WolvesFan21 wrote:I bet there is some correlation between political preferences and basketball analysis. The left and right wingers focus on a few cognitive confirmation biases to support their own preconceived notions. Whatever media source they watch sports on is what they will be programmed to believe in.
While the Libertarians and Anarchists see the entire picture for what it is. They look at every stat, every metric as well as the eye test to form their own opinions. The are not easily manipulated sheep by the large media giants. They understand that defense is part of basketball!!!
The anarchists have always seemed like the most level-headed analytical group.
Personally, I'm in favor of my seemingly one-man-only Pragmatist party. But it means a lot of wishy washiness and to be fair assessments that simply don't play well in acidic online forums.
Those are fake anarchists. The medias portrayal of what they want you to think. Police or actors will even dress up as "anarchists" and go create mischief (breaking windows or throwing rocks at police) to discredit the real people. Police are the real terrorists and they know it.
You can't be a real anarchist without being level headed and rational. It's a prerequisite.
Abe duped again.
It's easy to get duped.
Yeah. I'm such a rube. Thanks for showing me the light.
The State Sponsored Propaganda is hard to get away from. You got State run schools, State funded media Corps. It's completely out of control.
Think about a couple simple stats. The US imprisons the highest percentage of people in the world. The US has been at war for 227 out of 244 years. The US spends 10 times more on military then any other nation.
It's reasonable to conclude the US GOV is the largest terrorist organization on earth. Just based upon actual stats and facts.
FNG wrote:There was a lot to analyze in this loss...some good, some bad. Jon K talks about mostly the bad in his latest article in the Athletic ( I don't know if this will show up for non-subscribers, but get a cheap subscription if you don't already have one!). Read it and pay particular attention to Ant's lazy defense in the first video clip. He and JMac are applying full court pressure, but after Ant's man gets the ball back in the back court, he just gives up and allows him to get to the rim for a fast break layup. Disgraceful...it's lack of effort like that that allows an offensively-challenged team like OkC to put up 135 points on us.
I read the article and watched the video. I also just finished watching the game video. Of course I was disappointed when Ant didn't close out fast enough or keep his man in front of him. But those were moments. Having just re-watched the game, I noticed that everyone on the team had a lot of moments like the clips of Ant in Jon K's article. One of our fan favorites, Kyle Anderson, had a number of defensive lapses. If we're looking to point fingers at individual players, I suggest pointing them at Rudy Gobert who got himself tossed from the game in a moment of abject stupidity on his part. Sure, maybe it should have been a flagrant 1, but it was just as arguably the right call as a flagrant 2. That's on Rudy, not the officials. And how about McDaniels committing five fouls, three of them in the first half, and grabbing only 1 rebound in his 18 minutes of play. I'd like to say that Jaden's game last night was an aberration, but it wasn't. He has continued to display a frustrating inability to defend without fouling and an inability to assert himself on the boards despite his excellent length and athleticism.
Meanwhile, Edwards had 26 points on 45.4% shooting along with 3 rebounds, 4 assists and 6 steals. His 5 turnovers were troublesome, although at least two of those were the fault of the player who failed to catch his passes. Jon K notes that the Wolves have given up over 135 points in three of the last four games. I'll note that the great defender, Rudy Gobert, played in all of those game, although he only played 9 minutes last night because of his own stupidity. In the Wolves last four games, Edwards has scored either 26 or 29 points in each of them. He had 5 assists, 5 steals and 3 blocks against the Grizzlies. He had 8 rebounds to go with his 29 points against the Wizards while shooting 47.3% from the field. In contrast, Rudy's performances in the past four games have been erratic and in some instances downright terrible. He had only 9 points, 1 rebound, and 1 block against the Grizzlies. He hasn't had more than 1 block in any of the past four games and he had just 1 assist in those four games combined. He scored in double digits in only one of those four games. And of course, the Wolves game up over 135 points in three of those four games with Rudy playing major minutes in two of those three defensive debacles.
No, it's not all Rudy's fault. But it's almost surreal to read posts blaming Edwards (or even DLO) for the three bad losses in past four games or for the Wolves overall poor start in the first quarter of the season. Edwards needs to continue getting better and I think he will. But with the possible exception of KAT, he's clearly been the Wolves best player this season by just about every statistical measure. And he still barely 21 years old. Thankfully, we didn't have to give up any assets to get him. Just had to use one of our own picks to snag him. Right now, Anthony Edwards is WAY down the list of the problems with this team.
No doubt this team can play better than we've seen lately. They were terrific against Memphis last Wednesday and played probably their best game of the season so far against the Pacers Thanksgiving weekend. I like that Indiana game as a sign of hope because both KAT and Gobert were playing, the ball was moving, the defense was pretty sound and things were clicking. Nevertheless, this team has serious issues as they continue to be extremely inconsistent game to game and within games. They continue to add up to significantly less than the sum of their parts. There have been some signs of hope - Memphis and Indiana games - but it hasn't come together yet and I'm not sure it ever will. The best thing that could happen is if every player on this team played as consistently well as Anthony Edwards.
