2018-2019 OKC Thunder Regular Season Pt 1: A Renewed Hope

[SecondTake]

I predict a monster game from Schroder tonight.

23/5/5 on 55%

You realize he hasn't done that all year, right? A monster game for Schroder would be 20/4/4 on 45% shooting. He has managed to do that twice this year.

He had a 32/4/4 game at 63% against GSW. 23/5/5 on 55% isn't even as good as he has shown he can produce against the best teams out there. I think he's hearing the noise about him, hopefully coaching staff has sat down with him and made it clear he needs to do better and this would be the game to do it.

[Dn4sty]

I predict a monster game from Schroder tonight.

23/5/5 on 55%

Yikes so far

[Dn4sty]

I predict a monster game from Schroder tonight.

23/5/5 on 55%

Yikes so far

Schroder was a cool 5-14 from the field for 14 points while the guy he usually plays over hit seven 3s....

I think you make a move and take back an equally bad contract and call it good for a trade. Maybe even a couple of not so great but smaller contracts.

[Kizz Fastfists]

I think you make a move and take back an equally bad contract and call it good for a trade. Maybe even a couple of not so great but smaller contracts.

I'm not opposed to this, in theory. Which contracts do you think they could take for Schroder? The problem is that Schroder is only in the 2nd year of his deal. In order for another team to want to do it OKC would either have to include expiring contracts to take a bigger contract, with the same number of years, take a contract that was signed this past off-season where a team has instant buyers remorse or take a contract equal to Schroder AND take another bad contract into the Melo TPE.

I really think their best course of action is just to deal with a disgruntled Schroder. Bench him when appropriate and tell him that if he wants more playing time he has to earn it. He was given a chance to close games and play with the starters, but he proved he couldn't fit in that role.

As for Ferguson, he is up to 36% from 3 on the season after his terrible shooting start. He is playing very good defense. I think it safe to say he is establishing himself as a quality 3&D guy in year two. I think he'll continue to grow his offensive game and end up a very good player, but if he does nothing more than shoot around 37% from 3 this year with the defensive improvements that will be nice growth for year 2 at 20 years old. Then we can hope he continues to develop in year 3.

[CROklahoma]

Just came here to say, its really time to move from Schroeder.
I litterally skipped and FF game on League Pass just to not see him doing stupid bull all over the court.
And even on fast forwarding the game, I skipped to the point where he was again a focal point in doing stupid stuff.

Terrible defense, stupid shot selection, bad closing out, missed rotations.

Move on from him before the AllStar break ...

[ThunderBolt]

When we look back when Westbrook generation ends a lot of people will talk about the Harden and Durant situations, and rightly so. I think one of the bigger issues that is overlooked is the constant use of assets to move a bad contract/disgruntled player and never really improving the team as a result. Reggie Jackson, Ennis Kanter, Melo and now Dennis Schroder. This has been a big issue in preventing us from getting good role players like the Spurs have.

Presti is very polarizing. I think I'm one of the few that is torn on him. I see his mistakes while acknowledging he does some things pretty well. Sometimes you can make a good trade and it doesn't work out and vice versa. I don't blame Presti for Patterson basically being a bust. Right now it doesn't seem reasonable to blame Presti for whatever is going on with Abrines. Right now it looks like Ferguson is going to be a nice player and Diallo has shown promise for the future even though he can't contribute much. This years team could finish as high as third or miss the playoffs entirely. However if we had some guys like Forbes, White and Bertans I think we could really make some noise this year. Instead too many assets have been used to try to recoup value on guys we shouldn't have wasted time on.

[Pillendreher]

However if we had some guys like Forbes, White and Bertans I think we could really make some noise this year.

That's not a fair criticism. The Spurs always get 200 % out of these random roleplayers. Contrary to that, we get proven shooters not being able to hit anything. If Presti traded for guy like Forbes, he'd not even see regular rotation minutes here.

EDIT:

As for the other thing: It's 2019 and we're still paying for not letting Portland hang itself with the Kanter contract in 2016. Presti's biggest weakness besides his hubris is his inability to just write some things off. If he is invested in something, he is willing to dig himself even deeper simply because he is already "in it".

[ThunderBolt]

However if we had some guys like Forbes, White and Bertans I think we could really make some noise this year.

That's not a fair criticism. The Spurs always get 200 % out of these random roleplayers. Contrary to that, we get proven shooters not being able to hit anything. If Presti traded for guy like Forbes, he'd not even see regular rotation minutes here.

EDIT:

As for the other thing: It's 2019 and we're still paying for not letting Portland hang itself with the Kanter contract in 2016. Presti's biggest weakness besides his hubris is his inability to just write some things off. If he is invested in something, he is willing to dig himself even deeper simply because he is already "in it".

Why isn't it fair? Isn't Ferguson a player who is showing that OKC can develop talent? Steven Adams and Roberson developed as well. I don't think any organization gets as much out of their players as SAS. However what OKC might lack in development could possibly be made up for with Presti's ability to find talent.

Again, I'm not saying EVERYTHING is on Presti. Reggie Jackson put us in a bad situation. However too many assets were used in ways that didn't actually add better players to the roster. Some of those could have been kept to draft role players and some could have been traded to actually decent rotation players. Basically my point is what you are saying in your edit.

[Pillendreher]

However if we had some guys like Forbes, White and Bertans I think we could really make some noise this year.

That's not a fair criticism. The Spurs always get 200 % out of these random roleplayers. Contrary to that, we get proven shooters not being able to hit anything. If Presti traded for guy like Forbes, he'd not even see regular rotation minutes here.

EDIT:

As for the other thing: It's 2019 and we're still paying for not letting Portland hang itself with the Kanter contract in 2016. Presti's biggest weakness besides his hubris is his inability to just write some things off. If he is invested in something, he is willing to dig himself even deeper simply because he is already "in it".

Why isn't it fair? Isn't Ferguson a player who is showing that OKC can develop talent? Steven Adams and Roberson developed as well. I don't think any organization gets as much out of their players as SAS. However what OKC might lack in development could possibly be made up for with Presti's ability to find talent.

Again, I'm not saying EVERYTHING is on Presti. Reggie Jackson put us in a bad situation. However too many assets were used in ways that didn't actually add better players to the roster. Some of those could have been kept to draft role players and some could have been traded to actually decent rotation players. Basically my point is what you are saying in your edit.

Because we've seen those kind of guys on multiple othe teams - unless they're on the Spurs, they suck. I don't know what the hell they're doing to those players, but there's something other teams simply can't. It's not just "developing" guys. I think they have an uncanny ability to maximize their strenghts and minimize their weaknesses. Imagine a guy like Bertans on this team: He'd be out of the rotation probably because he couldn't keep up defensively and would not get above 35 % from 3 or so. When it comes to these type of players, we're like the complete opposite of the Spurs.

[ThunderBolt]

That's not a fair criticism. The Spurs always get 200 % out of these random roleplayers. Contrary to that, we get proven shooters not being able to hit anything. If Presti traded for guy like Forbes, he'd not even see regular rotation minutes here.

EDIT:

As for the other thing: It's 2019 and we're still paying for not letting Portland hang itself with the Kanter contract in 2016. Presti's biggest weakness besides his hubris is his inability to just write some things off. If he is invested in something, he is willing to dig himself even deeper simply because he is already "in it".

Why isn't it fair? Isn't Ferguson a player who is showing that OKC can develop talent? Steven Adams and Roberson developed as well. I don't think any organization gets as much out of their players as SAS. However what OKC might lack in development could possibly be made up for with Presti's ability to find talent.

Again, I'm not saying EVERYTHING is on Presti. Reggie Jackson put us in a bad situation. However too many assets were used in ways that didn't actually add better players to the roster. Some of those could have been kept to draft role players and some could have been traded to actually decent rotation players. Basically my point is what you are saying in your edit.

Because we've seen those kind of guys on multiple othe teams - unless they're on the Spurs, they suck. I don't know what the hell they're doing to those players, but there's something other teams simply can't. It's not just "developing" guys. I think they have an uncanny ability to maximize their strenghts and minimize their weaknesses. Imagine a guy like Bertans on this team: He'd be out of the rotation probably because he couldn't keep up defensively and would not get above 35 % from 3 or so. When it comes to these type of players, we're like the complete opposite of the Spurs.

I don't mean those specific players. I'm saying if we had kept our assets then we might not have had a crap bench for years. Patterson might still have sucked and he might suck if he played for the Spurs. However what if we hadn't made the Melo trade? We could have still bought Diallo and then drafted Kurucs who can hit threes. Also, Kanter would be an expiring this year.

I realize that with virtually every team you can go back with their draft and trade history and likely find what seems like a possibly better outcome. Is presti a failure because we drafted Adams over Giannis? That's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that if Presti would quit trying to recoup value from bad trades/contracts then its likely we would have a few more guys on this roster that don't suck and that's what this team needs right now. I don't think that's too hot taken or me being captain hindsight.

[CROklahoma]

Nobody gonna even comment on Billy putting our main piece injured back in the game ?
Guess no one from journalists are even gonna ask that Q, whats going on ?

We really risked one guy's health in a regular season game in a 2OT game, what kind of a idiot is running our medical and coaching staff, he literally limped on the court ...

What the actual ...

[Dadouv47]

Nobody gonna even comment on Billy putting our main piece injured back in the game ?
Guess no one from journalists are even gonna ask that Q, whats going on ?

We really risked one guy's health in a regular season game in a 2OT game, what kind of a idiot is running our medical and coaching staff, he literally limped on the court ...

What the actual ...

If he wasn't able to come back to the game, I think it's the medical staff to blame for letting him coming from the locker room.

Speaking of him, any updates on Adams injury? We can't afford to lose him

[slick_watts]

IF OUR OFFENSE WAS AS GOOD AS LAST YEAR'S OFFENSE AND DEFENSE STAYED THE SAME WE WOULD PROBABLY BE 7-8 SRS TEAM RIGHT NOW. SAD THAT WESTBROOK, ABRINES, PATTERSON CHOSE THIS SEASON TO TURN INTO PUDDLES OF FAILURE.

[Dn4sty]

Nobody gonna even comment on Billy putting our main piece injured back in the game ?
Guess no one from journalists are even gonna ask that Q, whats going on ?

We really risked one guy's health in a regular season game in a 2OT game, what kind of a idiot is running our medical and coaching staff, he literally limped on the court ...

What the actual ...

Yep you are exactly right. Billy decided to go against the medical advice of our team to risk further injury to Adams. I mean this makes complete and total sense to me. I can’t believe he had the audacity to do such a terrible thing. Next thing you know Billy will be the cause of a flu outbreak. The Billy Flu is a scary thing.

[slick_watts]

rumor has it that alex abrines was infected by worms in spain and that's what his issue has been. there was then a scare with the entire team, which is what the other 'illnesses' were about. the whole team required precautionary antibiotics treatment.

[spearsy23]

rumor has it that alex abrines was infected by worms in spain and that's what his issue has been. there was then a scare with the entire team, which is what the other 'illnesses' were about. the whole team required precautionary antibiotics treatment.

Credible rumor or just a rumor?

[slick_watts]

rumor has it that alex abrines was infected by worms in spain and that's what his issue has been. there was then a scare with the entire team, which is what the other 'illnesses' were about. the whole team required precautionary antibiotics treatment.

Credible rumor or just a rumor?

it was passed on by weston shepherd with the caveat that his source may not be credible.

[Pillendreher]

rumor has it that alex abrines was infected by worms in spain and that's what his issue has been. there was then a scare with the entire team, which is what the other 'illnesses' were about. the whole team required precautionary antibiotics treatment.

Credible rumor or just a rumor?

Apparently posted on DT. Weston received an anonymous Twitter PM.

PS: I would just like to point out that a "worm incidenct" would tie in nicely with some of our troubles this season since there's a German proverb called "Da ist der Wurm drinnen" which would translate into "There's the worm in there" and means that things are going wrong repeatedly for more or less unknown reasons.

[slick_watts]

rumor has it that alex abrines was infected by worms in spain and that's what his issue has been. there was then a scare with the entire team, which is what the other 'illnesses' were about. the whole team required precautionary antibiotics treatment.

Credible rumor or just a rumor?

Apparently posted on DT. Weston received an anonymous Twitter PM.

PS: I would just like to point out that a "worm incidenct" would tie in nicely with some of our troubles this season since there's a German proverb called "Da ist der Wurm drinnen" which would translate into "There's the worm in there" and means that things are going wrong repeatedly for more or less unknown reasons.

an illness or condition abrines is suffering from that caused a partial or total team wide 'scare' i think makes the most sense with the facts we have. if this was a family thing would he be present at practices and stuff? he'd be with his family.

[ThunderBolt]

Hopefully Alex understands that skipping visits to the vet isn't a laughing matter.