Cade Cunningham, Keon Ellis and 4 More Recent NBA Observations
January basketball has been all sorts of fun, folks
The hoops don’t stop… and why would we want them to? Here are seven unrelated observations of varying importance from the past few days in the NBA.
Keon Ellis Will Rescue Sacramento
Kings fans have been clamoring for more Keon Ellis since he entered the NBA. We’re finally getting more Keon Ellis… and this shit rocks! He is everything Sacramento needs; active as an individual and team defender, a legitimately good three-point shooter (42% for his career) and a star connecter for everyone around him. He slithers around, searching for ways to insert himself in the game, and makes a positive impact far more often than not.
17 points, 8 rebounds, 3 assists, 3 steals, 1 block last night for Ellis, in what was Sacramento’s most important win of the season — maybe of the past two seasons.
With Miami up as much as 17 in the fourth quarter, I was sooooo close to turning the TV off and playing Zelda. You know that’s true because I said, “If Miami gets this back above 15, I’m turning the TV off and playing Zelda.”
Then Keon Ellis hit a three, then Keon Ellis hit another three, then Keon Ellis made some great defensive plays and suddenly we were in 2OT and DeMar DeRozan showed the world his balls of steel (he didn’t actually flash anyone he just hit clutch shots again) and now Sacramento has won five straight and is three games out of the five seed in the West. Beam!
Great work from Kings Film Room on Keon’s beauty of a game.
Cade’s World is a Utopia
Maybe we weren’t comprehending how bad Detroit’s roster had been before this season, because all it took for Cade Cunningham to become an All-Star was Tobias Harris on the wing. This is such a beautiful profession because I get to write sentences like that.
A 32 /9/6 outing vs. Portland was his follow-up to 40/9/6 vs. Minnesota two nights ago. Both wins for Detroit. 26/52 from the field in those games, 8/18 from 3PT.
Detroit has won four straight — now just a half-game back of Indiana for sixth place. (Indiana’s in sixth place?) I don’t like to talk betting on here, but Detroit’s win total for the season started at 22.5… they’ve won 18 games and it’s January 7th. A complete obliteration of expectations and Cade is the reason for that (plus JB Bickerstaff is working some miracles.)
Think of the championship contenders in the NBA; how much worse would each of them be if you replaced their lead guard with Cade Cunningham? Not much… not much at all.
Explain it To Me Like I’m Five
By “it,” I’m of course referring to the Minnesota Timberwolves. This team lives 10 lives per game. Some of them are glorious and full of wonder; some of them are bleak, harsh lives. By the end of any Timberwolves game, their fans look like those pictures of US presidents before they took office and after they left office. I don’t think anyone in Target Center bombed Laos, though.
Writing about this team is exhausting. I wrote an article called “Wolves Back” like two weeks ago, mostly about how their defense was rounding back into form, and in the 10 games since publication they’re No. 28 in defensive rating. This is me to the Timberwolves, every night:
Anyway, Anthony Edwards said he wants to be aggressive and then scored 90 points in two games, so point taken I suppose. I’m boycotting writing about the Wolves until they make any sense.
Jamahl Mosley is The Greatest We’ve Ever Seen
He might not be… but can we say that definitively? I want to make sure we’re on the same page about how heroic of a coaching job Mosley has done this season. Paolo Banchero tearing his oblique was a body blow. Franz Wagner also tearing his oblique (weird) was another body blow. Orlando was on the ropes, looking for options to replace about half of their shot attempts (Paolo and Franz shoot about 38 of Orlando’s 85-ish shots per game) in an already limited offense.
No problem, just have Jalen Suggs start shooting 30 times a game. He’s out too, okay that’s fine just have Cole Anthony (24 points) and Wendell Carter Jr (19 points) lead the way, which is what happened on Monday night when Orlando won in New York.
Orlando, theoretically, should be flailing right now. Franz and Paolo are as important to their team as any stars in the NBA. But Mosley and Orlando actually embody the “no excuses” mantra that injury-riddled teams always want to claim. This is a masterful job to just stay competitive without two stars. Mosley coach of the year campaign starts right now. This is actual magic.
The Quietest 8-3 Stretch of All Time
Speaking of the Pacers… hello Indiana! 8-3 in the last 11 games, the Pacers are kind of rolling right now — and their star is starting to do star things as Indy is getting 27 & 10 from Tyrese Haliburton in those three games. Haliburton has played good games this season… but stringing them together has been the obstruction between him and the player he was last year. He needs to be a 23 & 10 guy for Indiana — the 18 & 8’s are cool, but this team needs more volume from its star to really work.
However, the crazy part about Indiana is how much better all of these guys can play. No one on this team (save Andrew Nembhard, maybe) is playing the best basketball of their career, so to see wins coming before everyone hits their stride is intriguing. They can probably get the five-seed if everyone looks close to the best versions of themselves by March.
Jimmy Butler Can’t Fix Your Team
Unless you’re the Memphis Grizzlies — which is why I don’t understand Butler saying he has “no interest” in playing for the Grizzlies. For the record, I don’t want Butler to go to Memphis because I really like this Grizzlies team and I really don’t want to cheer for Jimmy Butler at all (he tricked me at one point but I’m back on this side). But plugging Butler into this lineup would be deadly — my brain tells me he and Ja would be sublime. Ah well, nevertheless. Butler going to Phoenix will be by far the funniest outcome anyway.
What I’m Listening to: River Tiber & Justin Nozuka
Yeahhhh that’ll play