Tag: NBA

Indiana Pacers Lose the NBA Finals, Haliburton Injury, and A Fan Reflection

Welcome to the Torg Stories Podcast! We’re recording Mon June 23rd, the day after the Pacers lost in game in 7 of the NBA Finals to the Oklahoma City Thunder. Anne, I’m fresh off of Day 1 of the Watauga Girls Basketball Camp. Did you used to go to camp as a kid?

What’s most prominent in your mind after this game 7 of the NBA Finals?

It’s two things for me: Haliburton slamming the floor and after the game when his teammates came off the court and he greeted them one by one.

How would you describe the single overwhelming emotion you felt in the final minute of Game 7, win or lose?

  • Deflated. After the game the camera was following the Pacers back to the locker room. Haliburton was waiting on everyone. Felt like the producers missed the big story when they went to the championship celebration.

How did you think Haliburton going out impacted each team? Did you see anything?

Two recent experiences that might inform some of what happened in Game 7:

  1. Kate having a knee injury as a junior and missing at least a half.
  2. RJ Reynolds point guard spraining an ankle in walk through and not playing us.

Keys to the outcome:

  1. Haliburton injury. What do they lose when they lose Haliburton? (vs. McConnell)
  2. Stifling defense that made Indiana go long stretches without scoring and forced Indiana into 21 turnovers. 32-10 points off turnovers.
  3. SGA can get 29 one way or another when no one else in the game could.
  4. Five blocks by Chet Holgrem

Go over the team stats and the box score click here.

X-Factor:

  1. McConnell going 8-13 for 16 points off the bench. Chet Holmgren getting 18 on 6-8 shooting with 5 blocks. He’s not always doing that.

How does this Game 7 performance alter your perspective on the current Pacers team and their potential for the future?

Regardless of the final score, what was the biggest surprise for you in how Game 7 unfolded? Did anything completely go against your expectations?

  • The Pacers leading at halftime was a pretty big surprise.

Game Notes on a Timeline:

  1. Pacers could win the title and never get picked for like three rounds.
  2. Dort hang and over the shoulder lay up to cut to 11-8. Just fancy.
  3. Nesmith 2 fouls at over 7 mins in first.
  4. Freaking Caruso.
  5. Haliburton 4:12. Down 18-16.
  6. Everyone trying to hit a little extra tougher shot, but hanging in there 20-22 45 secs in 1st. 22-25 at QTR. Reminds me of Durant. Toronto fans seemed to cheer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBv99Orq9Ys
  7. It barely touches Haliburton’s hands. TJ dribbles a lot but he scores and forces a timeout cutting score 36-37.
  8. SGA splitting help on ball screens.
  9. Nesmith diving on floor for jump ball 40-42 2:19 in half.
  10. Dort flop with less than a minute in half.
  11. Dort hail Mary 10:37 48-52.
  12. That Dort can slide over to someone else makes it hard.
  13. Two turnovers in a row by TJ. Threes by OKC. 56-65.
  14. TJ big third quarter. Pacers trying to free him with a ball screen near half court and he gets trapped. 5 second violation 66-75 2:17 in third.
  15. Suffocating defense 8:27 68-89.
  16. 27-5 points off turnovers up 68-89.
  17. I feel irritated with the finger twirl.
  18. Wow, OKC out of timeouts with 4:11 left.

Best Commercials:

  1. State Farm Logo Commercial. Everything is easier from the logo. Sheboygan, WI!
  2. Progressive can’t protect you from becoming your parents.

Pacers Trivia Game Created by Google Gemini:

1. Question: Which legendary Boston Celtics player coached the Pacers to their first and only NBA Finals appearance in 2000?

2. Question: Who is the Pacers’ all-time franchise leader in blocked shots?

3. Question: Before moving to Gainbridge Fieldhouse (originally Conseco Fieldhouse), the Pacers played in what famously domed arena from 1974 to 1999?

4. Question: In the 1987 NBA draft, the Pacers famously selected Reggie Miller with the 11th pick. Which Indiana University star did many local fans want the team to draft instead?

5. Question: What was the well-known nickname of the 7’4″ center from the Netherlands, Rik Smits, who played his entire career with the Pacers?

6. Question: The Pacers acquired their current All-Star point guard, Tyrese Haliburton, in a major trade with which Western Conference team?

7. Question: During the Paul George era in the early 2010s, which Eastern Conference rival, led by LeBron James, eliminated the Pacers from the playoffs in three consecutive seasons (2012, 2013, 2014)?

8. Question: The number 529 is retired in honor of legendary ABA coach Bobby “Slick” Leonard. What does the number 529 signify?

9. Question: Who was the last Pacers player to win the NBA’s Most Improved Player award, doing so in 2018?

10. Question: Which player, known for his defensive prowess, won the NBA Defensive Player of the Year award as a Pacer in the 2003-2004 season?

Answer Key

  1. Answer: Larry Bird
  2. Answer: Myles Turner
  3. Answer: Market Square Arena
  4. Answer: Steve Alford
  5. Answer: The Dunking Dutchman
  6. Answer: The Sacramento Kings (in a trade for Domantas Sabonis)
  7. Answer: The Miami Heat
  8. Answer: His total number of wins as the Pacers’ head coach (a combination of ABA and NBA victories).
  9. Answer: Victor Oladipo
  10. Answer: Ron Artest (now Metta Sandiford-Artest)
Indiana Pacers Haliburton achilles NBA Finals

Thanks for checking out the website and this edition of the Torg Stories Podcast!

Pacers in NBA Finals, Worried about the Fever, and Reasons for Living in LA and Boone, NC

Welcome to the Torg Stories Podcast. On this episode we’re talking about the Pacers in the NBA Finals, deciding if we should worry about the Indiana Fever, and explaining why we live where we live: Boone and Los Angeles.

Click above to listen to audio only

We are also a video podcast. See window below:

Indiana Pacers Notes and Discussion Prompts:

From Game 1:

  1. I’ve been harping on how bad team’s sideline out of bounds plays have been. There was no timeout on Haliburton’s game winner. (same with Cleveland game winner)
  2. I texted you 19 turnovers in the first half but I was still hopeful because the game was still somewhat close. Ended with 24 to Thunder 6. Thunder ended with 16 more shots.
  3. With this team, you just keep watching if they are within 20.
  4. Pacers hit 18 threes to Thunder’s 11.
  5. Think these two teams are more even than thought before. Pacers probably won’t shoot that well but they also might not turn the ball over that much. Great chance Dort from OKC won’t hit 5 threes.

We read Ramona Shelburne’s ESPN article titled “Why Tyrese Haliburton’s superstar ascension actually began three years ago.” Click here for article.

  1. We have listeners who will say, I don’t watch the NBA. What would you tell them about Haliburton?
  2. There’s this quote from the article: “This season he has hit an astounding 13-for-15 game-tying or game-winning shots in the final two minutes of the fourth quarter or overtime — the best field goal percentage in a single season since play-by-play was first tracked in 1996-97, per ESPN Research.”
  3. It’s understood that if you take these shots, you’re going to miss plenty of them. The thing is to have the courage to keep taking them when you’ve missed. That’s not what is going on here.
  4. When do you first remember noticing Haliburton as an NBA player? For me, it was his appearance on JJ Reddick’s podcast, “Old Man and the Three.”
  5. From trainer Drew Hanlon: “The big quote that we always say is, ‘Sometimes being too unselfish is actually being selfish,'” Hanlen told ESPN Thursday night, as he waited for Haliburton by the Pacers family room in Oklahoma City. “When he’s unselfish, it actually negatively impacts his teammates’ success and negatively impacts his team’s success.The more aggressive he is, the more his team wins.”
  6. I’ve never given a player a goal of shots to take but it makes me think of a couple of high percentage – low volume shooters that maybe I could have done this for.
  7. Haliburton certainly doesn’t sound entitled. It sounds like he is self critical and needs to be pumped up occasionally.
  8. Think this is a good sign that Haliburton would say this after hitting the game winner: I know I was terrible. I made the shot and everything, but there’s a lot of room for improvement. I can be better.”

Haliburton is 13-15 from the field with a chance to tie or take the lead with 2 mins or less to go. From @pitlessball on X. Click here for video.

  1. Reminds me of this quote about LeBron from Rotella’s book How Champions Think:

“I did tell him that I thought he could benefit from one of the standard methods of sports psychology, visualization. I wanted him to see himself making three-point shots. I suggested that he ask the Cavaliers’ staff to make a highlight video for him, about eight to twelve minutes long. This video would be a LeBron James long-range shooting montage. It would have LeBron making threes off the dribble. It would show LeBron catching the ball and making threes spotting up. It could have some of LeBron’s favorite music in the background, helping him to attach the good feelings associated with that music to the act of shooting threes. He would watch it every night. As he fell asleep, he could conjure up images of himself making three-point shots against tall, quick, tenacious defenders. He could let them fill his dreams.”

Are we worried about the Indiana Fever?

  1. Can Clark get and stay healthy? The team was constructed really well around Clark but she hasn’t been able to play. She’s like Curry and Jokic to the Fever. Just not very good without her.

Fever vs. Chicago Skye Notes:

  • (1st ever prime time national network game)
  • Anne, you said no stars. Angel Reese isn’t a star? Reese leading rebounder in W.
  • Lexie, what is she from 3 in league?
  • Vandersloot injured.
  • Fever are a team without a point guard.
  • Up 21-13 at the quarter. Chicago doesn’t have basket makers including Reese and Cardoso.
  • Lexie Hull so much better than she used to be. Playmaking. Creating opportunities beyond stand and shoot.
  • Game in United Center.
  • Jordan Kent (play-by-play), Isis Young (analyst), and Tiffany Blackmon (sideline reporter).
  • So much traveling!
  • 41-28 at half. Ball popping better for the Fever. Seeing some of those extra passes that we’re used to with the Pacers.
  • Ball goes from being in someone’s hands most of the time to moving from player to player more quickly.
  • Team chemistry looks good.
  • McDonald, Clark’s replacement, will be gone.
  • Skye playing with two offensively unskilled bigs. Reese is Rodman, Gordan

Living on Purpose

I like to say I live in Boone, NC on purpose. You wanted to live in LA so much that you moved there without a job. Here are five reasons I live in Boone:

  1. Green Mountains Water: Something inside me that is moved the most when I see green, water, and mountains. It doesn’t something to me that wide open landscape of corn fields, the Rocky Mountains, or the Grand Canyon doesn’t do. I think sitting next to the ocean is a close second. Mountain River Water: I think Stackhouse Access and The Ledges on the French Broad River are the two places that first evoked that feeling. Now I regularly am regularly standing in the shallow water of the Watauga River at the Valle Crucis Park.
  2. College Town of Appalachian State
  3. Place other people come on vacation.
  4. The way 50 minutes in the woods can unwind tension.
  5. People are friendly, chill, and helpful. That was not my experience driving the Grand Central Parkway in Queens, NY.

Other notes:

  1. Anne went to see Phoenician Scheme.
  2. I bought Landman from Amazon.
  3. Anne was moved by the TikTok of the elephant rescuing the antelope. Click here to see video.
  4. Anne thought one of these pens looked a lot better than the other and the one she liked the best didn’t work.

Thanks for checking out this episode of the Torg Stories Podcast!

Trying to Enjoy the Victories, NBA Playoffs, and Ted Lasso Season 3, Episode 8

Thanks to the listeners who have recently read my novel Love on the Big Screen and took the time to write me about it. I appreciate you! Anne, the Kindle version is only $2.99!

News from my house:

-I did an enormous amount of weeding. Found and cooked some morel mushrooms. Classes are over at App State, and I’m collecting late work and final assignments. Mom has been going on a daily walk. She’s got a memoir book to fill out and Charlotte is coming home from college this week.

There has been some good feedback on people enjoying hearing about what we read and watch. Here’s what I read and watched last week:

  • read Kindle sample of Lorne (as in SNL Michaels) by Susan Morrison. Still might buy it. I did buy David Sedaris’s collection of essays titled Calypso. There are stories about Sea-Section NC beach house, Fit Bit walking, and his sister’s suicide.
  • watched the movie the Gray Man with Ryan Gosling. Made it to the end. Could use a cut of 15% of the fight and chase scenes. Really good little girl character. Billy Bob Thorton is in it too.
  • Started first episode of The Last of Us. Might stay with it a little longer on the treadmill and see how it goes.

The Big News of this Ted Lasso episode:

  1. There’s a massive internet hack of celebrities and an explicit video video that Keeley sent becomes public.
  2. Ted fears Michelle and Dr. Jake are going to get married.
  3. We get a lot of couples to start: Jack and Keeley, Michelle and Dr. Jake, Nate and Jade

Golden Lines from the Episode:

  1. You can’t worry about something that hasn’t happened yet. -Crimm to Ted (added: Find out before you flip out). This is during a Diamond Dogs meeting about Michelle and Jake. The Diamond Dogs are very much in the spirit of my Brothers in Pursuit college group.
  2. You should enjoy your victories. -Jade to Nate

5 Observations or Questions Related to NBA Playoffs

  1. I’ll name the NBA team and you say the first thing that comes to mind: Thunder, Nuggets, Clippers, Timberwolves, Cavaliers, Pacers, Knicks, Celtics, Warriors, Rockets
  2. Anne, you said the Clippers are your new team. Why them over Pacers?
  3. In each series, do you feel yourself rooting?

Let’s give Anne a chance to see if she can guess any of these NBA Playoff Stat Leaders:

  1. Points per game: Giannis 33, Brunson 31.5, Tatum 31.3
  2. Rebounds per game: Giannis 15.4, Jokic 11.6, Sengun 11.5
  3. Assists: Haliburton 11.6, Jokic 10.1, Harden 9.1
  4. Blocks per game: Holmgren 2.8, Edey 2.5, Turner (IND) 2.2
  5. Three point field goals per game: Gary Trent 4.4, Steph Curry 4.2, Fred VanVleet 4.0
  6. Free throws per game: Tatum 9.2, Giannis 8.8, Luka 8.2
  7. Minutes played per game: Murray 42.1, Anunoby 42.0, Luka 41.6.

Ted Lasso Season 3, Episode 8 titled “We’ll Never Have Paris”(a few more items to potentially discuss)

  • Nate has a meeting. Calls it the Love Hounds to talk. Disco has been divorced 3x. Other guy says to insult her. An Oscar Wilde quote:
  • Roy says he’s sorry and then ruins it.
  • Ted, Beard, and Henry go to West Hamm.
  • Jack says Keeley is her friend.
  • The story behind “Hey Jude.”

In 1968 the longest song to ever reach number one on the Billboard charts was Paul McCartney’s epic “Hey Jude”—clocking in at seven minutes and twelve seconds. The song was written to soothe John Lennon’s son Julian amid his parent’s divorce. Click here for Wikipedia entry.

  • Michelle tells Ted Dave Grohl learned to play drums on pillows.
  • Henry no dap for Dr. Jacob. Michell no kiss. She looks up to see if Ted is watching her go.
image produced with Google Gemini and Words Added by Canvas

Podcast: The Stories People Tell You, NBA Playoffs, and the NBA Playoff Player Pyramid

It’s Sunday, May 7 and welcome to the Torg Stories Podcast. I’m here with my sister Anne and we’ve got more stories to tell, we’re going to go over the NBA playoff picture and we’re going to update our NBA Playoff Player Pyramids. Anne, happy Sunday night podcast!

Bill’s Playoff Pyramid as of 5/7/23
Click above to listen to audio podcast.

The idea for starting off tonight is to come up with some criteria for evaluating the stories people tell you. So if you and I are in the car driving up from Charlotte or I’m at App State waiting for a meeting to start, let’s think about that situation and come up with some criteria for evaluating the story.

Grading / Evaluating Stories:

  1. Purpose – to entertain, to inform, to move emotionally, to elicit sympathy or support. (the opposite: why do people seem to tell us things? for company, to have someone to talk to, to fill up silence)
  2. Pacing
  3. Choice of details

Our stories:

  1. Anne : a car trouble story
  2. Bill: a North Miami coaching story

Let’s grade/evaluation our stories. How do we like our criteria?

NBA Playoff Update. Anne, take us through it. My observations:

  1. Jokic. One of the least complaining superstars. Very difficult to guard him 1v1 and one of the best passers in the game which makes him hard to double.
  2. Suns: Booker still getting it done. Durant a level below. They aren’t putting them together in actions, such as staggers. I see what people mean about Ayton. I think it’s just motor, conditioning, and focus. Lots of players like that. Think KD is trending up.
  3. Warriors vs. Lakers: I hadn’t thought about how small the Warriors are. Didn’t know Wiggins is among the most athletic in the NBA. Warriors gotta come back to figuring out how to get Curry open.
  4. Heat. Jimmy is still doing it. Bam is trending up for the Heat. I don’t see how the Knicks do it if everyone in the series stays healthy.
  5. Celtics have more dudes.
Anne’s player playoff pyramid

Playoff pyramid notes:

  1. Top scorers still in the playoffs: Booker 36.9, Butler 34.4, Curry 30.6
  2. Top three pointers made still in playoffs: Curry 4.7, Klay 4.3, Harden 3.3, Tatum 3.1 (Harden has worst % of those but still 36% which everyone would be happy for)
  3. Free throw attempt leaders: Butler 10 a game, Embiid 8.8, Durant 8.4
  4. Rebounds: Jokic 14.3, Looney 14.1, Davis 13.9, James 10.3
  5. Assists: Jokic 9.0, Harden 8.0, Draymond 7.6
  6. Steals: Booker 2.1, Brunson 1.8
  7. Blocks: Davis 4.1, Embiid 3.2, Horford 2.0

Thanks for listening everyone. Have a good week!

Down on Disney, NBA / NFL Standings, and White Lotus Episode 4

Down on Disney, a peek at the NFL and NBA Standings, and White Lotus season 2, episode 4 are the topics on this November 27, 2022 Episode of the Torg Stories Podcast.

Click audio file above to listen to the podcast.

Relevant Links to today’s podcast:

  1. NFL Playoff picture click here.
    • The Jets roll with a new quarterback.
    • Bengals recover nicely after a terrible start.
  2. NBA Standings click here.
    • Celtics best record in the league. Pacers in 4th place?!!!
  3. NY Times article “Iger’s Sudden Return to Disney Shocks a Discontented Kingdom” by Brooks Barenes, Benjamin Mullin, and James B Stewart click here.
    • Eye-popping losses in streaming. Lower-than-expected theme park profitability. Sharp challenges in cable television, including at ESPN.
  4. White Lotus Season 2 Cast and Characters click here.
    • “My whole life has been one long distraction.”

Watch this video to see how to rate and review the podcast:

https://videopress.com/v/YyzYOQvV?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=true

Enjoy the podcast? Use the podcast icon on an iPhone to rate and review. See the video above.