Nah that was his groin injury, to get a haematoma you kind of need to be hit pretty hard in that spot, so he must've copped a bad corkie in the last few weeks.

Well the rest of the season just got boring. Melbourne have qualified for the grand final already, Perth and the Phoenix will play in the other semi, nothing else matters.

Hodgson kept sticking his knee out on screens in that game.

Yeah, those knees prob did it over multiple occasions. I'd say he's good to go, but they'd be taking every precaution to have him 110% for finals and are backing themselves to be able to take a United home game if they get in.

I'm pretty sure he copped a cork in one of the Tassie games vs NZ

Bad corkies can linger so there is a chance this could effect Perth's playoff run. Better to forego chasing United for top spot and sit him out for the last three rounds whilst crossing their fingers he will be okay come the start of the playoffs.

If as expected they end up playing SEM in the Semi's that could be a very interesting series.

Cotton needed a rest anyway so it's good to see him put on ice before the playoffs.

He actually had surgery for it, hopefully no complications. :/

It feels good to be on a hat trick.

Win or lose it's good to know each season the anons will award us with a *.

Ooof, article this morning said they won't risk Cotton's health and if he misses some of the playoffs then so be it, they'll try to win without him. Damn, I presume he'll miss a few games of the first series at the very least.

'The continuous dribble about 3 peats and how good were are is sickening.'

No different from the continuous, "cat's won't make finals this year", "cat's can't win without a 3rd import", "Cotton is being played too many minutes, they can't win come finals". The 'salt' is real...

Yep, comparing a footy club who has recent controversy's such as racism, assault, rape, and paedophilia to a club that has probably been one of the most professional sporting clubs in Australia, if not the most. You should be angry at your own blubs for not at least trying to emulate this for your own success.

*clubs, not blubs...

I don't think the Wildcats can get past full strength SEM without Cotton.

Is every series a 5 game series? I can't even remember? If it's 5 then I like our chances better, Cotton maybe misses the first 2.

SEM are peaking as well...it's gonna be tough, if the Cats can snag one without him, that would be nice.

Ah, yeah, that's definitely going to be tough with no Cotton. Norton will have to shutdown Sykes without getting into foul trouble. Mooney and Magnay will have to takeaway Creek's inside game and make him shoot long jumpers, they both should be too strong for Wetzel and Moore on the offensive end. Then i guess Blanchfield, Steindl and Wagstaff are going to have to be lights out from beyond the arc.

I can't see Cotton missing all 3 games, but then again an Eagles player missed 6 weeks a few years back with the same issue... :/

I can't see Cotton missing all 3 games

Melbourne clubs having to play at a neutral location could level the playing field.

Never underestimate Gleeson ability to cover player loss, though Cotton would be a major loss.

Sounds like he's done for the year.

Congrats United.

Either he's done for the season, or Trev is playing some major mind games right now.

I reckon SEM has got this over United.

Congrats Phoenix

The thing I hate most is now LV gets his stupid all-Victorian grand final he's been crowing about.

No, because the intelligence of a proclamation can only be measured with respect to the information available at the time.

I'm basically done with this season. It was bad enough when there were only two decent teams, now that there's only one and we're sitting through endless clashes of wooden spoon teams it's just not worth the effort. Bleeding into the NBL1 and junior rep seasons is bad enough, but when there's not a competitive product on the floor...

NBL Cup has ruined everything. The $300K LK got from the Victorian government wasn't worth it.

Yeah because it's not like anyone has been complaining how boring the NBL is over the last month.

For me it's not so much that it's been boring - we looked to be in for a tight finish for top spot at the very least only a week ago - but the overlap with the winter seasons is just too much. Four games on Fridays, five games on Saturdays, and three games on Sundays is just burning me out. There hasn't been a single day off from the NBL in two or three weeks, and won't be for another couple of weeks yet.

The fact that most of the games meant nothing was just making it worse, and now that none of the games mean anything I can't summon any energy whatsoever.

The season should've been wrapped up a month ago, the Cup was a terrible idea.

Haha "LK took my championship"

Re fatigue: That's what happens when you’re so isolated from the rest of society.

It also produces a bubble inducing self-centric delusions and wild Trumped up conspiracy theories that would make the GOP blush!

Perth's issue is more a lot of physical travel than playing so many games in so few days - there's really not much that can be done to get around that.

36ers did something similar at the start of the season, lots of games in few days, without the travel

Agreed #772

#773 yeah

By the way if Cotton is out for finals, that would suck - we always want the best possible talent on the court for finals

Trevor Gleeson has come out and said (9 News Perth talking with Pav) he doesn't expect Bryce Cotton to return for the remainder of the season, including finals.....unless he makes some kind of miracle recovery.

I believe its a pretty serious injury, will just have to wait and see if there's enough time left for him to recovery and get back on the court. For everyone's sake I hope he does, at this point its really only a two horse race and I don't think Perth can beat Melbourne without Cotton.

By the way if Cotton is out for finals, that would suck - we always want the best possible talent on the court for finals

I don't think I’ve seen that from posters - 99% of us should want the NBL to be as strong and competitive as possible.

If I’m paying the amount they charge for tickets these days, I want to see the best players - I’d want to see my team beat a full side not an injured side.

I think #856 meant Jeremy.

At this point, it would be literally pointless to add anybody, as they can't qualify for the finals, so they'll go with the squad they have.

The NBL cup was a risk, and we got lucky. But I think that counting the games was always going to create a problem. It left Cairns, Adelaide, and even NZ, basically screwed. That's resulted in a lot of dead rubbers at the end of the season.

For mine, the finals just got interesting.

Granted, the blockbuster last game, with GF HCA on the line, just got fucked. But even so. Perth win that game, take top spot, and it was all over. Send the trophy to the engravers.

But this puts everything up for grabs.

I actually think an all Lilliputlian final would be great for the NBL. Keep in mind that the record crowd was at such a final, and it would be great to see that tested.

But it's not going to happen. I'd put money on that.

MU still has to get past Goorj. The guy who's won more finals than anybody else. (I think Vickers can do it, but its far from assured.)

And if you think that rube from the phoenix is going to outcoach Gleeson. No Cotton makes it harder, but as they say, defense wins finals.

The Melbourne teams will sweep the semis.

Melbourne will win again because of a key injury.

The "Cats overplayed Cotton" line is actually BS. Cotton strives to be the best, aims for NBA and would be playing back 2 backs every week with 3-5 games per week if he was in fact at in the NBA and a starter.

I think many underestimate Norton, but even alongside MVP-level Cotton, they were still a guard short. Who gets the bulk of the guard minutes now?

The "Cats overplayed Cotton" line is actually BS. Cotton strives to be the best, aims for NBA and would be playing back 2 backs every week with 3-5 games per week if he was in fact at in the NBA and a starter.

Melbourne will win again because of a key injury.

"This is nitpicking but he should not have been put back on against Cairns once they were leading by 20."

This is true, but it happens fairly often, it sounds like the damage was done already though.

Yeah, an unrelated (much more temporary) bit of damage was done in that Cairns game. Trev didn't want to put him back in, but lost his nerve with how badly we were choking our lead away.

Not a good sign for the playoffs if they cant even hold off Cairns without cotton on the floor. I'd like to see corey sherville get more minutes now. He's done nothing wrong when given opportunities but trev seems to have lost confidence in him the second half of the season.

"The Melbourne teams will sweep the semis"

I'll take that action.

Chances of them both making it are less than 50%, and chances of both sweeping are slim

Chances of them both making it are less than 50%,

All depends on Cotton's status

If SEM is healthy and Cotton is playing underdone, SEM will win the series IMO.

It's difficult to know how healthy a guy is just from watching though.

Even if Cotton is healthy and firing I expect a tight series.

Cotton won't be playing at all. Keep up.

"We'll keep the door open for him and hope he has a speedy recovery. But we're not planning on him joining us any time soon.

"At this stage we hope he's back. But being realistic, I don't think he'll be back for the first lot of finals.

From the limited information available, and my even more limited medical knowledge, it seems that originally they thought it was simply a matter of draining the haematoma, but when they did that they discovered more severe damage, maybe damaged blood vessels that required stitches or similar. Given its in his muscle, that basically means he can't strain it until it heals. I would think that would be at least a few weeks.

How disappointing for the NBL if Cotton misses the semi finals.

SEM will sweep them.

Who knows what will happen though, SEM have been smashed by injuries all season and United have had plenty, so any more injuries there and it'll go some way towards evening the ledger

Although I do think Cotton is the true MVP- in the sense he's more important to Perth than any other player is to their team.

Without Sobey, Brisbane would be last

Although I do think Cotton is the true MVP- in the sense he's more important to Perth than any other player is to their team.

Bill Simmons has a really good discussion on this in The Book of Basketball

He lists 4 factors he considers when deciding MVP.

"Do they play for Boston?"

What's the other 3

It's called the MVP because BBall started in America, and that's what they call it.
If it had started in Australia, it would be called the "Best & Fairest" (even when won by dirty c_nts.)

It's given to the best player. Period
Notwithstanding that they often get it wrong, and when that happens hoops dickheads proclaim "it's 'Most Valuable' not 'Best", and then proceed to pontificate on their theories as to how it's different and how their favoured player is a deserving winner.

I honestly have not kept up, but I know the system has changed, and I think changed again??

At one point, it did seem to favour great players on crap teams.

The peak of which was Brian Wethers winning it while playing for the Hunter Pirates.

What's the current MVP method? Still the ref votes? Sobey didn't have a huge amount of competition from teammates, and had a more than decent season other than ladder position.

That is why I've got Sobey winning the MVP.

Cotton had a bit of a down year this season anyway numerous games where he shot poorly plus Mooney would be taking more votes from him than in other years.

Cotton out and Cats still winning. Would they be doing the same without Mooney? And I think Cotton is one of the greatest nbl players ever. Mooney on the other hand is just so efficient in everything he does. Has he even had one poor game?

What's the current MVP method? Still the ref votes?

Cotton out and Cats still winning.

You'd be pretty ballsy to say sobey has played better than Cotton across the season.

Has he even had one poor game?

I don't think Cotton is MVP this particular season. But if he does win it, it won’t be outrageous.

Slightly outrageous. I can't see any possible way he could win it especially now missing the last 4 games of the season.

Give it to Mooney.

Cotton will probably just win MVP despite missing the last few

How many games would he have 5 points (Max votes)? More than anyone else I'd think.

Mooney is a threat

So is Sobey, because he's been so far and away Brisbane's best. He'll get sympathy votes "oh we'd better give someone votes from the losing team"- 2 or 3 votes to Sobey in many of their losses, plus of course a fair few 4s and 5s in wins

Above was me.

Has anyone told us how it does work?

Is it the coaches vote that someone referenced?

That's how it has worked- coaches votes from each game

I have vague memory it changed but can't find any reference to it? What's the new system?

Yeah, it's an end of season vote now. It changed a couple of years ago.

Got it- just found a reference online to this too

This new system makes it more likely Cotton wins Imo

Although if they keep winning the last few without him, it might swing the pendulum to Mooney

I must admit I thought the MVP voting was still the old system of the coaches doing a 3,2,1 vote after each game that gets tallied up at the end of the season.

That was never the system either.

Previously: at the end of each game, coaches allocate ten votes to players from either team as they see fit (or only to their own team, if nobody tells Matt Neilsen what the rules are), with a maximum of five going to any one player.

Currently: media nominates a number of players, I think 20, at the end of the season (or a week or two earlier, because the awards night is immediately after the last game so the awards need to be decided in advance, so in a normally-scheduled year the votes would have been in before Cotton got hurt), and a coach and captain from each team votes 3-2-1.

I thought Adelaide were meant to have the most knowledgeable fans!

IMO do it the Brownlow way.

Sorry, meant coach votes. Confused by Brownlow or whatever it is that uses refs. Didn't know they'd changed it to a panel though. I don't follow the league anywhere near as closely these days (kids, businesses, etc).

but both coaches give their 3-2-1 after each game to whoever they want. When you allow them to give their ten points without restriction, it leads to players on losing teams winning the award.

Bogut won under the new system, not the old one.

Which goes to show that maybe the problem isn't the voting system, it's that fans simply don't value players the way other players and coaches do.

The problem with the old system was that it favoured great players on shit teams. Elbows at the Crocs, and Rotnei at the Hawks being recent examples.

Anybody who can't concede that Cotton is far and away the best player in the league, should seek counseling (or use more hemorrhoid cream.)

This a guy who's played the whole season against 8 coaches who have developed "Stop Cotton" plans, and has still out-performed everyone else.
Who has often spent the first half passing first, and still outscored everyone.

The only thing that counts against him is now missing the last 4 games.

But keep in mind that the current system does not inherently penalise him for that. He can still be given maximum votes.

The fact that commentators claimed Magnay guaranteed Perth the championship, and are now questioning whether they even make the GF, only reinforces the perception of Cotton.

And of course (to whatever extent such a thing exists) he'll get the "sympathy vote."

"Well no he wouldn't, because the unofficial MVP selections done at the end of the season"

ok, so your argument is that the system wasn't biased, precisely because everyone knew it was biased?
do you not see the problem with that argument?