I'll fully admit, I'm a pretty optimistic and realistic guy and it's only December. I'm still not gonna change my BOS > OKC in 6 in the Finals prediction either.
BUT... idk... something really does seem off about this team. I get more 2023 vibes from this team than 2024, and even glimpses of 2022 (the bad portions).
I really hope they are just going through the motions and maybe aren't trying as hard because it's December and not April. But if not... they could have a rude awakening when they play a team like CLE/ORL/NY in the 2nd round or ECF. I'm not worried they are gonna collapse or be an early playoff exit but if we're talking a Finals run, they won't make it playing like this particularly on the defensive end and with the poor effort on rebounding/defense.
I have the same opinion about their chances today that I had yesterday. I never thought they were guaranteed to win, we all know how hard it is to repeat, but I'm not ready to write them off in December. I try to think of success and failure as probabilities, not binary solutions. It's tough to repeat, but we all knew that. It's as much to do with their mental preparation and mindset as it is the physical talent and chemistry of the team. Health and luck also play a big role.
We know they have the team to win it, so the mental part is where Joe will have to keep them focused over the long season. Anyone who has successfully completed a really difficult task that took forever and took a lot of effort and sweat will know how hard it is to get back into the same mental state to do it again. But that's what differentiates the ATGs - the champions, the likes of Russell, Bird, Steph, MJ, LeBum - from the others who were able to do it once but never again.
That being said, I'm not prepared to write a team off on the basis of one bad month. This competition doesn't happen in a vacuum, nor is it a one-off FIFA World Cup Final or NCAA championship or NBA Cup. Whoever wins this thing has to win 16 games in June, in the pressure of the playoffs, under all sorts of adversity, dealing with possible health issues. I still think we're probably one of the 3 or 4 teams with the best probability of doing that, and a 4 point loss isn't really enough to move the needle for me. If you're the type of person that overreacts after one or two losses it's going to be a tough (or should I say the usual
) regular season rollercoaster ride. If you're a negative person by nature, you're not going to like what you're seeing - my dad has already written them off, just like he did at various times last season.
What I think we should be looking at are trends over longer periods. What is the opposition 3FGA% over the course of the season? Is it going up or down? How many of those shots were defined as "open" or "wide open" (i.e. nearest defender was 3 -6+ feet away). What is ours? Our 3FGA has gone from 42 to 50 but our % has dropped from 38% to 34%. We're still making more than any other team in the league but that's due to volume, not efficiency. Why? Are we taking contested 3s? What is our turnover rate? Who are the main culprits? Is there a change to how other teams are defending us (as Gary Washburn of the Globe suggested)? Are we winning the effort plays, the hustle plays? Those are usually a good indicator of a team's hunger.
I'm sure the team has their army of nerds that are poring over endless hours of film so they will have all the answers to these questions. If I had to guess, I would suspect that there have been a few key plays that have not gone our way, and it's had a cascading effect. Tight games, like the ones we've lost (except the Chicago game) usually turn on some key plays. In the Sixers game, you can say a) they left Caleb Martin open and he made them pay by making 7-of-9 3s, that's 21 points right there. Then we had PP shoot 1-9, 0-8 from 3. Jaylen shot 10-23 and had 5 turnovers and numerous defensive lapses.
But you also have to look at the tight wins, because those could have gone the other way as well, to try and see if there's something systemic behind the drop in efficiency and performance. The biggest thing I'm concerned with, other than the defensive breakdowns at the perimeter, is the deterioration of Hauser. He seems to have lost confidence, to the point where he's not even attempting shots, and he's letting his defensive errors affect his offensive game. He's a vital cog in this team, because he and PP are key in maintaining pressure on the other team when the 2nd unit comes on. They have to figure out how to fix him, pretty quickly.
To me the exciting part about last season was seeing if they had the gumption to go all the way. This season, the exciting part is seeing how they face adversity, improvement from other teams, and how they respond to losses. Excited to see how they respond to this one
Topic: This team will not repeat?. (Read 30300 times)