2024 NBA FINALS: #1 Boston Celtics vs #5 Dallas Mavericks (BOS leads 3-0)

[rapstarter]

This video is a really good explanation of Porzingis' injury.....looks like he'll still be able to play but it'll effect his game for sure. Impaired function with pain. Mavs will definitely be going at him, he'll struggle to guard a shifty player like Kyrie.

Watch on YouTube

Lively with another Mavs lane violation to this time injure Porzingis.

These guys are out of control refs someone do something.

Are you serious? That's a normal basketball play you see every second free throw. It just happened to involve a player who's famous for being injury prone.

[Bob8]

Luka was a liability on defense in game 2.

The Celtics targeted him over and over and the Mavs defense collapsed because he couldn't keep anyone in front of him.

This could have easily been a blowout if Boston had made their open 3s.

Luka's obviously a great player but a lot of his work on offense gets undone by his defense when he plays like this. This was easily one of the worst defensive performances I've seen on this stage by a superstar.

He can get by on defense against a 4-out offense with the 5 roaming behind him. He has no one to bail him out against Boston's 5-out. He has to step up.

Celtics scored 107 and 105 points and we're talking about Mavs D? Really? On the other hand Mavs scored miserably 88 and 97? Do you really believe that Mavs lost because of D?
In game 2 Mavs outside Luka have been able to hit 11% of open 3s. They made 2 3s.

But if you insist talking about Luka's D, Mavs plan is to direct Celtics penetration to help, which I agree is more capable than Luka to defend, and to rotate him and others primarily defenders to shooters. I understand that GB is not the place for serious discussion, but basketball is a little more complex than it seems.

[California Gold]

Luka's getting the job done and he's got to stay with it until some of his teammates join the party.

Read on Twitter

Except that Luka has been horrible on defense and one or two plays don't make up for all the bad ones where he looks like he isn't even trying. Prime Harden esque.

Even on plays where his man easily beats him he tries to reach for a steal the same way Harden used to do lazily. Hey.. sometimes it'll work and net in a turnover but just overall pathetic level of effort.

[165bows]

This video is a really good explanation of Porzingis' injury.....looks like he'll still be able to play but it'll effect his game for sure. Impaired function with pain. Mavs will definitely be going at him, he'll struggle to guard a shifty player like Kyrie.

Watch on YouTube

Lively with another Mavs lane violation to this time injure Porzingis.

These guys are out of control refs someone do something.

Are you serious? That's a normal basketball play you see every second free throw. It just happened to involve a player who's famous for being injury prone.

Cool thx for explaining that.

Also a violation that resulted in injuring a player so here we are.

[Bob8]

Lively with another Mavs lane violation to this time injure Porzingis.

These guys are out of control refs someone do something.

Are you serious? That's a normal basketball play you see every second free throw. It just happened to involve a player who's famous for being injury prone.

Cool thx for explaining that.

Also a violation that resulted in injuring a player so here we are.

Kp is in Boston because he was nonstop injured first in New York and then in Dallas. That's his normal state of body.

[HotRocks34]

Luka's getting the job done and he's got to stay with it until some of his teammates join the party.

Read on Twitter

Except that Luka has been horrible on defense and one or two plays don't make up for all the bad ones where he looks like he isn't even trying. Prime Harden esque.

Even on plays where his man easily beats him he tries to reach for a steal the same way Harden used to do lazily. Hey.. sometimes it'll work and net in a turnover but just overall pathetic level of effort.

False.



There's plenty more data and highlights to back me up.

I've gone over this elsewhere so no need to repeat it here.

[Yinwest]

Injured Clippers, Rookie OKC, young and dumb Minnesota, hey but the west tho

[rapstarter]

Lively with another Mavs lane violation to this time injure Porzingis.

These guys are out of control refs someone do something.

Are you serious? That's a normal basketball play you see every second free throw. It just happened to involve a player who's famous for being injury prone.

Cool thx for explaining that.

Also a violation that resulted in injuring a player so here we are.

It happens at both ends EVERY single time and there was clearly no intent to injure him. What's next? Porzingis get his 100th injury, this time dribbling a basketball, and we change traveling rules for him? "Out of control" lol

[California Gold]

Luka's getting the job done and he's got to stay with it until some of his teammates join the party.

Read on Twitter

Except that Luka has been horrible on defense and one or two plays don't make up for all the bad ones where he looks like he isn't even trying. Prime Harden esque.

Even on plays where his man easily beats him he tries to reach for a steal the same way Harden used to do lazily. Hey.. sometimes it'll work and net in a turnover but just overall pathetic level of effort.

False.



There's plenty more data and highlights to back me up.

I've gone over this elsewhere so no need to repeat it here.

Yet there's plenty of highlights.. or lowlights.. to back up exactly what I'm saying as well. It's alright.. Fanboys will always try to defend their guy. I get it. I'm just adding to the objective discussion in this thread is all.

Even this level of defense by his fanboys is similar to Harden's time with a lot of fellow Rockets fans doing the same. Deja vu.

[Bob8]

Luka's getting the job done and he's got to stay with it until some of his teammates join the party.

Read on Twitter

Except that Luka has been horrible on defense and one or two plays don't make up for all the bad ones where he looks like he isn't even trying. Prime Harden esque.

Even on plays where his man easily beats him he tries to reach for a steal the same way Harden used to do lazily. Hey.. sometimes it'll work and net in a turnover but just overall pathetic level of effort.

Directing Tatum and Brown in help D is by design.

But let say that Luka is awful in D. Just imagine how awful must Tatum be, struggling to score against the worst defender in playoffs. Luka would have scored 150 against himself, Tatum can't score 20.

[HotRocks34]

Except that Luka has been horrible on defense and one or two plays don't make up for all the bad ones where he looks like he isn't even trying. Prime Harden esque.

Even on plays where his man easily beats him he tries to reach for a steal the same way Harden used to do lazily. Hey.. sometimes it'll work and net in a turnover but just overall pathetic level of effort.

False.



There's plenty more data and highlights to back me up.

I've gone over this elsewhere so no need to repeat it here.

Yet there's plenty of highlights.. or lowlights.. to back up exactly what I'm saying as well. It's alright.. Fanboys will always try to defend their guy. I get it. I'm just adding to the objective discussion in this thread is all.

You have no idea what you're talking about and I won't waste another second of my time talking to you.

Research is your friend.

[Chanel Bomber]

Luka was a liability on defense in game 2.

The Celtics targeted him over and over and the Mavs defense collapsed because he couldn't keep anyone in front of him.

This could have easily been a blowout if Boston had made their open 3s.

Luka's obviously a great player but a lot of his work on offense gets undone by his defense when he plays like this. This was easily one of the worst defensive performances I've seen on this stage by a superstar.

He can get by on defense against a 4-out offense with the 5 roaming behind him. He has no one to bail him out against Boston's 5-out. He has to step up.

Celtics scored 107 and 105 points and we're talking about Mavs D? Really? On the other hand Mavs scored miserably 88 and 97? Do you really believe that Mavs lost because of D?
In game 2 Mavs outside Luka have been able to hit 11% of open 3s. They made 2 3s.

But if you insist talking about Luka's D, Mavs plan is to direct Celtics penetration to help, which I agree is more capable than Luka to defend, and to rotate him and others primarily defenders to shooters. I understand that GB is not the place for serious discussion, but basketball is a little more complex than it seems.

The Mavs defensive gameplan is not to collapse in the paint and leave the Celtics shooters wide open on the perimeter. This is what happened repeatedly in game 2 off of Boston's dribble penetration against Luka. So I appreciate your smug energy, but I'd argue that making the argument that the Mavs defense was sound in game 2 isn't "serious discussion", if anything.

The reason why it didn't cost Dallas more points and a blowout was Boston's lower-than-usual conversion on their open 3s. You don't evaluate a scheme merely by the outcome in a single game, but also by the process and the type of shots it generates. Dallas played with fire all game long on defense and it started with Luka's defense.

Obviously, Luka played great on offense, and Dallas's shooters shot horribly. This was another issue for Dallas. Not the sole issue.

I don't know why I would need to make the second point when highlighting the first.

Maybe you have a Luka problem. I don't know.

[California Gold]

Luka's getting the job done and he's got to stay with it until some of his teammates join the party.

Read on Twitter

Except that Luka has been horrible on defense and one or two plays don't make up for all the bad ones where he looks like he isn't even trying. Prime Harden esque.

Even on plays where his man easily beats him he tries to reach for a steal the same way Harden used to do lazily. Hey.. sometimes it'll work and net in a turnover but just overall pathetic level of effort.

Directing Tatum and Brown in help D is by design.

But let say that Luka is awful in D. Just imagine how awful must Tatum be, struggling to score against the worst defender in playoffs. Luka would have scored 150 against himself, Tatum can't score 20.

The levels of copium by fanboys.

Can't defend Luka's putrid defense so lets attack another player's putrid play. Whether Tatum is **** or not, it doesn't change what Luka is on defense. Sorry folks.

[rapstarter]

Except that Luka has been horrible on defense and one or two plays don't make up for all the bad ones where he looks like he isn't even trying. Prime Harden esque.

Even on plays where his man easily beats him he tries to reach for a steal the same way Harden used to do lazily. Hey.. sometimes it'll work and net in a turnover but just overall pathetic level of effort.

False.



There's plenty more data and highlights to back me up.

I've gone over this elsewhere so no need to repeat it here.

Yet there's plenty of highlights.. or lowlights.. to back up exactly what I'm saying as well. It's alright.. Fanboys will always try to defend their guy. I get it. I'm just adding to the objective discussion in this thread is all.

Even this level of defense by his fanboys is similar to Harden's time with a lot of fellow Rockets fans doing the same. Deja vu.

Focusing on highlights/lowlights when the number clearly disagrees is not adding to the objective discussion. It's cherry picking. It's like looking at the clips of all the missed shots and saying a player had an off-shooting night, when the box score says something liek 10/17 3FG

[California Gold]

False.



There's plenty more data and highlights to back me up.

I've gone over this elsewhere so no need to repeat it here.

Yet there's plenty of highlights.. or lowlights.. to back up exactly what I'm saying as well. It's alright.. Fanboys will always try to defend their guy. I get it. I'm just adding to the objective discussion in this thread is all.

You have no idea what you're talking about and I won't waste another second of my time talking to you.

Research is your friend.

Ah the good ol' I'm right you're wrong by the fanboy. It's alright bud, I'm sure you'll pop up again to whiteknight in his defense at some point later in this series.

[165bows]

Are you serious? That's a normal basketball play you see every second free throw. It just happened to involve a player who's famous for being injury prone.

Cool thx for explaining that.

Also a violation that resulted in injuring a player so here we are.

It happens at both ends EVERY single time and there was clearly no intent to injure him. What's next? Porzingis get his 100th injury, this time dribbling a basketball, and we change traveling rules for him? "Out of control" lol

You scoff but yet you don't have a sense of humor.

Nevertheless it wasn't me that ran Porzingis over like a clod in the middle of the lane trying to run down the court.

[rapstarter]

Cool thx for explaining that.

Also a violation that resulted in injuring a player so here we are.

It happens at both ends EVERY single time and there was clearly no intent to injure him. What's next? Porzingis get his 100th injury, this time dribbling a basketball, and we change traveling rules for him? "Out of control" lol

You scoff but yet you don't have a sense of humor.

Nevertheless it wasn't me that ran Porzingis over like a clod in the middle of the lane trying to run down the court.

And it's clear you have zero sense of anything if you think there was anything out of control or unnatural about that play.

[California Gold]

False.



There's plenty more data and highlights to back me up.

I've gone over this elsewhere so no need to repeat it here.

Yet there's plenty of highlights.. or lowlights.. to back up exactly what I'm saying as well. It's alright.. Fanboys will always try to defend their guy. I get it. I'm just adding to the objective discussion in this thread is all.

Even this level of defense by his fanboys is similar to Harden's time with a lot of fellow Rockets fans doing the same. Deja vu.

Focusing on highlights/lowlights when the number clearly disagrees is not adding to the objective discussion. It's cherry picking. It's like looking at the clips of all the missed shots and saying a player had an off-shooting night, when the box score says something liek 10/17 3FG

Cherrypicking? No there's plenty of evidence showing how Luka was on defense through these two games. Luka has a ton of fanboys on this board, it's a tough thing to get a meaningful objective discussion. It's no different though than other players we've seen here over the years.

[rapstarter]

Yet there's plenty of highlights.. or lowlights.. to back up exactly what I'm saying as well. It's alright.. Fanboys will always try to defend their guy. I get it. I'm just adding to the objective discussion in this thread is all.

Even this level of defense by his fanboys is similar to Harden's time with a lot of fellow Rockets fans doing the same. Deja vu.

Focusing on highlights/lowlights when the number clearly disagrees is not adding to the objective discussion. It's cherry picking. It's like looking at the clips of all the missed shots and saying a player had an off-shooting night, when the box score says something liek 10/17 3FG

Cherrypicking? No there's plenty of evidence showing how Luka was on defense through these two games. Luka has a ton of fanboys on this board, it's a tough thing to get a meaningful objective discussion. It's no different though than other players we've seen here over the years.

Full data says otherwise, so yeah, it's cherry picking. That's literally what focusing on highlights/lowlights is. If you only looked at players' highlights, you'd think everyone shoots 100%.

[165bows]

It happens at both ends EVERY single time and there was clearly no intent to injure him. What's next? Porzingis get his 100th injury, this time dribbling a basketball, and we change traveling rules for him? "Out of control" lol

You scoff but yet you don't have a sense of humor.

Nevertheless it wasn't me that ran Porzingis over like a clod in the middle of the lane trying to run down the court.

And it's clear you have zero sense of anything if you think there was anything out of control or unnatural about that play.

Your ability to detect sarcasm has not improved but what can I say, Canada and cultural differences and what not, I get what I deserve here. Anyways Lively told you he was gunning for his leg if you'd been paying attention.

Watch on YouTube