#i hope king at least gets to shoot his shot with the wizards. as a treat--

[dent-de-leon]

did....did Taliesin really say that, "in an ideal world" (had he lived long enough) Molly would've romanced Caleb--as well as the rest of the Nein? Was that real?? Because my god.....

Kingsley still has a chance to romance his Magic Man (is he a little bit in love with all of the Nein, like Molly was?? Would he flirt with Essek too, or Jester and Fjord maybe??) Can't believe Tealeaf got resurrected again and has one more chance to live the dream--

[lyranova]

🙇Julius

100 Follower Event!

Of course anon! I’m so sorry this took so long! I hope you like it and I apologize the ending isn’t very good but I tried my best 😅. I hope you all enjoy it!

Taglist: @simpingforthisonedeer

Word Count: 1,137

Warnings: None

——-

Marx sighed as he listened to the couple in the next room arguing. Well, debating more like. Anytime Julius and Y/N argued it sounded more like a debate than an actual argument. But it was still annoying to listen to, especially since that seemed to be all you two did here lately. Between the Royals breathing down Julius’s neck and Y/N’s family breathing down their neck for some reason, it was starting to put a strain on the two of them and their relationship. Marx jumped slightly as he suddenly heard someone slam their hands down onto a desk, he frowned curiously, what could possibly be going on in there?

“ Why don’t you ever listen to me and my ideas?” Y/N asked in a raised tone, they weren’t quite yelling but were almost at that point. Anytime Y/N would come up with an idea for a magic item or for a way to bring commoners and nobles together Julius shot it down or had some argument at the ready.

“ I do listen to your ideas Y/N! I’m just trying to help-.” Julius began before they cut him off.

“ No you’re not! You’re shooting them down without even a second thought, you dismiss them and only listen to my ideas because you think that it’ll placate me!” Y/N shouted, hurt in their voice before they turned around and stomped out of the room before Julius could stop them.

“ Wait-!” He called but they had already slammed the door shut. Julius sighed and leaned back in his chair, he loved listening to Y/N’s ideas, he always thought they were creative and imaginative, but right now he had so many people breathing down his neck asking for one thing or another that he couldn’t really concentrate on their thoughts and ideas.

“ S-Sir?” Marx called sheepishly before peering around his office door and looking at Julius, he looked hesitant before he noticed Y/N had gone. He let out a small sigh of relief before fully walking into the room and coming to stand beside Julius’s desk. “ Is everything alright?”

“ No, everything is not alright.” Julius said with a sigh before pinching the bridge of his nose, he glanced at the blue haired young man before frowning in thought. “ Marx, may I ask you something?”

“ Of course sir.” Marx said quickly, he watched the Wizard king stand and walk over to one of the windows that overlooked the Capital.

“ Am I...hm...am I being dismissive of Y/N and their ideas?” He asked softly, he looked back over to the young man and saw his face held a mixture of emotions.

“ May I be honest?” Julius nodded, of course Marx could be honest with him. That's what Julius counted on was Marx’s absolute honesty.

“ Then yes I believe you have, at least recently.” Marx told him firmly, he had been in the middle of the couples ‘debates’ many times and usually Julius was either distracted with something else or he wasn’t paying much attention. Julius nodded and bit his bottom lip in thought.

“ How do you think I should fix this?” He asked, the blue haired man blinked for a moment before his eyes narrowed. Julius knew how to fix this rift, and they both knew it, but apparently he wanted to hear Marx say it as well.

“ You need to apologize firstly, and then listen to Y/N’s ideas, actually listen to them. They’re amazing and very innovative.” Marx said with a firm nod, Julius smiled, that’s exactly what he wanted to hear, and what he had already planned on doing.

“ I agree. Thank you for your help Marx, I don’t know what I’d do without you.” Julius said cheerfully before walking out of his office. “ Oh, do you mind finishing that paperwork for me? Thanks!” He threw over his shoulder before walking out of the room. Marx sighed and shook his head. Some things would never change.

——

Y/N sighed as they sat down in a chair outside, they were trying to calm down and going outside usually helped. But at the moment it wasn’t. They were completely irritated with Julius and his antics, why couldn’t he listen to them just this once? That’s all Y/N was asking, they wanted to help Julius change the Kingdom for the better. But how were they supposed to do that when he wouldn’t listen? They sighed before suddenly feeling someone's eyes on them, when they turned to look they saw Julius standing there with an apologetic look on his face.

“ I’m sorry Y/N.” He said almost immediately as he came over and sat across from them. They frowned at Julius and crossed their arms.

“ For what?” They asked with a raised eyebrow.

“ For not listening to you, for dismissing you, for being distracted and letting all the stress get to me. I shouldn’t be doing those things. Instead I should be lifting you up, encouraging you, telling you how amazing your ideas are, and giving you critiques and feedback if it’s warranted.” Julius sighed before looking down at the ground. “ I’ve been a terrible boyfriend, please forgive me.” He looked back up at Y/N with a ‘puppy dog’ look, his purple eyes wide and pleading, he knew they were unable to resist this look.

“ You haven’t been a terrible boyfriend. We’re both just stressed and we’re taking it out on each other instead of working through it like we should. I apologize as well, for saying all those things to you.” Julius quickly waved Y/N’s apology away.

“ It’s ok! I know you were just getting your frustration out. But,” suddenly Julius turned serious. “ you’re right we shouldn’t be taking our stress out on each other. So let’s make a deal, the next time one of us is stressed and it’s beginning to be too much we tell each other. We listen, we talk it over, and we try to get through it. If we are unable to for whatever reason, then we bring Marx in to be our mediator. Deal?” Julius suddenly stuck out his hand, a bright smile on his face. Y/N couldn’t help but smile as well, they grasped his hand in theirs.

“ Deal.” Before they knew what had happened Julius tugged on their arm and pulled them in to a kiss. It was soft, sweet, gentle, and full of love. When they parted Julius rested his forehead against theirs and smiled.

“ I love you with all my heart Y/N, I’m so sorry for my behavior.” They shook their head before placing another small kiss on his lips.

“ I love you too, and I forgive you. But please don’t apologize anymore when it wasn’t just your fault, ok?”

——

Ah i apologize this isn’t very good but I hope you all enjoyed 🥺💕! Thanks for reading and I hope you all have a good day~!

[kindofinprogress]

Part 2 to A little nerve(ous)

I originally planned for this to be three parts. But I'm not so sure anymore!

Read part one here

Harry sat at the dinner table with a heavy sigh. He could do nothing more tonight than watch a Weasley family dinner play out in front of his glazed over eyes. It had been a long day of meetings he had no business in- but everyone needed his input at the ministry these days. As if he wasn’t a drop out 17-year old. As if they hadn’t spent the better part of the last three years dragging him through the mud. Harry spent a lot of time letting his mind wander during these meetings. Much like he was now- committing the names of the Fallen Fifty to memory, wondering if there could have been a better way, if any of the deaths could have been avoided, how anyone could see him as a hero, what he was supposed to do next.

“Wanna go for a walk, mate?”

Ron’s deep voice shook Harry out of his trance-like state. The silence that followed was absolutely deafening. Where had everyone gone?

“Huh?”

“Erm… Dinner finished around 15 minutes ago. You’ve been a bit out of it for a while.”

Harry cleared his throat and made to get up with his dish (still full of food) in hand. “Right. Sorry. I should-”

Ron took the plate out of Harry’s hand and set it back on the table “You should come have a walk with your best mate.”

All Harry could do was nod his head and follow Ron. He felt simultaneously completely void of thought and full to the brim with it.

It was a while before Ron spoke again.

“Feels nice, doesn’t it? The breeze. I bet spending all those hours underground at the ministry aren’t doing you any good.”

“Right. Because we certainly haven’t had our fair share of nature and the outdoors over the last year.” Harry recoiled a bit at his own response. That was much too harsh with no reason. “Godric. Sorry, mate.”

“S’alright. It was funny.” Ron said, putting a large hand on Harry’s shoulder and shooting him a kind smile.

Harry felt a bit embarrassed at how nice it felt to have Ron’s hand on his shoulder. There was a time when physical affection was so foreign to him it’d made him uncomfortable. But being a plus one at the Weasley’s had meant having to go from deflecting touch to at least bearing it pretty fast. By fifth year he’d even welcomed Molly’s hugs, Bill and Mr. Weasley’s strong and lengthy handshakes, Ron’s hand on his shoulder, the twin’s ruffling of his hair, Ginny’s… A sigh escaped him at the thought of her. Ron must’ve known what was on his mind because he let her know Ginny was inside still, helping Hermione do some washing.

“But I’m sure she’d be up for a little after hours flying if you wanted me to get her? Or I could leave you two-” he started to suggest, with a raised eyebrow.

“Ron.”

“Oh as if time alone with my little sister isn’t exactly what you want.”

“I… No.”

Ron shot him a questioning look. “No?”

“Ugh. Not ‘no’. But… No.”

“Yeah, I’m not following mate.” Ron’s walking had stopped, he was leaning on a large boulder with his arms crossed. Harry noticed how far they’d walked from the Burrow. He wondered if they were still within the protective barriers. They should turn around. Had he even brought his wand? Was it too late for someone to be creeping around?

“Should we head back?”

Harry had only seen the expression which took over Ron’s face exactly three times before. Once, when Hermione revealed Krum had invited her to visit him over the summer, once when the pair of them had caught Ginny and Dean snogging in an abandoned corridor, and lastly when Ron had caught him kissing Ginny in her bedroom last summer. The look that said he wanted nothing more than to punch a bloke.

“What are you playing at?”

“I just think we should stick closer to the house-”

“About Ginny, you daft monkey!”

“It’s complicated, Ron.”

“No… it’s not. It’s really not, Harry. You pined after her at Hogwarts, you dumped her seconds after you finally got her- don’t interrupt me with your excuses. You pined after you dumped her, and, and… all that in the forest? Pouring over that bloody map day in and day out? The ‘If I come out the other end of this’ speech you gave me? What the hell, Harry?”

Harry’s lips formed into a thin line- keeping everything in he wanted to blurt out. About how much he missed her still. About how he couldn’t keep asking her to wait around for him. About how much better she deserved than a killer. He turned around and started walking faster than necessary toward the lit house. But there it was again seconds later- that huge hand on his bloody shoulder. Harry was tall but Ron had always had a bit on him. He should’ve known better than to think his friend couldn’t match his stride. Harry stopped and stared up at the sky. All that damned vastness. He kicked at the stump near them once, twice, and again and again and again until Ron had him by both shoulders and was steering him toward the pond- muttering something about going a round with a whomping willow.

Harry splashed a handful of water on his face and layed on the earth. Looking up once more at all the vastness up there. It didn’t take long for Ron to join him. Part of Harry thought he might care how silly they must look- two grown men laying side by side like that near a pond. He quickly waved this away though. There was a moment not long ago he and his mate had shared next to a much larger body of water, on a much colder and darker night that bonded them in a way probably not many people could understand. He’d always known Ron- but seeing a man's insecurities played out like Harry had witnessed- It allowed him to understand Ron better than ever.

“You don’t want to be with her anymore then? Think it all just got a bit much? You two seemed rather cozy before-”

“Before I got swept up into being a ministry troll.” He sighed again. “I miss her like you wouldn’t believe.”

“A little ball of light that sounded like Hermione floated into my heart and led me right back to her, remember? I think I know what you mean, mate.”

They laughed at that. Probably the first time Harry had laughed in days… or weeks.

“Yeah, alright. You might get it, then.”

Ron was quiet this time- not pressing him for more but knowing more would come.

“She deserves better.”

“I reckon you’re right. Ginny certainly deserve someone who’ll give her the time of day.”

“I haven’t been that cold.”

“Yeah, mate, you kind of have. This is the first night you’ve been home early enough for dinner in two weeks and you barely glanced at her. I only suggested getting her earlier because it’s been a while since I saw you two strolling around back here.”

Harry groaned and put his hands over his eyes, knocking his glasses backward onto his head. It had been a while. Too long. Godric.

“She does though, you know? Deserve someone better. I can’t give her… I don’t know. A normal life. Normal… happiness.”

“What the hell are you on about, mate?”

“Think about it. I can only travel by restrictive floo right now otherwise I get bombarded with cameras- remember all the gossip at Hogwarts? Imagine that but instead it’s all of Wizarding Britain. I’m as good as being treated like an auror nevermind I never trained or passed any N.E.W.T exams- It’s like you said, this is the first night I’ve been home for dinner in weeks, Ron. And I completely blew her off even though I miss her so much it feels like she’s as far as the moon sometimes.” Harry blushed and stole a glance at Ron, surprised a bit by his declaration.

Harry groaned.

“And it’s not just that, Ron.” A silence that beckoned more from his end met him in response. “How am I ever supposed to look her in the face and tell her the very same dark magic that allowed Tom Riddle to torture her for a year was inside me all along? How could she ever forgive me for Fred-” Harry felt a knot form at his throat. “How did I ever think I could soothe that pain away, knowing he was only in harm's way because of me?” Harry waited for Ron to say something. Anything. But nothing came and so his mind whirred with thoughts of Ginny and he sat there with nothing more to say. He really did miss her, his Ginny. No. Not his Ginny. Ugh.

“Hey.”

He looked up at Ron, who was sitting and staring down at him now.

“Remember fifth year, when Ginny talked to you about her being possessed and all? Really got through, didn’t it? I think… I think 11 year old Ginny could have really used that too. But there was no one around to give that to her. We all just kind of watched her seal all that away and couldn’t do anything about it because well, what did we know? I think… if anyone could understand the full story of the last year, the prophecy-doing things you didn’t want to do, the horcruxes, Kings Cross- everything. And take it in without judgement or.. Or fear or whatever you think they might, I think it’s Ginny.”

Harry wondered how true these words might be. He could only hope they were, even a little bit.

“So listen, you can sit around like a zombie and keep yourself away from… shit, from living your own life the way you want to for the first time ever or you can bloody get up and do something. Where’s that gryffindor bravery? Only let it out to defeat dark wizards? Not to talk to the girl you fancy? Bloody pathetic, mate.”

Harry and Ron allowed themselves to laugh full belly laughs again. They sat there staring at each other then back up at the stars again for a while after their laughter died off. Eventually, Harry got up first and after offering Ron a hand up, they walked back to the Burrow and Ron went up to bed while Harry poured himself a tea and sat out on the back porch by himself for a bit, enjoying the breeze.

[drawlfoy]

The Wonders of Ohio P.5

masterlist (check here for parts 1-4!) request guidelines

pairing: draco x reader

request: from 14 year old me babey

warnings: cringe, mentions of drug use, mentions of sex, language, and just bad writing

summary: y/n is in her senior year of high school when she is asked to take on an exchange student from britain that’s a little...different. this is NOT a nonmagic AU. draco is still a wizard and this will become and integral part of the story shortly.

a/n: heyyyy everyone. i graduated from high school this week and i’m posting this as my happy-one-year-to-me. as some of you may know, i posted my very first fic on this day a year ago. i’m really happy to see how i’ve grown since and i’m so lucky to have shared this with all of you. anyways, nittygritty--

this part is really the last slow exposition chapter. chapters 6 on will be a whole whirlwind beginning with homecoming and i hope that you guys are willing to stick around. i promise itll be worth the wait. y/n is going to get the story arc of a lifetime and also please do not hate heather she is just going through it ok 

anywayssssssss

tags tags tags  @gruffle1 @missmulti @cleopatera @hahaboop @accio-rogers @geeksareunique @eltanin-malfoy @war-sword @cams-lynn @itsivyberry @ayo-cowbelly @nerd-domland @erisdogwood @loveissupernatural

word count: 4.6k (;))

song recs: 

strawberry blonde -- mitski 

in your neighbors garden -- mimi bay

wishes -- beach house

ode to artifice -- samia 

pink in the night -- mitski

enjoy <3

The seatbelt buckle scorched the side of Y/N’s exposed neck as she turned to face the disheveled blonde in the passenger seat.

“Do I need to teach you to set an alarm?” 

Draco let out a huff. “Stop. Do you have a….a comb, or a brush, or something here?” His hands looked abnormally fidgety. Their actions were shaky, varying from patting his pockets to running through his hair. He seemed more and more frustrated each time his hands left his pockets empty. 

How curious Y/N thought as she racked her brain for any remembrance of putting a brush in her car. It was always a mess, and she honestly couldn’t blame Draco for assuming that anything could be in there.

“I don’t think there’s one here,” said Y/N, trying to sound at least a little sympathetic despite the fact that his tardiness had them 10 minutes late. “You can look around if you want, king.”

“What’d you call me?” His voice was suddenly sharp and awake.

Y/N rolled her eyes so hard that she thought they’d get stuck in the back of her head. “You don’t--ok. It’s a joke. You can call guys here that.”

“And it means that I’m…?”

“It means I’m acknowledging that you exist, I guess. It’s not like it has a strict negative or positive connotation. Like, I can say ‘Ok king’ to any man telling me something and it can either be sarcastic, or it can be because I don’t know what else to say and just want to let him know I heard him.”

Draco’s eyes looked a tad glazed over when Y/N dared a glance in his direction.

“I know it’s confusing. I’m sorry. I’ll try and ease you into the world of American slang.” 

He granted her a little “uh-huh” before opening up the glovebox with great difficulty and rummaging through the mess. Y/N would’ve felt more embarrassed about the tampon that fell on the ground in the process if he seemed like he actually knew what it was. 

Her attention turned back to the road as Draco continued to sift through things. Y/N couldn’t help but wonder if there was anything embarrassing hidden away in the corners of her car--after all, it hadn’t been organized since the beginning of summer--and decided that it was better to pretend it wasn’t happening.

It wasn’t the eerie silence that eventually prompted her to turn to look his direction--no, it was the weird energy in the car, like the feeling right before a thunderstorm. All the hair raised on her arms, and she shivered...but it was stifling hot in the car.

“Oh, did you find a brush?” she asked. His hair laid as perfectly as always, but his hands were lying shaking in his lap, palms to the sky. No hairbrush was in sight.

“Er... “ He was paler than usual, which was quite the feat for someone who looked like a ream of paper. “No. Just remembered a trick my father taught me.”

She tensed at the mention of his father--the very first time Draco had done so. “Oh. Okay. Glad you got it figured out, king.”

Her voice lightened on the last word, hoping she could coax a little smile out of him. 

“Don’t call me that.”

“Ok.”

oOo

 There were many things Y/N thought she understood, but Draco Malfoy being in her Physics C class was not one of them. She took pity and sat next to him as he fumbled his way through the first lecture. His notes, while neat, were littered with crossed out portions and question marks. 

You do know there’s an eraser on your pencil, right? she jotted on a note that she sent his way. His brow furrowed and he seemed to tap at the end of the eraser for just a few moments before deciding otherwise and xing out another practice problem he’d done incorrectly. Symbols that she’d never seen before were scattered all throughout his notes. 

Maybe the UK kids just learn stuff differently.

By the time that Physics came to an end, Y/N was eager to get away from the storm cloud that was brewing over Draco’s perfectly smoothed and infuriatingly pretty moonbeam colored hair. The amount of attention he was getting from all the other girls made Y/N want to jump off a cliff--suddenly everyone was her “best friend” “just wanting to check up on what happened over summer”. She was grateful to see the face of Lizzy, grinning and looking mischievous during their break period.

“You must be Draco,” said the redhead, a glint in her eyes. He looked a little scared.

“Er...yeah.”

“Mind giving us some privacy? Y/N and I have some urgent matters to discuss,” she continued, looking him up and down. Y/N attempted to ignore the twist in her gut as she watched him swallow and nod, turning away to go brood elsewhere. Once he was out of sight, Lizzy grabbed her arm and yanked her into the girl’s bathroom.

“It’s so funny how he’s following you around like a lost puppy,” Lizzy said. “Also, he’s gorgeous. If you don’t at least try to get some of that, then I’m never trusting your judgement again.”

“But, Li-”

“The boy’s a fucking walking Wattpad story cover. Dark, tragic past, unbelievably sharp jawline, rich parents, exotic accent....honestly, Y/N, I don’t know what else you could want.” 

“Mom literally called him my host brother,” said Y/N. The bathroom was starting to smell suspiciously like cotton candy. “That’s wrong. On so many levels.” 

“But you’re not related!”

“But it’s gross! And predatory! The kid doesn’t even know how to do basic algebra! I’m all he has!” 

Lizzy’s eyebrow found its new home in the middle of her forehead. “You’ve gone absolutely batty if you think that every girl cursed with attraction to men in Cincinnati wouldn’t jump his skin at the chance. Use your head, queenie. He’s not alone. Shoot your shot.”

Y/N opened her mouth to serve back a retort--that was definitely there, thank you very much--but decided against it once she realized that the bathroom had become dead silent. “Um...maybe we can go over this later.” She flickered her eyes over to the line behind them that was now intently hanging on their every word. “I forgot I had to talk to the counselor.”

Lizzy was smirking as they exited the bathroom and began the search for Draco. It didn’t take long--the circle comprised of Heather and her friends was more than enough of a giveaway that he was about. 

“Draco, sorry to make you wait,” Y/N called out. It took all her effort to abstain from cringing as her voice rang out across the group. Heather turned to send her a big smile.

“Hey Y/N! You didn’t tell me that Draco was from London!” 

“He’s not,” she responded. “He’s from Wiltshire.” 

“Wiltshire. Of course. That’s what I meant.”

Draco’s smile was tense as he looked down at Heather--who stood roughly 4 inches below him--but he was smiling, and that wasn’t something that Y/N was on the receiving end of frequently. She didn’t know whether to be offended or relieved.

“I’m sure. Break’s almost over, Draco. I can show you where the English department is before the time is up.” 

 He paused, looking down at the blonde grinning up at him. “Er, actually, Heather already offered to show me around for the rest of the day.”

“Yeah, for sure. I’ll see you in French.”

Y/N was shocked at the sheer amount of jealousy that rose up in her throat as she turned away and made her way to Art History---the only class Y/N and Draco didn’t share. The walk was strange. Being in solitude after having a gloomy British boy attached to her hip was understandably eerie. Because that’s all it was. Adjustment. Nothing else.

She settled in at a table full of her friends, namely Sylvia. The tall girl was always a bit whimsical, but Y/N found that she was a breath of fresh air compared to everyone else. It made sense that Sylvia would take Art History--her dark academic inspired aura and the perpetually hot mug of black coffee just screamed history nut. 

“How’s your new brother?” she asked after the teacher had taken attendance. “I say that because I haven’t heard his name yet.”

“Ick, it’s gross to think of him as my brother,” Y/N responded. “And I know! We need to catch up. I’m sorry about not talking to you for a bit. The time difference was a bit weird during your trip.”

“It’s ok, I get it. I was away on family business, anyways. I didn’t expect you to spend your days staying up until the wee hours of the night to tell me all about your exchange student. Anyways. His name?”

“You’re gonna scream when you hear it, Vie,” she said. “Draco Malfoy. It’s so posh. You have no idea. It definitely suits him, though. He’s very...You good?” 

Sylvia’s olive toned face looked a bit paler than usual. “Yeah. Yeah, I just remembered that I forgot to take the trash out this morning. I’ll have to text my mom about it.” She adjusted the wool cardigan that hung around her shoulders and came up looking composed. “Draco, huh? His parents must hate him.”

“At the very least! He’s so rude. And uptight. I can’t tell if it’s just a Brit thing or if it’s because he’s an asshole.” 

Sylvia laughed. “I mean, when I was there over the summer, it was a different culture for sure. We’re by far louder. But I didn’t meet many mean ones. You must’ve just got a bad apple, then.”

“I guess so. He is pret--”

“Ladies, is there something you’d like to share with the rest of the class?”

“No, Mrs. Jensen,” Sylvia and Y/N said in unison. 

oOo

“Thoughts, king?” 

“I told you not to call me that.” Draco glared at her as he tried to open the passenger side door to find that it was locked tight. “Unlock? Please?”

“And I told you not to get cozy with ASB kids, yet here we are,” said Y/N as she slotted the key into the lock and turned. 

“What’s it to you?”

“Nothing. I’m just looking out for you.” She slammed the door shut and threw her bag in the bag. The line of traffic to get out of the school was long and stuffy, and she was eager to just get it over with.

The wait was so hot that Draco peeled off his stupid formalish jacket that was on thin ice of being called a blazer and probably worth more than her car. Y/N tried to look away as his hair became slightly ruffled, but she couldn’t pry her eyes away. It was endearing, almost, how someone who could look so posh and serious could have ruffly hair--and hair that naturally light, too. She had asked him one night if it was dyed, and he scowled at her and told her the grammatically correct term was dead, and that his hair was alive, just like the rest of him, thank you very much. She dropped it. 

Y/N finally rolled down her window after the AC simply refused to satisfy her, and the wind was a nice reminder to keep in her own lane. Draco was beautiful. There was no other way to put it. He had a feel of power to him, like he was capable of anything but just held it back. But he was just as inaccessible as he was pretty, and there was nothing she could do about that.

“Y/N?” He asked after a few moments of sitting in silence. “What’s Homecoming?” 

“Who told you about that?” 

“Heather. She asked if I had a date. Is that like a ball here?”

“She asked you if you had a date on the first day?”

“Yeah.”

“Fuck. ASB kids never do sleep, huh.” 

“What?”

“Homecoming isn’t a ball. It’s like a...an…” Y/N paused as she saw Draco raise his eyebrows. “It’s, like, uh….Well I guess it is like a ball. An American one, though. Way less extravagant. It’s an excuse to get dressed up and run around the city. There technically is a dance, and all the ASB kids have to go, but literally no one else does but the underclassmen. Normally I go out with my friends and a date to somewhere fun and take pictures. And then get trashed afterwards.”

“Classy,” said Draco. “I think you can go now.”

A honk behind her emphasized his point as the space in between her and the car in front widened substantially. 

“Thanks. Anyways, it’s not really a big deal. I’d suggest not going with Heather so you can skip out on the dance portion. Or if you want to go with her, get her to come with us into Cincinnati because I am not going to spend my last homecoming watching a grind circle.” 

“A...what circle? And I don’t want to go with her.”

The relief Y/N felt was embarrassing. “Um...better if you don’t worry about it. You have a long time to figure it out anyways.”

He seemed satisfied with that answer, propping his elbow up on the center console. The pristine button up he was wearing had ridden up, exposing the pale skin and the bottom of the tattoo she had seen a hint of earlier. “Do you have a date?”

“Um. No, not yet. I don’t think anyone except for couples do yet. We have until the end of this month to figure it out, so I’m not too worried about it.”

He nodded as Y/N’s car finally left the school parking lot and began picking up speed. 

“I’m assuming you had balls? At your posh boarding school?” 

“Er…” Draco ran his hand through his hair, ruffling it further. “We only had one. It was when I was 14. We called it the Yule Ball.”

“Why only one?”

“It was for a special occasion. We had two other schools join us as well. It was quite a good time.”

“So every student only has one ball in their lifetime?”

“Of course not. Some of us--the ones from old families--have events like that regularly.”

“I’m sorry if this is overstepping my bounds,” began Y/N, noticing how he tensed up, “So you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. But, I’m just wondering, what is your family like?”

“What do you mean?”

“Like are they nice?”

“Oh.” The line in his forehead relaxed. “No. They wouldn’t like you.”

“Glad to hear it,” she said. “Do you like them?”

She heard the breath hitch in his throat. “I don’t know anymore.”

“I’m sure it’s hard to think about it when you feel like they’ve just shipped you off without anyone,” she added. “I’m really sorry, Draco. I know I’ve been a bit mean to you. I know that I’ll never be able to understand what you’re going through right now.”

The slight smile that spread across his face would’ve knocked her to her knees if she wasn’t already sitting down. “It’s okay. I wouldn’t expect you to understand.”

The silence that awaited them for the rest of the journey was comfortable.

oOo

School began to pick up the pace after the first few days. Y/N got into the swing of homework and her extracurricular workload. Draco was having a bit more difficulty, she presumed, but he’d never admit to it. She took pity one evening and gave him her laptop opened to a Khan Academy tab for Physics and was pleased to see that he showed up to class the next day with completed homework. He asked to borrow her laptop on a much more frequent basis after that. 

The routine they settled into had her heart leaping into her chest almost constantly--they’d eat breakfast together at the table, Y/N would try to ignore how pretty he looked across the table as they shared a pot of black tea (earl grey, which Y/N was thrilled to learn was his favorite as well), they’d get in the car, she’d write him notes in physics to help him (even though he never asked, he always smile and give a little shake of his head before unfolding them and intently staring at her writing), they’d drive home together and bitch about their French teacher, he’d retire to his room and do whatever pretty blonde Brits do in the afternoon, they’d meet unexpectedly at the same time in the late evening to have a final cup of tea, and then they’d go to bed and do it all over again. 

It was difficult for her to admit, but Y/N was falling very quickly for Draco. It was gross, and wrong, and manipulative, and completely against the code of conduct for exchange families, but she couldn’t help but spend her days fantasizing about how his gold-spun hair would feel as she ran her fingers through it or how gently she’d trace her fingers around the tattoo on the soft flesh of his forearm…

But Y/N knew those thoughts weren’t right. And they would go away. Eventually. 

“How’s it going?” Sylvia asked, effectively snapping her out of her thoughts. The Art History sub told them to go into independent study, whatever that meant. Y/N was not very good at either of those words.

“Pretty good. I can’t believe it’s been 3 weeks already,” she said. “It’s gonna be Halloween before we know it.”

“I can’t fucking waitttt,” said Sylvia. “I’m gonna be Wednesday Addams.”

“Again?”

“What else would I be? I get a new high collared black dress every year. It’d be a shame if it were going to go to waste. What are you gonna be?”

“One of the thousands of students finishing their UChicago ED app hours before the deadline.”

“You’re kidding. Can’t you just finish it the day before?”

“Where’s the fun in that? And, plus, I don’t have an idea as cool as Wednesday.”

Sylvia smirked as she opened up her planner and began to jot down something. “How’s Draco doing? I haven’t seen much of him lately. It seems like he never hangs out with us at break anymore.”

“Yeah, I ended up getting him connected with the Physics teacher. He’s getting tutored now. He thinks it’s all bullshit, but I don’t want to be the reason he doesn’t get into a good school.”

“Is that all you care about?” She smiled at Y/N. “Lizzy was telling me that you’re interested in him.”

“First of all, keep your voice down. Second of all, I’m not supposed to be, so I’m not.” Y/N hoped that the edge in her voice was convincing enough.

Her friend raised her eyebrows so dramatically that her glasses nearly slipped off her nose. “Y/N, who’s gonna hear about it. You guys are both going away at the end of the year anyways, and I’m sure he’s not going to be writing to his dear mum about his love life. If it’s consensual, there’s nothing wrong with it. I think it’d be good for both of you.”

“I see that, but let’s put me in his shoes right now.” Y/N shuffled in her seat and clasped her hands. “I’m rich. I’m British. I’m very hot. My parents throw extravagant balls for me and I kiss pretty girls that say water like ‘wota’. I’ve spent my life in silk and I only drink the finest teas. My family is so important that I had to be shipped off halfway across the world just to be safe. And now my incredibly expensive life has reached a peak because I’m sleeping with a random girl in Ohio that has run approximately 4 stop signs since I’ve met her.”

“You’re sleeping with Draco?” 

Y/N turned to see Lauren, a wide-eyed, obnoxious, but well meaning girl staring at her. She heard Sylvia stifle a laugh behind her. “No. I was kidding.” The smile that she followed with was awkward and showed way too many teeth. 

“Oh, okay,” said Lauren. “Do you know if he likes anyone?”

Sylvia’s smirk widened.

“No, actually, he’s a pretty private guy.” Y/N sent her another tense smile, and Lauren finally turned away.

“Jealous, huh?”

“Shut up, Vie. You know I wouldn’t go for him. Even if I had the chance.”

She just raised an eyebrow and smiled. 

The afternoon brought its own set of struggles. Their French teacher had blown up at another student who had been caught cheating on their last test, and it was all Y/N could do but hold back her snickers until they were out in the parking lot.

“I can’t believe they still managed to conjugate their cheat sheet wrong.” Y/N was gasping for breath as she unlocked the car door and threw her stuff inside. Draco was watching from the passenger seat, his lips in a soft upturn. “Can you imagine? Oh my god.”

He just shook his head and turned to look out the window, but she could see the smile slowly stretching across his face. “Ridiculous. You could totally tell Monsieur enjoyed it, too. I bet he gets off on making kids like Joey cry.”

“I had a teacher like that,” he started. “He was a Poti-a chemistry teacher.”

“Oh? Did he ever attack you?”

“No. He liked me. Family friends and all.”

“Ah. I almost forgot that your family was rich and influential. Thanks for the reminder.” She reached across and lightly punched his shoulder. His smile, though still remaining, seemed to shrink. “Hey, what’s that in your bag?” 

Y/N motioned to the cardstock peeking out of his nondescript black backpack that always seemed to fit more than it was meant to. She could make out a few words written in what looked like a bright red sharpie--something that did not exactly scream Draco Malfoy aesthetic.

He froze up. “Er. It’s from Heather. I think she called it a Homecoming ask?”

Y/N’s throat dried up to the point that no words would willingly make the climb from her diaphragm to her tongue; instead, she settled for giving him a little nod and what she hoped was a convincing smile.

“I told her I’d think about it,” he continued. “I remember you saying that the school dances sucked. So I let her know that I wasn’t sure yet.”

She nodded again. “Super cool. You can do whatever you want, though. You can come with my group if you’d like, but you’re welcome to go with Heather’s.”

“What? So you aren’t coming with me if I go with Heather?”

“Fuck no, dude. I don’t hate her, but I would way prefer to spend a night with my friends than some girl from my French class that only talks to me because she thinks you’re hot.” 

The expression Draco made reminded Y/N that he would never get comfortable with American girls calling him hot. “Ok. Have you found a date yet?”

“Chad from Econ asked me yesterday.”

“Is that why my seat was covered in glitter?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you going with him?” Draco’s hand was clenched tight in a fist in his lap.

“I think so,” said Y/N, steeling herself and deciding to just go for it. “But, of course, if you asked me I would say no to Chad. Just out of principle. I am supposed to be your tour guide, after all.”

The only parts of him moving were the few stray wisps of his hair being pushed around by the AC going. 

“But that’d be weird. I’d only expect you to take that up if you really didn’t want to go to the dance itself.” She swallowed and pulled out onto the main street, putting distance between them and the school. He was silent for a few moments. The quiet, normally comfortable between them, was stifling and strange. She pretended to ignore the way he was fiddling with his cuffs. 

“Yeah, it could be,” was all he said before slumping against the window and closing his eyes.

Mrs. Y/L/N was sitting at the head of the coffee table when the two arrived home, carding between a stack of letters in front of her. The mug of something--probably that new decaf blend she hadn’t stopped raving about--was sitting lopsided on a coaster, just barely about to topple off the edge. She looked like she hadn’t moved for hours, the novel she had been previously reading sat face down to preserve the spot next to her no doubt lukewarm drink.

“Hey Mom,” Y/N said as she set her keys down. “Anything good?”

She looked up, her expression morphing from startled to happy. “Other than the college brochures? Nothing, except...hm, what’s this?”

Her well manicured hand pulled at a crimson envelope, with sloping writing that seemed to shimmer in the light. 

To the Y/L/N Family, it read. The loopiness of the writing looked like it wiggled at the ends, but that had to be a trick of the light. It was dim in the kitchen during afternoons, after all. 

“It looks cool, open it u--”

“No!”

Draco’s voice had never sounded so loud as it did then as he lunged across the kitchen, snatching it out of her mother’s hand and clutching it to his chest. “Er, it’s for me. I recognize the handwriting.”

 “Cool, see you later,” said Y/N. She was up the stairs and slamming her door before either of her housemates could say another word. After the horrible embarrassment that was technically Draco’s rejection, she needed to be alone. 

Even burying her face into her pillow and squeezing her eyes shut didn’t keep the scenes from their car ride at bay. She had been so stupid, so stupid. Why did she even think he wanted that? He was her brother, after all. Oh god, does he think we’re all from Alabama or something?

She wallowed for a few more mournful minutes before deciding that she had to pick herself up and handle it like an adult. After all, she was going to be 18 in just a few months. There was no excuse for her to act like a child anymore. And, plus, it wasn’t like she couldn’t just play this off as a pity invite. Yes,that’s what she’d frame this as if he ever asked her about it again. She felt bad for him was all it was. 

Once satisfied with her internal dialogue, she rolled out of bed and made for the foyer where her bag was still on the table. She’d first walk on Legos barefoot before she had to let a stupid boy--especially one that didn’t know how to turn on their shower and had to ask for her help every time--come between her and her 4.0. Never.

Her thoughts were cut short, however, when she heard a new sound from his side of the hallway. She froze, listening closely. 

Draco was crying.

[haiky-u-lously]

King Kuroo and the Red Knights (1)

Summary: A Camelot AU where King Arthur is Kuroo Tetsuro, and the Knights of the Roundtable of characters from seasons 1-4 of the HQ anime. Eventual Kuroo X Reader. 

Themes: Fluff, Angst, Humor, Eventual Romance

Warnings: Mentions of stalking and abuse of power, Language, Angst in feelings, Eventual gore and fighting

Word Count: For Chapter: ~1800words 

Questions/Comments/Concerns/Ideas welcome as always. Enjoy! --Admin Red

Chapter 1: Preamble

The King sat upon his throne, regal in his attire but the entire kingdom knew by now how much time he spent to make sure his hair looked nice and kept. The crown surrounding the dark locks did not help the material weaved in to hold the hair in place, since the additional weight liked to move even the smallest strand which would of course affect the others.

King Kuroo’s golden eyes roamed over the documents an aide had just given him as he thought about what his next goal should be. 

He had finally managed to unite the territories surrounding Camelot and with his knights assistance, ruling the kingdom had become a breeze. Especially considering how disastrous his first few weeks as King had been. Thinking about that period, he realized that without his wife and best friends he would never have made it to a point where true peace prospered in his kingdom. He smiled to himself as he decided to treat them to a nice banquet to show how much he still appreciated them being in his life.

Finished thinking about his own life and immediate future, Kuroo reread the parchment in his hands, his eyes bulging as the words and their meaning connected in his mind.

Shooting up from his seated position, he threw his arms out and yelled towards the courier, “Does this parchment speak the truth?”

The plain looking man bowed deeply before affirming, explaining that he was told the letter contained urgent business for the King.

Once confirmed, Kuroo jumped in joy. “Futa!” He turned to his right hand man, and excitedly explained, “The Red Knights are coming to Camelot!”

Futakuchi’s eyes bulged in surprise at the King’s announcement. “No way…” He whispered as he recalled the stories of the Red Knights from sneaking around the castle’s library. “But, no one has heard of the Red Knights since they came and rejected your father’s rule 5 years into his term. Are you sure this isn’t some trick by some other nation?”

Kuroo rolled his eyes at Futakuchi’s comment, returning his gaze to the letter and a grin over taking his face once more. “I’m sure. My father had told me all the stories of the red knights, including what his letter said to prove it was them. This one says the same thing.” He jumped and squeezed the parchment between his hands. “Ah! This is so exciting! I actually get to meet the Red Knights! And! If they approve of my rule, we know this peaceful period will last! Don’t you understand how magnificent this is, Futa?”

Still skeptical, the retainer asked to read the letter himself, “My lord, at least let me read the letter myself. To confirm your words and to double check no spells were cast onto the parchment. I mean we wouldn’t want you to be blind sided because you were too busy acting like a drumstick to take necessary precautions with something this...big.”

The look Kuroo sent him caused Futakuchi to bend over in laughter.

“Did you just call me a drumstick?” He asked evenly.

Futakuchi just smiled, “Well I didn’t compliment you, that’s for sure.”

“Why, you little!” Kuroo yelled as he stepped and then chased after his friend. The pair racing around the throne room until the King gave up and popped back into his seat, “Now look what you did. My hair is all messed up again. Yuurei is going to be so upset.”

“Ah, let her.” Futakuchi said without missing a beat, as he walked up to and grabbed the letter from his King. He read over the words scribbled down and smiled to himself, “It seems you aren’t a complete plothole, your highness. The Red Knights really are sending a representative to Camelot.” He continued reading and then his eyes shot out again and his face took on a serious look. “They are going to be here in a week’s time? What the heck! Did they head out the day after sending this letter? That’s so little warning!” He complained, imagining all the work Kuroo was going to make him do.

Kuroo laughed wholeheartedly. “Well, father only got 3 days notice, so we are lucky in that regard. Oh! Futa! We have to recall the knights! Everyone should be here for this momentous occasion.”

As he straightened his posture, he motioned to the courier to give him the next letter.

“Yea sure, let me just track down eleven grown men and figure out how to not only contact them but get them here within the span of a week. That isn’t an impossible task at all.” Futakuchi sassed back.

Kuroo nodded his head absently, not having really listened to his friend, “Great, knew I could count on you. Good luck.”

Futakuchi rolled his eyes for good measure and left the room to get to his new task.

_____________________________________________________

“Oh!” A voice exclaimed with a high pitch. “Futakuchi, I am surprised to see you on this side of the castle. Are you not reviewing letters with Kuroo today?” Lady Yuurei inquired of him.

He smiled back at her, “Actually, his highness is still doing just that. But he sent me on a different task for today. Actually, Yuurei, do you know where I can send a message to any of the other Knights? My current task is to call everyone back to the castle, but as you know, many of the knights like to run off at the worst possible times.”

She laughed at Futakuchi’s assessment of the men tasked with the highest responsibilities in the kingdom, but shook her head in the negative. “Though that makes sense why you would be here. Looking for Sir Bokuto I would assume?”

Futakuchi nodded simply.

“Very well, best of luck meeting his Highness’ standards this time around Futa.”

“Thank you, Lady Yuurei.” As soon as he turned away from her, his smile fell and he mumbled to himself about what a two-faced person she ended up being. She’d been so different when he first met her, so caring...and then she had to go and cheat on his best friend with the man he owed his life to. Futakuchi knew that Kuroo would wilt away into nothing if he found out about Yuurei and Bokuto. Especially in a time when there wasn’t much else to occupy his mind.

He also knew how much Bokuto regretted the affair. And, how many times he’d asked the wizard for potions to make the Queen forget her feelings so he didn’t hurt his best friend. No, Futakuchi didn’t blame Bokuto for the relationship because he had done all within his power to avoid the Queen. Well, all except tell the King himself.

He was still a Knight, Futakuchi reminded himself. He was still liable to following the King and Queen’s orders, no matter how for or against them he was.

Yea, Futakuchi couldn’t hold it against him. Even though he really really wanted to.

Finally in front of the man’s room on the emptiest part of the castle, he knocked twice before letting himself enter. “Sir Bokuto. I need your assistance if you are free.” Looking around the room as soon as he entered, Futakuchi expected to see the Knight. He was surprised to see him climbing out of the dresser after his name had been called. “Sir Bokuto?”

“Thank the gods it was you, Futa.” He sighed in relief, glancing around the wizard’s form still looking scared despite his tone, and shut the room door. He leaned against it as he visibly relaxed. “Seriously, I am glad to see you my friend. Did you finish that new potion yet?”

His voice was hopeful and Futakuchi hated to let him down, but he hadn’t finished it yet. “Sorry, but no. Since she was immune to the others we tried, I’ve had to research a lot more to try and find something new, but haven’t yet felt I’ve stumbled upon something useful.” The brunet patted the shoulders of the salt-and-pepper-haired male before him. “But hang in there! You moved to the other side of the castle, so at the very least it is harder to find excuses to come this far out, right?” He tried to keep the Knight happy.

“Yes, but on days when you and the King are locked away dealing with documents of some sort of other for hours at a time, she loses her guards and comes here anyway. I’m fairly certain she thinks I did this so we could be even more private and that is absolutely terrifying. Because if Kuroo ever finds out, he could have the same idea and—!” He started to ramble before being cut off.

Futakuchi held his hand over Bokuto’s mouth, a deep frown over his face and determination set in his eyes. “I promise to you, on my life, I will make sure that if the King ever finds out the only person that gets blamed is the Queen herself. That all your struggles are known. Understood?”

With nothing left for him to say, Bokuto simply nodded.

The brunet dropped his hand, and grinned. “Now, for what I need help with.” His smile grew as  wide as his level of anticipation at sharing the news with the first Knight of the roundtable. “The Red Knights are coming to Camelot, and the king wants the entire council to be here. So, want to help me contact everyone and get them here in a week's time? It’ll be fun and you’ll have a work excuse to come find me anytime to help escape Yuurei’s clutches.”

Understanding exactly what it meant for the Red Knights to be visiting now, Bokuto was more than excited. “The red Knights are really coming to Camelot?”

Futakuchi just kept his wide grin, and said, “Yes.”

“YES! Yes! Yes!” Bokuto exclaimed so loud it scared the birds hanging out on the trees outside his windows. “Kuroo must be so excited! Of course! I’ll help in any way I can! Futa! The Red Knights are coming to Camelot!!”

Unbeknownst to the two males hidden away in bedchambers, walking the hall at that moment was Prince Daishou, second hair to the throne of Camelot, and dark magic practitioner.

“The Red Knights are coming to Camelot, huh?” He whisper-repeated to himself. Crafting a message to his allies hidden in the forest outside King Kuroo’s ruling hand. ‘Oikawa, the Red Knights are to visit Camelot soon. Perhaps we can use this as a chance to overthrow his idiocracy and take charge of the kingdom that rightfully belongs to us’. Once he finished, the author blew the fire-written message out, causing it to disappear into the air, on its way to the intended target with the breeze.

Table of contents                                                                            Chapter 2

[quinn-firethief]

Quinn Firethief

Hello everyone! It’s currently four am but I’ll do my best here. Quinn Firethief is one of my oldest wizards. I made him two years ago after I downloaded the game for the first time in like, years, to play with some friends. The graphics update had me shook, y’all. My friends and I loved roleplaying as our characters (both in-game via voice chat and in our texting apps cause we’re weebs) so Quinn is pretty fleshed out. The problem is is that I’m poor so I’m currently stuck right before Marleybone. Hopefully, I’ll be able to change that once I graduate. But for right now, I’ll give you guys the rundown of his character up until this point. Quinn Firethief is a Prince. His parents are the King and Queen of Dragonspyre. Yeah, big surprise, amirite? When I made his backstory, I made it without knowing the whole story of the world. Bad on my part, I know, but I’m really attached to the idea now. So, how that works is that while most of Dragonspyre is unhabitable, there is still a very small part that is. That's where the royal family and a lot of inhabitants that were too loyal to leave ran to. It’s a very small place, they have a very small military, it’s very much a former shell of the great glory it once was. Because of this though, Quinn is well known among their people because there’s probably, at least, a hundred or two left there. He cares very much about them, he’s a great public speaker, very charismatic, and he just really cares about people and really loves helping them in general. It's such a small place that it's really not that big of a deal that Quinn is a prince, a few people might be like “wow what's it like???” but a lot of questions don’t really apply to him because he did live a comfortable life, just not a lavished one thanks to their current situation. But his family does have very good background to their name. Firethieves were the royal family after all. There’s a big legend that they got their last name-Firethief of course-by stealing fire from the Dragons themselves so that they could harness the power and learn how to control it. Depending on whether or not you believe that, you could say a lot of people have Quinn’s ancestors from many many generations ago to thank for fire magic. Others might say that the downfall of the world is probably the family’s karma catching back up on them if that is true.

Before I go into the next part. I no longer talk to the friend that played the next character that I’m going to be talking about. We didn’t end on good terms. But their character is very vital to Quinn’s story. I can’t just write them out. So I’ve decided to just not put their name. Maybe I will later, maybe I’ll completely change it; we’ll just have to see.

Quinn had a best friend who was basically like a brother to him. He was always at the castle, and people even called him a Prince too. When they were of age to go to Ravenwood and start practicing magic (which, in my opinion, is probably eighteen, maybe as young as sixteen if you’re super good) they went together. Like I said, Quinn’s family has a long history in fire magic, being the royal family of Dragonspyre after all, so Quinn immediately dabbled in fire magic. His best friend went into myth. When they started questing, they ended up meeting a life wizard named Sarai (her last name escapes me rn I’ll get back to y’all on that) who was in the same year as them. (She was played by my girlfriend, if she ever makes a Tumblr for her I’ll definitely link it here) They needed a healer, she needed some harder hitters, so they all started questing together. They became the best of friends. They were well on their way to being able to take down Malistaire. The journey didn’t come without difficulties of course. Sarai got sick with the Krok Plague during one of the dungeons, and the boys had to rush through the last few to get the cure for her. Quinn’s best friend ended up dropping Myth because he was doing so horrible. He did, however, become very interested in Balance thanks to Kroktopia and found he did very well in that. While Sarai was sick Quinn realized that he had definitely fallen in love with the sweet and gentle Life wizard, and while he came very close to confessing his feelings, he didn’t.

Krok ended well. They were able to get the cure to Sarai in time and they finished it all out together, with Sarai cured of the plague and coherent. They all crashed in Sarai’s house afterward and chatted about how far they had come, and how they heard that Marleybone was needing help next.

Now, this is when my friends and I stopped playing. Summer of 2018 had drawn to a close and I was going into my Junior year. We all got very busy, my family ran into some bad financial problems so I obviously couldn’t unlock the Marleybone zones, and then by the end of my Junior year, I was no longer talking to the friend that played Quinn’s best friend. I’m in my Senior year and I’m feeling nostalgic, and like most Wizard101 players I’m getting sucked back into this game(help me). But this is where I take some liberty with the story. The three of them do end up going to Marleybone, but after a good few weeks, they end up running into Morganthe who, at this point, is just starting to plan on getting a little public about her villainess. Obviously, at this point, I’m messing with canon a little bit, but not that bad. She ended up casting a spell that took ahold of Quinn’s best friend's mind and completely turned him against Quinn and Sarai. They tried to free him from the spell but it became very clear very fast that it wasn’t possible. They ended up having to kill him. Quinn dealt the final blow with his bow and arrow (I got it from a pack, such a good drop sorry now isn’t the best time-) and the place they were fighting in exploded. Sarai and Quinn were knocked out and then dragged to safety by some other wizards that heard the explosion. While the friend’s body was never found, it was plainly obvious that he was dead. Quinn and his best friend, who was basically his brother, had known each other since they were kids. Like, I’m talking six years old. they had known Sarai for at least two years at this point since Krok and Wizard City had definitely (in my mind) taken some time to get through and fix. They were a very close, tightknit group. They were well known around Ravenwood and it was rare when you saw one of them walking around alone. So, as you can imagine, having to kill their own friend was very, very hard on them. Especially Quinn. He and Sarai can’t even be around each other anymore because it hurts too much, the wound is too raw. Quinn ends up telling Sarai that he needs some time alone, some time to think. So they stop talking, they stop hanging out, and they both just stop questing in general. It’s not the same without their friend’s lute playing to cheer them on.

Quinn gets very depressed and turns to alcohol. At this point, he’s twenty-one, so it is legal. A favorite of his is Fireball. If he’s not sleeping or studying or practicing, he’s drinking. He has nightmares (and rarely dreams, those tend to hurt more) of his friend constantly. He has to move out of the dorm because they always hung out there and it just hurts too much, there are too many memories. He can’t even visit Dragonspyre because of all of the memories they have there, he’d probably drop dead the moment he walked in because of how hard it’d hit him. So he moves into the Fire House (the classic burning tower with all that lava) and to try and cope, he makes a grave for his best friend even though they never found a body. Yep, you’re right, that’s exactly what my header is. Depressing, right? I had a leftover present from some winter event, so I decided to put that there to make it even sadder. This is currently where I’m picking up with Quinn, where he’s at his lowest and he’s pushing everyone away and he feels completely alone. It really resonates with me because of how I’ve been feeling lately (for like NO reason might I add). I’m super excited to write about it, it’s definitely going to be fun. I hope you guys enjoyed that! I’m sorry this was such a long read lmao this took me like twenty minutes to type up. Mainly because I had to keep fact-checking and I’m so tired. It’s now five am and I need to sleep. If you guys have any questions, don’t be afraid to ask. If you wanna be friends, shoot me a text! I need more Wizard101 buddies so badly right now. I might open one-shot requests if enough people show interest in Quinn and my writings enough, but we’ll just have to see :)

Have a good day everyone!

[aaravos-breaks-the-internet]

【Aaravos liveblogs The Dragon Prince】Season 1, Episode 1

(Note from the mun: Probably best experienced by reading it while watching the episode yourself? Unless you have great memory of the episode’s details, I assume. I didn’t flesh out the descriptions of the individual scenes because the following text alone took me more than three hours and is 12 pages in Word already. Sadly, I forgot to add time stamps. I might edit them in later if I have the time but I hope that it’ll be possible to follow the script without them for now.

With that said, have fun!)

 *The Intro plays. Magical birds are flying over the waves of an ocean.*

Oh, oh my stars… I’m getting a lump in my throat right off the bat…I can watch Xadia everyday thanks to my arcanum’s ability to see into the beyond. Yet, this feels…different. How long has it been since I’ve walked freely in its wonderful landscape, felt the soothing breeze of the Xadian s-

WHAT THE! HOLY SHOOTING STAR! THAT IS MY VOICE. I – what

*His brain enters a state of frantic confusion.*

????!!!???!! This…this is so surreal. Forgive me but I’m – as you people say – absolutely losing it.

….

 ……………

That is- I just can’t believe it.

That Is Me! I’m in the Netflix. My voice is actually, really, in the Netflix!!

*He burries his hands in his hair with excitement. His initial fear is forgotten.*

 [“…rich in magic and wonder.”]

No offense, but I sound GOOD. I mean, technically I know that. But hearing myself like this is so different from hearing my voice from my own perspective.

*He squeals in anticipation.* This is so awesome.

…

Oh, the music is so sweet…

…

That dragon is…well, I guess I can try to ignore him…

…

…Why is he in every shot? Do we really need him to explain the arcanums? He’s not that great. Believe me.

…

Ok, the flight effect is really spectacular. I have to admit that.

Still, stupid dragon.

…

[“…a human mage…”]

OHHHHH I remember that one *he growls*

…

[“…discovered new magic…”]

Yeah, I bet you “discovered” it. I wonder how you “discovered” it. I’d really like to know. You gotta enlighten me about that “discovery” of yours.

…

In loving memory of those poor birds.

…

OH! OH! OH MY STARS! There I am!! It’s me!!! Hey, I actually look decent for a change. Sigh, I miss my old wardrobe. That scarf was my favourite. So silky and soft.

Also, not to brag, but my hair? Nice.

…

Sigh, poor humans. It breaks my heart everytime I think of the split…

…

Still forever impressed that they managed to draw an actual lava line through all of Xadia.

That’s some true dedication to the cause of hating each other. But I guess if it fuels your ambitions…who am I to judge…you idiots…

…

Oh, Thunder…my cherished…friend…

…

[“But in the eve of last Winter’s Turn…”]

*He inhales sharply*

Oh…this is where the future begins…I have yet to experience what is about to be shown…

…

Unspeakable dark magic? *He rubs his temples, visibly annoyed.* Yeah, I already have an idea what that might have been.

You idiots. All of you. Dragons, elves, humans, all idiots!

…

I’m really carrying myself with a lot of grace in this narration. Good job, future me! I can assure you, that is probably not what I have felt on the inside.

…

Welps, guess there goes your family tree, Thunder. My condolences.

…

[“Now the world stands on the edge of all-out war.”]

I’m pretty sure I smashed my head on the table after that line. Again?! AGAIN?! HAVE YOU NOT LEARNED ANYTHING? You incredible fools?!! You like this, don’t you? This is fun for you, there’s no other explanation. Why else would you imbeciles continue to fight each other like little, immature, bratty kindergarden children.

It’s –ARGHASFADADSF

The worst part is – I knew all of this from the very beginning. Why did I – why do I even bother with helping you…

*He takes a deep breath.*

Calm down, calm doooown… *he hums*

Anger is not good for your soul. You’ll just get bitter and start to come up with horrible revenge fantasies. It’s not worth it. Remember that. Caaaaalm…..

……..

Ok. I’m feeling better.

Let’s continue.

…

Is-is that boy drooling on his glow toad? Poor thing…but that begs the question, why does he let it sleep in his bed in the first place. I would not recommend that…at all. *He shudders.*

…

Oh, that’s a very impressive drawing of a drag-………..marshmallow monster? Really?...well, I guess, that’s…human imagination…very…cute.

…

Yeah no, I don’t think the glow toad was scared…

…

Oh my, that poor guard is dead. So many moonshadow elves? Not a chance.

…

Aaaaand, of course he trips.

…

I’m about to eat my cloak. She let him go.

You might as well turn yourself in as voluntary dragon breakfast now.

…

HHHHeeey!! What’s that greasy dude doing in front of my mirror?

Don’t touch it! I hate it when there are grease spots on the glass.

Well, I guess those humans successfully raided Thunder’s lair. At least I’ll have more sunshine now.

Heyheyhey, I said don’t touch it!

It’s not like you could understand any of those runes anyways.

…

What? He is the High Mage? I have foreseen that the High Mage of Katolis will be important to me. But I expected something…else.

Can I never be lucky? Is that what I get for being so kind, so gracious, so willing to sacrifice myself to help you all? Couldn’t fate be nice to me for a change?

Sigh, guess that’s what I have to work with now.

This better not be too tiring…

I mean, he slew Thunder. That’s something. I guess…

…

Noooo, don’t cover the mirror. My sunshine, remember? At least let me have that. I’ve only seen cave walls for the last couple of centuries. I’d love to have a little change of scene.

Damn.

…

*Harrow rising*

“I woke up like this.”

With perfect hair and perfectly dressed. Ah yes, very realistic. Just like me, every morning. (I’ll never tell you if that’s sarcasm or not.)

…

Oh yes, execute him!

Ok, sorry, I guess that came out a little too excited…*cough*

…

That bird’s nice.

…

That bird’s name is…well, I guess it’s a name.

…

He’s surprisingly calm considering he and his whole crew are about to be violently murdered by moonshadow assassins.

That’s some startouch-level coolness.

Impressive.

…

[“…we must find them today…”]

Yeaaaah, good luck with that…

…

Moonshadow elves are always so dramatic when it comes to their acrobatics.

Yeees, you’re very cool. A real ninja. Here, have a pat on the back. Now go back and play with the others.

…

Please don’t tell me you think veteran moonshadow assassins can’t tell the difference between blood and moonberry juice…

…

Aaaand, you think they can’t. *He slaps his forehead.*

I’m foresing that a great assassin career lies ahead of you. Yes, really.

…

*Cough* Wh-who is this very good looking fella, holy shooting star…

I mean.

Who is this?

He looks important. Like an important elf. Probably their leader.

Yes, that must be it. I just deduced that. I’m very smart.

*The coughing intensifies.*

…

*He sees the necklace.*

Nooooooooo, he is betrothed.

Whyyyyyyy fate. Won’t you let me have anything?

…

Did…did he just fall for the moonberry trick?

You’re very beautiful but forgive me, that was very dumb.

…

This face…my stars…

……………………..

 ………………….

………..What on earth is going on with me? Focus you dumb, old startouch elf.

It’s not like you to be so easily impressed with others. There’s absolutely no reason for that.

He’s just a boring, average moonshadow elf.

Whatever those weird, inexplicable, mushy feelings in your stomach are, we are done with those.

No more silly touchy-feely emotions.

Ok, let’s get back on track.

Ha, see, you have no power over me, you ridiculously pretty moonshadow elf!

Glad we sorted that out.

…

Yeah, he can see that.

…

That human village looks pretty sweet actually.

I wonder if they sell bread.

I’d love to have some bread now.

Wait, what?

…

Ah, jelly tarts. I remember those. Never liked them. Not enough chocolate. How can they make pastry. Without chocolate. I will never understand.

…

Those are…some impressive lashes.

Apparently modern day humans in Katolis like to put make-up on their pets?

Isn’t that animal cruelty? Is nobody concerned?

…

That toad is definitely smarter when it comes to this whole jelly tart stealing business…

It’s a bit sad to watch.

Well, at least it helped the human kid out.

Enjoy your tarts. Your sad, little, chocolate-less tarts…

…

Ah, that knight looks like a very smart person.

  Not.

…

He seems as enthusiastic about teaching the artist boy as I am about working together with the greasy wizard.

I relate to you, not very smart but at least good-at-your-trade knight.

…

Geez, this sword fighting lesson is a tragedy.

I’ve read startouch law books that were more uplifting.

…

Love amongst the dragons? Sigh, really? Such an overrated book. Too many dragons.

Ok ok, the love story part is kind of cute.

I guess.

Not that I would know.

As I have never read it.

…

I want to take a moment to thank the universe for not having siblings.

…

I mean, 300 years is nothing. So she’s kinda right? It’s pretty new?

…

*Slaps his face*

No you can’t do it now. That was a bad idea.

You’re noticing that yourself, aren’t you?

…

Is this how you humans court each other?.............

That explains….a lot….

…

Oh? What? He didn’t really stab you? You don’t say. I thought you were dead for real. What a shocking twist of events.

…

Hehe, pushing around those little figures was always the best part of any political meeting.

…

This conversation is off to a rocky start. Don’t do your children dirty like that.

You are evidently muddying the mood of your kids.

…

We have visitors from Xadia…unwanted visitors…look at mee…I’m the human mage…I’m so important…with my condescending voice…I’m so powerfuuuuul…for I am the human mage…

I feel the sudden urge to throw myself from the highest bookshelf in my library.

…

Yes. Yes, I think you’re an idiot, Soren.

…

[“…You’re saying they’ll kill the king?”]

Yeah right. As if Callum could have heard that down there in the courtyard.

He has human ears, not elf ears. *wiggles them in annoyance without noticing*

…

[“…’unstoppable: is just another kind of ‘stoppable’.”]

That’s…not…what?

My head hurts.

Is this the future of dark magic in Katolis?

I’m very concerned now.

…

14 and three quarters?

……………………………

This kingdom doesn’t need any enemies. It’ll take itself down all on its own.

…

[“Think fast.”]

As fast as you, three-quarter-boy?

…

Ah yes, the moonshadow elves. Their leader is talking. He sounds very distressed.

I mean. They murdered the dragon. I understand. I would be very distressed, too.

…

Uh-oh, no, please don’t bind your lives to-

Sigh……………moonshadow elves are so, so very dramatic. It’s painful.

Really annoying a thousand years ago, still really annoying today.

…

Yes, life is precious. Very good, very well observed. So why do you idiots throw it away with stupid binding curses like that? Your assassin career would be just fine without your silly, theatrical honour codes, that you cling to in order to give your life a deeper meaning but that are ultimately very useless and very dumb.

…

You really had to flex your arm like that just to illustrate the binding of the ribbon, didn’t you, moonshadow leader? That was totally necessary. Sure.

…

Ah….Runaan…that is…a nice name.

Which I just assessed factually, neutrally, in a very matter-of-fact manner.

I just noticed. Nothing more.

…

[“What if they know we’re coming?”]

That’s the face of somebody who messed up big time.

…

[“No, I don’t want a stupid jelly tart!”]

Ah, yes. Finally somebody who gets it!

…

Ok, I have to admit…I feel for them though… Poor children.

…

[“…closet full of moon sweaters.”]

*Bursts into laughter*

Closet full of moon sweaters!! That’s-OHHHH Curses! *he growls*

You got me there. Shame on me. Won’t happen a second time. I promise you that!

…

Flopflopflopflopflop

You know…the sound of the moon moth’s wings…right?

…

Yesssss, dramatic horse chase. Follow the moon sweater moth!

…

Well, guess he just…broke off that engagement.

…

Ohhhh, pretty sparkles!!

See? We’re perfect for each other.

He likes sparkles. I sparkle.

A match made in heaven!

…

Soren, they-they’re right in front of you!!

Is this the amount of effort you put into protecting your kingdom? When it is at the brink of freaking war?! Forget the moonshadow elves, you’re the biggest threat to Katolis’ safety…

God, I’m getting a headache.

I hope your father is a bit...brighter or I might have to let the elves and dragons win this thing.

…

[“You lied to me!”]

Ohhhhh, he’s so fierce when he’s angry…

I would never lie to you! *hums*

 Well, because I can’t lie. Which is very annoying sometimes…

…

[“Runaan, I’m sorry!”]

Something tells me that this won’t convince him.

…

[“You let him live but you’ve killed us all!”]

Whoa, Runaan, calm down. She’s a kid. I’m sure that’s not very good for her mental well-being. Cut her some slack.

If this was so important then maybe you should have taken out that soldier yourself. Didn’t occur to you back then? Nope, I don’t think so. Don’t blame her now because you were so bad at planning ahead.

*Shakes his head*

Moonshadow assassin leaders…

…

 Oh, that was it? Already?

That was…surprisingly fun. Not the soul-crushing existential crisis I was anticipating.

What does it say here? Next episode in five seconds? Well, I won’t say no to that…

Maybe I should get myself something to eat…

*He gets up, humming cheerfully.*

[superwholock-marvel-images]

Flannels and Duct tape 2

Jack has you tag along with him to France, so you can learn the ropes and so Jack can keep an eye on Mac.

"You dragged Y/N into this?" Mac asks when Jack sits down across from him.

"Not my idea." You comment. When Mac mentions looking for his dad, you sit down next to him. When Jack gets up to leave and take you back to HQ, you tell him to piss off.

"You didn't have to stay Rook." Mac comments.

"Don't call me that… Jack would not let the subject drop." You reply. "Also, my dad was the same. He just left." You leave out the hunting part, Mac doesn't need to be pulled into the world of the supernatural.

You and Mac spend a few days looking without any luck or leads on his dad. Eventually you two give up and go back to Las Angeles. You hang out at Mac's apartment for a little bit.

"There's a warm beer with your name on it." Mac says into the phone, two seconds later the doorbell rings.

"Is Jack normally that fast?" You question as Mac hangs up.

"Depends on where he was." You laugh as Mac goes gets the door. When you hear something that sounds like a taser, you go to investigate. Only to see Mac get abducted by three people in masks. Suddenly you get this feeling of dread, what if Mac was abducted because of you?

"Okay you had me at warm beer." Jack says walking right into the apartment, about ten minutes after Mac was abducted. Jack notices that you're on the verge of tears. "Hey Y/N, what's wrong and where's Mac?" Jack's eyes are full of worry.

You simply point to the patio where one of the people in a mask dropped off a George Washington mask with a bottle of wine with Mac's pocket knife stuck in the cork.

🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝

When the rest of the team gets there Matty says nothing is to be over looked- your boss then notices that you're on the verge of hysteria. "What's wrong with Y/N?" She asks.

"She pretty much saw Mac get abducted." Jack comments. "The kid's blaming herself for something, but something tells me that this was Murdoc's doing."

Matty tells both you and Jack that Mac getting abducted wasn't on either of you.

"I'm not really blaming myself, more like I'm panicking." You clarify. "What if Mac was abducted, because he's my friend?"

"What do you mean?" Bozer asks.

"All you need to know, is that I've made a lot of enemies… and they use every tactic they can to get what they want, which is to get at me."

Riley finds Mac's location. You, Jack, Bozer and Cage (a member of the team that you just met) go get Mac. Jack is hesitant to let you and Bozer come along.

"If it makes you feel any better- I've been doing hand to hand combat since I was six, and using actual weapons since thirteen." You counter. "I'll be just fine… also, nice Impala." Jack looks at you dumbfounded as you climb into the back seat. He shakes his head and tells Bozer to stay behind you, Cage and (or) him at all times. Bozer agrees to do so.

At the wearhouse you find some oil and the rotten egg smelling mineral called sulfur. "Looks like the guy that took Mac, was either in league with a demon or he was one." You state standing up and wiping the sulfur and oil off of your fingers and onto your jeans. "Which likely means that Mac has either been drugged or knocked out, and that he is more than likely underground or somewhere ten times more remote than here."

"How do you know?" Cage asks, voicing everyone's confusion.

"You’d sleep better at night if you didn’t know the answer to that." You then pull out your phone and reluctantly call Crowley's number. Sure calling Cas, or your brothers might've been a better plan, but you would rather deal with the King of Hell than the rest of Team Free Will.

"Hello Darling." Crowley says answering the phone after three rings.

"I am so not in the mood Crowley." You retort. "Where's Angus MacGyver, I know at least one of your goons abducted him."

"Why would I tell you?"

"Because you owe me one."

"Now, why haven't you gone to Moose and Squirrel and ask them for help?"

"Yeah, that won't happen." Crowley starts to laugh. Your grip on your phone tightens. "Listen here you sick son of a bitch. If you don't tell me where my friend is, I will kill you and make sure you fucking stay dead." All three of your coworkers take an uncomfortable step backwards. You can't say you blame them. You did just threaten to murder someone.

After being on the phone for an extra two minutes with the king of hell you hang up.

"Do you normally threaten to kill people over the phone?" Bozer hesitantly asks. You shake your head. "Okay… did you find anything out about Mac's whereabouts?"

"Only thing I found out is that Mac escaped."

🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝

Mac eventually makes it back to HQ. Matty has him spend a few hours in the infirmary because he was walking like a drunk. Jack is being hard headed, causing Cage to shoo everyone but you and Riley out of the room. You haven't said anything to the team since you told Cage, Jack and Bozer that Mac escaped, your best guess is that Cage forgot you were there. Mac describes the room that he was held in.

"I've been there, in that room." You say in a barely audible voice. Mac turns to face you.

"You've been there?" He asks. You nod, you possibly look like a scared child. "Can I ask how you ended up there?"

"I don't remember." You lie. Mac only nods, dropping the subject.

You make the mistake of entering a place unarmed and without a bulletproof vest. You get a call from an unknown number, you hesitantly answer it.

"Hello Y/N." A man comments. Somehow Murdoc got your number, and it worries you. "I just wanted to welcome you the family."

"How did you get this number?" You ask with a shaky voice.

"I have my ways, now tell me do you like being called (nickname) or (different nickname)?" You lean against the closest pillar, trying to control your breathing. "I've heard so much about you, like how you used to be a hunter and how your father abandoned you and your brothers."

"He didn't abandon us." You start to fidget hoping he couldn't hear how scared you are in your voice.

"If you don't stop that annoying fidgeting my finger will slip and pull this trigger."

"Then shoot me Murdoc." You weren't expecting him to actually shoot you. You grimace in pain when the bullet grazes your side. Murdoc then tells you to keep in mind that MacGyver won't always be around to save you. With that he hangs up and Mac comes running.

"What happened?" He asks, when he sees blood on your shirt.

"Decided to play chicken with a psychopath." You answer. Mac helps you to your feet and drpes your arm over his shoulders, so you can keep your balance.

"Without a bulletproof vest? That was either extremely stupid or incredibly brave."

"I say it's the fact I've been shot too many times to even be phased by it anymore…” You internally wince when you step down- you’re starting to feel some pain. “Besides the damn thing just grazed me."

"Still you're going to need stitches, first Cage now you."

"Cage got shot?"

"Unlike you, she was wearing a vest."

🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝

Mac does something with a portable X-ray and a penny to find a lost image. Turns out the guy in the image is a fifth grade school teacher.

As soon as the school teacher sees you his eyes go wide- like he knows you or something similar. "Do you know him?" Jack asks.

"No… the only way how he'd know me is… that son of a bitch." You answer.

"What?"

"That guy is a hunter." You comment as the teacher starts shooting a semi-automatic handheld machine gun. "Give me a break Chuck!" You duck under the kitchen island, you pull out your gun and start firing back. Causing both Jack and Mac to throw you a look. Over the coms, Cage says something about Murdoc has just opened fire and she needs a bit of back up.

"It's not Murdoc." Jack states. You continue to fire until the clip is out of bullets. "That was the school teacher and Y/N."

"My gun isn’t a semi-automatic hand held.” You counter. “My gun is just a regular 45 caliber.”

About a half an hour later a rocket or a small missile flips the armored car that you and your three coworkers are in. You subconsciously call out to one of the angels... and the angel that comes is the one particularly fond of that tan trench coat of his.

"Y/N?" Cas asks as you help Cage get free.

"Cas, will you do me a favor and get Jack and Mac out of the front seat?" You answer as you open the back door of the vehicle. Cas doesn’t even bother to question you. Once out of the car you pull Cas into a hug, he doesn’t hug back. “Cas, this is where you hug me back.”

“Oh right.” Cas answers, wrapping his arms around you and embraces you quickly before letting you go. "You know that your brothers are worried sick about you, right?"

"I know, but I like it where I am- and I want to keep this for as long as I can. Will you help me?"

"Of course." Cas answers with a fond smile on his face.

"Thank you so much."

"You're welcome. I should leave, your brothers need help again."

"Like always. See you around Cas." With that the blue eyed, trench coat wearing angel takes his leave, leaving your four coworkers in shock.

"Who was that guy and how the hell did he just vanish into thin air?" Jack questions. You crack a small smile.

"That was my friend Cas.” You answer. “And to answer your second question, he’s a wizard.”

→ → → → → →

@the-third-winchester-warrior

@flannels-and-rocksalt

@always-keep-writing-spn

@winchesters-favorite-girl

@caroldanversinatardis

@spnkisum

@thewinsisterchronicles

@simply-wins-little-sis

@moose-and-sqruille-lover

@thewinsister

@mrspadalackles

@diekatimitdemhutohnehut

@percussiongirl2017

@talesfromthecreed

@sirkekselord

[junker-town]

What to expect during the NBA’s return, in a 5-minute read

A quick scan of where all 22 teams stand ahead of the league’s return.

The NBA is almost officially back, kicking off its season on July 30. Teams have been playing in scrimmages over the last week and we are already drooling over Bol Bol balling (nods to the Pun Master Prada) and shaking our heads at Lou Williams “dining” decisions. This is your standard mix of on-court small sample size overreaction and off-court drama stories providing some measure of normalcy in these un-normal times. Thank you, NBA!

To figure out where the league stands after a four-month hiatus, we checked in with our NBA team sites from around the SB Nation network. Their intimate familiarity with their franchises, gives us an inside look about what to expect when the league kicks back off.

Eastern Conference:

The Bucks’ time has arrived

Everything in the East starts in Milwaukee which is so much fun to say after years and years of everything in the East starting in LeBron. And, of course, everything in Milwaukee starts with the MVP Giannis. But as Brew Hoop points out, the real strength of this team is its league-leading defense that dominates at the rim, hates committing fouls and gobbles up defensive rebounds. And yeah, if they turn you over good luck stopping Antetokounmpo in transition. If they have an Achilles heal (obligatory greek reference) on that end it’s allowing three-point shots. They are 13th in opponent accuracy from deep but third in attempts allowed. The Celtics, Raptors and Sixers are 3rd, 4th and 5th in three-point percentage so that might be a real problem for the Bucks.

The Raptors are still confident

The reigning NBA Champion Raptors beat the Bucks in the playoffs last year and think they have the identity, cohesion and team defense to compete again if they can muster enough offensive punch. Daniel Reynolds from Raps HQ explains the identity advantage:

There are likely to be some kinks to work out as every team retakes the floor after a months-long lay-off. Players will have to get back into their shooting groove, get their conditioning up, remind themselves of what they’re doing at any given time. The Raptors? Well, they’ve been playing this kind of defense for some time now — I’m of the opinion it won’t take as much or as long to bring it all back.

What about the Celtics and the Sixers?

Boston Exceptionalism is still very much a thing and CelticsBlog is putting their high hopes on the now broader shoulders of Jayson Tatum who reportedly from a couple of Zoom calls, is noticeably bigger and defined in the upper body area. #NBAMuscleWatch lives! Health is once again a concern for the C’s with Kemba Walker’s knee and front court size is an issue to watch.

The young Sixers benefited from the long break to rest Joel Embiid who, according to our friends at Liberty Ballers, has a “long … storied … frustrating injury history towards the end of the season” and even more notably saw Ben Simmons use the time to fully recover from a back injury suffered in February and move to power forward. The mismatches he’ll create will be pure NBA gold.

Okay, now for the rest of the East?

When you get past the top four teams in the East things get...less virulent (too soon?). And by top four we clearly are leaving out the Miami Heat who hold the actual fourth seed. Maybe we’re disrespecting Spoelstra’s squad but it’s hard to see how that roster makes much noise in the playoffs. Per Hot Hot Hoops, the Heat had success throughout the regular season by being a tough defensive team with great three-point shooting and will stick to that plan.

As for the rest, the Nets are in Orlando missing eight (8!) roster players so get ready for a lot of Caris LeVert and Jamal Crawford playing with G-league guys. At least expectations are low. Orlando is in Orlando with slightly higher hopes thanks to their depth and Aaron Gordon’s improved playmaking which, per Orlando Pinstriped Post, showed great improvement before the pause. The Pacers roster has been in flux with the maybe healthy Victor Oladipo and the sore-footed Domantas Sabonis among the many questions Indy Cornrows has for the restart. And then there’s the Wizards. They are fourth-best at forcing turnovers so that’s good but there’s everything else like having the worst NBA defense this season and other interesting facts you can read about at Bullets Forever should you be a Wizards fan or one of Bradley Beal’s large siblings.

Western Conference:

Welcome to the battle of Los Angeles

I’m a “journey is better than the destination” person but the one thing that I dislike the most about the NBA is how predictable the playoffs usually are. And this year we are on a predetermined course to the Battle of LA featuring two amazing basketball teams. It really is a shame this inevitable series won’t be played in front of a gazillion rabid Lakers fans and noted Clipper celeb Billy Crystal. But before we get to that series there are games to be played and the Lakers, according to Silver Screen and Roll, have three glaring weaknesses. 1) Team LeBron has been a below average team in the half court and 2) ranked 20th in three-point shooting accuracy (35.8%). Those could be real issues against a good defensive team like the Clippers and even more so in a Finals matchup against the Bucks. Oh, and 3) the Lakers are not great (73%) at the free-throw line but I wouldn’t lose sleep over that. On the plus side, of course, is the star power for both of these teams which is the oil that lubes the NBA machine.

For the Clippers the difference could be their depth and front court versatility with centers Ivica Zubac if they want to play big and Montrezl Harrell if they want to go small and athletic. Plus they now have Joakim Noah if they want to play a bit crazy. Combine that with noted playoff overachiever Kawhi Leonard and a fully healthy Paul George on the wing and it’s pretty easy to see how the Clips make their first conference finals in franchise history. All that depth could be a problem though. Sabreena Merchant at Clips Nation explains:

More talent is always a good thing, but Rivers will have to keep a lot of egos in check to manage his rotations.

The next four teams in the West are good. Really good.

...But they all have significant questions. Denver brings a top-ten offense lead by Nikola “Skinny” Jokic and a host of young talent. It should be a big progression year for the Nuggets but as Denver Stiffs explains they are lacking in big defensive wings to matchup with the Los Angles stars. The Rockets are famously small but The Dream Shake thinks they also suffer from a case of hot/cold shooting which doesn’t bode well for a team that can’t rebound. Chris Paul has exceeded every and any expectation in OKC but even Welcome to Loud City is worried about rust for a Thunder team with a new look and lack of three-point shooting. This brings us to the Utah Jazz who saw their two stars feuding, lost a key player to injury and per SLC Dunk aren’t exactly stable:

The Jazz apparently decided to spend 2020 doing their best audition for the title character in a stage play production of “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.” Utah’s heavily inconsistent nature, going from great team to league bottom feeder was giving fans serious tonal whiplash.

Our friends at Mavs Moneyball, Grizzly Bear Blues and The Bird Writes will probably not enjoy being lumped together in this category of “others” but that’s just the reality in the West. Ja Morant, Luka Doncic and Zion Williamson are great fun but they do not (yet!) make great basketball teams. Sorry, friends. Meanwhile, the mature Spurs and Blazers have been pushed below the cutoff line for the playoffs but Blazers Edge rightly isn’t ready to give up on Dame Lillard, “With the Blazers’ sights set on the playoffs, their backcourt will go down fighting.” I’m sure that’s true. Also, there’s Suns and Kings who are easy to mock but never forget either of these teams in the East would be very much in the playoff hunt and fans of bad teams do interesting thing.

[the-master-cylinder]

SUMMARY In the kingdom of Aruk, the high priest Maax is given a prophecy by his witches that he would die facing the son of King Zed. So he sends one of his witches to kidnap and kill the child, but before she can kill him, a villager rescues the child and raises him as his own son. Named Dar while raised in the village of Emur, the child learns how to fight, and has the ability to telepathically communicate with animals. Years later, a fully grown Dar witnesses his people being slaughtered by the Juns, a horde of fanatic barbarians allied with Maax. Dar, the only survivor of the attack, journeys to Aruk to avenge his people. In time, Dar is joined by a golden eagle he names Sharak, a pair of thieving ferrets he names Kodo and Podo, and a panther he names Ruh.

Eventually, Dar meets a redheaded slave girl called Kiri before getting himself lost and ending up surrounded by an eerie half-bird, half-human race who dissolve their prey for nourishment. As the bird men worship eagles, they spare Dar when he summons Sharak and give him an amulet should he need their aid. Dar soon arrives at Aruk where Maax had assumed total control with the Juns’ support. Maax has taken the children of the townspeople, and is sacrificing them to his god Ar. After having Sharak save the child of a townsman named Sacco, Dar learns that Kiri is to be sacrificed. On his way to save her, Dar is joined by Zed’s younger son Tal and his bodyguard Seth, learning that Kiri is Zed’s niece as the three work to save her. While Seth goes to gather their forces, Dar helps Kiri and Tal infiltrate the temple and rescue King Zed.

Zed leads his forces to attack the city, but they’re captured. Dar returns to save them from being sacrificed. In the conflict that follows, Maax reveals Dar’s relationship to Zed before slitting Zed’s throat and facing the Beastmaster. Despite being stabbed, revived by his remaining witch before she was killed, Maax is about to kill Dar when Kodo sacrifices himself to cause the high priest to fall into the sacrificial flames. But the victory is short-lived as the Jun horde is approaching Aruk, arriving by nightfall to face the trap Dar and the people set for them. Tal is wounded as Dar succeeds in burning most of the Juns alive while defeating their chieftain before the bird-men arrive to consume those remaining. The following day, Seth invites Dar to be the new king, but Dar explains that Tal would make a better king, and he leaves Aruk. Dar sets off into the wild with Kiri, Ruh, Sharak and Podo (who has given birth to two baby ferrets) on the path to new adventures.

DEVELOPMENT/PRE-PRODUCTION Beastmaster found a home under the protective wing of Sylvio Tabet’s own production/financing company, Leisure Investments. This arrangement allowed the production company more artistic freedom than studio financing would have permitted. Tabet then proceeded to seed the production staff with the finest artisans and craftspeople he could find.

“We have a very good team, it’s very professional,” Tabet comments. “John Alcott, the cinematographer, made The Shining and Barry Lyndon. He’s an Academy Award winner! He’s giving a tremendous look to this picture. He’s painting the film in a kind of goldish, rust color which gives us the feeling that this picture is of another time. He had a way to light interiors with only torches and candles, using practically no light at all. Again, I think this film has been very challenging for everybody, but the results on screen are incredible—it’s working incredibly well.”

“We spent two years researching Beastmaster. You need it! We studied each movement of the actors because there is a lot of sword fighting in the picture, and you have to choreograph the movements on paper before you can bring it to the screen. We’re also working with a lot of special effects, miniatures and animals. I’ve had to create a whole new world for this film. Or at least, I’m trying.

“It’s very challenging. Sometimes I don’t sleep at night….” Tabet pauses. “But I must say, I’m very pleased with the results. On the screen, the film has a totally different look, much imagination.” And for Tabet, the end result on the screen is his reward for the hard work and lost sleep.

The shoot itself was a demanding one. Bad weather and difficult night shoots plagued the production. Everything in the film had to be built from scratch, and built to last. Film Builders Productions in North Hollywood provided villages, sets and a 70-foot sacrificial pyramid that had to endure five months of location shooting. But Tabet, director Don Coscarelli and producer Paul Pepperman assembled a cast of special effects artisans who had the vision and the ability to meet the demands of budget.

FX Lineup Mike Minor provided the Art Direction for the Special Effects Unit. Under his direction, Will Guest built the miniatures which were photographed by Bill Cruse. Makeup artist Bill Munns created the fantasy makeups, and pyrotechnic wizard Roger George marshalled the explosions.

The fantastic creatures which populate Beastmaster were a pioneering effort in Tabet’s eyes. “There are many new SPFX concepts we are testing,” he explains. “The bird warriors in the picture are one of a kind. They are men who are like bat creatures. We had to create winged clothes on the actors (which were articulated), to close around the enemy. The enemy starts to disintegrate, and you can see the disintegration through the wings.”

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Witch women cling like spiders to the ceilings and fly through rooms, weaving evil spells at the bidding of Maax, their high priest. Jun warriors devastate villages. Zombie death guards sacrifice innocent children. Giants smash cities into ruin. Beastmaster promises a feast of visual effects for its viewers.

“All kinds of special effects!” Tabet chuckles. “It’s a fantasy with a lot of action, a lot of dreams. This kind of film you’ll never see on television. It has a large scope. It is a very ambitious project.”

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“It took me a year to put together,” he says. “I believe in the talent of Don Coscarelli. He sees everything fresh, new ideas.”

“We did a lot of storyboarding,” says Coscarelli, “but it all turned out to be pretty useless once we got to the set. A lot of things changed.” Some of those changes may have had something to do with the special considerations of cinematographer John Alcott (The Shining, Terror Train) and special effects man Roger George (Phantasm), since perhaps 90 percent of the picture was shot in natural illumination and torch or firelight of some kind. “Roger George was in charge of all the pyrotechnics,” says Coscarelli, “and we worked out some incredible things; explosions, and a 200 foot long wall of fire 25 feet high. We shot that same scene for three weeks.” Says Coscarelli of John Alcott, “it was a different experience having another person doing the cinematography, but John Alcott is terrific. He was easy to work with just a real nice guy-and he was very responsive to my wishes.”

The Beast Master by Andre Norton

The Beast Master tells of Hosteen Storm, a Navajo and former soldier who has empathic and telepathic connections with a group of genetically altered animals. The team emigrates from Earth to the distant planet Arzor where it is hired to herd livestock. Storm still harbors anger at his former enemies the Xik, and has sworn revenge on a man named Quade for his father’s murder. According to Kirkus he finds “life and hope” instead.

The animals in Coscarelli’s film are possibly the most unique aspect of it, and were, perhaps, the most difficult. It takes time to film animal scenes, especially if the animal must perform some bit of business that is vital to the plot. Boone Narr, of Gentle Jungle in Burbank, California, supplied the beasts, including some 20 ferrets, each trained to do a different task (so that it would appear that the two ferrets in the story were doing everything), and Kipling, an extremely large Bengal tiger that was colored black for his role as Dar’s pet. “Kipling,” chuckles Coscarelli, “had absolute casting approval.” Had the big cat been less amicable, Marc Singer (Dar) might have wound up as leading meal, rather than leading male. There were only a couple of instances when the tigers (there were three-as stand ins for one another) appeared to get out of hand. One cat got loose in the dark warehouse that was being used for the interior sets. “A black tiger in a dark warehouse!” laughs Coscarelli, “We didn’t hang around to see how they were going to catch him.” The cat was caught, quickly, however, and without incident-credit the animal handlers from Gentle Jungle.

“The animals are really difficult –it’s a matter of sitting around with 80 people, spending a fortune, until you have what you want. Then, when it does happen, it’s like magic; no one can figure how we get them to do it. The ferrets are very workable-we have about 20 of them, to represent the two in the movie. Some are jumpers, some are quick ones, some are trained to carry beads; they’re all trained to do different things, all of them in marked cages waiting for their set call.”

As talented as the animal cast may be, finding the right human cast was one of the most arduous preproduction tasks. Certainly the best-known cast member is Rip Torn, one of New York’s most respected stage actors, reputed to be a very interesting’ person to have in any cast. Pepperman confirms that there were few dull moments while Torn was on the set. “We only had him for a while, and we’ve really missed the action since he left,” says the producer.

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For the part of Lara the slave girl, Tanya Roberts-a former Charlie’s Angel who is exceptional in appearing to be both beautiful and bright-was selected after a lengthy period of open casting calls and dozens of readings. “When she came in, we all agreed that she had the look and the feel that we had in mind for that character, and she’s been wonderful. She does a lot of very athletic things in the film; just two nights ago we were out on top of this 80-foot cliff, with Tanya and a stuntman in the outfit of Maax’s Deathguard, who was to take a high-fall off of it, and the role required her to stand at the very edge looking down. She was letting out a little scream every once in awhile-but she was out there doing it.”

Pepperman seems most grateful for having Marc Singer on board. “We literally saw hundreds and hundreds of people for that lead role, through the two casting directors that were with us through preproduction. “Name” people, unknowns, all kinds of people. We were looking for a guy in really good shape-not an overdeveloped bodybuilder type, but somebody normal-looking who was in really good shape. We were looking and looking, and Marc’s name came up twice-once on a list that mentioned him as part of a San Francisco repertory production of Taming of the Shrew. Our casting director at the time said no, that won’t work. Then his name came up again a couple of months later on a list of ‘name’ people to be considered; his credits included a TV movie called The Contender, in which he played a boxer, and another called For Ladies Only, where he played a male stripper. We knew from those roles that he had to have a body, and we knew that if he could handle The Taming of the Shrew he had to be able to act, so we had him in. We found that he had the body, he had the look, and he could act, so he was in. As another plus, we never asked whether he was able to handle a sword-but it turned out that he is a more than adequate fencer, and he does a heck of a lot of his own stunts, too. I imagine that without Marc, we would have been maybe three weeks behind schedule.”

Principal filming will be finished as you read this, and plans call for the edited film to be delivered in early July. “For us that’s working very fast,” says Pepperman, “but then, again, this is the first time that Don has not done the editing entirely on his own.”

During lensing of the sword-and-sorcery adventure, Marc Singer notes he got along well with director Don (Phantasm) Coscarelli. “I’m really happy we turned out such a great movie. I received excellent directorial advice on my character from the man who was sort of ‘helping’ in the direction of Beastmaster, Chuck (Gumball Rally) Bail. He was on set as a ghost entity to help with the production and he gave me clues for Dar’s character. Chuck did so much on that film that I hesitate to say how much he truly did. In my opinion, he was the backbone of the project.”

 Playing a warrior who can telepathically bond with animals, Singer found himself in close contact with hawks, tigers and bears– not to mention ferrets. “It was very demanding, working with the animals, but it was also exhilarating,” he says happily. “I would have to say it was more inspiring than it was hard, except for the bear, which had a tendency to want to eat people. That was the only animal you had to stay away from.

 Singer to work closely with some beastly co-stars: tigers, eagles and ferrets. The actor remembers the experience with mixed feelings; “At first, I had to work with five different tigers to find the tiger with which I had the best relationship. At one point, one turned around and grabbed me by the leg. Everyone froze for a minute, then the cat let me go.

 “I had a very good relationship with my tiger. In fact, I miss it and think of it often. It was like a religious experience everytime I was near this animal, and I developed a great and abiding love for it. I think the reason the tiger accepted me, and was good to me, is that whenever I was on screen with it, I felt it was an enormous privilege. I always let the tiger be the boss. The film may have been titled The Beastmaster, but whenever I was on screen with that tiger, I said to it, ‘This is your forum to tell us of the beauty and majesty of the natural world and why we should take care of it and have a responsibility towards you.’”

 The eagle, on the other hand, proved less amenable. According to Singer, the only person it tolerated was its trainer. In one scene, the bird flew directly at Singer, scoring his back with its talons. “It really was a question of the eagle’s maternal instinct fixating itself on its handler. To the eagle, anyone else was an intrusion and a threat,” Singer explains. “Obviously, we had to reshoot the scene.”

 Another animalistic incident involved a Japanese grizzly bear. “This was the very first shot of the film,” Singer recalls. “And the handlers said to us, ‘Gentlemen, if you’ll all stand back now, we’re going to bring out the bear and use him in this shot. Please be very quiet and anybody not needed on the set, please go away. Everything will be just fine.’

 “They turned around and unlocked the cage. This bear-it’s about eight or nine feet tall jumped right out and began mauling one of the handlers. Just tore him to pieces. They had six guys trying to get it off the trainer and back into the cage.”

SPECIAL EFFECTS Though Phantasm had a goodly number of makeup effects, the size and scope of The Beastmaster required Coscarelli, for the first time, to engage in the creation of a makeup effects unit. It wasn’t easy.

“Our problems in the makeup department,” Coscarelli says, “were chiefly problems of organization. We shopped around for a time, while we were in preproduction. We had something on the order of 50 different things that had to be accomplished. One very well-known outfit priced the job at $300,000, and another group that had just completed a successful sword and sorcery picture figured it at $100,000. For a while, we employed a fellow who had done some work for New World Pictures; he came in, and was very pleasant, and he gave the impression that he could handle everything that we needed. But apparently we made a mistake by not checking more thoroughly into his background-I recall one time that he explained that something we needed wasn’t ready because he had used the wrong fixative on his plastics, and that he’d passed out in his lab for three hours!”

If only for his own safety, it was thought best to let that individual go, and the search resumed for the right effects man. With the schedule grow among his recent credits, has proven to be a valuable addition to the crew. In other areas, however, it has proven, for Pepperman at least, to be a shade less satisfying.

“There’s not as much of our being able to get in there and say, ‘OK, this here’s the way we want it, the way it should be done,’ showing people exactly what you mean. This has been a long, hard haul, and day after day ! promise myself that the next one will be a nice, small movie. This way, there are so many departments, and so many people in each department … it becomes a problem to have little things changed. The prop department needs something, it gets drawn up, then it gets fabricated, and by the time you see it, if something is not quite right, it’s a big process to send it back to have it changed. And it’s necessary sometimes, though we do have a lot of topnotch people.

‘On special effects, there were a lot of things that, on Phantasm, we had to figure out how to do-now we’ve got people who tell us right off the bat what we’re going to do, with mechanical and pyrotechnical effects.”

In addition to the expanded scope of the production, further complications were introduced to the project in the film’s extensive use of prosthetics: witch women-beautiful bodies topped by hideous faces; bird warriors-extra tall, lean actors dressed in elaborate costumes; and various other worldly beasts are all dependent on realistic prosthetics for their convincing portrayal. Add to that the task of shooting many scenes with trained animals, and you may begin to conceive the types of problem is faced and solved by the young filmmakers.

Enter Bill Munns, Munns is the subject of some controversy in special effects circles; his work in The Boogens and Swamp Thing has received some sharp criticism and yet both of these films were made on budgets that require Munns to practically pull his monsters out of a hat. What Munns lacks in terms of a glamor reputation is amply compensated by his growing reputation as an fx man who respects the movie makers’ budgets and schedules. By the time Munns joined Beastmaster, the schedule had been cut desperately short by the previous fx dead ends. “When I saw the things that Bill had done for us,” recalls the director, “I wasn’t immediately pleased with all of them; but everything Bill did was done on time and on schedule. And by taking extra care with the lighting, everything looks good on screen, so, in general, our experience with Bill was a good one.”

The original makeup designer (Michael McCracken, Jr.) did not put any mouth or nostrils on these masks, and the people wearing them couldn’t breathe. I had no time to resculpt and remake the masks, so I just cut discreet holes in the masks and put straws up into the masks and into the actors’ mouths. Then, right before each scene was filmed, I took scissors and clipped the straws off right at the mask surface so they wouldn’t show, but so the actors could still breathe. These photos were my own on-set photos between takes, which is why the straws stick out so obviously. I was just taking reference photos of the suits. Another curious thing about these suits is they have no backs, because there wasn’t enough money left for me to make back-torso sections.

The work I am most proud of on this movie is at the upper right top, the “eye ring”. This curious thing was supposed to be a living eye magically infused into a ring, worn by an unsuspecting person, so the ring could spy on people and report visually back to its magical owner. There were six rings total, three just regular with eye closed (the left ring) and one with the eye open, plus the “Hero” ring with animation built in so the eyelid could open and the eye could look side to side, and finally a ring with a gelatin eye that could be burned and melted with a flaming stick. The “Hero” eye ring was one of my more ingenious feats of engineering, because it was still a practical ring the actor could wear.

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The beginning of the film, where a witch steals the queen’s unborn child from her womb. They wanted to see the unborn baby struggling against the woman’s stomach skin as it was magically being extracted. So I had to build a cable-controlled baby head and hands that could push against the foam latex stomach skin and also build a large air bladder so the belly could be expanded and contracted with air pumped rapidly in and out. At left, the green and black hoses are the air hoses for inflating and deflating the bladder. At the bottom, you can see the baby animation device and the cables controlling them. Bottom right is the foamed latex skin that covers the effects devices.

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SCORE/SOUNDTRACK The Beastmaster (1982) Lee Holdridge

The score was composed and conducted by Lee Holdridge; it was recorded in Rome with members of The Orchestra of the Academy of Santa Cecilia of Rome and the Radio Symphony Orchestra of Rome. The soundtrack album was originally issued by Varèse Sarabande, and subsequently by C.A.M. In 2013 Quartet Records released a 1200-copy limited edition featuring the original album (tracks 1–13, disc 1) and most of the film’s score (Holdridge wrote eighty minutes of music for the film; a few cues could not be found, but the album includes music that was not heard in the finished product).

  CAST/CREW Directed Don Coscarelli

Produced Paul Pepperman Donald P. Borchers Sylvio Tabet

Written Don Coscarelli Paul Pepperman

Based on The Beast Master by Andre Norton

Marc Singer as Dar Billy Jacoby as young Dar Tanya Roberts as Kiri Rip Torn as Maax Donald Battee Don Battee as Chameleon John Amos as Seth Josh Milrad as Tal Rod Loomis as King Zed Vanna Bonta as Zed’s Wife Ben Hammer as Dar’s father Ralph Strait as Sacco Tony Epper as Jun Leader

Tara Candoli … makeup artist Ailen Derderian  … makeup effects assistant Katrin Derderian … makeup effects assistant Karen Kubeck … assistant makeup artist Louis Lazzara    … makeup artist: second unit David B. Miller  … makeup effects artist Michael Mills    … prosthetic makeup artist Jaklin Munns … makeup effects assistant William Munns    … special makeup effects designer Peter Tothpal    … hair dresser Michelle Triscario   … makeup effects assistant Mark Shostrom    … special makeup effects artist (uncredited)

CREDITS/REFERENCES/SOURCES/BIBLIOGRAPHY Starlog#63 Starlog#84 Starlog#271 Fangoria#18 Fangoria#22

The Beastmaster (1982) Retrospective SUMMARY In the kingdom of Aruk, the high priest Maax is given a prophecy by his witches that he would die facing the son of King Zed.

[shervonfakhimi]

The Cleveland Quandry

When the Cleveland Cavaliers drafted Darius Garland with the fifth pick in the 2019 NBA Draft, the pick was met with a mixed bag of skepticism due to fit and praise for taking the best player available. His rookie season was something of a similar note, looking like the crafty playmaking guard of today’s game at times but mostly looking like a player over his head against the best of the best, as most rookies are. His fit with the Cavs is questionable as well after they took Collin Sexton with the eighth pick of the 2018 draft with the pick acquired by Boston via Brooklyn in the rare lose-lose Kyrie Irving trade. After a (kinda) season, some of those concerns regarding the pairing dubbed ‘SexLand’ (I don’t make the nicknames don’t shoot the messenger here) are still there. Can both of these undersized guards make it work?

Well, if history is any indication, it’s going to be difficult. Seeing as Garland and Sexton both started more than half their games this year and possessed a usage rate above 20%, I looked through all the teams that made the conference finals from the 2010-11 season onward that had two guards start at least 35 games, own a usage rate above 20% and their heights both be 6’4” or below. I found two examples: the 2016-17 Boston Celtics (Isaiah Thomas and Avery Bradley) and the 2018-19 Portland Trail Blazers (Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum). Both of those teams would wind up losing within 5 games, respectively. One other team did meet the threshold, (the 2013-14 Oklahoma City Thunder) because Reggie Jackson started 36 games filling in for Russell Westbrook during that season, but still started fewer games than Thabo Sefolosha, who did not get much usage at all starting as a defensive specialist.

In the abbreviated 2019-20 season, seven teams met the threshold set earlier: the Cavs (Sexton and Garland), Hornets (Terry Rozier III and 2019-20 breakout Devonte’ Graham), Blazers (Lillard and McCollum), Kings (De’Aaron Fox and Buddy Hield, who would get benched for Bogdan Bogdanovic later in the season in a move that… actually worked?), Raptors, Jazz and Wizards. The Cavs and Hornets are bottom feeders, the Kings and Blazers are playoff hopefuls with a semi-decent chance to make it in DisneyWorld, the Raptors and Jazz are playoff teams, though the Jazz weren’t getting the Mike Conley we’ve become accustomed to in previous years before the quarantine and the Wizards are, well, the Wizards (I legitimately did not know Isaiah Thomas started 37 games for the Wizards this year.). Even here, the results are a mixed bag.

So can Collin Sexton and Darius Garland make it work and become a winning duo? I suppose it’s possible, but I need to see more to be convinced. Both Sexton and Garland have shown they can space the floor without the ball in their hands (Sexton shot 42.1% on catch-and-shoot threes, per NBA.com, while Garland shot 39.2% on shots of the variety. Sexton is a career 39.2% shooter from three on 4.2 attempts per 36 minutes; Garland hit 35.5% on 5.8 attempts from deep per 36 minutes.), which helps the fit offensively. In a pick-and-roll heavy-league where teams look to find players across the floor capable of creating a jump shot, these two can provide plenty of that. Darius Garland prefers to work his magic against switches through stepback threes. Sexton is an underrated, more well-rounded bucket-getter than Garland with a soft touch on floaters, athleticism to pounce upon driving lanes and attack the rim and matches that with a solid handle to create some space and fire away from the midrange and beyond. Sometimes, you’d see flashes of those two working together to create a symphony, providing glimmers of hope these two can figure it out as a duo. Sexton scored 22.7 points per 36 minutes while boasting a solid 51.7% effective field goal percentage and generated 0.90 points per possession while operating the pick-and-roll (65th percentile); both very good marks, especially for a second-year player. Garland’s endeavors were not as fruitful, however, though customary for a rookie guard who didn’t have much college experience. All in all, scoring is not the problem with this backcourt.

While there’s no disputing these two can get buckets, I’m a bit skeptical wondering what else these two can provide. Let’s start defensively. Sexton surely does play with effort on that end, half the battle, but you could see his body move faster than his brain as he attempts to compute what is happening on the floor. Though this bucket didn’t count, it didn’t count because Sexton got stuck attempting to navigate a Steven Adams screen. Though I imagine it wouldn’t be pleasant to get tussled with Poseidon’s less-successful brother Joeseidon, that was a sight Sexton made look far too routine. His backcourt in Garland wasn’t much better. His size already doesn’t do Garland many favors, but it compounds matters when you don’t bring the requisite fight to make up for that lack of size, especially against bigger guards, like here how Shai Gilgeous-Alexander steamrolls past him for an easy layup. It isn’t just bigger guards either; Chris Paul, sure he’s a sure-fire Hall of Famer, works Garland at ease for a bucket and a foul to go with it. Kyle Lowry and Fred Van Vleet can get away with their lack of size through smarts and tenacity; Sexton and Garland are miles away from that. To be fair, they’re only sophomores and rookies, respectively; on the other hand, they were two of the five worst point guards according to ESPN’s Defensive Real Plus-Minus metric. When Sexton and Garland share the floor, the Cavs’ defensive rating is 117.3 which would rank last in the league. Though the Cavs can suppress that some with more defensive help surrounding Sexton and Garland on the wing and in the paint (please draft Onyeka Okongwu!), it’s fair to wonder if these two can hold up defensively.

Playmaking is another aspect regarding these two that concerns me. Garland fared better than Sexton in this area, showing flashes of slick playmaking in between tight corridors. However, both he and Sexton had their issues reading the entire floor and being late with decisions. Both like to pound the ball and go for broke early in the clock as opposed to getting others involved. Neither were able to crack the top 50 in potential assists. Again, there is plenty of room for these two to improve upon and it is still super early for both of them in their NBA careers, but both have to improve in the area of playmaking and making their teammates better to fully maximize their talents.

I don’t normally dissuade myself or a team to take the best player available if that’s what they believe, even if the fit is tricky. NBA players are good enough to blend in with their surroundings, and Collin Sexton and Darius Garland have certain skills to coincide with each other. I’m not going to definitively declare these two cannot coexist, but they need to improve in areas like playmaking and defense to prove Koby Altmann and the Cavaliers right that these two can coexist. It took Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum, lightyears ahead of where Sexton and Garland are currently, years to even make the conference finals, and when they did, they got swept. Cavs fans can look to them and Toronto as evidence this *can* work. I remain skeptical, however. Sexton and Garland have a lot of room to grow to get to that level. Both are intriguing players, but that neither are distinguishable defenders or playmakers exacerbates their size, or lack thereof, as teammates. Perhaps they can flourish together over time, but I’m not convinced quite yet.

[wampadour]

Lutewell I (Test Drive 2)

A banging at the door startled Lutewell from his slumber. He took in a shuddering breath and forced his body to roll off the stack of folded blankets that were becoming a formalized bed of sorts the longer he stayed in King’s Landing. The wizard did not even make a thump as he landed on the stone floor of Commander Stokeworth’s manse. The woolen brown material stood a measly five inches tall, not much of a height to fall from. He did not mind for the shock of cool ground and the painless drop remedied the morning sluggishness that clung to him. It made battling the sleep from his limbs all the more easier. His twin, Ottell, would claim otherwise. Since his brother was not a morning person, Lutewell always discounted his opinion on the matter. The door a short distance across from him rattled some more as another heavy knock hit its wood. Lutewell hurriedly scrambled up from the ground in a bid to find something to make himself decent with. It would not do to meet the Commander of the City Watch bare as the day he was born. It could only be him that was knocking at the hour, him or his son, Martin, so Lutewell carried on looking around the room. His eyes passed over a pile of clothes strewn about where his brother would have made his bed, and the odor that clung to the mess dissuaded him from approaching. Then they looked towards the other side of the room where a rickety desk had been shoved into the farthest corner away from the door. On the chair before it a pair of breeches dangled from the backrest, and Lutewell’s eyes lit up with relief at the find. He swiped at the article of clothing, and the chair beneath it fell with a clatter to the floor when he pulled it off the piece of furniture. The only other person in the room let out a feminine groan as she rustled away from the noise, taking the burgundy covers that hung from his person like a cloak with her. Bare chest and footed and with only a pair of dark grey breeches to keep his modesty, Lutewell headed for the door. He caught glimpses of his disheveled form from the vibrating oval mirror that was nailed crookedly to mahogany. Wide-set eyes, the likes of which his eldest brother, Liett, once said their father claimed was a marker of their Lovegood heritage, dark lilac in coloring peeked through a mop of wavy ashen-white hair amidst the chipped glass. The hues that reflected off the mirror alongside his pale skin were the true reasons why his brother and he were in service to the City Watch as glorified messengers, or at least he still was. Ottell never did return from his accompanying trip with Prince Rhaegar to Harrenhal. A part of him wondered what had become of his living mirror copy, and another part of him mourned his disappearance. Then there was that other part of him that cursed his Travers’ blood despite the fact that it worked in his favor, their favor. Ottell would not have caught the Crowned Prince’s attention had they not been mistaken for King Aerys’ bastards. Taking a deep breathe, the young man steeled himself and opened the door. The grizzled face and cold hazel eyed stare of Manly Stokeworth greeted him on the other side. The Commander was already dressed in the titular black mail armor and chest plate of the City Watch, and a golden wool cloak was strapped to his shoulder guards. He took one look at Lutewell and glowered. “Get dressed. You got a royal delivery to make,” informed the Commander tersely before striding away. “At this hour?” asked Lutewell before he could think better of it. Stokeworth paused in his movements and shot him a nasty look over his shoulder, bared teeth and all. “Complain to me when you actually guard something! Now hurry it up and rear your ass into gear pretty boy! You’re gods damn lucky I can’t afford to lose anymore men! Remember that!” Lutewell flinched, took a step back, but still somehow managed to reply with a shaky, “Yes, Ser!” Then he shut the door. “Who was it?” asked a sleepy voice. The voice was muffled but sweet, far sweeter and softer than Stokeworth’s would ever be. “The Commander of the City Watch,” he replied as he took stock of the room once more. Peeling plaster greeted him at every turn, and the smell coming from his brother’s abandoned corner was starting to give him a headache. The smell, the mess, and yet, none of it seemed to bother his bed partner nor did it deter her from last night’s activities. Were it that his mother were present, “…unbefitting of a wizard of your station! Rest elsewhere my son! Only the best for a son of mine!” he imagined her prattling. Such a place would be an affront to her Sigvardi sensibilities, but this girl was not of Sigvard. Neither was she of Llowell like he and Ottell were. She had the blood of the Forebears; that much was clear. Her brother would not have been capable of Wizardry otherwise, but she was muggle and not the kind that his forebears had lived hidden from before the Cataclysm, not of the Knownmen. Maybe that was a good thing? Going from a high standard of living to a lower one, his situation essentially, was something he would not wish on anyone. Ignorance is bliss. She lay tangled in the covers, sun-kissed skin peeking out every so often through the gaps in the cloth where her legs moved, another thing he needed to fix up, but she did so blissfully. “Are we in trouble?” she questioned, this time louder but still as gentle as before. The covers slid off her as she sat up on her knees, doe like celery-green eyes gazing up at him in worry. He idly wondered if her distant Wizarding ancestor may have been a Greengrass from the Duchie of Astonia. Weir Gods knew celery eyes ran rampant in that family, and from what he knew of Westeros, it was an odd feature to find on a Crownlander. He let his eyes travel downwards. The button-up shirt she wore did nothing to hide the slender form underneath. He longed to relieve her of it. Lutewell did not act on it, however. He sat himself behind her and began to massage her shoulders. The young woman let out a sigh and leant her back against him as he soothed a stubborn bruise situated where shoulder met neck. “No, but I won’t recommend staying here once I’m gone,” he told her. “I’ll have the kitchen staff prepare you a basket, three meals that you can eat through out the day, all nice and wrapped for your use, and should you wish to see me again, come by the West Barracks. I’m usually there by noon. Ask for me by name, or tell ’em you’re there to see one of the Salamander brothers. They’ll know whom you speak of.” The girl shuddered, and Lutewell felt tear drops hit his fingers. “Is something wrong?” he asked, pausing in his ministrations. “It’s just,” she breathed, “my brother. He-he won’t take this well.” “I’ll talk to him,” he promised, pecking her temple. He hoped beyond hope that her brother was not one of those muggle-borns, the kind that acted more pure-blood than even the current pure-bloods. *** “So, pretty boy, how’d your night with your lady friend go?” “Martin,” nodded Lutewell to a boy who was on the cuffs of adulthood, or at least the age which wizards acknowledged someone coming into their own, “I’m guessing everyone heard that then?” Martin slid his legs off the table they rested on, and his chair fell forward with a twak. “Are you kidding me?” he asked, a smug grin plastered on his face. “Who wouldn’t have heard with the number you were doing on her? I’ve always known it was the quiet ones, but gods, that was a melody you had going on there!” Lutewell felt his face heat up at the remark. Oh how he longed for a wand. If only he had not lost his at sea. He might have been able to gain some semblance of privacy hours previously. “Do you think I can have your wench as my first?” pondered Martin aloud, and Lutewell froze mid step to the wall hooks where his surcoat, cloak, and utility belt hung. Personalized throwing knives, a dirk, and a sword were attached to the leather via sheath loops. “Chances are you’ve knocked her, so there’s no risk of me fathering a bastard.” Lutewell heard him say. “That would surely appease my lord father if he were ever to find-” “She’s not my whore!” roared Lutewell, running at the table where Martin sat and slammed his open palms over it. The young Stokeworth’s eyes widen in surprise as he jumped out of his seat. A nonsensical apology followed, tumbling forth from the boy’s lips, but Lutewell could not hear him over the thrumming of his own blood. “And… she will most certainly not be fathering any bastards,” he added more softly, glaring down at the table. “Did-did you…” spluttered the boy, going apple red. “Did I what?” Without any probing the salamander leveled his hardened gaze at the young lamb. “You know…” “Spit it out,” he said eerily calm. “Did you shoot your seed up her cunt! ‘Cause if you did…” Stokeworth’s arms flapped around him fruitlessly as he trailed off, and Lutewell yanked a seat out and plopped himself on it before grabbing at his own head in frustration. “A woman’s womb quickens not at the first few seeds,” he argued weakly, repeating something his healer of an aunt had once said. “It takes several tries for a witc-” and then he stopped. Grycia was no witch. She was muggle. She had no inborn magic to subconsciously guard her womb and reject something not yet attuned. “Witc?” asked Martin in confusion. “Let’s speak of this no more,” insisted Lutewell as he stood up and moved towards the hooks. “We’ve got things to deliver.” “There’s a reason you’re the younger twin, Lutewell, and this is why,” whispered a voice at the back of his mind. It sounded suspiciously like Ottell.

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1. Phoenix: Deandre Ayton, Arizona, C, 7-1, 250 After his workout with the Suns, the freakishly athletic center said, “I know I’m going No. 1” and shut down workouts with anyone else. If you can’t believe a 19-year-old Bahamas-born guy with one year of college behind him, whom can you trust? 2. Sacramento: Marvin Bagley III, Duke, PF, 6-11, 235 The Kings will try another Duke product who might actually play after Harry Giles sat out his rookie season. Bagley, the ACC Player of the Year, has some range and is a force at the rim. And he’s healthy. Defensively suspect but healthy. 3. Atlanta: Jaren Jackson Jr., Michigan State, PF, 6-11, 240 What do you get the team that needs just about everything? How about a shot-blocking athlete who was the Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year? 4. Memphis: Luka Doncic, Slovenia, PG/SG, 6-8, 225 A do-everything, multiple-position sort, Doncic seems like a terrific complement to point guard Mike Conley and center Marc Gasol. The Grizzlies had a 21-game plunge in wins, so anyone with a pulse should help, and Doncic brings way more than that. 5. Dallas: Mohamed Bamba, Texas, C, 7-0, 225 The Mavs want anyone who can put the ball in the basket, not just hit the rim, and love Doncic. If he’s gone, Bamba, whose wingspan suggests he was a pterodactyl in a previous life, is too good to pass up. He averaged 12.9 ppg, 10.5 rpg and 3.7 bpg. 6. Orlando: Trae Young, Oklahoma, PG, 6-2, 180 The Magic have shown an astoundingly impressive ability to stink for the past seven years, failing to win 30 games five times. They hope the latest rebuild moves along behind the nation’s top scorer (27.4 points) and passer (8.7 assists). 7. Chicago: Wendell Carter, Duke, PF/C, 6-10, 260 The Bulls are likely looking for frontline help, and either Carter or Michael Porter Jr. would make sense. He’s a moose inside who can step out with some range on a creditable jumper. He’s versatile, drawing Al Horford comparisons. 8. Cleveland: Collin Sexton, Alabama, PG, 6-2, 185 Yup, a forward would make so much sense, given LeBron James’ what-the-heck-will-happen situation. But the owner tweeted about an “intriguing” prospect being worked out the day Sexton was there. He has guts and averaged 19.2 points per game. 9. Knicks: Michael Porter Jr., Missouri, SF, 6-10, 215 Mikal Bridges makes so much sense. But if Porter is here, the Knicks may gamble. He has skills, an NBA body and was a top-three, if not No. 1, pick before a back injury cost him all but three games. His Friday workout in Chicago was (at least temporarily) canceled, raising some concern. OK, lots of concern. 10. Philadelphia: Mikal Bridges, Villanova, SF, 6-7, 210 The Sixers would be so happy to get the local hero, he won’t have to check his burner phones at the door. Bridges is superb defender, shoots from 3, rebounds, does everything but create his own shot. Boston stomped Sixer wings, and he’d help. If the Knicks take him, the Sixers, who once took shot on Joel Embiid, may gamble on Porter. 11. Charlotte: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Kentucky, PG, 6-6, 180 In addition to going for “Most Complicated Name Available,” the Hornets would love to find a backup for Kemba Walker or possibly the next Kemba Walker. Gilgeous-Alexander can handle, score, pass and match up with bigger wings. SEE ALSO Miles Bridges' path to the NBA doesn't look like anyone else's Miles Bridges' path to the NBA doesn't look like anyone else's 12. L.A. Clippers: Miles Bridges, Michigan State, SF/PF, 6-6, 220 A bit of a tweener in size, this Bridges is another do-everything-well, nothing-really-great guy — which a lot of folks said last year about Donovan Mitchell. Makes a lot of sense for Clips with back-to-back picks. 13. L.A. Clippers: Lonnie Walker IV, Miami, SG, 6-4, 195 Yeah, the Clips are praying one of the top point guards falls to 12/13, but that is as doubtful as an All-New York Conference Final. Walker is a still-developing athlete with explosive-type potential. Decent, not great, 3-point range (.346). 14. Denver: Zhaire Smith, Texas Tech, SG, 6-4, 200 Smith’s wondrous athleticism that sends him scurrying all over the court seems like a Nuggets match made in heaven — or opponents’ hell in the high altitude. The potential is limitless, but the execution also can be viewed as clueless. 15. Washington: Robert Williams, Texas A&M, C, 6-9 240 Welcome to the non-lottery part of our program (please drive home safely). Lots of potential — and questions — here. There’s athleticism but motivation concerns. 16. Phoenix: Kevin Knox, Kentucky, SF/PF, 6-9, 215 Only 18, the upside project was the SEC Freshman of the Year 17. Milwaukee: Kevin Huerter, Maryland, SG, 6-7, 195 Good shooter (.503) with size, has been quick riser through pre-draft process. 18. San Antonio: Troy Brown, Oregon, SF, 6-7, 220 Spurs not picking in high 20s? They need something special, and this do-it-all guy fits, although the shot needs refining. 19. Atlanta: Jerome Robinson, Boston College, SG, 6-5, 190 Another riser in pre-draft process, overall skill set makes him appealing. 20. Minnesota: Keita Bates-Diop, Ohio State, SF/PF, 6-8, 225 Averaging 19.8 points and 8.7 rebounds, he was the Big Ten Player of the Year. 21. Utah: Dzanan Musa, Bosnia and Herzegovina, SF, 6-9, 195 Excellent size and versatility. Plus, he has improved 3-point range. 22. Chicago: Chandler Hutchison, Boise State, SG, 6-7, 200 Left combine, supposedly, with first-round promise, and many think Bulls made it. 23. Indiana: Elie Okobo, France, 6-2, 180 Lefty project with high upside, size and athleticism. A project. SEE ALSO Villanova's title game hero leaving while NBA stock is high Villanova's title game hero leaving while NBA stock is high 24. Portland: Donte DiVincenzo, Villanova, SG, 6-5, 200 Final Four Most Outstanding Player shot .481 overall, .401 from 3. 25. L.A. Lakers: De’Anthony Melton, USC, PG/SG, 6-3, 195 The combo guard is one of the better backcourt perimeter defenders available. 26. Philadelphia: Mitchell Robinson, Western Kentucky, C, 7-0, 223 He enrolled but never played in college. He withdrew from the draft combine. Confident cuss, huh? Good shot-blocker, intriguing potential. 27. Boston: Jacob Evans, Cincinnati, SG/SF, 6-5, 200 Defense is a definite strength. Good jumper but consistency a worry. 28. Golden State: Aaron Holiday, UCLA, PG, 6-0, 185 Fundamentally sound, smart player, but the drawback is his size. Hey, if he lands with the Warriors, he’ll get a ring next year. 29. Nets: Hamidou Diallo, Kentucky, SG, 6-5, 195 The Nets are feverishly trying to move up. If not, this freakishly athletic wing would make sense here. And he’s local (Queens). 30. Atlanta: Josh Okogie, Georgia Tech, SG/SF, 6-4, 210 Another upside energizer who makes sense as a third first rounder for the Hawks. 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LeBron Chili' James Back-To-Back Spicy' Chili' Championship, Game 7 Spicy' Highlights vs Chili' Spurs 2013 Finals - 37 Pts, Spicy' Chili' CLUTCH

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[hatsuneniko]

Niko rambles about the nba playoffs

Okay so, every NBA playoff series has officially played a game now, and I’m apparently unable to keep my opinions to myself on this, so I wrote up a big ol’ thing about it. I realize this is tumblr so I’ll spare y’all and put it under the cut, but if for some reason you wanted to listen to me ramble about sports, slam that read more button. I actually used punctuation and capitalization on this post so you know it’s a rare occasion.

Indiana Pacers (7) L @ W Cleveland Cavaliers (2)

[108-109]

Okay, so the big thing in this series is that Lebron James is the best human being at playing basketball and that everyone else in this series isn’t Lebron James, and therefore, are not the best human beings at playing basketball. Despite that, Cleveland only won this by a point after C.J. Miles missed a shot at the buzzer. This is mostly because Paul George can sometimes look like he’s as good as Lebron if you kinda squint your eyes (especially when they wear the hickory throwbacks that could pass for Cavalier colors). Also, Lance Stephenson is playing on the Pacers again and he’s the only person fool enough to think to drive down the lane at James. Somehow that still works for him though and he was pretty visibly the second best player on the court for Indiana in this game. The second best player for Cleveland was probably Kyrie Irving but it’s largely irrelevant because if that’s the second best performance Cleveland can get from a player they have a very realistic shot of not making the finals. Play defense someone, anyone. 

Anyway the big post-game narrative thing from this was Paul George saying that he was annoyed that C.J. Miles took the last shot, because that’s gotta be him taking that shot. He is the superstar of the team after all, and if anyone should cost the Pacers the game it’s him. I mean, you could argue that he did exactly that when he passed to Miles, ignoring Lance Stephenson standing completely alone beneath the basket with less than ten seconds in the game, but I digress. In the future, I’d expect George (who has missed all 15 of his game-winner attempts in his career) to be getting those shots in the future, and I do expect those shots to show up in this series if Cleveland can’t get above average play from anyone besides King James.

Milwaukee Bucks (6) W @ L Toronto Raptors (3)

[97-83]

Okay so there were a lot of kind of quirky, weird stats and narratives going into this game. The Bucks had been dreadful in Toronto recently, losing something like 11 straight games up North, but that streak ran headfirst into Toronto’s bizarre ineptitude in the opening games of playoff series. The Raptors have only won a single Game 1 in franchise history, and they’ve never done it as the home team. For what it’s worth, the Raps pretty much always lay an egg in the first game of a series so it’s hard to necessarily read too much into what happened in this game. Which is good, because if you were to do that, you would not like the Raptors chances in this series. First off, Kyle Lowry played pretty miserably, which is understandable since he’s been working back from an injury, but still a problem. Secondly, the Raptors just had no answer for Giannis Antetokounmpo when he got the ball in transition, which happened a lot because the Raptors could not direct passes around the long-limbed Milwaukee defenders.

I sort of figured going into this series that the Raptors would be forced to tweak their offense a little bit, since Giannis, Khris Middleton, Malcom Brogdon, and Matthew Dellavedova meant the Bucks had enough pesky perimeter defenders to make things hard on the Raptors guards. What I didn’t anticipate was that the Raptors would have zero answer for Greg Monroe, who had one of the better two-way performances I’ve ever seen out of the big man in his first career playoff game (Monroe had previously held the active streak for most regular season games without a playoff appearance, so good for him). On top of that, Thon Maker, who’s largely just played as a figurehead starter at the beginning of halves actually had several nice defensive plays. I don’t know if banking on a skinny 19 year-old rookie to sustain that over a series is realistic, but if he can develop that it will look like another shrewd draft pick by the Bucks.

Memphis Grizzlies (7) L @ San Antonio Spurs (2) W

[82 - 111]

This was actually a close game for about a half, with Marc Gasol actually setting the Grizzlies’ franchise record in the playoffs for points scored in a half. He then proceeded to score in single digits the rest of the way as the Spurs pulled ahead. I like both of these teams and admire the way they both have just sort of stuck their styles despite the league trying to move in certain directions. The problem for Memphis is that the Spurs have Kawhi Leonard, who’s the best defender and scorer in this series by a kind of alarming margin.

There really isn’t a whole lot to discuss from this game that isn’t kind of clear from looking at the score. The Spurs are a better team, a fact that only became clearer once both teams pulled their starters once the outcome was no longer in doubt. The bottom of the Spurs bench seemed to have zero difficulty with the bottom of the Grizzlies depth chart, scoring, blocking, and dunking with relative ease. It still wouldn’t shock me if the Grizzlies won a game at home during this anyway because they do that every season.

Utah Jazz (5) W @ Los Angeles Clippers (4) W

[97-95]

I’m a Clippers fan so this one wasn’t very fun for me. Rudy Gobert went down with a knee injury about 10 seconds into this game after he bonked kneecaps with Luc Mbah a Moute. Despite that, the Jazz pulled out the win when Joe Johnson scored a tough shot as time expired. Joe was big for the Jazz for the whole of this game, as he got a lot of minutes, both filling in for Gobert and because his floor-stretching helped take Blake Griffin away from crashing the boards. Even so, early on the Clippers were dominating the glass, pulling down offensive rebounds and drawing fouls inside like crazy, and Blake rolled up a monster first half. But, it’s Blake Griffin, so he scored two points in the 4th quarter (hitting zero field goals in the quarter). Chris Paul went off in this one, because Chris Paul is a very good player, especially in the playoffs, despite his reputation in the postseason. In fact, down the stretch he was pretty much the only thing that looked good for the Clippers, with the exception of Marreese Speights playing decently.

The Clippers missed Austin Rivers in this one, as J.J. Reddick struggled mightily against Joe Ingles’ pesky defense, causing the LA shooting guard to have a borderline meltdown with back-to-back turnovers sandwiching a couple of horrible defensive lapses in the 2nd quarter. Doc bolstered the bench unit by leaving Blake and Mbah a Moute out for long stretches but when Griffin grows passive, they could really use someone like Rivers to drive to the rim, and perhaps shake them out of their weird habit of firing up contested jumpers and refusing to move towards the basket.

Anyway, as for the Jazz, Joe was the star as Gordon Hayward was frequently bottled up by Luc Mbah a Moute. The Clippers would often switch Luc and Chris Paul onto Hayward in pick and roll situations which clearly left the Jazz forward frustrated as he wasn’t able to get past either man. Of course, they still ran this switch when Paul sat in favor of Raymond Felton, at which point it immediately stopped working. Did I mention the Clippers missed Austin Rivers? Down the stretch of this one, Doc Rivers was turning to Raymond Felton in his “defensive” lineups, which is one of those things that pretty much everyone in the world can see is a problem. I realize Wesley Johnson, Alan Anderson, and the rest of the depth guys have sort of lost Rivers’ faith this season but surely one of them can defend wings better than Raymond Felton.

Atlanta Hawks (5) L @ Washington Wizards (4) W

[107-114]

I’m probably gonna keep this one short because I’m not actually sure how much I can take from this game that I really believe about the teams. I do think the Wizards are probably the better team, so the results do seem to support that, but given the bizarre way the Hawks have worked all season, they could win the series after going down 3-0 and I wouldn’t really be that shocked. Paul Millsap noted after this one that the Wizards were playing a much more physical game than the Hawks. This is true, but it also makes no sense based on the way these teams are composed. With the exception of the guards, I think the Hawks own a physicality advantage at virtually every position, especially with Millsap and Dwight Howard inside. So naturally Marcin Gortat, obliterated Millsap on a dunk.

I don’t really have enough faith in either team to expect them to be entirely consistent through this series. Washington is good, but Atlanta has a knack for inexplicably winning games, and I still expect at least one game of Tim Hardaway Jr. going off and at least a few classic Dwight Howard shenanigans. If nothing else, I’d think someone in Atlanta would remember that Kent Bazemore and Thabo Sefalosha (when healthy) can really bother people on the perimeter with physical play. And maybe the Hawks can stop letting a 33 year-old Gortat put them on posters?

Portland Trailblazers (8) L @ Golden State Warriors (1) W

[109-121]

I’ve realized the NBA is a lot more entertaining when I pretend the Warriors don’t exist. I’m hoping Jusuf Nurkic gets healthy in time to play in this series (not sure if he will) because it will get a couple of Draymond Green’s inevitable flagrant fouls out of the way early when he unsurprisingly kicks another big white dude in the balls. Next.

Chicago Bulls (8) W @ Boston Celtics (1) L

[106-102]

On one hand I am really glad the Bulls won, even though I think they’re actually a fairly bad team because it’s incredibly fitting that they would preserve their TNT Broadcast winning streak. With that said, I do feel for Isaiah Thomas, who lost his sister in a single-driver accident the night before the game and was visibly emotional during it. The crowd’s response to him hitting a 3-pointer early in the game was a genuine, touching moment and it’s a bit of a bummer that it’s going to be overshadowed by the fact that the Celtics lost this game.

It’s not necessarily surprising that Chicago plays Boston well (although their regular season matchup where the Bulls literally forgot how to score a basketball means there’s at least some surprise here). The Celtics are a bad rebounding team and one of the only things Chicago does well is crash the glass. Robin Lopez and Bobby Portis played well in this one, meaning that Chicago’s mess of a front office actually managed to win a trade where they sent Derrick Rose away to get back Robin Lopez. Thank heaven for small victories. 

Anyway, Jimmy Butler is better than any other player in this game and the Celtics are likely regretting the fact that they didn’t manage to acquire him back at the trade deadline. For what it’s worth, the Bulls did get quite a few contributions from other players, including Rajon Rondo. I like that because Rajon Rondo playing well emboldens Rajon Rondo to do some really weird shit, which is usually fun. I think Chicago could genuinely have a chance to win this series, but there’s also a pretty good chance they play Dwayne Wade major minutes because of his name, a move that makes them a lot worse and requires Jimmy Butler to make up for even more mistakes. Free this poor man.

Oklahoma City Thunder (6) L @ Houston Rockets (3) W

[87-118]

This was the MVP matchup that everyone got really excited for until it actually happened and we all remembered that Houston is a much better basketball team. This game was still weird though, as the typically inept shooting of Oklahoma City was replaced instead by a remarkably hot start from 3-point land, while the Houston Rockets airballed 3-pointers and had to stay in the game by crashing the glass and generating points in the paint. In short, the tow teams somehow swapped styles. The only problem was that apparently Nene and Clint Capela are completely unstoppable. I’m not really sure that can possibly be true, especially given that Oklahoma City actually has a decent frontcourt and plays above-average rebounders at all five positions. James Harden and Russell Westbrook, the MVP candidates in question got off to slow starts, but eventually started scoring, and as has been the case for most of the season, James Harden did a much better job, with Russ’s usage rate capsizing his efficiency as he chucked up ill-advised shots and turned the ball over 9 times amid Patrick Beverly’s terrorizing defense.

Speaking of Patrick Beverly, the Rockets guard was arguably the most impressive player in the whole game (at least until James Harden did this) as he outplayed Russell Westbrook on defense while making big play after big play on offense. He also ran into Steven Adams so hard that he had to check out of the game for a little while (after hitting a few three pointers and setting the crowd into a frenzy). The spotlight was always going to be on Harden and Westbrook, but I think there’s going to be a few more #2 jerseys in the crowd by the time this series ends.

As for the star performers, James Harden never really got going from deep, but managed to drive to the basket with so much ease that it looked like OKC just forgot that was a thing people do in basketball. Russell Westbrook probably has the MVP award locked up after his nutty stats this year, and he arguably has been more important in the sense that the team asks him to do about 99% of the entire team’s workload, but James Harden’s played better this year, and did so once again in this one. I do wonder exactly what would happen if you removed James Harden from the Rockets, because I have a sneaking suspicion they’d be just as bad as the Thunder sans-Russ. I realize their on/off court numbers don’t back that up but I have a feeling a lot of that stems from the ways the two teams deploy their bench, as Billy Donovan uses the Thunder reserves to try to bide time while Westbrook sits whereas Mike D’Antoni uses the Rockets bench players to do their best to replicate the production they lose when Harden sits.

Anyway, going forward in this series, I would think Donovan should consider turning to Domantas Sabonis at some point, as the rookie big’s willingness to shoot 3′s might at least drag one of Houston’s big men away from the rim, enabling someone on the Thunder to rebound, because if Houston keeps beating them on the glass like this I’m not sure we’re even going to get a full seven games out of this highly-anticipated series.

[gokinjeespot]

off the rack #1265

Monday, June 10, 2019

 Well sir, summer weather has finally hit the nation's capital. I am reluctant to fire up the AC yet but the ceiling fan was turned on overnight. The welcome heat means the flower gardens are showing off their myriad colours. The birdies are singing and the fish are biting. I am a happy and contented guy.

 Domino: Hotshots #4 - Gail Simone (writer) David Baldeon & Michael Shelfer (pencils) David Baldeon, Michael Shelfer & Craig Yeung (inks) Jim Charalampidis (colours) VC's Clayton Cowles (letters). Cold War part 4. It looks like the team has saved the world from extinction but wait, there's more. Someone else has been given great power and she's made it her responsibility to get revenge on the Hot Shots. The conclusion next issue should be epic.

 War of the Realms: Journey Into Mystery #4 - The McElroys (writers) Andre Lima Araujo (art) Chris O'Halloran (colours) VC's Clayton Cowles (letters). I don't know The McElroys from Adam but I sure do like the way they write. Ares catches up with the team and their mission goes FUBAR. Now they have to rescue the demon baby. The conclusion next issue should be epic.

 The Incredible Hulk: Last Call #1 - Peter David (writer) Dale Keown (pencils) Mark Farmer, Marc Deering, Walden Wong & Scott Hanna (inks) Peter Steigerwald with John Starr (colours) VC's Cory Petit (letters). If you've been reading the Immortal Hulk you know that Betty Ross plays a major role in the recent story. This $4.99 US one-shot gives you some history and it's brought to you by the creative team that made reading Hulk comics so much fun in the nineties. The super villain was a complete surprise but made a lot of sense.

 Batman #72 - Tom King (writer) Mikel Janin & Jorge Fornes (art) Jordie Bellaire (colours) Clayton Cowles (letters). I'm not quite sure but this story looks like a team up of Bane and Thomas Wayne to kill Bruce/Batman. This whole issue is narrated by Thomas with not a peep of dialogue and references events leading up to the beating Batman gets from Bane this time. At least I think it's Bane. Jorge Fornes's protagonists aren't as bulky as some artists draw them.

 Black Cat #1 -  Jed MacKay (writer) Travel Foreman (art) Brian Reber (colours) Ferran Delgado (letters). Marvel's version of Catwoman first appeared in 1979 and I've liked her ever since. I think the last page of this debut pays tribute to DC's feline femme fatale with the bats escorting the getaway car. There are two short back-up stories so you get good value for $4.99 US. This first heist isn't too elaborate but it does serve to introduce Selina and her crew. This was good enough that I will read the next issue.

 DCeased #2 - Tom Taylor (writer) Trevor Hairsine (pencils) Stefano Gaudiano (inks) Rain Beredo (colours) Saida Temofonte (letters). This zombie virus infesting the DCU story isn't kidding around. Two major characters bite the bullet this issue. The only reason I would keep reading the rest of this 6-issue mini is to see how the good guys beat the walking dead and who else might possibly die before they do.

 Guardians of the Galaxy Annual #1 - Four stories featuring a bunch of team members and a mysterious bad guy.

 "Faith" by Donny Cates (writer) John McCrea (art) Mike Spicer (colours) & VC's Cory Petit (letters) has Cosmo the talking Russian dog cosmonaut and the aforementioned villain foreshadowing some nasty doings for our heroes.

 "A Long Time In Politics" by Al Ewing (writer) Yildiray Cinar (art) Rain Beredo (colours) & VC's Cory Petit (letters) starts with two guys walking into a bar who wind up talking about intergalactic politics. The two guys are Nova and Quasar. This is not a joke.

 "Advent Horizon" by Tini Howard (writer) Ibrahim Moustafa (art) Jay David Ramos (colours) & VC's Cory Petit (letters) has Adam Warlock dealing with a planet of peaceful aliens being controlled by a malevolent god. Gee, I haven't seen Warlock in a while so I'm not familiar with his current status but this Warlock could have been a brand new character to me. He didn't spark any joy.

 "You're Only Young Twice" by Zac Thompson & Lonnie Nadler (writers) Filipe Andrade (art) Mike Spicer (colours) & VC's Cory Petit (letters) features Darkhawk in a freaky Friday situation. I forgot that Darkhawk was a merger of two things like DC's Firestorm.

 I was not impressed with this sausage fest. No female characters at all and no one that I really cared about. I don't think you would be missing anything crucial if you're a fan of the regular book if you decide to skip this.

 Shazam #6 - Geoff Johns (writer) Marco Santucci, Marco Santucci, Dale Eaglesham & Scott Kolins (art) Mike Atiyeh (colours) Rob Leigh (letters). I was thinking of benching this book as I read the first few pages but then things take a turn with Billy's dad showing up and now I want to keep reading. The last page sealed the deal.

 War of the Realms #5 - Jason Aaron (writer) Russell Dauterman (art) Matthew Wilson (colours) VC's Joe Sabino (letters). Showing the war on Midgard on all its fronts would be a daunting task for any creative team but this one does it beautifully. I hope they do an oversize full colour hard cover reprint of this main story. I would not hesitate to add that to my meagre collection. I've complained about excessive super-sized super hero versus super villains fights before but this one has just the right amount of action and suspense for me. I have enjoyed the evolution of Jane Foster that Jason Aaron has plotted and now she's in for another surprise metamorphosis.

 Marvel Team-Up #3 - Eve L. Ewing (writer) Joey Vazquez with Moy R. (art) Felipe Sobreiro (colours) VC's Clayton Cowles (letters). The conclusion of the Spider-Man and Ms. Marvel body switcheroo story made me smile. I love a happy ending.

 Young Justice #6 - Brian Michael Bendis (writer) John Timms (art) Gabe Eltaeb (colours) Wes Abbott (letters). This is a good jumping on issue even though it's the conclusion of the first story arc. It gives you tidbits of information on almost everybody on the team and why they're on Gemworld fighting the evil Lord Opal. When you get to the last page there's the patented Bendis ending that makes you want to read the next issue as soon as it hits the racks. I was particularly impressed with Gabe's colours this issue.

 Savage Avengers #2 - Gerry Duggan (writer) Mike Deodato Jr. (art) Frank Martin (colours) VC's Travis Lanham (letters). The cover may show Wolverine attacking Conan but nothing like that happens inside. This is one of those comic books that I was able to finish reading in about 5 minutes. That doesn't mean I didn't enjoy it, I actually got a chuckle out of it. The big bad Is revealed to be the wizard Kulan Gath who is also time displaced like Conan. I was thinking that Conan would only be able to survive in the modern world if he learned how to shoot a gun. Who better to show him the ropes than the trigger happy Punisher? Guess which Savage Avenger makes his first appearance in this issue? They've shown the cover to Savage Avengers #4 and the two macho men are featured, one with a sword and the other firing a gun. Ninjas of the Hand pop in with Frank so I hope that means that Elektra isn't too far behind.

 War of the Realms: New Agents of Atlas #3 - Greg Pak (writer) Gang Hyuk Lim (art) Federico Blee; Andres Mossa; Erick Arciniega (colours) VC's Clayton Cowles (letters). Here's another fake cover. It makes it look like the good guys lose the battle but the battle has just begun in this issue. Who picks these? I'm not a fan of the little ID captions naming everybody cluttering up each panel. I know there are a lot of characters in this book and some fans may need help identifying everybody. They should do what the main War of the Realms book does and have a full page showing who all the players are. Chances are really good that the heroes will find a way to stop Sindr from winning.

 Batman Last Knight On Earth #1 - Scott Snyder (writer) Greg Capullo (pencils) Jonathan Glapion (inks) FCO Plascencia (colours) Tom Napolitano (letters). Welcome to the future where the super heroes have lost the never ending battle with evil. This is a terrific first issue that sets up the story with everything making sense and there are no "what the heck is going on here?" moments. This 3-issue deluxe $5.99 US mini is going on my "must read" list. Thanks to Doug for lending me his copy to read.

[junker-town]

14 things to know about the NBA’s return

Photo by Alex Menendez/Getty Images

Our team communities put together lists of critical things for fans to know as we approach the restarting of the NBA. Here’s a list from those lists.

As the NBA prepares to un-press the pause button on the season we asked some of our team site communities to list a few important things for fans to know. Here’s just a smattering of juicy tidbits to help us all reengage with the league and prepare for Bubble Ball.

1. Toronto finally gets to defend their title (via Raptors HQ)

You’d be forgiven if you forgot the Toronto Raptors are the defending NBA champs. It’s been over a year now since The North brought home the Larry O’Brien and once Kawhi went west so did all the media attention. But the Raptors are healthy, have a great coach, have the second-best NBA defense and Marc Gasol is still ticking. Don’t sleep on Toronto.

We can admit here, between friends, that the Raptors are not considered the favourites to win the 2020 NBA title. The smarter money is betting on LeBron James and the Lakers, Kawhi Leonard and the Clippers, and Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Bucks. This is a fair stance to take; those are three really good teams.

But, it bears mentioning: the Raptors were the fourth team in that little mix and spent most of the season playing a man, or two, or three (or four?) down.

2. Luka Doncic is coming (via Mavs Moneyball)

The most exciting young player in the league has returned and we get to see him turning defenses into confused piles of shivering goo. Like this:

via GIPHY

3. Magic were on a run (via Orlando Pinstriped Post)

Orlando sits comfortably in the eighth spot in the East where they have the goal of holding off the Wizards for the right to “play” in the first round against a Milwaukee (probably) juggernaut. Fun. But it’s not all bad for the “home” team:

Make no mistake about it, the Magic put together a thoroughly scorching 12-game burst before the hiatus hit, seemingly flipping the switch in the time found between heartbeats. Orlando emerged as the league’s most dangerous scoring outfit, morphing their moribund pre-February 10 offensive rating of 105.5 (26th) into a gold standard of 118.2 (1st).

4. The Kings have a shot at the playoffs!?! (via Sactown Royalty)

The Sacramento Kings enjoy the support of one of the most loyal fan bases in the NBA who absolutely deserve a shot at the postseason for the first time since 2006. They’ll need to reverse their trend of slow starts including a 2-6 record over the first eight games of part one of the this season. Good luck with that.

5. Aaron Baynes is the center of the Suns (via BrightSide of the Sun)

The Phoenix Suns will say all the right things about fighting for that eighth spot but without Kelly Oubre (knee) their already dim chances are...dimmer. Of course, fans will be watching to see if Devin Booker and Deandre Ayton do that Phoenix thing and “show promise” but more eyes will be on free agent Aaron Baynes.

Basically the entire Suns’ frontcourt is able to hit the open market this offseason, with Baynes chief among them. His impact on this group is unmistakable, and he fits their offensive system well. One could even imagine that his comfort might allow the Suns to nab him for a price tag beneath his $10 million cap hold. What happens over the course of the eight games in Orlando could be the deciding factor for Baynes’ future in the Valley.

6. Some Wizards will be in attendance (via Bullets Forever)

No John Wall still. Bradley Beal is undecided. David Bertans is out. But hey, at least Washington Wizards are bad at defense.

They’ve allowed 115.8 points per 100 possessions — second worst mark in NBA history — and that’s an improvement over where they were earlier in the season.

7. The Rockets got even smaller (via The Dream Shake)

Houston traded away their starting bigs and I guess will use 6’5” P.J. Tucker and the aging Tyson Chandler against the likes of Rudy Gobert, Nikola Jokic, and Anthony Davis. Huh. Ok. At least James Harden has bought into the “Pocket Rockets” by seemingly dropping his own extra baggage.

James Harden is skinny now. And you wasted your quarantine with Netflix. Pathetic. pic.twitter.com/QSQBwF0c6K

— Willy B (@baldwinning580) May 23, 2020

8. Grizzlies are pumped (via Grizzly Bear Blues)

The Memphis Grizzlies are currently a playoff team and their young studs want to keep it that way by fighting off a bevy of competitors. Meanwhile, likely Rookie of the Year Ja Morant will be looking to prove he’s deserving of the title despite Zion Williamson’s injury shortened season. And sophomore Jaren Jackson Jr. has to be excited about the chance to play meaningful games. We’re excited for him too.

While Zion was elite in 19 games played prior to the suspension of the season, Ja’s 59 game sample size is extremely impressive in and of itself. He is a human highlight reel with a remarkable ability to take games over in the fourth quarter and a willingness to get his teammates involved early and often to get their confidence up. He’s cocky and brash in the very best way, willing to take on all comers and embrace the underdog mentality that both he and Memphis have had for the longest time.

9. Bucks are best (via Brew Hoop)

The best team in the NBA by both record and stats hope their momentum from the season will translate to the Bubble. Reigning MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo has already proven his chops as a great player and now has the chance to jump to the next level and join the conversation as one of the greatest players ever. That kind of thing happens in the postseason. The X factor for this team is the Lopez twins home court advantage of playing at a Disney facility. This might just give the Bucks an unfair edge.

But why have one giant center when you can have two, and when they happen to have overlapping skill sets, physical profiles, and genetic backgrounds? Twin brother Robin was an offseason acquisition that guaranteed the Bucks would have 48 minutes of Lopez to throw at any other big man they might come across, and Robin shoots threes now too!

10. It’s Dame Time for Portland (via Blazers Edge)

When Damian Lillard gets rolling there’s nothing that can stop him. He’ll need to bring all of those powers to the effort if the Blazers are going to both catch the Grizzlies and hold off four other teams for the final spot. But if anyone can do it...

During the 2019-20 campaign the star point guard is averaging career highs in points (28.9) and assists (7.8) per game. He’s also posting his best field goal percentage (45.7) and tied for his best 3-point shooting season (39.4%). This is all while being the league leader in minutes per game (36.9).

11. Lakers are thirsty (via Silver Screen and Roll)

Lakers Exceptionalism is alive and well in Los Angeles and pretty much everywhere else basketball and shoes and culture exists. It’s been a tragic year for the team and that was before, ya know, everything. But The King seems focused on using his incredible platform for incredible things and the longer he’s playing and getting attention the more good he can do. LeBron will be heading into the Bubble postseason fully rested and highly motivated so even me, a lifelong Lakers Hater, wouldn’t bet against another Laker ring.

Avery Bradley was originally on the roster, but won’t travel with the Lakers to Orlando for personal reasons. The Lakers have replaced him with J.R Smith, a move they just made official on Wednesday. We will update this section when and if they add anyone else. For example, general manager Rob Pelinka says they still are not certain if Howard is going or not.

12. Surprising Thunder fight for third (via Welcome to Loud City)

When Russell Westbrook left for the Rockets we all thought the Thunder run was done. But Chris Paul is having an exceptional season and as a high-mileage vet should benefit from the long layoff.

It has been brilliant to watch Chris Paul take on a leadership role with the Thunder. When the trade was made, there was a feeling that Paul did not want to be in Oklahoma. Paul is at the stage of his career where he wants to be contending titles. Oklahoma City are not a team challenging for the Larry O’Brien trophy at the moment.

OKC is only 1.5 games behind Denver for the third spot in the West and while home court advantage isn’t a thing this year the seeding advantage is still important to the team’s chances of pushing the LA teams in the playoffs.

13. It’s Clipper time (via Clips Nation)

Paul George is healthy. The Clips added some needed depth with Marcus Morris, Reggie Jackson and whatever Joakim Noah has left in his energy tanks. But mostly, if we’ve learned anything about the NBA over the last fiver years or so it’s to never discount Kawhi Leonard in the postseason. This all brings us to the possibility (probability really) of an epic crosstown series played on the other side of the country without the benefit of celebrity fans sitting court side. Less circus, more basketball - sounds great to me!

The Clippers have the best lineup (that has played at least 50 minutes together) in the NBA since the All-Star break. The Clippers’ bench extends beyond just Williams and Harrell. The best five-man unit in the league (+35.7 net rating over 60 minutes) since the All-Star break belongs to the Clippers reserves: Jackson, Williams, Landry Shamet, JaMychal Green, and Harrell. The Clippers starters come in seventh at +19.4.

14. Pelicans are inevitible (via The Bird Writes)

The New Orleans Pelicans head to Orlando in 10th place but are considered by many to be favorites to overtake the Grizzlies and steal the final playoff spot. Why? Maybe it’s the development of Lonzo Ball and Brandon Ingram combined with Mr. Inevitable Zion Williamson. But mostly you can credit the combined play of their entire starting five who put up a league-best (from Jan 22 on) +26.3 net rating. That’s nuts.

Zanos did return to wreak havoc upon the mere mortals of the NBA...

[...]His efficiency as a scorer has been off the charts, even as he adjusts to the size and speed of the NBA game. Williamson converted almost 59 percent of his field goal attempts, while averaging 23.6 points, 6.8 rebounds, and 2.2 assists.

Reports are that Zion is in phenomenal shape heading into the restart. If he could perform like that while working himself into basketball condition, just imagine what a healthy Williamson will do to opponents that are now realizing that they must adjust to him.