2016 Playoffs Round 1: OKC Thunder vs. Dallas Mavericks

[Andre Roberstan]

It's frustrating cause Foye's actually not terrible off the ball, and Dion's catch and shoot has been much better than it was before. BUT WE DON'T PLAY THE GUY WHO COULD PUT THEM OFF THE BALL.

[bwgood77]

Oh, the problem with the coach is rotations. He just doesn't understand them.

And I get all fans compain but he went 2 months into the season before he realized the backup PG sucked. So after he switched and it worked, he benched the guy playing well for Randy Foye. And here we stand with lineups having no PG and Durant turning it over 7 times a game. But hey, why play a PG when you can let Foye and Dion try it.

Are you saying it should be Payne who is playing? Or Westbrook? Because I know he took a bit of heat from the media for resting Durant and Westbrook at the same time and not having one on the court at all times (not that what the media says should necessarily matter).

[Andre Roberstan]

Oh, the problem with the coach is rotations. He just doesn't understand them.

And I get all fans compain but he went 2 months into the season before he realized the backup PG sucked. So after he switched and it worked, he benched the guy playing well for Randy Foye. And here we stand with lineups having no PG and Durant turning it over 7 times a game. But hey, why play a PG when you can let Foye and Dion try it.

Are you saying it should be Payne who is playing? Or Westbrook? Because I know he took a bit of heat from the media for resting Durant and Westbrook at the same time and not having one on the court at all times (not that what the media says should necessarily matter).

Payne needs to play. He plays and our bench looks good. He doesn't play and our bench looks bad. The staggering is fine, but expecting Durant to carry the playmaking load in a Foye/Waiters/Durant/Ibaka/Kanter lineup just DOES NOT WORK.

I'm sure Mavs fans are having the same conversation about Justin Anderson.

[bondom34]

Oh, the problem with the coach is rotations. He just doesn't understand them.

And I get all fans compain but he went 2 months into the season before he realized the backup PG sucked. So after he switched and it worked, he benched the guy playing well for Randy Foye. And here we stand with lineups having no PG and Durant turning it over 7 times a game. But hey, why play a PG when you can let Foye and Dion try it.

Are you saying it should be Payne who is playing? Or Westbrook? Because I know he took a bit of heat from the media for resting Durant and Westbrook at the same time and not having one on the court at all times (not that what the media says should necessarily matter).

Payne. They put the best stretch of the year in until he got benched. From December 27th through February 19 when herally got minutes cut. Went 20-4

http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/OKC/2016_games.html

[bondom34]

Oh, the problem with the coach is rotations. He just doesn't understand them.

And I get all fans compain but he went 2 months into the season before he realized the backup PG sucked. So after he switched and it worked, he benched the guy playing well for Randy Foye. And here we stand with lineups having no PG and Durant turning it over 7 times a game. But hey, why play a PG when you can let Foye and Dion try it.

Are you saying it should be Payne who is playing? Or Westbrook? Because I know he took a bit of heat from the media for resting Durant and Westbrook at the same time and not having one on the court at all times (not that what the media says should necessarily matter).

Payne needs to play. He plays and our bench looks good. He doesn't play and our bench looks bad. The staggering is fine, but expecting Durant to carry the playmaking load in a Foye/Waiters/Durant/Ibaka/Kanter lineup just DOES NOT WORK.

I'm sure Mavs fans are having the same conversation about Justin Anderson.

Who started

[spearsy23]

You got your years mixed up.

2014 Grizzlies series, Brooks shortcomings were in full display. Clippers couldn't guard Russ and KD, simple as that. I don't even want to talk about the Spurs series.

Wait, you're talking about the series we won? I mean, those Grizz teams were good tough teams, beating them isn't like beating this Mavs team. Yeah, it wasn't super imaginative, but Brooks offense almost always won out even when it didn't look pretty. And the 2012 Spurs series he out coached Pops, and we looked like we would go toe to toe with them in 2014 whenever Serge was healthy. People have built up Brooks failures into something larger than they actually ever were.

So because he won with 3 of the best players in the series that means he's a good coach? They won because they had the better team.

You are literally handing Brooks credit because he had the best players in majority of his series. He didn't outcoached ****, KD and Harden comepletely took over the series against the Spurs. Along with Thabo having the best game of his career in game 3(or 4).

Teams generally don't win if players suck, that's just the way the game works. He was the driving force behind the development of Russ, KD, Harden, Reggie, Serge, and even Steven to an extent. People love to bash him for his in game adjustments, which were mediocre but nowhere near as horrible as you all pretend, but completely ignore the way he empowered his players and got maximum effort on a nightly basis. And yes, he did out coach Pop. The most specific example is the Russ/KD pin down that was implemented in that series and spammed time and time again to great effect down the stretch.

Once again the 2 best player were in OKC for the Grizzlies and Clippers series. Also giving him credit for Thabo and Perkins being defensive geniuses is pretty outlandish.

Russ better than Paul before last year is a pretty outlandish statement and you'd find few who agree. Regardless, they were pretty evenly matched teams and Brooks didn't ever cost us games. And it's actually kinda hilarious propping up Perk and Thabo, especially Perk who everyone knew was a piss poor excuse for a starting center.

Apparently you had no problem with brooks not developing Lamb(same problem with Payne now) and riding with Butler and Fisher. Harden even got into a fight with Brooks in the 2012 Finals over his ass playing Fisher more minutes over him.

If you're going to trash him for Lamb then you need to give him credit for every other young player that turned into something special. And you think he should've played Harden more in those finals? Harden was trash. Playing him more was the last thing to do. The usual criticism is that he should have benched Perk, and while I'd agree, the decision not to didn't cost us anything because we were outmatched that whole series.

Stop acting like Brooks was this lokey genius who had no flaws and was a god at rotations and plays which is far from the truth.

Genius? This is the problem with these discussions, people have no nuance and it's all black and white. Scott was a top 5-10 coach in the NBA, for a young team I'd say he would be the best possible coach. Was he the greatest thing ever? No. There are maybe 3 or o4 coaches in the world that could actually swing the outcome of a series in a positive direction despite having less talent, he isn't one of them. But firing him for anyone but Carlisle/Pop/Kerr/Budenholzer was going to be at best a lateral move, and at worst a disaster. It ended up being a downgrade and a pretty significant one, 15 blown 4th quarter leads proves that.

[bwgood77]

Oh, the problem with the coach is rotations. He just doesn't understand them.

And I get all fans compain but he went 2 months into the season before he realized the backup PG sucked. So after he switched and it worked, he benched the guy playing well for Randy Foye. And here we stand with lineups having no PG and Durant turning it over 7 times a game. But hey, why play a PG when you can let Foye and Dion try it.

Are you saying it should be Payne who is playing? Or Westbrook? Because I know he took a bit of heat from the media for resting Durant and Westbrook at the same time and not having one on the court at all times (not that what the media says should necessarily matter).

Payne. They put the best stretch of the year in until he got benched. From December 27th through February 19 when herally got minutes cut. Went 20-4

http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/OKC/2016_games.html

Looks like he resumed playing quite a bit from March 14th on. Was he injured at all in between?

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/p/payneca01/gamelog/2016/

[bondom34]

Are you saying it should be Payne who is playing? Or Westbrook? Because I know he took a bit of heat from the media for resting Durant and Westbrook at the same time and not having one on the court at all times (not that what the media says should necessarily matter).

Payne. They put the best stretch of the year in until he got benched. From December 27th through February 19 when herally got minutes cut. Went 20-4

http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/OKC/2016_games.html

Looks like he resumed playing quite a bit from March 14th on. Was he injured at all in between?

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/p/payneca01/gamelog/2016/

His minutes were halved, and the only heavy minute games were blowouts or guys sitting. He was hurt recently but not major and he could have played from what was reported I believe. It was just a coaching decision.

[spearsy23]

Are you saying it should be Payne who is playing? Or Westbrook? Because I know he took a bit of heat from the media for resting Durant and Westbrook at the same time and not having one on the court at all times (not that what the media says should necessarily matter).

Payne. They put the best stretch of the year in until he got benched. From December 27th through February 19 when herally got minutes cut. Went 20-4

http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/OKC/2016_games.html

Looks like he resumed playing quite a bit from March 14th on. Was he injured at all in between?

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/p/payneca01/gamelog/2016/

Dion's brother died and he missed a week or so, then Singler was injured for several games, then we started resting guys. He fell out of the normal rotation but circumstances kept him playing. It was pretty obvious he'd be back out once the playoffs started, but some people still had an ounce of hope left.

[Marcus50]

Having let the heat wear off a bit we did some things well tonight. We defended well even though Russ was not as active on his man as game 1. Adams was very good defending Dirk in the 2nd half and was excellentdown the stretch possibly the best performance on the night.

Where did it go astray?. K Ds shooting was poor and is a straight forward fix. Playing without a point guard still baffles me. My pick is that Donovan will get forced into playing Payne in the playoffs just as Brooks was forced into playing Adams in his rookie year. Donovans lack of experience showed tonight. Exhorting KD to keep shooting was not a good call. KD got into that space where he became desperate to sink them. I would have closed with Morrow out there to get better spacing but hey that's just me.

[bondom34]

F it this sounds corny,but just want to say I'm really grateful for you all. Its good to have this group to vent after games like this.

[bondom34]

Who's ready for another 30 point blowout? I know you guys love to depressed but this is our year

This however.....little premature.

[spearsy23]

Warriors win by 9 without the MVP. This is the first time since 2011 that I've felt like our fully healthy squad can't compete with another team.

[bondom34]

Warriors win by 9 without the MVP. This is the first time since 2011 that I've felt like our fully healthy squad can't compete with another team.

I've known that one since November or December, kinda ready for the offseason.

Also, Houston kinda stinks. This was basically OKC without KD.

[spearsy23]

Warriors win by 9 without the MVP. This is the first time since 2011 that I've felt like our fully healthy squad can't compete with another team.

I've known that one since November or December, kinda ready for the offseason.

Also, Houston kinda stinks. This was basically OKC without KD.

Up until the post all-star break suckitude there was still some level of hope that we could give them a good series. Maybe somehow push them to seven and at least have a shot. Now? I'd consider it playing above our best if we took either them or San Antonio to 6 games.

[bondom34]

Warriors win by 9 without the MVP. This is the first time since 2011 that I've felt like our fully healthy squad can't compete with another team.

I've known that one since November or December, kinda ready for the offseason.

Also, Houston kinda stinks. This was basically OKC without KD.

Up until the post all-star break suckitude there was still some level of hope that we could give them a good series. Maybe somehow push them to seven and at least have a shot. Now? I'd consider it playing above our best if we took either them or San Antonio to 6 games.

I still think they hang with the Spurs possibly. GSW kills them.

[Pillendreher]

I've had it with both Presti and Donovan. For the sake of this franchise, both need to go in the summer.

[Pillendreher]

This has been our bench production per player so far:

4,8 Pts / 3,2 Reb / 0,7 Ast / 0,6 Stl / 0,1 Blk / 0,9 Tov / 1,7 PF / 35 FG% / 27 3P%

40 % of our playing time has been taken up by this kind of performance.

[Bergmaniac]

Yet another plain dumb game by the Thunder this season. They let the Dallas off the hook by running terrible plays and taking really dumb shots all night. Yes, usually Durant would make enough of these to win pretty comfortably, but that is no excuse. This should never have been close against this really mediocre and short-handed Dallas team.

This is the type of game the Thunder supposedly got Kanter for. Durant's shot was terribly off, Westbrook's wasn't much better, nobody could hit a 3, the opposing centre was nothing special...Yet he barely ever got the ball on offense, only 7 shots and most of them came after offensive rebounds. Just run the pick the roll with him, it is not like there is anything complicated here, Westbrook and Kanter were destroying defenses like this last season even though the rest of the roster was pretty bad with Durant out. Now it is barely used. And when Westbrook sits, Durant should try to ran that pick and roll with Kanter way more instead of taking contested long 2s from 20 feet and the 3s with 18 seconds on the shot clock and a hand in his face.

And for the love of God this Durant as PG nonsense has got to stop.

You should still win the series pretty easily because this Dallas team is just too short-handed and lacking in talent, but it is not a good sign for the rest of the playoffs. The Spurs and the Dubs are too good to beat them playing such dumb basketball.

Part of this is on Donovan for sure, but it is also the old problem again - Westbrook and Durant are very willing to share the ball at the start of the game and when the team has a comfortable lead but when things are close, they tend to try to do too much by themselves.

[NaturalThunder]

You know what makes losing by one even more frustrating in hindsight?

I can think of three times where Durant was obviously fouled last night and the ref swallowed his whistle. That back-to-back possession set where he got raked across the arm on a shot attempt with no foul call then got body checked by Mejri (who didn't stay vertical at all) with no foul call were very crucial in hindsight. Not only did Durant miss a dozen or so open shots he makes 60%+ of the time, the refs didn't do him any favors, either.