Kevin Love - Miami Ground Machine

[Flight479]

I refuse to believe he has no trade value to get us players that can help us in multiple areas.

 

[bee-eazy13]

GIMME MY FAT LOVE BACK PLZ!

GIMME MY FAT LOVE BACK PLZ!

Been watching some Minnesota Love Highlights...man he was such a bruiser in the paint. He would go toe to toe with front courts like OKC and Clippers and give them hell.

I think he should bulk up a bit again. Being skinny now, he doesn't look more noticeably athletic than he was back then (maybe on defense now, but back then he didn't even try on that end) but he could impose his will inside a lot more it seemed...just going by the highlights on YouTube...

 

[WorldFreeB]

Wonder if he dropped the weight to save his back and knees long term?

 

[Benway]

Maybe his body chemistry changed?

 

[gourimoko]

I refuse to believe he has no trade value to get us players that can help us in multiple areas.

Believe it...

 

[MrX]

Been watching some Minnesota Love Highlights...man he was such a bruiser in the paint. He would go toe to toe with front courts like OKC and Clippers and give them hell.

I think he should bulk up a bit again. Being skinny now, he doesn't look more noticeably athletic than he was back then (maybe on defense now, but back then he didn't even try on that end) but he could impose his will inside a lot more it seemed...just going by the highlights on YouTube...

You Tube highlights are deceiving. You can take bottom feeders and put a package of great highlights together. I could take Love in a Cavs jersey and create insane highlight clip. Driving to the paint thunder dunking and muscle his way through players in the paint. Doesn't mean that's the norm. There are no shooting stats that support he was any better as fat Love.

Given his improved Defense and past back issues I'll pass. We need him to keep up with perimeter players

 

[Jscc]

This is the first time Kyrie and Love directly felt the loss of a finals. Both were injured in 2015.

If they come back truly hungry and pissed off to become complete players. We got a shot.

It should piss them off that LeBron can't rest two friggin minutes without it going to hell. Time is now..

Problem with that is... I honestly think Kevin's capped out in terms of what to expect and Kyrie just doesn't have that kind of drive. Whether that be because of injuries constantly derailing him or something else.

 

[MirORich]

Problem with that is... I honestly think Kevin's capped out in terms of what to expect and Kyrie just doesn't have that kind of drive. Whether that be because of injuries constantly derailing him or something else.

It sucks that we judge them this way. LeBron, Kyrie, , and Love vs. any combination of three of the Warriors stars and it's a 6 or 7 game series that either team could have won. GS broke the game, exploiting 3-4 truly unique circumstances that allowed them to add an MVP to an already all time great team(73-9, 2 straight Finals)

And because of that, we start to treat Kyrie and Love like there is something lacking in them.

 

[Jscc]

And because of that, we start to treat Kyrie and Love like there is something lacking in them.

Perhaps. Do you believe that Kyrie can take another step or do you believe he is what he is?

 

[MirORich]

Perhaps. Do you believe that Kyrie can take another step or do you believe he is what he is?

I think the true greats take their biggest mental leaps around 27. That doesn't mean it will happen with Kyrie but think of the training and pedigree he's been receiving over the past few years with his Olympics experience, playing with LeBron, winning a title, 3 straight deep playoff runs.

And then this year, the first real failure. Sure we lost to GS in 2015 but Kyrie was out. So when we won last year, as hard as it was, he may have thought to himself, "this is what wold have happened in 2015 if me and Kev were healthy"

So to suffer the setback of losing this Finals, it does present him with the opportunity to fully understand how challenging and demanding it is to win(even more so than usual with GS in the shape they are). So if he has that drive in him, I think in the next two years we will see him become the complete best version of himself. I don't think he's "tapped out" at all, because there is still room for small to medium realistic improvements in playmaking for others, defense, and intangibles like focus, leadership, preparation etc.

 

[priceFTW]

It sucks that we judge them this way. LeBron, Kyrie, , and Love vs. any combination of three of the Warriors stars and it's a 6 or 7 game series that either team could have won. GS broke the game, exploiting 3-4 truly unique circumstances that allowed them to add an MVP to an already all time great team(73-9, 2 straight Finals)

And because of that, we start to treat Kyrie and Love like there is something lacking in them.

Maybe, but how did that GS team get to 73-9 in the first place without Durant? How were/are they so good? Good coaching and system for sure and good contributions from their role players for sure. Without Durant, they were up 3-1 on us and very easily could have won the 2016 Finals. Without Durant, they were a better team than the Cavs for an entire regular season and about even in a seven game series. The question is why/how? What makes them so good? What allows them to win so many games with such a large margin of victory?

The biggest reason was/is that Curry and Draymond are far and away higher impact players than Kyrie and Love and affect the game on a play by play basis far more than Kyrie and Love do. Switch the pairs and keep everything else the same and the Cavs either sweep or win in 5. Fair or not, that's why they're judged like this. On a play by play basis, GS has three of the four highest impact players and unless we can have at least two of the top 4, it's highly unlikely we can beat them in a best of 7.

 

[MirORich]

Maybe, but how did that GS team get to 73-9 in the first place without Durant? How were/are they so good? Good coaching and system for sure and good contributions from their role players for sure. Without Durant, they were up 3-1 on us and very easily could have won the 2016 Finals. Without Durant, they were a better team than the Cavs for an entire regular season and about even in a seven game series. The question is why/how? What makes them so good? What allows them to win so many games with such a large margin of victory?

The biggest reason was/is that Curry and Draymond are far and away higher impact players than Kyrie and Love and affect the game on a play by play basis far more than Kyrie and Love do. Switch the pairs and keep everything else the same and the Cavs either sweep or win in 5. Fair or not, that's why they're judged like this. On a play by play basis, GS has three of the four highest impact players and unless we can have at least two of the top 4, it's highly unlikely we can beat them in a best of 7.

I fully understand the smart basketball decision made between 2009 and 2014 to get that team built.

The fact remains, Curry evolving into a MVP player on an 11 million per year contract and the massive jump in salary cap allowed them to add Durant, an MVP, to a team that already possessed three in their prime top 30 players, including an MVP in Steph. It's a salary cap era NBA anomaly, plain and simple, likely to never again be realized. It doesn't take away from whatever collective work they did to build the 73-9 team or the system/style of play they employ.

Add Durant right now to the Cavs or Spurs(the only two teams that were in the 73-9 pre Durant Warriors league) and they too would dominate, regardless of style of play philosophy.

I truly believe that towards the end of Game 6 we had solved the riddle on how to play the 2016 Warriors and had you frozen those two teams as is for 5 years, we would have beat them 3 or 4 time in 5 years. But time doesn't freeze and we had a normal offseason for a championship team and they were able to capitalize on fortuitous circumstances and add Kevin Durant. C'est la vie.

 

[fan0283]

I fully understand the smart basketball decision made between 2009 and 2014 to get that team built.

The fact remains, Curry evolving into a MVP player on an 11 million per year contract and the massive jump in salary cap allowed them to add Durant, an MVP, to a team that already possessed three in their prime top 30 players, including an MVP in Steph. It's a salary cap era NBA anomaly, plain and simple, likely to never again be realized. It doesn't take away from whatever collective work they did to build the 73-9 team or the system/style of play they employ.

Add Durant right now to the Cavs or Spurs(the only two teams that were in the 73-9 pre Durant Warriors league) and they too would dominate, regardless of style of play philosophy.

I truly believe that towards the end of Game 6 we had solved the riddle on how to play the 2016 Warriors and had you frozen those two teams as is for 5 years, we would have beat them 3 or 4 time in 5 years. But time doesn't freeze and we had a normal offseason for a championship team and they were able to capitalize on fortuitous circumstances and add Kevin Durant. C'est la vie.

Hate to say this but it's not unusual for a 4 or 5 game series to end with the lesser team playing the dominant team closer the last few games of the series

 

[Alec]

Male Model Love isn't bulking up again. Won't be seeing the chinstrap or buzz cut either.

 

[Gus Zing]

Believe it...

We give up Wiggins for Love. We can't get Butler for Love. Wolves get Butler without giving up Wiggins.

WTF, lol.