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It’s not looking good atm. I reckon Memphis can go on a ridiculous streak just as we can to close the season. Hopefully they choke and we take advantage, but I don’t think that is a given whatsoever. This will be a hard fought 8th seed from here on out. We can’t lose many
When you lose 13 straight before the coaches make a change to the defence says a lot.
Win half of those and this team is definite 8.
We have 20 games left, if I remember rightly, against teams who are under .500. As I see it, we'll need to go something like 15-5 in those games to have any realistic shot of making the playoffs. Cause our other games are against at or above .500 teams (obviously, lol) and we're unlikely to dominate in those matchups: we have Rockets, Bucks, Pacers (Oladipo's back), OKC, Lakers x2, Clippers x2, Mavs, Heat, Jazz, and Sixers all left on the schedule. Right now, I could easily see us going something like 3-9 in those 12 games, and we'd need to be overwhelmingly good against the under .500s to make up for it.
And of course, that includes picking up the required wins against Memphis, Sacramento, Minnesota, and San Antonio that we have left on the schedule. We're already 1-0 against Memphis, Sacramento, and Minnesota, which is great, but we're 0-1 to San Antonio and we only play them twice more, so we'd have to win both games against them to secure the season series.
It's not an easy path at all. We may only be 5 games back with plenty of games left to play, but objects in the mirror may be farther away than they appear.
For the most part, during that stretch of games when we lost 13 straight, we had a raw, 19 year old, 220 #, foul-prone rookie anchoring the defense in the paint (did I say raw?). We probably would have been better off playing Jah or Melli exclusively, but alas, it is what it is.
I think it's too late to make the playoffs. I also think losing those two in a row when Zion came back really destroyed our chances. Memphis has just been too hot, and I just don't see them cooling down.
Why not? They beat an injured Denver team but other than that, they tend to look bad against decent to good teams, which they haven't played much. And when they do, it's usually at home in Memphis.
I'm really not too worried about catching them. The teams to worry about getting hot would be Portland and San Antonio.
Saying it's too late when 5 games back before February is beyond panic mode. Chill out. Where's your Mamba mentality at?
And if they simply beat Memphis at home Friday, all of you nervous nellies will be right back on the playoff train, even though still 4 games back. Fans I tell ya
Last edited by luckyman; 01-30-2020 at 02:53 PM.
If they're 5 games ahead, it means they don't actually need to be better than us at all to beat us for the playoffs spot. It just means they have to be not-5-games-worse.
The schedule is in our favour, of course, but I've been a Pelicans fan long enough to never underestimate our capacity to lose games we should win.
Exactly why I’m not getting my hopes up right now. If Memphis weren’t currently very decent, then I could see us having a more comfortable chance. I just think that they might do what we were supposed to do and we will drop some very winnable games (we already have) that will bite us in the arse
Yeah my bad, I was just scanning the schedule on basketball-ref so I might have missed a game here or there, but I think my point in general still stands.
Same thing we already knew: they're not that great. People like to point to the fact that they were one CP3 injury away from the Finals and very possibly a ring last year, as evidence for the fact that Harden/D'Antoni actually are winning players, playing a winning style. What they miss is the significance of that piece; CP3 is an all-time great, one of the 5 greatest at his position ever. Being one ''all-time great'' away from the Finals is actually a pretty big gap; Harden had multiple chances to take down a not-full-strength Golden State and he just crumpled.
On a semi-related note, James Harden just averaged 35%FG and 25.2%3PT over the month of January.
Not sure if this has already been said but beginning March 10th, the Grizzlies will have 18 games remaining. Of those 18 games, 11 are against current playoff teams. The other 7 are @ Portland, @ San Antonio, vs New Orleans, @ New Orleans, vs NYK, @ Portland.
This isn't just a difficult stretch, this is one of the hardest stretches I've ever seen. If they go 9-9 in these 18 games, they'd deserve that playoff spot IMO. Its possible that they'll be considered underdogs in every game other than vs. Nola and vs. NYK.
I did basically say that more than once.
But because Pelicans are currently 5 games back and Memphis just won 2 straight games, I was told this thread should be hidden until March, something about gambling, and Memphis just needs to not be 5 games worse with damn near 35 games left?
This helps.
https://www.nola.com/sports/pelicans...m_campaign=snd
No Guduric or Jaren Jackson Jr.
My man, Elfrid still giving us assists.
Last edited by msusousaphone; 01-30-2020 at 08:35 PM.
BI, Zion, and CJ had a net rating of +3 when on the court together. BI and Zion had a +13.4, BI and CJ had a +13.2, Zion and CJ was just +5.4.
BI and Zion worked. BI and CJ worked. It was CJ and Zion and all three together that didn't work.
On one hand, I respect his grift; he averages a bajillion points because he's absolutely nailed the flaws in the reffing system and has taken full advantage of them. It's hard to get that mad at someone who is just playing the game and exploiting it the best way he knows how.
On the other hand, it is very annoying to watch and, I think, not in the spirit of the game. So I don't like him.
Nah, Elfrid was wrong.
Just because you decide to stop playing halfway through the 4th quarter doesn't mean the other team is required to do the same. You wanna stop someone from taking a shot, how about trying to play some defense for once?
Apparently it's more disrespectful to the game to take a shot with 50 seconds left on the game clock than it is to do whatever the hell it is the Knicks have spent the last few years doing. Crazy world we live in.
Oh stop it. The game was conceded and well done. To steal the ball, THEN march out to the 3 point line and shoot on top of that is about as petty as petty gets. You've already won.
As a man you don't do things like that and if you do, you get what Crowder got. Plain and simple. Anybody that has seriously played competitive sports knows what I'm talking about.
The hell is going on in this world.
Yep, and a bunch of people have been defending those really stupid comments, basically just telling on themselves.
And hey, if ''feminine tendencies'' is what wins games, maybe Morris should be trying to get more in touch with his feminine side. It's clear that being a macho-man dudebro isn't working out for him when it comes to winning basketball games.
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