PG Indy - Turn out the lights

[machu46]

True or false: Chris Livingston would’ve been more effective in our rotation than Kyle Kuzma?

I know I'm the only one on here that thinks Livingston has some potential, but even if I didn't, Livingston would have been a great improvement over Kuzma.

And really, it's not Kuzma's fault that he's bad. But trading for him and giving up assets and then starting him in big games shows the disfunction of this franchise.

I'm still so confused that we had no interest in trying Kuzma at the 4 and Giannis at the 5 really at any point after acquiring him. Felt like it was the main benefit of the trade from an on-court perspective and it was probably the least used lineup with Kuzma by a mile.

[paulpressey25]

Also feel like it took until OT of our final game for anyone on our team to make an off-ball switch to avoid mismatches (I noticed Bobby came from the corner to switch onto Siakam and pointed for AJ or whoever it was to pick up Nembhard in the corner). Just a really dumb and unathletic team and that's a terrible combination against the Pacers.

Was so frustrating to watch that layup line at the end. Doc never figured out any adjustment to pick up Haliburton at the rim. Or McConnell earlier in the game. And how do you not put any pressure on Nembhard and give him that very quick wide open three.

[Chad34]

Don’t know if anyone has posted this yet, but wow what a great response/perspective from Giannis

Read on Twitter

[BigO]

True or false: Chris Livingston would’ve been more effective in our rotation than Kyle Kuzma?

I know I'm the only one on here that thinks Livingston has some potential, but even if I didn't, Livingston would have been a great improvement over Kuzma.

And really, it's not Kuzma's fault that he's bad. But trading for him and giving up assets and then starting him in big games shows the disfunction of this franchise.

I'm still so confused that we had no interest in trying Kuzma at the 4 and Giannis at the 5 really at any point after acquiring him. Felt like it was the main benefit of the trade from an on-court perspective and it was probably the least used lineup with Kuzma by a mile.

You're still assuming Kuzma is a decent player. I don't see it. No good basketball skills and a low bball IQ. A bad player doesn't become a good one by changing positions.

The other thing is that if you're changing his position for defensive purposes, the Bucks were switching everything, which negates what position you're best suited for.

[machu46]

I know I'm the only one on here that thinks Livingston has some potential, but even if I didn't, Livingston would have been a great improvement over Kuzma.

And really, it's not Kuzma's fault that he's bad. But trading for him and giving up assets and then starting him in big games shows the disfunction of this franchise.

I'm still so confused that we had no interest in trying Kuzma at the 4 and Giannis at the 5 really at any point after acquiring him. Felt like it was the main benefit of the trade from an on-court perspective and it was probably the least used lineup with Kuzma by a mile.

You're still assuming Kuzma is a decent player. I don't see it. No good basketball skills and a low bball IQ. A bad player doesn't become a good one by changing positions.

The other thing is that if you're changing his position for defensive purposes, the Bucks were switching everything, which negates what position you're best suited for.

I'm not really assuming anything aside from the Bucks probably thought he could help the team. I'm stunned that the seemingly most obvious way he might be able to help was the path they chose not to try.

[BigO]

I know it wasn’t a good look, and I’ll probably look back after time has passed and change my opinion, but I’m not mad at Giannis for the after game stuff lol. Idk if anybody here is but just how I’m feeling.

The pacers are actually a pretty good team. I don’t think we beat them fully healthy honestly. That’s the only nice thing I can say about them.

I don't think the Pacers are a very good team. Their roster is uninspiring.

I usually pick the team to win with the best players. In this series, I picked the Bucks, because of Giannis.

This is a series where I believe the Bucks would have won with a different coach. His lineups were so bad that I could be convinced he was on the take.

You play last night's lineup for the entire series and I'm convinced the Bucks win.

[BigO]

I'm still so confused that we had no interest in trying Kuzma at the 4 and Giannis at the 5 really at any point after acquiring him. Felt like it was the main benefit of the trade from an on-court perspective and it was probably the least used lineup with Kuzma by a mile.

You're still assuming Kuzma is a decent player. I don't see it. No good basketball skills and a low bball IQ. A bad player doesn't become a good one by changing positions.

The other thing is that if you're changing his position for defensive purposes, the Bucks were switching everything, which negates what position you're best suited for.

I'm not really assuming anything aside from the Bucks probably thought he could help the team. I'm stunned that the seemingly most obvious way he might be able to help was the path they chose not to try.

If they were going to try anything, you're probably right. I just think he's that bad.

[BigO]

I was not a Doc fan, but I thought he had some good basketball minds on his bench that made the situation workable.

I was so wrong and some posters warned us about it. Now that I have seen the light, I'm like a former smoker. Get him out of here.

Yes. Ham is a lightweight but Joerger is a good coach. So is Prunty. Buckner was supposed to be a defensive genius. He was a swing and a miss.

I agree with you, but when Ham was hired and demanded and received second in command, it was the sign that Doc was not a smart coach and just wanted a friend next to him. My criticsm isn't of the assistants. It's that Doc apears to have ignored them.

[Scizzup]

I know it wasn’t a good look, and I’ll probably look back after time has passed and change my opinion, but I’m not mad at Giannis for the after game stuff lol. Idk if anybody here is but just how I’m feeling.

The pacers are actually a pretty good team. I don’t think we beat them fully healthy honestly. That’s the only nice thing I can say about them.

I don't think the Pacers are a very good team. Their roster is uninspiring.

I usually pick the team to win with the best players. In this series, I picked the Bucks, because of Giannis.

This is a series where I believe the Bucks would have won with a different coach. His lineups were so bad that I could be convinced he was on the take.

You play last night's lineup for the entire series and I'm convinced the Bucks win.

The league has changed, teams construction are more important and individual superstars are less important now than they were pre 2020. This is because everyone is shooting 3s, the variance in shooting has reduced the difference in having a superstar vs not having a superstar.

I don't think any coaches changes the fact that pacers just had more good players that contributed.

[German Athens]

I know it wasn’t a good look, and I’ll probably look back after time has passed and change my opinion, but I’m not mad at Giannis for the after game stuff lol. Idk if anybody here is but just how I’m feeling.

The pacers are actually a pretty good team. I don’t think we beat them fully healthy honestly. That’s the only nice thing I can say about them.

I don't think the Pacers are a very good team. Their roster is uninspiring.

I usually pick the team to win with the best players. In this series, I picked the Bucks, because of Giannis.

This is a series where I believe the Bucks would have won with a different coach. His lineups were so bad that I could be convinced he was on the take.

You play last night's lineup for the entire series and I'm convinced the Bucks win.

The league has changed, teams construction are more important and superstars are less important now than they were pre 2016/ This is because everyone is shooting 3s, the variance in shooting has reduced the difference in having a superstar vs not having a superstar.

I don't think any coaches changes the fact that pacers just had more good players that contributed.

And yet, since 2016, the teams that won titles all had top-5 players on them.

[Scizzup]

I don't think the Pacers are a very good team. Their roster is uninspiring.

I usually pick the team to win with the best players. In this series, I picked the Bucks, because of Giannis.

This is a series where I believe the Bucks would have won with a different coach. His lineups were so bad that I could be convinced he was on the take.

You play last night's lineup for the entire series and I'm convinced the Bucks win.

The league has changed, teams construction are more important and superstars are less important now than they were pre 2016/ This is because everyone is shooting 3s, the variance in shooting has reduced the difference in having a superstar vs not having a superstar.

I don't think any coaches changes the fact that pacers just had more good players that contributed.

And yet, since 2016, the teams that won titles all had top-5 players on them.

I mean you still need a superstar to win it all (likely). I am saying roster construction is just more important now than it was back then. You could have a meh team and as long as you have a superstar that was 50 wins. KG was winning 50 games with bums etc. superstars impact were oversized back then. They played a lot of mins and had more impact on success of their teams in RS and playoffs.


Lakers are probably going to lose to Wolves, just like Nuggets last year. You can't just go into a series saying a team with the superstar wins especially as soon as Dame injuries became a thing. At that point, Pacers were the better team. quality roleplayers are just more important today.

[DingleJerry]

I know I'm the only one on here that thinks Livingston has some potential, but even if I didn't, Livingston would have been a great improvement over Kuzma.

And really, it's not Kuzma's fault that he's bad. But trading for him and giving up assets and then starting him in big games shows the disfunction of this franchise.

I'm still so confused that we had no interest in trying Kuzma at the 4 and Giannis at the 5 really at any point after acquiring him. Felt like it was the main benefit of the trade from an on-court perspective and it was probably the least used lineup with Kuzma by a mile.

You're still assuming Kuzma is a decent player. I don't see it. No good basketball skills and a low bball IQ. A bad player doesn't become a good one by changing positions.

The other thing is that if you're changing his position for defensive purposes, the Bucks were switching everything, which negates what position you're best suited for.

Generally agree with the sentiment. However, with the positions aspect it matters in that due to the switching if you're all playing a position down you're generally just going to be out-athleted than the other team. Basically by having one more big slow guy out there its putting everyone in a worse position and it kills the 'lineup'. We have to get off the obsession with Brook and these huge lineups in todays nba. Generally speaking you're right though that it doesn't change that kuzma pretty much sucked at everything the last few weeks.

[rilamann]

Gross play by Giannis. Green open, & if he's closed it's moved to Trent for a better look at it. Identical to the Heat OT game. 1 of the biggest disappointments of the series was how the offense functioned running the ball thru Giannis. I really thought he turned the corner in this dept.

Read on Twitter

I had to go outside at the start of the overtime because I didn't want to watch what was about to happen. Which was precisely what ended up happening, although I didn't think it would be as bad as it ended up being.

But that play right there was the final straw for me where I was too aggravated to even watch the overtime.

I went back and watched the overtime afterwards, but happy I went with my intuition and didn't watch it live. That might go down as my all-time best sports decision or whatever you want to call it.

Watching that choke in real-time as it happened would have been bad for my health lol.

[DingleJerry]

Yea due to Giannis' poor shooting I would have had the play/plan be all about him attracting the double and having Green/Trent shoot for the win. Of course you tell Giannis if he gets a crease to attack the rim and they'll likely foul, but otherwise just try to bait them to double and let someone else have an open shot. But of course in the nba the star has to shoot in order to be the man, not unlike how Den had Jokic shooting contested fadeaway 3 at the buzzer a few days ago.

[rilamann]

I know it wasn’t a good look, and I’ll probably look back after time has passed and change my opinion, but I’m not mad at Giannis for the after game stuff lol. Idk if anybody here is but just how I’m feeling.

The pacers are actually a pretty good team. I don’t think we beat them fully healthy honestly. That’s the only nice thing I can say about them.

I don't think the Pacers are a very good team. Their roster is uninspiring.

I usually pick the team to win with the best players. In this series, I picked the Bucks, because of Giannis.

This is a series where I believe the Bucks would have won with a different coach. His lineups were so bad that I could be convinced he was on the take.

You play last night's lineup for the entire series and I'm convinced the Bucks win.

The Pacers are better than a lot of people think.

The Pacers better than you would assume because they are very well coached. They are a legit, good team, but Carlise gets the most out of that roster.

Ironically, the Bucks are complete opposite of the Pacers. The Bucks are not as good as you would assume because they are very poorly coached.

That's why during the last month of the regular season I was saying we should rest Giannis and take the #6 and try to avoid the Pacers and I was met with a lot of Relax, we are going to beat those clowns (Pacers) in 5 or 6.

The Pacers are a lot better than you think.

The Bucks were a lot worse than you thought.

The Carlise vs Doc coaching match-up alone gave the Bucks pretty much no real shot in this series, I was saying this daily since early March. So it's not hindsight. Although it should have been common sense for everyone.

[BUCKnation]

L2M report says no foul on aj for that late and 1 from Hali, no s***

[Bernman]

Yea due to Giannis' poor shooting I would have had the play/plan be all about him attracting the double and having Green/Trent shoot for the win. Of course you tell Giannis if he gets a crease to attack the rim and they'll likely foul, but otherwise just try to bait them to double and let someone else have an open shot. But of course in the nba the star has to shoot in order to be the man, not unlike how Den had Jokic shooting contested fadeaway 3 at the buzzer a few days ago.

Another problem in utilizing Giannis for these end of game situations is, to get his scoring effect, he has to go early. That means you don't get the last shot, if he's the one to take it. Unless he takes a lower % one like that.

That's why you needed a Middleton to complement him, or Dame, in theory, though that hasn't worked out nearly as well because he had a hard time playing the 2nd banana Kyrie role up until those moments, he didn't actually deliver in them this season, & he seldom would play d.

[Bucksmaniac]

L2M report says no foul on aj for that late and 1 from Hali, no s***

Funny that we have had two games affected for us by fouls for Haliburton that should have been no calls. Definitely nothing fishy about that.

[Bernman]

L2M report says no foul on aj for that late and 1 from Hali, no s***

So they replay the game starting at the beginning of the 2nd OT, right?

Seriously, AJ gets the worst whistle in the league. And this is another thing he was wrongfully blamed for. Add it to the list. He was also at fault for completing a pass out of a trap, supposedly.

I think missing 1 of 2 ft's holding a late lead is boiler plate, unless you're Dame-level in ft shooting & experience. He only shot 81% on super low volume. At <75% you're missing 1 most of the time under no pressure.

Then he got beat by Hali like everyone on our team when they were tired. The notable errors were Gary's 2, KPJ's dribble TO in OT & bad shot late in regulation, + Giannis' non-pass at the end of regulation. Then Doc over-played the starters. And give the Pacers' credit for elite clutchness.

[bucksfansince88]

barbershop whispers....but I heard that Doc didnt want to hear anything anyone on his staff had say in those meetings.