to actually play defense instead of calling fouls every 5 seconds. I love the playoffs it’s not a snooze fast like the RS.

That is generally the case (RS vs Playoffs) but I believe there was a stat showing it was one of if not the biggest drop in FTA (pre vs post-asw) in league history. So it's been trending towards this physical style even before the playoffs began

Read on Twitter

[Ghost of Kleine]

The NBA just changed the rules and teams with physical players have an advantage now.

Maybe, but then again, We got bullied by the Bucks back in 2021, and the Mavs too got clear advantages by being really aggressive with us as well. One of the big reasons why so many disliked Ayton but also really liked Nurkic despite his clumsiness and lack of athleticism is that Nurkic was willing to actually consistently play with physicality utilizing his size and too often Ayton would not, and got chided constantly for playing a finesse style instead of capitalizing on his superior athleticism and size. Both players being polar opposites, but our needs remained the same because we were and are a very finesse and mentally soft team. It's really no secret to anyone!

So sure, maybe it's true that the NBA has pivoted back to a more physical and aggressive style of play. With emphasis and favor placed upon the more physical and aggressive teams. But then it's still really up to us to adjust and adapt and evolve accordingly if we want to actually keep pace with the rest of the league. The problem with being such a finesse team is that when our shooting/skill-based offense goes cold and our efficiency struggles, Then the opposition knows that we just don't have the size and athleticism, or physicality and tenacity to beat other teams' top-tier athletes. That's why Ayton was so important to our offensive scheme because he could rely on his size, fluidity, and elite high-end athleticism to create mismatches and get easy high-percentage shots around the basket whenever our shooters struggled offensively. This really helped us in that he could help sustain us offensively in those situations while also being able to switch defensively too.

But ultimately he had to go because he wasn't consistently playing that way enough for us to be truly elite. That's also why so many currently recognize and are pining for more size, length, athleticism, and high-motor physical athletes. But the reality of this team is as I stated, that we're just too small, undersized, unathletic, and a finesse style team that relies on beating opponents with skill and smooth shooting. So the well-known template to beat us is just to play us very physically, beat us up with size and physicality, and because we absolutely are a soft, undersized finesse team, we repeatedly fold against size/athleticism/ and physicality. The fact that the NBA decided to go back to rewarding a more physical, athletic style of play was just incidental really unfortunate timing for us due to the masses' frustrations with so many fouls constantly slowing the game down and making it less exciting.

Eh... Ayton tried to play physical multiple times, every single time he would get whistled for phantom or ticky tacky fouls. You could see him literally changing how he played to not foul out. For all the hate he got, he was really good at avoiding foul trouble and staying on the floor. That's also why he got limited blocks but still played good defense.

We got bullied by the Bucks because the refs allowed them to be physical without doing the same for us.

That's very true also, but then Giannis was very athletically physical and dominant against us, Holiday was also very physically aggressive to the point of shutting down Booker and then they dominated us with bigger lineups too. Giannis, Lopez, and Portis lineups with size against us. Sure the refs allowed a lot of very physical play too, But we can't depend on the refs' decisions as a foundation for our success or an excuse for our failures, even if it does contribute to either outcome. IF we want to be a legitimate championship-level contender, we need to have enough adaptability BOTH in our roster for specific matchups, and for our style of play and mental fortitude against those bigger and more physical and athletic teams regardless of the refs. We have to be adaptive and evolve successfully within the context of our situation.

That's why I've repeatedly suggested adding players with these specific attributes etc, because of our one-dimensional style of play in trying to basically outshoot/outskill opponents really only works if we're firing on all cylinders and at the top of our games offensively. We desperately need legit size, length, athleticism, energy, speed, tenacity/grit and physicality. Basically all of the things that Jones, etc has ignored perennially that we severely lacked and was continually exploited by the opposition each year.

[Ghost of Kleine]

The NBA just changed the rules and teams with physical players have an advantage now.

The NBA “Just” changed the rules? We all knew that regular season and playoffs have two different set of rules. Fouls are not called loosely in the playoffs allowing teams to actually play defense instead of calling fouls every 5 seconds. I love the playoffs it’s not a snooze fast like the RS.

That is generally the case (RS vs Playoffs) but I believe there was a stat showing it was one of if not the biggest drop in FTA (pre vs post-asw) in league history. So it's been trending towards this physical style even before the playoffs began

Read on Twitter

History just as everything else in life being cyclical. It's not all that surprising honestly that the league has returned to this as many, many fans seemed unhappy with the excessive amount of foul calls prior to this season's playoffs slowing the game down significantly. They're likely just trying to find a happy medium to promote a better overall product. But yes, right now there are a lot of inconsistencies with the process.

[bwgood77]

Denver lost 8 games at home and just got throttled by Minny without Gobert. And won the first one. So these are impressive wins. The TWolves are for real. They were the #1 seed most of the year, and Towns missed quite a bit of time.

Our series against them doesn't look as bad now as it did at the time. It will be interesting to see if they role through the west...and if they do, how well they play against Boston (assuming they get there).

Indy kind of got screwed last night with that Myles Turner moving screen with like 12 seconds left. That was definitely NY ref bias. It was technically the right call but is the type of thing that would never be called normally at that point in the game.

[bwgood77]

The NBA just changed the rules and teams with physical players have an advantage now.

The NBA “Just” changed the rules? We all knew that regular season and playoffs have two different set of rules. Fouls are not called loosely in the playoffs allowing teams to actually play defense instead of calling fouls every 5 seconds. I love the playoffs it’s not a snooze fast like the RS.

That is generally the case (RS vs Playoffs) but I believe there was a stat showing it was one of if not the biggest drop in FTA (pre vs post-asw) in league history. So it's been trending towards this physical style even before the playoffs began

Read on Twitter

Except they certainly didn't swallow it against Indy at the end of that game.

[sunsbg]

Suns moral victories continue - taking two games against DEN last playoffs and winning the regular season games against potential new champion. So proud of them.

Seriously though what is MIN missing. They have size, athleticism, experienced PG and chemistry, 3PT shooting, up-and-coming superstar. The Wolves are hungry too.

[sunskerr]

The NBA “Just” changed the rules? We all knew that regular season and playoffs have two different set of rules. Fouls are not called loosely in the playoffs allowing teams to actually play defense instead of calling fouls every 5 seconds. I love the playoffs it’s not a snooze fast like the RS.

That is generally the case (RS vs Playoffs) but I believe there was a stat showing it was one of if not the biggest drop in FTA (pre vs post-asw) in league history. So it's been trending towards this physical style even before the playoffs began

Read on Twitter

History just as everything else in life being cyclical. It's not all that surprising honestly that the league has returned to this as many, many fans seemed unhappy with the excessive amount of foul calls prior to this season's playoffs slowing the game down significantly. They're likely just trying to find a happy medium to promote a better overall product. But yes, right now there are a lot of inconsistencies with the process.

Regular season vs post season has been called differently for decades. We know this as Suns fans going back to the Nash era (remember the Spurs being allowed to trip people?). In fact it was the most apparent during the Warriors era since all eyes were on Steph and the league didn't give a crap that the Cavs were literally holding on to his jersey and arms as he would try to get open.

I'm glad the whistle started getting swallowed in the regular season. I do prefer physical basketball myself, lower scores that make a basket more valuable. But if we're trying to build a contender, this new physical style does not benefit us since we are small and unathletic (relative to other contenders).

Funny enough this style of whistle directly helps the wolves, since all their main guys are huge. The defensive 3 second call being called less is also massive since they play a two big lineup. It kind of helps the thunder too since they have some physical defenders and lots of length, but if the Wolves go up against Chet I can see the new whistle working against the Thunder since he is so skinny.

And on the subject of the wolves it would be a mistake to think that their dominance so far of the Nuggets makes us getting swept look better. A sweep is a sweep and we looked trash and as far away from being a contender as ever.

[Ghost of Kleine]

Suns moral victories continue - taking two games against DEN last playoffs and winning the regular season games against potential new champion. So proud of them.

Seriously though what is MIN missing. They have size, athleticism, experienced PG and chemistry, 3PT shooting, up-and-coming superstar. The Wolves are hungry too.

Really the only aspect they need or could improve greatly upon that would make them truly almost invincible would be high end 3 point specialists that could make them much more potent and near unbeatable on either side of the floor.

But obviously their weakness wouldn't be a very high paced fast break team that could run them off the floor as their bigs would struggle in movement and recovery against elite quick high level guards and open court scorers. But adding the element of a high level 3 point shooting specialist would obviously help them offset those points they'd give up on the break!

[Ghost of Kleine]

Maybe, but then again, We got bullied by the Bucks back in 2021, and the Mavs too got clear advantages by being really aggressive with us as well. One of the big reasons why so many disliked Ayton but also really liked Nurkic despite his clumsiness and lack of athleticism is that Nurkic was willing to actually consistently play with physicality utilizing his size and too often Ayton would not, and got chided constantly for playing a finesse style instead of capitalizing on his superior athleticism and size. Both players being polar opposites, but our needs remained the same because we were and are a very finesse and mentally soft team. It's really no secret to anyone!

So sure, maybe it's true that the NBA has pivoted back to a more physical and aggressive style of play. With emphasis and favor placed upon the more physical and aggressive teams. But then it's still really up to us to adjust and adapt and evolve accordingly if we want to actually keep pace with the rest of the league. The problem with being such a finesse team is that when our shooting/skill-based offense goes cold and our efficiency struggles, Then the opposition knows that we just don't have the size and athleticism, or physicality and tenacity to beat other teams' top-tier athletes. That's why Ayton was so important to our offensive scheme because he could rely on his size, fluidity, and elite high-end athleticism to create mismatches and get easy high-percentage shots around the basket whenever our shooters struggled offensively. This really helped us in that he could help sustain us offensively in those situations while also being able to switch defensively too.

But ultimately he had to go because he wasn't consistently playing that way enough for us to be truly elite. That's also why so many currently recognize and are pining for more size, length, athleticism, and high-motor physical athletes. But the reality of this team is as I stated, that we're just too small, undersized, unathletic, and a finesse style team that relies on beating opponents with skill and smooth shooting. So the well-known template to beat us is just to play us very physically, beat us up with size and physicality, and because we absolutely are a soft, undersized finesse team, we repeatedly fold against size/athleticism/ and physicality. The fact that the NBA decided to go back to rewarding a more physical, athletic style of play was just incidental really unfortunate timing for us due to the masses' frustrations with so many fouls constantly slowing the game down and making it less exciting.

Eh... Ayton tried to play physical multiple times, every single time he would get whistled for phantom or ticky tacky fouls. You could see him literally changing how he played to not foul out. For all the hate he got, he was really good at avoiding foul trouble and staying on the floor. That's also why he got limited blocks but still played good defense.

We got bullied by the Bucks because the refs allowed them to be physical without doing the same for us.

Well the Pacers have a pretty similar kind of player in Myles Turner who loves jumpshots over physical contact so I don't agree that Ayton was the main problem, The Pacers have Siakam, Toppin & Mathurin who have a bit of size and athletic ability so they aren't an all finesse team by any means so they can still win when teams get physical on them.

JJ assembled a finesse team with Bridges, Cam, Crowder, Book, Ayton and CP3 with none of them necessarily very good at finishing through contact or the ability to draw a lot of fouls which led to the kind of routs like Game 7 when the offense just completely broke down because nobody could hit a jumpshot.

NO! You're right that Ayton wasn't really the problem! At least not the primary cause of our collapse that he was scapegoated to be. Our team had a lot of cumulative issues that dismantled any real chance we actually had to win a championship! And the biggest of those has been/still is our inept and inconsistent front office constantly underperforming in their roles/duties to put us in an optimal situation for success. Sure Aytons' hot/cold motor and passive/ finesse style of play was a contributory factor. But we had a lot more significant issues still to address even around that time. And honestly, I believe that had our previous owner and Jagaloon Jones actually treated Ayton accordingly right after our finals run, and actually prioritized him more, then he'd maybe still be here now without the lack of engagement due to shining him on about his initial contract extension. But it is what it is with this franchise and front office.

[garrick]

The NBA “Just” changed the rules? We all knew that regular season and playoffs have two different set of rules. Fouls are not called loosely in the playoffs allowing teams to actually play defense instead of calling fouls every 5 seconds. I love the playoffs it’s not a snooze fast like the RS.

That is generally the case (RS vs Playoffs) but I believe there was a stat showing it was one of if not the biggest drop in FTA (pre vs post-asw) in league history. So it's been trending towards this physical style even before the playoffs began

Read on Twitter

Except they certainly didn't swallow it against Indy at the end of that game.

I think they should have waited till next offseason to make the change instead of instituting the change mid season.

Teams like the Suns and Nuggets did not adjust well to this increased physicality. Maybe for us we will never adjust well since KD is so weak and Booker gets unnerved more often than not when he isn't getting fouls called for him.

[lilfishi22]

That is generally the case (RS vs Playoffs) but I believe there was a stat showing it was one of if not the biggest drop in FTA (pre vs post-asw) in league history. So it's been trending towards this physical style even before the playoffs began

Read on Twitter

Except they certainly didn't swallow it against Indy at the end of that game.

I think they should have waited till next offseason to make the change instead of instituting the change mid season.

Teams like the Suns and Nuggets did not adjust well to this increased physicality. Maybe for us we will never adjust well since KD is so weak and Booker gets unnerved more often than not when he isn't getting fouls called for him.

The funny thing is the NBA got Joe Dumars onto the Lowe Post to talk about the pretty apparent swallowing of the whistle if IIRC, Dumars was saying they haven't had any discussions with the officials about changing how calls are made etc. Basically trying to downplay how obvious the difference was in officiating and that the change was coming from the top.

As you said, it's totally fine to me if they want to bring more physicality back (by not calling as many fouls) but do it in the offseason.

[KLEON]

Been saying it that you beat this Wolves team playing uptempo style. They are terrible on transition defense and Malone made the change unlike Vogel