Playoff Observations

Holiday with a great defensive play leading to the alley oop. Clutch defense in the biggest moment!

Going to be difficult for the Suns game 6 in Milwaukee.

I love watching Giannis play. He loves the game, his compete level is 100%.  This brings out the best in him and his teammates. A winner, in the Auerbach tradition.

Giannis is my favorite player, slightly edging out Jaylen because his mother can make spanikopita.

Brian Robb @BrianTRobb
yesterday
Suns shooting splits were 54/61/90 and they lost.


Bob
MY NOTE:  Didn't look like a lot of defense in this one, until that steal by Holliday off of Booker that resulted in the Giannis oop.  57.5% fg% for Milwaukee vs 55% for Phoenix.  Giannis was 4-11 from the line.  That makes Ben Simmons look good.  He's shooting 59% from the line for this series,  55% from the line on the entire 2021 playoffs.  He shot 68.5% from the line for the regular season, so he's not a good frito shooter.  Yes, I know he does almost everything else inhumanly well, but not this.


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Chris Paul tried to undercut Giannis on the ally opp, glad no one got hurt, those type of dirty plays should be automatic flagrant….just sayin

Shout out to bobbyc’s boy Pat Connauhton he’s 15-30 from 3 in this series and plays good defense, he has been huge in this series!!!

Celt's could have signed Pat C cheap. My nephew went to a wedding with him in Arlington last year. Pat does not drink and is all about  basket ball, basketball, basketball. He signed a healthy contract with the Bucks but he was available and would have loved to have been a Celtic. Of course now he will get a Chip. He's got two more years on a $5,333,333 a year contract. He shot .371 this year from 3. He's averaged .500 from three for the playoffs this year. He's been 100% from the frito line the past three playoff seasons, and he averaged.787 from the charity stripe over his career. He was a minor league baseball player out of Notre Dame and had a career .288 ERA. I like the kid a lot. He's 6'5", 209#.

Real tough loss by the Suns. The Bucks can close this out in game 6 or game 7.

General observation, the Suns could really use a top notch defender in their backcourt off the bench and a better BU at center would not hurt one bit.

So could the Celts.

worcester wrote:So could the Celts.

We have a top notch defender in our backcourt - Marcus Smart and we have at least 3 BU centers.

Well, let's answer the most pressing question...No, I did NOT quit my day job!

Now, back to the Finals. That's a wrap, folks. Bucks proved they are the champs winning the all important G5 when split 2-2 and on the road even.

Monty probably should have called a TO the play before he actually called it to set up the go ahead basket. When he did call it, it was too late. Woulda, coulda, shoulda/Hindsight 20/20. Might have cost PHX the title, although I don't want to count out the team with the best road record in the league come Tuesday. But having lost 3 in a row now, the nail may already be in the coffin for Chris Paul and the magical mystery tour.

As always...we'll see.

db

cowens/oldschool wrote:Shout out to bobbyc’s boy Pat Connauhton he’s 15-30 from 3 in this series and plays good defense, he has been huge in this series!!!

Hometown boy makes good. Will be awesome to call him a World Champion!

Bobbyc when was the last time you saw your buddy, his Dad?

Pat is a surprisingly good defender, has perfect fundamentals, actually jumps pretty well. Love seeing him perform in his role.

Many moons now, seen his uncle more recently.

dboss wrote:

worcester wrote:So could the Celts.

We have a top notch defender in our backcourt - Marcus Smart and we have at least 3 BU centers.

We have really good defenders at 2-3, AN, Romeo, Jaylen, Tatum. I’m expecting our defense to play much better than last year….

We could always use more good D, but we do have the makings of a strong defensive team. Attitude, work ethic, and proper coaching is going to get us there.

worcester wrote:We could always use more good D, but we do have the makings of a strong defensive team. Attitude, work ethic, and proper coaching is going to get us there.

Yeah 

I think our D should be much better.

dboss wrote:

worcester wrote:We could always use more good D, but we do have the makings of a strong defensive team. Attitude, work ethic, and proper coaching is going to get us there.

Yeah 

I think our D should be much better.

For our personnel we definitely underachieved, last year was such a bizarre year, covid, compressed schedule, injury bug, lack of motivation/consistent effort, for whatever multiple reasons we so underachieved on defense….

Ime will light a fire under these guys.

So some other Finals observations.

Jrue Holiday is a very heady good defender, easily worthy of his first team all NBA status, he has been the difference between this Bucks team and the underachieving team of last few playoffs without him. Strong, wiry, can cover both backcourt positions and gives them key direction on offense.

Kris Middleton is a very crafty heady player with a clutch gene. He has been beyond huge in the clutch last 2 games. He reminds me of a skinny Paul Pierce, doesn’t have Paul’s force in finishing in traffic, but has the 3 point range, step back, can drive and enough spontaneous counter moves to be deadly in clutch.

Giannis is a superstar, carries that team every night, so consistent putting up his 30-35 like clockwork, so athletic and skilled getting to the rim; showed a new dimension, crafty passing from the post/midrange. Love that Bucks are showing teams with size can still play with size at this level, Lopez, Giannis and Portis have been a load pounding on Suns.

I think I’ve already mentioned how much I’ve been going ape sh.t over Pat C who leads the series in 3 pointers at 15-30.

I have been having fun with predictions in these Finals, before game 4 I said look for a breakout game for Middleton, that he was due. I said before game 5, Ayton needed to put up at least 25 for Suns to win, he scored 20 and Suns lost by 4. My prediction for game 6, Chris Paul has to have a monster 35-40 point game for Suns to pull it out. Booker had 2 40 point games in a row, do not see him going for 3 in a row, as talented as he is. Paul is going to have to pull out a HoF type of performance for Suns to extend series, if he cannot do it, do not see series going back to Phoenix.

worcester wrote:Ime will light a fire under these guys.

I read he was architect for the Nets defense, and based on personnel I thought Nets would be soft on defense, but they were much better and more resilient than I thought they would be.

cowens/oldschool,

PHX is going to have to show tomorrow why they are the best road team in the league. That really is about it. I like your prediction. You, unlike me, can quit your day job unless handicapping profitably is your day job!!

This has been a very interesting Finals if you like the two huge change in direction-type series so far. Is there room for one more swing back the other way? We'll see!!

db

cowens/oldschool wrote:Chris Paul tried to undercut Giannis on the ally opp, glad no one got hurt, those type of dirty plays should be automatic flagrant….just sayin

Cow,

I didn't think it was much of an undercut. He put a hand on him while he was in the air, but there really wasn't any push behind it.


Bob


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bobheckler wrote:

cowens/oldschool wrote:Chris Paul tried to undercut Giannis on the ally opp, glad no one got hurt, those type of dirty plays should be automatic flagrant….just sayin

Cow,

I didn't think it was much of an undercut.  He put a hand on him while he was in the air, but there really wasn't any push behind it.


Bob


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On those kind of plays my biggest fear is another Gordon Hayward type of terrible landing, your so vulnerable in mid air like that, it’s so easy to land wrong….you see my point?

Oh man I love this, Max Kellerman just said on First Take it’s all on Chris Paul in game 6 or Suns don’t survive and then right after Steven A said it was wrong for Chris Paul to push Giannis on the alley opp dunk!!!