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They only played 18 games against the West thanks to the condensed schedule, and the three Western Conference teams they played twice were the Mavs, Lakers and Thunder (lost all six). So, not exactly a fair criticism. Especially when you consider that they're old as dirt and I assume weren't too keen on West Coast travel on a condensed schedule. It's an unprecedented set of circumstances.
9 points in the 4th Q is invisible?
I didn't use the word invisible. Legler said that for most of the last 5 minutes of the game LeBron didn't touch the ball on offense. If this is true, don't you find it the least bit problematic? '
What does "most" mean? He scored the basket near the end to cut the lead to two.
yeah but only 2 in the last 8 minutes. I thto ink a lot of the LeBron bashing is pointless, but the Heat aren't going to beat Boston with him basically not scoring especially with Bosh not playing. You simply aren't going to break down the Celtics defense if he isn't looking for his shot in some capacity.
Is it your impression that during the last 5 minutes LeBron touched the ball enough? Because it was not mine. I wasn't paying attention to the actual numbers at that point, but it did seem like he wasn't doing much on offense during the crucial moments of the game.
Edited my earlier post for accuracy.
Well he wasn't effective on the defnsive end (as his -12 +- stat shows). He's clearing still a step slow and Spoelstra isn't going to say he didn't play because he sucked on D.
Still not accurate. I think it's on Spoelstra, not LeBron.
Misread your post but no, I don't find that problematic. Scoring in the last 5 minutes was not why they lost. They were 4/8 (4/7 if you don't count Wade's 3pt attempt when the game was over) with 4FT attempts. Stopping Boston was the problem.
But you still don't seem to get it.I didn't watch the game last night so I can't speak to the "vibe" you were getting. But I can read a play by play and see that LeBron did plenty in the 4th quarter. And look how quickly you've already changed your argument from "LeBron was good for three quarters" to "LeBron was good for 43 minutes." You can't keep changing the criteria until it supports your point. When is it you think LeBron magically disappears? Last quarter? Last five minutes? Last minute? Last possession? Or whatever fits for that particular game?
I admit it's not so easy to quantify.But even so, there was a key stretch where he wasn't touching the ball. And Miami wasn't scoring. And this occurred right towards the end of the game. I think that so long as this sort of thing continues, if the Heat don't win a championship, LeBron's going to continue to take crap for it. And I hate that; I want the guy to succeed.
I think the problem is that the haters have decided on the narrative and so they keep switching the criteria until they can find a way for it to continue. LeBron disappears in the fourth quarter- and then when he doesn't it becomes about the last five minutes or the last minute or the last possession. Then if he's taking shots and missing them it cam become about him not being clutch because he can't convert. Then when someone points out that he has converted in the clutch plenty in his career the criteria is changed again to only include his time with the Heat, or only Finals games, or whatever. And you seem to have bought into this narrative even though you're not a hater, so you're kind of doing the same thing. He's not going to shoot and score on every Heat possession. If someone wants to find evidence to support this ever-shifting narrative they'll eventually be able to find it by changing the criteria.
This is true. Apparently the part that turns fans into "haters" is when fans point out that the MVP didn't score a point in the last 8:10* of the most important game of the season for the Heat. --------------------
They're coming out in full force now
Who was guarding 78 yr old Paul Pierce?
Boston has given up 30+ in a quarter in 5 of 72 quarters in the playoffs. But hey, LeBron didn't score enough!
Can we rag on him for not playing D down the stretch? Or passing up wide open shots? I guess LeBron didn't defer to Norris Cole quite enough, otherwise they would have won. Idiots.
To the bolded, for sure. Criticizing their offense would be pretty dumb though.
If it's noon eastern time, I know it must be time for the Lakers fans to arrive at work, find this thread, and come up with that day's criteria for hating on LeBron. You can set your watch by it. He didn't do anything in the fourth quarter! I mean the last eight minutes! I mean he didn't shoot enough! I mean he didn't score enough, even though his teammates were scoring! I mean he didn't play defense!They're coming out in full force now
We agree. Though I think their offense sucks too in terms of having anything like a plan - that's all coaching/lack thereof.It's not like they're getting blown out here either. This series isn't over, particularly if Bosh can give them more minutes. If they had an actual coach they'd have won this thing already.
I completely agree that their offense needs work but despite that, it produced in the 4th Q last night.
LOL! I heard that too. Some kid screaming good effort. Touche.
They came up 5 points short any way you slice it, and it sure was ugly to watch, particularly from about 8 minutes on. Seems like they could have scored more if they had some semblance of a system/plays. The opportunities were there, you've got to capitalize on them. With Bosh limited Wade/James need to score 30+ each for them to expect to win. Wade actually had 3 less than LeBron (on less shots), so in truth it's not all on LeBron. Those 2 just have no margin for error at all.
Yep. Hard loss to swallow. A few bounces of the ball the Heat's Way and we are having a different conversation. This game is tough. And sometimes things just don't bounce your way. The effort was there.They must regroup, and go into Boston on a mission.I am very confident they answer the call. Wade, Lebron, Bosh. This is their moment to quiet all the nay-sayers. Get this series back to Miami and the conversation swings to The Heat pulled out a clutch road win and have a chance to take a game 7 at home.Gotta love the swings of NBA playoff basketball.
I'll be rooting for the Celtics to go on an 86 game losing streak after this series.I'm just angry that the Celtics have a great chance to go to the finals again. They could lose every game they play from now until the end of the world and I'd still want them to lose more.
Agreed.It is just amazing what kind of level LeBron is held to and how much criticism he gets. 9pts/1reb/1st/2stl/0to on 50% shooting. That is a great 4th Q for any player except LeBron apparently. LeBron has lead each of the 1st two rounds in 4th Q scoring in the playoffs but he is still ragged on for disappearing.
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1st round 4th quarter scoring leaders:1. Lebron James – 8.5 PPG2. Tony Parker – 8.0 PPG3. Dirk Nowitzki – 8.0 PPG4. Kevin Durant – 7.5 PPG5. Carmelo Anthony – 7.4 PPG6. James Harden – 7.3 PPG7. Kevin Garnett – 6.4 PPG8. Kobe Bryant – 6.1 PPG9. Rudy Gay – 5.6 PPG10. Paul Pierce – 5.3 PPGConference Semifinals 4th quarter scoring leaders:1. Lebron James – 10.0 PPG2. Kobe Bryant – 9.0 PPG3. Kevin Durant – 8.5 PPG4. James Harden – 8.0 PPG5. Kevin Garnett – 7.0 PPG6. Jodie Meeks – 6.6 PPG7. Dwyane Wade – 6.5 PPG8. Eric Bledsoe – 5.0 PPG9. George Hill – 5.0 PPG10. Darius Morris – 5.0 PPGYou're not thinking this through. If they make it to the finals they're just a Durant/Ginobli injury away from an 18th title. You can't play with fire like that.I'll be rooting for the Celtics to go on an 86 game losing streak after this series.I'm just angry that the Celtics have a great chance to go to the finals again. They could lose every game they play from now until the end of the world and I'd still want them to lose more.
6am....east coasters apologize for LeBron....rinse, repeat.If it's noon eastern time, I know it must be time for the Lakers fans to arrive at work, find this thread, and come up with that day's criteria for hating on LeBron. You can set your watch by it. He didn't do anything in the fourth quarter! I mean the last eight minutes! I mean he didn't shoot enough! I mean he didn't score enough, even though his teammates were scoring! I mean he didn't play defense!They're coming out in full force now
So many options- just eliminate the ones that don't fit and use the ones that do on any given day. It's foolproof.
Yes they will go to the finals and I'm rooting for them to go, because that means the Heat will be defeated. And once the Celtics are in the finals, they are going to get trounced- in 6 games or less by the Spurs, in 5 games or less by the Thunder. It's all good.I'm just angry that the Celtics have a great chance to go to the finals again. They could lose every game they play from now until the end of the world and I'd still want them to lose more.
Looks about right, though I'd put CP3, Melo or Dirk in there over KG. The best part about evaluating "clutchness" strictly by the stats, is that LeBron's uncontested layup with 9 ticks left last night counts just as much in most/many "clutch rankings" as Durant's big time 3 against the Lakers in Game 4.
This.
Agreed. Context is everything. It's going to be a helluva algorithm that is able to accurately reflect and quantify all of the factors that contribute to what all of us basketball fans can recognize is clutch by watching the games.
I think fangraphs has a good start on this - measuring shifts in WPA (win probability added) but of course it's far easier to measure stuff like that in baseball.
And after that work, all that we are going to figure out is that "clutchness" is random. That has already been proven by baseball stat nerds.
If that's true, then why haven't all teams who subscribe to sabermetrics not gone to closers by committee?
Partially the same reason that coaches let their offenses run hero ball- groupthink, job security, desire to avoid accountability in the media. If your designated "closer" blows a save now and then people blame the closer or just dismiss it as something that happens every once in a while. But if a patchwork approach fails, the manager is immediately on the hotseat and has to explain his actions.There's also the external pressure of the "save" category and the fact that financial compensation and to a lesser degree recognition often follow it. A manager or a front office might want to use closers by committee, but its best relievers will hate it. Bad for morale and for future rosters. Hard to attract an elite bullpen arm if he's only gonna get 20 save chances a year.
