Daily Thunder.com Charles Barkley favors the Lakers over the Thunder

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Breaking: Charles Barkley doesn’t like the way the Thunder score points. And because of it, thinks the Lakers will win the West. Via Sports Radio Interviews:

Who do you like to win the West?

“The Lakers.” Host: Over Oklahoma City? “Yeah. I’m not a big Oklahoma City fan because I don’t think they get any easy baskets. Like last year I didn’t think they could win and the reason I picked Miami to win the championship, the only way you’re going to beat Miami is beat them up inside. That’s what their weakness is. You’re not going to beat them on the perimeter shooting jumpers with Westbrook and Durant.

The only way to beat them is the way the Mavericks beat them, with Dirk Nowitzki and Tyson Chandler down low. Unless Oklahoma City gets some low post scoring, they’re going to win a lot of games because they have two terrific players and James Harden is terrific also, but you’re not going to win the championship just shooting jumpers.”

People really respect Sir Charles and what he has to say. It’s why when he makes comments about something, you see it as a headline all over the place. It’s why I’m writing about what he has to say right now. But just because he has an opinion about it, doesn’t make it right. Or even intelligent.

Because to say that the Thunder lost in the Finals because they didn’t score in the paint is silly. They lost because LeBron James went to another level, James Harden didn’t play to his capability, they uncharacteristically shot poorly from the free throw line and the Heat exploited OKC’s matchup issues. Not to mention they got unexpected performances from Shane Battier and Mario Chalmers. It didn’t have to do with the Thunder shooting too many jumpers.

In fact, there’s this: In the five-game series, the Thunder attempted 131 shots at the rim compared to Miami’s 133. For the series, OKC scored 194 points from nine feet or less. Miami scored 216 inside that range. Not some massive distinction. In what I’d call a jumper (10 feet and out), the Thunder attempted 218 in the series with Miami taking 200. That’s 43.6 per game for OKC and 40 for Miami. Again, not significantly different.

Besides, what exactly is “easy” about a low post basket? What makes that “easier” than an open Kevin Durant jumpshot or a stop-and-pop from Russell Westbrook? Both are high percentage looks. Like I’ve said all along, the way you win is by making difficult baskets, not easy ones. Because there are no easy ones in the postseason. To act like the Mavericks beat the Heat by easy buckets in the post from Dirk and Tyson Chandler is revisionist history. They won by spreading the floor, knocking down perimeter shots and relying on Dirk to get tough baskets down the stretch. Not by scoring easily on the block. That’s nonsense.

(For reference, the Mavericks ranked 12th out of 16 teams in points per game in the paint in the 2011 postseason. They made 11.9 per game under five feet, third to last in the playoffs. They made 5.3 shots per game from 20-24 feet and 4.4 per game from 25-29 feet, both third most in the postseason. Dallas took 22 more shots from 25-29 feet than any other team in the playoffs. So tell me more about Tyson Chandler scoring down low. I’m listening.)

The Thunder were darn close to winning a championship with a middle finger at Barkley’s formula. He didn’t think they could advance deep into the playoffs “just shooting jumpers” and there they were, in the NBA Finals. They won Game 1 and gave away Game 2 with seven crucial misses at the foul line along with a horrific first eight minutes. In fact, the Thunder out-shot the Heat from the floor in three of the five games. OKC lost Game 3 despite Miami hitting only 37.9 percent from the field.

Regardless, it’s not about how you can beat the Heat anyway. That wasn’t the question. You don’t have to be better than Miami to be the Western favorite. It’s about how you beat the Lakers and Barkley favors L.A. over OKC, I guess because the Lakers’ inside strength. Didn’t exactly do them much good against the Thunder last postseason and you could argue they were better offensively with Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol than with Dwight Howard and Gasol.

Oversimplifying the critique of the Thunder to just “they shoot too many jumpers” isn’t fair. Because while OKC might not have a traditional back-to-the-basket big man, they scored plenty in the paint in transition, by attacking off the dribble and by cutting and slashing. Harden and Westbrook were two of the top rim finishers in the league last season. Westbrook ranked 10th in the league in points in the paint and Durant 14th. Four teams had two players finish in the top 20 of that: The Jazz, Lakers, Heat and Thunder.

OKC got their share of so-called “easy” baskets. They did it on the break or by straightforward athletic assaults on the rim. Or from Kevin Durant. He’s basically an easy basket in of himself.

(For reference: The Thunder ranked 10th in the league in points in the paint with 41.9 per game. Plus, don’t assume points in the paint equals wins either. The top 10: Nuggets, Jazz, Kings, Spurs, Grizzlies, Wizards, Lakers, Heat, Cavs, Thunder.)

OKC shoots lots of jumpers, yes. But that’s a convenient luxury when your primary scorers are terrific jumpshooters. Why would you go away from what makes you good? The Thunder were the second best offense in the league last season and were so very close to a title. Seems like the plan is working pretty well to me.

Daniel Hawaii

3 Like

"It’s about how you beat the Lakers and Barkley favors L.A. over OKC, I guess because the Lakers’ inside strength. Didn’t exactly do them much good against the Thunder last postseason and you could argue they were better offensively with Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol than with Dwight Howard and Gasol."

The Lakers didn't JUST add Dwight. They also added 2 other potent offensive players in Nash and Jamison. So they have 3 very good offensive players coming in, with just one going out (Bynum, who was also kind of a locker room cancer.)

The Lakers are a much better offensive and defensive team now than they were 2 months ago and I don't blame Chuck one bit for favoring them over us.

ThunderChick2010

1 Like

@Daniel Hawaii

Hey Daniel H . . . you're back! I've decided not to worry about this until we see them play together. Not sure if that's reasonable--or just denial. :)

Daniel Hawaii

1 Like

@ThunderChick2010 Sorry I haven't been posting much here recently. I've just been too disheartened about our closest competition getting better with the Heat getting Ray Allen and the Lakers getting Howard, Nash and Jamison. I think our championship aspirations took a major hit this offseason.

El Prez

2 Like

Let's quit beating around the bush when we write about Andrew Bynum. He's soft. he usually plays his best ball in the first 24 minutes of the game and not the last 24. Andrew Bynum is what I would decribe as a 'mentally relaxed' athlete. Let's put this in TSN perspective:

Dwight Howard 94% TSN rating, Andrew Bynum 58%

Steve Nash 91% TSN rating, Ramon Sessions 63%

Plus, as you mentioned--they now have instant offense coming off the bench in Jamison.

What part of this is difficult to follow?

jusaziam95

@El Prez

You know your stuff El! I like the Sixers, and I am happy they are finally getting a legitimate center, one they haven't had since an old, but still effective Motumbo in 2001 for the playoffs after Ratlif went down with season ending injury.

However, the fact still remains that Andrew hasn't played to his full potential, and if he's hoping to lead any team one day to the finals, he has to be consistently productive; that is how greatness is measured and differentiate from being a very good player with talent to a great player.

HookemKD

1 Like

@El Prez Umm Dwight isn't exactly great at the end of games himself...

jusaziam95

@Treviedo

David Robinson also won his 2nd NBA title at the age of 37 with a bad back, and August of that same year, 2003 he turned 38.

Hello! See where I am going with this my friend.

Thanks for reading. We should do this again sometime :)

jusaziam95

@Treviedo

Kobe just turned 34 this month. By the end of his 6th ring this season he'll still be 34...just an fyi.

Also, the G.O.A.T. (Michael Jordon) was 35 when he won his 6th and final championship. He also scored 45pts. in that game.

Thanks for reading.

jusaziam95

@HookemKD @El

You have a point HKD. However, he has been more consistent in every aspect of his game than Bynum, so for that reason, I am totally in a agreement with the trade and some aspects of Barkley's comment.

Treviedo

@El Prez 35, 38 and bad back...

El Prez

Name the best player Dwight Howard played with at Orlando?

I'll name the three best players he'll have beside him in LA:

Kobe

Nash

Gasol

I think we have some here in denial of what just transpired.

142 comments

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DerekHamilton

The author of this article missed Charles point. Yes Miami is a perimeter team like OKC the difference is they're better. Thats the point Charles was making you can't beat Miami at their game.

JMan55

@DerekHamilton The author of this post missed everything. Face, meet palm.

El, with Tim Duncan on the first team I would agree with everyone else you had selected for my 1st team. My 2nd team would be:

John Stockton----pg

Kobe Bryant------sg

Shaquille O'neal----c

Scottie Pippen----sf

Charles Barkley----pf

You figure Charles got his ass kicked by MJ enough to figure out that you don't need low post scoring. And yes, I know, KD isn't MJ... KD is, in fact, more efficient. BUT (obviously) that isn't the only factor. Where the Bulls won their titles was on the other side of the floor, with suffocating perimeter defense. That's what OKC needs to win a title. BETTER PERIMETER DEFENSE! Anyone who thinks OKCs problems lie on the offensive side of the ball is over-analyzing...

@HookemKD

KD is more efficient than MJ??? Really!? Why would you mention the two in the same breath. Two different positions, and different style of play, so their numbers will NEVER match. Was MJ more efficient that Shaq...absolutely not! Why? Different position and different style of basketball. Please do not distort your comments by mentioning pennies with dollars. MJ is in a class by himself, and the only person that could be mentioned close to him is the great Bill Russell. Thank you for reading...we should do this again sometime. :)

abizn

@jusaziam95 you can definitely compare EFG across different positions and styles. The point is how often they get the ball in the bucket not how they do it. Pennies with dollars can be compared for sure....100 pennies = one dollar.

Jus,,,just so you know...my all time TSN first team is as follows:

Magic Johnson pg

Michael Jordan sg

Larry Bird sf

Bill Russell c

Kevin McHale pf

El, as great as McHale was, I will remind you that defense adn rebounds win games adn championships, so my pf would be Mr. Twin Tower, the great Tim "Timmy" Duncan. A defensive guru, and he can score. Top that baby! lol!

Charles didn't go far enough in my opinion. You'll notice he said pretty much what I've been saying, "OKC with KD, Russ, and James will be an extremely entertaining team to watch, but won't ring the bell." It's not just the low post scoring--we all know that. I'm not going to go off in mid August with a TSN rant, but it's obvious to me Charles has been on the Daily Thunder and has been reading some of my sketch previews for the 2012-13 season. Whoever wrote Perk could conceivably go 8 for 8 on here should be drug tested by Royce before he/she is allowed to post again so as the credibility of serious posters isn't diminished on this site.

myy_911

In my opinion there's sense to Barkley's claims. No matter what you say, whoever takes the shot, it is more likely that Kendrick Perkins will finish the game shooting 8 0f 8 from the inside than durant making 10 of 10 from the outside.

Sustainable Parameters

@myy_911 Perk wouldn't shoot 8 of 8 if you locked him in a gym by himself. He'd go 3 for 8 with 4 turnovers and 3 illegal screens and get a technical.

@myy_911

8 of 8? I love my Kendrick Perkins, but have you seen him shoot?

Thunderman

Barkley is becoming the Lee Corso of the NBA. "O no, don't pick my team to win!"

cleandoe

http://www.dailythunder.com/2012/08/thunder-scout-david-vanterpool-moves-to-blazers/

This comment has been deleted

@AlexanderWest24 Fletch would never delete his comment

@AlexanderWest24 Hey. If that's what you're into. But leave Fletch, the Thunder, me & TC out of this.

@AlexanderWest24 I like Fletch better

reddirt717

Barkley picked the Nuggets over the Lakers in the first round, the Lakers over the Thunder in the second round and the Spurs over the Thunder in the third round.

I'm not sure, but, I don't think his most recent prediction bothers me.

[censored]

@reddirt717 I like Chuck because he doesn't always get caught up with the media hoopla and seems to have his own thoughts, but sometimes I get the feeling that he just doesn't care all that much or pay attention until the playoffs start. He's more in touch with the game from an analyst standpoint than, say, Shaq, though. It's worth listening to what he has to say at least.

OBoy

ESPN is ranking NBA players, out of 500 Hollis Thompson is ranked 496. Eddy Curry is ranked last and our buddy Kent Bazemore is 499

@OBoymuzik link?

@cleandoe http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/8246986/2012-nba-player-rankings-401-500

they've now added orton and Thabeet, Orton is 426(up from last year) and Thabeet is 443 (down from last year)

@OBoymuzik @Jax Raging Bile Duct He's above these lot. It is just common knowledge so they don't need to mention it

@cleandoe @Jax Raging Bile Duct i'm assuming they also don't consider Lazar a professional basketball player just like i don't

Jax Raging Bile Duct

@OBoymuzik Great find!

Legendary_Dork

*takes a deep breath* ................. EVERY FREAKING TEAM IS A JUMP SHOOTING TEAM......BARKLEY *shakes fist*

no team, EVER, has won all 82 games doing NOTHING but inside passing and dunking. Btw the ONLY one whom jumps and shoots on our team is russ, and thats to get elevation and have his shot almost unblockable. Im so sick of this OKC is a jump shooting team bullshit . YEAH, well THIS jump shooting team made it to the damn finals barkley sooooo *blows raspberries* >.<

As Promised

@Legendary_Dork We didn't win it though. We were a few key defensive positions away from having that series. Defense needs to be a key, especially for Ibaka Harden and Durant this season. Or else we are doomed to see the cycle over and over and over and over...

@thelaughingwiseman lots of reasons we didnt win, cant just pin point one >.<

"OKC shoots lots of jumpers, yes. But that’s a convenient luxury when your primary scorers are terrific jumpshooters. Why would you go away from what makes you good?"

I wouldn't call Westbrook a 'terrific' jumpshooter. 43% eFG on jump shots last season according to 82games. Harden and Durant both well over 50%. Westbrook is like Wade in this respect, but Wade has at least curtailed the three pointers. Russ attempted 3 3PA a game last year which I really don't like.

Will be interesting to see where Russ' FTA go. Although he made strides with shot making last season, his drop in FTA hurt him just as much as his better shooting helped him. If he could get the FTA back up he'd be a monster. But there are other things for him to focus on before that, I think.... defense, mostly.

@justin_mia i think at some point he'll get more respect from refs...i think there are times when he just looks like hes out of control and they don't call fouls, but then there are times like games 2 and 4 of the finals where he should have got more calls than he did.I don't know if him complaining to officials hurts him or not

i'm pretty confident in his defense this upcoming season, his biggest impact on the olympic team was defensively and he had many big moments on the defensive side in the playoffs and only a few slip ups (leaving blake open, games 1 & 2 against parker) I think he'll see how he can impact the game if he locks in defensively and be more consistant this year

I think Barkley is right and wrong. OKC offense is obviously pretty good, no matter what criticisms you want to sling at it. I don't think "jump shooting team" is a valid criticism, since OKC isn't so different from Miami in that respect (or the best jump shooting team in the league and best offense, San Antonio). What's wrong with OKC's offense is that it tends to gum up in the half court. When defenses are set (i.e. the other team scores), OKC struggles more than it should. When OKC forces a turnover, or missed shot, even if there is not a fast break opportunity, they often get favorable cross matchups and whatnot which makes life a lot easier for the offense. That's when they seem unbeatable to me.

The problem against the Heat was that OKC was taking the ball out of their net all the time and going up against a set Heat defense. This will probably matter a lot more against this Lakers team since they might be even be better than the Heat defensively. Barkley's right because the offense has an issue, but I think he's wrong because it isn't due to shooting too many jump shots. It's because OKC can't play defense consistently, and struggles to score against set defenses more than it should.

Also, it does not help that we start every half of basketball with a horrifically unbalanced, ridiculous starting unit that DOES shoot too many jump shots.

Crow

@justin_mia Starting lineup had 103 offensive efficiency and 108 defensive efficiency in the playoffs. The defense was 11 pts better on average in the regular season. The offense was the same.

@Crow I don't get that lineup at all. Are they waiting for Serge to be something? One of Thabo or Perkins has to come off the bench IMO. I wouldn't be opposed to Serge coming off the bench either but I suspect he will start due to contract stuff.

@justin_mia @Crow I'm waiting for Perkin to lower his minutes, but that is totally on Scott Brooks. He can't run Perk like the other people. He has to distribute that time to Others

@justin_mia last sentence FTW

Serge flew back to the US yesterday/today which makes me think he's going to work with hakeem..normally he doesn't come back until right before training camp

Also it sounds like Dwade is leaving the Jordan brand, i'd be pretty shocked if they don't consider Russ

The Thunder need to work on their all around defense. They did not need to rely on the Interior offense of Perkins and Ibaka. They needed to find a way to stay on their assignments and not blow their coverage of the outside.

And the easy basket down low Barkley speaks of is the fact that MIA's interior defense is basically non existent and DAL had enough to take advantage of that. It turns out they didn't really need interior defense since we had 2 defensive mind brutes in Perkins and Ibaka who couldn't score worth a damn. But the real issue was Ibaka not being able to guard the stretch 4 in Battier and whomever, which showed in MIA 3 pointers that hurt the Thunder bad

@thelaughingwiseman And to add to your point - the proof is that Battier successfully defended Perkins whenever Perk got the ball on the block. That's just a low down dirty shame.

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Add His Caboose To Laker Bandwagon | Blak4rest says:

August 17, 2012 at 3:43 pm

[...] Did we mention fat meat’s greasy? Didn’t think so. If I’m a Laker fan (I am), this isn’t news I want to read. Charles Barkley is habitually wrong. Remember last season he had the Spurs winning it all? Dissed Oklahoma City and the Thunder like a bad habit for much of the season despite having 1 of the best records in the NBA. Then, he dumped more B.S. on the city even after some of the locals tried to pacify him during the Western Conference Finals by parading his fat ass around on a freaking horse. Should have been the other way around. Even worst, he has shown his ignorance about Oklahoma, infamously saying once he didn’t realize any black people lived there. If only he read up on a little Oklahoma history, Barkley could learn plenty. But I’m convinced the only thing Barkley reads is a menu. Unfortunately, though, that’s what you get from him, all bark (all pun intended) and rarely providing any substance to his comments. He does little homework. Now he has jumped on the Laker bandwagon since the club has added Dwight Howard and Steve Nash. Barkley believes they will beat the Thunder if the 2 play for surpremacy in the West next year, which probably will be the case. I wouldn’t be so quick to crown the Lakers just yet, particularly if Sir Charles is picking them. Daily Thunder [...]

Charles Barkley favors the Lakers over the Thunder

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