Game 64: Phoenix Suns (45-18) @ Oklahoma City Thunder (21-43) l Sunday l 5:00pm l BSAZ

[grumpysaddle]

There's no jumpball in high school or college? WTF are you talking about, Ann?

They do the possession arrow after the initial jump at the game start

Weird. I mean, I don't really watch college basketball, but pretty sure when i played in high school we had jumpballs outside the opening one.

[Calvin Klein]

Another W. Moving on.

[Jdiddy701]

OKC played with a lot more hunger. A win is a win, and I’ll take it.


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[Mulhollanddrive]

good practice holding a lead

[grumpysaddle]

Suns just wanted that late-game clutch experience for the playoffs.

[Flying Colors]

That missed out of bound calls probably sealed it, Suns didn’t deserve this win with that collapse, but its a win

[Keith_myath]

Bench bar Johnson and maybe Craig had motive to play hard this game; starters did not.

Should have stuck with the bench as the best Thunders players are bench quality anyway.

[dremill24]

None of the late game stuff matters if you just play defense for even one quarter of the game.

[grumpysaddle]

It's a good thing garbage teams aren't in the playoffs.

[Frank Lee]

Craig is a no nonsensor

[Mulhollanddrive]

Lakers look to be back to 5th, good to stay out of our way

[WeekapaugGroove]

Lakers look to be back to 5th, good to stay out of our way

Dallas losing to Sacramento is a bad bad loss. Can't take any of these for granted.

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[bwgood77]

None of the late game stuff matters if you just play defense for even one quarter of the game.

Yeah, we didn't play all that poorly, though like I said earlier, they need to get Ayton more shots, just run the pick and roll, etc, and some easy points.

OKC shot well. If we make it a jump shooting game and don't take efficient points when we can, you have to live with a hot shooting night from the other team.

But if you play hard defense all game, those great shooting nights for the opposition won't happen as often.

[Frank Lee]

That was a slacker night for DeYAWNdre. May be he needs to engage himself. He was a spectator in the paint. Dude should lay off the ganj

[Mulhollanddrive]

Lakers down 13, would be 7th on tiebreaker.

Next 4 games vs Denver, Clippers, Portland, Phoenix.

[ATTL]

Last 2 minutes were absolutely awful

[Christine-In-AZ]

None of the late game stuff matters if you just play defense for even one quarter of the game.

Yeah, we didn't play all that poorly, though like I said earlier, they need to get Ayton more shots, just run the pick and roll, etc, and some easy points.

OKC shot well. If we make it a jump shooting game and don't take efficient points when we can, you have to live with a hot shooting night from the other team.

But if you play hard defense all game, those great shooting nights for the opposition won't happen as often.

Ayton needs to get Ayton more shots.

He too often plays like it’s 6:45am or he just ripped a couple good bong hits in the last hour.

I have dreams for this team, but without a fully engaged and grrrrrrrrrrr! Attituded Deandre,it’s a lame fantasy. No chance for a ring. WCF appearance? Sure... maybe. Nothing more. He lacks the necessary je ne sais quoi of a title team big man so far (to put it lightly). Maybe he’ll grow a pair in the next aeveral weeks. I don’t see it.

[grumpysaddle]

Absolutely not deserved, but... I have to do it.

[Revived]

None of the late game stuff matters if you just play defense for even one quarter of the game.

Yeah, we didn't play all that poorly, though like I said earlier, they need to get Ayton more shots, just run the pick and roll, etc, and some easy points.

OKC shot well. If we make it a jump shooting game and don't take efficient points when we can, you have to live with a hot shooting night from the other team.

But if you play hard defense all game, those great shooting nights for the opposition won't happen as often.

Ayton needs to get Ayton more shots.

He too often plays like it’s 6:45am or he just ripped a couple good bong hits in the last hour.

I have dreams for this team, but without a fully engaged and grrrrrrrrrrr! Attituded Deandre,it’s a lame fantasy. No chance for a ring. WCF appearance? Sure... maybe. Nothing more. He lacks the necessary je ne sais quoi of a title team big man so far (to put it lightly). Maybe he’ll grow a pair in the next aeveral weeks. I don’t see it.

He’s still wildly inconsistent. He predetermines which games he wants to play with effort in. He might come out next game with 25 and 12.

This is my only concern about giving him a fat extension this summer. The consistency part.

[lilfishi22]

Yeah, we didn't play all that poorly, though like I said earlier, they need to get Ayton more shots, just run the pick and roll, etc, and some easy points.

OKC shot well. If we make it a jump shooting game and don't take efficient points when we can, you have to live with a hot shooting night from the other team.

But if you play hard defense all game, those great shooting nights for the opposition won't happen as often.

Ayton needs to get Ayton more shots.

He too often plays like it’s 6:45am or he just ripped a couple good bong hits in the last hour.

I have dreams for this team, but without a fully engaged and grrrrrrrrrrr! Attituded Deandre,it’s a lame fantasy. No chance for a ring. WCF appearance? Sure... maybe. Nothing more. He lacks the necessary je ne sais quoi of a title team big man so far (to put it lightly). Maybe he’ll grow a pair in the next aeveral weeks. I don’t see it.

He’s still wildly inconsistent. He predetermines which games he wants to play with effort in. He might come out next game with 25 and 12.

This is my only concern about giving him a fat extension this summer. The consistency part.

He seems to be most focused or motivated when he knows he has a really big and important personal match up. Against guys like Embiid, Jokic, Giannis, Gobert....players he's likely expecting to spend a good amount of time defending, he seems to take it up a notch in intensity. That's always been the case for him except it's only been in this season and a few games last season where he's been able to more than hold his own against the elite bigs. But against teams or players that has no business in challenging him, he plays down to that competition, doesn't play with urgency or intensity and just has a bit of a floaty kind of performance.

The positive is that he seems to turn things on more often than not in important games/match ups and hopefully that translate to good playoff performances because every game is important. For me, the only barometer for the size of his extension is playoff production/performance. If he's a guy that steps it up in the playoffs and is focused game in and game out, then he's deserving of a big contract even if he "takes off" 1/4 of the games season. He's clearly good enough to help propel a decent team into playoff contention so if he's able to show his worth and step up in the playoffs, then you can "write-off" those 20-odd games.

It's a similar rationale to someone like Kawhi who is elite in the 60 or so games he plays *and* steps up in the playoffs but you can write-off that 20ish games he's not going to be available due to injuries or load management.