I tried to stay awake last night as the Thunder were on the road against the Bucks without both J-Dub and Lu. I thought it might be an interesting game with the Thunder’s two best defensive studs injured and sitting. I also thought it might an opportunity for the Milwaukee Bucks to display their rout over the Thunder in the Emirates NBA Cup wasn’t a fluke.
Obviously all my thinking was flawed as the Thunder made it clear they can beat the bottom twenty-six teams in the league without both of these guys minus the Cleveland Cavs, Boston Celtics and ‘maybe’ the Denver Nuggets. Heck, OKC beat Boston on the road without J-Dub on Wednesday in a national showcase game.
A shoutout to Chet and Cason for stepping up after I called them out for their poor play in the home loss rout to the Nuggets on the second night of a back to back. I’m always fair on this blog. Always. I never ban anyone for telling me I’m wrong. I don’t ban as some of the Thunder interent sissies do in OKC. MJ prays for those sissies.
With the Nuggets, me listing them as a contender might be a HUGE stretch considering the inconsistent play of their rotation beyond the seventh player. Maybe even six to be pragmatic. Russell, please….play within yourself, for God’s sake.
The Lakers with fat, lazy Luka and LeBron’s aged groin would seem doubtful to evolve as the primary threat to the Thunder in the West.
The two hottest teams in the West currently are the surging Golden State (7 straight wins) Warriors and the surging Minnesota Timberwolves (8 straight wins). Minus the chemistry of the Julius Randle with the TWolves—these are the two teams in my mind Sam Presti should be most concerned with as we finish these last three weeks of the NBA regular season.
Jimmy Butler so far has proved to be the perfect spiritual balm for the mecurial Dr. Draymond Green and the rest of the Warriors including Steph. The Dubs have won 12 of their last 13 games and appear to be the same type of Warriors’ team which unexpectantly won the NBA Championship two seasons ago.
Jimmy Butler > Andrew Wiggins…not even close.
I’m defintely watching and covering the Denver at Golden State game tonight. Then what MJ will be doing is following both Porter and Jenni’s teams this next week.
The Sooner women will be hosting the first two games in their NCAA sub-regional. Which I will be attending. I’m jacked and ready to go. I’m also very proud of Porter and his team for not giving up after that almost disastrous home loss to LSU over a month ago. Porter’s team is a No. 9 seed in the West and easily made the tournament. A tough draw in the Western Regional though versus the two-time defending champ UConn Huskies though. With the SEC champion Florida Gators looming in Round 2.
Do your best, guys.
*I would assume the favorite Van Halen song for most Stage 4 cancer surivivors is Dreams. I know its’s mine. And…I got a little fired up playing Van Halen on my blog last week here in the heart of Trump redneck country music. So…I’m going to try and set my all-time record on my 32 minute sprint race today and this is the song I save for such occasions. Have a meaningful week.
BOOMER!
Mike J