Eastern Conference | Round 1 | (4) Philadelphia 76ers vs. (5) Toronto Raptors

[eyeatoma]

What's up with all the talk about the whistles for embiid? You guys are new to the NBA? It's called superstar calls. Sixers had to life through it since Iverson was gone. No whistles for us either. It's just how the NBA works since the Jordan days. (If it happened before MJ too I apologize, I am not old enough to have seen bird/magic live)


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Thank you, well said!

[Snotbubbles]

Prior to game 1, all we heard was when the playoffs rolled around, the Sixers wouldn't get foul calls...well...because it's the playoffs.

Now 1 game into the playoffs and the narrative has somehow changed. LOL.

[SelfishPlayer]

You don't get calls in the playoffs when you're a treadmill team without superstars. Too bad Toronto's GM is not allowed to do a full rebuild. Toronto keeping two 28 year old players after letting Lowry walk makes zero sense. They should have acquired draft capital and/or youth for those two veteran NBA players. Perhaps Toronto believes that they can strike lightening twice by having a disgruntled superstar get traded to them until he hits free agency and can sign a contract with a team located in the United States. That may be the championship formula for them.

[rzzzzz]

Prior to game 1, all we heard was when the playoffs rolled around, the Sixers wouldn't get foul calls...well...because it's the playoffs.

Now 1 game into the playoffs and the narrative has somehow changed. LOL.

I’m gonna guess that Harden will not get the lean into fouls he’s lived on much of the last ten years. Just as well. I’d rather see his distribute, hit some step backs, maybe sneak in for a couple of drives. On the other hand, if the only way to stop Embiid down low is to hang on his arms, he’s going to the line, even in the playoffs.

[PennSports]

raptors fans still so mad about an airplane for 3 seconds in a series they won in a season they won the championship

what a strange thing to get attached to. It is far more disrespectful to do the "too small" thing that like half the players in the league do

[LordCovington33]

Prior to game 1, all we heard was when the playoffs rolled around, the Sixers wouldn't get foul calls...well...because it's the playoffs.

Now 1 game into the playoffs and the narrative has somehow changed. LOL.

Because it was a false narrative. Embiid’s FTA in the previous two seasons (regular and playoffs) were quite similar. If a player continues to commit fouls, the refs will call them.

[bebopdeluxe]

Prior to game 1, all we heard was when the playoffs rolled around, the Sixers wouldn't get foul calls...well...because it's the playoffs.

Now 1 game into the playoffs and the narrative has somehow changed. LOL.

I’m gonna guess that Harden will not get the lean into fouls he’s lived on much of the last ten years. Just as well. I’d rather see his distribute, hit some step backs, maybe sneak in for a couple of drives. On the other hand, if the only way to stop Embiid down low is to hang on his arms, he’s going to the line, even in the playoffs.

Harden DIDN'T get those calls. People b!tched - including Nurse - about Harden getting away with contact, but from what I saw 1) the refs didn't give Harden JACK on most of his drives, and 2) plays that Nurse and others were whining about - such as one play where he ran into Barnes - were correct no-calls (Barnes' foot was inside the restricted area - I rewatched the game last night).

At least as far as Harden is concerned, he ain't getting bailed out with a whistle.

[LordCovington33]

You don't get calls in the playoffs when you're a treadmill team without superstars. Too bad Toronto's GM is not allowed to do a full rebuild. Toronto keeping two 28 year old players after letting Lowry walk makes zero sense. They should have acquired draft capital and/or youth for those two veteran NBA players. Perhaps Toronto believes that they can strike lightening twice by having a disgruntled superstar get traded to them until he hits free agency and can sign a contract with a team located in the United States. That may be the championship formula for them.

Barnes was doing all right with the free throws till he went down. 9FTA to Embiid’s 11 - in fewer minutes. But Embiid had the only dodgy fouls apparently.

[aj174]

I've been saying this the entire year. He's officiated differently...look at this soft foul

People that think he could hang in the early 2000's brutal post game...y'all wild lol

https://imgur.com/a/p4w4nJj

BOUCHER SHOULD BE EJECTED FOR THAT BRUTAL FOUL!!

This is the exact play I was thinking of! Can anyone explain how this is a foul on Boucher? I've seen this so many times in this league, where someone is standing with their hands up and it's a foul. Nowadays an offensive player can just run into a defensive player and that's a foul too, which is more understandable compared to standing with your hands up.

It's really not hard to understand if you know anything about NBA rules. A defender must keep his arms straight up. Boucher leaned his arm(s) forward as Embiid was going up and then after the ball was out he pulled them back to be straight up. You'll clearly see his arm fall forward into Embiid's air space at the .02 second mark.

That's an easy Fouls 101 call against a defender especially a big at the rim.

::EDIT:: Here I even did the work for you and have a link for the rule you clearly don't know about.

https://official.nba.com/nba-rule-authority-restricted-area-and-verticality-plays/

You know, I was genuinely curious and here you are actually answering the question, so thank you. But why are you such a jerk about it? Is this how you answer questions to people? Come on now.

[SelfishPlayer]

You don't get calls in the playoffs when you're a treadmill team without superstars. Too bad Toronto's GM is not allowed to do a full rebuild. Toronto keeping two 28 year old players after letting Lowry walk makes zero sense. They should have acquired draft capital and/or youth for those two veteran NBA players. Perhaps Toronto believes that they can strike lightening twice by having a disgruntled superstar get traded to them until he hits free agency and can sign a contract with a team located in the United States. That may be the championship formula for them.

Barnes was doing all right with the free throws till he went down. 9FTA to Embiid’s 11 - in fewer minutes. But Embiid had the only dodgy fouls apparently.

Okay...

[aj174]

This is the exact play I was thinking of! Can anyone explain how this is a foul on Boucher? I've seen this so many times in this league, where someone is standing with their hands up and it's a foul. Nowadays an offensive player can just run into a defensive player and that's a foul too, which is more understandable compared to standing with your hands up.

It's really not hard to understand if you know anything about NBA rules. A defender must keep his arms straight up. Boucher leaned his arm(s) forward as Embiid was going up and then after the ball was out he pulled them back to be straight up. You'll clearly see his arm fall forward into Embiid's air space at the .02 second mark. That's an easy Fouls 101 call against a defender especially a big at the rim.

You can't really see from this angle but the ref is like 6 feet away and has a clear view of it, seems like Boucher's hand must've slapped Embiid's arm when he brought it down. The ref doesn't hesitate for a second in calling it.

We can't really see it from there, so I guess you could either go with that explanation, or go with what seems like it's in Cubbies and AJ's head which is that there is no arm contact here and the ref is part of a larger a conspiracy to allow Embiid to score maybe 2-3 more points per game--a conspiracy that gets the league pretty much nothing from and could risk them a major season-shattering scandal. But I guess we don't know it's not happening for sure, gotta choose which thing we can't see is real.

Nope no conspiracy, just looking at the league at large. I don't remember it being officiated this way years back, but maybe it was. It's pretty hard to see these things in real time

[aj174]

Lmao @ anyone who thinks the Raps are a treadmill team. We're 5th place in the east in a rebuilding year, we have our cornerstone piece in Scottie, Trent and Achiuwa have developed nicely and we're getting all star level play from FVV and Siakam. Life's good

This is the sixers time to do it, I don't know if they get passed Miami in round 2 but they should be beating us in round 1. I expect more of a fight tonight

[LordCovington33]

Lmao @ anyone who thinks the Raps are a treadmill team. We're 5th place in the east in a rebuilding year, we have our cornerstone piece in Scottie, Trent and Achiuwa have developed nicely and we're getting all star level play from FVV and Siakam. Life's good

This is the sixers time to do it, I don't know if they get passed Miami in round 2 but they should be beating us in round 1. I expect more of a fight tonight

I expect adjustments and the game will be closer.

[BullyKing]

Lmao @ anyone who thinks the Raps are a treadmill team. We're 5th place in the east in a rebuilding year, we have our cornerstone piece in Scottie, Trent and Achiuwa have developed nicely and we're getting all star level play from FVV and Siakam. Life's good

This is the sixers time to do it, I don't know if they get passed Miami in round 2 but they should be beating us in round 1. I expect more of a fight tonight

What exactly makes this a rebuilding year for the Raptors?

[aj174]

Lmao @ anyone who thinks the Raps are a treadmill team. We're 5th place in the east in a rebuilding year, we have our cornerstone piece in Scottie, Trent and Achiuwa have developed nicely and we're getting all star level play from FVV and Siakam. Life's good

This is the sixers time to do it, I don't know if they get passed Miami in round 2 but they should be beating us in round 1. I expect more of a fight tonight

What exactly makes this a rebuilding year for the Raptors?

Well after 2020, the Lowry Era is done, the cycle was over. Last year we were pretty bad but also in Tampa, and played for a top pick when it was obvious we weren't going to the playoffs, due to covid absences and our roster, Tampa.

So we end up getting the 4th pick which turns out to be Barnes. No one thought the Raps would be a 48 win team, that Barnes would be this good this quick. Masai hasn't ever done a traditional rebuild, but he's said so himself that this is a team with growing pains to be had. We're in between the we the north Era and transitioning to a post Era with FVV, Siakam, and Barnes developing.

Masai all he's been doing is accruing talent, while trying to remain competitive. Aside from the players I've mentioned we have OG who's 25? Trent is 23 and Achiiuwa is 22? Somewhere in that range. Barnes is 20. Lots of assets going forward, putting us in a familiar situation where we might be able to make a trade in the future. I'm thinking it might be one of fvv or siakam, but we'll see what happens

[dacrusha]

Lmao @ anyone who thinks the Raps are a treadmill team. We're 5th place in the east in a rebuilding year, we have our cornerstone piece in Scottie, Trent and Achiuwa have developed nicely and we're getting all star level play from FVV and Siakam. Life's good

This is the sixers time to do it, I don't know if they get passed Miami in round 2 but they should be beating us in round 1. I expect more of a fight tonight

This is a sound and reasonable post. You sure you're on the right site?

For the Raptors to be in this position in year 2 of a 5-7 year rebuild is VERY satisfying, regardless of the outcome of this series.

[BullyKing]

Lmao @ anyone who thinks the Raps are a treadmill team. We're 5th place in the east in a rebuilding year, we have our cornerstone piece in Scottie, Trent and Achiuwa have developed nicely and we're getting all star level play from FVV and Siakam. Life's good

This is the sixers time to do it, I don't know if they get passed Miami in round 2 but they should be beating us in round 1. I expect more of a fight tonight

What exactly makes this a rebuilding year for the Raptors?

Well after 2020, the Lowry Era is done, the cycle was over. Last year we were pretty bad but also in Tampa, and played for a top pick when it was obvious we weren't going to the playoffs, due to covid absences and our roster, Tampa.

So we end up getting the 4th pick which turns out to be Barnes. No one thought the Raps would be a 48 win team, that Barnes would be this good this quick. Masai hasn't ever done a traditional rebuild, but he's said so himself that this is a team with growing pains to be had. We're in between the we the north Era and transitioning to a post Era with FVV, Siakam, and Barnes developing.

Masai all he's been doing is accruing talent, while trying to remain competitive. Aside from the players I've mentioned we have OG who's 25? Trent is 23 and Achiiuwa is 22? Somewhere in that range. Barnes is 20. Lots of assets going forward, putting us in a familiar situation where we might be able to make a trade in the future. I'm thinking it might be one of fvv or siakam, but we'll see what happens

So basically because Lowry walked and you used a draft pick, it's a rebuilding year. Got it.

[Arsenal]

Do craps have any chance tonight? Their fans have multiple excuses ready in advance once again.

What a climb down from all the trash the craps were spewing prior to the series!

[Cubbies2120]

What's up with all the talk about the whistles for embiid? You guys are new to the NBA? It's called superstar calls. Sixers had to life through it since Iverson was gone. No whistles for us either. It's just how the NBA works since the Jordan days. (If it happened before MJ too I apologize, I am not old enough to have seen bird/magic live)


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I guess Jokic (soon to be 2x MVP) isn't a superstar cause he gets 6 FTA a game despite shooting a large majority of his shots at rim or in paint...

His FG% is so high in the paint that it's almost better for teams to hack him intentionally than let him touch it in the paint, yet he gets 6 FTA?

[aj174]

What exactly makes this a rebuilding year for the Raptors?

Well after 2020, the Lowry Era is done, the cycle was over. Last year we were pretty bad but also in Tampa, and played for a top pick when it was obvious we weren't going to the playoffs, due to covid absences and our roster, Tampa.

So we end up getting the 4th pick which turns out to be Barnes. No one thought the Raps would be a 48 win team, that Barnes would be this good this quick. Masai hasn't ever done a traditional rebuild, but he's said so himself that this is a team with growing pains to be had. We're in between the we the north Era and transitioning to a post Era with FVV, Siakam, and Barnes developing.

Masai all he's been doing is accruing talent, while trying to remain competitive. Aside from the players I've mentioned we have OG who's 25? Trent is 23 and Achiiuwa is 22? Somewhere in that range. Barnes is 20. Lots of assets going forward, putting us in a familiar situation where we might be able to make a trade in the future. I'm thinking it might be one of fvv or siakam, but we'll see what happens

So basically because Lowry walked and you used a draft pick, it's a rebuilding year. Got it.

Haha alright then. What do you think the Raptors are doing then? I'd like your honest assessment on where they are if they're not rebuilding or retooling.

Since the 2019 championship:

Lowry, Kawhi, Serge, Gasol, DG gone. That's the entire starting line up. Ibaka and Gasol were the anchors to our D. The only pieces that have stayed are Siakam and FVV who have emerged as the leaders of the team. Are they the two players to lead to a title? No. While helpful and needed pieces neither of them are superstars.

Getting the 4th pick was a blessing cause we were supposed to pick 7th but instead picked a guy who we all hope and see flashes of becoming THAT guy. A quick rebuild, retool. Call it what you want, but now we wait to see what we have and let Achiuwa, Trent, Barnes develop. Let OG develop into his prime and see what we have.