Adam Silver made it clear a few years ago that if teams are losing as a result of injuries or giving young guys more chances to evaluate and rebuild, it is perfectly OK. Even if some of our injuries might be suspect, we certainly qualify the latter category. Jason Kidd just opened up a can of worms for Dallas that puts them more in the limelight for outright tanking to improve draft position. Think we're gonna be OK. "Over the past several seasons, discussions about so-called 'tanking' in the NBA have occurred with some frequency, both in the public discourse and within our league, and you as governors have taken steps to address the underlying incentive issues by adopting changes to our draft lottery system that will go into effect next year. Throughout this period, we have been careful to distinguish between efforts teams may make to rebuild their rosters, including through personnel changes over the course of several seasons, and circumstances in which players or coaches on the floor take steps to lose games. The former can be a legitimate strategy to construct a successful team within the confines of league rules; the latter — which we have not found and hope never to see in the NBA — has no place in our game. If we ever received evidence that players or coaches were attempting to lose or otherwise taking steps to cause any game to result otherwise than on its competitive merits, that conduct would be met with the swiftest and harshest response possible from the league office." https://www.usatoday.com/story/spor...-mark-cuban-fined-tanking-comments/360493002/ Coincidentally, all that also came after they found Dallas tanking for Zion. They clearly aren't very tactful at this.
Four starters out to “injuries” just when it’s most convenient to get a better spot in the draft? I don’t think that’s fooling anyone.
Yes. Do anything possible to get an All Star (or near) out of Ant and future picks. Add that to Dame, Grant, Sharpe, Nurk, and our pick, and we've got something cooking.
You think there's NO difference between (a) claiming a player is injured and submitting a request for an expanded roster to the NBA, and (b) putting "rest" as the reason two of your players aren't playing? That's ridiculous. If the NBA wants to interview the Blazers players to see if they've actually got injured, they can do that. If they want to call the Blazers liars, they can do that. They don't even need to do that with the Mavericks. They just chose not to play two healthy players due to "rest". Like I said: if you don't see a difference there, then you should look harder, because it's as clear as day.
That would seem to indicate #5 is over due for a win! So of course, that means they're getting boned!
You can call it whatever you want, but everybody in the NBA knows Portland is tanking. Saying a player is “injured” is a little game that the NBA commissioner should certainly be smart enough to figure out. The Mavericks can claim their players needed “rest” as easily as Portland can claim their players are injured, but again, the NBA commissioner should be smart enough to see through both ruses.
that's not all Dallas claimed. Kidd admitted postgame that the decision to bench everyone came from his GM and Owner and was made to maximize their future moves in order to win a title.
Silver only cares that the Mavs are tanking because he knows they would bring much better TV ratings to the playoffs than a team like OKC
I don’t want Dallas to get it…. But I really don’t want San Antonio to get it. Fuck that. It hasn’t been long enough. That would be like the Patriots getting another Tom Brady after only a few years. Their fans don’t deserve it.
Wild guess... perhaps the only reason he played at all was because it was I Feel Slovenia Night for the Mavs? https://www.prnewswire.com/news-rel...-feel-slovenia-night-in-dallas-301784043.html STOMP
If the Pacers and Magic win these games that they are in right now that would be great. We could play Shaedon tonight and see if he can get to 40.
The fact is that with Washington well ahead of Houston both Indy and Orlando can play to win but shouldn't because if one of them win and the other loses the team that loses will have the better odds but I hope they don't give a shit because we will do whatever it takes to keep that 5th spot by ourselves. So we will have guard rails if either team loses and we can take them off if both win.
I’d like to see the Blazers try to beat Golden State … if Indy and Orlando win … which is looking okay at the half. Scoreboard watching! Gotta be happy! And in wierd news … Mikal Bridges kept his streak alive for never missing a college or a pro game by checking in … immediately fouling … and checking out. 4 seconds. He gets a mulligan on this one as it is his 83rd game this year … and missing his 84th potential game wasn’t a miss as he was inactive, trade pending when he went to Brooklyn … so sayeth the NBA. It all counts! Can’t make this stuff up.
