Good Saturday. Thank you for your support of Daily Thunder. 160 days.
That Russell Westbrook, he’s pretty good. Here are his top 10 plays of the 2012-13 season. My five favorite things about them: Keep Reading…
Scott Halleran/NBAE/Getty Images
Most interesting thing from today: Reggie Jackson said he was up until 3 a.m. last night dribbling a basketball. Said it’s something he always does.
It was kind of his jumping off point to talk about how much he loves the game and how much he’s always looking to improve. Jackson said he hopes to be part of OKC’s summer league team, because he’s itching to play.
Jackson has quickly become one of the more exciting and intriguing things about this Thunder team. His emergence in place of Russell Westbrook was incredibly impressive as he showed real signs and potential of blossoming into the Thunder’s bench stud of the future. The question is if Scott Brooks is willing to free his mind and not think of Jackson as exclusively a point guard. Jackson is a great combo player and needs to play alongside Russell Westbrook. And in a lot of ways, he needs to be the Thunder’s new sixth man. Keep Reading…
NBAE/Getty Images
When the Thunder’s season ended in Oklahoma City on Wednesday night, fans chanted “O-K-C! O-K-C!” as players walked off the floor.
But as one clever person tweeted at me, he thought they were chanting “Am-ne-sty! Am-ne-sty!”
The Thunder’s big offseason question, other than what happens with Kevin Martin, is if they should use their amnesty provision on Kendrick Perkins. Perk was asked yesterday about his future with the Thunder and he said it this way: “I’m pretty sure I’ll be back next year.” And I agree with him. Here’s why, and it has less to do with Perk as a player and more about the simple economics: It doesn’t make sense. When has the Thunder done anything that didn’t at least make some rational sense? (Don’t say say drafting Byron Mullens and don’t say signing Perk to an extension sight-unseen.)
But it doesn’t make sense because of the money, and because it doesn’t really fix anything. Keep Reading…
Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE/Getty Images
For the first time, the Oklahoma City Thunder have ended a season by taking a step back instead of a leap forward.
And that, for now, is OK.
It’s not OK that Russell Westbrook got hurt. It’s not OK that the Thunder were unable to come up with a competent plan (on the fly) without him. It wasn’t OK to watch Kevin Durant struggle to 5-of-21 shooting and miss free throws in a closeout game — that felt worse than watching an endless YouTube video of defenseless puppies being kicked with steel-toed boots. It’s not OK that Derek Fisher went from white-hot to ice-cold, that Kendrick Perkins was only able to summon his trademark defense for a few possessions per game, that Serge Ibaka stayed in a slump for far too long, that Nick Collison couldn’t buy a favorable call or that we have no idea if Jeremy Lamb or Perry Jones are going to be useful. Keep Reading…
Ben Golliver for CSNNW: “Watching the Memphis Grizzlies close out the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 5 on Wednesday night left me with two Portland Trail Blazers-related thoughts. First, even the most carefully laid plans are subject to ruin by even the slightest knee injury. Russell Westbrook’s early exit from the playoffs left the remaining Thunder players struggling to cobble together lineups and responsibilities much like Brandon Roy’s ongoing issues kept juggling things in Portland for multiple seasons. Sam Presti put together arguably the league’s deepest and most balanced roster, one that withstood a blockbuster trade of James Harden just fine all season long, only to have all that hard work go poof when Westbrook went down. Basketball can be cruel, as Portlanders have known for years (decades).”
Berry Tramel: “Absolutely the Thunder got better this season. The Heat was and is a big favorite to repeat. But the Thunder was favored over the Heat last June in the Finals. The Thunder certainly could have made a run at the championship this season. But then Westbrook went down, and opportunity was lost. The Thunder will have many more chances. But the number of years is not infinite. The clock is ticking.” Keep Reading…
For a team like the Thunder, the goal in training camp is pretty clear. It’s about winning a championship, plain and simple. You can use the buzzwords and talk about development and process and positive steps, but the mission was to raise a banner.
It didn’t happen. Extraneous circumstances interfered, and the Thunder unceremoniously exited in the second round.
In some ways, all that good stuff that happened over 82 games, the margin of victory, the improvements, the 60 wins, the division title, the top seed, it all kind of feels like it was for not, doesn’t it?
In fact, Kevin Durant was asked if he felt like this season was a “wasted” year. Kobe Bryant once said any season that doesn’t end in a championship is a wasted year of his life. Keep Reading…
Layne Murdoch/NBAE/Getty Images
I’m staring at a white screen right now and I’m not entirely sure what to do with it. It’s May. May. This obituary wasn’t supposed to be written until the I-40 asphalt started cooking under triple digits in June. The Thunder’s once promising season is now over, buried under a pile of barbecue and menisci.
I want to ramble on about this season. I want to vent about the last few games. I want to talk about Derek Fisher finally coming back down to his awful reality and why Perk and Serge can’t catch a pass and why Nick Collison can’t catch a break and why Patrick Beverley can’t still just be in Russia. I want to talk about a lot. I don’t think I can, though, so I won’t try. They’d be spotty, shaky points at best. The ramblings of a sad, jaded fan.
This loss, really, wasn’t a surprise. This wasn’t inevitability reaching out its dumb hand and tapping hope on the shoulder repeatedly asking it to sit down until hope was finally like, Alright, dude, I’ll chill. This was inevitability doing this to hope, over and over again for 48 minutes. Keep Reading…
Headlines
- Fisher’s lawyer claims conflict of interest for Hunter
- Russell Westbrook is off crutches, says ‘I’m back’
- Gervin on KD: ‘I think he’ll be much better than me’
- Report: Mo Cheeks hired as Pistons head coach
- Nike donating all profits of KD V Elites through 6/15
- Report: KD dropping agent, expected to change to Jay-Z
- Mo Cheeks the ‘frontrunner’ for the Pistons job
Presti: Amnesty is ‘not really something we’ve explored’
dailythunder.com
You’ll never believe this, but in Sam Presti’s final season media availability the biggest topic of conversation centered around Kendrick Perkins.
And if I understood Presti right through his fancy words, lofty sentence structure and winding explanations, it doesn’t sound like the Thunder are considering using the amnesty clause on Perk.
“Obviously I know that’s a topic that’s been talked about, and for us, the amnesty application is not something we really have ever considered as an organization,” Presti said. “I understand that it’s something that’s been talked about quite a bit, but organizationally that’s not something we’ve considered.
“We just haven’t considered using the provision,” he said. “I wouldn’t necessarily attribute that to any player on our team. Every team looks at the amnesty provision different depending on their circumstances, but it’s not really something that we’ve explored.” Keep Reading…