2025 NBA PLAYOFFS West Semifinals: #1 Oklahoma City Thunder vs #4 Denver Nuggets (DEN leads 2-1)

[GSWFan1994]

Gotta love the "prisoner of the moment" takes and threads.

[WhatTheBuck]

What's so suprising? They bailed him out when he won the chip too.

But it does sound pretty cool to say he has never had an all-star play next to him.

Adds to the mythology and hagiography of Jokic.

[Capn'O]

Big time SGA choke job. He was 1/8 in the fourth quarter and OT and he missed his last 7 FGA.

But Denver's defense was set up for his ISOs. Did you watch the game? There were 2-3 guys waiting for him when he drives in. And Daignault kept running the same play over and over again. Till they lost.

Mark has been awful this series. Completely outclassed.

[PushDaRock]

Williams should have had 50 tonight. SGA freezing him out in overtime to brick everything was comical.

Yeah that was pathetic. Coach can't let that happen idk how good a year dude had he didn't have it tonight.

Jokic didn't either, but he still came through with a couple buckets they needed.

Coaches are going to live with the result of having the ball in their Superstars' hands.

[yoyoboy]

When a guy like SGA is a possible league MVP, you know the league Is in bad shape.

Do you guys ever get tired of posting such incredibly stupid reactionary takes? Do you not feel at all embarrassed? You know this same guy had 34 points, missed two shots, and posted the highest single game plus-minus in playoff history just two days ago right?

This is what makes the league so great. That a young guy who had one of the greatest guard seasons in league history on a dominant 68 win team can still find himself experiencing some obstacles in the playoffs against a less talented team of experienced veterans. Maybe he’ll lose the series and it’ll prove to be a learning moment like it was for the countless other examples of MVPs who had struggles in the playoffs and then had dominant championship runs later (LeBron, Dirk, Curry, and Giannis just to name a few recent ones). Maybe he’ll have a monster Game 4 and you’ll shut up until the next night he has a bad shooting night.

[WemBA Time]

Does the board's opinion change on this after every game?

[Wolfgang630]

Can’t take these people serious who keep **** on Jokic and won’t say anything about SGA. Biased and Lakers fans mostly

[jokeboy86]

Imagine how much better OKC would be if they swapped Chet for Giannis.

I said it like 5 pages ago. I know OKC fans want to stick with their home grown team but you trade for Giannis and you own the league for the next 5 years.

The spacing would be horrible OKC would need a stretch 5 that can defend and those do not grow on trees.
Y
I think they are better off sticking with this team. They have the age advantage so there is no need to panic

The question for OKC is can Chet get even better and will they be patient enough to wait and see? I think Chet has a high floor but I still don’t know what his ceiling is

[KGDirkTD_Fan]

Imagine how much better OKC would be if they swapped Chet for Giannis.

I said it like 5 pages ago. I know OKC fans want to stick with their home grown team but you trade for Giannis and you own the league for the next 5 years.

Exactly. Giannis is 30 and plays a style of basketball that won't age well, but it doesn't matter. He has enough gas left to win at least two or three titles.

im sure there's OKC fans that will drive Chet to the airport if it means Giannis. Two top 5 players on a roster...good lord.

I remember folks discussing if they would trade Paulo for Giannis, that GM would never have a job again if he didn't entertain a call from Milwaukee for that kind of trade.

[dautjazz]

They've showed up when it counts, but they are often hurt or inconsistent with their play.

[LFGK]

Minnesota/Denver was the real Finals last year, don’t you remember?

You should worry more bout my squad puting you in a 3-0 hole tomorrow. Hell of a game tonight but SGA was Brutal and Denver tightened up defensively in the 4th and OT.

Celtics would never go down in 0-3 hole

My boy the good luck charm! never 0-1 never 0-2 now never 0-3, bet the house on the Knicks tomorrow

[HotRocks34]

Okc is getting tested in these close games where they don’t have much experience. They will need to win some if they want to win a ring. It may not matter for this series but the next one or the finals may be where it bites them.

All those regular season blowouts only help you so much.

They don't look ready. They were shook late.

Right now they're looking like front running regular season champs that aren't quite prepared for prime time. Dallas 2007.

There's still time to fix it but tonight was ugly.

[C-Melo Man]

Nuggets fans whats up? How we feeling?

Feeling pretty good. Jokic has had a couple mediocre games & his teammates have stepped up. If they can all play to their level, they can win it in 5-6. Experience is prevailing this series.

[SpreeS]

Murray is one of the biggest playoff risers ever. **** is undeniable at this point. Iirc he has the most 40pt playoff games in Nuggets history after that one against the Clippers. This was an insane performance against a perimeter defense as dominant as Okc. Its not even arguable hes the best player to never make all star would be absurd if he never does

He is a "playoff riser" becuase he is ass in the regular season not hard to be a "riser" when you average 20 points enough of this ****!

He is West Butler…to rise 5 pts on avg is one thing, to be clutch as f…. is other.

[Deathray]

Shai was way too passive. Daigenault was doing all he could to keep him off the ball to try to set stuff up for him but Shai would not assert himself. Maybe he got intimidated by Braun because Christian was consistently able to stay in front of him.

And I don't understand why Caruso was not in the game during crunch time. That makes no sense.

[WhatTheBuck]

You are supposed to look at it over the a large sample size. He has less help than other superstars. This is just true.

That's just false!

He won a championship with this same core lmao

Stop making excuses for the best player in the world.

He's not the best player in the world.

[76ciology]

This is the season we win a ring for Westbrook. Brodie has been through so much and he deserves a ring.

The NBA should introduce a “J.R. Smith Award” for the ultimate boom or bust playoff performer.

[Mk0]

SGA looking like Kobe, you don't have it pass the **** ball

Kobe could get in the post at 17 years old. Kids these days have just the faceup.

Perhaps I'm biased due to my age, but I don't recall Michael Jordan ever playing as miserably as SGA played today.

Jordan pooped the bed in his first playoff game since returning from playing baseball.

8-22 19 points, 8 TOs

That was the whole "#45 isn't the same as #23" trash talk

But he kinda bounced back and won another 3 titles in a row

[ArksNetsSince99]

Nuggets have the same strategy with OKC/SGA but only JDub stepped up.

I lost my reverse jinx powers , I always root for Denver hard and they won

Your powers only work on the hater side.

This might be true , I don’t dislike anybody on the OKC team

[Castle Black]

Gutsy win by Denver. Their role players stepped up when Joker was playing the worst game of his life, especially Murray, Gordon, and MPJ. Have to give credit where credit is due. With that said, OKC is fine. They played horribly and still should've won. They'll win Game 4 and then Game 5 at home and retake control of the series. They're not worried.