Playoff Prediction Thread

[td450]

I feel like people are sleeping on Toronto vs Phila

I would feel very good about Toronto's chances of beating Philly if they had a player similar to what they had in Marc Gasol in 2019 against Embiid. A 25mpg big bodied center. 260lbs of meat. Gasol a legit seven footer. Someone to bang with Embiid. To physically matchup against the physical power of Embiid.

It doesn't need to be a star. It doesn't need to be anything special. Just give me 25mpg of good D on Embiid that (1) stops my team D from falling apart every time he touches the ball because I gotta double team him (2) frees up the rest of my guys to be aggressive (those long tall forwards) shrinking the court, trapping the ball, forcing turnovers.

Just a solid 25mpg role player and I'd favour them over Philly.

Without that though ... nah, I'm not buying what TOR are selling.

I really like Toronto's team. They are very close to being very very good. But they are not quite there yet and this (Philly) is the most troubling matchup for them because of Embiid. I do not like their chances. They'll scrap hard but I don't see them coming out victorious.

I don't know about that.

Embiid is unstoppable, but they throw 3 or 4 different power forwards at him the whole game. Meanwhile, they rotate some great athletic defenders at Harden. Can Embiid carry them and still have some gas so he can finish strong? Not so sure. I think Toronto wins. Nurse is the better coach, and Toronto is tougher mentally.

[Who]

I feel like people are sleeping on Toronto vs Phila

I would feel very good about Toronto's chances of beating Philly if they had a player similar to what they had in Marc Gasol in 2019 against Embiid. A 25mpg big bodied center. 260lbs of meat. Gasol a legit seven footer. Someone to bang with Embiid. To physically matchup against the physical power of Embiid.

It doesn't need to be a star. It doesn't need to be anything special. Just give me 25mpg of good D on Embiid that (1) stops my team D from falling apart every time he touches the ball because I gotta double team him (2) frees up the rest of my guys to be aggressive (those long tall forwards) shrinking the court, trapping the ball, forcing turnovers.

Just a solid 25mpg role player and I'd favour them over Philly.

Without that though ... nah, I'm not buying what TOR are selling.

I really like Toronto's team. They are very close to being very very good. But they are not quite there yet and this (Philly) is the most troubling matchup for them because of Embiid. I do not like their chances. They'll scrap hard but I don't see them coming out victorious.

I don't know about that.

Embiid is unstoppable, but they throw 3 or 4 different power forwards at him the whole game. Meanwhile, they rotate some great athletic defenders at Harden. Can Embiid carry them and still have some gas so he can finish strong? Not so sure. I think Toronto wins. Nurse is the better coach, and Toronto is tougher mentally.

They can double team and take the ball out of Embiid's hands but then you leave three point shooters open. You leave Harden and Maxey with open lanes to drive to the basket and make a play for themselves or others.

It takes your whole defense out of balance.

The idea of offense is to create penetration = meaning to penetrate the first line of defense and force a help sequence. To force a help defender to come over. This creates a wide open outside shot or a lane for a cutter or driver for high efficiency scoring attempts.

That is the only way Toronto can stop Embiid. To concede those high efficiency scoring opportunities and hope Philly's supporting cast misses them.

The opposite is to deny penetration thereby allowing your defense to keep its man in between the ball and the basket leading to a contested jump-shot aka a low percentage scoring attempt.

Toronto cannot do that to Philly consistently because they cannot defend Embiid without double teaming. Philly can do that to Toronto because they do not need to double team TOR's scorers (to their forwards anyway, VanVleet causes some trouble).

So one team can create high percentage shots consistently and deny their opponent high percentage shots. The other team cannot consistent create high percentage shots and cannot stop the opponent from getting high percentage shots.

I know which team I'm betting on in this situation.

[hpantazo]

I feel like people are sleeping on Toronto vs Phila

I would feel very good about Toronto's chances of beating Philly if they had a player similar to what they had in Marc Gasol in 2019 against Embiid. A 25mpg big bodied center. 260lbs of meat. Gasol a legit seven footer. Someone to bang with Embiid. To physically matchup against the physical power of Embiid.

It doesn't need to be a star. It doesn't need to be anything special. Just give me 25mpg of good D on Embiid that (1) stops my team D from falling apart every time he touches the ball because I gotta double team him (2) frees up the rest of my guys to be aggressive (those long tall forwards) shrinking the court, trapping the ball, forcing turnovers.

Just a solid 25mpg role player and I'd favour them over Philly.

Without that though ... nah, I'm not buying what TOR are selling.

I really like Toronto's team. They are very close to being very very good. But they are not quite there yet and this (Philly) is the most troubling matchup for them because of Embiid. I do not like their chances. They'll scrap hard but I don't see them coming out victorious.

I don't know about that.

Embiid is unstoppable, but they throw 3 or 4 different power forwards at him the whole game. Meanwhile, they rotate some great athletic defenders at Harden. Can Embiid carry them and still have some gas so he can finish strong? Not so sure. I think Toronto wins. Nurse is the better coach, and Toronto is tougher mentally.

Don’t underestimate the Sixers playoff superpower of having two guys who can get 20+ free throws each just by flopping

[Who]

A bunch of teams have been getting some joy defensively against Harden this year. He hasn't been as good at beating his defender off the dribble. There is good reason to be confident in defending him one-on-one if you have capable athletic wing defenders as Toronto does have.

However, if you have to double Embiid and leave Harden open or even partially open ... how many players in the NBA are better at exploiting angles, slithering into space and getting to the basket than Harden?

This is like Shaq and Kobe in 2000-02. Teams have to focus all their attention on Shaq to stop him. To do that they have to leave Kobe and let him play against a collapsed defense. Kobe is free to attack a defense that cannot setup against him because all their focus is on stopping Shaq. Kobe meanwhile is on the weakside waiting for the ball rotation to come to him while he can attack the already broken down team defense.

That is brutal to stop.


.... and then you have Maxey who is lightening fast and very capable of exploiting driving lanes against a collapsed team defense. Nevermind Tobias Harris as the 4th option who can handle, pass and shoot. A well rounded offensive threat.


Toronto's athletic wing defense could cause Harden massive problems if they were allowed to hone in on him but ... but they cannot do that because they have to double team Embiid whenever he gets the ball inside because Toronto have nobody capable of defending Embiid one-on-one leaving Harden free to attack an already scrambling team defense rather than a set defense honed in on him.

[td450]

I feel like people are sleeping on Toronto vs Phila

I would feel very good about Toronto's chances of beating Philly if they had a player similar to what they had in Marc Gasol in 2019 against Embiid. A 25mpg big bodied center. 260lbs of meat. Gasol a legit seven footer. Someone to bang with Embiid. To physically matchup against the physical power of Embiid.

It doesn't need to be a star. It doesn't need to be anything special. Just give me 25mpg of good D on Embiid that (1) stops my team D from falling apart every time he touches the ball because I gotta double team him (2) frees up the rest of my guys to be aggressive (those long tall forwards) shrinking the court, trapping the ball, forcing turnovers.

Just a solid 25mpg role player and I'd favour them over Philly.

Without that though ... nah, I'm not buying what TOR are selling.

I really like Toronto's team. They are very close to being very very good. But they are not quite there yet and this (Philly) is the most troubling matchup for them because of Embiid. I do not like their chances. They'll scrap hard but I don't see them coming out victorious.

I don't know about that.

Embiid is unstoppable, but they throw 3 or 4 different power forwards at him the whole game. Meanwhile, they rotate some great athletic defenders at Harden. Can Embiid carry them and still have some gas so he can finish strong? Not so sure. I think Toronto wins. Nurse is the better coach, and Toronto is tougher mentally.

They can double team and take the ball out of Embiid's hands but then you leave three point shooters open. You leave Harden and Maxey with open lanes to drive to the basket and make a play for themselves or others.

It takes your whole defense out of balance.

The idea of offense is to create penetration = meaning to penetrate the first line of defense and force a help sequence. To force a help defender to come over. This creates a wide open outside shot or a lane for a cutter or driver for high efficiency scoring attempts.

That is the only way Toronto can stop Embiid. To concede those high efficiency scoring opportunities and hope Philly's supporting cast misses them.

The opposite is to deny penetration thereby allowing your defense to keep its man in between the ball and the basket leading to a contested jump-shot aka a low percentage scoring attempt.

Toronto cannot do that to Philly consistently because they cannot defend Embiid without double teaming. Philly can do that to Toronto because they do not need to double team TOR's scorers (to their forwards anyway, VanVleet causes some trouble).

So one team can create high percentage shots consistently and deny their opponent high percentage shots. The other team cannot consistent create high percentage shots and cannot stop the opponent from getting high percentage shots.

I know which team I'm betting on in this situation.

I do agree that Embiid will have his way, but Philly really doesn't have the personnel to do much against Barnes, Anunoby, Siakam and Trent. Thybulle is their only athletic wing. So I don't see Philly being well suited to defending Toronto.

I think it will boil down to whether Embiid has enough energy to dominate the game on both sides for 48 minutes while defending a waves of much smaller, quicker guys. I'm not sure he does.

[celticsclay]

I'm surprised so many are high on Philly beating Toronto, think Thybulle is a pretty big loss for them. The Raptors will obviously struggle to contain Embid and he will get a lot of points. But who is guarding all the length on the Raptors? Defensively they are going to throw Danny Greens corpse against them?

The only offensive threat that scares me in a playoff series is VanVleet. The rest of them are fine but nothing special. Not anything to panic over. All manageable.

VanVleet is special. The entire offense revolves around his individual excellence. His quickness, his ball-handling, his outside shooting especially off the dribble long distance shooting, his dribble penetration and passing. He creates so much time and space for his teammates. He is the problem for opponents to worry about.

The Raptors length? Length is one thing. You gotta have the skill to go with the length to exploit the physical advantage. The Raps long wings have some skill but none of them are high skill offensive threats.

Philly matchup fine with them. They have Tobias Harris for Siakam. They have Harden for Anunoby and Danny Green for Scottie Barnes. Will the Raptors get some joy here? Sure. It is so much that it will break their team D and force double teams? I don't see it. Will their offense be so much that it wins them the series? I don't see that either.

I see steady solid offensive play like Toronto has gotten from them most of the season.

There is one guy on that team that is capable of more than steady & solid offensive play and that is VanVleet. The little midget. Not the tall long forwards.

Siakem averaged 23 points per game on 50% from field. Also shoots 34% from 3 and averages 5 assists and 8.5 rebounds.. A lot of people have him on the all NBA third team. How is this not skilled? He is a much much better player than Harris is. He gets to the line 5.5 times a game (Harris 2.5) and may rebound slightly better and definitely passes better and does a better job on drives.

[celticsclay]

I feel like people are sleeping on Toronto vs Phila

I would feel very good about Toronto's chances of beating Philly if they had a player similar to what they had in Marc Gasol in 2019 against Embiid. A 25mpg big bodied center. 260lbs of meat. Gasol a legit seven footer. Someone to bang with Embiid. To physically matchup against the physical power of Embiid.

It doesn't need to be a star. It doesn't need to be anything special. Just give me 25mpg of good D on Embiid that (1) stops my team D from falling apart every time he touches the ball because I gotta double team him (2) frees up the rest of my guys to be aggressive (those long tall forwards) shrinking the court, trapping the ball, forcing turnovers.

Just a solid 25mpg role player and I'd favour them over Philly.

Without that though ... nah, I'm not buying what TOR are selling.

I really like Toronto's team. They are very close to being very very good. But they are not quite there yet and this (Philly) is the most troubling matchup for them because of Embiid. I do not like their chances. They'll scrap hard but I don't see them coming out victorious.

I don't know about that.

Embiid is unstoppable, but they throw 3 or 4 different power forwards at him the whole game. Meanwhile, they rotate some great athletic defenders at Harden. Can Embiid carry them and still have some gas so he can finish strong? Not so sure. I think Toronto wins. Nurse is the better coach, and Toronto is tougher mentally.

They can double team and take the ball out of Embiid's hands but then you leave three point shooters open. You leave Harden and Maxey with open lanes to drive to the basket and make a play for themselves or others.

It takes your whole defense out of balance.

The idea of offense is to create penetration = meaning to penetrate the first line of defense and force a help sequence. To force a help defender to come over. This creates a wide open outside shot or a lane for a cutter or driver for high efficiency scoring attempts.

That is the only way Toronto can stop Embiid. To concede those high efficiency scoring opportunities and hope Philly's supporting cast misses them.

The opposite is to deny penetration thereby allowing your defense to keep its man in between the ball and the basket leading to a contested jump-shot aka a low percentage scoring attempt.

Toronto cannot do that to Philly consistently because they cannot defend Embiid without double teaming. Philly can do that to Toronto because they do not need to double team TOR's scorers (to their forwards anyway, VanVleet causes some trouble).

So one team can create high percentage shots consistently and deny their opponent high percentage shots. The other team cannot consistent create high percentage shots and cannot stop the opponent from getting high percentage shots.

I know which team I'm betting on in this situation.

I do agree that Embiid will have his way, but Philly really doesn't have the personnel to do much against Barnes, Anunoby, Siakam and Trent. Thybulle is their only athletic wing. So I don't see Philly being well suited to defending Toronto.

I think it will boil down to whether Embiid has enough energy to dominate the game on both sides for 48 minutes while defending a waves of much smaller, quicker guys. I'm not sure he does.

This is exactly what I think. Danny Green is about to be 35 and Kork and Milton are absolutely horrific defensively. Definitely a lot of tough matchups for the 76ers too.

Edit and also just to be clear, I do think Philly is a slight favorite to win the series, just think people are not respecting Toronto at all and/or haven't watched Harden the last month and a half.

[celticsclay]

A bunch of teams have been getting some joy defensively against Harden this year. He hasn't been as good at beating his defender off the dribble. There is good reason to be confident in defending him one-on-one if you have capable athletic wing defenders as Toronto does have.

However, if you have to double Embiid and leave Harden open or even partially open ... how many players in the NBA are better at exploiting angles, slithering into space and getting to the basket than Harden?

This is like Shaq and Kobe in 2000-02. Teams have to focus all their attention on Shaq to stop him. To do that they have to leave Kobe and let him play against a collapsed defense. Kobe is free to attack a defense that cannot setup against him because all their focus is on stopping Shaq. Kobe meanwhile is on the weakside waiting for the ball rotation to come to him while he can attack the already broken down team defense.

That is brutal to stop.


.... and then you have Maxey who is lightening fast and very capable of exploiting driving lanes against a collapsed team defense. Nevermind Tobias Harris as the 4th option who can handle, pass and shoot. A well rounded offensive threat.


Toronto's athletic wing defense could cause Harden massive problems if they were allowed to hone in on him but ... but they cannot do that because they have to double team Embiid whenever he gets the ball inside because Toronto have nobody capable of defending Embiid one-on-one leaving Harden free to attack an already scrambling team defense rather than a set defense honed in on him.

Comparing Harden to Kobe at their respective points in their careers is beyond ridiculous. Have people been watching him? He has been shooting like 32% from the field for 6 weeks at this point and is absolutely not passing the eye test. Prime Kobe Bryant good grief.

[Who]

I'm surprised so many are high on Philly beating Toronto, think Thybulle is a pretty big loss for them. The Raptors will obviously struggle to contain Embid and he will get a lot of points. But who is guarding all the length on the Raptors? Defensively they are going to throw Danny Greens corpse against them?

The only offensive threat that scares me in a playoff series is VanVleet. The rest of them are fine but nothing special. Not anything to panic over. All manageable.

VanVleet is special. The entire offense revolves around his individual excellence. His quickness, his ball-handling, his outside shooting especially off the dribble long distance shooting, his dribble penetration and passing. He creates so much time and space for his teammates. He is the problem for opponents to worry about.

The Raptors length? Length is one thing. You gotta have the skill to go with the length to exploit the physical advantage. The Raps long wings have some skill but none of them are high skill offensive threats.

Philly matchup fine with them. They have Tobias Harris for Siakam. They have Harden for Anunoby and Danny Green for Scottie Barnes. Will the Raptors get some joy here? Sure. It is so much that it will break their team D and force double teams? I don't see it. Will their offense be so much that it wins them the series? I don't see that either.

I see steady solid offensive play like Toronto has gotten from them most of the season.

There is one guy on that team that is capable of more than steady & solid offensive play and that is VanVleet. The little midget. Not the tall long forwards.

Siakem averaged 23 points per game on 50% from field. Also shoots 34% from 3 and averages 5 assists and 8.5 rebounds.. A lot of people have him on the all NBA third team. How is this not skilled? He is a much much better player than Harris is. He gets to the line 5.5 times a game (Harris 2.5) and may rebound slightly better and definitely passes better and does a better job on drives.

It is not that Siakam is not skilled. It is that he is not super-skilled. He is not a player that breaks your defense. He is a good supporting scorer. He is not a Jayson Tatum level scorer. He is more Andrew Wiggins level scorer.

Siakam scores at high volume but only around league efficiency. That efficiency is also boosted by him playing at center part of the time this season giving him more advantageous matchups and boosting his scoring efficiency.

You live with what Siakam does. Siakam doesn't kill you. He can hurt you but he doesn't kill you. It's like Scottie Pippen as a scorer vs Michael Jordan as a scorer. Yeah, Pippen is a threat but he ain't the guy that is going to kill you. MJ on the other hand will kill you.

[Who]

Another interesting note on the Raptors heading into the playoffs is the VanVleet situation. He has been struggling with an injury for the last few weeks and his shooting has suffered horribly.

Pre All-Star VanVleet had a TS% of 57%.
In 15 games post All-Star VanVleet is down to 48% TS%.

VanVleet is far and away Toronto's best offensive player with his ball-handling, quickness, outside shot making and passing. He is also their player most capable of punishing Embiid in the PnR and on switches.

If he is not able to go and play at a high level, Toronto is in real trouble. Potential sweep. A 4 or 5 game series.

[celticsclay]

Another interesting note on the Raptors heading into the playoffs is the VanVleet situation. He has been struggling with an injury for the last few weeks and his shooting has suffered horribly.

Pre All-Star VanVleet had a TS% of 57%.
In 15 games post All-Star VanVleet is down to 48% TS%.

VanVleet is far and away Toronto's best offensive player with his ball-handling, quickness, outside shot making and passing. He is also their player most capable of punishing Embiid in the PnR and on switches.

If he is not able to go and play at a high level, Toronto is in real trouble. Potential sweep. A 4 or 5 game series.

How can you mention this for Van Fleet and not acknowledge how awful Harden has been/looked the last 6 weeks?

[Who]

There are scorers you can live with and scorers that kill you.

The difference is usually efficiency and/or playmaking in addition to the scoring.

There is also some level of degree of difficulty shot making (which VanVleet has, Siakam does not) that also has additional value in the halfcourt against tough defenses in a playoff setting.

If I am Philly, I can live with Siakam getting 20+ppg on league average efficiency. Obviously I'd rather my defense was able to stop him or slow him down but at league average efficiency I feel confident my offense (Embiid, Harden) can out-score Siakam and his cohorts.

Scottie Barnes and Anunoby are both around league average too and both are more opportunistic scorers than true shot-creators. Gary Trent is also around league efficiency but he is a legit shooter / scorer. Trent makes difficult shots at an above average level but cannot create enough easy shots for himself. A sneaky dangerous threat. 

Siakam's passing is what impresses me the most relative to Barnes, Anunoby, Trent rather than his scoring.

[Who]

Players like Siakam. He gets to league average efficiency by getting high percentage hoops in transition, cuts, deep catches / post ups and drives against weak defenders.

Siakam is reliant on those high percentage shot attempts to cover up his mediocre scoring efficiency on more difficult shot attempts such as contested jump-shots.

If you can control tempo, you can reduce transition opportunities. If you can clog the middle, you can reduce easy finishes on drives, cuts and post ups. If you have a big bodied forward to bang with him on postups, you can reduce deep catches.

These are all ways you can take a league average scorer like Siakam and make him a below average scorer in the playoffs because you can force him into taking more jump-shots off the dribble which he isn't that good at. More average than above average.

This is where someone like VanVleet can be so dangerous because he can make those tough jump-shots off the dribble and he can be that guy that breaks tough defenses in the halfcourt in the playoffs when easy hoops are being taken away.

You don't worry about guys like Siakam killing you in a playoff series. You just reduce some of those easy high percentage scoring attempts and live with the rest. What he does to you, won't kill you. And if you have strong defensive forwards like Boston does, you can shut him down completely. He is not a guy that scares you in a playoff series.

He is a good all-rounder. Not a killer scorer.

[Who]

Another interesting note on the Raptors heading into the playoffs is the VanVleet situation. He has been struggling with an injury for the last few weeks and his shooting has suffered horribly.

Pre All-Star VanVleet had a TS% of 57%.
In 15 games post All-Star VanVleet is down to 48% TS%.

VanVleet is far and away Toronto's best offensive player with his ball-handling, quickness, outside shot making and passing. He is also their player most capable of punishing Embiid in the PnR and on switches.

If he is not able to go and play at a high level, Toronto is in real trouble. Potential sweep. A 4 or 5 game series.

How can you mention this for Van Fleet and not acknowledge how awful Harden has been/looked the last 6 weeks?

Because I was talking about VanVleet. Not Harden.

[celticsclay]

Another interesting note on the Raptors heading into the playoffs is the VanVleet situation. He has been struggling with an injury for the last few weeks and his shooting has suffered horribly.

Pre All-Star VanVleet had a TS% of 57%.
In 15 games post All-Star VanVleet is down to 48% TS%.

VanVleet is far and away Toronto's best offensive player with his ball-handling, quickness, outside shot making and passing. He is also their player most capable of punishing Embiid in the PnR and on switches.

If he is not able to go and play at a high level, Toronto is in real trouble. Potential sweep. A 4 or 5 game series.

How can you mention this for Van Fleet and not acknowledge how awful Harden has been/looked the last 6 weeks?

Because I was talking about VanVleet. Not Harden.

Yeah but you are literally comparing him to kobe with Shaq and haven’t mentioned it once despite it being one of the worst stretches of shooting for any guard in the league that is considered half decent. Seem to be picking apart torontos issues and not acknowledging any of the 76ers. Feels very biased.