Let's Hear it for the Role Players
356 sats \ 9 comments \ @Undisciplined 1 May Stacker_Sports
I've always loved great role players and one of my pet peeves is when franchises don't value them (looking at you Rob Pelinka). We have some tremendous role guys in these playoffs, so I wanted to take a little time to show some appreciation.
Coming into this season my two favorite role players were Alex Caruso and Gary Payton III, aka The Caru-show and The Mitten. When I played basketball, I was only able to get on the court because I was all-out effort every play and I love seeing guys who play that way make it big.
Josh Hart has displaced them. Has there ever been a more perfect Knick than Josh Hart? I'm very happy for Knicks fans that they get to root for this squad (Long-suffering devoted fans have to stick together).
In no particular order, here are some of the guys I love watching:
  • Jrue Holiday and Al Horford shutting down superstars with their defense
  • Aaron Gordon and his aerial displays on Jokic lobs
  • Jonathan Isaac being able to disrupt everything and everyone on the other team
  • Kevin Love and his beautiful outlet passes
  • Slow-mo aka Kyle Anderson making all the right plays
  • Surprisingly, Nic Batum being impenetrable defensively and knocking down trey's
Who are the unsung heroes that you look forward to watching every night?
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103 sats \ 4 replies \ @gnilma 1 May
How about Lu Dort completely shutting down BI during that first round sweep?
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42 sats \ 0 replies \ @grayruby 1 May
My pick was Chris Boucher but I like Lu as well.
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21 sats \ 2 replies \ @Undisciplined OP 1 May
Yes! I can't believe I omitted Dort.
In grad school, we started playing a lot of pick-up. One of my friends had really never played basketball before. He was almost exactly the same size as me, but younger and more athletic.
I started calling him Lu Dort once he got the hang of defending me, in honor of Lu Dort being the only one who could defend James Harden a few years ago. (Compared to those nerds, I was basically James Harden).
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21 sats \ 1 reply \ @gnilma 1 May
Must feel good being James Harden of your group, or even to have a bunch of guys to play with. I lost my basketball buddies to Call of Duty during covid and my skills aren't good enough to play pickup with the young guys at the gym. Haven't lace up my sneakers for a few years now. Probably can't even shoot by now.
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21 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined OP 1 May
It was a lot of fun, despite my friend learning how to completely shut me down.
I've only played a few times since then. I do usually manage to win because the kids don't take the old short guy seriously until it's too late, plus I'm way more competitive than the younger generation seems to be.
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83 sats \ 1 reply \ @grayruby 1 May
Zapped this post this morning but forgot to comment.
My pick is Chris Boucher. Canadian and always brings the energy.
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50 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined OP 1 May
Nice one. I don’t see him play very often, but I do usually like him.
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83 sats \ 1 reply \ @Cje95 1 May
I didn't watch too much basketball this last year but when I did it was mainly just the Rockets. I was super impressed by two of our rookies who could emerge as great role players. Cam Whitmore I had to google to see who he was and was impressed with his ability to step it up when the team needed it. The other people might see it as a disappointment given his draft status but Amen Thompson when healthy was really pretty great in his role off the bench as well. With those two in particular the team had a heck of a lot of depth!
Ironically enough I do think Fred VanVleet served a great role as an anchor to help right the ship and even though I personally despise his antics Dillon Brooks is extremely good at being irritating. He doesn't take it to the Draymond Green level either but does toe that line.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined OP 1 May
I didn't watch very many Rockets games this year, but it looks like a really fun emerging team. When Dillon Brooks is on the right side of the line, he's a lot of fun.
Sengun is looking like an emerging star, but for now he might qualify as one of the most fun role guys.
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