Observations: Bulls take over Nuggets arena in thrilling win
/ by Rob Schaefer
Bulls
USA Today
DENVER — Zach LaVine’s focus entering Friday’s road matchup with the Denver Nuggets, which capped a five-game West Coast swing for the Chicago Bulls, was simple.
“We just wanted to end the road trip the right way,” LaVine said.
Mission accomplished. Behind some raucous fan involvement, and a fourth-quarter closeout speared by their stars, the Bulls bested the Nuggets 114-108, moving their record to 11-5 on the young season (3-2 on the trip).
Here are 10 observations:
1. When Nikola Jokić was ruled out just before tipoff with a wrist injury, it didn’t appear the Bulls would play at as much of a size disadvantage as they do on most nights; Denver started Monte Morris, Austin Rivers, Will Barton, Aaron Gordon and Jeff Green.
But Gordon bullied the Bulls in the first quarter nonetheless, tallying 10 points, four rebounds, two assists and a block in 10 minutes (en route to 28 points, nine rebounds and four assists on the night). The Nuggets went to him multiple times in the post for buckets over Javonte Green and LaVine — and when the Bulls brought two defenders to him on another possession, he hit a cutting Green for a layup.
2. Denver jumped out to a 22-12 lead midway through the first on the strength of Gordon’s aggressiveness and some really tough shotmaking, shooting 9-for-13 in the game’s first seven-and-a-half minutes. But, despite the hosts shooting 61 percent, the Bulls drew level 30-30 by the end of the frame, led by 10 points from LaVine.
3. At the end of a wonky first half the Bulls won 53-52, Derrick Jones Jr. was the team’s second-leading scorer behind LaVine. Looking comfortable again as the stopgap backup center, he tallied 10 points and seven rebounds (three offensive), burying a couple putbacks and flying out on the fastbreak for a loud dunk. Plus, after picking up five fouls apiece against the Lakers and Trail Blazers, he committed zero in his first 15 minutes. Crucial.
Jones Jr. added three dunks in the third quarter, but committed four fouls between the third and early fourth, finishing with 16 points and eight boards. Billy Donovan said both before and after the game that Jones Jr.’s defensive activity at the center spot has been a positive revelation in the stretch since Nikola Vučević tested positive for COVID-19. His dynamism as a roll threat is noteworthy too.
“If Vooch is on this trip, Derrick probably never gets that opportunity,” Donovan said of Jones Jr.’s offensive involvement as a roller. “And now that’s something he has some familiarity with.”
4. Nearly the entire Bulls supporting cast brought it in this one. Tony Bradley notched eight points, five rebounds and two assists two nights after looking lost in Portland. Ayo Dosunmu contributed 10 points, a whopping eight rebounds and two 3-pointers off the pine. Green and Alex Caruso’s box score lines don’t fully reflect it, but their disruptiveness, particularly at the defensive end, swung momentum at multiple points.
“The team is so locked in right now. I think we're really good with our roles,” LaVine said. “Everybody's really connected on the team right now, so I think we know the mission at hand and we're going out there and executing.”
5. The Bulls sprinted out to an 8-0 run to start the third quarter, and maintained a six-to-12 point advantage throughout the period, leading 88-78 entering the fourth. DeMar DeRozan came alive to score 10 in the frame after shooting 3-for-10 in the first half, while LaVine (12 points) and Jones Jr. (six) combined for 18 points and five thrilling jams.
6. Ball Arena came alive as well in that quarter, erupting into multiple ear-shattering “Let’s go Bulls!” chants. The first was catalyzed by a lockdown defensive possession by Caruso on Will Barton (he had another stunning sequence guarding Monte Morris earlier in the game), with more coming during Gordon free throws and a routine timeout stoppage.
It was downright jarring for a road arena, but a reminder of this team’s reach when firing on all cylinders.
“I haven't heard that before, so that was really cool for me,” LaVine said postgame. “I think the Bulls have obviously one of the best fanbases in sports, so when we come back around and we get the support from them I think it's incredible, especially on the road like that in a place like this.”
Added Jones Jr.: “Very fun. It’s different when the away crowd is chanting “Let’s go Bulls.’ I just never had that in my career. I’ve never gone to a city and that city’s chanting for my team.”
And Nuggets coach Michael Malone put the cherry on top: “I wasn’t sure if we were at the United Center or Ball Arena.”
7. This Denver team doesn’t quit, though. Aided by a flurry of Bulls turnovers, the hosts opened the fourth quarter on a 6-0 run, and at the 6:15 mark, trailed 94-90.
That’s when Green and LaVine took over. On one possession, Green corralled two offensive rebounds, resulting in a LaVine 3-pointer. Two possessions later, after LaVine followed a Facundo Campazzo 3 with another jumper to make it 99-93, Green jumped a passing lane for a steal, leading to a LaVine floater on the other end to make it 101-93 with 3:47 remaining. Green closed the last seven minutes of the game as the team’s de facto center.
“I love playing with Woo,” Jones Jr. said of Green, using his nickname. “I thought I had a ball of energy in me, but he different.”
8. Still, the Nuggets continued to counter, trading buckets with the Bulls until the bitter end — even cutting their deficit to 110-108 with less than 20 seconds to play.
But LaVine brought counters to every haymaker they levied. The Bulls’ All-Star guard scored 12 of his 36 points in the fourth, shooting 5-for-7 from the floor and 2-for-2 from 3-point range. He made every array of jumper imaginable in a supreme display of shotmaking, from the firmly-set catch-and-shoot to contested, off-balance leaner.
“It’s remarkable to watch him,” Donovan said of LaVine. “He’s I think one of the best tough shotmakers in the league, and he’s comfortable doing it.”
9. DeRozan, too, was crucial down the stretch, scoring eight points on eight free-throw makes in the fourth — two on the possession following the Will Barton 3 that made it a two-point game late. The Bulls shot 24-for-24 from the foul line for the night, essential to winning as hard-fought a matchup as this.
And their prolific perimeter scoring duo combined for 20 of the team’s 26 points in the final frame. In the process, they became the fastest pair of teammates to each accrue 10 25-plus-point games since Jerry West and Elgin Baylor in 1962-63, per ESPN Stats and Information.
Zach LaVine and DeMar DeRozan both have 10+ 25-point games this season, in only the Bulls' 16th game.
They are the fastest duo to hit 10, 25-point games each since Elgin Baylor and Jerry West in 1962-63 (11th game).
(h/t @EliasSports) pic.twitter.com/xg9I28irne
— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) November 20, 2021
10. Coby White, evidently, is still finding his rhythm after recently returning from the torn labrum he sustained during the offseason. This is the most involved the third-year guard has been in his three games back — he got up seven shot attempts and three 3-pointers in 11 minutes — but his impact was negative; White missed six of his seven shot attempts (including two open layups) and all of his 3s, committing two turnovers in the first two minutes of the fourth quarter on a charge and wild pass operating in pick-and-roll.
Donovan tempered expectations on White coming back after five months away — and with limited live-action ramp-up — for a reason. He’s shot 1-for-11 from the floor since returning, and remains behind Dosunmu in the rotation for the time being.
And so the Bulls are both 11-5 and off the schneid after a tough loss in Portland.
“We're a resilient team. We're out here to come out here and complete the task, go out here and try to win each and every game,” LaVine said. “And if there's a bump in the road we respond the right way.”
INDIA IPPON DESU
Saturday, November 20, 2021
Wednesday, November 10, 2021
Fed financial stability report - Yves Smith
Regular readers would hopefully have internalized the Fed’s framework:
Elevated valuation pressures are signaled by asset prices that are high relative to economic fundamentals or historical norms and are often driven by an increased willingness of investors to take on risk. As such, elevated valuation pressures imply a greater possibility of outsized drops in asset prices.
Excessive borrowing by businesses and households leaves them vulnerable to distress if their incomes decline or the assets they own fall in value..
Excessive leverage within the financial sector increases the risk that financial institutions will not have the ability to absorb even modest losses…
Funding risks expose the financial system to the possibility that investors will “run” by withdrawing their funds…
I suspect experts like Steve Keen and Richard Vague would be more than a tad frustrated by this. Normally, in academic work and even financial reports, the ordering of items signals which is to be taken as most important. It’s distressing to see the central bank depict itself as concerned with asset price levels, and even worse, broadly stated.
Investors are supposed to be grown-ups and know that they are taking risk, as in the possibility of loss. Financial economics posits the existence of a risk-return tradeoff, that investors take more risk in the hope of getting better results.
So what a central bank ought to be concerned about is leverage of assets, and not asset prices per se. Recall that we had an enormous dot-com bubble, but in public stocks, and the regulators have strict limits on margin loans. When it imploded, there was no damage to the financial system (amusingly, there was to players that had managed to leverage themselves to the mania by taking Internet stocks in lieu of cash….like McKinsey, which had to write off $200 million. It also had to shrink its headcount by nearly 50% in two years in North America due to having greatly increased staffing to service dot-com panicked clients and serve clients who had eyeballs rather than cash).
But instead, the Fed sees itself as the guardian of asset prices generally, irrespective of the degree of blowback to financial institutions, because confidence fairy. The continuation of the Greenspan-Bernanke-Yellen put is what created these greatly attenuated valuations, but you never hear a hit of agency in how the Fed characterizes its “Gee, asset prices are pretty high” observation.
Most experts who have taken a hard look at crises have found that high levels of private sector borrowings, particularly by households, is what sets the stage for a financial crisis.
Another financial crisis risk factor, oddly absent from the Fed’s list, is high levels of international capital flows. An 800 year study of financial crises by Ken Rogoff and Carmen Reinhart found that high levels of international capital movements were strongly correlated with rising and increasingly severe financial crises. When their study came out, it received all sorts of approving noises. But no one was willing to act on its obvious implications and start imposing capital controls, or at least increase frictions through transactions taxes. Can’t wind the clock back on the supposed progress of ever more globalization and financialization.
Now let’s turn to the list of current worries. According to the Financial Times and Bloomberg, it’s China. Their headlines, respectively: Fed warns ailing China real estate sector poses risks to US economy and China Property Stress Spurs Fed Warning as Bond Losses Widen .
While these headlines are narrowly correct, they give the impression that the Fed singled out China as representing a distinctively seroius yellow peril to America’s economic health. In fact, China is listed third. Here they are, in order:
A potential worsening of the public health situation may result in a reduction in business and household confidence, negatively affecting future economic activity and financial vulnerabilities…
A sharp rise in interest rates could slow the pace of economic recovery and lead to sharp declines in asset valuations and stresses at financial institutions, businesses, and households…
Stresses in China’s real estate sector could strain the Chinese financial system, with possible spillovers to the United States….
Adverse developments in other emerging market economies spurred by a sudden and sharp tightening in financial conditions could also spill over to the United States…
In Europe, a slower-than-expected recovery could trigger financial stresses and pose risks to the United States because of strong transmission channels
Moreover, if you read the section on China, you get the feeling that the Fed doesn’t really have a theory as to how blowback from China might occur, just that China is so big, if it went really pear-shaped, it couldn’t not affect the US:
In China, business and local government debt remain large; the financial sector’s leverage is high, especially at small and medium-sized banks; and real estate valuations are stretched. In this environment, the ongoing regulatory focus on leveraged institutions has the potential to stress some highly indebted corporations, especially in the real estate sector, as exemplified by the recent concerns around China Evergrande Group. Stresses could, in turn, propagate to the Chinese financial system through spillovers to financial firms, a sudden correction of real estate prices, or a reduction in investor risk appetite. Given the size of China’s economy and financial system as well as its extensive trade linkages with the rest of the world, financial stresses in China could strain global financial markets through a deterioration of risk sentiment, pose risks to global economic growth, and affect the United States.
Translation: the Fed does not see any direct transmission mechanism from China’s financial systems to ours. However, a domestic financial crisis could produce a sharp drop in trade. Suppliers in China are already getting slow payments on receivables, and many borrow to cover that. That contraction could blow back to other economies and their banks, and potentially propagate to the US, or more likely, directly whack confidence. Recall that there have been a couple of episodes of sharp downdrafts in Chinese financial markets, which typically lasted only two weeks, and markets abroad dropped in sympathy.
In fairness, one could argue that Bloomberg was using the Fed report as a hook for an update on souring conditions in China. From its article:
The cash crunch is worsening by the day. The yield on a Bloomberg index of Chinese junk dollar bonds — dominated by property firms — has surged toward 24%. Kaisa Group Holdings Ltd., which said last week it missed payments on wealth products, was downgraded further into junk by Fitch Ratings on Tuesday.
The selloff has spread to higher-grade issuers such as Country Garden Holdings Co., while even a company controlled by China’s government has seen its bonds slump. Spreads on the nation’s investment-grade bonds over Treasuries widened the most since April on Tuesday.
So Bloomberg only discussed the China section. The Financial Times led with China and devoted six out of fourteen paragraphs to it. Three were on meme stocks even though the Fed did not cite them as a “near-term risk” but instead had a special section them. The article inaccurately said the Fed’s domestic warnings were only a sharp interest rise and its impact on risky assets and housing. No mention whatsoever of the lead item, Covid risk.
By contrast, the Wall Street Journal put Covid front and center: Fed Says U.S. Public Health Among Biggest Near-Term Risks to Financial System The Journal did not mention China but stressed that Fed officials were concerned about elevated asset prices.
What is striking is that the Fed report mentioned supply chain problems all of once (to its credit, the Journal did pick up on that). From the Stability Report:
A possible deterioration in the public health situation could slow the recent economic recovery, particularly if widespread business closures returned and supply chains were further disrupted.
Note that the central bank sees supply chain problems as not a danger at their current level, nor a sufficient risk to create damage to the economy absent a resurgence of Covid.
Yet there is no indication the log jam in West Coast ports is getting any better. Lambert cited a Business Insider piece yesterday in which an intrepid reporter took a boat ride to see what was happening, and things were not better than on the earlier boat ride that described how little action there was.
We are getting reports that the crunch may be about to turn acute. As we report in Links, rural hospitals in flyover are not able to get crutches or walkers due to aluminum shortages. It’s easy to dismiss that more as a function of problems with trucks and trains, but one reader says a CEO in the industry says that the problem is not only widespread but also acute, and will go critical within two months. Even though aluminum is also recycled domestically, that equipment is fussy and prone to breakdown, and parts for them are in very very short supply. We are also hearing warnings about copper due to high quit rates in recycling plants and mines that rely on seasoned personnel where it is hard to bring on new staff. Operators are attributing it to vax resistance; the men work in close conditions in poor ventilation and know or believe they have already gotten Covid and resent being asked to take a shot now. The claim is they are getting out now while the job market is strong.
Mind you, these reports are anecdata, and aside from the story on shortages at one hospital, not independently corroborated. But this is the sort of story that could easily fall through the cracks. The financial press is very hollowed out, focused on big markets and big industries. Domestic processors are likely way below their radar. And insiders would not want to sound alarms if all that would do is cause buying panic.
So please be on the lookout for supporting or contrary data points. Either of these shortages would be a very big deal if they come to pass.
Elevated valuation pressures are signaled by asset prices that are high relative to economic fundamentals or historical norms and are often driven by an increased willingness of investors to take on risk. As such, elevated valuation pressures imply a greater possibility of outsized drops in asset prices.
Excessive borrowing by businesses and households leaves them vulnerable to distress if their incomes decline or the assets they own fall in value..
Excessive leverage within the financial sector increases the risk that financial institutions will not have the ability to absorb even modest losses…
Funding risks expose the financial system to the possibility that investors will “run” by withdrawing their funds…
I suspect experts like Steve Keen and Richard Vague would be more than a tad frustrated by this. Normally, in academic work and even financial reports, the ordering of items signals which is to be taken as most important. It’s distressing to see the central bank depict itself as concerned with asset price levels, and even worse, broadly stated.
Investors are supposed to be grown-ups and know that they are taking risk, as in the possibility of loss. Financial economics posits the existence of a risk-return tradeoff, that investors take more risk in the hope of getting better results.
So what a central bank ought to be concerned about is leverage of assets, and not asset prices per se. Recall that we had an enormous dot-com bubble, but in public stocks, and the regulators have strict limits on margin loans. When it imploded, there was no damage to the financial system (amusingly, there was to players that had managed to leverage themselves to the mania by taking Internet stocks in lieu of cash….like McKinsey, which had to write off $200 million. It also had to shrink its headcount by nearly 50% in two years in North America due to having greatly increased staffing to service dot-com panicked clients and serve clients who had eyeballs rather than cash).
But instead, the Fed sees itself as the guardian of asset prices generally, irrespective of the degree of blowback to financial institutions, because confidence fairy. The continuation of the Greenspan-Bernanke-Yellen put is what created these greatly attenuated valuations, but you never hear a hit of agency in how the Fed characterizes its “Gee, asset prices are pretty high” observation.
Most experts who have taken a hard look at crises have found that high levels of private sector borrowings, particularly by households, is what sets the stage for a financial crisis.
Another financial crisis risk factor, oddly absent from the Fed’s list, is high levels of international capital flows. An 800 year study of financial crises by Ken Rogoff and Carmen Reinhart found that high levels of international capital movements were strongly correlated with rising and increasingly severe financial crises. When their study came out, it received all sorts of approving noises. But no one was willing to act on its obvious implications and start imposing capital controls, or at least increase frictions through transactions taxes. Can’t wind the clock back on the supposed progress of ever more globalization and financialization.
Now let’s turn to the list of current worries. According to the Financial Times and Bloomberg, it’s China. Their headlines, respectively: Fed warns ailing China real estate sector poses risks to US economy and China Property Stress Spurs Fed Warning as Bond Losses Widen .
While these headlines are narrowly correct, they give the impression that the Fed singled out China as representing a distinctively seroius yellow peril to America’s economic health. In fact, China is listed third. Here they are, in order:
A potential worsening of the public health situation may result in a reduction in business and household confidence, negatively affecting future economic activity and financial vulnerabilities…
A sharp rise in interest rates could slow the pace of economic recovery and lead to sharp declines in asset valuations and stresses at financial institutions, businesses, and households…
Stresses in China’s real estate sector could strain the Chinese financial system, with possible spillovers to the United States….
Adverse developments in other emerging market economies spurred by a sudden and sharp tightening in financial conditions could also spill over to the United States…
In Europe, a slower-than-expected recovery could trigger financial stresses and pose risks to the United States because of strong transmission channels
Moreover, if you read the section on China, you get the feeling that the Fed doesn’t really have a theory as to how blowback from China might occur, just that China is so big, if it went really pear-shaped, it couldn’t not affect the US:
In China, business and local government debt remain large; the financial sector’s leverage is high, especially at small and medium-sized banks; and real estate valuations are stretched. In this environment, the ongoing regulatory focus on leveraged institutions has the potential to stress some highly indebted corporations, especially in the real estate sector, as exemplified by the recent concerns around China Evergrande Group. Stresses could, in turn, propagate to the Chinese financial system through spillovers to financial firms, a sudden correction of real estate prices, or a reduction in investor risk appetite. Given the size of China’s economy and financial system as well as its extensive trade linkages with the rest of the world, financial stresses in China could strain global financial markets through a deterioration of risk sentiment, pose risks to global economic growth, and affect the United States.
Translation: the Fed does not see any direct transmission mechanism from China’s financial systems to ours. However, a domestic financial crisis could produce a sharp drop in trade. Suppliers in China are already getting slow payments on receivables, and many borrow to cover that. That contraction could blow back to other economies and their banks, and potentially propagate to the US, or more likely, directly whack confidence. Recall that there have been a couple of episodes of sharp downdrafts in Chinese financial markets, which typically lasted only two weeks, and markets abroad dropped in sympathy.
In fairness, one could argue that Bloomberg was using the Fed report as a hook for an update on souring conditions in China. From its article:
The cash crunch is worsening by the day. The yield on a Bloomberg index of Chinese junk dollar bonds — dominated by property firms — has surged toward 24%. Kaisa Group Holdings Ltd., which said last week it missed payments on wealth products, was downgraded further into junk by Fitch Ratings on Tuesday.
The selloff has spread to higher-grade issuers such as Country Garden Holdings Co., while even a company controlled by China’s government has seen its bonds slump. Spreads on the nation’s investment-grade bonds over Treasuries widened the most since April on Tuesday.
So Bloomberg only discussed the China section. The Financial Times led with China and devoted six out of fourteen paragraphs to it. Three were on meme stocks even though the Fed did not cite them as a “near-term risk” but instead had a special section them. The article inaccurately said the Fed’s domestic warnings were only a sharp interest rise and its impact on risky assets and housing. No mention whatsoever of the lead item, Covid risk.
By contrast, the Wall Street Journal put Covid front and center: Fed Says U.S. Public Health Among Biggest Near-Term Risks to Financial System The Journal did not mention China but stressed that Fed officials were concerned about elevated asset prices.
What is striking is that the Fed report mentioned supply chain problems all of once (to its credit, the Journal did pick up on that). From the Stability Report:
A possible deterioration in the public health situation could slow the recent economic recovery, particularly if widespread business closures returned and supply chains were further disrupted.
Note that the central bank sees supply chain problems as not a danger at their current level, nor a sufficient risk to create damage to the economy absent a resurgence of Covid.
Yet there is no indication the log jam in West Coast ports is getting any better. Lambert cited a Business Insider piece yesterday in which an intrepid reporter took a boat ride to see what was happening, and things were not better than on the earlier boat ride that described how little action there was.
We are getting reports that the crunch may be about to turn acute. As we report in Links, rural hospitals in flyover are not able to get crutches or walkers due to aluminum shortages. It’s easy to dismiss that more as a function of problems with trucks and trains, but one reader says a CEO in the industry says that the problem is not only widespread but also acute, and will go critical within two months. Even though aluminum is also recycled domestically, that equipment is fussy and prone to breakdown, and parts for them are in very very short supply. We are also hearing warnings about copper due to high quit rates in recycling plants and mines that rely on seasoned personnel where it is hard to bring on new staff. Operators are attributing it to vax resistance; the men work in close conditions in poor ventilation and know or believe they have already gotten Covid and resent being asked to take a shot now. The claim is they are getting out now while the job market is strong.
Mind you, these reports are anecdata, and aside from the story on shortages at one hospital, not independently corroborated. But this is the sort of story that could easily fall through the cracks. The financial press is very hollowed out, focused on big markets and big industries. Domestic processors are likely way below their radar. And insiders would not want to sound alarms if all that would do is cause buying panic.
So please be on the lookout for supporting or contrary data points. Either of these shortages would be a very big deal if they come to pass.
Sunday, November 07, 2021
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