2024-2025 OKC Thunder Games Thread

[Mr Thunder Nick]

Chet is such a bad rebounder. He has to grab the ball in the last minute. Then poor FT. Why fouling 2 times when 11 and 10 seconds stay to play. I'm really pissed too.

[bbms]

i didn't like one bit of jdubs press conference demeanor

also, never forgetting: will isiah joe ever hit a three on a game like this? my goodness, for a specialist he's extremely unreliable

also cason wallace looked so much better than dort out there (quicker, faster, more playmaking), no idea why he played just 21 minutes and dort closed the game out.

[Dadouv47]

Some players are afraid of the basket on the offensive end it's sad.

Coach D doesn't know if he has to play two bigs or only one...he was switching way too often.

I get that you gotta play physical and make fouls but it was bad for us because it slowed the game a lot in the 4th and let Denver players to rest.

Caruso looked like DPOY out there he was fantastIc. I like what I saw from Chet too despite some shooting struggles.

Isaiah Joe should be traded if he can't hit 3's in the POs...Wiggins wasn't terrible and I think he should have played more.

[cjmcallist]

That was just bad all around. Feels like the 'rust' won out. I'm surprised at the comedy of errors, this team wasn't like that in the regular season. So, I'm looking forward to seeing how they come back on Wednesday. Then I'll decide whether or not to be worried.

What did y'all think about the Caruso foul with 10 seconds left? I thought it was a bad decision at the time.

Do you think that was an intentional Daigneault decision or a Caruso decision?

[Woerzboerg]

All time choke job to lose this game.

OKC is still the better team on paper and they now have the pressure to win game 2. I hope they will learn from it.

[Dadouv47]

That was just bad all around. Feels like the 'rust' won out. I'm surprised at the comedy of errors, this team wasn't like that in the regular season. So, I'm looking forward to seeing how they come back on Wednesday. Then I'll decide whether or not to be worried.

What did y'all think about the Caruso foul with 10 seconds left? I thought it was a bad decision at the time.

Do you think that was an intentional Daigneault decision or a Caruso decision?

It was beyond terrible to commit a foul. Didn't spend time clock and Coach D is confusing himself in the press conference saying that it worked in the regular season but those were situations with something like 4-5 seconds left in most cases.

What was the worst case scenario by not fouling? Denver makes a 3 and you have one possession to win it before the buzzer. I would say the odds of an OT in that case is lower than 30%. Didn't want an OT obviously and both Chet and Hartenstein had 5 fouls but Jokic too and coach D just decided to gamble without thinking because of pressure IMO.

[bbms]

Read on Twitter

it wasnt a coach decision on time, it's a routine. you don't mess with routine overnight, might create some hesitation... this is what mark d is essentially saying

there'll be fouling up 3 if it comes to it.

i think it's fine when you're about 5 seconds left or less. 12 seconds is just bad judgement.

denver took massive advantage of that. this is really a bad philosophy then.

[shakes0]

I don't care what he does in the regular season, from now on I will only look at JDub as a playoff bum. Same goes for Chet to a lesser extent.

JDub needs to prove he's not a playoff bum cause this is now 2 years in a row of him being beyond terrible once the playoff comp got legit. Pathetic effort by him last night.

[Dadouv47]

I don't care what he does in the regular season, from now on I will only look at JDub as a playoff bum. Same goes for Chet to a lesser extent.

JDub needs to prove he's not a playoff bum cause this is now 2 years in a row of him being beyond terrible once the playoff comp got legit. Pathetic effort by him last night.

I'm 100% with you on Jdub but I think Chet is doing quite well given his recent injury and the fact that he was not moving well in the end of the regular season. Yeah, he missed two clutch free throws but other than that he was having a good game.

Most frustrating thing about JDub is that he showed new moves attacking the paint and it worked but he did it like 3 times in 5 games.

[shakes0]

I don't care what he does in the regular season, from now on I will only look at JDub as a playoff bum. Same goes for Chet to a lesser extent.

JDub needs to prove he's not a playoff bum cause this is now 2 years in a row of him being beyond terrible once the playoff comp got legit. Pathetic effort by him last night.

I'm 100% with you on Jdub but I think Chet is doing quite well given his recent injury and the fact that he was not moving well in the end of the regular season. Yeah, he missed two clutch free throws but other than that he was having a good game.

Most frustrating thing about JDub is that he showed new moves attacking the paint and it worked but he did it like 3 times in 5 games.

yea I'm a little hard on Chet as I said, but those 2 FT's really bothered the crap out of me.

JDub is a flat out bum at this point in my eyes until he proves otherwise.

[bbms]

happens is that denver are playing that gimmicky zone with jokic fixed on the elbow, clogging the driving lanes and daring the thunder to shoot. they don't even bother closing out moderately open shooters.

that has been a challenge for SGA, but it is a MASSIVE problem for jdub since like, always. he's not creative as a lead guard, and the thunder is relying a lot on him to be a initiator/creator on top of the key, where he shouldn't. we shouldn't be a development team anymore. which is why i wanted a guy like butler or durant in. guys that you can trust to create something once the play is busted and offense stagnated.

i'm not pissed at jdub for his performance, he had a bad shooting night which happens, and had a defensive performance on par with his standards, but the rest? his technical/physical profile doesn't match the tactical role he's been assigned.

thunder team as a collective needs to attack better the zones and finding people in motion. specially when chet is on and hart is off, they really need to look more for getting chet good looks than a jdub isolation. i think that's something easy to correct. they've been good at those adjustments, see thunder x cavs 1 and 2 and how they were able to attack zones much better.

what is beyond me is why cason was benched for dort who has been roasted by quicker/nimbler lead guards like murray. cason/caruso turned the game for the thunder. dort was dead last in +/-. once again i'm very disappointed with mark daigneault, he's been really bad at everything once situation needs him to be out of autopilot - for a long time.

looks very dogmatic to me.

[Dadouv47]

I don't get how vegas still likes our chances that much (series and championship). Hope they are smarter than me

[Dadouv47]

our coaching staff had almost 10 days to prepare for either Nuggets or Clippers so I don't get why they kept switching the two big men line up all the time in game. It's not like Denver had some different line up or a situational issue that needed to be changed.

Ultimately the most concern aspect to me is that players were not looking to attack and just wanted to give the ball to Shai. They are really afraid of the moment.

[Zagor]

I'm 100% with you on Jdub but I think Chet is doing quite well given his recent injury and the fact that he was not moving well in the end of the regular season. Yeah, he missed two clutch free throws but other than that he was having a good game.

Most frustrating thing about JDub is that he showed new moves attacking the paint and it worked but he did it like 3 times in 5 games.

Chet missed a dunk, a open three point, a putback and two free throws. That's pure trash level. His rebounding is disgraceful.

Denver wanted it more, they were more intensive.

Still, the main problem is half court offense in clutch moments. They will always have Jokic option where he can post up, shoot over defender or pass to open man.
But Shai in clutch will be doubled and it would be on other guys to close the game. And I don't believe that JDub or Chet can do it.

Next game is a must win.

[bbms]

it's not just chet that is a poor rebounder. basically only hartenstein and jaylin are positive rebounders on the whole roster.

i like how doncic provides that "offensive rebounding neg" even as a guard. per xrapm he's in the 93rd percentile of impact on opponent offensive rebounding. also per xrapm jdub is in the bottom 1% in net oreb%.

for a non big that's impressive and i think a chet team need to find a guy that provides that strong defensive rebounding presence.

our coaching staff had almost 10 days to prepare for either Nuggets or Clippers so I don't get why they kept switching the two big men line up all the time in game. It's not like Denver had some different line up or a situational issue that needed to be changed.

Ultimately the most concern aspect to me is that players were not looking to attack and just wanted to give the ball to Shai. They are really afraid of the moment.

that reeked lack of conviction to me.

[Dadouv47]

Read on Twitter

bad timing but well deserved

[Kizz Fastfists]

Isaiah Joe should be traded if he can't hit 3's in the POs...Wiggins wasn't terrible and I think he should have played more.

Two facts

1- Joe has a higher playoff 3pt% than Robert Horry.
2- Josh Giddey has a higher playoff 3pt% than Wiggins.

Give me more Joe and keep Wiggins on the bench. Joe had a couple of 0 for games last playoffs and always rebounded. Wiggins has never

[Dadouv47]

Isaiah Joe should be traded if he can't hit 3's in the POs...Wiggins wasn't terrible and I think he should have played more.

Two facts

1- Joe has a higher playoff 3pt% than Robert Horry.
2- Josh Giddey has a higher playoff 3pt% than Wiggins.

Give me more Joe and keep Wiggins on the bench. Joe had a couple of 0 for games last playoffs and always rebounded. Wiggins has never

Wiggins can attack the paint and he can create his own shot. He also can defend a little bit. At this point I'm not sure if I want to give JDub or Wiggins the ball to create and make a shot. Isaiah Joe can ONLY shoot 3's. Is he elite at it? Of course and that's the reason why I didn't want to include him in a trade at the deadline because a team that has a midrange god like Shai needs good 3 pts shooters but he choked last playoffs and he looked scared of the moment again yesterday.

[Dadouv47]

i didn't like one bit of jdubs press conference demeanor

also, never forgetting: will isiah joe ever hit a three on a game like this? my goodness, for a specialist he's extremely unreliable

also cason wallace looked so much better than dort out there (quicker, faster, more playmaking), no idea why he played just 21 minutes and dort closed the game out.

I only saw it now and I'm pissed

He likes to act like a grown man when he's an all star or doing interviews for NBA medias but acting like this after such an important game is so wrong.

[Dadouv47]

Read on Twitter

JDub, no comment