Ball so hard wrote:Kilroy wrote:Ball so hard wrote:
6ers and Bucks will likely be tough.
Agreed, and those teams will be tough... I'm not too worried though about them. I think the Sixers are going to struggle this year with chemistry. I think Simmons and Embiid may be getting a little tired of sharing the spotlight with each other, and year after year of getting close but not winning it all, is going to start grinding on them. They're young too, and Embiid at least is a little immature...
I think the Bucks over-achieved last season... Giannis is a smaller version of Davis with no jump shot. I think they're going to try to rely heavily on him again this year and teams will have figured him out a little more.
I don't think it's going to be a team that matches up size wise with us that's going to be the team (or couple teams) that have the formula to give us headaches. It's just going to be that team with a weird matchup combination... Maybe the Nuggets, or a team like Portland or something that just fits in our natural weaknesses.
I'm intentionally not mentioning that other team in LA because I don't want to speak it into existence, but they might have the formula too... They're going to test LeBrons defense like maybe no other team in the league.
Yea, i'm also afraid of Houston. Say what you want about Russ's fit next to Harden...i'm not sure we have a single player on our roster that can slow either of these two down. It will likely take a great defensive game plan to slow down these two. These two have the potential to put our guys in foul trouble. They have two players (Tucker and Capela) that should be adequate at defending AD. They have no answer for Lebron.
That's a matchup where Davis may have to play a lot of C... I think if we throw AB, KCP and Green at Russ and Harden, with LeBron at PF and Davis at C, we can slow them down and still play to our strengths...
The thing is, like the Clips, adding a second guy that does the same things, isn't always a net-positive... They are going to have to figure out how to have a flowing offense that keeps both of them involved, or they're going to stagnate and end up hurting each other. One of the 2 of those teams is going to struggle.. I'm not sure which right now, but my money is on Houston. I think Harden is more interested in his individual stats than he is about his rings... I think last season was almost a perfect season for him... It's a matter of time before Westbrook's personality gets in the way.
In fact, I can't really think of a team that was successful with 2 ball dominant stars like that...
That said, for any of these teams, if we come out and play the right way, we can put all of them on their heels and force them to try to figure out how to slow us down instead of us slowing them down.
I mean, if Davis and Lebron are in sync and on fire, if McGee is active on both ends of the floor, if Green is 3 and D-ing efficiently, along with Bradley... We're going to be getting out in front early... Probably by double digits...
Never have rice at Hanzo's house...