I like Cairns for an upset tonight. Hoping for a close one in any case because I expect Hawks-Perth will be a double-digits loss type of game.

Looking like it will be pretty empty for game 1

It would be a pity if it's empty. Hopefully not another Library!

Any news on Oliver's knee?

He is on the box score but starting on the bench. Not sure what to make of that.

He is on the box score but starting on the bench. Not sure what to make of that.

TV picture hasn't improved.

Stream working great for me on SBS on Demand.

If Cairns fans raved about Jawai being in good shape this season they actually would've been legit, best shape I've ever seen him in.

Why is newbill not getting court time? Injured?

SBS crapped out on me. It looked terrible anyway. I have two days of KAYO subscription left from World Cup - looks like I might be resubscribing because it works and looks alright.

I also notice the on-screen clock continues to be out of sync with the court clock.

I reckon newbill might have food poisoning or a vomiting bug or something like that hes gone to the change room twice during the first half and no one knows whats going on.

Well they are commentating from an-off site bunker.

Jawai is so overrated. Negatives outweigh the positives....no pun intended.

Broadcast has no atmosphere from either the commentators or the venue sounds. Please bring back the venue commentators.

"Nobody cares about this game" great post? What game does everyone care about?

Does anyone care about Tommy's diet?

Machado probably thinking what the hell have I gotten myself into

Machado part of the problem with some of his casual dribbling and passing. Cairns 3 rotation guys short, really. No Newbill compounds it, too

The audio mix on this broadcast is so off.

Surely Simon conn is a better option than some of these cairns players?

I get he is old but guy has more game

Noi is definitely no rookie ingles

Would you bother sacking Mike Kelly or just accept that Cairns are a crap team?

Kelly hasn't got much to work with. You can’t turn shit into wine

How were Cairns not given a Next Star?

Yeah, Noi is no Ingles, but I think he's quality, just doesn't really seem to have much of an offensive game developed at the moment and is trying to do too much.

First opportunity I've had to watch a broadcast. The bunker commentating is a losing prospect. Like someone said in a previous thread, it's exactly the same feel as watching the listless Euroleague games on ESPN.

And yep, plenty of empty seats. Partly because Cairns holds least appeal in the league. Mostly because it's a 6:30pm start at a location with wretched traffic woes that not everybody has the appetite to fight.

JvG every bit the courtside commentator that he was GM.

I like his commentary and always thought JVG was more suited to that than being a GM.

Admittedly that throw to the Perth game wasn't his best work.

AFAIK Cairns were offered La Melo.

League pays for next stars.

Offered yet declined? Doesn't add up?

Why would they decline if the Next Star is a paid for by the league player?

Trust me they declined. Maybe he's not that good?

The venue looks shit
So small and empty seats

It looks like a suburban rec center, not a major professional stadium.

Brisbane trying to call the venue "The Armoury" is as lame and forced as the #thisiswhoweare hashtag they push out.

Disregarding location, venue itself is very good but.

"Analytics has squashed that, and the low scores had as much to do with the snail pace of play Fearne teams played at."

Firstly, being able to slow more talented teams who are looking to play fast is not easy, and it takes good offensive and defensive discipline to do so.

Secondly, and most importantly, Fearne's Taipans were in the top half of the league for defensive rating in 5 of his last 7 years (I don't have stats for his two seasons before that).

So we have a team that was good enough to slow teams down and also good enough to keep them to reasonably low points-per-possession totals, despite having less talent than their opponents more often than not.

Sounds like a pretty decent tick to Fearne.

1400 seats more than the Convention Centre. Venue is a massive upgrade in almost every way

I dont mind the look of the venue. The capacity suits the Brisbane fanbase and its not too small either so theres room for growth. For me the atmosphere looked decent on TV and the stadium itself was fine. Certainly didnt have a rec centre feel for me.

Sure its not an elite state of the art arena, but it seems that Brisbane isnt ready for one anyway.

I'd be more concerned with the crowd number. 2000 is dreadful especially for a season opener and moreso for a new venue. Was there no curiosity factor?

Their new owners have a lot of work to do yet.

I also notice the same excuses being made about poor crowds being that traffic is really bad and the time slot isnt great. If you cant get more than 3000 on a Friday night then you may as well play at noon on a Wednesday.

Traffic problems and issues getting there? I can sympathise, but this is not unique to Brisbane only. A car breakdown on the mitchell or kwinanna freeway and all of a sudden it can take over an hour to get to Perth Arena if driving from either end of the city.

Would be good to give them a chance by allowing them some 7.30pm or even 7pm Friday games.

You would if you abided by daylight saving like the rest of the country.

In Australia, Daylight saving is observed in New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and Norfolk Island. Daylight saving is not observed in Queensland, the Northern Territory, Western Australia, Christmas Island or the Cocos (Keeling) Islands.

We aren't allowed to have daylight saving in WA since it stands for Wait Awhile.

The DST states ought to abolish it. That's the real solution here.

Gordon

No daylight savings in Eucla region either (Australian Central Western Time).

Other time zone anomalies are Broken Hill area (uses ACDT), "train time" on The Indian Pacific and Lord Howe Island Time (30 min ahead of NSW/ AEST in standard time, same time during Daylight Saving). I'd love to know what what time zone is used for the Australian Antarctic Territory (or Australian Antarctic Penguin Time).

KR

Won't happen, because DST makes sense in redistributing daylight hours to the end of the day. It allows people to engage in outdoor recreation after day shift working hours.

On the Qld/NSW border it helps to spread the traffic a bit more in peak hour on the M1/Pacific Hwy. I’m loving being able to sleep in for early morning trips to Brisbane. People who work in NSW time and live in Qld also get the same benefit of more daylight hours after returning home from work.

If legal papers need to be lodged with a Federal Court, eastern states law firms can gain an extra 2/3 hours (depending on Daylight Savings status) by lodging them in Perth, supposedly. Don’t think I’d trust lawyers who need that to finish their work on time though.

We can catch tv shows we’ve missed, by watching Gold Coast channels an hour after NSW start times.

In Tweed/Coolangatta mobile phones switch between towers, and therefore time changes by an hour each way, at this time of year. You can be in 3 different time zones at once if you’re inside Time Zone Coolangatta.

The DST states ought to abolish it. That's the real solution here.

You can be in 3 different time zones at once if you're inside Time Zone Coolangatta.

Why do we need DST?

In WA?

Anywhere, really. Screwing with your sleep schedule like that is incredibly bad for you.

I actually googled Antarctic time zones. According to timeanddate.com there is no actual Australian Antarctic Penguin Time. I am most disappointed.

"What is the Time Zone at the South Pole?
The Earth's longitudes meet on the geographical South Pole in Antarctica. This means that, in theory, any of the world's time zones could be used there. However, since it is usually accessed via New Zealand, the Amundsen-Scott station located on the South Pole observes New Zealand Standard Time (NZST) during standard time and New Zealand Daylight Time (NZDT) during the DST.
Arctic Stations on Their Own Time
Since Antarctica is largely uninhabited, the continent is not officially divided up into time zones. However, there are a number of research stations, each of which observes its own local time. Some stations use the time zone of the country that operates or supplies them, others observe the local time of countries nearby.
For example, Palmer Station is a United States research station, but it keeps Chile Summer Time (CLST) as Chile is the closest country.
McMurdo Station, however, follows New Zealand Standard Time (NZST) during standard time and New Zealand Daylight Time (NZDT) during the Daylight Saving Time (DST) period in New Zealand.
Troll Station changes between Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) and Central European Summer Time (CEST), which are 2 hours apart."

There is a Mawson Station time also, which is the Australian base there. It's GMT (or UTC or Zulu Time) Plus 5 hours. That puts it in line with Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Karachi, Lahore and Southern France zone, amongst others.

Personally I prefer extra sunshine while awake.

Sleep issues are fixed with it too - even with DST the sun would set at 8-8:30PM so it's a non-issue. What actually screws with sleep is intense sunlight at 5:30AM without the adjustment.

What screws with sleep is going to work at 9am for six months and then suddenly having to wake up an hour earlier to get to work at 8am.

I don't think Daylight Saving could be observed in Antarctica.

Funnily enough I had a client who worked on Penguin Island and then Mawson station. I recall checking e-mail headers to see what time zone he was in on base.

Is Penguin Island on the Mawson time zone?

Mawson Station Coordinates: 67.6033° S, 62.8742° E
Penguin Island coordinates: 32.3057° S, 115.6906° E

So it's about 1/6 of 360 deg difference in longitude, or 1/6 of a world away longitudinally (not that the distance would be much that close to the pole).

These things are important.

I got the name of the island wrong. It was Macquarie Island - home of the royal penguins.

MI 54.6208° S, 158.8556° E

Currently on AEDT

The idea is to slow the other team but to play fast yourself.

"It wasn't "slowing opposition teams" it was slowing themselves!"

Incorrect. You have to do both, and the Taipans were close to the best in the league at slowing opposition teams. Fearne's initial strategy was around not contesting offensive boards and having a highly-structured d-trans.

Then, after a few years of getting close he decided they needed extra possessions if they were going to win big games against the best teams. That's where they created the "tagging up" principle of o-boards/d-trans to enable them to do both.

This concept is now used by teams around the globe, but it was never as successful at slowing opponents as Fearne's original d-trans concept. In those earlier years the Taipans' defence was a very tough nut to crack.

"Madness basketball. There is no world in 2019 where ANY team is trying to slow the game down at the offensive end! That is prehistoric!"

Out of interest, the top four teams in the NBL last season played at the slowest pace. It's about getting the ball into offence quickly, but not necessarily taking the quickest shot unless it's a good one.

Still one of the most effective methods in basketball is making opponents play defence for long periods throughout the game, through good execution and ball movement, and through offensive rebounding.

"That's false. The offence's job is to find an action/situation that statistically benefits the offensive player."

Exactly. And that's why I wrote:

"It's about getting the ball into offence quickly, but not necessarily taking the quickest shot unless it's a good one."