CrippleCreek

Nico doesn’t want to give Luka the super max based on concerns over how he’d age regardless of his fitness, compounded by concerns over his durability and conditioning.

With those concerns, hard to imagine Luka staying in shape if he wasn’t happy, and possible it turns 2025 into a total wash.

Then he demands out over the summer if you’re not going to give him the full max, and you never get a player the quality of AD in that scenario.

So you just do it now. I guess that would be the logic?

I am pissed they traded him at all.

However, I would be much more upset if, as a mavs fan, they traded an all-nba homegrown talent for a big box of hopium on a spreadsheet. I’m a little surprised they couldn’t pry the other trade-able first off the Lakers though.

Have any of those “massive trade returns” everyone is pumping as the alternative ever amounted to any actual winning other than the Celtics?

I’m not infatuated with it, but at least the basketball on the court will still be good.

And there has to be another trade, because I don’t believe you can actually plan to play one of the centers with AD and PJ for huge minutes unless they’re ready for Lively to actually become a corner 3 pt threat.

It’s an optics loss more than an on-field loss, most likely.

The list of QBs like Maye, Young, Stroud and Williams won a grand total of nothing in College. And then there’s the group that didn’t pan out at all.

The most likely scenario is probably that Underwood pops next year, is elite by year 3, and doesn’t win a national title before being a first round pick.

Wonderful for him, clearly not a bust, but not really something that raises the program’s level or profile.

Just look at Raiola and Lagway. You cant expect much more than that in year 1, and then you’re already a third of the way through his time in college.

Since Lawrence in 2018, no underclassman has won a title, while multiple have been won by transfers. That trend doesn’t look to break in 2024.

The two missed FG would have been Ramos career long. A month ago we wouldn’t have even attempted those because there was no trust in the defense. The decision to kick at least two, and possibly all 3, was dicey at best.

Those series needed to be called from a presumption of 4th down territory.

Losing Bama, Florida and Auburn would be the hardest of NOs from me, and I think most LSU fans.

The ones posting here just know they don’t get a vote and keeping the melt going is more fun than bitching about something we have no control over.

If for some reason there aren’t pods and LSU ends up in the SWC I’ll need a new hobby.

The 9-10 seeds fading way way back in the standings has really ramped up with the flattening of the lottery odds, and this helps avoid that a bit.

One of the first years of the flattened odds the Mavericks traded everybody with a pulse other than Doncic to tank a .500 team at the deadline. They’d be less incentivized to do that now.

Both the good and bad teams have been trying to game the standings at the end of the season for matchups and lottery balls for what feels like a more protracted period every year. Getting rid of that even a little with the play-in is a good thing.

Unless they gave the group a horrible edit, it looked like CT skated because the group with an iron-clad grip on the game were dumb as bricks, and CT won what, 3?, eliminations.

Other than the double elimination; which didn’t even work out because Devin lost anyway, I didn’t feel like there was much meddling. The rogue setup kinda prevented too much intervention anyway.

Having Big T most of the season was also perfect for CT because the whole group running the game, who were horrible strategists, thought he was neutralized in a final by her and never really gave too much consideration to the possibility he gets to switch at some point.

There is no middle in any conference because of the schedules.

A 4-4 sec team is normally 8-4, ranked, and propping up the strength of record for the top teams. That team is 4-6 and sucks this season.

Even LSUs dumpster fire year would have a good shot at 7-5 and looking plain down, rather than disaster, in a normal year.

That the committee is so short sighted that they’re gonna force convention onto this top 4 instead of tossing a Cincy or Coastal in there so we can have a little fun is a damn shame.

Very few people could get tickets to the Texas or Bama games. There wasn’t a big neutral site trip this year.

LSU hasn’t made this game since 2011, and the conference championship still matters.

There are going to be a ton of LSU people going to this game. Neither (still not official) participant has allocated its tickets to season ticket holders.

Once that’s done the secondary market will pick up.

The return trip to the peach bowl if LSU were fortunate enough to end up there with the NCG in New Orleans is the one I’d expect a softer market for.

I’d bet on it being the chain of custody information referenced in reports that has gotten very little play compared to the equity of the length of the suspension.

It could allow the ncaa to overturn the suspension on a technical issue without dealing with changing any actual rules.

That information has been a footnote in most of the reports I’ve read, but always seemed to be the most promising path towards reinstatement to me.