Even if true, that's one more team who has a shot. In baseball, every single team who makes the playoffs has a legit shot. I'm not even saying that's good - I appreciate the top-heavy nature of basketball... but it does make for a more boring regular season when you know who has a legit shot, and it's only a few teams.

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lol the NBA will just rig it the way they always do when some team tries to upset the established order of things. The Rockets have zero chance, even they go up 3-0 on GSW it'll just be part of the mythology when they inevitably come back and win in G7.

I disagree with your conclusion there. It's only boring if you think basketball itself is boring. The 2013-2014 Bulls are one of my favorite teams of recent memory, and they never had a chance at a title. I don't subscribe to the Bernstein-esque "If Team X isn't a title contender their game is boring and meaningless" school of thought.

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Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

I can't wait to spend that 5 dollars.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Basketball is a beautiful sport. If you think these guys in the NBA are playing it at a beautiful level every single night throughout a grueling and relatively meaningless regular season, I disagree. Jordan did, but he's a freak of nature.

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Baseball isn't repetitive simply because of the pitchers.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Half way through the MLB season, you could honestly say at least 10 teams could win the world series. Some seasons as many as 15.

NBA, 4 teams can win it, tops. That's at the beginning of the season.

NFL, since it's not a series, you could say 5 or 6 teams could win it once the playoffs start.

They are 15-1 or 20-1 most places I've looked, so I figured it was worth spending $5 for the value.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Even with as much shit as Beardown takes, he understands the odds of sports better than anyone.

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Most guys are. This isn't 2002, where half the league is stoned and/or out of shape. Every game the Spurs play is team basketball being played perfectly at the highest level imaginable.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

But you're one of those that give me shit!!!

No, I don't. I think you're probably a serial killer, but I don't begrudge you for that.

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Same thing can and should be said about the style of play different NBA teams prefer. If you watch the Jazz and then watch the Rockets and then watch the Cavs, you just watched three very different styles of play. Jazz games don't look like Rockets games and vice versa.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Awww, shucks. Thanks. That's the nicest thing anybody here has ever said about me.

Look, forget everything we've even talked about and just envision an NBA game. There is very little emotion from the fans or the team (regular season). It's really inarguable. They play lame-ass songs and chants of "defense" over the loudspeakers to get people to give a shit. It's not a problem with basketball - it's a problem with the format of the NBA. But as long as they make money, they won't care. I watch sports to root my ass off for my team. The aesthetics and "greatness" of the players is nice, but I ultimately want to root my ass off for a team or root my ass off against a team I hate. I don't care about the "purity" or the "aesthetic" of it (within reason). I want to jump out of my seat and dry hump the TV when MJ dunks over Ewing. I don't give a flying fuck about Tony Parker making a smooth cut off a high screen and hitting a 16-foot jumper in a meaningless game.

That said, I will say for the umpteenth time that I love the game of basketball and I love the NBA playoffs (because they're real). I just don't care about the regular season where half the players are in a coma.

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It's hilarious that you presume to know the effort and quality of a NBA regular season game considering you admitted you don't watch NBA regular season games. "Half the players aren't even trying" is one of those lazy old tropes people who don't watch the NBA fall back in when they got nothin' else but still want to criticize it.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Debate my points or don't. Don't draw conclusions from how many games I watch. I watch enough, and I watch MANY games when it is top teams squaring off (GS vs SA, GS vs Cavs, SA vs Cavs, etc.). I've watched the NBA since I was a little kid, some years more than others, and I'm confident in saying that it doesn't change on a monthly basis. You don't have a special knowledge because you watch more contemporary NBA than I do.

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If someone says the sky is green, how do you debate it? You just say no, it's blue. That's all I can really do here. No, leash, saying half the league doesn't try is simply false, and indicative of someone who isn't watching.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

I feel like when you call me by name, you're really upset. Maybe we should talk through this one offline?

Anyway, I'm not saying they intentionally don't try. I'm saying that they subconsciously don't try. Come on... envision you are a 30-year-old big black stud who is paid millions of guaranteed dollars. You visit every sizeable city in America on an annual basis. When you play games, they are mostly inhabited by "fans" who are either there for an "outing" or who received tickets via corporate/sales departments. You know deep down that none of this shit matters. If you're a contender, you're waiting for the playoffs. If you're a pretender, you're waiting for the offseason. Your point guard comes at you for the millionth time to run a screen and roll and you have practiced so many times, the thought of it makes you vomit. Are you really giving 100% effort every night?

There's a reason Jordan used to say "I play for that person in the audience who has never seen me in person." It's because he had to find a way to motivate himself (even that FREAK had to find ways to motivate himself!)

The regular season Spurs would get absolutely demolished by the playoff Spurs. They're two different teams... and I don't even blame them. Every game they play is basically meaningless until they get to the playoffs.

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Well, when you say they are in a coma, you have to forgive me for interpreting that as they aren't trying.

Still though, I disagree with most of that. Whoever is shooting better is going to win that Spurs on Spurs matchup. I'd say you would have a point with a team like the Cavs, but outside of sitting players the Spurs basically go balls out to win every game. And the point about the fans applies to every other sport as well and ignores the many die hards at every game.

There are guys that don't give 100% effort every night, but there aren't that many and they usually stand out pretty glaringly. I'm thinking of guys like Carmelo, Miroric, Okafor. Raymond Felton used to be one.

To the example you used, he's not black, but yes Stephen Adams is absolutely killing himself physically every night just to get Westbrook a more open shot.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

I agree that the Australian/European/South American/Antarctic guys are busting their asses every night. They have no other option.

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Since you need a black American example of this, Kawhi Leonard does too. You're not gonna become the best defensive player ever without busting your ass every night.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Russell Westbrook plays pretty hard too.

yeah, I suppose so.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

How about we just stick to Cubs threads, huh, Matches?

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Sheeeeeet.

Just wait till I get up enough confidence to start posting my Hockey thoughts. Then like the Beatnuts say, there will be "No Escapin' This" poster.

NBA fandom has gotten really weird to me in the last few years. It's just so nerdy, but not in the hardcore-quant way that baseball nerds are nerdy, but more like half of that crossed with that Bethlehem Shoals purple prose about how LeBron James changes the way we ever thought about physical beauty by picking up a rebound.

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I dunno. Yeah that's weird and all but it also describes exactly zero NBA fans I know.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Not saying they represent NBA fans, but in fairness to Hair, Deadspin reeks of what he's talking about.

Yeah but Deadspin is pretentious about everything. It's not like that is specific to the NBA.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul