tonyreyes123 wrote:In hindsight the Mavs should've been favored this series. Their team boasted a stronger balanced starting 5/roster
They were by far the oldest team in the league. Tyson Chandler was on 5 different teams prior to his stint with the Mavs and had iirc one healthy season. Kidd was a shadow if his former self, retired after the next season. Terry was his usual streaky no defense playing shooter self. At least he stepped up in that playoff run. Their 2nd best scorer was missing the entire playoffs while Miami had all their top scorers healthy. Dirk had at least two injuries, elbow and finger, which was the main reason why he struggled some in the finals. Marion was till good but entering his twilight years.
There were plenty of good reasons to not favor the Mavs in that playoff run. They simply weren't a usual championship winning team which more often than not consisted of a superstar, another all star or even superstar and fitting starters/role players around them who are also not 33+ on average.
Old teams win championships in the NBA
Bucks tricked me into being a diehard in 2001, LeBron is the 2nd best player ever, and pizza is awesome.
lorak wrote: Could you show video with whole play? (or at least tell what quarter and time on the clock was, so I can check it myself.) Because it seems like Terry was lost on D and that's why Miller was open - not because Dallas defensive scheme was designed that way to leave MM open and focus on LJ. That's BTW why I don't like screen shots much, because you could show anything you want if you chose proper moment (not saying that you did it on purpose, just general observation about screen shots).
Yeah no problem. Understand your concern. It's Miami's 2nd possession of the 2nd quarter, occurs with about 11:15 on the clock.
Terry indeed follows Miller around the curl, but immediately stops and turns to face LeBron when James comes around the curl, leaving Miller wide open for a couple seconds, until James passes to Bosh at which point Terry fights through Haslem to get back to Miller.. It occurs very quickly, which is why I did a still image in the first place. But I don't really see a way this can be called a mistake by Terry.
Here is the whole possession, uncut: [youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vQ6tPunRHI&feature=youtu.be[/youtube]
EDIT: Listen very carefully, and you can even hear somebody yell "HEY" when James touches the ball. This is absolutely schematic.
“I’m not the fastest guy on the court, but I can dictate when the race begins.”
Going off my memory, one thing I'd like to add about the notion of LeBron being passive in that '11 series that I haven't seen anyone touch upon yet is the effect of Wade's play.
Remember, Wade was beasting that series, he averaged 27/7/5 on 61%TS.
From what I remember, there were multiple sequences from game to game where LeBron would be struggling but instead of kinda just playing & grinding through (like he'd do in later years in Miami) until he can figure out how he can be effective and establish some sort of rhythm out there, he gave the ball to Wade and went to stand in the corner doing nothing for god knows how many possessions. I can see the reasoning behind it, he was struggling, the defense was really focusing on disrupting him as much as possible, and you got a teammate who's tearing it up.'' Simply put, not playing the blame game whatsoever but I just believe that if Wade hypothetically wouldn't have had such a great series that LeBron would be forced to be more active. Whether he would be able to produce more with the way he was playing/the attention he was getting is up in air, but at least he wouldn't default to a bystander out there and I feel that's more important. He shot poorly and he was turning the ball over way too much, that was bad, but having 23%USG and not even touching the ball on several possessions was even worse.
There no reason for Lebron to be crushed like he was i can excuse the 2007 crush but this time Lebron had more then enough help. Lebron is a great player but with out the ball in his hands and him doing well with it he is kinda dead space. Lebron can make bad players better but when he is with superstars i do not think he makes them better so if he plays like **** they lose. I mean he kinda just gave up did he not and the Mavs winning it was out of no were even though that run put Dirk on the map.
I think this series is being over analyzed here. There are 3 core reasons the Heat lost:
1. Lebron's weak performance 2. Dallas' depth over miami(their shooters were hot) 3. Spo was outcoached.
The whole thing about Lbj deffering to Wade because he was hot is such a cop out. Wade was just as hot if not more so agaisnt Boston and you didn't see him deffering then. He was the one closing out most of those games and for some reason he made little attempt to do so against Dallas.
tonyreyes123 wrote:In hindsight the Mavs should've been favored this series. Their team boasted a stronger balanced starting 5/roster
They were by far the oldest team in the league. Tyson Chandler was on 5 different teams prior to his stint with the Mavs and had iirc one healthy season. Kidd was a shadow if his former self, retired after the next season. Terry was his usual streaky no defense playing shooter self. At least he stepped up in that playoff run. Their 2nd best scorer was missing the entire playoffs while Miami had all their top scorers healthy. Dirk had at least two injuries, elbow and finger, which was the main reason why he struggled some in the finals. Marion was till good but entering his twilight years.
There were plenty of good reasons to not favor the Mavs in that playoff run. They simply weren't a usual championship winning team which more often than not consisted of a superstar, another all star or even superstar and fitting starters/role players around them who are also not 33+ on average.
Experienced teams in their prime win most championships in the NBA
/fixed
Be the Best wrote:I think this series is being over analyzed here. There are 4 core reasons the Heat lost:
1. Lebron's weak performance 2. Dallas' depth over miami(their shooters were hot) 3. Dirk closing out games and playing very well at 27 ppg / 9 rpg 4. Spo was outcoached.
The whole thing about Lbj deffering to Wade because he was hot is such a cop out. Wade was just as hot if not more so agaisnt Boston and you didn't see him deffering then. He was the one closing out most of those games and for some reason he made little attempt to do so against Dallas.
/fixed
If you're asking me who the Mavs best player is, I'd say Luka. A guy like Delon Wright probably rivals his impact though at this stage in his career. KP may as well if he gets his **** together. GeorgeMarcus, 17/11/2019
Great thread OP. A bit of a sore spot for me as a massive LeBron fan, but it's definitely worth talking about - I've sort of been in denial that this series ever happened. It's about time we face it.
Defensively, Dallas did an outstanding job swarming LeBron and rendering him largely ineffective, by his own standards. Marion would funnel him into Chandler who did a great job defending the paint. He also did a good job of keeping him away from the areas he felt comfortable in.
If I remember correctly, that season, LBJ was particularly bulky and was having issues blowing past defenders. His three point shot suddenly seemed to abandon him as well, so there was a limit to his efficacy on the offensive end given Miami's iso-heavy style. Wade's resurgence made him defer a lot and led to a lot of standing around. Meanwhile, the Mavericks' shooters and bench players seemed to step up in a big way and hit the shots they needed to. All in all it was just a perfect storm to take down the Heat, especially since Miami did not seem to adjust or adapt to Dallas' goal of keeping LeBron from making a big impact.
I maintain that this was a series that Miami should have and could have won, but Spoelstra didn't seem to adjust his offensive game plan at all and there's no doubt in my mind that in games 5 and 6 the hype and hoopla seemed to rattle LeBron a bit.
And above all, we've got to give credit to Dirk. That entire postseason was just incredible for him.
Hyaena wrote:Wade's resurgence made him defer a lot and led to a lot of standing around.
What do you mean by Wade's resurgence? Wade was pretty good that entire year and pretty amazing in the first two rounds. He struggled a bit against the Bulls but Bosh stepped up and the Heat won. I don't buy this "LeBron deferred to Wade too much" theory. They played that entire season as 1a/1b and had success with it for the most part including against the Bulls/Celtics when Wade helped Lebron close games out.
Wade was even trying to get LeBron going. There's also that infamous clip at the end of game 4 when Wade was yelling at LeBron to stop passing the ball and Simmons wrote about it as well. He said that Wade and the entire team was pumping up LeBron to get him going from what he could see at the games.
JordansBulls wrote:The Warriors are basically a good college team until they meet a team with bigs in the NBA.
Brenice wrote:This thread is shameless. All these ridiculous excuses.
I don't think this thread is about excuses, but about trying to analyze this series strategically rather than the stale "CHOKER/LeLoser" stuff that's always regurgitated.
Hyaena wrote:Wade's resurgence made him defer a lot and led to a lot of standing around.
What do you mean by Wade's resurgence? Wade was pretty good that entire year and pretty amazing in the first two rounds. He struggled a bit against the Bulls but Bosh stepped up and the Heat won. I don't buy this "LeBron deferred to Wade too much" theory. They played that entire season as 1a/1b and had success with it for the most part including against the Bulls/Celtics when Wade helped Lebron close games out.
Wade was even trying to get LeBron going. There's also that infamous clip at the end of game 4 when Wade was yelling at LeBron to stop passing the ball and Simmons wrote about it as well. He said that Wade and the entire team was pumping up LeBron to get him going from what he could see at the games.
By resurgence I was referring to the Bulls series (ECF). It seemed to me that Dallas' plan was to basically let Wade get his while limiting LeBron's attack. Wade definitely had a solid year but his numbers in the Finals were exceptionally good (26.5/7.0/5.2 on 61.4% TS vs. RS stats of 25.5/6.4/4.6 on 58.1% TS) and the best he had posted the entire playoffs other than the Boston series. Hence he seemed to improve. I'm not blaming LeBron for Miami's reliance on Wade during the series, but I think Dallas deserves credit for making LBJ uncomfortable and little was done about it apart from more Wade isos. Had Miami adjusted, had LeBron got going at all, his numbers go up and Wade's reduce at least slightly.
They needed LeBron to be more proactive but Dallas really scouted him well and totally took him out of his comfort zone. Miami had no answer for that despite Wade's excellent play and it wasn't enough.
Hyaena wrote:Wade's resurgence made him defer a lot and led to a lot of standing around.
What do you mean by Wade's resurgence? Wade was pretty good that entire year and pretty amazing in the first two rounds. He struggled a bit against the Bulls but Bosh stepped up and the Heat won. I don't buy this "LeBron deferred to Wade too much" theory. They played that entire season as 1a/1b and had success with it for the most part including against the Bulls/Celtics when Wade helped Lebron close games out.
Wade was even trying to get LeBron going. There's also that infamous clip at the end of game 4 when Wade was yelling at LeBron to stop passing the ball and Simmons wrote about it as well. He said that Wade and the entire team was pumping up LeBron to get him going from what he could see at the games.
By resurgence I was referring to the Bulls series (ECF). It seemed to me that Dallas' plan was to basically let Wade get his while limiting LeBron's attack. Wade definitely had a solid year but his numbers in the Finals were exceptionally good (26.5/7.0/5.2 on 61.4% TS vs. RS stats of 25.5/6.4/4.6 on 58.1% TS) and the best he had posted the entire playoffs other than the Boston series. Hence he seemed to improve. I'm not blaming LeBron for Miami's reliance on Wade during the series, but I think Dallas deserves credit for making LBJ uncomfortable. Had Miami adjusted, I think LeBron's numbers go up and Wade's reduce at least slightly.
They needed LeBron to be more proactive but Dallas really scouted him well and totally took him out of his comfort zone. Miami had no answer for that despite Wade's excellent play and it wasn't enough.
His numbers are slightly better than his RS numbers but they are not astronomically better where you think he had one good series.
His numbers against Boston were 30/7/5 on 62% TS which would be better than his Finals numbers, which is why I am not sure why some act like what he did in the Finals was above and beyond what he did during the RS, and that it partly caused LeBron to defer to him. Throughout the year they played as 1a/1b and doing a lot of isos. It's not like Wade out of nowhere got hot in that series and LeBron was seeing something unprecedented so he backed off.
Just look at those highlights. It's not like they were playing him 1 on 1. I said this in my first reply, after they would get the ball out of LeBron's hands, Wade too was routinely seeing 2 or 3 defenders. It's not like he was getting single coverage and just got hot for the series.
JordansBulls wrote:The Warriors are basically a good college team until they meet a team with bigs in the NBA.
PaulieWal wrote: What do you mean by Wade's resurgence? Wade was pretty good that entire year and pretty amazing in the first two rounds. He struggled a bit against the Bulls but Bosh stepped up and the Heat won. I don't buy this "LeBron deferred to Wade too much" theory. They played that entire season as 1a/1b and had success with it for the most part including against the Bulls/Celtics when Wade helped Lebron close games out.
Wade was even trying to get LeBron going. There's also that infamous clip at the end of game 4 when Wade was yelling at LeBron to stop passing the ball and Simmons wrote about it as well. He said that Wade and the entire team was pumping up LeBron to get him going from what he could see at the games.
By resurgence I was referring to the Bulls series (ECF). It seemed to me that Dallas' plan was to basically let Wade get his while limiting LeBron's attack. Wade definitely had a solid year but his numbers in the Finals were exceptionally good (26.5/7.0/5.2 on 61.4% TS vs. RS stats of 25.5/6.4/4.6 on 58.1% TS) and the best he had posted the entire playoffs other than the Boston series. Hence he seemed to improve. I'm not blaming LeBron for Miami's reliance on Wade during the series, but I think Dallas deserves credit for making LBJ uncomfortable. Had Miami adjusted, I think LeBron's numbers go up and Wade's reduce at least slightly.
They needed LeBron to be more proactive but Dallas really scouted him well and totally took him out of his comfort zone. Miami had no answer for that despite Wade's excellent play and it wasn't enough.
His numbers are slightly better than his RS numbers but they are not astronomically better where you think he had one good series.
His numbers against Boston were 30/7/5 on 62% TS which would be better than his Finals numbers, which is why I am not sure why some act like what he did in the Finals was above and beyond what he did during the RS, and that is partly caused LeBron to defer to him.
Just look at those highlights. It's not like they were playing him 1 on 1. I said this in my first reply, after they would get the ball out of LeBron's hands, Wade too was routinely seeing 2 or 3 defenders. It's not like he was getting single coverage and just got hot for the series.
I already acknowledged how well Wade played against the Celtics in my initial response to you. He did a much better job in the Finals than he did in the ECF, though, and slightly better than he did in the RS. It wasn't just one good series, but he was good enough at that point in his career that Miami seemed to turn to him after LeBron's play was negated and the impression I got is that LeBron didn't seem to oppose it. Miami NEEDED LeBron to play better but he didn't. Wade did.
I'm not in the camp that says he just happened to get hot that series and was trash otherwise. But I thought it worth mentioning that LeBron's anemic offense in the Finals led to Wade becoming the main option after his relatively weak series against Chicago where Bosh stepped up.
Obviously a lot more was at play that caused Miami's downfall, but Dallas making LeBron uncomfortable and Wade playing well seemed to suit the Mavs just fine.
ronnymac2 wrote:I remember at the time of the series, ElGee was tracking possessions and observed a sharp decrease in LeBron's defensive effectiveness over the whole of the six-game Finals series relative to the defensive dominance he had displayed against Chicago and Boston in the East Playoffs. IIRC, more mistakes, less effective closeouts on shooters, less penetrations stopped. It jibed with what myself and others saw via an admittedly less studious eyetest, e.i., his defensive effort waned in the Finals. It didn't seem consistent with his work against Chicago and Boston (arguably his two best series ever, particularly the CHI series), so it added to the shock of LBJ playing so poorly. I wish I could find that post.
I want to thank Dr Spaceman for finding examples of what Dallas was doing and explaining why LeBron James wasn't at his best on offense. Coach Carlisle developed a great plan, and they had the pieces to orchestrate the attack on LeBron. Kidd/Marion/Stevenson had the size, strength, length to constantly have a solid initial defender on LBJ, and Chandler/Nowitzki were space eaters in the middle, especially Chandler with his mobility.
As has been noted often on this board, 2011 LBJ had gained muscle mass and lost some live dribble explosiveness in the halfcourt. So when things got bad and LBJ was forced to play 1 vs. 1 from the perimeter, he couldn't pull a 2009 LBJ and just drive to the basket and do anything he By Gawd wanted. He had to take a more measured approach, and as noted in the OP, perhaps Dallas saw that and used LBJ's best basketball personality trait to contribute to his own demise.
There's also MPG. LBJ took on an enormous load on both sides of the ball in the East playoffs and played like 43 MPG or something. May have been drained. I doubt this was a major factor, however. He was 26. It was 2011, not 2014.
Dallas disallowing him from favorable post positions was huge. Dallas' greatest Four Factors advantage in the series was FT/FGA. (Miami actually won rebounds and TOV%.) LeBron took less than 4 FTAs per game, while Bosh and Wade were both over 7 FTAs per game. If LeBron had gotten superior post position and/or was able to constantly slash into the paint no matter what a la '09 LBJ, he'd probably be in that range as well, and considering the series was so damn close, we're probably looking at a Miami victory even if LBJ had gone cold from the perimeter.
At the time, what pissed me off was the FTAs. It showed passivity. Not sure if it was mental or if he physically was unable to break through a space-eating defense like he was a year or 2 earlier, but it made it seem like he wasn't aggressive enough. Maybe I was wrong for attributing the poor play to a lack of aggression instead of taking a more nuanced look at the factors contributing to the decrease in FTAs.
As far as the result on his production and efficiency, he had a USG% of 22.9 and an individual ORTG of 102. So Miami got inefficient production from LeBron James. That's not too damning. His tepid offensive rebounding makes sense considering he was forced to the perimeter with the ball a lot. Turnovers are really poor.
He got over 7 assists per game, but I'm not sure how much of that was creating vs. simply passing. There's a difference. Again, I think the evidence in the OP points to Dallas wanting LBJ to pass to the players they knew they could control relatively speaking. Considering the lack of shooting and inexperience of SPO to create an efficient, machine-like offense we saw in 2012 and beyond, it worked. This is the part that might be damning to 2011 LBJ.
No Miami player aside from the Big 3 and Super Mario had an individual ORTG over 100 (Juwan Howard only played 29 minutes in total, not counting him). LBJ and Bosh were still pretty inefficient. Wade and Chalmers were the only ones able to capitalize on the way Dallas played LBJ.
To be honest, I don't think there was a counter for what Dallas did. That version of LBJ couldn't slash and create the way 2009 LBJ could from the perimeter, especially without spacing and with a space-eating defense concentrating on him.
FWIW, I do think 2011 LBJ gets underrated. Finals aside, it might be his finest defensive season ever, his mid-range game was on point, and he was still a beast slashing and creating, albeit a lesser beast than 2009-2010 and 2012-2015.
Okay just finished game 6. This was really really bizarre, LeBron started out 4/4, being crazy aggressive, and he had two nice assists to Bosh that were really reminiscent of their later years together. It's easy to forget watching this series how good Miami could actually look on offense in 2011 with LeBron engaged despite all these issues.
But then it just... stopped. Maybe it was unsustainable, because that stretch saw LeBron hit two step back Js and 2 deep 3s. He went to the post on one possession and got fouled as well, and had a great backdoor cut. Miami spent like the whole half of the first quarter with Haslem/Howard in the front court and it just ended their run. Wade had a couple drives but other than that no one could get anywhere on the court. This was honestly such a big issue for them.
I have to be honest, in hindsight I'm kind of buying the fatigue thing. He was insane 2009 LeBron active for like the first 6 minutes of this game and then I didn't even notice he was on the floor again until the 4th. By the 2nd quarter he was late on rotations and just chasing around screens. Honestly there were several plays where he'd drive into the paint and it looked like his body just wasn't responding the way he expected; he was stumbling, getting stripped and just losing control of the ball for no reason. He spent lots of clock time just hanging out in the corner and not moving. Given the way he broke down in 2012 and 2014... I'm not ready to discount fatigue as a major contributor to this. Also, he was so dreadful on free throws, which kind of lends support to this.
PaulieWal wrote:I don't think he saw as many zones as he did against Dallas in 11. My point is that this was probably the first time of him seeing this many zone coverages at this level, I might be wrong but I will need to re-watch some of those games against Boston before 2011 at some point.
I tracked when Dallas went to the zone in the first quarter. Here are the possession logs (shot clock time in parenthesis):
1. Wade misses fadeaway 18 feet (2) 2. LeBron misses 3 26 feet (12) 3. Turnover James bad pass (LeBron dives into the lane out of control into 3 defenders, jumps, spins in the air and throws it away) 4. James backcourt turnover 5. Eddie house makes corner 3 (3, basically a bailout shot)
When Dallas first went to the zone (BTW- they didn't do it after a timeout. After a made basket they literally just switched during gametime. Wow) it was @ 3:44 in the 1st, score 25-24. At the 10 minute mark of the second, they went back to man and it was 40-28. That's a 15-4 run in about 6 minutes after they switched to zone, and it honestly probably won them the game.
“I’m not the fastest guy on the court, but I can dictate when the race begins.”
Hyaena wrote: But I thought it worth mentioning that LeBron's anemic offense in the Finals led to Wade becoming the main option after his relatively weak series against Chicago where Bosh stepped up.
But that's my point, man. They played the entire RS as 1a/1b and the first two rounds of the playoffs. It was only one series were Bosh was the #2 option because he was beasting from the mid-range against the Bulls. Other than that Wade/LeBron were playing as the two main options. And my only other objection is that the Mavs were letting getting Wade his. They were sending a lot of help defense towards both LeBron AND Wade. As I said it's not like they played Wade 1 on 1 and left his defender on an island against him. He was seeing a lot of help as well. I don't know if you watched the clip I linked but there are a couple of possessions where LeBron feeds Wade the ball in the post and drifts towards the 3 point line, then the Mavs send LeBron's man plus another defender towards Wade to form a wall.
JordansBulls wrote:The Warriors are basically a good college team until they meet a team with bigs in the NBA.
Hyaena wrote: But I thought it worth mentioning that LeBron's anemic offense in the Finals led to Wade becoming the main option after his relatively weak series against Chicago where Bosh stepped up.
But that's my point, man. They played the entire RS as 1a/1b and the first two rounds of the playoffs. It was only one series were Bosh was the #2 option because he was beasting from the mid-range against the Bulls. Other than that Wade/LeBron were playing as the two main options. And my only other objection is that the Mavs were letting getting Wade his. They were sending a lot of help defense towards both LeBron AND Wade. As I said it's not like they played Wade 1 on 1 and left his defender on an island against him. He was seeing a lot of help as well. I don't know if you watched the clip I linked but there are a couple of possessions where LeBron feeds Wade the ball in the post and drifts towards the 3 point line, then the Mavs send LeBron's man plus another defender towards Wade to form a wall.
Right, they were the two main options - the improvement I cited was purely with respect to the Chicago series. Given the fact that he could put up good numbers against Dallas, Miami seemed to rely on him and I can't rule out that LeBron was fine with this considering how listless LeBron was during the series. He needed to do better. He didn't. He NEEDED to step up and do work and he did not. Wade did.
I saw your link. I'm not sure what it is, but Wade seemed to deal with the help defense a lot better than LeBron did. We can chalk it up to whatever, but LeBron's offense just looked forced and uncomfortable. Dallas would essentially force him to pass and he'd just drift away, act passive, not attack... it was infuriating. Just passing away and not getting involved and being incapable of moving the way he used to. It's the drifting away from the action that turned everything upside down from Miami - whereas Wade would continue to attack and stay aggressive, LeBron seemed far too content to stand and watch and "make the right play" when he gets swarmed, which was Dallas' aim in the first place. Wade to this day demands double teams, there's nothing new there. But it seemed that Dallas put particular emphasis on neutralizing LeBron more than anyone else, and that worked perfectly. And the killer was Miami not adjusting at all.
Hyaena wrote:Right, they were the two main options - the improvement I cited was purely with respect to the Chicago series. Given the fact that he could put up good numbers against Dallas, Miami seemed to rely on him and I can't rule out that LeBron was fine with this considering how listless LeBron was during the series. He needed to do better. He didn't. He NEEDED to step up and do work and he did not. Wade did.
I saw your link. I'm not sure what it is, but Wade seemed to deal with the help defense a lot better than LeBron did. We can chalk it up to whatever, but LeBron's offense just looked forced and uncomfortable. Dallas would essentially force him to pass and he'd just drift away, act passive, not attack... it was infuriating. Just passing away and not getting involved and being incapable of moving the way he used to. It's the drifting away from the action that turned everything upside down from Miami - whereas Wade would continue to attack and stay aggressive, LeBron seemed far too content to stand and watch and "make the right play" when he gets swarmed, which was Dallas' aim in the first place. Wade to this day demands double teams, there's nothing new there. But it seemed that Dallas put particular emphasis on neutralizing LeBron more than anyone else, and that worked perfectly. And the killer was Miami not adjusting at all.
Yes, we pretty much agree then .
My only point was that yes, they game planned for LeBron more but they certainly weren't just letting Wade abuse his man in single coverages. That's why I don't get when sometimes people say, "they just wanted to stop LeBron and let Wade do whatever he wanted". Well, that's not true because when you are seeing multiple help defenders as well they are not just letting you do whatever you want. IMO their strategy was to first get the ball out of LeBron's hands and then also shift the defensive attention towards Wade similarly by throwing help defenders at him. For whatever reason Wade was more with comfortable with 2 or 3 defenders and LeBron was more concerned with the right pass in that series as you said.
I am watching a lot of Wade's highlights from that series right now and the one thing that jumps out at me right away is how much better Wade was moving without the ball. LeBron would make the right pass but then sometimes he wouldn't move much which made him that much easier to defend IMO.
JordansBulls wrote:The Warriors are basically a good college team until they meet a team with bigs in the NBA.
Brenice wrote:This thread is shameless. All these ridiculous excuses.
I don't think this thread is about excuses, but about trying to analyze this series strategically rather than the stale "CHOKER/LeLoser" stuff that's always regurgitated.
Yeah, I don't think anyone would denies the fact that Lebron DID played very badly in this series. What is interesting is why and how did that happen, because, yes, you won't find many finals by players of his caliber where they play this badly and this passively.
That's why I don't get when sometimes people say, "they just wanted to stop LeBron and let Wade do whatever he wanted". Well, that's not true because when you are seeing multiple help defenders as well they are not just letting you do whatever you want.
I think it might have been directed at me because I said something like that earlier in this topic. I totally agree, and maybe I should have phrased it differently because I did not wanted to say that Dallas wasn't trying to stop Wade. They tried, they just couldn't. It's was more like : "This stategy (of making one player bring the ball up, forcing him to decide to pass, and hopefully make him passive) has more chance to work on James that Wade". And I think you are spot on about the off ball play of Wade and James, and it's one of the reason this strategy that worked on James wouldn't have worked on Wade.
TheGr81 wrote:I think he [Wilt] had similar athleticism, skill level and basketball IQ as Javale McGee
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