burninmylight said:
"Of course, that's ignoring the major point that if the Bucks had equivalent injuries-- Middleton not playing, Holiday missing most of the series and coming back on one leg --" "The Bucks are just lucky to be the one team who's stars are mostly healthy and/or not in Covid protocol right now." Injuries are a part of the game, and always have been. The Lakers didn't have LeBron in the playoffs this year. The Suns are missing Chris Paul. The Rockets missed Chris Paul when the took the Warriors to six or seven games a few years ago. The Heat didn't have Goran Dragic for most of the finals last year. Golden State didn't have KD or Klay Thompson the year before that. It's not the Bucks' fault that Brooklyn couldn't play their stars as intended, and it's not the Bucks' fault that Brooklyn's depth was absolutely shot because of its extremely top-heavy roster. I can't believe that you still need explanation at this point, but here goes: when you sacrifice depth for more stars, you are not only left with giant holes in your roster when those stars are healthy, but craters when those stars are hurt. We can call it karma if trying to make me a strawman makes you feel better about it. I call it history. "The Clippers have depth, yet with no Kawhi they're not going to win anything and probably won't even make the finals." The Clippers didn't trade away important starters/role players that would have played big minutes in the playoffs to acquire Kawhi Leonard, did they? They signed him and Paul George off the street. What would be your next point after that glaring hole in your argument? |
I'm won't even bother addressing most of this, because I can already see I'm wasting my time. I just have to point out the glaring irony of accusing someone for using a strawman, to immediately use a strawman yourself in the next point-- how exactly does signing Kawhi and PG13 (incorrect btw, that was a trade) as free agents, not losing their depth, have anything to do with my point? The point is that having depth doesn't matter if you lose one of your most important stars, and especially if you lose multiple stars. Even if the Clippers lost PG13 instead of Kawhi, they'd have a better shot at making the finals, but would still be very unlikely to win it.
If the Bucks had equivalent injuries to the Nets, it's not simply 'well we'll never know what could've been'; it's already proven that Giannis is a mediocre jump shooter who struggles late in big playoff games and has free throw demons. If he couldn't rely on those other star playmakers during the last 2 games to close out and had to be the primary option every possession, the Bucks lose. The fact you can go from saying "Harden was poor, but still better then the next option", admit that Durant was literally a toe away from sending the Bucks into a deep offseason restrucure, and then somehow believe "well we'll never know what could've happened" (if the Bucks were missing two stars) in that same game, just shows how warped your logic is.