"Does winning or losing summer league games matter in the grand scheme? Of course not. Does players being competitive and trying to win summer league games matter when it’s your young and upcoming prospects? Of course. It shows competitiveness." I already know that every player playing in summer league is competitive. If they weren't they would have no chance of ever playing in the nba. Though they might not play their hardest in SL because they know it doesn't matter and they dont want to get hurt in a meaningless game and risk millions of dollars for their future.
"Shooting translates, whether it’s pickup ball or summer league or college. If you ahoot well there, you’ll more than likely shoot fine in the games. If you don’t shoot well, you almost certainly won’t." That kevin durant dude definitely never learned to shoot after his poor shooting in summer league.
"If you can’t defend in a summer league game, you won’t be defending well in a regular season game." Or you improve over time. Get better coaching. Get bigger and stronger. Or you care more in a real game than a summer league when you are a top pick with a guaranteed spot on the team. Lots of variable involved here.
"The idea that these games don’t matter for anything is just so outlandishly stupid it’s hard to argue against. Might as well say that college games don’t matter." The games do matter to dudes trying to get on a roster. They dont matter for much of what is being discussed in the context of my comment that the games dont matter (Rotation in the upcoming season is mostly what I was getting at. Hardy doesn't look at summer league play to determine who starts out of collier or WCJ for example. He will use training camp, practice, pre season and actual regular season game to make those decisions. Hardy doesn't care how collier played in summer league. He cares how he plays in practice and actual nba games.)
"Heck, nba players load manage during the regular season. Regular season games don’t matter now!" This actually quite true for those particular games. If a team and coach really want to win a particular game then they will definitely play their best players if they are available. But the fact is that often times throughout the regular season teams just dont really think every game matters so they rest dudes. You definitely wont see dudes resting in playoff games. They still matter. Many regular season games still matter as well but obviously not all of them.
