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@MercAnalytic
. Hyper personalized basketball analytics, in all forms. NBA, WNBA, NCAA consulting. Connect me with players you want to succeed.
Jordan Poole in the Finals in his third year. Grant Williams in the Finals in his third year. Both of them were looking like they were on their way out of the league as rookies.
If Packie and I can't continue our relationship next season, let it be known our stuff WORKS.
Dennis Rodman played in 911 games in his NBA career, and won 636 of them. That's a winning percentage of 70%.
In those 911 games, Rodman scored more than 20 points exactly 11 times.
Being incredible in your role is more important than being the scoring star. Always.
How is anybody surprised that we have another 30 days of lockdown?
We're trending towards months and months of this, and every time some idiots get together and conglomerate in close quarters, that number inches upwards.
If you're somebody who is saying that the NBA shouldn't be suspending AD for Game 6, you better not have been crying for the NBA to suspend Draymond for Game 5 in 2016.
LeBron is to player agency as Kevin Durant is to putting obnoxious fans in their place using social media.
The greats are never respected for their trials until at least 5 years later.
A team that played Lance Stephenson and Roy Hibbert a combined 58 minutes a game was the most serious challenge LeBron ever faced in the East.
It’s Jordan. It’s Jordan, and being persistent or loud is not going to change that.
Has anybody else noticed that basically every piece of media surrounding Saint Peter has prominently shown the only white player in the program, despite him being their 3rd leading scorer who only started a handful of games this season for them..?
Saint Peter’s gave us one of the greatest Cinderella runs ever.
⭐ First 15-seed to make the Elite Eight
⭐ Major upsets over Kentucky and Purdue
⭐ Ended Murray State’s 21-game win streak
⭐ Obliterated brackets and captured hearts nationwide
What a run 👏
Danny Green, a former 46th overall pick, is one of the worst dribbling shooting guards in the entire NBA, yet has won 2 championships and signed $80 million in contracts.
Keep working on those 3-move combos though, young guys. Those look dope against air on your Instagram.
I really haven't cared much about awards on a personal level since Russ won the MVP on a 6th seed, but oh my lord Luka over Steph is one hell of an outcome.
The public is determined to make Stephen Curry the most underappreciated player of all time.
@Reuters
Whoever picked this picture should be fired.
A picture of a COVID particle running rampant through crowds of people while Trump spouts, "I wanted to always play it down. I still like playing it down," in the background would be a far more accurate portrayal.
Trash journalism.
Embiid is a paper tiger.
I don't care what any counting stats or aggregate stats say. He's the problem with this team.
Trade him.
Spacing cannibal, scheme-dictating, terrible-diving, out of shape dinosaur.
The most shots Steph has ever taken in a game is 32, for his entire career.
Kobe needed 46 to get 81.
Wilt needed 63 to get to 100.
Just once let him try to beat it.
Tom Thibodeau after trading away half the Timberwolves young assets, paying Jeff Teague and Gorgui Dieng $121 million, drafting Kris Dunn over Jamal Murray, throwing $150 million at Andrew Wiggins, and finishing 97-107 with one playoff win over three years
Tre Jones' defense this season was absolutely elite, especially for a freshman. Tre was the primary defender on 20 late in the shot/game clock situations, and only conceded 2 points, a mark that obviously led all D1 players, min. 20 poss. His effort/IQ were always on full display
Y’all are mad that Breonna Taylor’s mom allegedly bought a Bentley, but are okay with the 500 people who could solve global inequality with a 0.5% wealth tax fighting against it so they can instead buy a new 8 to 9-figure superyatch every 6 years.
Over-quantifying Kobe is a huge mistake. In a vacuum his numbers don't compare to some contemporaries even, but when remembering he was asked to do the highest difficulty job in hoops (score efficiently on a high volume with non-stretching bigs), they're super impressive.
I like LeBron a lot as a dude, but I'm looking forward to the day he retires.
This army of people who are invested in being LeBron's fan like it's their only personality trait are awful for the game of basketball, and unbearable to deal with.
Hopefully, they lose interest.
Kawhi Leonard, a recruit who was ranked 8th in his state in HS, has been unstoppable these NBA Finals, due in large part to his ability to execute simple, but explosive moves while staying on perfect balance
Keep practicing those 3-move combos and fades for IG though, young guys
@JJMaples55_MST
She's in the comments talking about the one time somebody was shot for Beyonce apparel.
Holy shit, I would google how many people have died over Jordan shoes, but the number would only make me sad.
Happy she knows her tiny corner of the world so well, though.
Cam Reddish scores in the 46th percentile for all NBA players on a per-possession basis. Basically league-average.
If he didn't take a single mid-range jumper this season, that number would jump to almost the 70th percentile: A near-max-level player at 22 years old.
Imagine being a person who looks at a 21-year old undrafted rookie who is tasked with guarding an MVP for 7 games, and in Game 7 scores 30 points on 28 possessions, and instead of being happy for him and his perseverance, nitpicks a heads-up play that didn't work out.
Crazy factoid I noticed this morning:
The Warriors currently have a Roster Continuity of only 18%. That means that only 18% of their team's minutes have been played by players on the roster from the previous season.
It would be the 4th lowest Continuity total in NBA history.
Why are ratings down?
ESPN has a 1 on 1 interview with Pascal Siakam, and they spend a minute and a half asking him basically, "are you sad you're injured and not playing?" and "do you guys want to win?"
Simply incredible, one of the best stories so far this century in sports.
She shot 35.7% from the field with almost 3 turnovers a game her last year at Rutgers. Quit her $72k a year jobs to play basketball for $200 A WEEK in Puerto Rico.
Un-fucking-believable. Never give up.
Doug Gottlieb out here using his 1/4 million person platform to advocate for financially ruining thousands of disproportionally black and underprivileged 18-year olds every year, and further taking away any freedom they have in the NCAA system.
And Doug thinks he’s the victim.
@BigHimK
@gswchris
@DragonflyJonez
...And this precludes him from letting himself feel emotions and owning his game?
You can do stuff like this and be singularly focused on winning, LeBron found a way to do it too.
Clown
@HPbasketball
all you want, but he's just proved a point I've been making (and living) for years: You can have a polite and civil conversation about analytics with anybody if you aren't massively condescending.
These tributes are great, but seeing these players dealing with raw grief is terrible and I did not ask to see this.
The NBA should’ve cancelled these games. Nobody was going to forget to pay tribute to Kobe if it wasn’t going to be tonight.
Yes, of course, "Bitchass whiteboy," the phrase that sends chills up every white person's spine, reminding them of the centuries of institutionalized death and cruelty dished out for the all-powerful and all-controlling....?
Power dynamics and history are the important elements.
@ShamsCharania
Clippers's Montrezl Harrell has been fined $50,000 and suspended from all Clipper facilities and team activities for one week for an anti-white comment.
Steph Curry, triple-doubles by year:
2013-14 (final Mark Jackson season): 4
14-15: 0
15-16: 2
16-17: 0
17-18: 0
18-19: 0
Team Success
13-14: 12.8 wins per triple-double recorded
14-15 to 18-19: 148 wins per triple-double recorded
What a great statistic. So important.
Ty Jerome is a dead-eye shooter, but his ability to read defenders both before and after the catch is what makes him a deadly weapon coming off screens. His PPP of 1.12 when using off-ball screens was 2nd in Power Conference play this year among players with as many possessions.
The myth of inefficient Kobe is such willful ignorance at this point.
People love quoting his career numbers like he wasn’t drafted at 17 and didn’t play 3 years after a devastating Achilles injury.
Pre-Achilles, he had a higher career TS% than Tim Duncan.
Shaquille O’Neal On Criticizing Current Players: “When Kareem Abdul Jabbar Gave Me Constructive Criticism, I Took It, I Listened And I Brought My Game To Another Level. These Guys Now Are Pudding Pops.”
There's an openly racist man as your president, lauded anchors on your news networks spewing racism, a head writer on said shows resigning because his open racism was discovered, applause as the army puts down protests demanding racial equality, and you claim you're not racist.
St. Thomas is now 3-3 in their first 6 D1 games since making the jump from D3. Here is the breakdown of who's scored their 478 points through 6 games:
Returners from D3 days: 467 points
Freshman: 11
D1 Transfers: 0
Go where you're recruited. There are D1 players at every level.
Who remembers this?
The autistic man who was almost shot because he had a toy train, the his therapist, hands in the air, who pleaded with the police to not shoot and kept informing them that it was a train and the other man was autistic, was shot.
Officer remains employed.
Steph Curry torched the NBA for 5 straight years with a combination of three-point shooting off the dribble and aggressive off-ball movement to get wide-open threes off the catch
...Yet most skills trainers lean heavily into one of the skills, and completely neglect the other.
I have recently come into $1,000,000, and instead of investing it or buying a beautiful property, I’ve decided I will disiminate it via 1,000 strangers who like and RT this tweet.
Guys. I am so super for real. This is my serious plan for how I could best spend this money.
@MGRADS
Oh yeah? Oh yeah, Grads?
You’re trying to tell me that Bob Cousy, 6’1”, 175 pounds of pure C
caucasian GRIT, wouldn’t be able to slide his feet on Trae Young?
He’d take charges on Morant. He would just sit in that chair and take the ball away from Kyrie. He’d block Trae.
Some people have this mad hate in their hearts for Melo.
There's no misconceptions about his abilities, and nobody is out here saying he's a first-option. Do people have this same energy for Jae Crowder, or Dillon Brooks? Because they're also starters on a 16-22 team.
I’ve always thought people who hated Steph Curry were losers.
After tonight, the people who truly hate Steph Curry have been revealed and, yes, they truly hate him and they are losers.
Here is the biggest trend in all of Kobe's statistical profile if you ask me: According to BB-Ref, from the beginning of his prime until he blew his Achilles', the Lakers had a top 10 offense by ORtg every single year.
Even in the 34-48 season with Chucky Atkins and Chris Mihm.
The affect RJ is having on Cam Reddish is easily identifiable.
This year, Cam has only had 31 catch-and-shoot jumpers attempted that Synergy tracked as unguarded. RJ was the passer on only 4 of them.
In 431 possessions from RJ, he has only gotten his sharpshooter 4 open shots?
LaMelo Ball has a, practically speaking, limitless ceiling.
He also gets to decide what his floor is. Can't say both of these things for many players in NBA history.
LaMelo will be as good as he wants to be.
Don't blame KD. Blame:
1. Whoever taught that kid such a ridiculous move
2. Trainers who are obsessed with turning a simple rule, the travel, into a dense fog of impractical, non-basketball moves
3. Overtime for posting and perpetuating this garbage
4. Refs who don't call it
It’s the Warriors’ offensive versatility, for me.
Never has an offense had so many ways to bend and press the opposing team’s defense until they find the weakest and most vulnerable point.
The defining trait of their dynasty.
All day, videos of kids who probably can't make 30% of their open threes are popping across my TL, doing double and triple move combos that end with an off-balance attempt at the rim.
That's all just wasted time if you can't make open jumpers or finish strong with your off-hand.
Steph is such a great role model for Luka to use as a development model:
1. You don’t have to be the best defender, but you have to be hidable at all times
2. On-ball is important, but the easiest and highest percentages shots are found off the ball
3. Give it up early and move
I'm so happy for Cam Reddish.
Stood up to a hailstorm of hate online in the first months of his rookie year, didn't mentally check-out, kept showing up and playing hard every single night, and just made the most important play in a big win over a playoff team.
Good work, kid!
Breonna’s family will be taxed at a rate at least 20 to 30 times higher on their settlement than Amazon was on their record profits in 2019.
You know, the company that treats their employees so badly they have a constant social media astroturfing campaign to say they don’t.
This man is 5’2” and covering more ground on his steps than the 6’8” kids that get gassed up as “pros” while they’re still playing AAU.
Oh, and he shot 42% from three on over 6 attempts a game last year.
This jig is rapidly approaching being up for the NCAA, and they know it. Losing one of their two major cash cows (high-major men’s basketball) is on the horizon, and football will surely follow at some point, too.
It was never about anybody else. It was about the $$ and control.
The FBI drugged then double-tapped Fred Hampton in his sleep for feeding black children in Chicago, but they sure couldn't detain a bunch of traitorous terrorists as they lounged, in full regalia, in their hotel lobby the night after the storming of the Capitol building.
I am embarrassed that it has taken me this long to read The New Jim Crow.
This is one of the most important, well-researched, well-argued books I have ever read.
If you value any amount of my basketball thinking, even if you disagree with me polically, this is a must-read.
...but, yeah super insecure dude, your time as the 6th man on your .500 small town high school team would absolutely have you prepared to stop a move like this...
It took Giannis 7 years to develop the outline of a halfway-decent three-pointer. Took Jason Kidd at least 9 years to become a good shooter, and took LeBron James 9 years to get to 36% (and he entered the NBA shooting threes!).
Ben Simmons is in Year 4.
James Harden, scoring below the NBA average for both himself and in PnR, making ~$45 million a year the next two year, and just named an All-Star.
Hilariously, it makes me think of Sam Hinkie. Had he been able to reign it in about 10-15%, his strategy would've owned this NBA.
Welp, I want to give these guys the benefit of the doubt every time they value a flag over valid emotions, fears, and lived experiences, but it's getting harder and harder to not group them all together at the onset of those actions when it's consistently backed up with this.
How does the undisputed greatest shooter ever end up with the 12th most unguarded catch-and-shoot jumpers so far in the NBA this year?
By ceaselessly hunting them via constant off-ball movement, screening, giving the ball up, coming off tight, and always looking for open space.
Steph Curry's understanding of his own gravity, and using it to get everybody else involved with easy looks off of great passes...
Man, I have missed watching him play.
Danny Green is awesome at four things:
-Catch and shooting
-Point-of-attack defending
-Effort
-Intelligence and awareness
Bam. $80 million dollars over his first 11 years in the league.
Seriously, Luka looks fantastic for in-season weight loss.
You can really tell in when looking at both his arms, and the way the jersey is hanging off of him in the 2nd picture.
First one is from Halloween, second is tonight.
Talen Horton-Tucker currently playing in a way that makes me wonder where the NBA reps were all season.
Lakers won 11 games by at least 20 points this season, and the staff could only find him 5 minutes all year until tonight?
C'mon! Play your young guys, they might surprise!
If I’ve said it once, I’ll say it a million times: AAU basketball is probably the biggest reason why America remains number one in the world in basketball.
If people think AAU is too sloppy, I challenge them to think about how sloppy college Freshman would look without it.
Luka needs to pull every trick in the book out to get a tough 12-foot, off-balance floater against a switch versus a defender from the Beijing Ducks
And some people think the Hawks made a mistake??
Holy shit people...
Wow, I bet he sure feels like an idiot for skipping out on those games he was playing in for free in college...
Surely going to have a long-standing impact on his professional career. Surely.
Kobe wasn't along for the ride for the first three rings, he had fantastic contributions in the postseason because (surprise!) it's hard to run a crunch time offense through a player who can't make free throws. And to say Pau or Bynum won the other two is just indefensible.
This is literally the team.
One star.
Two very dependable starters.
One all rim protection, no offense big.
One inefficient, loose cannon.
Four players off the bench who were decidedly ineffective.
This team had no spacing, little offensive punch, and took LeBron to 7.
People aren't taking the time to even figure out what the WNBPA is asking for, and that's sad. They only want an equal share of the league revenue as the NBA players get.
Shocking the difference in basketball leagues' response to COVID-19.
The NBA, who is invested financially in their players, cancels the moment they have a player infected.
The NCAA, who don't invest in their players and earns $770 million by having March Madness, opts to play.
In the three years since KD joined the Nets, Brooklyn has made an average of nearly $250 million in revenue a year.
If they’re the “losers” in all of this, that’s a joke.
They still get to keep all that money AND get a trade haul for KD if this goes south.
You have Al Horford on an Island, down two, and you choose to pull up from three as a 32% career three-point shooter..?
C'mon... I don't ever want to hear anybody ever say analytics is the problem in basketball. Analytics would NEVER say to take that shot there.
Steph Curry last 5 games:
49 points, 10 threes
47 points, 11 threes
33 points, 4 threes
42 points, 11 threes
53 points, 10 threes
No one is NBA history has made more threes (46) in a 5 game stretch.