Right wasn't he suppose to average 17
Official NBA 2016-2017 Thread - 30 teams, 1 goal. 2 weeks left, so much can happen!!
Right wasn't he suppose to average 17
Cause Klay wants out
Smfh
Everybody getting their shots every single game
The day that made up rumor came out all 3 of them damn near dropped 30 smfh
One of the dumbest rumors ive ever seen!!; Klay aint going no where and GS definitely not trading him for that Boston shit; Klay got 15 just missed; most of the shots were wide open; he will be alright; Media just need something to talk about; KD is getting more and more comfortable and talkative; They are going to be really good after the all star break; I expect them to commit more to the defensive end by then; Just not sure why Kerr isnt playing looney and ian more....
Bro he doesnt come in here when LBJ loses or GS wins; That mofo will be silent until GS loses; then he will come in and say see I told you KD wouldnt work...
Working thru it.
I think Mcgee should be on the court a lot more.
And I like the 2nd unit defense with livingston iggy and mccaw just add a scorer and it's pretty set
Trade Clay for some inside help.
another dumb statement...
I dont think they need to add another scorer; Kerr is always gonna have 1 of the 4 at all times; I just think McCaw, Ian, and Looney need to play more; With McGee, Iggy, and Livingston, well thats a nice bench; Zaza and West need to only play about 15-20 combine mins, maybe less....
Yeah a dumb rumor. That would have devastated the Warriors team moral, especially with Curry and Draymond. Also would have been upsetting to Durant as he was sold on playing with the entire group
Why is everyone trying to make Golden State a perfect team? With them not having the perfect rim protection is makes the games somewhat competitive.
Y'all trying to make it so that Golden State wins every game by 30
McGee took looney minutes as they are trying to see what McGee brings. Damion is close to being back and he is an athletic 7 footer who will provide defense and rim protection
He had paragraphs on paragraphs on how he would not score more than 17.
Then he will use his classic response that the Cavs are not playing hard to not get injured. But Golden State has everything wrong with them
I don't know if the rookie will get playing time..to be honest don't think they need him
When I say add a scorer I don't mean another person I mean have either klay out there or Durant out there with them
I'd also like a draymond and klay with the 2nd unit. great defense and klay is the ##1 option on offense with about 3 willing passers who don't really want to shoot
Yup. once he's back we will see what time it is
My main complaint is they don't play as hard as they should and that might be a Kerr thing
They played hard every night with luke
Shouldve been Co coach of the year last year or give it to luke actually imo
This doesn't mean Kerr isnt a good coach it just means he nerds to tighten the effort up
I think them playing hard last year all the time ruin them because ultimately they didn't win; they not about to play hard until after the break;and to be honest no need to; looney mccaw mccgee need to play hard, the rest can coast and learn each other...
That faggit... he has everyone on ignore except Bills and Gene
fuck that basketball troll
Real Big Deal
Karl-Anthony Towns isn't just Rookie of the Year or the next great NBA center. He's the man destined to redefine what it means to dominate.
by Kevin Arnovitz
TRUEHOOP PRESENTS
Real Big Deal[/SIZE]
11/17/16
Karl-Anthony Towns is struggling. It's a Saturday night in early April at Portland's Moda Center, and the 27-52 Timberwolves are facing the 43-37 Trail Blazers, the season's most improbable success story -- and an aspirational template for the Wolves. Portland, despite having exactly one regular over the age of 26, has cultivated a veteran vibe and culture. It's what Karl-Anthony Towns seeks to build in Minneapolis. But these are things constructed over time with smaller achievements.
Tonight in Portland is just another game, one more push of the boulder up the mountain. But by the time it's over, it will become something more: a microcosm of Towns' rookie year and an illustration of why this 20-year-old is not just the next great NBA big but a paradigm for all who will follow.
Less than 30 seconds into the game comes the first glimpse. As Blazers forward Mo Harkless slices through the lane and contorts his body for a twisting left-handed layup, Towns knows his front-line collaborator, Gorgui Dieng, has it all under control. Towns is blessed with many defensive skills, among them the ability to seemingly spot a well-timed rejection before palm ever meets leather. So he's already watching the glass, balls of his feet planted, ready to absorb the load of his 7-foot frame before he bounces off the floor and snags what remains of the shot.
With only a few games left in the season, Towns' rebounding average has hovered around 10 per game. He set finishing the year in double digits as a personal goal, not so much to bolster his rookie of the year candidacy -- with days left in the season, that's a fait accompli -- but because that's what any self-respecting big man does.
Now, with the ball in hand, Towns races his way through traffic down the floor, finds open space and pulls up in transition. Four dribbles and four seconds, that's all it takes. He's a man in a hurry, and the sudden stop of his quick-release jumper appears rushed. The ball barely grazes the rim. Brick.
About a minute later in a Minnesota half-court set, he hands off to Ricky Rubio, then sweeps around a few screens to claim his rightful place on the left block.
Towns works against Portland's Al-Farouq Aminu, one of these newfangled wings masquerading as a small-ball 4, as if guarding the likes of Towns for 38 minutes a night can be outsourced to any combo forward off the street. Towns flings two hard dribbles as he thrusts his left hip into Aminu, carving out room to work, before stepping back, facing up and unleashing an old-school hook shot, which circles the cylinder ... before popping out.
He spends the rest of the half grousing at himself in self-flagellation.
Towns is the NBA's big man of tomorrow
Karl-Anthony Towns merges old divisions of labor as the new complete basketball player.Brad Rempel/USA TODAY Sports
Construct a world and it will evolve over time. We can debate the nature of that evolution -- whether it's good, bad or just is. But change is irrepressible, and species that don't respond to the conditions of that change eventually die out.
So it is with basketball and the evolution of the big man. From the game's beginning, basketball roles were defined by edict. A team was an aggregation of individual skill sets, a division of labor, and the name for the tallest presence on the floor, "center," said it all: The game would revolve around this guy. The big man was an immovable force, dominating as a defensive presence in the paint. And when one of them got the ball in close proximity to the hoop, you'd better have had a defender of equal stature, or send a second body at him, or both.
Jump to the '70s, when in search of competitive advantage, disrupters like Jack Ramsay began finding new functions on the floor for their big guys. Soon you could run offense through the big men in the middle. And then all bets were off. Over time came the mobile big man, then the mobile über-athletic big man, then the mobile über-athletic big man with "skills," then the über-athletic big man with "skills" who also had range. Today, qualifying exactly what a big man does on the floor has become futile.
"It's positionless," says Kentucky coach John Calipari, whose program has become a veritable finishing school for NBA big men. Today's game is all pace, all space, all stretch. In each of the past two Finals, the Warriors and Cavaliers have disguised power forwards as centers at the series' most crucial moments -- and often without a traditional big altogether.
An open 3-pointer, once the near-exclusive purview of perimeter players, now represents a better value than a hook shot at close range. Last season 7-footers fired up more 3-pointers than in the first 13 seasons of the 3-point line combined.
The league has put the big man on notice: It's not enough anymore to take up space in the middle, shoot 60 percent at the rim, rebound in the low double digits and block a couple of shots a night. It's not even enough to shoot a little from the outside. You must now combine power and finesse and make plays for teammates and have quick feet that can switch out on speedy point guards on the pick-and-roll and run the floor and be able to catch the ball on the move and attack like a perimeter slasher and still display that old-school big-man gravitas so that your four Lilliputian teammates heed your commands, hear you calling out defensive assignments from the back line or issue a decree in the huddle during a stoppage.
That is the big man of today. But Towns isn't just the big man of today. He is the first big man of tomorrow.
Garnett worked with Towns to harness his intensity on the court. Rich Pedroncelli/AP Photo
By the time the horn blows to end the first half against the Blazers, Kevin Garnett has seen enough. Garnett, who's played 1,462 regular-season games, has spent the season administering a graduate-level seminar to Towns in Big Man-ology, working with him not only on the mechanics but the business of harnessing his intensity.
"I remember one night he was playing OKC, and he was pouting and being a bit of a baby," Garnett says. "I yanked him to the side, had some strong, comforting words for him to reassure himself and to get him to gather some confidence. I like to think that we're all human and have human moments. I like to think that was his human moment."
Likewise, tonight, during halftime, KG corners Towns in the locker room, and with the team's young future leader flailing under the weight of the moment, the team's elder stages an intervention.
"Keep your f---ing composure!" Garnett screams. "Slow down! It's going to be OK! Breathe! Breathe! And slow down! Everything is going to come! Just keep playing hard!" Towns stoically absorbs the weight of KG's sermon.
Ask Coach Calipari to describe what exactly it is that makes Towns different and he's likely to tell the story of last August, when Calipari organized a charity softball home run derby in Lexington, where Towns was the headliner. After clubbing a 380-foot moon shot on his way to the title, Towns -- who had not played organized baseball beyond the eighth grade -- received a text from an incredulous Calipari: "Is there anything you can't do? Pingpong, pool, what?" Towns responded: "I do it all, Coach. I do it all."
Indeed, despite his size -- Towns was already 6-foot-3 by the time he was 11 years old -- he spent much of his time as a young player in northern New Jersey out on the perimeter. Calipari recalls meeting coaches who had faced off against Towns in high school who described him as someone who would shoot 15 3-pointers in a game.
At 15, Towns was invited to compete on the Dominican national team -- Towns' mother, Jacqueline, was born in the Dominican Republic -- to play for Calipari and alongside Al Horford and Francisco Garcia. NBA lifer Del Harris assisted Calipari on the bench, and on the team's second day of practice, he watched Towns jack up a fusillade of 3-pointers. Harris strolled onto the court.
"You're 6-10, but you might as well be 5-10," Harris told Towns. "Get yourself down inside and learn the position."
Calipari echoed Harris, and throughout Towns' time with the Dominican team and later in Lexington, Calipari and his staff insisted that the 7-footer develop interior skills. "We're not satisfied because he has so much more," Wildcats assistant coach Kenny Payne said after Towns logged 19 and 10 in an exhibition game against a French professional team in 2014. "He has to learn that we play this game from the inside out, not outside in."
Twenty-six months later, Towns is sitting in his favorite Italian restaurant in Minneapolis, repeating those words almost verbatim about the Timberwolves. "We have a philosophy that we work from inside out, not outside in," he says as he works his way through a chicken Parmesan (no Parmesan), a brick chicken entree, linguine, potatoes, a platter of roasted Brussels sprouts and a nonalcoholic strawberry daiquiri. "Maybe it's fortunate to blend in with the new, current, modern-day NBA big, maybe it's not. What I can do is be as versatile as possible, where I could have played today or years ago when the 5s were rolling around. That's why I play. I play inside, and I also play outside. I play in both eras."
Karl-Anthony Towns isn't just Rookie of the Year or the next great NBA center. He's the man destined to redefine what it means to dominate.
by Kevin Arnovitz
TRUEHOOP PRESENTS
Real Big Deal[/SIZE]
11/17/16
Karl-Anthony Towns is struggling. It's a Saturday night in early April at Portland's Moda Center, and the 27-52 Timberwolves are facing the 43-37 Trail Blazers, the season's most improbable success story -- and an aspirational template for the Wolves. Portland, despite having exactly one regular over the age of 26, has cultivated a veteran vibe and culture. It's what Karl-Anthony Towns seeks to build in Minneapolis. But these are things constructed over time with smaller achievements.
Tonight in Portland is just another game, one more push of the boulder up the mountain. But by the time it's over, it will become something more: a microcosm of Towns' rookie year and an illustration of why this 20-year-old is not just the next great NBA big but a paradigm for all who will follow.
Less than 30 seconds into the game comes the first glimpse. As Blazers forward Mo Harkless slices through the lane and contorts his body for a twisting left-handed layup, Towns knows his front-line collaborator, Gorgui Dieng, has it all under control. Towns is blessed with many defensive skills, among them the ability to seemingly spot a well-timed rejection before palm ever meets leather. So he's already watching the glass, balls of his feet planted, ready to absorb the load of his 7-foot frame before he bounces off the floor and snags what remains of the shot.
With only a few games left in the season, Towns' rebounding average has hovered around 10 per game. He set finishing the year in double digits as a personal goal, not so much to bolster his rookie of the year candidacy -- with days left in the season, that's a fait accompli -- but because that's what any self-respecting big man does.
Now, with the ball in hand, Towns races his way through traffic down the floor, finds open space and pulls up in transition. Four dribbles and four seconds, that's all it takes. He's a man in a hurry, and the sudden stop of his quick-release jumper appears rushed. The ball barely grazes the rim. Brick.
About a minute later in a Minnesota half-court set, he hands off to Ricky Rubio, then sweeps around a few screens to claim his rightful place on the left block.
Towns works against Portland's Al-Farouq Aminu, one of these newfangled wings masquerading as a small-ball 4, as if guarding the likes of Towns for 38 minutes a night can be outsourced to any combo forward off the street. Towns flings two hard dribbles as he thrusts his left hip into Aminu, carving out room to work, before stepping back, facing up and unleashing an old-school hook shot, which circles the cylinder ... before popping out.
He spends the rest of the half grousing at himself in self-flagellation.
Towns is the NBA's big man of tomorrow
Karl-Anthony Towns merges old divisions of labor as the new complete basketball player.Brad Rempel/USA TODAY Sports
Construct a world and it will evolve over time. We can debate the nature of that evolution -- whether it's good, bad or just is. But change is irrepressible, and species that don't respond to the conditions of that change eventually die out.
So it is with basketball and the evolution of the big man. From the game's beginning, basketball roles were defined by edict. A team was an aggregation of individual skill sets, a division of labor, and the name for the tallest presence on the floor, "center," said it all: The game would revolve around this guy. The big man was an immovable force, dominating as a defensive presence in the paint. And when one of them got the ball in close proximity to the hoop, you'd better have had a defender of equal stature, or send a second body at him, or both.
Jump to the '70s, when in search of competitive advantage, disrupters like Jack Ramsay began finding new functions on the floor for their big guys. Soon you could run offense through the big men in the middle. And then all bets were off. Over time came the mobile big man, then the mobile über-athletic big man, then the mobile über-athletic big man with "skills," then the über-athletic big man with "skills" who also had range. Today, qualifying exactly what a big man does on the floor has become futile.
"It's positionless," says Kentucky coach John Calipari, whose program has become a veritable finishing school for NBA big men. Today's game is all pace, all space, all stretch. In each of the past two Finals, the Warriors and Cavaliers have disguised power forwards as centers at the series' most crucial moments -- and often without a traditional big altogether.
An open 3-pointer, once the near-exclusive purview of perimeter players, now represents a better value than a hook shot at close range. Last season 7-footers fired up more 3-pointers than in the first 13 seasons of the 3-point line combined.
The league has put the big man on notice: It's not enough anymore to take up space in the middle, shoot 60 percent at the rim, rebound in the low double digits and block a couple of shots a night. It's not even enough to shoot a little from the outside. You must now combine power and finesse and make plays for teammates and have quick feet that can switch out on speedy point guards on the pick-and-roll and run the floor and be able to catch the ball on the move and attack like a perimeter slasher and still display that old-school big-man gravitas so that your four Lilliputian teammates heed your commands, hear you calling out defensive assignments from the back line or issue a decree in the huddle during a stoppage.
That is the big man of today. But Towns isn't just the big man of today. He is the first big man of tomorrow.
Garnett worked with Towns to harness his intensity on the court. Rich Pedroncelli/AP Photo
By the time the horn blows to end the first half against the Blazers, Kevin Garnett has seen enough. Garnett, who's played 1,462 regular-season games, has spent the season administering a graduate-level seminar to Towns in Big Man-ology, working with him not only on the mechanics but the business of harnessing his intensity.
"I remember one night he was playing OKC, and he was pouting and being a bit of a baby," Garnett says. "I yanked him to the side, had some strong, comforting words for him to reassure himself and to get him to gather some confidence. I like to think that we're all human and have human moments. I like to think that was his human moment."
Likewise, tonight, during halftime, KG corners Towns in the locker room, and with the team's young future leader flailing under the weight of the moment, the team's elder stages an intervention.
"Keep your f---ing composure!" Garnett screams. "Slow down! It's going to be OK! Breathe! Breathe! And slow down! Everything is going to come! Just keep playing hard!" Towns stoically absorbs the weight of KG's sermon.
Ask Coach Calipari to describe what exactly it is that makes Towns different and he's likely to tell the story of last August, when Calipari organized a charity softball home run derby in Lexington, where Towns was the headliner. After clubbing a 380-foot moon shot on his way to the title, Towns -- who had not played organized baseball beyond the eighth grade -- received a text from an incredulous Calipari: "Is there anything you can't do? Pingpong, pool, what?" Towns responded: "I do it all, Coach. I do it all."
Indeed, despite his size -- Towns was already 6-foot-3 by the time he was 11 years old -- he spent much of his time as a young player in northern New Jersey out on the perimeter. Calipari recalls meeting coaches who had faced off against Towns in high school who described him as someone who would shoot 15 3-pointers in a game.
At 15, Towns was invited to compete on the Dominican national team -- Towns' mother, Jacqueline, was born in the Dominican Republic -- to play for Calipari and alongside Al Horford and Francisco Garcia. NBA lifer Del Harris assisted Calipari on the bench, and on the team's second day of practice, he watched Towns jack up a fusillade of 3-pointers. Harris strolled onto the court.
"You're 6-10, but you might as well be 5-10," Harris told Towns. "Get yourself down inside and learn the position."
Calipari echoed Harris, and throughout Towns' time with the Dominican team and later in Lexington, Calipari and his staff insisted that the 7-footer develop interior skills. "We're not satisfied because he has so much more," Wildcats assistant coach Kenny Payne said after Towns logged 19 and 10 in an exhibition game against a French professional team in 2014. "He has to learn that we play this game from the inside out, not outside in."
Twenty-six months later, Towns is sitting in his favorite Italian restaurant in Minneapolis, repeating those words almost verbatim about the Timberwolves. "We have a philosophy that we work from inside out, not outside in," he says as he works his way through a chicken Parmesan (no Parmesan), a brick chicken entree, linguine, potatoes, a platter of roasted Brussels sprouts and a nonalcoholic strawberry daiquiri. "Maybe it's fortunate to blend in with the new, current, modern-day NBA big, maybe it's not. What I can do is be as versatile as possible, where I could have played today or years ago when the 5s were rolling around. That's why I play. I play inside, and I also play outside. I play in both eras."
yup interesting in seeing the wolves
Yeah, he's like a taller Lebron. Shit's going to be serious if he gets off those minutes restrictions.
Taller Lebron tho?
In regards to physique plus coordination. I believe that's what we're on.
And he's still learning the pro game. If he stays healthy, and get's some talent around him, sky's the limit. He's good.
Harden gonna win MVP if he stays healthy, calling it now; Rockets gonna get 5th seed and hes good to go...
I think Westbrook but what the fuck we know CheapCode could win it or Demar
I see more Hakeem with him. Just a taller and slower version with more range on his jumper
Similar threads
