MarxyLebronist wrote:I've enjoyed helping stoke and also put out these fires about Iverson vs. Curry, Lebron vs..... every single greatest ever apparently? Etc.
But the truth is that the storylines and shame point scores are far too clearly drafted by the league.
Talk of "underdog" this and "no help that," ad nauseam so far this season after a really restful Warriors hype-free bubble and offseason is tipping the hand. I'm no gambler, but I imagine it's going to be wise to bet on Curry for MVP here near future, if not already, and bets on everyone else will be in and pocketed to make it a nice profit for the house regardless.
And I absolutely expect the Warriors to dominate the Blazers tonight. The one hedge I'll offer: even if it's only a narrow win tonight, it will be perfect to get started with and they will ABSOLUTELY demolish the Kings tomorrow night. I came into the season hoping to see some changes for the Kings, and I certainly love Haliburton's game so far. But they're going to get clocked hardcore tomorrow night and are not playoff locks by any stretch obviously. Wish it were otherwise, though that arena deal hostage situation on Sacramento's head earns you some bad karma perhaps. Warriors, from the top through the players' locker room, are aiming at a specific standings window to maximize "assets," and that window is, roughly, a play-in playoff team that keeps its own pick while also adding MIN's. But I expect them to not have to play-in at all, for reasons, and to also help solidify the complicit and nerd voters' case for doing what they want to do already and give Curry another MVP to win the argument.
So there's my locked in pick for the season, in a season that I'd be hard pressed to make many other calls on- Lakers are no title lock, 76ers may indeed keep rolling as is, Harden may choose to stay and see what they can cook up all together down there in HOU, after all that noise. But this amount of chaos and the insane scoring (no take on blowouts just yet, but those were so quickly downplayed that they smell funny too) plays into the usual weak storywriters' "twist" and "disruption" hands, and that outcome is pretty much always actually very uninteresting. Most billionaires have tiny imaginations outside of the one thing they're very good at: controlling all the capital.
I don't know what a "small market" could even be in such a collusive, global, profit-sharing structure, but I do know that cities that struggle to appeal alongside the rich megaliths like LA, NY, CHI, MIA?, DAL, Bay Area, are what we really mean. ATL does not count at all as a small or undesirable market, for but one example of a lame season outcome that could be produced this year. I would be comfortable making ATL my title call, by this logic, though I don't actually think you could "sell" that since their talent isn't good enough and also they deserve some bad karma for all their blocky FA work. Where have wee seen that before lol. But we shall see.
I see CLE and DET as the only two of those to have a title in the past 30 seasons.
Curry "rising up" (from being the highest paid player in the league and a supposed GOAT?) this year and proving all tha haterz wrong would be the most predictable, snotty, Hollywood formula outcome for my money, and so that's where I'm putting it with my deep expertise in narrative and cultural analysis.
If Golden State holds on.. good call OP. Let's see how the Warriors play tomorrow.
