This was why the Lakers had to fire Ham.

He ****ed them over something awful. They just could not match up against Denver but that doesn't mean Denver was unbeatable. They could be had - and if they're not around, LA has a legit shot to come out of the West.

But by dicking around all season and setting them up in a 1st round matchup with them, he signed their death warrant.

It's an all-time display of HC incompetence, IMO.

I love the new NBA. This is so much better than the gay ass super team era.

Feels like it’s the Wolves year. Mavs are kinda stuck in that 3rd tier of teams in the West and Thunder have a really talented team but they’re young. Thunder also have a shit load of assets so I expect them to be even better next season.

Feels like the Wolves and Thunder will continue pushing the hell out of the Nuggets.

My favorite story is the Knicks coming back. League is better when the Knicks aren’t a dumpster fire

There's still super teams, they're just built better. It always has and always will take multiple stars to win championships.

I think he's referring to the trading of 5+ years worth of future assets to get those stars vs developing from within the organization.

Eh - I'm fine trading assets to get those guys and 'build' your team.

I think what he's probably talking about were those Heatles/Warriors teams where guys decided to join together as a sort of quasi all-star team and then hire on a bunch of cheap ring-chasers to fill in the gaps.

Nothing has ever been more satisfying than watching that Heat team struggle to break through. That stupid little "Heat Index" thing on the friggen front page of ESPN.com every day talking about their wins. I mean god that was intolerable.

And it was such an anti-competitive contrivance.

As was said then - can you imagine stars from the 80s and 90s doing that? Those guys wanted to beat each other, not join up for some Wonder Twins Power superteam. I don't think we're actually getting back to that - but at least they're SLIGHTLY less overt about how little true competition actually drives them these days than they were 10 years ago.

The issue with the Heat was that it was with Lebron and people hate Lebron.

The Celtics did the same thing a few years prior, no one cared.

Yeah the Heatles and the KD Warriors were the big ones. The KD Warriors got me disillusioned with basketball for 2 years.

It's hard to blame LeBron because Cleveland ****ed him over in his early years and gave him NOTHING to work with. But it's not very fun if youre a basketball fan to watch.

It's dying down now, but is that just because those stars are finally getting too old for that strategy to work? These young guys could just decide in the next 5 years to do the same thing and we'd be right back where we started.

Correct. Lakers also attempted a similar thing a few years before that when they added late-career Malone and Payton to Shaq/Kobe. That's forgotten because of what a massive failure of a season it was but both Malone and Payton were still averaging 20 PPG+ when he signed and the Lakers were considered the massive favorite going into that season.

LeBron's move to the Heat simply continued a process in the NBA that began long before him (and that was after wasting several of his peak years with a complete sad sack franchise in Cleveland).

But that's the thing - the CELTICS did it - not the players.

And they went out and traded for a 32 year old Ray Allen and 31 year old Kevin Garnett. And gave up real value to get the guy (Al Jefferson and a couple first round picks) rather than some BS forced sign and trade like the Bosh deal when Bosh was just entering his prime or 'The Decision' from James when they all got together and contrived to land in Miami.

Danny Ainge and Celtics leadership built a good team. In Miami, LeBron and Wade simply decided to circumvent the cap to form a superteam.

Having 3 good players on a single team isn't the same thing as what Miami did. Or even Durant. The former was good team building - the latter was a bitch move.

The Lakers are a closer analogue, yes. But signing year old Karl Malone to play 40 games and 35 year old Gary Payton who was just openly ring chasing as his career wound down is far more akin to acquiring Russell Westbrook on the backside of his career than LeBron James as he enters his prime.

It struck me watching these games what a massive difference it is having Austin Reaves/D'Lo guard Jamal Murray versus the onslaught of great guard/wing defenders the TWolves are throwing at him.

Nothing remotely comparable to the Heatles and Warriors.

I'm still trying to figure okc out. They look like they can dominate at any given time but there just feels like there are holes. I think it's just the consistency of their role guys and depth. Dort and giddey gotta play better and more consistent on offense. Dallas is a team that can just get crazy streaky. I really like sga so I'm pulling for them.

If you look at it, though, they were both still quite good in that season before they signed. Obviously they were shells of the players they once were in the 90s, but there was reason to think they'd be good contributors to a team led by two of the NBA's best.

Russell Westbrook, in my mind, was washed well before he ever joined the Lakers. I absolutely hated that particular move (and I have no doubt LeBron was behind it).