The Pelicans are killing fools on the backs of the league’s third-best defense, and it makes sense. With Brandon Ingram and Trey Murphy firing from…
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Michael Shearer
Michael Shearer is an NBA obsessive who writes to answer the questions he has about the league. You can follow him @bballispoetry. He also is a contributing writer for Fansided at Hoops Habit and writes a free NBA analytical newsletter at basketballpoetry.com that goes out every Tuesday and Friday.
John Konchar, Rebounding Machine and Terrible Businessman
Last year’s Memphis Grizzlies were one of the great success stories of the league. Despite a host of injuries, the Grizz rode their elite depth…
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NBA 2022-23 First Quarter Awards
Defensive Player Of The Quarter: Brook Lopez, Milwaukee Bucks Stillness. Many observers mistake activity for solid defense, but too often, that activity is reactive, making…
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4 NBA Things I’m Grateful For
I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! 1) YUTA THE SHOOTA! Yuta Watanabe has long been a fascination of mine, a whirling dervish of flailing…
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Portland’s defense is different, but the same
Here’s something strange: Portland’s defense is way better than last year despite giving up almost the same shot distribution to opponents: loads of threes and…
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Are The Kings Maybe, Kind Of, Possibly Good?
Nothing about the Sacramento Kings makes sense. They hired Mike Brown to fix a defense that hasn’t been better than 18th since the 2005-2006 season…
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The Best and Worst NBA City Edition 2022-23 Jerseys
Folks, we’ll get back to the analytical content soon, but it’s time to talk about jerseys! League Pass junkies like myself are often desperate for…
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Milwaukee’s Monotonous Domination
It’s typical to say that dominant teams “can’t be stopped,” but that’s not quite right for the Milwaukee Bucks. They’re actually relatively easy to stop,…
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How Hot Is Your Coach’s Seat?
The Brooklyn Nets’ firing of Steve Nash created our first coaching casualty of the year (not including Ime Udoka). Each NBA season usually sees a…
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Four Players Making The Most Of Their Chances
We are roughly seven games into the season, and already we’ve had some happy stories. Today I wanted to shine a light on four guys…
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A Tale Of Two (Backup) Point Guards
The Dennis Smith Jr. Revival Is Here It’s always fun watching players take advantage of a second (or third) chance. Dennis Smith is still only…
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The Jazz Are Winning. Oopsie.
Utah Jazz CEO of basketball operations Danny Ainge can’t be happy. After two blockbuster trades and several smaller ones landed the Jazz a boatload of…
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Winners And Losers From The First Few Days
The best basketball in the world is here (as are the Spurs)! It’s been an incredible first couple of days, with wild comebacks, surprising performances,…
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2022-23 Western Conference Preview Haikus
As before, these are presented in order of how I expect the teams to finish in the regular season. Check my Eastern Conference preview haikus…
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Eastern Conference Preview Haikus
Milwaukee Bucks Crown rests with Giannis No Chick-fil-a nugs last year Middy’s health the fix? Giannis is the consensus best player in the NBA, and…
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21 Wild Predictions
A quick plug before we get to the usual article: I was thrilled and honored to host a podcast with NBA analyst nonpareil David Thorpe,…
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The Death Of The Defensive Specialist Is A Harbinger Of Things To Come
It used to be that if you had one plus skill, you could be a role player in the NBA. Think sweet-shooting but sedentary power…
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Ben Simmons Is Back, But Is He Different?
After a half-season of back-and-forth with the Philadelphia 76ers over whether or not Simmons was faking mental distress to force a trade, in which neither…
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Positional Scoring Trends
Here’s a fun chart I made! This is the % of total points scored in the NBA, split by position. For example, in 2021-2022, the…
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Ime Udoka and Bojan Bogdanović
A lot has happened in the NBA recently. I recapped some of the major stories here, and today I’m following up with some thoughts on…
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