2025 NBA PLAYOFFS West First Round: #2 Houston Rockets vs #7 Golden State Warriors (Series tied 1-1)

[f4p]

Why do people keep calling Butler, Robin? Does Robin usually have better stats and turn the whole team around?

Maybe because Butler says he is Robin?

Yep and Jimmy Butler calls Curry a hellafied Batman. He's always talking about how Stephen Curry is Batman.

https://youtu.be/VrfDCM8BLMA?si=DL-nmuNO_peEcOAT

Well yeah, obviously he's not going to show up and start something by claiming to be better on the franchise where steph is beloved. I mean, are y'all serious here?

[510TWSS]

Obviously the turnover battle will be huge for the warriors to win this series.

Rockets 1st Q Turnovers: 3
Rockets 2nd Q Turnovers: 7
Rockets 3rd Q Turnovers: 2
Rockets 4th Q Turnovers: 4

The Rockets got sloppy with the ball during the 2nd quarter once the Dubz started collapsing on drives to the paint causing errant outlet passes. Will be interesting to see how it correlates moving forward

[Swift21]

Rockets aren’t going to shoot 20% from 3 and 55% from the free throw line. I still like the rockets. They were in the game while shooting like ****. If they can shoot 30% from 3’s and hit 75% of their Ft’s, which should be doable, I think they win the series, Fred is the X factor for me. Doubt he goes 2-13 again

They really don't have much shooting to begin with. Green is just a streaky volume scorer.

[Kobe187]

Death, taxes, and Curry from deep… Bang!

It was inevitable, this is life lol

[LakerLegend]

Extremely disappointed by Jalen Green, he has all the physical tools to be great. He’s a ja/anthony Edwards level athlete.

[California Gold]

Warriors are heavy favorites to win this series at this point. The Rockets were in over their heads, but this is at least valuable experience that some of the young guys will get. Green will be traded this summer, I already see it. Some guys just have it and some guys don't. He's way too inconsistent, the only solace is that his contract isn't terrible.

[Impuniti]

The traditional mugging defense of Steph -- I hope they bought him dinner first. Damn... Oh, and the Refs look right at this, and act like its nothing to see here.

Fishy

[tweet]191416182296742342tweet]

So, I'm a Heat fan (obvious username), and since the Jimmy trade, I've been following you guys. I want Jimmy to get his first ring, which seems possible this year, I actually like GSW to the Finals.

But.

Why does Steph get treated like this? He's one of the GOAT's faces of the league. I heard it was because he signed with UA instead of Nike, because imagine if they gave Steph a normal whistle like they do with SGA or whatever. Add +5 points to his PPG? Can't have Curry getting GOAT level status while wearing Under Armor.

There's a couple of reasons. Warriors are a very cocky team, and at times very annoying. Dray is possibly the player that refs might hate the most in the league because of the way that he acts. Steph also has taunted and embarrassed refs here & there, so you dominance filled with arrogance, which I'm sure the refs don't really like. It's also tougher to see every non on-ball foul when the game is so fast and it's already hard enough to see what's happening when people are on the ball.

Of course, I'm going to leave the Alex Jones tier conspiracies at the door.

[Ice Man]

One of the reasons that players foul-bait more than they did in the past is because fouls are harder to come by.

Average number of fouls called per game:

1985 - 50
1995 - 47
2005 - 45
2015 - 40
2025 - 37

Average number of FTs awarded per game:

1985 - 58
1995 - 54
2005 - 52
2015 - 46
2025 - 43

They gotta work harder to get the call.

[michaelm]

The traditional mugging defense of Steph -- I hope they bought him dinner first. Damn... Oh, and the Refs look right at this, and act like its nothing to see here.

Fishy

[tweet]191416182296742342tweet]

So, I'm a Heat fan (obvious username), and since the Jimmy trade, I've been following you guys. I want Jimmy to get his first ring, which seems possible this year, I actually like GSW to the Finals.

But.

Why does Steph get treated like this? He's one of the GOAT's faces of the league. I heard it was because he signed with UA instead of Nike, because imagine if they gave Steph a normal whistle like they do with SGA or whatever. Add +5 points to his PPG? Can't have Curry getting GOAT level status while wearing Under Armor.

There's a couple of reasons. Warriors are a very cocky team, and at times very annoying. Dray is possibly the player that refs might hate the most in the league because of the way that he acts. Steph also has taunted and embarrassed refs here & there, so you dominance filled with arrogance, which I'm sure the refs don't really like. It's also tougher to see every non on-ball foul when the game is so fast and it's already hard enough to see what's happening when people are on the ball.

Of course, I'm going to leave the Alex Jones tier conspiracies at the door.

I agree with others that it is significantly due to his style of play with his game mainly not involving the type of plays which draw fouls. As opposed to Harden, a player I rate highly in general btw, in his Moreyball days Curry is usually trying hard to actually make his 3 point shots which is aided.by avoiding contact.

[Impuniti]

So, I'm a Heat fan (obvious username), and since the Jimmy trade, I've been following you guys. I want Jimmy to get his first ring, which seems possible this year, I actually like GSW to the Finals.

But.

Why does Steph get treated like this? He's one of the GOAT's faces of the league. I heard it was because he signed with UA instead of Nike, because imagine if they gave Steph a normal whistle like they do with SGA or whatever. Add +5 points to his PPG? Can't have Curry getting GOAT level status while wearing Under Armor.

There's a couple of reasons. Warriors are a very cocky team, and at times very annoying. Dray is possibly the player that refs might hate the most in the league because of the way that he acts. Steph also has taunted and embarrassed refs here & there, so you dominance filled with arrogance, which I'm sure the refs don't really like. It's also tougher to see every non on-ball foul when the game is so fast and it's already hard enough to see what's happening when people are on the ball.

Of course, I'm going to leave the Alex Jones tier conspiracies at the door.

I agree with others that it is significantly due to his style of play with his game mainly not the type of plays which draw fouls. As opposed to Harden, a player I rate highly btw, in his Moreyball days he is usually trying hard to actually make his 3 point shots which is aided.by avoiding contact.

Great point, he's not trying to get FTs when he plays which doesn't help him at times. It's stark watching Jimmy and Steph's playstyles next to each other to see the difference.

[TheProfessor]

Extremely disappointed by Jalen Green, he has all the physical tools to be great. He’s a ja/anthony Edwards level athlete.

Edwards is a mixture Jordan/Westbrook athletically, Pre-injury JA was more quick than Jalen and I think Ja still has more basketball tools than Green.

Edwards>>>Pre-Injury Ja>>Current Ja>Green.

[michaelm]

There's a couple of reasons. Warriors are a very cocky team, and at times very annoying. Dray is possibly the player that refs might hate the most in the league because of the way that he acts. Steph also has taunted and embarrassed refs here & there, so you dominance filled with arrogance, which I'm sure the refs don't really like. It's also tougher to see every non on-ball foul when the game is so fast and it's already hard enough to see what's happening when people are on the ball.

Of course, I'm going to leave the Alex Jones tier conspiracies at the door.

I agree with others that it is significantly due to his style of play with his game mainly not the type of plays which draw fouls. As opposed to Harden, a player I rate highly btw, in his Moreyball days he is usually trying hard to actually make his 3 point shots which is aided.by avoiding contact.

Great point, he's not trying to get FTs when he plays which doesn't help him at times. It's stark watching Jimmy and Steph's playstyles next to each other to see the difference.

I am sure the NBA is drastically unkeen on players being awarded 3 FTs for fouls on 3 point shots in general, scamming 3 FTs is by a large measure the most effective scoring method as Morey identified.

[Edrees]

Maybe because Butler says he is Robin?

Yep and Jimmy Butler calls Curry a hellafied Batman. He's always talking about how Stephen Curry is Batman.

https://youtu.be/VrfDCM8BLMA?si=DL-nmuNO_peEcOAT

Well yeah, obviously he's not going to show up and start something by claiming to be better on the franchise where steph is beloved. I mean, are y'all serious here?

Well, in the case he felt he was the real batman, but wanted to play nice, he wouldn't go out of his way to say Steph is batman either. He just wouldn't bring up the topic or use those specific words

He didn't call Tyler Herro his batman when he got to Miami, and he didn't call KAT his Batman on the wolves, He didn't even call Embiid his batman when he went to Philly. So the idea that he does this kind of thing when he arrives on a new team is completely fabricated. He's never acted that way before.

He went way out of his way to make that comparison. And Jimymy Butler isn't exactly known for not stirring the pot or going out of his way to be nice, lmao.

[Ice Man]

Strikes me that Jimmy is very grateful to finally have an all-timer on his side, as opposed to all those of years of going into battle with only support players (save for the one season in Philly, with Embiid).

[Twinkie defense]

Yep and Jimmy Butler calls Curry a hellafied Batman. He's always talking about how Stephen Curry is Batman.

https://youtu.be/VrfDCM8BLMA?si=DL-nmuNO_peEcOAT

Well yeah, obviously he's not going to show up and start something by claiming to be better on the franchise where steph is beloved. I mean, are y'all serious here?

Well, in the case he felt he was the real batman, but wanted to play nice, he wouldn't go out of his way to say Steph is batman either. He just wouldn't bring up the topic or use those specific words

He didn't call Tyler Herro his batman when he got to Miami, and he didn't call KAT his Batman on the wolves, He didn't even call Embiid his batman when he went to Philly. So the idea that he does this kind of thing when he arrives on a new team is completely fabricated. He's never acted that way before.

He went way out of his way to make that comparison. And Jimymy Butler isn't exactly known for not stirring the pot or going out of his way to be nice, lmao.

To add to that: Jimmy is a great player. Steph is one of the greatest. Jimmy Butler understands that. I'm sure he loves finally having a superstar alongside of him.

[Sane]

Take it from the fan of a team (Rockets) who have played the Warriors an insane amount of time in the playoffs in the Curry era:

The reason Curry gets guarded that way is because since the days of Andrew Bogut and until now, his teammates beat the sh*t out of everyone, kick people in the balls, set moving screens, throw elbows, shove people out of bounds and do whatever it takes to get Curry open. That's how they play. They set the tone that way intentionally. The videos you're watching of Curry is EXACTLY TO THE T how they used to guard James Harden. You can search on youtube for endless reels of how many insane aggressive fouls went uncalled against the Rockets in those series. What Rockets fans didn't understand is that that was the tone of the game. We should have been doing it too if the refs were letting it go because the Warriors won't stop scratching and clawing.

So now they come across a team who's more physical than them and they are crying like a bunch of babies. Spare me. Take the W and get on with it. No one is going to feel sympathy for this stuff.

[Onlytimewilltel]

Take it from the fan of a team (Rockets) who have played the Warriors an insane amount of time in the playoffs in the Curry era:

The reason Curry gets guarded that way is because since the days of Andrew Bogut and until now, his teammates beat the sh*t out of everyone, kick people in the balls, set moving screens, throw elbows, shove people out of bounds and do whatever it takes to get Curry open. That's how they play. They set the tone that way intentionally. The videos you're watching of Curry is EXACTLY TO THE T how they used to guard James Harden. You can search on youtube for endless reels of how many insane aggressive fouls went uncalled against the Rockets in those series. What Rockets fans didn't understand is that that was the tone of the game. We should have been doing it too if the refs were letting it go because the Warriors won't stop scratching and clawing.

So now they come across a team who's more physical than them and they are crying like a bunch of babies. Spare me. Take the W and get on with it. No one is going to feel sympathy for this stuff.

[ILOVEIT]

Oddly, I like the Warriors better on the road than at home. Warriors have sort of sucked at home.....and I think it's a bit of home pressure and expectations. Curry is likely to have a stinker in the next three games so I wouldn't be shocked to see the series 2-2.

I like Warriors chances winning game two on the road more than winning two at home.

[TrueFan420]

Maybe because Butler says he is Robin?

Yep and Jimmy Butler calls Curry a hellafied Batman. He's always talking about how Stephen Curry is Batman.

https://youtu.be/VrfDCM8BLMA?si=DL-nmuNO_peEcOAT

Well yeah, obviously he's not going to show up and start something by claiming to be better on the franchise where steph is beloved. I mean, are y'all serious here?

Or maybe just maybe he understands Curry is a better player than him and that his skillsets perfect align with Curry’s. He likely also respects Curry’s approach to the game as a whole as he works very hard at his craft. Partnering with Curry is Jimmys best and last chance at winning a ring.

[WarriorGM]

Jimmy is a savvy operator and saw what happened last time when KD was around. Media trying to instigate petty feuds and rivalry and he's shutting it down from the get-go. Setting an example for the rest of the team too.