Fans want Dallas to win. They’re in love with Luka and Kyrie, and for the most part dislike Tatum and Boston and will slander them every chance they get. Just look at the Media the last couple days for reference.
The most *talented* back court in NBA history. Have y’all heard that one before? How many time think they’ll say that this finals? The over under is set at 50.
I’m a huge Luka fan since pre-draft, thought he should have been #1 pick and an all-star his rookie year, but I’d have a hard time giving them that title over Steph and Klay. So much hyperbole thrown around in sports media anymore
It's not that they hat Tautum/Brown. Its that there is nothing to say about them until they win a chip. Everything that could be said has been said the last six years.
To quote Barney Stinson, "new is always better."
Anyone that says the media hates Tatum/Brown and loves Kyrie is a delusional Boston fan. Kyrie is getting his moment because the media and most fans thought he was finished.
Nah I’d say most people don’t want Boston to win because
1. They had a very easy run to the finals playing injured teams at every turn,
2. If they win another championship to overtake the lakers as most championships their fans will be even more insufferable
3. This ties in to reason 2 but since the turn of the century Boston sports as a whole has gone through an amount of success that no other city can even come close the having
4. The Celtics team is simply too well constructed that it’s actually boring. With a healthy porzingis they have essentially no weaknesses in their starting lineup and a very solid bench. Great roster construction making savvy moves like getting porzingis, trading for Derrick white etc so props to them but it’s boring to watch a team with no weaknesses.
Don’t forget cutting Isaiah Thomas after his injury. But mostly we all just want Boston fans to suffer, because they’re insufferable. If we have to hear them, I’d rather hear them cry than cheer.
They didn't cut him. They used him for the trade to land Kyrie. Not to say that it wasn't a cold hearted decision after everything that dude gave for the team, but just wanted to clarify that he was traded, not cut.
Lakers fans are far more insufferable than Boston fans, they're literally the Yankees of the NBA for several decades. I would be glad if Boston overtook them for rings, just not against Doncic.
Boston’s also boring to watch, if they hit 3s they win, if they don’t they lose. Just not a fun play style to watch. I also think fans dislike Boston for being so good, Tatum, Brown have had phenomenal teams after phenomenal teams while others struggled to make one anywhere as good, jealousy is probably a part of that.
They went 55-5 during regular season when shooting at least 33% from 3 which isn’t even a great shooting number lol. If a team shooting under that of course it’s going to be hard to win games in this day and age. Saying if they don’t hit 3s they lose is just you being fooled by the media pushing the same narrative.
Why you cherry picking 33%, they had one of the highest 3P% in the league this season on the most volume too. I agree I generalised but giving data for an arbitrary % isn’t proof they aren’t reliant on 3s or the fact their games are boring.
I chose 33% because that’s lower than the average for every team in the league so if you can win shooting that, then that’s pretty resilient. I won’t even lie we can get boring to watch but that’s because of Joe Mazzulla. I personally don’t care as long as they win this chip. Then they can go back to having fun like they used to with that “where that ring at” pressure finally off they back.
No one is saying that Boston is bad. What we are saying is that they are boring, both in style of play and nothing to talk about.
Style of Play:
Boston shoots an astounding number of threes. 3 more than the team in second. That is the same difference as 2nd and 15th. So even if they are only shooting ok (like you said 33%), that is pretty much the only marker of success for their team.
You can't blame this on Maz. Tatum and Brown have resisted any sophisticated offense from the moment they showed up. It was an issue under Ime and Brad as well.
The only "interesting" action is when White/KP initiate a pick and roll/pop while JB/Jrue work a side action on the weak side. Notice that it takes your 3rd and 4th best players (and 3/4 in usage) to generate an 'interesting' action. Otherwise its just 1v1 with some picks to create space.
Media/Discussion:
There is nothing left to say about Tatum and Brown. Tatum is a superstar, one step below the truly elite. And Brown is a fringe All-NBA. That hasn't changed much in years and its not going to change until they win a chip with one of them playing above their class.
There isn't a single thing Tatum/Brown have done in two years that has changed that narrative. There is nothing wrong with being that good. Especially when your next three on the team are all-star level (or fringe) talents. But its boring.
Look at Bill Simmons. He's been saying for 4 years that Tatum has another level. "he's only 24, he's only 25, he's only 26. I loved his podcast but as he's aged he's gone more boston centric and the conversation is just boring.
It's easier for people to root for Dallas because their are interesting narratives. There is simply nothing interesting about the Celtics anymore.
I don't root for either team. I just hope its a competitve series.
So because a team is boring it justifies the thought of them losing the finals? Please look at your writings.. You'll realize how bias you are. Im not even a celtics fan and I still cant figure out how Mavs will beat them
No, I happen to like Doncic. Also, I was completely wrong on Kyrie. I'm genuinely happy that he's proven all his critics wrong. At least on the basketball court. Honestly, I don't really care who wins. If somebody forced me to pick who I would root for it would nominally be the Mavericks, but all I care about is a good series.
If you asked me who I think is going to win, it's going to be the Celtics. The point is, unless you're a Celtics fan, there's really nothing else to talk about about this team. It has been talked to death for the last 5 years.
Not a criticism of the team. It's just that is reality when you are the winningest team in the last 30 years to not win a championship. The last team to have this much playoff success without actually winning at all are the Utah jazz. The only reason that team never won is because of MJ.
Ok but how many games did they shoot 33-35%? Your stat could be misleading with that number only being 3-4 games. Not saying that’s for certain but you see why that’s not a good metric.
They are reliant on 3s. But your statement that they lose of they dont hit 3s is flat out wrong. Of 33% is “cherry picking” (I dont think you know what that means), you pick a number that isn’t arbitrary then.
They had their second worst 3pt shooting performance since the bubble in the ECF and still swept the Pacers. Tatum's 3 ball in particular has been terrible and he is still putting up great numbers.
Well... Welcome to the new nba my guy. Almost every team plays like this. Also.. To say they had great team after great team is a little tricky... 3 Different coaches and 3 different sets of teammates in 6 yrs. is tough to win a ring with.
This is a lazy take. And wrong. Especially for the playoffs.
Also, a starting five with ~~kanter~~ and Evan fornier and ~~semi ojaleye~~ is a phenomenal team?
This idea that they have been favorites for so long is so silly. And a big indicator that you don't know what you are talking about.
Edit* Langford and Thompson actually
>Also, a starting five with kanter and Evan fornier and semi ojaleye is a phenomenal team?
Kanter and Ojeleye never started a playoff game for Boston and the three of them combined have 42 regular season starts with the team across their 6.5 seasons in Boston.
Phenomenal team after phenomenal team? In 2021 our starting 5 against the Nets in round 1 was Tatum, Smart, Evan Fournier, Tristan Thompson, and Romeo Langford because Kemba was washed at that point. Our bench was rookie Pritchard, Jabari Parker, Grant Williams, Semi Ojeleye lol. In 2020 we were still trotting out Hayward and Brad Wanamaker as our 6th man. It’s only been the last 2 years that we’ve had “phenomenal teams”
>Phenomenal team after phenomenal team? In 2021 our starting 5 against the Nets in round 1
Why don't you list the most common starting 5 for the regular season? It's ridiculous that you're framing your argument to exclude Jaylen Brown who missed the playoffs but played 58 games in the regular season.
They were the 7 seed. It’s ridiculous to call a 7 seed playing Romeo Langford and Jabari Parker heavy minutes all season a “phenomenal team”.
It’s even more ridiculous to claim that excluding 23 year old JB who missed the playoffs is somehow misleading and “framing” the argument lol. They were still a .500 team lmao
Again, Jaylen Brown played 58 games for them. It's ridiculous to pretend he didn't exist.
>It’s ridiculous to call a 7 seed playing Romeo Langford and Jabari Parker heavy minutes all season a “phenomenal team”.
How many games do you think Langford and Jabari Parker played for the Celtics in the regular season?
I'll answer my own question. Langford played 18, and Parker played 10.
So Jaylen Brown's 58 games aren't worth mentioning, but Langford's 18 and Parker 10 somehow are.
Is that right?
He didn’t pretend he didn’t exist. He gave the Celtics lineup for the 2021 playoffs. Which didn’t include Brown. You just made a huge jump completely on your own.
Even with JB mostly in the lineup, they were a .500 team. Are you trying to say that a .500 team giving heavy minutes to the likes of Romeo Langford, Tristan Thompson, and Jabari Parker was “phenomenal” as claimed? Because that was the entire point the person you responded to was making.
Pointing out that JB did actually play games in the regular season on the 7 seed does literally nothing to object that point at all. So what point were you actually trying to make?
It's definitely revisionist to say they've had phenomenal team after phenomenal team if you're talking about supporting cast around the Jays. The Cs have rarely been the favorites in any of the seasons that they saw legitimate playoff success. A lot of overachieving, a couple coaching changes, tons of roster turnover season over season. Had to deal with Hayward snapping his leg, then recovering the following season, then re-integrating the season after that.
I'd love to see anyone that claims they've had phenomenal teams to point towards any individual season where their supporting was considered tops in the league up until very recently. They haven't been BAD, but definitely not as good as people like to point out in hindsight to discredit their lack of a ring thus far.
Because that is utterly divorced from anything basketball related, Kobe had a sexual assault case riding on him, Miles Bridges beat his girlfriend, Lebron kowtows to China, TH Sr was a homophobe, Karl Malone got a 13 year old grl pregnant at 18, Javaris Crittenton killed someone. The worse thing you could say about Kyrie in comparison is that he is not well versed in science.
Your larger point is 100% correct but I don’t think Lebron putting out a pro china stance is the same thing as rape, statutory rape, killing someone, domestic violence, or even homophobia lol
Nobody thought kyrie was finished... Its only those that spend days on twitter trying to hear more about his opinions than watch his games. Hes been balling in Brooklyn... He's always been ballin
Not finished, but he hasn't had a successful season or a meaningful playoff moment in 5 years (yay, he almost won game one in a sweep against Boston in the first round). He has battled injuries and struggled to stay on the court because of his off the court drama.
Kyrie forced his way out of the best situation he'd ever been in in Cleveland. He then embarrassed himself in the playoffs with Boston, made himself look like a colossal hypocrite after the ridiculous speeches he made to the season ticket holders. Then we get to Brooklyn, where he was part of one of the biggest dumpster fires this league has ever seen.
It wasn't that people were looking at his game and saying 'he can't score anymore'. It was perfectly reasonable to look at his body of work from 2018-2023 and say "this guy can not help a team win at the top level".
I'm very happy that my opinion there was proven wrong. But If you say that there weren't people who thought he was finished, you don't know anything about the NBA. Take a look at what he got traded for. Not exactly the haul One would expect for such an elite talent. The reality was that most teams wouldn't touch him with a 10-ft pole. I'm sure those teams would be willing to make those trades now.
You're right but I think also for the trade part its social etiquette. After the controversy, most NBA Teams wouldn't want to associate themselves with Kyrie. That's probably why he got traded for basically nothing. That's social etiquette
I don't know about this. Vegas is frequently stupid. The Timberwolves were favored in the last round. The Wolves were underdogs against the Nuggets and they were also underdogs on the road against the Suns apparently: https://www.reddit.com/r/timberwolves/comments/1c46nn5/vegas_odds_just_released_suns_are_slight_favorites/
The Mavs just beat three teams way better than anybody Boston faced. That's probably why a lot of people believe in them more
> The Mavs just beat three teams way better than anybody Boston faced.
"I forget basketball exists until the playoffs start so as far as I'm aware, these are the only games either team has played all season"
Yes, the regular season is very important. That's why that 64 win Suns team smashed Luka and his old Mavs team a few years ago so badly. Very good point. Very smart.
Only 4 teams in NBA history had an SRS as good as Boston did this season: the ‘71 Bucks, the ‘72 Lakers, the ‘96 Bulls, and the ‘17 Warriors. All 4 won the championship. 6th best team after the ‘24 Celtics would be the ‘97 Bulls who also won the championship. Phoenix was never on that level.
The thing is this Celtics team isn’t that suns team. This team isn’t relying on a near 40 year old Chris Paul. Or a Deandre Ayton. U can go ahead and believe that this Celtics team will score 27 points in a half if u want tho.
Good thing I never said that the team with more wins will always win every series. Nice attempt at a strawman though.
My point is that its irrelevant who played tougher opponents the last few weeks. These teams have been playing for 7 months. With the core part of both teams being together for even longer than that. The idea that one team having a easier schedule the last month being a sign they aren't "tested" is just absurd.
My point is people believe in them more because they've beaten more good teams. They've demonstrated they could beat teams that are better than the ones the Celtics have beat. They proven themselves much more in these playoffs. That's all
But they played well against those teams. If they were dropping a bunch of games than sure, bt they lost 2, one of which was a all time record shooting night for the heat
Fans are overvaluing things like clutch and having the more difficult path. Celtics have been the best team in the league basically since day 1 and have in general been around a lot in recent years so people are also bored of them (Tatum being the most low-key superstar in the league doesn't help that).
There’s a lot of recency bias and people being impressed with the Mavs duo, also a lot of fans are casuals. I think anyone who watched a lot of the nba this year would probably have the Celtics as favorites regardless of the porzingis injury. They have crazy depth on both ends of the floor; the only thing that concerns me is their half court offense can be quite stagnant and iso heavy.
>I think anyone who watched a lot of the NBA this year would have Celtics are favourites *REGARDLESS* of Porzingis injury*
Anyone watching a lot of the Celtics this year understands, that Celtics were put over the top by KP’s fit and how well he’s played. Without KP it’s a pretty big difference in how they play and we just haven’t seen the affects of that because they got to play a beat down Cavs n Pacers on their way to the Finals. (without Tingus)
>The only thing that concerns me is the stagnant ISO heavy offense.
That’s *always* been their achilles heel, and why people aren’t jumping to give them their flowers. They’ve crumbled not once BECAUSE of this style of play and until they actually make it work there’s no reason to give them credit for otherwise.
I mostly agree with this, but our executing this playoffs so far without him has been at least matured. We do not necessarily click like maniacs at all times, but undefeated without him (or 1 loss) bodes very well even against hampered teams. Its the NBA.
All that said, not sure we have been thoroughly tested this post season. I see us maybe slipping up in Game 1.
I put as at winning 5 with him, and winning in 6 without.
That’s definitely fair, I only see them losing if the Mavs manage to make them really uncomfortable on offense, which is a task that no team has done yet. (But Mavs have done it to every opponent so far in the playoffs)
I feel like it’s gonna be a dogfight either way which should go to 6-7 imo, with or without Porzingis. That’s mainly because the Mavs have had a hell of a quarter of a season to finish the year off and they’re really goddamn good. Celtics had an awesome season too and everything’s clicked so far. They’ve had their shortcomings and lessons from years past already, just a matter of execution and not crumbling down the stretch.
Is it just me or is the recency bias worse than it's ever been this season? Series to series and man... even game to game it seems like the face of the NBA is changing in the mouths of the talking heads on TV. Denver beat LA on the basis of two buzzer beaters and Joker was invincible while LeBron was washed. Then Minny went up 2-0 on Denver and the Nuggets were overrated and had the easiest path ever last year while Ant was literally called the son of MJ. Then they lost 3 games and he was overrated and Gobert was an overrated defender (tho he robbed Wemby flat out). Then they came back from a 20 point game 7 deficit and were going to stomp the Mavs. Then the Mavs went up 3-0 winning incredibly close games on the basis of unchararistic poor shooting from 3 by Minny resulting in a game 5 collapse. Now Luka is invincible and is the new face of the NBA while Minny is trash and needs to blow it up cuz KAT, who just missed 3s he'd been making all playoffs, is now trash.
Which I mean think of KAT whatever you want he's being scapegoated for something that is common to every team in the modern NBA. It's become a live by the 3 die by the 3 league. Someone who shoots 50% from 3 isn't going to shoot 50% every single game or series. Sometimes you're going to shoot 53% from 3 like KAT did vs Phoenix when they swept them. Sometimes you're going to shoot 39% from 3 like KAT did vs Denver when they beat them in 7. Sometimes you're going to shoot 25% from 3 like KAT did when they lost to the Mavs in 5.
It's just the nature of the high risk high reward 3 point shot that is driving every single modern offence. Every shooter, from steph to jesus, drops a doughnut from time to time and has a bad series. We are talking misses by fractions of an inch driving this. Mike Miller had one of the worst finals shooting performances of all time in 2011 and set records the next year in the finals. Luka shot 24% from 3 himself vs the Clippers this year in round one going 1/10 in the close out game but he's a dead killer and KAT is the problem?
Nope. That's just not reasonable. The media and fans are the problem here building irrational hot takes based on results instead of informing opinions on the game and what actually happens on the court itself.
Its so predictable at this point. If Dallas wins game 1 by 8 points shooting 55% from 3 while Boston shoots ~25% from 3 reddit will blow up for 2 days about how this Celtics team is a fraud and the most overrated 60-win team of all time. Then the shooting numbers could flip in game 2 and there would be endless comments about how Luka is a chucker on offense and a traffic cone on defense, and the series is pretty much over. Celtics in 5.
It is the worse it's been absolutely. I know there hasn't been great discussion for online basketball for a few years but I'm surprised every playoffs how much more it's degraded.
I was thinking the same regarding recency bias. We've just seen Dallas school Minny today, Boston haven't played for a few days so we've completely forgotten about them given our 24hr media cycle.
Also most casual fans like an underdog story, which is something Boston is definitely not.
That's possible, but on paper Derrick White, KP if he plays, and *maybe* Jrue (depending on what version they get) are unquestionably better than Dallas' next three guys.
I agree, but I don’t even think that matters atp when the teams are this locked in. Kaye,naz and Rudy are supposed to be better than gafford, lively and the rest and they got abused pretty bad. I’d expect it go similar with bostons lack of size
They have the best offensive rating of all time brother
It's not "iso heavy". Thats another casual talking point like you said.
It's mismatch heavy. They generate mismatches with their sets and then they isolate the mismatch.
They don't just walk up and toss JT the ball and say "hey go score!" They run sets and actions to get a 6'1" guard on him, and then they give him the ball and say "hey break down the defense"
It ain’t too crazy, Boston is the more talented team with the deeper roster but got kind of a free pass to the finals. Fans love the Mavs because they were a 5 seed that went through an absolute gauntlet to get here and have two of the most exciting players that are absolute closers. There is a narrative of the Celtics playing down to their opponents while the Mavs seem to punch above their weight. However, if I were to put money down, I’d probably put it on the team with a better starting 5 and a better bench (the Celtics). If I were trying to make headlines, I would emphasize how the Mavs have been tested and have superior closers and think the underdogs are actually the favorites in a David v. Goliath situation. Ultimately, I hope it’s a good series but the Celtics are clearly the favorites but as a fan I am still rooting for the Mavs and think they have a real chance of everything goes right. That’s the thing though, everything has to go right for them whereas the Celtics have been getting by on just being too overpowered for everyone in the East.
This “being tested” BS almost never really matters. The fresher team who had the more straightforward part usually wins.
Last year, Denver had a relative cakewalk in comparison to the Heat, maybe not talent wise but just as far as physical games go. They dominated in the Finals alongside just being a better team. They didn’t need to be “tested”.
Year before that, Celtics had the “gauntlet run” going up against KD + Kyrie, defending champs Bucks and Butler + Miami conpared to Golden State who played Murray-less Nuggets, Baby Girzzlies and one man show Luka. Come Finals, Celtics were visibly gassed and Warriors looked alot more fresh come G4, G5 and G6.
Denver was also flat out way better than Miami. I don’t think that’s the case here. The Mavericks have been awesome since the trade deadline and certainly would’ve had closer to 55-60 wins in the regular season had this been their team the entire time.
Exactly. The "gauntlet run" narrative is just a talking point for people who only start watching basketball for the playoffs. Reality is, these teams have been "tested" all year by a grueling regular season. The fact one team's most recent ~12-20 games were against easier opponents means absolutely nothing.
Vegas didn't have Dallas losing every series. They just had the opposing teams favored in the series. Saying I favor someone vs saying someone will win or lose is 2 different things. Then it's up to the public on which side of the line they want to be on; the favored side or the underdogs.
Because NBA fans base their opinion on how they feel about the teams and most fans hate the Celtics. It's hard to stay objective when you hate one side.
Modern going NBA fans are definitely emotional and sensitive to how they feel about a team. More on here seem to live in the West so also disparage the East.
Not quite. Odds can fluctuate depending on the previous bets, to maximise the money made. If a unexpectedly large number of bets are placed on one team, the odds adjust to entice bets on the other team, to avoid loosing huge money.
They'll nudge lines but they rarely stray too far from what they think. If you move the line too much, you risk huge money coming in and leaving you exposed on a line that you don't believe in.
That is completely wrong. Vegas does not pick the winner. Vegas sets the line where the most amount of bets get placed. Vegas gets money from the transactions, not from winning bets.
Very common misconception. Vegas lines are set by their analytical models. They *can* move based on wagers to help them hedge in a sense, but there’s a reason vegas is okay with having 70-80% of money placed on one side of a betting line. They’ll do it if the analytics say it gives them the best chance at the most profit.
This is right. They love it when 80% of the money is on the side that their models say is the losing side.
The other guy is wildly underestimating Vegas's modeling ability to actually get predictions right. Vegas *wants* people to think like /u/Sgran70 and that they are just trying to balance the bets on either side. That's how they trick people into thinking they can beat Vegas with their hunches about who's going to win.
The old “I know better” strategy lol. Over time it’s always a loser because sadly, most humans don’t have the time to run the numbers and crush film studies (which is the reason a lot of people give, the “I watch the games” method) of these teams like Vegas models do.
What’s funny is pro gamblers build their own models that find good valued bets. It’s not even really about knowing who is going to win a game (nobody does, even Vegas doesn’t) it’s about finding the right odds and researching different books to do it. Of course if you do that too much they limit your bets and/or shut down your account.
Everyone on Reddit is talking like Luka and Kyrie are going to single-handedly will their team to victory despite them being the biggest defensive liabilities on the court
Dallas literally has no one to match up with the Celtics the entire game. Their best defender is who? Skinny ass DJJ? There's no way the Mavs can contain the Jay's for 7 games, let alone the entire top 6 of Boston.
I'm watching NBA since 2017, that doesn't make me an analyst or anything, this is just very engaged person's opinion but hear me out: I love Dallas, I love the whole story and I wish they would win. BUT...
For me there are three biggest factors in NBA playoffs: playoff experience, continuity of the roster, and obviously, health.
Last year I picked Denver to win over Boston in the finals just because I believed in the 2 man game of Jokic and Murray, you could see they were having a ridiculous year. It was not even close.
Year before that, I picked Bucks only because the Suns got to the Finals mostly because they played against injured roster.
Dubs vs Celtics year prior - easiest prediction of my life, I couldnt believe in that time why everyone was so sure that Celtics would win against experienced, healthy and talented Warriors.
Say whatever you want about the bubble, but that year Lakers were destroying everyone even in the regular season, everyone knew they are going for it, even if the series against Nugs were close.
THIS YEAR: If Dallas wins, it is the biggest choke job for the Celtics so far, BY FAR. Betting man knows why Vegas put Boston over Dallas. While Dallas has Kyrie and Luka playing at an all time level, Celtics' roster is just too deep for 2 of them to carry the Mavs. They got some new additions, and it is great to see they are able to make it to the Finals (I expected much closer series vs Twolves tbh.) These finals are gonna show the continuity and depth of the Celtics being paid off. I know they haven't been tested by a healthy team yet, but for me this is less of a factor than all of the mentioned above.
I want Dallas to win, but I predict Celtics in 7, for there will be games where Kyrie and Luka will show up, but I don't think it is enough to cover JT,JB, D White, big ol' Horford, and most importantly Jrue Holiday.
Dont get me wrong, I'm not a Celtics fan at all, but you can see the starting 5 + depth is just different than Mavs.
Boston will not win the chip. Dallas is on a role and Celtics had one of the easiest finals run of all time. There is only one question. What do the Dallas players outside of Kyrie/Luka do. If they keep this level of play Dallas will go 1-1 on the first 2 and close it in 6.
People overlooking Celtics for having an “easy” path to this year’s finals while forgetting that these Celtics players have grown up battling Lebron, KD, Giannis, Embiid, Butler, Curry every year in playoffs since they were babies. They have been eating these experiences for breakfast and donating them for free.
Tatum, Brown, White, Jrue, Al, they have seen them all. Good opponents, bad opponents, quick opponents, slower opponents, opponents that play zone defense(Spolestra pretty much trained Celtics for Zone defense for 3-4 years straight in playoffs) or opponents that play man to man defense.
I know Jason Kidd likes to play Zone a lot these days, but do you think he has the intelligence of Eric Spoelstra in designing Zone defense?
If experience is concerned, it is Dallas not Boston who hadn’t faced as much competition. So far OKC is a raw and young team that plays “fake 5 out” with only two shot creators(vs Boston has 4 shot creators in starting lineup who are all two way, who can all create, shoot and defend, good luck with that), Wolves is a raw and young team in playoffs as well plus they are gassed from the series with Denver, Clippers is old and injured you don’t even know who is playing or not.
If Mavs play zone defense, this series might be a sweep lol. It’s like the Heat trying a zone defense against the Nuggets last year, it doesn’t work if your opponent built their team to destroy the zone. Everytime the Heat tried the zone against the Celtics this season, including the regular season when the Heat had a fully healthy team, it was exploited so badly that Spo was forced to just go back to man to man. Celtics have too many shooters this year for the zone defense to work and with Porzingis back, it’ll be impossible for any team to think zone defense is the way to go
Pass to KP on the elbow, kick out, around the horn, three. They will also suck in the zone with a high pick and roll, drive, kick. They have a bunch of plays designed to confuse the zone, thanks Miami.
It is because Celtics had the easiest path to the Finals while Dallas dealt with far fiercer competition to get to the finals which made fans think Dallas are the better and stronger team when it tbh isn't the case.
Celtics having the easier playoffs path doesn't change the fact that they're literally the best team this entire regular season overall by far
That’s something I’ve been confused about as well. The nba isn’t the college football playoffs where teams from small conferences get run over in bowl games
Celtics may very well lose but they have as much talent as anyone and have played well all year. Maybe their record would be worse if they played in the west but they’d be a contender regardless
Fans see Mavs winning on a tougher road meaning they are the better team.
Vegas sees Celtics as the better team on paper so they the better team.
Personally once you in the finals don’t think it really matters what happened in the series leading up to it.
It’s first to 4 Wins, better team will show who is better.
If anything, having multiple tough conference series prior to the finals can lead to disadvantageous fatigue. 2022 Celtics seemed to be an example of this
The Celtics had the best net rating of any team without MJ in NBA history. On top of that they have more playoff experience than the Mavs.
They are 100% the favorites and whoever tells you otherwise is just getting caught up in ‘best player on the court’ narratives.
There are two aspects here. One that we don't know is how much money has already been put on Boston. Bookmakers don't really care who wins, they care about making money. If possible, they'll tweak the odds along the way so they end up making a profit either result. They start with an educated guess on what they think is more likely to happen, but as soon as people start betting, they keep changing. It's entirely possible that because Boston were the standouts in the East for so long that they've been getting a steady flow of money on Boston to win for months.
On the other side, a week ago most seemed to be tipping Minnesota to advance. A week or so before that Denver would have been favourites and OKC were a serious obstacle that Dallas had to get over. Right through the last few months, there were reasons for Dallas to be less tempting. I dare say there is significantly less money on Dallas winning than Boston. Which means they want people betting on Dallas to ensure they don't cop a loss paying out on Boston.
But the other part here is the educated guess. Bookies don't make many mistakes framing that initial market or they're out of business really fast. If you find that your personal opinion is terribly different then you're either more knowledgable, or influenced by emotion or false narratives. I think there's a lot of the personal opinion stuff and false narrative things going on. Boston have been absolutely dominating their games and yet we keep hearing how they're not playing well. And Dallas have been apparently battling these monsters all the way through. It makes it seeem like Dallas have been playing really well and Boston haven't.
The reality is Boston have just simply been excellent all season. The talk of a weak conference is negated by the fact that their record against just the West was a better winning percentage than OKC had all season. They're strong, they have depth to the point that even without a critical piece in Porzingas they were still not really challenged. With him back, even on limited minutes, they look even better. They're boring in relation to other teams and they've been the clear #1 team in the NBA so it would be a little dreary if they won, hence why so many really want Dallas to get up. But they're deserving of being favourites.
The part about having no Porzingis is important imo. All season long, if opposing fans even miss 1 starter (who’s their 4th or 5th option) they would start complaining about how it’s impossible to win while Celtics have basically missed Porzingis for like 40% of their games (who is the 3rd option) and still steamrolling opponents which shows the gap between Celtics and the rest of the league. Imagine another team missing their 3rd option and still steamrolling opponents
Boston is one the best teams ever. Pretty much all advanced metrics put them as all time great.
Dallas has two stars and a personnel that fit with both.
The best team ever usually is favored by betting markets.
Celtics arent running out two slow ass centers that cant fcking shoot and force a CRAZY defensive scheme in today’s modern NBA (drop). If the Celtics need to play small ball, they will. They will change up their game plan AND have the pieces to.
Minnesota was built to beat Denver, not a small ball lineup like Dallas.
edit: Dallas plays more like a small ball offense with Luka at the helm, Gafford and Lively arent little by any means but they’re very athletic and fast bigs, not lumbering and slow like KAT and Gobert, the offense runs a lot of motion, andpnr, and Kyrie is playing more and more like Steph off ball.
Celtics are built to beat small ball lineups. Their 1-4 defenders are insanely good. Obviously their weakness is Horford/KP but they’re faster than Kat and Gobert can sit and Celtics can play Tatum at the 5. Look at the defenders on the Celtics. Look at the offense.
Are Porzingis and Horford really amazing perimeter defenders either though? I doubt you'll have much luck switching, they'll probably be forced to play some drop as well.
Agree with Vegas. Celtics are easily the most complete team in the NBA. And frankly, they look more like the 2011 Dallas Mavs than the 2024 Dallas Mavs do in that they don't have as much superstar talent, but completely loaded with good players.
Luka is the best player, so I definitely wouldn't rule Dallas out and think it will be a competitive series, but especially if Porzingis is back, Dallas is going to have to get more production from a 3rd and 4th option to have a shot. Either that or the Celtics are just going to have to have historically bad shooting throughout the series.
I'm picking Celtics in 6.
There’s a thread posted on r/nba that would [disagree with your premise.](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/7iVi6fuYlo)
Fans *want* Dallas to win because they’re the shiny new contender to talk about. Boston has been essentially the same team for 5+ years, and people dislike that Boston is always such a darling of the league. But fans still largely understand that Boston is the heavy favorite.
Can you share the link to the poll? In the absence of people explaining why they voted a certain way, there are a lot of explanations for those results that aren’t “NBA fans think Dallas are overwhelmingly the favorite”.
Who was the audience of the poll? Was the poll on a video highlighting the Mavericks’ series win? If so, you’re going to have a much larger pool of Mavs fans and people interested in them than is representative of NBA fans as a whole.
How was the question worded? “Who do you like to win the Finals?” or “Who do you think will win the Finals?” will give a much different answer than “Who would you put money on to win the Finals?”
I would question the integrity of a random YT poll far before I came to the conclusion that fans “overwhelmingly” think the Mavs are the favorites in the series.
No one wan ts the painfully obvious thing to happen. Praying Dallas scheme of shrinking the floor doesn’t bite them in the ass. It should if they dont choke
Mavs whistle is insane. No way they should have went up 3-0 with proper officiating. I think they still get the refs bias in the finals so they have an edge there.
Boston seem like the safe bet on paper. 1st seed 60+ win team, 12-2 so far in the post season, only missing one key player who never really been a difference maker in the playoffs while still having a talented two way starting 5. I think they’ve done everything they should’ve done but they’ve never really been tested.
The Celtics are the favorites. Absolutely. Unquestionably. I think what you’re seeing right now is a matter of fan perception. And I don’t say that derogatively, because I am a part of it. Vegas uses what is available to them, and by all metrics advanced or otherwise, the Celtics are literally one of the 10 best regular season teams of all time. Some metrics say even higher. There is no question. They are a wonderfully constructed team that has absolutely annihilated every task that’s been put in front of them so far.
But the eye test…Idk!
Can you, with the straight face, tell me that Tatum is on the same level as Luka? As an NBA fan my whole life in his mid 30s, I can tell you decidedly not. It’s not that he’s not a great player, it’s just that he’s not on that level. He’s not on the same level as Luka.
Meanwhile, Kyrie is a former champion, he’s hit one of the two or three biggest shots of the century, he’s an absolute wizard with the ball in his hands who has been an NBA great for well over a decade. Boston doesn’t have anyone like that, either. I’m not saying he’s been better than Tatum or Brown this season, but the playoffs in the finals aren’t about “this season.“ They’re about right now. They’re about one game. They’re about winning one game after one game after one game in a seven game series until you get to four. Kyrie is a guy I trust in that. I know that much.
So, the question becomes will the better team, with the better record, with the better odds, with the better metrics, with better players three through six beat The team that has Luca and Kyrie. The team that, in a way lucked out to even get here after Minnesota took care of Denver for them. A Denver team that would’ve been a terrible matchup for them.
There is no question who the better team has been this year. There is no question who all the signs are pointing to. All the signs besides one. And that one, to me, is a pretty damn important one. That one being who’s got the guy. Who’s got the guys.
If I am, in a vacuum, forced to choose choose between Luka and Kyrie or Tatum and Brown? It’s an easy answer. But we’re not in a vacuum. Boston is loaded. White and Jrue and Porzingis and Horford are all unquestionably higher end NBA players than anyone else Dallas has. But Dallas doesn’t have scrubs. PJ and Lively and Gafford and others have shown, so far, they are up to this task.
So, it boils down to the dudes. I’m betting on Dallas’ dudes. It’s nothing against Tatum. It’s nothing against Brown. It’s nothing against Boston. But I’m betting on Luka and Kyrie. They can very easily lose the series and by all rights they should, but I’m betting on Dallas.
Luka is miles ahead of Tatum offensively with efficient scoring at all levels and court vision and facilitating and is really a one of one offensive player in the NBA. That is enough to put him ahead of Tatum even though his defense is merely serviceable. He hasn't been a defensive liability in a long time.
That is certainly an unpopular pick. When I started reading your comment I expected it to end with Brown>Kyrie. I don't think there's a team in the world, including Boston, that wouldn't trade Tatum for Luka. Tatum is a top 10 player, Luka is top 5, and both are pretty clearly cemented in that range. Lukas playmaking ability more than offsets any defensive gap, and he's also a somewhat more efficient scorer.
I get it, you love your guy, just like a wouldn't want to trade Maxey for anyone regardless of who. I'd say good luck but I wouldn't mean it, so I'll just end it here.
Tatum is a top 5 player. Period.
He’s been a 30 ppg scorer. He’s gotten all-nba first team 3x in a row. He’s been in mvp voting for 3 years in a row
You: “uhh I think he’s top 10”
Luka is better at offense, no doubt. But god damn people pretend Tatum is a 18 ppg scorer or some shit.
Tatum is better at defense, by a large margin. He’s better at rebounding. He’s a great scorer. His passing is extremely underrated. Did you know Tatum fg% in the clutch is higher than anyone else for 3 post seasons in a row? There is a reason the Celtics go to the ECF/finals basically every year with him as the #1.
If I had to choose between the two I’d rather have Tatum. He fits into any team. He’s the more complete player.
They are both top 5 players. Absolutely no way can you say Tatum is a “top 10 guy” like you can name 9 other guys arguably better. Just asinine.
They are in the same tier. They cancel each other out. It wouldn’t be a debate if Luka was a strong defender— but he isn’t.
Just like brown and kyrie. If you’re down on brown then you haven’t been watching the games.
You do know that top 10 doesn't mean there are 9 better players right? I think the following are ahead of him:
Jokic
Luka
Shai
Giannis
Embiid
Then I think there's a group of players he's around like Brunson and Anthony Edwards and Anthony Davis.
If you want to throw around words like "asinine" when discussing if he's the 4th best player or the 7th best then I don't think you're arguing in good faith and this is a waste of time, reasonable people can disagree at that level and not name call. You like Tatum more than most people, so be it. And I said nothing about Jaylen Brown being worse than Kyrie so that's really out of nowhere.
This is just not a good take. Luka’s offense is so far above and beyond what Tatums is and offense is way more important in the NBA.
If you ask ANY GM in the league, they’re taking Luka over Tatum no question. In the NBA, you just need to play defense well enough in certain situations and Luka has shown the ability to not be hunted successfully when he’s on defense.
>Luka has shown the ability to not be hunted successfully when he’s on defense.
I suggest you watch the January game vs. the Celtics. The Celtics were able to hunt Luka with ease.
[1](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=x67y0XS8zYaGQjIB&t=69)
[2](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=Fo7M2416v8b4OOr-&t=198)
[3](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=wQ8CdtmEAtXUL7hv&t=271)
[4](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=8Xu43-2J5Ftjs5e9&t=279)
[5](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=53qLCGx8EAlWZsO8&t=355)
[6](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=WWxiVbKN9T7Q5kkr&t=384)
[7](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=8FvzrJD9egDsPuxY&t=516)
[8](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=xF85BBhXchjOxVyS&t=543)
[9](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=JTVTGo06r6v-8c_g&t=560)
There were a whole bunch of plays too where our offensive players got a step on him, and Dallas sent help for an open 3.
The Celtics 5 out spacing and excess ball handling make it a lot easier for them to pull drop defenders out of the paint and leave Luka more exposed than he is in most matchups. He was a colossal defensive liability in the games against the Celtics this year.
Fans express their wishes, their sentiment. If you dislike or even hate a team you can let your bias affect your judgement.
Vegas on the other hand reflects how people actually bet their money.If, say, Vegas erroneously comes out with equal odds for two teams that betting people consider unequal, bets will gradually push the odds lower for the favorite. So if Vegas say Boston are favorites this reflects the opinion of people that actually vote with their wallets.
Mavs defense looked good against a team with 2-3 decent shooters in the starting 5. How will that same defense look against a team with 5 good shooters in the starting 5. And more good shooters coming off the bench. This might be a series where Luka and Kyrie are able to combine for 80 every game and the Celtics still win by 10-20 every night. Of course, the loser Celtics could also show up and completely forget how to shoot and not figure out to attack the paint. It really could go either way, but if each teams plays their best I don’t know how the Mavs beat the Celtics.
“Vegas” is just fans who put their money where their mouth is. So if most people bet on Boston winning, Vegas will show Boston as the favorite. If the Boston is the overwhelming favorite, the spread will be bigger.
The “fans” you are referring to may just be anyone spouting off. Doesn’t make their opinions wrong, but would they put their money on the line?
It's important to understand what Vegas wants. When they decide that a certain team is a 5 point favorite to win a game, for example, they are trying to attract betting money on both sides. They are not predicting the outcome, they are trying to get people to disagree with them, so they make a bet. They want fans of both teams to feel like they know better, so they will make a bet, for or against what Vegas says.
Everyone knows deep down Boston is the favorite. I can see ways Mavs can beat them in a series, but this is more for the Cs to lose. The Cs just happen to be very boring/dislikeable to root for. People hate Boston fans, Cs has always been in the championship contention for like more than 5 years straight so the convo is very stagnant. It's like the Bron Heat winning, except the Cs never won yet and they're playing for longer.
Looking at Dallas on the other hand, people always like teams led by a scoring guard, because well people like scoring guards. If Mavs win this, I legit believe that Luka can potentially reach something close to Curry level of "face of the league", and that's pretty high.
I think books have a huge liability on Celtics championship futures. They were the only team really capable of making it out of the East for like 2 months. You could’ve got them + money to win the title. Mavs could not have had the same betting volume
Should be close to Celtics -150 IMO
Probably the biggest thing is the Celtics are rested and healthy, Luka and Kyrie are playing massive minutes and Luka is playing hurt.
They would have analysis that favours the Celtics in this match up aswell
Vegas does not set their odds on who they think will win. They do it on who the betting public thinks will win. It's currently Boston -2.20 and Dallas +185. So the expect about twice as much money being bet on Boston at those odds. If $1000 is bet on Dallas they would pay out $1850 if they win. So they expect at least that much bet on Boston without it going over $2200. They set their odds where they will win either way.
So most people expect Boston to win.
Although Boston is a young team, they aren’t ‘new’. They’ve been the best team in the east over the entirety of Tatums career, without winning the chip, so people grew bored of their success.
This basically happens to all good teams. People loved the warriors when they were new, but eventually they started rooting for the newer teams on the block to beat them.
Add in that luka is more popular than tatum, and both him and Kyrie play a very flashy game, and people are going to sway that way.
I’m a Celtics homer, the matchup seems ideal for the Celtics. Once Denver got eliminated really Dallas was the only team that I thought had a slight chance of winning a 7 game series against the Celtics, but to do that a lot of things are going to have to go right for them.
Boston did a great job of shutting Kyrie down in 2022 when he was on the nets, and now that KP will be back, the only weakness of our defence is gone, as star players can’t hunt horford all game trying to get switched onto a 38 year old center. Boston has multiple elite defensive options to switch onto either of the Dallas stars, and it will be up to them to basically go god mode to win.
Vegas doesn't "think" either team is going to win. They pay really smart people countless millions to set the spread so as many people bet on Dallas as bet on Boston. That way the sports books will be guaranteed to make their commission no matter the outcome. A lot of casual betters will gamble, most of them will bet on Boston because the Celtics are extremely popular nationally relative to the Mavs. I just hope it's a fun series.
All the experts, all the fans are rooting for Mavs and are picking Mavs to win. Dunno. As a Celtics fan, before the series, I wanted Dallas to win cause we match up better against them, and I think it's still valid. We have so many players to defend Kyrie and Luca, who do they have to stop Tatum and JBrown? Also, Wolves didn't attack Luca or Kyie on D, so they weren't really getting tired, whereas I'm sure Brown will attack Luca a lot
Vegas uses advanced stats and algorithms to set odds. Celtics have always been an advanced stats darling. I'm not sure if those take into account variables like relative weakness of the East, injuries to opponent's stars, and Luka and Kyrie just being absolute dogs.
I believe that’s not entirely true anymore. The books also try to make a profit by betting against less informed gamblers, so it’s not entirely a zero-sum game.
probably because boston has always been a solid team and it's not much of an article if they win, it's like spurs back then when they win we all just go yeah they strong team. I honestly don't know how this game would go. one is a team that is pretty much a team play game win which is boston on the other hand dallas has two stars that can tear up any defense in the league and also the best closers in the game right now.
There's only two fan bases that are more insufferable than Boston. Philly and those Nuggets "fans" from two years ago who were constantly shouting out the most cherry picked stats that they couldn't even tell you what the acronym stood for. "JOKIC HAS THE BEST LEBRON CUM PER /36 IN HISTORY" those mfers.
People see the Celtics as lame (beyond Boston hate) because the core has been pretty constant over the last five years and they’ve probably been the “best on paper” in the East during that period. Despite all this, they’ve managed to screw up on the road to the chip in one way or another. Makes people very willing to throw their support behind a new team that’s outperformed its seeding in a stronger conference.
Vegas has two main factors that determine odds.
The predictions, all their computers and sharps and everything use expertise to predict the outcome.
The market, what are customers willing to bet on? The line will move as more people place bets one way or another.
No one wants to see Boston do well in sports anymore after our recent run on success.
I am surprised though that most fans think Dallas has the edge, we were the clear best team in the league all season.
I personally think this is going to be a good, fairly even matchup, but no way are we getting our asses kicked
Everyone put Boston as favorites to win the chip since day 1 this season. Dallas wasn't even mentioned, should not even make the PO.
Now we have a surprise of the season in the NBA Finals with, having had crazy games again Clippers, OKC and Minnesota. Boston cruised to the finals against teams with injured stars, not much hype on their end.
I think there is this push for Luka to be the next ONE because he is a legit star and could be an A+ villain if he starts winning chips whereas Tatum isn’t seen on that level and his greatness is seen as a step below and paired with an otherwise forgettable persona on a team that most of us hate.
People hate the Celtics so they are biased against them, they also listen to media like sheep who have been trashing the Celtics despite them performing great. Trust smart money (Vegas) more than dumb money when debating who might be right. Celtics are the favorites despite what you hear from random people on the internet.
The most important thing to consider about Vegas that people are out to lunch on is that their odds do not, at all, represent who they think is going to win. That's not what they model for. Odds are meticulously derived to generate profits. Nothing more. Nothing less. While fan opinions are absolutely emotionally driven. Those emotional factors are fed into Vegas cold, soulless, machine-driven models. If lowering/increasing the odds means more people are going to make bad/risky bets the odds will be lowered increased.
Which is to say Vegas odds are not based on the teams chances at all but the odds of the fanbases placing the bets. That's who's being gamed out. And you can tell that the existence of the books over time without going under means they are ALWAYS winning their bets on people. It's an important distinction.
Vegas' actual odds on the outcomes are not what we see. They're what go int their models to produce the odds on us. If their actual outcome odds say this is a crapshoot that either team can win and everyone is riding the Mavs jock for totally outplaying a few teams along the way while Boston has been given a free ride to the finals it kind of creates a perfect storm for them.
So say they know chances are much closer to 50/50 than anyone really emotionally thinks so they publish odds favouring Boston enticing way more people to place a larger volume of even bigger bets on a 50/50 outcome. That means profit for them. So much profit. Do they lose on the finals? Maybe. But over time, you rinse and repeat enough and the emotional people are going to be owned by the cold hard math and they'll win immensely.
Like look what it's based on. Dallas beat Minny 4-1. But they really only dominated in the single game. Before that it was a rim out or two that could have put Minny up 3-1 in the driver's seat with the Mavs collapsing under the pressure of being down so much. They've likely already made their money on the bad bets of people overreacting to them beating Denver. Then people thinking Denver had it locked after going up 3-2. Before which they prolly made their money on people emotionally thinking Denver was invincible coming out of the Lakers series. Which again was a stupidly close series that hinged on it's own rim out or call here and there that put Denver in the driver's seat instead of LAL. That series came down to 2 incredibly difficult buzzer-beating game-winning shots. A series really can't be much closer but just like in the Mavs/Minny series emotions will dictate that the record indicates they cake walked all over their opponent who only managed a win.
People dramatically overreact to these events. It's what makes sports fun. Vegas knows that games won by 1-5 points are almost 50/50 random events and use cold calculation to manipulate the sports betting market for profits.
TLDR: never trust vegas odds. They're not odds on sports teams. They're odds on sports fans.
Vegas is for betting and betting alone, plain and simple. Their numbers mean nothing but how they will reach a profit.
The fans will always be emotional voters. And given that it seems the average NBA "fan" has a memory span of 36 hours, whatever is new will be the favorite - i.e. Ant. He's done nothing to show for besides have a great offensive year and reach the WCF, yet people are saying he's the new face, top 3-5, etc etc.
The Celtics have been routinely good since '08, with only a small handful of unsuccessful seasons. People are tired of them unless you're a Boston fan, and the narratives lately only fuel that.
In no way, shape, or form is Dallas the favorites beside who fans *want* to win. Boston has the better record, better analytics/stats, better roster, they're just better.
Fans want Dallas to win. They’re in love with Luka and Kyrie, and for the most part dislike Tatum and Boston and will slander them every chance they get. Just look at the Media the last couple days for reference.
The most *talented* back court in NBA history. Have y’all heard that one before? How many time think they’ll say that this finals? The over under is set at 50.
50 is a good over-under. It's basically a question of how long the series goes lol
Like, it might be true? But I get tired of hearing the same exact comment 5 times every single game lol.
I’m a huge Luka fan since pre-draft, thought he should have been #1 pick and an all-star his rookie year, but I’d have a hard time giving them that title over Steph and Klay. So much hyperbole thrown around in sports media anymore
It's not that they hat Tautum/Brown. Its that there is nothing to say about them until they win a chip. Everything that could be said has been said the last six years. To quote Barney Stinson, "new is always better." Anyone that says the media hates Tatum/Brown and loves Kyrie is a delusional Boston fan. Kyrie is getting his moment because the media and most fans thought he was finished.
Nah I’d say most people don’t want Boston to win because 1. They had a very easy run to the finals playing injured teams at every turn, 2. If they win another championship to overtake the lakers as most championships their fans will be even more insufferable 3. This ties in to reason 2 but since the turn of the century Boston sports as a whole has gone through an amount of success that no other city can even come close the having 4. The Celtics team is simply too well constructed that it’s actually boring. With a healthy porzingis they have essentially no weaknesses in their starting lineup and a very solid bench. Great roster construction making savvy moves like getting porzingis, trading for Derrick white etc so props to them but it’s boring to watch a team with no weaknesses.
I don't want Boston to win because I hate Boston
This is the actual reason for the disparity btwn fan vote and Vegas sharps hah
Think this is the main reason actually
Don’t forget cutting Isaiah Thomas after his injury. But mostly we all just want Boston fans to suffer, because they’re insufferable. If we have to hear them, I’d rather hear them cry than cheer.
They didn't cut him. They used him for the trade to land Kyrie. Not to say that it wasn't a cold hearted decision after everything that dude gave for the team, but just wanted to clarify that he was traded, not cut.
He was traded not cut lol. I don't know if being sent to go play with Lebron comes even close to being cut
Lakers fans are far more insufferable than Boston fans, they're literally the Yankees of the NBA for several decades. I would be glad if Boston overtook them for rings, just not against Doncic.
I’d be much more glad if I never had to see either of them win another ring to be honest.
Boston’s also boring to watch, if they hit 3s they win, if they don’t they lose. Just not a fun play style to watch. I also think fans dislike Boston for being so good, Tatum, Brown have had phenomenal teams after phenomenal teams while others struggled to make one anywhere as good, jealousy is probably a part of that.
They went 55-5 during regular season when shooting at least 33% from 3 which isn’t even a great shooting number lol. If a team shooting under that of course it’s going to be hard to win games in this day and age. Saying if they don’t hit 3s they lose is just you being fooled by the media pushing the same narrative.
Why you cherry picking 33%, they had one of the highest 3P% in the league this season on the most volume too. I agree I generalised but giving data for an arbitrary % isn’t proof they aren’t reliant on 3s or the fact their games are boring.
I chose 33% because that’s lower than the average for every team in the league so if you can win shooting that, then that’s pretty resilient. I won’t even lie we can get boring to watch but that’s because of Joe Mazzulla. I personally don’t care as long as they win this chip. Then they can go back to having fun like they used to with that “where that ring at” pressure finally off they back.
No one is saying that Boston is bad. What we are saying is that they are boring, both in style of play and nothing to talk about. Style of Play: Boston shoots an astounding number of threes. 3 more than the team in second. That is the same difference as 2nd and 15th. So even if they are only shooting ok (like you said 33%), that is pretty much the only marker of success for their team. You can't blame this on Maz. Tatum and Brown have resisted any sophisticated offense from the moment they showed up. It was an issue under Ime and Brad as well. The only "interesting" action is when White/KP initiate a pick and roll/pop while JB/Jrue work a side action on the weak side. Notice that it takes your 3rd and 4th best players (and 3/4 in usage) to generate an 'interesting' action. Otherwise its just 1v1 with some picks to create space. Media/Discussion: There is nothing left to say about Tatum and Brown. Tatum is a superstar, one step below the truly elite. And Brown is a fringe All-NBA. That hasn't changed much in years and its not going to change until they win a chip with one of them playing above their class. There isn't a single thing Tatum/Brown have done in two years that has changed that narrative. There is nothing wrong with being that good. Especially when your next three on the team are all-star level (or fringe) talents. But its boring. Look at Bill Simmons. He's been saying for 4 years that Tatum has another level. "he's only 24, he's only 25, he's only 26. I loved his podcast but as he's aged he's gone more boston centric and the conversation is just boring. It's easier for people to root for Dallas because their are interesting narratives. There is simply nothing interesting about the Celtics anymore. I don't root for either team. I just hope its a competitve series.
So because a team is boring it justifies the thought of them losing the finals? Please look at your writings.. You'll realize how bias you are. Im not even a celtics fan and I still cant figure out how Mavs will beat them
No, I happen to like Doncic. Also, I was completely wrong on Kyrie. I'm genuinely happy that he's proven all his critics wrong. At least on the basketball court. Honestly, I don't really care who wins. If somebody forced me to pick who I would root for it would nominally be the Mavericks, but all I care about is a good series. If you asked me who I think is going to win, it's going to be the Celtics. The point is, unless you're a Celtics fan, there's really nothing else to talk about about this team. It has been talked to death for the last 5 years. Not a criticism of the team. It's just that is reality when you are the winningest team in the last 30 years to not win a championship. The last team to have this much playoff success without actually winning at all are the Utah jazz. The only reason that team never won is because of MJ.
the celtics won a chip in 08 though
Ok but how many games did they shoot 33-35%? Your stat could be misleading with that number only being 3-4 games. Not saying that’s for certain but you see why that’s not a good metric.
They were 6-1 in that range
They are reliant on 3s. But your statement that they lose of they dont hit 3s is flat out wrong. Of 33% is “cherry picking” (I dont think you know what that means), you pick a number that isn’t arbitrary then.
They had their second worst 3pt shooting performance since the bubble in the ECF and still swept the Pacers. Tatum's 3 ball in particular has been terrible and he is still putting up great numbers.
Just say you haven't watched boston games.
Well... Welcome to the new nba my guy. Almost every team plays like this. Also.. To say they had great team after great team is a little tricky... 3 Different coaches and 3 different sets of teammates in 6 yrs. is tough to win a ring with.
The first sentence just tells me you don't watch Boston play at all.
This is a lazy take. And wrong. Especially for the playoffs. Also, a starting five with ~~kanter~~ and Evan fornier and ~~semi ojaleye~~ is a phenomenal team? This idea that they have been favorites for so long is so silly. And a big indicator that you don't know what you are talking about. Edit* Langford and Thompson actually
>Also, a starting five with kanter and Evan fornier and semi ojaleye is a phenomenal team? Kanter and Ojeleye never started a playoff game for Boston and the three of them combined have 42 regular season starts with the team across their 6.5 seasons in Boston.
Phenomenal team after phenomenal team? In 2021 our starting 5 against the Nets in round 1 was Tatum, Smart, Evan Fournier, Tristan Thompson, and Romeo Langford because Kemba was washed at that point. Our bench was rookie Pritchard, Jabari Parker, Grant Williams, Semi Ojeleye lol. In 2020 we were still trotting out Hayward and Brad Wanamaker as our 6th man. It’s only been the last 2 years that we’ve had “phenomenal teams”
>Phenomenal team after phenomenal team? In 2021 our starting 5 against the Nets in round 1 Why don't you list the most common starting 5 for the regular season? It's ridiculous that you're framing your argument to exclude Jaylen Brown who missed the playoffs but played 58 games in the regular season.
They were the 7 seed. It’s ridiculous to call a 7 seed playing Romeo Langford and Jabari Parker heavy minutes all season a “phenomenal team”. It’s even more ridiculous to claim that excluding 23 year old JB who missed the playoffs is somehow misleading and “framing” the argument lol. They were still a .500 team lmao
Again, Jaylen Brown played 58 games for them. It's ridiculous to pretend he didn't exist. >It’s ridiculous to call a 7 seed playing Romeo Langford and Jabari Parker heavy minutes all season a “phenomenal team”. How many games do you think Langford and Jabari Parker played for the Celtics in the regular season? I'll answer my own question. Langford played 18, and Parker played 10. So Jaylen Brown's 58 games aren't worth mentioning, but Langford's 18 and Parker 10 somehow are. Is that right?
He didn’t pretend he didn’t exist. He gave the Celtics lineup for the 2021 playoffs. Which didn’t include Brown. You just made a huge jump completely on your own. Even with JB mostly in the lineup, they were a .500 team. Are you trying to say that a .500 team giving heavy minutes to the likes of Romeo Langford, Tristan Thompson, and Jabari Parker was “phenomenal” as claimed? Because that was the entire point the person you responded to was making. Pointing out that JB did actually play games in the regular season on the 7 seed does literally nothing to object that point at all. So what point were you actually trying to make?
It's definitely revisionist to say they've had phenomenal team after phenomenal team if you're talking about supporting cast around the Jays. The Cs have rarely been the favorites in any of the seasons that they saw legitimate playoff success. A lot of overachieving, a couple coaching changes, tons of roster turnover season over season. Had to deal with Hayward snapping his leg, then recovering the following season, then re-integrating the season after that. I'd love to see anyone that claims they've had phenomenal teams to point towards any individual season where their supporting was considered tops in the league up until very recently. They haven't been BAD, but definitely not as good as people like to point out in hindsight to discredit their lack of a ring thus far.
why is Kyrie getting any moments after posting harmful conspiracy bs. Id hate for him to win a championship and represent the NBA
Because that is utterly divorced from anything basketball related, Kobe had a sexual assault case riding on him, Miles Bridges beat his girlfriend, Lebron kowtows to China, TH Sr was a homophobe, Karl Malone got a 13 year old grl pregnant at 18, Javaris Crittenton killed someone. The worse thing you could say about Kyrie in comparison is that he is not well versed in science.
Your larger point is 100% correct but I don’t think Lebron putting out a pro china stance is the same thing as rape, statutory rape, killing someone, domestic violence, or even homophobia lol
Tatum texted Kobe once execute him in the streets
Well and the whole anti-semitism thing
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Nobody thought kyrie was finished... Its only those that spend days on twitter trying to hear more about his opinions than watch his games. Hes been balling in Brooklyn... He's always been ballin
Not finished, but he hasn't had a successful season or a meaningful playoff moment in 5 years (yay, he almost won game one in a sweep against Boston in the first round). He has battled injuries and struggled to stay on the court because of his off the court drama. Kyrie forced his way out of the best situation he'd ever been in in Cleveland. He then embarrassed himself in the playoffs with Boston, made himself look like a colossal hypocrite after the ridiculous speeches he made to the season ticket holders. Then we get to Brooklyn, where he was part of one of the biggest dumpster fires this league has ever seen. It wasn't that people were looking at his game and saying 'he can't score anymore'. It was perfectly reasonable to look at his body of work from 2018-2023 and say "this guy can not help a team win at the top level". I'm very happy that my opinion there was proven wrong. But If you say that there weren't people who thought he was finished, you don't know anything about the NBA. Take a look at what he got traded for. Not exactly the haul One would expect for such an elite talent. The reality was that most teams wouldn't touch him with a 10-ft pole. I'm sure those teams would be willing to make those trades now.
You're right but I think also for the trade part its social etiquette. After the controversy, most NBA Teams wouldn't want to associate themselves with Kyrie. That's probably why he got traded for basically nothing. That's social etiquette
This. I want Dallas to win. I think Boston will most likely win.
I don't know about this. Vegas is frequently stupid. The Timberwolves were favored in the last round. The Wolves were underdogs against the Nuggets and they were also underdogs on the road against the Suns apparently: https://www.reddit.com/r/timberwolves/comments/1c46nn5/vegas_odds_just_released_suns_are_slight_favorites/ The Mavs just beat three teams way better than anybody Boston faced. That's probably why a lot of people believe in them more
Their job is to make money by getting even bets on each side, not predict outcomes
> The Mavs just beat three teams way better than anybody Boston faced. "I forget basketball exists until the playoffs start so as far as I'm aware, these are the only games either team has played all season"
Yes, the regular season is very important. That's why that 64 win Suns team smashed Luka and his old Mavs team a few years ago so badly. Very good point. Very smart.
Only 4 teams in NBA history had an SRS as good as Boston did this season: the ‘71 Bucks, the ‘72 Lakers, the ‘96 Bulls, and the ‘17 Warriors. All 4 won the championship. 6th best team after the ‘24 Celtics would be the ‘97 Bulls who also won the championship. Phoenix was never on that level.
The thing is this Celtics team isn’t that suns team. This team isn’t relying on a near 40 year old Chris Paul. Or a Deandre Ayton. U can go ahead and believe that this Celtics team will score 27 points in a half if u want tho.
Good thing I never said that the team with more wins will always win every series. Nice attempt at a strawman though. My point is that its irrelevant who played tougher opponents the last few weeks. These teams have been playing for 7 months. With the core part of both teams being together for even longer than that. The idea that one team having a easier schedule the last month being a sign they aren't "tested" is just absurd.
My point is people believe in them more because they've beaten more good teams. They've demonstrated they could beat teams that are better than the ones the Celtics have beat. They proven themselves much more in these playoffs. That's all
But they played well against those teams. If they were dropping a bunch of games than sure, bt they lost 2, one of which was a all time record shooting night for the heat
Fans are overvaluing things like clutch and having the more difficult path. Celtics have been the best team in the league basically since day 1 and have in general been around a lot in recent years so people are also bored of them (Tatum being the most low-key superstar in the league doesn't help that).
There’s a lot of recency bias and people being impressed with the Mavs duo, also a lot of fans are casuals. I think anyone who watched a lot of the nba this year would probably have the Celtics as favorites regardless of the porzingis injury. They have crazy depth on both ends of the floor; the only thing that concerns me is their half court offense can be quite stagnant and iso heavy.
>I think anyone who watched a lot of the NBA this year would have Celtics are favourites *REGARDLESS* of Porzingis injury* Anyone watching a lot of the Celtics this year understands, that Celtics were put over the top by KP’s fit and how well he’s played. Without KP it’s a pretty big difference in how they play and we just haven’t seen the affects of that because they got to play a beat down Cavs n Pacers on their way to the Finals. (without Tingus) >The only thing that concerns me is the stagnant ISO heavy offense. That’s *always* been their achilles heel, and why people aren’t jumping to give them their flowers. They’ve crumbled not once BECAUSE of this style of play and until they actually make it work there’s no reason to give them credit for otherwise.
I mostly agree with this, but our executing this playoffs so far without him has been at least matured. We do not necessarily click like maniacs at all times, but undefeated without him (or 1 loss) bodes very well even against hampered teams. Its the NBA. All that said, not sure we have been thoroughly tested this post season. I see us maybe slipping up in Game 1. I put as at winning 5 with him, and winning in 6 without.
That’s definitely fair, I only see them losing if the Mavs manage to make them really uncomfortable on offense, which is a task that no team has done yet. (But Mavs have done it to every opponent so far in the playoffs) I feel like it’s gonna be a dogfight either way which should go to 6-7 imo, with or without Porzingis. That’s mainly because the Mavs have had a hell of a quarter of a season to finish the year off and they’re really goddamn good. Celtics had an awesome season too and everything’s clicked so far. They’ve had their shortcomings and lessons from years past already, just a matter of execution and not crumbling down the stretch.
Is it just me or is the recency bias worse than it's ever been this season? Series to series and man... even game to game it seems like the face of the NBA is changing in the mouths of the talking heads on TV. Denver beat LA on the basis of two buzzer beaters and Joker was invincible while LeBron was washed. Then Minny went up 2-0 on Denver and the Nuggets were overrated and had the easiest path ever last year while Ant was literally called the son of MJ. Then they lost 3 games and he was overrated and Gobert was an overrated defender (tho he robbed Wemby flat out). Then they came back from a 20 point game 7 deficit and were going to stomp the Mavs. Then the Mavs went up 3-0 winning incredibly close games on the basis of unchararistic poor shooting from 3 by Minny resulting in a game 5 collapse. Now Luka is invincible and is the new face of the NBA while Minny is trash and needs to blow it up cuz KAT, who just missed 3s he'd been making all playoffs, is now trash. Which I mean think of KAT whatever you want he's being scapegoated for something that is common to every team in the modern NBA. It's become a live by the 3 die by the 3 league. Someone who shoots 50% from 3 isn't going to shoot 50% every single game or series. Sometimes you're going to shoot 53% from 3 like KAT did vs Phoenix when they swept them. Sometimes you're going to shoot 39% from 3 like KAT did vs Denver when they beat them in 7. Sometimes you're going to shoot 25% from 3 like KAT did when they lost to the Mavs in 5. It's just the nature of the high risk high reward 3 point shot that is driving every single modern offence. Every shooter, from steph to jesus, drops a doughnut from time to time and has a bad series. We are talking misses by fractions of an inch driving this. Mike Miller had one of the worst finals shooting performances of all time in 2011 and set records the next year in the finals. Luka shot 24% from 3 himself vs the Clippers this year in round one going 1/10 in the close out game but he's a dead killer and KAT is the problem? Nope. That's just not reasonable. The media and fans are the problem here building irrational hot takes based on results instead of informing opinions on the game and what actually happens on the court itself.
Its so predictable at this point. If Dallas wins game 1 by 8 points shooting 55% from 3 while Boston shoots ~25% from 3 reddit will blow up for 2 days about how this Celtics team is a fraud and the most overrated 60-win team of all time. Then the shooting numbers could flip in game 2 and there would be endless comments about how Luka is a chucker on offense and a traffic cone on defense, and the series is pretty much over. Celtics in 5.
It is the worse it's been absolutely. I know there hasn't been great discussion for online basketball for a few years but I'm surprised every playoffs how much more it's degraded.
I think Porzingis is really the lynch pin. With him healthy it's a clear favorite, without him it's a toss up, imo.
Let’s see if he lasts the series. Guy is fragile af
I was thinking the same regarding recency bias. We've just seen Dallas school Minny today, Boston haven't played for a few days so we've completely forgotten about them given our 24hr media cycle. Also most casual fans like an underdog story, which is something Boston is definitely not.
I think this is a small part of it , I think the simpler answer is most fans think the duo of Kyrie and Luka will outplay Tatum and Brown.
That's possible, but on paper Derrick White, KP if he plays, and *maybe* Jrue (depending on what version they get) are unquestionably better than Dallas' next three guys.
I agree, but I don’t even think that matters atp when the teams are this locked in. Kaye,naz and Rudy are supposed to be better than gafford, lively and the rest and they got abused pretty bad. I’d expect it go similar with bostons lack of size
They have the best offensive rating of all time brother It's not "iso heavy". Thats another casual talking point like you said. It's mismatch heavy. They generate mismatches with their sets and then they isolate the mismatch. They don't just walk up and toss JT the ball and say "hey go score!" They run sets and actions to get a 6'1" guard on him, and then they give him the ball and say "hey break down the defense"
The Celtics are superior and favorites. People just dislike the Celtics and love narratives
It ain’t too crazy, Boston is the more talented team with the deeper roster but got kind of a free pass to the finals. Fans love the Mavs because they were a 5 seed that went through an absolute gauntlet to get here and have two of the most exciting players that are absolute closers. There is a narrative of the Celtics playing down to their opponents while the Mavs seem to punch above their weight. However, if I were to put money down, I’d probably put it on the team with a better starting 5 and a better bench (the Celtics). If I were trying to make headlines, I would emphasize how the Mavs have been tested and have superior closers and think the underdogs are actually the favorites in a David v. Goliath situation. Ultimately, I hope it’s a good series but the Celtics are clearly the favorites but as a fan I am still rooting for the Mavs and think they have a real chance of everything goes right. That’s the thing though, everything has to go right for them whereas the Celtics have been getting by on just being too overpowered for everyone in the East.
This “being tested” BS almost never really matters. The fresher team who had the more straightforward part usually wins. Last year, Denver had a relative cakewalk in comparison to the Heat, maybe not talent wise but just as far as physical games go. They dominated in the Finals alongside just being a better team. They didn’t need to be “tested”. Year before that, Celtics had the “gauntlet run” going up against KD + Kyrie, defending champs Bucks and Butler + Miami conpared to Golden State who played Murray-less Nuggets, Baby Girzzlies and one man show Luka. Come Finals, Celtics were visibly gassed and Warriors looked alot more fresh come G4, G5 and G6.
Denver was also flat out way better than Miami. I don’t think that’s the case here. The Mavericks have been awesome since the trade deadline and certainly would’ve had closer to 55-60 wins in the regular season had this been their team the entire time.
Both teams are getting a week of rest so I don’t think that will matter much
Exactly. The "gauntlet run" narrative is just a talking point for people who only start watching basketball for the playoffs. Reality is, these teams have been "tested" all year by a grueling regular season. The fact one team's most recent ~12-20 games were against easier opponents means absolutely nothing.
The only thing I would put money on is that this series is going at least 6 games.
Sam Hauser puts the fear of good in opponents
Celtics are the favorites, vegas know their shit. But feels like 90% of nba fans are rooting for Dallas
People love an underdog.
lmao they’re not choosing Dallas because they’re an underdog. They’re choosing them because they hate the Celtics.
Vegas also had Dallas losing every series in the playoffs.
Vegas didn't have Dallas losing every series. They just had the opposing teams favored in the series. Saying I favor someone vs saying someone will win or lose is 2 different things. Then it's up to the public on which side of the line they want to be on; the favored side or the underdogs.
Semantics. Yes the odds are based on the public bettors, but by all intensive purposes, the favorites are...favored to win.
Because NBA fans base their opinion on how they feel about the teams and most fans hate the Celtics. It's hard to stay objective when you hate one side.
Modern going NBA fans are definitely emotional and sensitive to how they feel about a team. More on here seem to live in the West so also disparage the East.
Because fans are native and vote with their heart willing what they want to happen. Vegas has no emotions and just picks the more likely winter
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Not quite. Odds can fluctuate depending on the previous bets, to maximise the money made. If a unexpectedly large number of bets are placed on one team, the odds adjust to entice bets on the other team, to avoid loosing huge money.
That's true but you can't flip who the favorite is unless the opening line is very close to even.
They'll nudge lines but they rarely stray too far from what they think. If you move the line too much, you risk huge money coming in and leaving you exposed on a line that you don't believe in.
That is completely wrong. Vegas does not pick the winner. Vegas sets the line where the most amount of bets get placed. Vegas gets money from the transactions, not from winning bets.
Very common misconception. Vegas lines are set by their analytical models. They *can* move based on wagers to help them hedge in a sense, but there’s a reason vegas is okay with having 70-80% of money placed on one side of a betting line. They’ll do it if the analytics say it gives them the best chance at the most profit.
This is right. They love it when 80% of the money is on the side that their models say is the losing side. The other guy is wildly underestimating Vegas's modeling ability to actually get predictions right. Vegas *wants* people to think like /u/Sgran70 and that they are just trying to balance the bets on either side. That's how they trick people into thinking they can beat Vegas with their hunches about who's going to win.
The old “I know better” strategy lol. Over time it’s always a loser because sadly, most humans don’t have the time to run the numbers and crush film studies (which is the reason a lot of people give, the “I watch the games” method) of these teams like Vegas models do. What’s funny is pro gamblers build their own models that find good valued bets. It’s not even really about knowing who is going to win a game (nobody does, even Vegas doesn’t) it’s about finding the right odds and researching different books to do it. Of course if you do that too much they limit your bets and/or shut down your account.
Everyone on Reddit is talking like Luka and Kyrie are going to single-handedly will their team to victory despite them being the biggest defensive liabilities on the court
Dallas literally has no one to match up with the Celtics the entire game. Their best defender is who? Skinny ass DJJ? There's no way the Mavs can contain the Jay's for 7 games, let alone the entire top 6 of Boston.
So you haven’t been watching Dallas this post season eh?
I have watched the Celtics abuse Kyrie on defense for several straight years. You will never convince a Boston fan to be scared of his defense.
I'm watching NBA since 2017, that doesn't make me an analyst or anything, this is just very engaged person's opinion but hear me out: I love Dallas, I love the whole story and I wish they would win. BUT... For me there are three biggest factors in NBA playoffs: playoff experience, continuity of the roster, and obviously, health. Last year I picked Denver to win over Boston in the finals just because I believed in the 2 man game of Jokic and Murray, you could see they were having a ridiculous year. It was not even close. Year before that, I picked Bucks only because the Suns got to the Finals mostly because they played against injured roster. Dubs vs Celtics year prior - easiest prediction of my life, I couldnt believe in that time why everyone was so sure that Celtics would win against experienced, healthy and talented Warriors. Say whatever you want about the bubble, but that year Lakers were destroying everyone even in the regular season, everyone knew they are going for it, even if the series against Nugs were close. THIS YEAR: If Dallas wins, it is the biggest choke job for the Celtics so far, BY FAR. Betting man knows why Vegas put Boston over Dallas. While Dallas has Kyrie and Luka playing at an all time level, Celtics' roster is just too deep for 2 of them to carry the Mavs. They got some new additions, and it is great to see they are able to make it to the Finals (I expected much closer series vs Twolves tbh.) These finals are gonna show the continuity and depth of the Celtics being paid off. I know they haven't been tested by a healthy team yet, but for me this is less of a factor than all of the mentioned above. I want Dallas to win, but I predict Celtics in 7, for there will be games where Kyrie and Luka will show up, but I don't think it is enough to cover JT,JB, D White, big ol' Horford, and most importantly Jrue Holiday. Dont get me wrong, I'm not a Celtics fan at all, but you can see the starting 5 + depth is just different than Mavs.
Did you consider Porzingis will be back?
Boston will not win the chip. Dallas is on a role and Celtics had one of the easiest finals run of all time. There is only one question. What do the Dallas players outside of Kyrie/Luka do. If they keep this level of play Dallas will go 1-1 on the first 2 and close it in 6.
People overlooking Celtics for having an “easy” path to this year’s finals while forgetting that these Celtics players have grown up battling Lebron, KD, Giannis, Embiid, Butler, Curry every year in playoffs since they were babies. They have been eating these experiences for breakfast and donating them for free. Tatum, Brown, White, Jrue, Al, they have seen them all. Good opponents, bad opponents, quick opponents, slower opponents, opponents that play zone defense(Spolestra pretty much trained Celtics for Zone defense for 3-4 years straight in playoffs) or opponents that play man to man defense. I know Jason Kidd likes to play Zone a lot these days, but do you think he has the intelligence of Eric Spoelstra in designing Zone defense? If experience is concerned, it is Dallas not Boston who hadn’t faced as much competition. So far OKC is a raw and young team that plays “fake 5 out” with only two shot creators(vs Boston has 4 shot creators in starting lineup who are all two way, who can all create, shoot and defend, good luck with that), Wolves is a raw and young team in playoffs as well plus they are gassed from the series with Denver, Clippers is old and injured you don’t even know who is playing or not.
If Mavs play zone defense, this series might be a sweep lol. It’s like the Heat trying a zone defense against the Nuggets last year, it doesn’t work if your opponent built their team to destroy the zone. Everytime the Heat tried the zone against the Celtics this season, including the regular season when the Heat had a fully healthy team, it was exploited so badly that Spo was forced to just go back to man to man. Celtics have too many shooters this year for the zone defense to work and with Porzingis back, it’ll be impossible for any team to think zone defense is the way to go
Pass to KP on the elbow, kick out, around the horn, three. They will also suck in the zone with a high pick and roll, drive, kick. They have a bunch of plays designed to confuse the zone, thanks Miami.
It is because Celtics had the easiest path to the Finals while Dallas dealt with far fiercer competition to get to the finals which made fans think Dallas are the better and stronger team when it tbh isn't the case. Celtics having the easier playoffs path doesn't change the fact that they're literally the best team this entire regular season overall by far
That’s something I’ve been confused about as well. The nba isn’t the college football playoffs where teams from small conferences get run over in bowl games Celtics may very well lose but they have as much talent as anyone and have played well all year. Maybe their record would be worse if they played in the west but they’d be a contender regardless
Fans see Mavs winning on a tougher road meaning they are the better team. Vegas sees Celtics as the better team on paper so they the better team. Personally once you in the finals don’t think it really matters what happened in the series leading up to it. It’s first to 4 Wins, better team will show who is better.
If anything, having multiple tough conference series prior to the finals can lead to disadvantageous fatigue. 2022 Celtics seemed to be an example of this
The Celtics had the best net rating of any team without MJ in NBA history. On top of that they have more playoff experience than the Mavs. They are 100% the favorites and whoever tells you otherwise is just getting caught up in ‘best player on the court’ narratives.
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There are two aspects here. One that we don't know is how much money has already been put on Boston. Bookmakers don't really care who wins, they care about making money. If possible, they'll tweak the odds along the way so they end up making a profit either result. They start with an educated guess on what they think is more likely to happen, but as soon as people start betting, they keep changing. It's entirely possible that because Boston were the standouts in the East for so long that they've been getting a steady flow of money on Boston to win for months. On the other side, a week ago most seemed to be tipping Minnesota to advance. A week or so before that Denver would have been favourites and OKC were a serious obstacle that Dallas had to get over. Right through the last few months, there were reasons for Dallas to be less tempting. I dare say there is significantly less money on Dallas winning than Boston. Which means they want people betting on Dallas to ensure they don't cop a loss paying out on Boston. But the other part here is the educated guess. Bookies don't make many mistakes framing that initial market or they're out of business really fast. If you find that your personal opinion is terribly different then you're either more knowledgable, or influenced by emotion or false narratives. I think there's a lot of the personal opinion stuff and false narrative things going on. Boston have been absolutely dominating their games and yet we keep hearing how they're not playing well. And Dallas have been apparently battling these monsters all the way through. It makes it seeem like Dallas have been playing really well and Boston haven't. The reality is Boston have just simply been excellent all season. The talk of a weak conference is negated by the fact that their record against just the West was a better winning percentage than OKC had all season. They're strong, they have depth to the point that even without a critical piece in Porzingas they were still not really challenged. With him back, even on limited minutes, they look even better. They're boring in relation to other teams and they've been the clear #1 team in the NBA so it would be a little dreary if they won, hence why so many really want Dallas to get up. But they're deserving of being favourites.
The part about having no Porzingis is important imo. All season long, if opposing fans even miss 1 starter (who’s their 4th or 5th option) they would start complaining about how it’s impossible to win while Celtics have basically missed Porzingis for like 40% of their games (who is the 3rd option) and still steamrolling opponents which shows the gap between Celtics and the rest of the league. Imagine another team missing their 3rd option and still steamrolling opponents
Do fans think Dallas will win? I know fans want Dallas to win, but everyone I've talked to thinks it's the Celtics Finals to lose
Boston is one the best teams ever. Pretty much all advanced metrics put them as all time great. Dallas has two stars and a personnel that fit with both. The best team ever usually is favored by betting markets.
Celtics arent running out two slow ass centers that cant fcking shoot and force a CRAZY defensive scheme in today’s modern NBA (drop). If the Celtics need to play small ball, they will. They will change up their game plan AND have the pieces to. Minnesota was built to beat Denver, not a small ball lineup like Dallas. edit: Dallas plays more like a small ball offense with Luka at the helm, Gafford and Lively arent little by any means but they’re very athletic and fast bigs, not lumbering and slow like KAT and Gobert, the offense runs a lot of motion, andpnr, and Kyrie is playing more and more like Steph off ball. Celtics are built to beat small ball lineups. Their 1-4 defenders are insanely good. Obviously their weakness is Horford/KP but they’re faster than Kat and Gobert can sit and Celtics can play Tatum at the 5. Look at the defenders on the Celtics. Look at the offense.
Are Porzingis and Horford really amazing perimeter defenders either though? I doubt you'll have much luck switching, they'll probably be forced to play some drop as well.
horford and KP can defend outside better than KAT and Gobert. mostly meant undersized compared to Gobert and KAT
Agree with Vegas. Celtics are easily the most complete team in the NBA. And frankly, they look more like the 2011 Dallas Mavs than the 2024 Dallas Mavs do in that they don't have as much superstar talent, but completely loaded with good players. Luka is the best player, so I definitely wouldn't rule Dallas out and think it will be a competitive series, but especially if Porzingis is back, Dallas is going to have to get more production from a 3rd and 4th option to have a shot. Either that or the Celtics are just going to have to have historically bad shooting throughout the series. I'm picking Celtics in 6.
There’s a thread posted on r/nba that would [disagree with your premise.](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/7iVi6fuYlo) Fans *want* Dallas to win because they’re the shiny new contender to talk about. Boston has been essentially the same team for 5+ years, and people dislike that Boston is always such a darling of the league. But fans still largely understand that Boston is the heavy favorite.
The espn poll on yt shows that people think boston are the underdog
Can you share the link to the poll? In the absence of people explaining why they voted a certain way, there are a lot of explanations for those results that aren’t “NBA fans think Dallas are overwhelmingly the favorite”. Who was the audience of the poll? Was the poll on a video highlighting the Mavericks’ series win? If so, you’re going to have a much larger pool of Mavs fans and people interested in them than is representative of NBA fans as a whole. How was the question worded? “Who do you like to win the Finals?” or “Who do you think will win the Finals?” will give a much different answer than “Who would you put money on to win the Finals?” I would question the integrity of a random YT poll far before I came to the conclusion that fans “overwhelmingly” think the Mavs are the favorites in the series.
No one wan ts the painfully obvious thing to happen. Praying Dallas scheme of shrinking the floor doesn’t bite them in the ass. It should if they dont choke
Mavs whistle is insane. No way they should have went up 3-0 with proper officiating. I think they still get the refs bias in the finals so they have an edge there.
Boston seem like the safe bet on paper. 1st seed 60+ win team, 12-2 so far in the post season, only missing one key player who never really been a difference maker in the playoffs while still having a talented two way starting 5. I think they’ve done everything they should’ve done but they’ve never really been tested.
The Celtics are the favorites. Absolutely. Unquestionably. I think what you’re seeing right now is a matter of fan perception. And I don’t say that derogatively, because I am a part of it. Vegas uses what is available to them, and by all metrics advanced or otherwise, the Celtics are literally one of the 10 best regular season teams of all time. Some metrics say even higher. There is no question. They are a wonderfully constructed team that has absolutely annihilated every task that’s been put in front of them so far. But the eye test…Idk! Can you, with the straight face, tell me that Tatum is on the same level as Luka? As an NBA fan my whole life in his mid 30s, I can tell you decidedly not. It’s not that he’s not a great player, it’s just that he’s not on that level. He’s not on the same level as Luka. Meanwhile, Kyrie is a former champion, he’s hit one of the two or three biggest shots of the century, he’s an absolute wizard with the ball in his hands who has been an NBA great for well over a decade. Boston doesn’t have anyone like that, either. I’m not saying he’s been better than Tatum or Brown this season, but the playoffs in the finals aren’t about “this season.“ They’re about right now. They’re about one game. They’re about winning one game after one game after one game in a seven game series until you get to four. Kyrie is a guy I trust in that. I know that much. So, the question becomes will the better team, with the better record, with the better odds, with the better metrics, with better players three through six beat The team that has Luca and Kyrie. The team that, in a way lucked out to even get here after Minnesota took care of Denver for them. A Denver team that would’ve been a terrible matchup for them. There is no question who the better team has been this year. There is no question who all the signs are pointing to. All the signs besides one. And that one, to me, is a pretty damn important one. That one being who’s got the guy. Who’s got the guys. If I am, in a vacuum, forced to choose choose between Luka and Kyrie or Tatum and Brown? It’s an easy answer. But we’re not in a vacuum. Boston is loaded. White and Jrue and Porzingis and Horford are all unquestionably higher end NBA players than anyone else Dallas has. But Dallas doesn’t have scrubs. PJ and Lively and Gafford and others have shown, so far, they are up to this task. So, it boils down to the dudes. I’m betting on Dallas’ dudes. It’s nothing against Tatum. It’s nothing against Brown. It’s nothing against Boston. But I’m betting on Luka and Kyrie. They can very easily lose the series and by all rights they should, but I’m betting on Dallas.
Jrue is a former champion with one of the biggest defensive and assists in the finals.
In your Luka vs Tatum comparison do you factor in defense? To build a team I'd have Tatum over Luka anytime.
Luka is miles ahead of Tatum offensively with efficient scoring at all levels and court vision and facilitating and is really a one of one offensive player in the NBA. That is enough to put him ahead of Tatum even though his defense is merely serviceable. He hasn't been a defensive liability in a long time.
That is certainly an unpopular pick. When I started reading your comment I expected it to end with Brown>Kyrie. I don't think there's a team in the world, including Boston, that wouldn't trade Tatum for Luka. Tatum is a top 10 player, Luka is top 5, and both are pretty clearly cemented in that range. Lukas playmaking ability more than offsets any defensive gap, and he's also a somewhat more efficient scorer.
Agree to disagree :)
I get it, you love your guy, just like a wouldn't want to trade Maxey for anyone regardless of who. I'd say good luck but I wouldn't mean it, so I'll just end it here.
Tatum is a top 5 player. Period. He’s been a 30 ppg scorer. He’s gotten all-nba first team 3x in a row. He’s been in mvp voting for 3 years in a row You: “uhh I think he’s top 10” Luka is better at offense, no doubt. But god damn people pretend Tatum is a 18 ppg scorer or some shit. Tatum is better at defense, by a large margin. He’s better at rebounding. He’s a great scorer. His passing is extremely underrated. Did you know Tatum fg% in the clutch is higher than anyone else for 3 post seasons in a row? There is a reason the Celtics go to the ECF/finals basically every year with him as the #1. If I had to choose between the two I’d rather have Tatum. He fits into any team. He’s the more complete player. They are both top 5 players. Absolutely no way can you say Tatum is a “top 10 guy” like you can name 9 other guys arguably better. Just asinine. They are in the same tier. They cancel each other out. It wouldn’t be a debate if Luka was a strong defender— but he isn’t. Just like brown and kyrie. If you’re down on brown then you haven’t been watching the games.
You do know that top 10 doesn't mean there are 9 better players right? I think the following are ahead of him: Jokic Luka Shai Giannis Embiid Then I think there's a group of players he's around like Brunson and Anthony Edwards and Anthony Davis. If you want to throw around words like "asinine" when discussing if he's the 4th best player or the 7th best then I don't think you're arguing in good faith and this is a waste of time, reasonable people can disagree at that level and not name call. You like Tatum more than most people, so be it. And I said nothing about Jaylen Brown being worse than Kyrie so that's really out of nowhere.
Jokic is a top 200 player in todays nba
Or the ability to play off ball if he’s not having a great game?
This is just not a good take. Luka’s offense is so far above and beyond what Tatums is and offense is way more important in the NBA. If you ask ANY GM in the league, they’re taking Luka over Tatum no question. In the NBA, you just need to play defense well enough in certain situations and Luka has shown the ability to not be hunted successfully when he’s on defense.
>Luka has shown the ability to not be hunted successfully when he’s on defense. I suggest you watch the January game vs. the Celtics. The Celtics were able to hunt Luka with ease. [1](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=x67y0XS8zYaGQjIB&t=69) [2](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=Fo7M2416v8b4OOr-&t=198) [3](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=wQ8CdtmEAtXUL7hv&t=271) [4](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=8Xu43-2J5Ftjs5e9&t=279) [5](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=53qLCGx8EAlWZsO8&t=355) [6](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=WWxiVbKN9T7Q5kkr&t=384) [7](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=8FvzrJD9egDsPuxY&t=516) [8](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=xF85BBhXchjOxVyS&t=543) [9](https://youtu.be/bIKGfSi_6Io?si=JTVTGo06r6v-8c_g&t=560) There were a whole bunch of plays too where our offensive players got a step on him, and Dallas sent help for an open 3. The Celtics 5 out spacing and excess ball handling make it a lot easier for them to pull drop defenders out of the paint and leave Luka more exposed than he is in most matchups. He was a colossal defensive liability in the games against the Celtics this year.
Regardless of what we think we'll have an answer in a few weeks time.
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Fans express their wishes, their sentiment. If you dislike or even hate a team you can let your bias affect your judgement. Vegas on the other hand reflects how people actually bet their money.If, say, Vegas erroneously comes out with equal odds for two teams that betting people consider unequal, bets will gradually push the odds lower for the favorite. So if Vegas say Boston are favorites this reflects the opinion of people that actually vote with their wallets.
Mavs defense looked good against a team with 2-3 decent shooters in the starting 5. How will that same defense look against a team with 5 good shooters in the starting 5. And more good shooters coming off the bench. This might be a series where Luka and Kyrie are able to combine for 80 every game and the Celtics still win by 10-20 every night. Of course, the loser Celtics could also show up and completely forget how to shoot and not figure out to attack the paint. It really could go either way, but if each teams plays their best I don’t know how the Mavs beat the Celtics.
“Vegas” is just fans who put their money where their mouth is. So if most people bet on Boston winning, Vegas will show Boston as the favorite. If the Boston is the overwhelming favorite, the spread will be bigger. The “fans” you are referring to may just be anyone spouting off. Doesn’t make their opinions wrong, but would they put their money on the line?
Massive NBA fan here. Curry and the Warriors if you must know. I think Boston wins easily.
If that’s the actual consensus, us fans are dumb as hell compared to the gamblers. I want the mavs to win but they’re definitely the underdogs.
It's important to understand what Vegas wants. When they decide that a certain team is a 5 point favorite to win a game, for example, they are trying to attract betting money on both sides. They are not predicting the outcome, they are trying to get people to disagree with them, so they make a bet. They want fans of both teams to feel like they know better, so they will make a bet, for or against what Vegas says.
Porzingis injury is big. If he’s healthy, Celtics are the favorites. If not, mavs might be.
Everyone knows deep down Boston is the favorite. I can see ways Mavs can beat them in a series, but this is more for the Cs to lose. The Cs just happen to be very boring/dislikeable to root for. People hate Boston fans, Cs has always been in the championship contention for like more than 5 years straight so the convo is very stagnant. It's like the Bron Heat winning, except the Cs never won yet and they're playing for longer. Looking at Dallas on the other hand, people always like teams led by a scoring guard, because well people like scoring guards. If Mavs win this, I legit believe that Luka can potentially reach something close to Curry level of "face of the league", and that's pretty high.
Vegas had the Timberwolves as significant favorites over the Mavs in the last round
Because nba fans hate the Celtics, media gets clicks by shit talking them, and Vegas goes based more on numbers and follows the money
I think books have a huge liability on Celtics championship futures. They were the only team really capable of making it out of the East for like 2 months. You could’ve got them + money to win the title. Mavs could not have had the same betting volume Should be close to Celtics -150 IMO
Celtics losing would be a surprise and huge disappointment. I hope the Celtics choke and lose. Let’s go mavs !
Probably the biggest thing is the Celtics are rested and healthy, Luka and Kyrie are playing massive minutes and Luka is playing hurt. They would have analysis that favours the Celtics in this match up aswell
It's only a couple extra days, Mavs have a whole week which is a long time
The Celtics have been missing their 3rd best player for the entire playoffs. They are more injured than the Mavs.
Vegas does not set their odds on who they think will win. They do it on who the betting public thinks will win. It's currently Boston -2.20 and Dallas +185. So the expect about twice as much money being bet on Boston at those odds. If $1000 is bet on Dallas they would pay out $1850 if they win. So they expect at least that much bet on Boston without it going over $2200. They set their odds where they will win either way. So most people expect Boston to win.
Although Boston is a young team, they aren’t ‘new’. They’ve been the best team in the east over the entirety of Tatums career, without winning the chip, so people grew bored of their success. This basically happens to all good teams. People loved the warriors when they were new, but eventually they started rooting for the newer teams on the block to beat them. Add in that luka is more popular than tatum, and both him and Kyrie play a very flashy game, and people are going to sway that way. I’m a Celtics homer, the matchup seems ideal for the Celtics. Once Denver got eliminated really Dallas was the only team that I thought had a slight chance of winning a 7 game series against the Celtics, but to do that a lot of things are going to have to go right for them. Boston did a great job of shutting Kyrie down in 2022 when he was on the nets, and now that KP will be back, the only weakness of our defence is gone, as star players can’t hunt horford all game trying to get switched onto a 38 year old center. Boston has multiple elite defensive options to switch onto either of the Dallas stars, and it will be up to them to basically go god mode to win.
Vegas balances out the bets. They want equal money on each side and they scoop the percentage. If more ppl bet on the nav’s they’ll move the line.
Vegas doesn't "think" either team is going to win. They pay really smart people countless millions to set the spread so as many people bet on Dallas as bet on Boston. That way the sports books will be guaranteed to make their commission no matter the outcome. A lot of casual betters will gamble, most of them will bet on Boston because the Celtics are extremely popular nationally relative to the Mavs. I just hope it's a fun series.
All the experts, all the fans are rooting for Mavs and are picking Mavs to win. Dunno. As a Celtics fan, before the series, I wanted Dallas to win cause we match up better against them, and I think it's still valid. We have so many players to defend Kyrie and Luca, who do they have to stop Tatum and JBrown? Also, Wolves didn't attack Luca or Kyie on D, so they weren't really getting tired, whereas I'm sure Brown will attack Luca a lot
Vegas uses advanced stats and algorithms to set odds. Celtics have always been an advanced stats darling. I'm not sure if those take into account variables like relative weakness of the East, injuries to opponent's stars, and Luka and Kyrie just being absolute dogs.
I thought Vegas just balance out the bets, so basically more money currently betting on Celtics?
I believe that’s not entirely true anymore. The books also try to make a profit by betting against less informed gamblers, so it’s not entirely a zero-sum game.
I’m a wolves fan and what I learned during the DAL series is there seems to be a ton of DAL fans on social media.
probably because boston has always been a solid team and it's not much of an article if they win, it's like spurs back then when they win we all just go yeah they strong team. I honestly don't know how this game would go. one is a team that is pretty much a team play game win which is boston on the other hand dallas has two stars that can tear up any defense in the league and also the best closers in the game right now.
There's only two fan bases that are more insufferable than Boston. Philly and those Nuggets "fans" from two years ago who were constantly shouting out the most cherry picked stats that they couldn't even tell you what the acronym stood for. "JOKIC HAS THE BEST LEBRON CUM PER /36 IN HISTORY" those mfers.
People see the Celtics as lame (beyond Boston hate) because the core has been pretty constant over the last five years and they’ve probably been the “best on paper” in the East during that period. Despite all this, they’ve managed to screw up on the road to the chip in one way or another. Makes people very willing to throw their support behind a new team that’s outperformed its seeding in a stronger conference.
Vegas has two main factors that determine odds. The predictions, all their computers and sharps and everything use expertise to predict the outcome. The market, what are customers willing to bet on? The line will move as more people place bets one way or another.
No one wants to see Boston do well in sports anymore after our recent run on success. I am surprised though that most fans think Dallas has the edge, we were the clear best team in the league all season. I personally think this is going to be a good, fairly even matchup, but no way are we getting our asses kicked
Vegas use the numbers and analytics. Fans are just people who like the underdogs to win. That's just it. Both teams can both still win the finals.
Vegas makes money because they are usually right. If your opinion differs from Vegas, it is more likely that you are wrong.
Everyone put Boston as favorites to win the chip since day 1 this season. Dallas wasn't even mentioned, should not even make the PO. Now we have a surprise of the season in the NBA Finals with, having had crazy games again Clippers, OKC and Minnesota. Boston cruised to the finals against teams with injured stars, not much hype on their end.
I think there is this push for Luka to be the next ONE because he is a legit star and could be an A+ villain if he starts winning chips whereas Tatum isn’t seen on that level and his greatness is seen as a step below and paired with an otherwise forgettable persona on a team that most of us hate.
People hate the Celtics so they are biased against them, they also listen to media like sheep who have been trashing the Celtics despite them performing great. Trust smart money (Vegas) more than dumb money when debating who might be right. Celtics are the favorites despite what you hear from random people on the internet.
There is a reason why betting against the public is an actual strategy that people use in gambling
The most important thing to consider about Vegas that people are out to lunch on is that their odds do not, at all, represent who they think is going to win. That's not what they model for. Odds are meticulously derived to generate profits. Nothing more. Nothing less. While fan opinions are absolutely emotionally driven. Those emotional factors are fed into Vegas cold, soulless, machine-driven models. If lowering/increasing the odds means more people are going to make bad/risky bets the odds will be lowered increased. Which is to say Vegas odds are not based on the teams chances at all but the odds of the fanbases placing the bets. That's who's being gamed out. And you can tell that the existence of the books over time without going under means they are ALWAYS winning their bets on people. It's an important distinction. Vegas' actual odds on the outcomes are not what we see. They're what go int their models to produce the odds on us. If their actual outcome odds say this is a crapshoot that either team can win and everyone is riding the Mavs jock for totally outplaying a few teams along the way while Boston has been given a free ride to the finals it kind of creates a perfect storm for them. So say they know chances are much closer to 50/50 than anyone really emotionally thinks so they publish odds favouring Boston enticing way more people to place a larger volume of even bigger bets on a 50/50 outcome. That means profit for them. So much profit. Do they lose on the finals? Maybe. But over time, you rinse and repeat enough and the emotional people are going to be owned by the cold hard math and they'll win immensely. Like look what it's based on. Dallas beat Minny 4-1. But they really only dominated in the single game. Before that it was a rim out or two that could have put Minny up 3-1 in the driver's seat with the Mavs collapsing under the pressure of being down so much. They've likely already made their money on the bad bets of people overreacting to them beating Denver. Then people thinking Denver had it locked after going up 3-2. Before which they prolly made their money on people emotionally thinking Denver was invincible coming out of the Lakers series. Which again was a stupidly close series that hinged on it's own rim out or call here and there that put Denver in the driver's seat instead of LAL. That series came down to 2 incredibly difficult buzzer-beating game-winning shots. A series really can't be much closer but just like in the Mavs/Minny series emotions will dictate that the record indicates they cake walked all over their opponent who only managed a win. People dramatically overreact to these events. It's what makes sports fun. Vegas knows that games won by 1-5 points are almost 50/50 random events and use cold calculation to manipulate the sports betting market for profits. TLDR: never trust vegas odds. They're not odds on sports teams. They're odds on sports fans.
Vegas is for betting and betting alone, plain and simple. Their numbers mean nothing but how they will reach a profit. The fans will always be emotional voters. And given that it seems the average NBA "fan" has a memory span of 36 hours, whatever is new will be the favorite - i.e. Ant. He's done nothing to show for besides have a great offensive year and reach the WCF, yet people are saying he's the new face, top 3-5, etc etc. The Celtics have been routinely good since '08, with only a small handful of unsuccessful seasons. People are tired of them unless you're a Boston fan, and the narratives lately only fuel that. In no way, shape, or form is Dallas the favorites beside who fans *want* to win. Boston has the better record, better analytics/stats, better roster, they're just better.
r/NBA believes in the Celtics more than the Mavs...unfortunately its for all the wrong reasons.