United to bounce back.

Every game to go with the home team until United wins game 5.

Heres a topic for pre game banter

In the game 1 thread, I pointed out how deep and talented Perths roster is.

Some hack called it "reverse woofing".

So I put a list together, with my personal ranking of each team's players from best to worst:

Casper vs Cotton
Kennedy vs Kay
Goulding vs White
Boone vs Martin
McCarron vs Brandt
Barlow vs Norton
Pledger vs Wagstaff
Moller vs Jervis
Hooley vs Steindl
Jois vs Hire
Smith Milner vs Vague

A few comments.

I'm a massive fan of Casper and would take him over Cotton. I reckon if Casper was 3 inches taller he could be one of the better NBA point guards. But these two are both elite NBL players.

I'd take Boone over Martin and McCarron over Brandt (last night notwithstanding- Brandt was excellent). Boone has slowed but still one of the best rebounders in the comp. Knows his limitations and is effective at what he does. McCarron does a little bit of everything.

Jervis over Moller. Jervis started the last two years in Bris. 10ppg and 5rpg last season. Less opportunities now playing behind Brandt and sometimes Gleeson mixes in small ball with Kay at 5. Moller is a good defender and rebounder but still very weak offensively. Mostly takes wide open shots, since he's the 4th or 5th option and gets looks on ball reversals and dishes out of double teams, but still hits a low percentage.

Steindl I suspect has been held back by playing behind Cotton and White. He showed plenty under Fearne before taking his game to another level in Townsville, then put up decent numbers in Belgium. Compared to Hooley, big advantage Perth. Steindl is one of the best pure outside shooters in the comp.

Theoretically Jois is a much better player than Hire, but in this context, Jois joined United a month ago whereas Hire's been with Perth for a decade and Gleeson for 6 years. Jois is talented but hasn't had much time to learn the system or his teammates. Vickerman may understandably be reluctant to play him. Hire knows the system back to front and is a hard working team guy who has won championships with these teammates. Tough as nails. In a grand final series I suspect most coaches would know which of those two types of player they'd want off their bench. They'd take the 10 year role player over the talented newbie.

Overall it's fairly even. United a better top 5 and Perth with better depth.

You didn't comprehend the "reverse woofing" statement did you.

If you are going to do a "big" analysis actually analyse something. Decide a rating system and give them points accordingly, team with the most wins. For example you could grade each player out of 3 for offence, defence, playoff experience, intangiables you cant label but know are there. Max 12 pts per player. High turnovers means less points on offence, poor d rebounding, less on defence etc.

That would actually make for a more interesting discussion then lvs revolving opinions that always settle on united are better.

LVs comment:

[Overall it's fairly even. United a better top 5 and Perth with better depth.]

J's reply

[That would actually make for a more interesting discussion then lvs revolving opinions that always settle on united are better]

Hmmmm..... something's not quite right here!

Still opinion chief. And a better starting 5 trumps slightly better depth so yeah my statement holds true.

J, it must be getting near your bedtime

Let the adults talk in here please. Why don't you go find some other kids to talk with.

Let the adults talk in here please.

[If you are going to do a "big" analysis actually analyse something]

I never said I was doing a "big" analysis.... I said I was ranking each player from 1 to 11 and then I added a few quick comments....


[Decide a rating system and give them points accordingly, team with the most wins. For example you could grade each player out of 3 for offence, defence, playoff experience, intangiables you cant label but know are there.Max 12 pts per player]

So you want my opinion on a good rating system, then you want my opinion about each player's strengths and weaknesses in various areas of basketball, in a detailed mathematical format?

Interesting idea..... time consuming but could be fun.

[That would actually make for a more interesting discussion then lvs revolving opinions]

Oh....so you don't want my opinion?

[Still opinion chief.]

ooooohh.... you're struggling here.

What year are you in?

Whatever year it is, your English teacher should be able to help you with your comprehension and vocabulary

I vote we just lock this thread and start over.

Hopefully Jack creates a thread tomorrow.

Steindl's true shooting percentage is 62%, Moller's is 50%

Steindl's 43% from 3 and three quarters of his attempts are threes

Basketball has changed. Outside shooting is a bigger part of the game. You can't really afford to have an inside only 5 man, and then another player on court who's missing wide open jumpers more often than not

Once Moller's shooting improves he'll be worthy of a starting role one day. Maybe. But he's not there yet. Shooting needs to improve.

Ahh the child and vocabulary insult. A classic, yet I'm not sure anyone cares. My point was for a solitary post you wrote a particularly significant amount. Thus the "big analysis" comment. Yet in all you wrote there was very little actual analysis, thus, my suggestion.

All digs aside i think an actual analysis on some sort of criteria would be more interesting than boone over martin because....

It would also help you substantiate your opinion. Just a thought.

J please don't encourage him to use the internet any further.

J if you want detailed "actual analysis" hoops.com.au is not the place to be

Liam Santamaria's articles may be of more interest to you

And of course any analysis will ultimately rest on highly subjective assumptions and value judgements

My initial question was "which player is better". No analysis will objectively decide that

Calls out someones comprehension, doesn't know the meaning of substantiate...

Depending on the home cooking tomorrow? Same as when they play in Perth. United will come out all gun's blazing and Perth have to weather the storm.

J, quit your whining

Offer your own "substantiation" or analysis or opinion instead of offering useless criticisms of my post, which offered more food for discussion than 99% of posts on this forum

"Useless criticisms" that is how i would describe most of your posts of late actually. How ironic you cite official nbl articles as high level analysis, better than your own, yet ignore the fact they concluded brandts screen was neither dirty or illegal... shall we analyse what that says about your reasoning? Most of us will be biased or haters during the event, maybe after but in the end calm down, look over the stats and go "shit" if we had of done x,y,z better that call wouldn't have mattered. You start going over the tape min by min doubling down on your biased and often incorrect opinion, then throw in a the other team was better... cause they got calls.

Heres some analysis for you though, if cotton realises he has more space and stops rushing, united is in trouble. Casper is elite and made him work so very hard, but cotton had a fair few shots that were open, very open for him, he missed them, looked rushed. If he shot 30% from 3 thats a 20pt blowout.... also i expect perth to have a better plan for kennedy moving forward, he looked very good early, that 4/5 man pick and roll was deadly when perths bigs switched.

Do united fans actually like the way goulding plays the game? He is so talented, but my goodness he is hard to watch sometimes.

Saw game thread. Started reading..

I want that 3 minutes of my life back

Please start a new thread jack.

This thread:

I agree- lock this thread.

Myself, anon #420 and anon #424 are the only ip addresses allowed into the next one

Can you arrange that Isaac?

LV rambling has effectively ruined this thread.
Let's go Wildcats let's go.

Individual comparisons are only one part of it.

I rate Gleeson > Vickerman (sadly).

I reckon Perth play better as a TEAM, with better combination play. Regardless of whether that comes from the players or the coaches or the offensive system, it worked in game 1 and I believe it will get Perth over the line in the end.

In game 1, Perth simply shot better, United D got sloppy a few times in Q3, failing to anticipate screens, but on the whole United defended well. Perth couldn't miss for a stretch there

At the other end Perth D forced United into many shots that aren't ideal- eg jumpers by Boone, Pledger, Moller, of which all 3 didn't knock down

If Perth's bigs keep defending the high picks well and keep shutting down United's first 2 or 3 options, Id like to see United run plays to get Kennedy involved and attacking the hoop, as they did in the 2nd qtr on Friday

Or actually late 1st qtr too

Kennedy is the best circuit breaker Plan B when the jumpers aren't falling

This thread is Hiroshima

You won't see melts, Or celebrations, I won't be posting cos I'll be at the game.

Friday I was watching on couch then watching immediate replays on Kayo getting shitty with the bad calls.

As a pure basketball watching experience a TV and then 2nd screen with Kayo is as good as it gets

On the other hand, the atmosphere will be rocking today and the only way to experience that is buying yourself a seat

Melbourne to square it up

I believe that if life gives you lemons, you should make lemonade... And try to find somebody whose life has given them vodka, and have a party. It was no party for Melbourne last night in the first game after a tight first half, Melbourne tried to squeeze some lemons but all they got was juice in their eyes. A 14 to 31 third quarter saw them succumb to the mighty Perth Wildcats

Bryce Cotton tried to keep United in the game with a 0/9 performance outside the arc, but Terrico White missed the memo with a best on court performance surely attracting the attention of the Larry Sengstock Super Six.

Somehow jack finds a way to turn the tide of this thread with just a few words.

Yeah, sorry I didn't post earlier. I tried getting a thread up, but I couldn't

All good. Life gets in the way sometimes.

Good thing the game is pretty early today. I'd hate to think what this thread would have become if the game was another 6 hours away.

Im tipping melb in this one. But cant imagine cotton shooting so badly again, so who knows

On my way into the game, reflecting on what a non event this game is in Melbourne

Only the 4th game I've sm attended this year. Pretty pumped.

I mentioned to a few ppl that I was going today, and people barely even know it's on. That's including people who play basketball or follow NBA or both.

In the 90s the NBL was almost mainstream. Almost. Now it's a forgotten sport, despite all the gains made in the past few years

One step at a time.

Today will be sold out or close to, and ticket prices were astronomical- $125 premium, $85 gold, $70 silver, $50 Bronze. (I went to the BBL final a few weeks ago at Marvel stadium, cost $30 for the cheap seats).

So, if there's 9000 or 10000 people willing to pay those prices, there is hope for the sport in this city.

How ironic, straight after posting that, I look up and see the first person on this packed train in NBL attire

It's a Perth fan in a Damien Martin singlet

Well done Cats- a true success story off the court, and on

How ironic, straight after posting that, I look up and see the first person on this packed train in NBL attire

It's a Perth fan in a Damien Martin singlet

Well done Cats- a true success story off the court, and on

Astronomical, is every year cost in perth! And pretty sure thats the members price here.

Danger time for Perth, no starters

Some very soft fouls for united here. A 6-0 run from the ft line...