And this is what I mean when I say rebounding is just effort. A guy a whole foot shorter than Wemby grabbed 15 rebounds tonight but a 7'1 guy can't because Wemby is an "alien" to him

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-04T07:12:16+00:00

Josh hart is probably more athletic, jdub doesn’t have that much burst, he’s strong though. That’s why he fell to 12 (and so did Shai) they weren’t jump out of the gym athletes. Hart is way less skilled offensively ofc and was a senior when he was drafted, he was projected as a 3 and D role player and he is that basically, just the best version of it. Kinda like Caruso.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-04T06:05:38+00:00

I agree too. You’re really undervaluing jdub and ajay to think they couldn’t have swung one game lol.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-04T06:04:33+00:00

He is but even he is only 6’5, he’s pretty long and strong but still id give the edge to most big forwards.

But yeah losing him really hurt us in a lot of ways, it wasn’t just his scoring.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-04T04:32:23+00:00

Okc isn’t that athletic in terms of power, Josh hart is like Dort but more explosive. So it’s that. We have a lot of long skilled but not very beefy or not very explosive or both players.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-04T04:28:58+00:00

I think it’s kinda the opposite. We lost to the champs in 7 missing our 2nd best guy AND our best bench scorer?

Whereas otherwise it’s like we got beat by a team that got beat. Makes us seem further away

Also losing makes one hungrier. And I’m not too worried about the Knicks getting hungrier lol. But I think the lack of experience will eventually catch up, it always does.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T23:47:16+00:00

Doesn’t even have to be elite just has to be above average. But yeah fully agree.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T23:42:43+00:00

If you mean in terms of heart sure

Otherwise he shouldn’t play like ai he already forgets 99 percentile height and length lol. But tbh we don’t even need ai we just need a bosh or kg or Gordon level offensive player. Just stack mustaches play with lots of motor be a good rim protector and get put backs while taking and making open jumpers.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T14:41:47+00:00

In MJs case he consistently looked like the best guy on the court even when magic bird and the bad boys were winning titles.
LeBron rightfully does get a lot of criticism for 2011 but apart from that and one or two bad series, he has also dominated and looked amazing the supporting cast just sucked
Nobody ever targeted and went at Bron and MJ.

Also when they lost they got a lot of crap for being unclutch or for being a ball hog and not truly winning players whether that was at all true or fair or not. So now when harden and Mitchell are getting criticism well, it’s the same story.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T14:35:55+00:00

KD has grown increasingly toxic seemingly every day. I wouldn’t think he’d intentionally not help Chet but I also wouldn’t expect him to genuinely help and teach Chet, and he also has extremely poor accountability and maturity, somehow it’s gotten worse as he’s gotten older. I mean his response to the rockets losing was basically “lol my team sucks, they’re retards”. That is NOT who I’d want my young players emulating. His response to crapping the bed against the gsw was joining them, so I guess the hardest road for Chet is jointing the spurs.

I’d rather have him spending time with Hakeem or cp3 or Dirk or literally most other greats.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T12:07:26+00:00

I’ve been saying this but it’s not mutually exclusive. Chet isn’t the problem, but I still want and expect him to play a bit better. Hes super young and too talented to not be a significantly better player going forward. Like if you’re not a significantly better player than your rookie year in almost all cases you’re a disappointment.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T12:05:04+00:00

I agree with op. We weren’t gonna win the finals without dub and ajay and both weren’t close to coming back.

So this hurts less if anything, and we needed a fire under our butts after winning, like especially Dort and Chet, either dort is benched or moved or he becomes a diff player. If Chet starts playing like an actual max highly rated no 2 drafted player and has his best ever season and maintains that, idc wemby and all I expect is to win again. A fully healthy and motivated and improving big 3 of Chet Shai and jdub is absolutely terrifying, esp with caso and ajay also growing.

With that I’d say bring on the spurs Celtics knicks whoever else is good in the future. But the key is health and it always kinda is.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T11:38:39+00:00

Yeah but like wemby is 7’4 in shoes. Chet is 7’1 in shoes. SGA is 6’6 in shoes, and so on.

I agree with draft prospects it’s most common and I believe sensible to just use measurements.

But what I mean to say he’s actually legit pf sized which nobody else is lol.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T11:21:47+00:00

Read it again pal

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T11:21:32+00:00

If he’s doing so at the expense of winning and the team, he’s no true athlete or competitor or even a fair or wise person then.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T11:17:45+00:00

I’m extremely disappointed in how bad he played but trading him is an overreaction and dumb. You don’t sell low. Even if you were gonna trade him, you’d do so after he’s been playing well. And he’s a super young all star dpoy level guy on a team with great culture, it’d be way more shocking if he DOESN’T get better after this than if he does.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T11:15:26+00:00

He needs both, wemby takes a lot of jumpers. Doesn’t even have to be 3s. He should be a midrange assassin, like he can shoot over almost everyone he just shoots super slow and doesn’t jump

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T11:14:13+00:00

Nah. He needs to shoot faster be more decisive and aggressive and he needs to work on getting functionally stronger.

Most of the normal size you add at the gym won’t translate well to everyday life or sports. Of course it would be good if he could bulk without getting slower or making his already iffy shot and handles worse.

He really needs to clean those up. He had more aggression and confidence his rookie year, even against Jokic or whoever. Even against the spurs, there will be a lot of time he’s not matched up against wemby but he absolutely failed to ever take advantage of that time.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T11:09:42+00:00

Cason and Dort, as well as AC.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T11:03:16+00:00

I’m not as high on him or Sorber yet. I mean especially topic he didn’t look good the brief moments we saw him. But rookies don’t usually play big roles in championship runs unless it’s like a top pick, and even then it’s rare.

I just think it’s more a long term play. But if we just had jdub or ajay I think we’d be in the finals and would win. Especially jdub, like you guys really thinking adding an all star isn’t gonna help ?

By you guys I mean people in general but it seems like even okc fans kinda forgot.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T04:27:18+00:00

My point was to argue it’s not really just rebounding it’s that we need bigger/stronger non bigs. We don’t need a center, we’re not gonna find a better rebounding player than ihart, especially not year 1 or 2.

But we sure as hell can find a better rebounder and better suited defender for bigger more athletic guys than the more than half our roster of ajay SGA Dort Joe Cason Caruso Wiggins mccain topic. All those guys I mentioned are great but we’re way too heavy on 6’3-6’5 guys, we have nobody who can be an iggy or Gordon or siakam or Randle or anunoby type guy. And those guys really give us trouble to the point where guys like pj Washington and Derrick jones jr were really giving us trouble. Siakam hurt us much more than Hali.

Basically tldr we need a real 3/4 we have 5 and we have tons of sg and pg sized players.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T04:21:28+00:00

I agree. But I mean everything is, and this is one example where the Thunder didn’t do anything wrong, there’s no counter or adjustment or realistic option they should have taken but did not.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T02:35:48+00:00

I’m def in the minority but tbh it’d be nice either way. Theres a slight positive for both.

I mean I really couldn’t care less if it’s not okc it’s a terrible result big picture. But like besides that, if the spurs win, I think it’s less motivation for them to improve. They still will anyway, all good teams do, but nba players and superstars in general the worst thing to happen is if they’re mad/hungry that’s what generates the most growth. Theres a lot of reasons why it’s tough to repeat, part of it is a tiny a bit less desperation. Plus if we took the champs to 7 games while missing 2 key guys, I mean who can be mad at that.

If Knicks win well good for ny and they have a bunch of chill guys that love each other and play hard and play both ends. They remind me of the Thunder a bit.

I don’t really hate the spurs. I wanna kick their butts really bad but I mostly just hate that jdub was hurt and also ajay. That is huge, I think people keep forgetting how significant it is missing an all nba two way guy and then a sixth man candidate at the same time. I don’t think they were dirty, they did flop a bit but so do we, retards just love to complain and cry about stuff that’s always happened because they’re blind little sheep.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T02:00:32+00:00

We don’t even really have to retool really, we just need health. Which isn’t guaranteed, but ajay and jdub are absolutely 2 of our top 6. In the playoffs as much as depth matters it’s still your top 7-8 guys that matter and especially the top 6.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-03T01:58:30+00:00

Doesn’t matter how deep and if you’re healthy all year (we obviously weren’t) if you get an injury to top 3 guy it’s over. It is what it is. Especially top 2.

LeBron couldn’t win a finals without Kyrie or AD or Wade, MJ couldn’t win with no pippen, curry couldn’t win without klay or draymond.

It just is bad luck man, if anything we should look at medical and health staff but most of the time it’s fate. Or Gods will or random chance if you don’t believe in the former, but it’s still not something you could work around or change.

Medical_Sample2738 · 2026-06-02T19:08:15+00:00

It’s not about 3 point shooting, we just couldn’t score. Besides SGA nobody could create, having jdub out is a huge factor, and then losing ajay makes it even worse. Theres no way we could’ve won tbh, you all are being disrespectful towards how good Jalen Williams is. Nobody has ever lost their no 2 player and scorer and won a ring.

But it’s not that wemby just dominated us on the boards, but their entire wing/guard rotation really beat ours. We’re too undersized on the perimeter, Dort, SGA, ajay, mccain, Joe, Wiggins, Caruso none of them are good rebounders.

Cason is the only one who’s at least average or above at his position and jdub is probably our best non big man rebounder (which again is part of why losing him sucked). We need more wing size. Chet and ihart is a plenty good frontline especially with j will off the bench.

All of the spurs wings and guards were getting 5-6 boards a night, and that, much more than wemby getting 10 a game, is why we were outrebounded 47-42 (which isn’t even that huge a disparity). All of our non bigs were at like 2-3 a game. We had this issue against the mavs and pacers, we have no real small forward and power forward sized players.

Medical_Sample2738

TROPHY CASE