NBA 23/24:season

Dallas lose to Luka’s firmer Euroleague team Real Madrid. I know it’s a friendly, but still…they look like they’re going to have a really bad year and the season hasn’t even started.

You’re forgetting the fact of pride and not wanting to lose to a non-NBA team, how Dallas finished last season, the clock ticking on Luka etc.

My own feelings on Dallas (and I say this as a huge Luka fab) is they're incredibly ill-balanced and top heavy. Given how strong the West is I see their best hope is to make the Play In positions 6-10, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if they don't even do that. I know from listening to my usual podcasts a lot of people are very down on them this year after sh*tting the bed last year. I know they tanked towards the end of the season but going from a WCF to not making the Play Offs is a very bad sign.

If they don't start showing Luka they can win we know how the story goes.......

Big move from Boston adding Jeff Van Gundy to the coaching roster. It seems it’s a more overarching role than a game day bench role, but it’s a good move nonetheless.

A good start to the week. Now if the Lakers hire Mark Jackson it would become a great week!

They could in theory but I’d imagine between injury, injury prevention, rest (even with the new protocols), and being in a very tough conference they’ll be Top 4 in the West, but not 1. What they’re more likely to do IMO is put the hurt on some teams some nights when the top 3 are clicking and absolutely blow them out of the water. Wouldn’t rule out nights with 3 players scoring 30+ each either (it’s happened before but is a rare enough thing).

I think he will yes, because the alternative is to lose your job.

I don't blame him for last year as much as others do. He was catapulted into a head coach job less than a week before the start of the season after the whole sh*t show with Udoka so I think he needs to be cut a lot of slack. If they were going to fire him, they'd have done it in the pre-season and given a new coach the pre-season to work with. I am absolutely not a fan of changing coaches mid-season. And I don't think SVG wants a full time coaching job. If they wanted to replace Mazzulla, then Stevens would be the ideal candidate. You'd hope all parties view it as a "brains trust collective" type arrangement, rather than a "my way or the highway" one.

As for the players who left looking better - of course they will! They'll all be getting more time than they did in Boston so naturally will look better and put up better stats. It happens with a lot of players who are traded.

Smart? Yes, it hurts, no question - I was a big fan - was since his Rookie Season (I even picked him for Rookie of the Year before the season started on here!). I'm still a little surprised they went there with him, but, looking at it from a cold business perspective, Holiday is an upgrade. And all that said, there's obviously no hard feelings on Smart's side as Grosbeck, Mazzulla, Stevens, Tatum etc. were all at his wedding. He also wasn't the first choice in. that trade, it would have been Brogdon if he hadn't failed/had questions asked in the medical.

That aside, not sure how Holiday would fir with Smart.

I wouldn't rule out Smart coming back to Boston at some stage either.

And Porzingis is looking very good in pre-season.

I genuinely think they'll be better.

Grant Williams played SFA last year, esp. in the playoffs. He was clearly out of favour there.

As for the bench, that will likely change mid way through the season. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens. 🤷‍♂️