WCQF | (4) Oklahoma City Thunder vs Utah Jazz (5) | UTA 4-2

[Andre Roberstan]

I'd at least consider dusting off Collison against Favors for the bench. It's not ideal, but he's the only other guy I think has the size and strength to bang with him inside so we don't get utterly murdered on the glass.

[Dadouv47]

Not quiet sure why people are surprised that we are 1-1, I expected Utah to win Game 2 because they are a good team who will make adjustments. To say Utah, however, is going to run away with the series is asinine. I fully expect OKC to take either Game 3 or 4 in Utah. Pressure will be on Utah to come through both games and OKC has the experience to gut one out there and they will. I see 2-2 coming back to OKC with OKC closing out in Game 6.

I really hope you are right about the outcome but I can't see why the pressure is on Utah. They had 0 expectation coming into this season and Donovan Mitchell is still a rookie and will get a pass if he plays bad one or two games. On the other hand OKC has ton of pressure coming into this season and looks like they can't respond to it. I still think Westbrook will improve and show his willingness to win but about pg13 and Melo...0 expectation

[slick_watts]

I'd at least consider dusting off Collison against Favors for the bench. It's not ideal, but he's the only other guy I think has the size and strength to bang with him inside so we don't get utterly murdered on the glass.

nick's looking like a grandpa on the bench.

[Andre Roberstan]

I'd at least consider dusting off Collison against Favors for the bench. It's not ideal, but he's the only other guy I think has the size and strength to bang with him inside so we don't get utterly murdered on the glass.

nick's looking like a grandpa on the bench.

Sure. There's not much left there in the tank. But if the alternative is Derrick Favors playing Hungry Hungry Hippos when Stevie is out, I'm OK with experimenting.

[slick_watts]

I'd at least consider dusting off Collison against Favors for the bench. It's not ideal, but he's the only other guy I think has the size and strength to bang with him inside so we don't get utterly murdered on the glass.

nick's looking like a grandpa on the bench.

Sure. There's not much left there in the tank. But if the alternative is Derrick Favors playing Hungry Hungry Hippos when Stevie is out, I'm OK with experimenting.

i'd run patterson out there. you probably get favors defending him on the perimeter at least so orb isn't as much of an issue. i thought aside from getting beat once badly by favors on orb patterson had productive minutes on defense in game 2.

[Andre Roberstan]

nick's looking like a grandpa on the bench.

Sure. There's not much left there in the tank. But if the alternative is Derrick Favors playing Hungry Hungry Hippos when Stevie is out, I'm OK with experimenting.

i'd run patterson out there. you probably get favors defending him on the perimeter at least so orb isn't as much of an issue. i thought aside from getting beat once badly by favors on orb patterson had productive minutes on defense in game 2.

I think I agree with you, but Favors is a bull. I was at choir practice last night and didn't get a chance to watch the game live.

[dakomish23]

http://www.nba.com/games/20180418/UTAOKC#/matchup
The jazz controlled the entire game aside from the third quarter and a brief stretch at the start of the second. It doesn’t make sense to say OKC lost what they only had for a short time. Tonight was Utah’s night.

I said the 4th. OKC didn’t execute at all and UTA did. If that’s them winning it in your eyes, cool.

Does that Utah defense not get credit for that or is OKC so unstoppable in star power that only they can stop themselves?

That was one of the worst quarters they played all season. It’s not like they played well but the other team just outperformed them.

I’m not discrediting Utah. They performed.

[slick_watts]

small sample caveat.

westbrook is attempting 45% of his shots from mid-range the first two games versus 31% on the season. westbrook is attempting only 5.5 FGA per game the first two games on 21 drives per game. he's shooting 27% on those when he does shoot.

we're not going to win this series with both westbrook and melo < 50% ts. our offense has for the most part survived despite this due to everyone else shooting relatively well so far.

i'm not sure what i'd do differently with westbrook to get him going. the jazz are clearly giving him anything he wants 15 feet and out. gobert is dissuading him from taking shots at the rim.

[Andre Roberstan]

mood: trying to find which guys on our roster are Tough No Nonsense Thibodeau Players that we can trade for Towns

[slick_watts]

mood: trying to find which guys on our roster are Tough No Nonsense Thibodeau Players that we can trade for Towns

adams.

[Andre Roberstan]

mood: trying to find which guys on our roster are Tough No Nonsense Thibodeau Players that we can trade for Towns

adams.

i would be very sad about this but for my large son Karl Anthony Towns it might be worth it.

EDIT:

let me dreeeeeeaaaaammmmmmmmmm

http://www.espn.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=yamzyjdg

[ThunderBolt]

mood: trying to find which guys on our roster are Tough No Nonsense Thibodeau Players that we can trade for Towns

Russ, Dre and Adams.

[Bergmaniac]

i was thinking about this last night. can you come up with a better center - point guard defensive combination over the last 10 seasons than rudy gobert and ricky rubio? i feel like i have to be overlooking some obvious ones.

i know matt moore is convinced we do some things that bother rudy gobert, but that combination seems like the ideal one to stifle russell westbrook's forays.

This is why I really didn't get why people were saying Utah is a good matchup for you. They are tailor made to limit Westbrook's game and your offense is completely dependent on him except when George turns into Steph Curry and can't miss from 3.

The first game's score really flattered you IMO, you made a whole bunch of tough shots while the ball movement and shot creation was horrible for most of the game. This time I thought your ball movement was a bit better, Westbrook's passing was noticeable better, but your shooting was horrible.

You still have a decent chance, but Westbrook's got to shoot better or find a way to get Gobert into foul trouble and he should really stop treating Rubio as if he can't shoot a 3 at all, these days he's good long range shooter when he has enough time to set his feet and line it up. George has to show more than just 3 point shooting on offense, his ballhandling has been downright embarrassing at times this series.

[hardenASG13]

i was thinking about this last night. can you come up with a better center - point guard defensive combination over the last 10 seasons than rudy gobert and ricky rubio? i feel like i have to be overlooking some obvious ones.

i know matt moore is convinced we do some things that bother rudy gobert, but that combination seems like the ideal one to stifle russell westbrook's forays.

This is why I really didn't get why people were saying Utah is a good matchup for you. They are tailor made to limit Westbrook's game and your offense is completely dependent on him except when George turns into Steph Curry and can't miss from 3.

The first game's score really flattered you IMO, you made a whole bunch of tough shots while the ball movement and shot creation was horrible for most of the game. This time I thought your ball movement was a bit better, Westbrook's passing was noticeable better, but your shooting was horrible.

You still have a decent chance, but Westbrook's got to shoot better or find a way to get Gobert into foul trouble and he should really stop treating Rubio as if he can't shoot a 3 at all, these days he's good long range shooter when he has enough time to set his feet and line it up. George has to show more than just 3 point shooting on offense, his ballhandling has been downright embarrassing at times this series.

George's ball handling is always an adventure. When he dribbles inside the arc, I'm often hoping he just doesn't lose the handle rather than for him to make a play.

[Bergmaniac]

True, he is really prone to turnovers when dribbling inside the arc. His handle is really weak for an elite wing player in this league.

[Reign23]

Melo sucks ass. I would do anything to get him off the team.

tbh I think he played a very good game.... until the 4th quarter.

[Andre Roberstan]

Melo sucks ass. I would do anything to get him off the team.

tbh I think he played a very good game.... until the 4th quarter.

That's also when they started hunting him in pick and roll (Positive Residual has a great thread going on Twitter right now about it). Doesn't mean much on offense, but defensively it hurt badly, even with Russ and Brewer pre-switching a lot of stuff.

[bondom34]

Melo sucks ass. I would do anything to get him off the team.

tbh I think he played a very good game.... until the 4th quarter.

That's also when they started hunting him in pick and roll (Positive Residual has a great thread going on Twitter right now about it). Doesn't mean much on offense, but defensively it hurt badly, even with Russ and Brewer pre-switching a lot of stuff.

Read on Twitter

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[slick_watts]

Melo sucks ass. I would do anything to get him off the team.

tbh I think he played a very good game.... until the 4th quarter.

That's also when they started hunting him in pick and roll (Positive Residual has a great thread going on Twitter right now about it). Doesn't mean much on offense, but defensively it hurt badly, even with Russ and Brewer pre-switching a lot of stuff.

they were heat seeking melo whenever they could but even when they didn't, the russ / adams pnr defense was getting murdered as well. we were so disjointed, and part of the reason imo is because we were playing that grant with the starters lineup. this forced melo into defending on the wing far more than he should at this point in his career. he was in space too often. worse than just straight up defending favors for most of the game.

i'm sure it wouldn't surprise anyone to learn that the grant starters this year were just as bad defensively as the abrines or ferguson starters. in fact, this may have been an excellent time to have put huestis in there if they aren't going abrines. grant does not play a lot of 'wing' minutes for us this year, especially not with melo in the game.

offensively i thought melo did what was asked of him but what was asked of him shouldn't be asked of him. if our offense is ever reduced to melo isolations with george and westbrook in the game, that's a heavy win for the jazz.

[Bergmaniac]

It was your offense which was the bigger problem than the defence in the last quarter IMO. You only scored 16 points and had only one basket which wasn't a layup or a dunk the whole quarter (a three by Felton with 8 minutes left).

Melo was attacked a lot on D, sure, but his defensive rating in the quarter was 97.4, which is quite good. Some of this was due to Utah missing good looks, but it didn't seem to me that your defence was that bad with him. But you can't win a close game when nobody can hit a jumper the whole quarter and you can't get to the line either.