The world wanted a LeBron James versus Giannis Antetokounmpo matchup. Instead, they got something a lot better: Kentavious Caldwell-Pope versus Brook Lopez. Who even wants a matchup between two of the most popular superstars in the league? I didn’t, and I bet the people who paid tons of money for tickets to this game didn’t either. KCP vs Blopez, on the surface, doesn’t seem to have much drawing power, but don’t forget that these dudes were teammates last year. So there’s that.
Caldwell-Pope was basically the reason the Lakers were in this game at all. Every time he went on one of his little runs, the Lakers closed the gap, but when he wasn’t scoring, the Bucks pulled way ahead again. They got within 5 after his last triple, and then lost by 15 because he only took one more shot after that. Sure, the Bucks were trying to defend him in a way that they probably weren’t in the first half, but you gotta get your guy more than a single shot in that kind of situation. That’s when a good coach would draw up some plays. Puke Faulton’s play of “give the ball to Stephen Curry” doesn’t work when Stephen Curry isn’t on the team.
I admit, Caldwell-Pope’s scoring antics in the first half, 23 points worth, had me pretty flustered. I even unironically uttered the words “why do scrubs always go off on us”. Just kidding, I would never say such a thing, because I know that the nature of the NBA makes it so that scrubs are always going off, every night, multiple times against multiple teams. I’ve got 1900 vids of scrubs going off on my channel from this year alone, if you needed more proof.