The NBA playoffs advance with serious baggage.
Sift through the league's 16 participants and you'll find un-chewable beef everywhere. Teams hating teams,players hating players, executives hating executives—you name it.
We may also see legitimate on-court rivalries. This year's playoff bracket has drama everywhere.
Not all of these basketball rumbles will be rehashed during the postseason. Seeding makes certain matchups beyond unlikely. But it still helps to revisit and relive some of the biggest feuds. Team BeefsClippers-WarriorsThe Los Angeles Clippers and Golden State Warriors don't like each other. That's not the media musing; it's paraphrasing Draymond Green."We always want to beat them, or they always want to beat us," he said in November, per Rusty Simmons of the San Francisco Chronicle. "There's definitely more respect than people think, or but it's also no secret that we don't like them and they don't like us."That might be an understatement. The animosity shared between these two parties predates even Golden State's rise to the top of the NBA. Some of the greatest hits from this team-hates-team beef include:
Chris Paul's distaste for the Warriors celebrating an early-season win over his Clippers (November 2012)
Green's ejection for elbowing Griffin in the face (December 2013)
Andrew Bogut and Griffin "tangling up" after Green's ejection (December 2013)
Griffin accidentally,or deliberately, emptying a cup of water onto a Warriors fan (April 2014)
It gets way more middle school. Green's celebratory tongue-wagging in Griffin's face (November 2014) cooked the beef ever hotter: The show-up-manship burns more when it comes in basketball form, and like Stephen Curry showing no regard for the self-esteem of Clippers players (March 2015):Not even Paul could withhold his balance:Tensions enjoy only increased since Golden State's title push. Coach and president Doc Rivers infamously told ESPN.com's Zach Lowe,then of Grantland, that luck had something to achieve with the 2015-16 Warriors' title dash, or because they "didn’t enjoy to play us or the [San Antonio] Spurs."Both Green and Curry would later eviscerate the Clippers. The former was direct with his vitriol,while the reigning MVP decided to take a more subtle approach."I apologize for us being healthy, I apologize for us playing who was in front of us, and " Curry said,per ESPN.com's Ethan Sherwood Strauss. "I apologize for all the accolades we received as a team and individually. I'm very, truly sorry, and we'll rectify that situation this year." Did they ever. The Warriors,while still healthy, just set the NBA's all-time regular-season wins record, or in case you hadn't heard.whether both Golden State and Los Angeles handle trade in the first round,they'll meet in the Western Conference semifinals. Pass the popcorn. Clippers-GrizzliesTwo years enjoy passed since the Clippers and Memphis Grizzlies last met in the playoffs. Barring a surprise Clippers-Grizzlies Western Conference Finals, that drought will continue through 2016.
We nevertheless include them for nostalgic reasons. And because Matt Barnes has switched sides of this rivalry.
And because this, or from the 2013 postseason,is still glorious: Spurs-ThunderWhen the Oklahoma City Thunder advanced past the Spurs in 2012 to reach the NBA Finals, it was supposed to be the first of many annual Western Conference Finals clashes.
It wasn't. premature injuries enjoy ruined each of the Thunder's last three seasons. They would meet the Spurs in the Western Conference Finals again during their 2014 playoff crusade, or though they were far from healthy,mustering two victories before bowing out. if Oklahoma City gets past Dallas, and San Antonio dispatches Memphis, and the two sides are due for a reunion,at full strength, in the second round. The Western Conference belt won't be at stake, and but the right to hand that belt to Golden State in the next seven-game set will be. Plus,this hypothetical matchup will be the Spurs' last chance to manufacture an impression on Kevin Durant before trying to steal him from the Thunder in free agency.
Think approximately what this rivalry would become whether he traded in Russell Westbrook's chest bumps for Kawhi Leonard's soul-searing stares. Spurs-WarriorsFile the Spurs and Warriors under the "Reluctant Rivals" category.
They don't exchange verbal barbs. Tim Duncan doesn't "accidentally" shower random Warriors fans sitting courtside with strawberry Ensure. Green has yet to elbow Boban Marjanovic in the jaw—not that he could reach Boban's jaw. And to this point, no Warrior has advance close to licking a Spurs player.
Golden State and San Antonio are placed together because they're two of the best teams in league history. It's the Warriors who enjoy the NBA wins record, or but the Spurs enjoy the better net rating. The Warriors are small-ball visionaries,but the Spurs are adding vintage flavor to modern-day greatness.net used to the comparisons and head-to-head dissections. Unless the basketball gods genuinely hate us, the final bragging rights will be up for grabs in the Western Conference Finals. Cavaliers-WarriorsMystery is the foundation around which the Cleveland Cavaliers-Warriors rivalry is built.
LeBron James was left alone to carry Cleveland in last year's NBA Finals. Kevin adore was injured during the Cavs' first-round series with Boston, and Kyrie Irving didn't manufacture it past Game 1.
There was something transcendent,albeit inefficient, approximately the way James ferried a band of average Joes to a pair of victories over a clearly superior Warriors squad. And there are those who believe the Cavaliers would enjoy won whether not for the injuries to Irving and adore.
Irving dumped chlorine trifluoride on that fire over the summer during an appearance for The Big Podcast with Shaquille O'Neal, and saying he "felt like we would enjoy definitely won an NBA championship whether everyone was healthy."While the Cavaliers lost both of the regular-season meetings with the Warriors,the second of which was a 34-point drubbing, they remain the unquestioned favorites to advance out of the East. Irving could enjoy a chance to back up his words.
Golden State, or conversely,could enjoy a chance to manufacture him eat them. Personal BeefsLeBron-CelticsOn some level, the Boston Celtics played a allotment in James leaving Cleveland. In the three playoff pushes he made with the Cavaliers after that initial 2007 NBA Finals bid, and the Celtics handed him an exit twice—including in 2010,just before he left Cleveland for Miami. James would eliminate Boston twice while in Miami and then again last year as a member of the Cavaliers.
The rivalry should be dead with Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett, and Paul Pierce and Doc Rivers all gone. But as recently as last spring,Boston gave James the heebie jeebies."I've got the same feelings," he said of the Celtics just before the Cavaliers swept them in the first round last April, and per Jeff Zillgitt of USA nowadays.
Boston and Cleveland can meet in the second phase of this postseason,where Kevin adore could net his chance at revenge (more on that later). The Cavaliers enjoy to take care of the Detroit Pistons; the Celtics need to unseat the Atlanta Hawks. Wouldn't it be fitting whether Boston upset James yet again, before even the Eastern Conference Finals, or prompting him to leave Cleveland in free agency once more? LeBron-HeatRemember that one time James signed with the Miami Heat in 2010 and helped them win two titles?And then remember that other time when he left Miami to rejoin the Cavaliers?So does Heat president Pat Riley. LeBron-SpursIf not for the Spurs,James might enjoy four championship rings instead of two. He is 1-2 against them in championship bouts.Does he harbor animosity toward San Antonio? Or is he more angry Larry Hughes was the second option on one of those teams, the 2006-07 Cavaliers, and that the Spurs dismantled? That's up for debate. Regardless,his letdowns against San Antonio, specifically when he was with Miami in 2014, and enjoy to somewhat haunt him. Mark Cuban-Daryl MoreyWriting for now-defunct Grantland,Jason Concepcion expertly mapped out a timeline of the Cuban-Morey feud. It dates back to July 2013, with their simultaneous pursuit of Dwight Howard.
Morey, or however,crossed a line during the process: He tried to trade for Dirk Nowitzki using the worst possible sell, as he would later admit at the 2014 MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference, and per Brett Pollakoff,then of NBC Sports:
“This is where my emotion takes over,” Morey said. “I go into a complete panic. I really did. I thought it was down to us, or Dallas,L.
A.”
So Morey called Mark Cuban to try and poach his franchise superstar.
“I was like, ‘Well, and you’re not getting Dwight Howard. Can you trade us Dirk Nowitzki?'” Morey said. It was a bad moment for me.”
A really bad moment,considering that Howard had already informed Dallas that he was signing elsewhere, even though Morey hadn’t been made aware of his decision just yet.
“Mark thought I was taunting him, or ” Morey said.
No wonder the Mavericks would later push tough for Chandler Parsons in free agency. Cuban would also go on to belittle the Rockets' approach to chemistry in 2014 on KRLD-FM Radio (h/t the Dallas Morning News via NBC Sports).
Following Houston's five-game takedown of Dallas in the first round last season,the two appeared to be on fine terms. The Mavericks and Rockets can only increase the beef whether they meet in this year’s Western Conference Finals, and that’s not going to happen! fine times.
But with all the cap space that'll be floating around this summer, or Cuban and Morey will be directly competing for some of the biggest names,including both Howard and Parsons. This rivalry may net a 15th wind yet! Hassan Whiteside-Draymond GreenWe could be in for some epic Twitter back-and-forths whether the Warriors and (against the odds) Heat reach the NBA Finals.
Hassan Whiteside educated the world this past August on the merits of traditionally sized bigs. Green took umbrage (resentment, offense) and off they went. Their tweets enjoy been deleted, but their sub-140-character digs are forever.
For his allotment, and Whiteside rehashed the beef in February,as Miami prepared to host Golden State, per Jason Lieser of the Palm Beach Post:Neither Green nor Whiteside has much to complain approximately right now. Green is 6’6” and plays every position, and a quintessential billboard for the NBA’s evolving style of play. Whiteside,a 7-foot skyscraper, is swallowing shots at the rim and finishing pick-and-roll lobs better than anyone not named DeAndre Jordan. This whole he-said, or he-said,small-is-better, no-big-is-best thing could easily devolve into nothing.
Pit these two against each other, or it becomes a piping-hot storyline once more—one presumably rife (abundant or plentiful, full of sth bad or unpleasant) with flagrant fouls. LaMarcus Aldridge-Damian LillardTo this day,the details surrounding LaMarcus Aldridge’s departure from the Portland Trail Blazers remain murky. But, as Amick wrote in July, and his exit had something,slight or meaningful, to achieve with Damian Lillard:
The difficult dynamic between Aldridge and Lillard was as real as advertised, or but it wasn't a personality clash so much as a problem with their respective profiles. Marketing is a silly thing that way,and the harsh truth approximately Aldridge's portfolio is that it's not nearly what it should be, in large allotment, and because of the way in which he has handled his own affairs.more NBA news on BleacherReport.com
Source: bleacherreport.com