Friday, Oct 4th, 2019

An NBA-obsessed newsletter for the info-craved basketball mind. Did a friend forward you this newsletter? Sign yourself up here.

  The opening tip

• Welcome to part two of our preview series, The defeatist’s guide to the NBA season.

• Today we are going to yell at you about the Knicks, the Nets and the Bucks. 

• Sports Illustrated laid off dozens of journalists yesterday, including some really good NBA writers. We linked to an article in Quick Hits, and our featured podcast covers the situation.

The Knicks make it so easy

Expectation: Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant and Zion Williamson.Reality: Marcus Morris. Taj Gibson. Julius Randle. Bobby Portis. This team has more middling power forwards than the 1958 St. Louis Hawks had white guys named Don; than Joakim Noah has weed guys; than the MBTA has service delays; than Jimmy Dolan has backup band names; than your high school acquaintance has opportunities he’d love to discuss with you. They have so many power forwards there’s talk of a union, as a hedge for when Dolan wakes up from his eternal power nap, crumb-lipped, asking why the hell this team has so many power forwards. But, boy, are they tough and mean (and very ready to cash checks during meaningless games in April). Marcus Morris, everyone: 

He has much to learn.

What’s good:

RJ “We’re 100 percent GETTING Zion BRO” Barrett.

What’s depressing:

This team will be 10-38 by the All-Star Break. RJ Barrett will be scoring 14 points per game on 36 percent shooting. The Knicks fans will riot. Barrett will fold into himself. Dolan will say something stupid like, “Well, you can’t always choose your bandmates. Sometimes they choose you.” But, hey, that Kristaps Porzingis trade was The Right Thing To Do. At least they haven’t gone and plastered Barrett’s face on the side of a massive facade next to the Garden...

Some advice:

The Knicks over/under in terms of wins this season is 27.5

. Run to your shadiest friend right now and ask him to pull up his betting app (he’ll have one) and put 15 percent of your net worth on the under. This team sucks. This team will always suck. This team won’t win 28 games. This team won’t win 25. You’ll have doubled your money by January.

What’s funny:

Dennis Smith lost 15 pounds this summer,

simply by not eating Bojangles

’.

The Nets are too good to be cheap 

What’s depressing: The cheapest ticket on SeatGeek for opening night at the Barclay’s Center this season is $86. Seemed like only yesterday you could wander up to the arena and watch some anonymous players fool around against good teams for $15. But that’s Brooklyn for you -- pricing out the average human since Webster’s acknowledged the word g-e-n-t-r-i-f-i-c-a-t-i-o-n. Hope the players enjoy playing in front of their new fan base rich people with corporate seats who couldn’t tell the difference between Joe Harris and Chet From The Cubicle Down The Hall.Brooklyn’s best healthy player: The Nets traded in their reliable, no-frills car last year for a new, radical and chemically imbalanced one this year, who could win an NBA title for you just as easily as he could bomb so hard the franchise has to move back to East Brunswick. Kyrie Irving is so nuts -- (how nuts is he?). That’s it. He’s out of his fucking mind. And, oh!, today is the one-year anniversary, folks, of his promise to his now-former home. Never forget:What’s funny: Kyrie, on Media Day, on his new partner in crime: 

“We want to end our careers together...and then what better place to do it than Brooklyn?"

If you think these two are going to finish their careers in Brooklyn, then we have an economically viable NBA newsletter to sell you.

The other best player:

Kevin Durant, who’s probably busy firing off another mean tweet at a 12-year-old on Xbox Live right now. Goodness, he must be bored. Let’s wish him a nice recovery, so he can come back next year and turn the Nets into the contenders that people inexplicably think they’ll be this season.

The Bucks are too cheap to be great

A question: How much do you think Giannis has made this franchise, which went from the hot new relocation rumor to a nice new downtown Milwaukee arena, since he got drafted? The answer is a whole lot. The front office spoke briefly of this phenomenon in a 60 Minutes profile.A truth: Despite that chunk of cash flow and newfound international recognition that never-ever-ever-ever would have come to Milwaukee otherwise, the Bucks this offseason couldn’t quite pull the trigger on paying arguably their second-best player last year, Malcolm Brogdon. Instead, they gave Khris Middleton, a flawed All-Star who is hard to imagine as the second-best player on a title team, a five-year, $177 million contract. Brogdon walked, for free, to the Pacers for a four-year, $85 million contract, a bargain by today’s standards. Brogdon put up a quiet 50-40-90 last season on nearly 16 points per game. He’s the type of player that can help a team win a title, but Milwaukee wasn’t willing to go into the tax, which will haunt them when doomsday* hits. Speaking of which…Milwaukee’s best player: Giannis. The reigning MVP who doesn’t want people to call him that anymore, for paranoia of regression. The best player in the world. The teenager who fell in love with a cold Midwestern city, even though it wouldn’t serve him tacos. He is simply too good for the cheapo Bucks.What’s looming: 2021*. Doomsday. When Giannis can hit full-on free agency. When he’ll just start to get jaded with a franchise unwilling to fully reciprocate what he’s done for it. Face it, Milwaukee: He’ll be gone. And it’ll be for good reason.What’s funny: Milwaukee leaked that it was prepared to offer Giannis a full max deal (duh) when 2021 comes around. The NBA slapped them with a $50,000 fine, for tampering.Up next: The Pacers, the Pistons and the Bulls.

James Harden hits Montrezl Harrell with the eurostep

The Rockets went on to win, 109-96, last night. Watch the highlights of James Harden’s 37-7-7 effort here. 

  Quick Hits 

• Lonzo Ball fixed his broken jumpshot. 

• The Nets have new alternative jerseys, designed by street artist HAZE. 

• Sports Illustrated laid off a bunch of its writing staff yesterday, including Andrew Sharp and Jake Fischer, whose work we link to on here all the time. 

• Pascal Siakam is in discussions with the Raptors about a max contract extension.

• From Reddit: Vince Carter is older than Memphis’ coach, general manager, and owner. 

• Donovan Mitchell is among the first casualties of the NBA’s crackdown on height leniency. His actual height? 6-foot-1 and a quarter. He was previously listed at 6-foot-3. 

• Here’s a video of Steph Curry talking about how he and D’Angelo Russell will split ball-handling duties. It’ll be fun to watch those two. 

• Russell Westbrook and Paul George shared a nice moment during yesterday’s preseason game. 

• Nikola Jokic showed up to Media Day looking a little thick. 

• Jimmy Butler takes his damn time in the locker room.

 Concrete Reads 

• Racial epithets, a star benched and a coach questioned: Inside the L.A. Sparks' chaotic finish [ESPN]

• Can the NBA find a superstar in India? [The New York TImes]

• The real L.A. stories of Kawhi Leonard and Paul George [The Ringer]

• The ‘90s made the Sonics iconic -- and planted the seeds for heartbreak [The Ringer]

  Podcast Pick

Trump’s impeachment spin, layoffs at Sports Illustrated, and the WWE goes to Fox [The Press Box]