2024-2025 NBA Playoffs Round 1, Game 1: (7) Orlando Magic at (2) Boston Celtics - 3:30pm ET

[eyriq]

I mean, I get it, you’re hatewatching Paolo and Mosley and spinning anything you can get your hands on to paint them in a bad light. It’s going to result in a lot of embarrassing mistakes for you, though.

[SOUL]

eyriq glazing Mose!! What a time to be alive

[Knightro]

We know our ball movement didn't increase.

Yes, thank you.

[Knightro]

I mean, I get it, you’re hatewatching Paolo and Mosley and spinning anything you can get your hands on to paint them in a bad light. It’s going to result in a lot of embarrassing mistakes for you, though.

I don't mean this disrespectfully, but you don't actually know ball as well as you think you do. And you also digest stats in ways that aren't really accurate representations of what's actually happening on the court.

Also... I thought Paolo was very good in Game 1 (and I thought Franz was mostly very bad offensively), with the caveat that Paolo pounded the air out of the ball and wasn't overly looking to pass it all that much.

You have developed this really inappropriate belief that I don't like Paolo (which isn't true) and you're now trying to "gotcha" me at all times like I have some sort of bias against Paolo. It's bogus frankly.

The ball movement *was* significantly down compared to the back half of the season. This isn't something that is really up for debate. I'm not even killing specific player or coach or anyone for it specifically as Boston is a great defensive team and can force a bad offense with bad ball handlers into a lot of ugly actions. I'm simply point out factual information.

Paolo's time of possession in game 1 was 7.3, it was 5.6 in the second half of the year.

Franz's time of possession in game 1 was 5.4, it was 4.3 in the second half of the year.

Average seconds per touch and average dribbles per touch was up for both guys from the regular season as well.

[eyriq]

I mean, I get it, you’re hatewatching Paolo and Mosley and spinning anything you can get your hands on to paint them in a bad light. It’s going to result in a lot of embarrassing mistakes for you, though.

I don't mean this disrespectfully, but you don't actually know ball as well as you think you do. And you also digest stats in ways that aren't really accurate representations of what's actually happening on the court.

Also... I thought Paolo was very good in Game 1 (and I thought Franz was mostly very bad offensively), with the caveat that Paolo pounded the air out of the ball and wasn't overly looking to pass it all that much.

You have developed this really inappropriate belief that I don't like Paolo (which isn't true) and you're now trying to "gotcha" me at all times like I have some sort of bias against Paolo. It's bogus frankly.

The ball movement *was* significantly down compared to the back half of the season. This isn't something that is really up for debate. I'm not even killing specific player or coach or anyone for it specifically as Boston is a great defensive team and can force a bad offense with bad ball handlers into a lot of ugly actions. I'm simply point out factual information.

Paolo's time of possession in game 1 was 7.3, it was 5.6 in the second half of the year.

Franz's time of possession in game 1 was 5.4, it was 4.3 in the second half of the year.

Average seconds per touch and average dribbles per touch was up for both guys from the regular season as well.

You really do prize being the smartest guy in the room. You’ll get back on track once you stop hatewatching Paolo and Mosley.

[Knightro]

You really do prize being the smartest guy in the room. You’ll get back on track once you stop hatewatching Paolo and Mosley.

It’s just factual info mixed with common sense.

Two guys took 63% of the total shot attempts. Those same two guys were way up in time of possession, average dribbles, frontcourt touches, everything.

Passes in the front court were down. Touches in the front court by other players were down. The ball simply did not move as much as it had been moving in the back of the season.

I am not pinning any excess blame on Paolo or Franz or even Mosley in this case either. Boston is a great defensive team and can force a limited offense into much more of what they want to see more so than a lesser defense can do.

I am, however, simply pointing out the reality that the ball movement was down. Because it was.

But you’re so obsessed with painting things in an optimistic light, and specifically portraying the “young core” as this thing that should be celebrated beyond the reality, that you slant all of your takes in that direction.

To write off my analysis as simply me “hate watching” anyone is pretty bush league btw.

[basketballRob]

Young stars need to learn how to get everyone involved early in the game.

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[eyriq]

You really do prize being the smartest guy in the room. You’ll get back on track once you stop hatewatching Paolo and Mosley.

It’s just factual info mixed with common sense.

Two guys took 63% of the total shot attempts. Those same two guys were way up in time of possession, average dribbles, frontcourt touches, everything.

Passes in the front court were down. Touches in the front court by other players were down. The ball simply did not move as much as it had been moving in the back of the season.

I am not pinning any excess blame on Paolo or Franz or even Mosley in this case either. Boston is a great defensive team and can force a limited offense into much more of what they want to see more so than a lesser defense can do.

I am, however, simply pointing out the reality that the ball movement was down. Because it was.

But you’re so obsessed with painting things in an optimistic light, and specifically portraying the “young core” as this thing that should be celebrated beyond the reality, that you slant all of your takes in that direction.

To write off my analysis as simply me “hate watching” anyone is pretty bush league btw.

It’s bush league to question my ball knowledge in order to write off my analysis, hence my comment about you really wanting to be the smartest guy in the room. You shouldn’t go there, you should be able to make your point on the merits of the argument.

[MartinsIzAfraud]

Young stars need to learn how to get everyone involved early in the game.

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who are they going to get involved though? WCJ passes up wide open 3's, KCP isn't a volume shooter, AB might be the only one who's willing to shoot when open. This FO banked on internal improvement from everyone on the roster and the only 3 that did that was Paolo/Franz & AB. Everyone else took a step back, some bigger than others and this year has shown that.

It's easy for us to say well Paolo/Franz need to get xyz more involved. Well yeah, they seem to try and then we go on 3-minute cold spurts and are down 10 so now Paolo/Franz have to try to pull us back in. This team is begging for a 3rd playmaking guard who can create for others & shoot a wide open 3. That will take the pressure & insanely high usage off Franz/Paolo and will likely open up a lot more for this team. Until that happen what we saw post ASB is how this team will be run and its offensive in today's NBA.

[VFX]

As someone that doesn't really like Paolo's game, and never has, I'll give him his flowers for game 1 for the string of shots he put together in the second quarter that ended up giving us the lead into the half. He needs to do more of that consistently. Also, he rebounded the ball well enough in this game too.

Where he loses me is 4/4 A:TO. Now, I get that he has limited options to pass to and he's being tasked with pounding the ball for lack of a real point guard. I can live with that for the most part at this very moment.

I'd much rather get a more even distribution between the Hawks game Paolo with 7-8 assists, on minimal turnovers, with maybe not needing to put up 28 shots in Boston game 1 scoring Paolo. I understand Boston is a significantly better team defensively, but there just has to be a better distribution of shots. Let Orlando lose in spite of them involving everyone else and not because they didn't get everyone touches with big individual stat lines. That really helps nobody and makes The Magic look as bad as they are on offense.

Isaac can't be your third leading scorer with 7 points. That's insane. On some level that has to do with Mosely like it or not.

[MartinsIzAfraud]

Read on Twitter

Ball movement wasn’t down though…. Just 2 dudes with almost 40% usage

[Rainwater]

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Ball movement wasn’t down though…. Just 2 dudes with almost 40% usage

This pretty much confirms what Charles Barkley said. I love Paolo and Franz taking shots but there is no ball movement out there. The offense is literally give it to Paolo and Franz. I just don’t know if it is designed that way or just the lack of offense besides them.

[MartinsIzAfraud]

Read on Twitter

Ball movement wasn’t down though…. Just 2 dudes with almost 40% usage

This pretty much confirms what Charles Barkley said. I love Paolo and Franz taking shots but there is no ball movement out there. The offense is literally give it to Paolo and Franz. I just don’t know if it is designed that way or just the lack of offense besides them.

It’s lack of other options and Paolo/Franz not trusting the options even if it’s a better shot. There’s a reason we looked ok when CoJo got more minutes end of the year. He can at least handle the ball and get it moving. However vs the Celtics in the playoffs you need a quality 3rd ball handler to have any chance of beating them.

[eyriq]

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Ball movement wasn’t down though…. Just 2 dudes with almost 40% usage

I literally just pointed out most players scaled back their aggressiveness, substantially. Paolo and Franz had to increase their aggressiveness as a result. Other players, specifically CoJo, Cole, AB, and WCJ, need to be more aggressive and not shrink under the bright lights. That's the real story here.

[basketballRob]

Read on Twitter

Ball movement wasn’t down though…. Just 2 dudes with almost 40% usage

This pretty much confirms what Charles Barkley said. I love Paolo and Franz taking shots but there is no ball movement out there. The offense is literally give it to Paolo and Franz. I just don’t know if it is designed that way or just the lack of offense besides them.

It’s lack of other options and Paolo/Franz not trusting the options even if it’s a better shot. There’s a reason we looked ok when CoJo got more minutes end of the year. He can at least handle the ball and get it moving. However vs the Celtics in the playoffs you need a quality 3rd ball handler to have any chance of beating them.

Any of our guards shooting an open 3 is better than a turnaround fade away mid range shot.

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[eyriq]

Roleplayers propensity to shoot was much lower this game than it normally is. That's just a fact. They were more than happy to move the ball if they touched it rather than shoot it. Shots had to come from somewhere and they came from the alphas. It's actually quite an understandable phenomenon but questioning Paolo and Franz's playmaking or Mosley's gameplan is missing the point. The roleplayers need to step up and be more aggressive.

[basketballRob]

Roleplayers propensity to shoot was much lower this game than it normally is. That's just a fact. They were more than happy to move the ball if they touched it rather than shoot it. Shots had to come from somewhere and they came from the alphas. It's actually quite an understandable phenomenon but questioning Paolo and Franz's playmaking or Mosley's gameplan is missing the point. The roleplayers need to step up and be more aggressive.

I've noticed our players use Paolo and Franz as a bailout. They dump it to them so they won't need to make a play. I know Paolo has said before that his teammates keep passing the ball to him to make a play.

The 3 that AB shot, Franz passed it to him, and he passed it back to Franz, and then Franz passed it to him again before he finally took a shot. It was like Franz had to force him to shoot.

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[Knightro]

Read on Twitter

Ball movement wasn’t down though…. Just 2 dudes with almost 40% usage

I literally just pointed out most players scaled back their aggressiveness, substantially. Paolo and Franz had to increase their aggressiveness as a result. Other players, specifically CoJo, Cole, AB, and WCJ, need to be more aggressive and not shrink under the bright lights. That's the real story here.

They "scaled back their aggressiveness" because they collectively got the ball a lot less. These things go hand-in-hand more than you're letting on.

To pin the blame on the role players being too timid (and subtly take the blame off the better players) is simply not an accurate representation of what actually happened in the game.

[Knightro]

Roleplayers propensity to shoot was much lower this game than it normally is. That's just a fact. They were more than happy to move the ball if they touched it rather than shoot it. Shots had to come from somewhere and they came from the alphas. It's actually quite an understandable phenomenon but questioning Paolo and Franz's playmaking or Mosley's gameplan is missing the point. The roleplayers need to step up and be more aggressive.

The role players literally touched the basketball significantly less times than they normally do.

If you refuse to accept the trickle down effect that has on everything offensively, then you really can't be helped here.

It doesn't really matter that they weren't as aggressive from a shots per touches standpoint, when the touches drop significantly, everything else is going to drop along with it.

[eyriq]

Read on Twitter

Ball movement wasn’t down though…. Just 2 dudes with almost 40% usage

I literally just pointed out most players scaled back their aggressiveness, substantially. Paolo and Franz had to increase their aggressiveness as a result. Other players, specifically CoJo, Cole, AB, and WCJ, need to be more aggressive and not shrink under the bright lights. That's the real story here.

They "scaled back their aggressiveness" because they collectively got the ball a lot less. These things go hand-in-hand more than you're letting on.

To pin the blame on the role players being too timid (and subtly take the blame off the better players) is simply not an accurate representation of what actually happened in the game.

You're assuming there is a nonlinear relationship between touches and the propensity to shoot and that after a certain threshold is reached the propensity to shoot accelerates with each additional touch.

If this was true then early in the game you'd see lower aggressiveness from role players and later in the game as they touch the ball more and build confidence, or whatever factor you think is driving the nonlinear relationship, the aggressiveness increases.

Instead, the reality is that it's the playoffs. There's more pressure. Roleplayers perform worse on the road because of that pressure. There's even more pressure in Boston. I think this pressure is what led to lower propensities to shoot for our role players.