It was a great night of basketball for me…a tripleheader in essence. For the first time since the NBA came to OKC the Thunder are not my basketball scheduling priority. On this night with the Thunder in Portland they were third on my watchlist…and a half-hearted third at that.
No. 1 was O State at Iowa State…the Pokes without Cade Cunningham romped the abysmal Cyclones. Hard to believe Johnny Orr, Tim Floyd, and Fred Hoiberg all at one time coached at this once proud hoops program. No. 2 was the Big 12 headliner with #11 West Virginia hosting # 10 Texas Tech. This was a great game with West Virginia battling back from a double digit deficit to win on their last possession. Excellent college basketball game. Both of these teams could make the Sweet 16 with the right draw.
OU cracked the AP Top 25 yesterday for the first time this season and will be at #5 Texas tonight in the only basketball game I plan on watching. Six Big 12 teams are now in the Top 25 with O State one more quality win away from becoing the seventh team.
Portland only played eight players and were not the Portland team which eliminated the Thunder in five games two seasons ago. Even more telling for Portland… out of the eight who suited up who played …two of the eight were Carmelo Anthony and Enes Kanter.
It is for this specific reason that I will not hold this win against Sam Presti when he should be losing games. I get it…this would rank right up there with to losing to Kevin Durant or in reality much worse.
How could any basketball organization sell tickets next season if they couldn’t beat a team with two of the most glaring defensive liabilities to currently set foot on an NBA court in Carmelo and Enes?
I mean, it’s one thing for Terry Stotts to throw one pylon out there, but two? No…that’s too much even for a tanking team to accept and lose a basketball game.
In fact…I would hope NBA commish Adam Silver sends the Portland organization an email pointing out there could be potential ‘integrity to the game’ issues at play with both Enes and Carmelo on the floor together.
I thought Mikey Muscala, Shai, and Lu Dort were OKC’s three best players. They’re my three stars of the game.
I like the Oklahoma City players and Coach D. But they’re going nowhere towards relevance if they don’t come out of this summer’s draft with a top five pick and another pick in the top fifteen or so.
Let me make a football analogy. You know why OU will continue beating O State with constant regularity…because they have elite talent with excellent coaches and now that’s extending to both sides of the ball. O State is never going to beat OU with any consistency with their two and three stars up and down the roster. Not happening. That’s why Boone dropped all that money… ostensibly–to level the talent pool. But unfortunately Boone and Holder never hooked onto a coach like Matt Campbell at Iowa State.
If Sam Presti wants his team in Oklahoma City to stay relevant he better not screw this draft up this season by not losing enough. I undertsand there’s a delicate balance to the culture of a team in not accepting the concept of losing. But if you have a list of NBA top tier free agent talent coming here, please show it to me.
But as I wrote yesterday…OKC out of the thirty NBA franchises plays in a state which unfortunately is right there with West Virginia, Mississippi, and Alabama as rogue red Birther Trump states. Have you noticed West Virginia, Alabama, and Mississippi don’t have NBA franchises?
Before Black Lives Matter even became a thing….Bill Russell and his Celtic teammates wouldn’t even play in an exhibtion game in Louisville.
Elite black free agents aren’t coming here. Why should they? It was almost impossible getting even elite white free agents here during the apex of Durant and Westbrook. Pau Gasol ring a bell?
This is the one opportunity for Oklahoma City to somewhat balance the scales of talent in a year. Granted—there will still be development, but this is the time. Look how long even in big markets like Dallas and LA they got nowhere for a long time after the primes of Dirk and Kobe.
Add to the fact …in spite of the excellent job OKC did with MAPS you can’t put a non-relevant team out there for an extended period of time in Oklahoma. Ask the restaurant owners and ticket brokers in Bricktown if you doubt me as to the cash flow relevancy of having a relevant team.
Keep in mind, with the NCAA’s position on Covid eligibilty this season both OU and O State who are Top 25 programs this season they both could conceivably return everyone minus Cade Cunningham next season.
Let me give you another example…in Denver you have both the Colorado Avalanche and the University of Denver hockey teams. Both are elite, but if I lived in Denver… and the Avs weren’t relevant I’d spend more time watching the excellent DI college hockey team.
If I were Sam Presti I’d make sure I have a top five draft pick to if nothing else stimulate interest and ticket sales next season.