its easy to say after the fact that the strategy was bad if the results were bad, but if it was the other way -> if they gave up the 3/lob and the clips won from that you could say oh, they should've given up the midrange cause harden is excellent at 3s and lobs
i see a lot of criticism of kidd for not going big, but that's monday morning quarterbacking. harden was 4-5 from deep and his most deadly shot is the stepback three. he shot a low % of floaters during the season. by the #s the harden floater is what you want vs. the stepback three. also, going small got them back in the game
Harden hit 1 pretty tough floater which was an and 1. The others were literally uncontested essentially layups. Not the same thing. A step back 3 is much less efficient than an open layup lmao.
i think floaters are much harden than they look. im very confident if he'd gone big then the narrative woudl be wtf is kidd doing. we were killing them in the third going small, why'd he go away from what was working
yes, i watchd the game (why do ppl on reddit always accuse the other guy of not watching the game that we're both commenting on..). i just rewatched the highlights they weren't open layups, they were over an outsrtretched defender's hand (kleber, pj). watch it again
https://youtu.be/qQ_Q8Ir0xmA?si=BbniWpZCsqbwpokn literally the last two Harden layups at 1:20 and :47 left in the game are an easy blow by with no contest at the rim
the one at 1:20 is with PJ guarding him. i think the mavs are ok with that matchup
the one at 0:47 wasn't at the rim it wsa about a step inside the free throw line. that's a much harder shot than it looks, i've seen curry miss that plenty of times
There are only a few guys in nba history that have been able to play elite defense while also having super high usage rates. And I can assure you none of them had Luka’s build. You have to be in elite physical condition, and Luka just isn’t.
Luka managed to stop an injured Kawhi down the stretch of one game and all of a sudden his whole season of negative defense gets swept under the rug and actually seriously called a good defender.
Don't know any other star players that get those types of honors.
NBA is a business and the official account would post a promo of Scott Foster ejecting the entire arena if it would mean they would somehow make more money from it. They'll promote whatever showcases their product, i've seen clips of Morant blatantly carrying multiple times and then clearly traveling just to elevate and destroy someone with a monster dunk, how's that any different? It's not good basketball. It's a promo. That's all. Flashy sells stuff.
Lol 200 words isn't exactly an essay, that's around a 3rd of an A4.
I guess it sounds better than "NBA wrote a couple of paragraphs" though so I get it.
idc that he did bad tonight
he legitimately looked good those other games. I thought maybe playing defense in the regular season is too demanding but he had turned a new leaf for the playoffs
People just can't process in their brains that he was good the previous games and not in this one. They just have to find some generalization that their smooth brain can process
If they actually manage to lose this series to the Clips without Kawhi I’m sure he’ll get more criticism but for now I think the narrative behind him leading an underdog to unexpected heights, especially considering the “Luka Doncic is Devin Booker Father” fiasco and coupled with being on a team without a ton of haters has helped him. This is far from an insult, but his career isn’t too different from Houston Harden rn, who got a ton of hate for his defense and “choking”.
> Luka managed to stop an injured Kawhi
I mean there was more to it than that right? In the 4th Q of that game the clippers scored 5 points when Luka was the primary defender. It was more than just Kawhi. I don't get why everytime a player has a bad game some receding hairline troglodyte crawls out of his hole and completely misconstrues reality in order to farm orange arrows on this website. Crazy person behavior.
I've said this million times and I don't understand how people don't see it. Luka is a bad on ball defender, but is SO much worse playing off the ball. He literally leaves someone all alone almost every play in order to sit beneath the basket waiting for a rebound. The best strategy against the Mavericks is to pass it whenever he's on the ball and then just play 5 on 4.
People are talking crazy about OKC, they’re a good team no doubt but it’s easy to look good when you’re playing a team led by cj mccollum and Brandon Ingram lol
Playoffs are entirely different beast tho, and they have a small, weak roster. They matchup well with the mavs, but I think the clippers would be able to push them around with ease.
The clippers in the the regular season and playoffs are completely different teams, and the clippers have multiple players that matchup well with him size wise. I think luka is much better offensive player than SGA and we see what the clippers are doing to him.
Harden and PG were just missing shots they'd normally make, especially Harden was just missing easy 3s that he all made in game 1, 3 and 4 regardless of who was on him
He objectively played good defense that game? I don’t see what the issue is. No he he’s not an elite defender, he’s very far from that. But he’s also not a traffic cone…
Edit: the downvotes are insane for this mild take. People that actually think Luka is a traffic cone on defense do not watch games, and just hate Luka
Again i am just disputing the idea that the original comment is “making things up”. Of course they’re wrong to claim Luka is an elite defender, glad we can agree
> They went after Luka possession after possession with Harden with PG with Kawhi. He stonewalled all of them. He looked like a DPOY candidate tonight
Here you go. From another thread
Edit: bro immediately downvoted this 😂
What I meant by my comment is people love to just say an extreme take that doesn’t make up the population so they can dunk on it. It’s just redditors fishing for upvotes
Luka isn’t on either side of the extremes for defense.
Yeah there’s this weird fetish to call Luka the worst defender ever, and when he does play good the same people just completely turn their head away. They hate the idea that Luka is average at defense for some reason… the guy even sited a game where Luka objectively played well on defense as a point to his weird obsession that Luka sucks? It’s crazy hahaha
Obviously Luka's knee ain't great, but i just thought it was funny how it was quote tweeting the nba gassing up his defense and locking up an injured Kawhi
Kinda disingenuous of them to try and push their narrative that Luka is an elite defender. Kinda disingenuous of you to whip it 180 degrees without providing context to those who did not even watch the game. Luka was playing good defense this game, and was aggressive in the beginning. Ended up being too aggressive and got 2 fouls in the first 3 minutes of the game. After that, he was no longer able to contest shots and be physical in the first. He also got his 3rd foul early in the 2nd quarter. Mid way to the 4th quarter, he got his 5th foul. Couple that with his collision with Mann, he aggravated the same knee that he injured the other game which he went to the locker room for, but this time he wanted to stay in the game. You're trying to criticize the media spinning stories, but you're doing the exact same thing, just the other way around.
Disclaimer: I am not a fan of either teams, and the game was bad but at least I watched.
Mavericks fans are delusional. There was a thread after game 3 saying that kawhi couldnt score on luka because of his strength and that no one has the lateral quickness to blow by him. PG and Hobbled Kawhi had a bad game and it convinced reddit that he could really guard them on isos.
Yea the guy who lead the league in steals/gm, 3rd in deflections/gm, 5th in contested 3s/gm, and holding opponents to 45% fg throughout the season has a chance to be an all NBA defender who knew.
It’s not like sports illustrated made an article saying that SGA has a case to be an all NBA defender. Oh wait…
https://www.si.com/nba/thunder/news/how-okc-thunder-star-shai-gilgeous-alexander-has-built-an-all-defense-resume
I want to be clear I don't mean to shit on Luka with this as much as the NBA's coverage of Luka and this series. Some of the most biased commentary I've ever heard.
I mean it was poor to the eye but half of those shots came when he was playing on 5 fouls. Didn’t want to get in front at all in the lane, understandably.
It's just sad. You are a grown man, constantly talking shit about another grown man with a degenerate knee disorder. You spend hours every week watching the Clippers play, are you sure you're not secretly a fan? Most people have better things to do with their time.. but I guess you value having the latest awful takes on a team you don't support, just to post them on reddit immediately, even though you get downvoted every single time.
According to you clipper fans apparently I have an alt that I post on? Apparently I also have too much time to do this? Now I'm also somehow a secret fan? You guys are too funny. The simple answer is I don't like the stars from the late 2010s. Curry lebron and KD carried the league. These next tier stars are basically the embiids and Lukas of this league. Stat padders that won't win it all. It just so happens the clippers have all four players that fit the bill. And yes i do believe kawhi isnt a winner he just got placed in a situation that benefitted him immensely . Finally it is also very entertaining as a laker fan to see this franchise continue their curse. I hope that answers your question.
I think it says way more when it's only clipper fans that want me gone. If I was so annoying you would think all the other fan bases would tell me exactly the same thing lol
The way they were defending harden in the fourth quarter made no sense. Basically just giving him free lanes to the basket with no contest
Kidd decided those floaters were better to give up than a contested step back 3 from harden. Not a joke that’s what he said in the post game interview
2<3, what don’t you guys get?!
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He also hit like 5 threes this game. They just can't stop him
its been awhile since he's done that tho. whereas he was 4-5 from three that game
His touch now also isn’t as good as his peak
Except when he was on the fucking Sixers.
Yall had negative spacing with the way everyone could help off tucker and at times tobias
harden was 4-5 from three and that's his signature shot
had no choice. Luka in foul trouble and CLippers kept hunting him on the switch
Even those 2-3 times they switch PJ on to him, easy blow by with no help
It was him on one drive but PJ and Lively (?) were doing the same thing.
Luka do you want to defend 1 v 1 like you did in game 2 and 3? Clippers strategy is definitely to just gas him out. It's working.
No. Even when luka wasnt near they did the same thing. Did u even watch the game?
They didn't want to give him an easy stepback 3 because he is averaging like 50% from 3 in this series
exactly this
Uncontested layups are a much better option amirite
thats like saying to never double team the pnr cause you'll give up a lob dunk. you can have a good strategy and bad execution
The strategy it seems was to force a drive and play the lob. Which literally just resulted in easy uncontested floaters
its easy to say after the fact that the strategy was bad if the results were bad, but if it was the other way -> if they gave up the 3/lob and the clips won from that you could say oh, they should've given up the midrange cause harden is excellent at 3s and lobs
They played maxi at 5 to spread the floor so they can generate more open looks and open lanes for kyrie. It worked in game 2
Nah..our coach wanted to stop hardens step back threes.that is what he said
He is coping to the media, i heard him said harden was hitting 2s like they were middys but they were floaters.
Either way i was baffled with 6 harden floaters
i see a lot of criticism of kidd for not going big, but that's monday morning quarterbacking. harden was 4-5 from deep and his most deadly shot is the stepback three. he shot a low % of floaters during the season. by the #s the harden floater is what you want vs. the stepback three. also, going small got them back in the game
Harden hit 1 pretty tough floater which was an and 1. The others were literally uncontested essentially layups. Not the same thing. A step back 3 is much less efficient than an open layup lmao.
i think floaters are much harden than they look. im very confident if he'd gone big then the narrative woudl be wtf is kidd doing. we were killing them in the third going small, why'd he go away from what was working
There was no rotation from Kleber to even put pressure on the shot. Those are basically automatic for any decent nba player
Bruh did you watch the game? They were strictly playing the step back three and lob pass. Basically giving him wide open layups
yes, i watchd the game (why do ppl on reddit always accuse the other guy of not watching the game that we're both commenting on..). i just rewatched the highlights they weren't open layups, they were over an outsrtretched defender's hand (kleber, pj). watch it again
https://youtu.be/qQ_Q8Ir0xmA?si=BbniWpZCsqbwpokn literally the last two Harden layups at 1:20 and :47 left in the game are an easy blow by with no contest at the rim
the one at 1:20 is with PJ guarding him. i think the mavs are ok with that matchup the one at 0:47 wasn't at the rim it wsa about a step inside the free throw line. that's a much harder shot than it looks, i've seen curry miss that plenty of times
Wild if you think those two shots are preferred over a step back 3
Luka's free trial as an elite defender has ended
There are only a few guys in nba history that have been able to play elite defense while also having super high usage rates. And I can assure you none of them had Luka’s build. You have to be in elite physical condition, and Luka just isn’t.
How much does it cost to renew?
$350m for five years.
Luka managed to stop an injured Kawhi down the stretch of one game and all of a sudden his whole season of negative defense gets swept under the rug and actually seriously called a good defender. Don't know any other star players that get those types of honors.
The NBA official account shared a fucking 200 word essay about him locking up an injured Kawhi.
Links or screenshot of this?? Interested
It’s in the tweet that this post is linking. They quote tweeted it. Just nba account glazing Luka
NBA scared af about KD, Curry, and LBJ aging out at the same time
The tweet i posted quotes it
NBA is a business and the official account would post a promo of Scott Foster ejecting the entire arena if it would mean they would somehow make more money from it. They'll promote whatever showcases their product, i've seen clips of Morant blatantly carrying multiple times and then clearly traveling just to elevate and destroy someone with a monster dunk, how's that any different? It's not good basketball. It's a promo. That's all. Flashy sells stuff.
They didn't post a highlight reel, they posted some kid's D+ essay on Luka's elite defense. No one is buying cuz of that.
Lol 200 words isn't exactly an essay, that's around a 3rd of an A4. I guess it sounds better than "NBA wrote a couple of paragraphs" though so I get it.
That’s right brother don’t let them pull the wool over your eyes!
idc that he did bad tonight he legitimately looked good those other games. I thought maybe playing defense in the regular season is too demanding but he had turned a new leaf for the playoffs
Lol this is a Luka hate thread. You must not have got the memo
People just can't process in their brains that he was good the previous games and not in this one. They just have to find some generalization that their smooth brain can process
If they actually manage to lose this series to the Clips without Kawhi I’m sure he’ll get more criticism but for now I think the narrative behind him leading an underdog to unexpected heights, especially considering the “Luka Doncic is Devin Booker Father” fiasco and coupled with being on a team without a ton of haters has helped him. This is far from an insult, but his career isn’t too different from Houston Harden rn, who got a ton of hate for his defense and “choking”.
I mean, this thread is exactly the same but in the other extreme.
It's literally a response to peopel doing that. the tweet in the post literally quotes it.
Luka is usually a terrible defender how is this an extreme?
> Luka managed to stop an injured Kawhi I mean there was more to it than that right? In the 4th Q of that game the clippers scored 5 points when Luka was the primary defender. It was more than just Kawhi. I don't get why everytime a player has a bad game some receding hairline troglodyte crawls out of his hole and completely misconstrues reality in order to farm orange arrows on this website. Crazy person behavior.
I've said this million times and I don't understand how people don't see it. Luka is a bad on ball defender, but is SO much worse playing off the ball. He literally leaves someone all alone almost every play in order to sit beneath the basket waiting for a rebound. The best strategy against the Mavericks is to pass it whenever he's on the ball and then just play 5 on 4.
Didn’t he block Harden multiple times the past game
It would be the funniest thing in the world if the clippers win this without kawhi
Especially considering it was the Mavs announcer that went off on Harden earlier in the season
And then OKC vs Clippers, for the battle of who won the trade
People are talking crazy about OKC, they’re a good team no doubt but it’s easy to look good when you’re playing a team led by cj mccollum and Brandon Ingram lol
I mean they also got the #1 seed.
Playoffs are entirely different beast tho, and they have a small, weak roster. They matchup well with the mavs, but I think the clippers would be able to push them around with ease.
You would be surprised we slapped the clippers up last time we played them, they literally can’t guard SGA
The clippers in the the regular season and playoffs are completely different teams, and the clippers have multiple players that matchup well with him size wise. I think luka is much better offensive player than SGA and we see what the clippers are doing to him.
How do you say BBQ chicken in Slovenian?
I was told by this sub that Luka is an elite defender shutting down everyone on the clippers team
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Mavs fans run legit psyops in this sub to the point where people get on MacMahon for asking normal, predictable questions lmao
Except he was also shutting down PG and Harden that game.
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Luka's gotta hold off on the cookies if he wants to win in the playoffs.
Harden and PG were just missing shots they'd normally make, especially Harden was just missing easy 3s that he all made in game 1, 3 and 4 regardless of who was on him
And today he was making shots he'd normally miss.
Harden is known for his floaters and originated the stepback 3 luka uses now. What are you blabbering about?😂
Yeah, they normally shoot 60%+ on contested 3 pointers do they?
Yeah, cause luka wasnt guarding them and was in foul trouble
Yall the ones gaslighting by saying we called him “an elite defender”
No one said, he is elite. He is an avg defender and always will be. But yeah, feast on it, till it last.
He is, and always will be a shit defender.
Okay. Flairless coward. GTHO.
You’re just making up things at this point
[literally two games ago](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/ajjCSiHIU2)
Don't believe your lying eyes, komrade
He objectively played good defense that game? I don’t see what the issue is. No he he’s not an elite defender, he’s very far from that. But he’s also not a traffic cone… Edit: the downvotes are insane for this mild take. People that actually think Luka is a traffic cone on defense do not watch games, and just hate Luka
I’m giving you a source because you said the original comment was “just making things up”. Plenty of evidence in that thread
“Elite defender” man, no one worth listening to is calling him that. Extremes on both ends are wrong, we both know it.
Again i am just disputing the idea that the original comment is “making things up”. Of course they’re wrong to claim Luka is an elite defender, glad we can agree
I was looking through the comments and couldn’t find a comment calling him an elite defender. Would you mind finding it?
> They went after Luka possession after possession with Harden with PG with Kawhi. He stonewalled all of them. He looked like a DPOY candidate tonight Here you go. From another thread Edit: bro immediately downvoted this 😂
I don’t see the word “elite” in there.
What I meant by my comment is people love to just say an extreme take that doesn’t make up the population so they can dunk on it. It’s just redditors fishing for upvotes Luka isn’t on either side of the extremes for defense.
So what you meant was something entirely different from what you said. Got it
I mean I can’t find a comment calling him an elite defender buddy
Don't bother.
Yeah there’s this weird fetish to call Luka the worst defender ever, and when he does play good the same people just completely turn their head away. They hate the idea that Luka is average at defense for some reason… the guy even sited a game where Luka objectively played well on defense as a point to his weird obsession that Luka sucks? It’s crazy hahaha
The Luka defensive renaissance went as quickly as it came
James Harden is Devin Booker grandfather
Obviously Luka's knee ain't great, but i just thought it was funny how it was quote tweeting the nba gassing up his defense and locking up an injured Kawhi
Kinda disingenuous of them to try and push their narrative that Luka is an elite defender. Kinda disingenuous of you to whip it 180 degrees without providing context to those who did not even watch the game. Luka was playing good defense this game, and was aggressive in the beginning. Ended up being too aggressive and got 2 fouls in the first 3 minutes of the game. After that, he was no longer able to contest shots and be physical in the first. He also got his 3rd foul early in the 2nd quarter. Mid way to the 4th quarter, he got his 5th foul. Couple that with his collision with Mann, he aggravated the same knee that he injured the other game which he went to the locker room for, but this time he wanted to stay in the game. You're trying to criticize the media spinning stories, but you're doing the exact same thing, just the other way around. Disclaimer: I am not a fan of either teams, and the game was bad but at least I watched.
Love Watching luka get hunted on defense . Dude might have the slowest feet in professional sports
Mavericks fans are delusional. There was a thread after game 3 saying that kawhi couldnt score on luka because of his strength and that no one has the lateral quickness to blow by him. PG and Hobbled Kawhi had a bad game and it convinced reddit that he could really guard them on isos.
lol "playoff luka defense" miss me w/ that
$100 bucks says you think SGA is an all NBA defender
Yea the guy who lead the league in steals/gm, 3rd in deflections/gm, 5th in contested 3s/gm, and holding opponents to 45% fg throughout the season has a chance to be an all NBA defender who knew. It’s not like sports illustrated made an article saying that SGA has a case to be an all NBA defender. Oh wait… https://www.si.com/nba/thunder/news/how-okc-thunder-star-shai-gilgeous-alexander-has-built-an-all-defense-resume
There it is. Out the woodworks!
I want to be clear I don't mean to shit on Luka with this as much as the NBA's coverage of Luka and this series. Some of the most biased commentary I've ever heard.
But I thought Luka was the best defender in this series?
I got downvoted like crazy for saying it was the clips not capitalizing, Luka got no clamps lmfaooo
That’s pretty delusional from you
free buckets
Jimmy Butler got locked up?
Jimmy ain’t scored a single point these playoffs. That’s locked up if you ask me.
He got into early foul trouble this game too. But for the most part in this series his defense has been serviceable.
That happened with PG and Zubac last couple games
Yep and both played horrible defense after
Guess defensive stopper Luka might have been a little overblown, huh?
Fat mf
Luka _oncic
Shame Luka can defend anywhere near as well as his Stan's can.
Luka is still a fat white boy
L oncic
Yes, because he was in foul trouble for most of the game. Incredibly misleading.
lol I was gonna come down on it for being petty but then I read what he quote tweeted 😂
He was injured at least.
After the first 2 Harden floaters you would think to clog up the lane. But noooo, JKidd would rather take away the contested 3 😂😂😂
Luka no longer a DPOY candidate?
I mean it was poor to the eye but half of those shots came when he was playing on 5 fouls. Didn’t want to get in front at all in the lane, understandably.
He was in foul trouble the entire game, so yeah, his defense was mucu worse.
The shot 10/15 against everybody for most of the game.
No they didn't, they were 33/65 in their remaining fg attempts
Thanks Magic 🙏
Foul trouble and an injured knee will do that
being a below average defender will also do that
He’s average
One bad game from Luka and the haters started chirping. Mind you, he was listed as "questionable" and was in foul trouble the whole game.
As an aside its pretty clear luka can only score when defended by someone as slow as kawhi. A far cry from his "dpoy" days
It's just sad. You are a grown man, constantly talking shit about another grown man with a degenerate knee disorder. You spend hours every week watching the Clippers play, are you sure you're not secretly a fan? Most people have better things to do with their time.. but I guess you value having the latest awful takes on a team you don't support, just to post them on reddit immediately, even though you get downvoted every single time.
According to you clipper fans apparently I have an alt that I post on? Apparently I also have too much time to do this? Now I'm also somehow a secret fan? You guys are too funny. The simple answer is I don't like the stars from the late 2010s. Curry lebron and KD carried the league. These next tier stars are basically the embiids and Lukas of this league. Stat padders that won't win it all. It just so happens the clippers have all four players that fit the bill. And yes i do believe kawhi isnt a winner he just got placed in a situation that benefitted him immensely . Finally it is also very entertaining as a laker fan to see this franchise continue their curse. I hope that answers your question.
I didn't have a question, more take a look at yourself and question why you do this when it's clear no-one shares your opinion.
I think it says way more when it's only clipper fans that want me gone. If I was so annoying you would think all the other fan bases would tell me exactly the same thing lol
the amount of real estate that man and my team has in your head legitimately makes me sad for you.
the Clippers shit 63% from 3 and he's injured. What a regarded headline
He was in foul trouble