Tip your cap there - great contested shot by Lillard for the W.

Ball was hot garbage for the third straight game. Time to start bringing him off the bench, IMO. He's lost so much confidence in his shot that he'll pass on open looks and they're effectively playing 4 on 5.

Kuzma, OTOH, is some defensive development away from being a potential all-star. That kid can play.

Ingram and Ball killed the Lakers tonight.

Ball sucks. Like I said he is more than likely going to be a bust.

He is extremely young so he has that going for him but the kid has bust written all over him. He has so many weaknesses he needs to work on I'm not sure he'll ever be any good. Depends on his work ethic.. At the end of the day I don't see it happening... Lakers bought into the hype because of his loudmouth father and it is going to cost them.

I think he'll play for a long time but he'll be more akin to Brevin Knight than a true superstar like Kidd.

He doesn't have THAT many weaknesses; his lack of lateral quickness is compensated for on defense by his length and general intelligence; he's a pretty sound defender though not a true lock-down guy. His handles are good but his first step off the dribble won't allow him to be truly explosive going to the rack. At the same time, he sees every seam that opens and is pretty slippery getting into the paint - he can be an asset going to the rack.

But that shot is just so damn bad that he's no threat at all to put it up. So guys play off him and he can't find those lanes to drive. The shot undermines everything he tries to do out there. If he fixes that one thing, his ceiling goes up tenfold but the odds of him completely rebuilding a shot at the NBA level are just damn remote.

Just checking in to say as a Bulls fan I’m really excited about Markkanen.

Dude is a ****ing unicorn.

Not quite. He's not an exceptional athlete but he's game on the defensive end and he's long enough to be at least okay in that regard. Anthony Davis is a unicorn. Or Karl Anthony Towns. But to me, those guys need to have the athletic tools to do literally anything and excel anywhere. I don't see that in Markannen. Additionally, Markannen isn't really much of a passer so I don't see him leading a break or being a primary ballhandler any time soon (whereas Town and Davis could absolutely do that).

But he's a hell of a shooter. And there are worse things to be than a shorter Kristaps.

If Markkanen is a 'unicorn' then the term has been watered down enough to mean very little. There are more than a dozen of your supposedly mythical creatures at that point.

But he's a much better player than I figured he'd be, I'll grant you. I didn't see him being able to get his shot off the dribble as easily and successfully as he does. I kinda saw a rich man's Raef LaFrentz; a taller spot-up shooter with defensive limitations and a relative indifference to rebounding. He's definitely better than that.

I might be overrating him a bit, but he makes that Butler trade look a lot better than it originally did. If Lavine can get/stay healthy, and we get a top 3 pick, we might just have something there.

It’s alright. If the going gets tough he can jump ship and play for an already established team that he didn’t help build.

kidd improved, but it took time. He also played in a different era. Ball will play, but it’s going to be tough.

It's going to be tougher still when the guy they shipped out to make room for him (and get rid of that stupid goddamn Mozgov contract) puts up 22/6 per game going forward.

I absolutely hate that they gave up on Russell like they did. Byron Scott poisoned the well so badly with that kid that he just never had a chance here. Kid's still younger than Kuzma and we dumped him like he had no use to us. Just ridiculous.

I haven't been paying attention to the Bulls very much. How has Kris Dunn been? Is he still a shittier version of Ricky Rubio or has he become something more substantial?

I saw Dunn dunk somebody to the center of the earth a couple of days ago. Two handed stuff right on some big doofy seven foot white guy's head.

There's nothing more entertaining than seeing a 2 guard steal some scrawny white dude's soul. You shouldn't be in the NBA just because you're tall. You just know that guy played for Creighton or Gonzaga or Butler or something.

Pretty much. He hasn’t played a whole lot yet, but I haven’t been overly impressed.

Lebron wants to stop this 4 game losing streak and he is doing it all himself. He has played almost the whole game and has 49 pts and 10 boards so far. Up 9 with 3 minutes left

I believe you're thinking of Durant. The Heat won 43 and 47 games before LeBron got there while the Cavs won 24 and 33 before he came back there.

57-11-6-3-2 now. I wonder why he decided to try tonight. Maybe Beal's comments about Washington being the best in the East.