Van Gundy
"Bloargh!"

Derrick Rose: Last night, the rook had 1 measely assist (versus 16 shot attempts and 3 turnovers) in almost 39 minutes of PT. It was his second 1-assist game of this short season. Now, when I brought this up yesterday, people were defending Rose by basically saying "his teammates suck." But -- and I'm just checking here -- aren't these the same guys that Drew Gooden (3 assists), Luol Deng (also 3 assists), and Kirk Hinrich (3 assists) were passing to? And isn't Rose charged with handling the rock and running the offense most of the game? Oh, and regarding that "teammates suck" theory: Kirk "I'm the backup now" Hinrich hasn't dished for fewer than 3 dimes in the team's first four games. Hell, Earl Watson hasn't dished fewer than four assists yet this season...and he's playing for the Oklahoma City Thunder.

In the last three games, Rose has 5 assists, 8 turnovers and 50 [!!] shot attempts. And so my point remains the same: A shot-to-assist ratio of 10-to-1 is not what you want from your starting point guard. Look, I'm not trying to demean Rose's talent. He's super quick and can get to the hole at will. He sort of strikes me as a more athletic version of Tony Parker, except he's not French or a woman. But, like Parker, he's not a true playmaker. He's more of a scoring point guard. More accurately, he's a shooting guard trapped in a point guard's body. That concerns me because he's the franchise's new cornerstone, and Chicago desperately needs a guy who isn't just a great individual player...but someone who makes his teammates better.

For comparison's sake, check out Chris Paul's game log from his rookie season for the Hornets. He didn't have a single 1-assist game all season. Now check out the roster. It's not like it was playing with the Super Friends.

Luol Deng: Is Deng in a shooting slump? What could you call 31 percent shooting (14-for-44) over four games? And that includes the first game of the season -- during which all the Bulls padded their stats -- when he shot 8-for-13. Since then Luol has gone 6-for-31 from the field (19 percent). Let's hope last night's 1-point, 0-for-8 shooting performance was Deng's way of bottoming out. But this is one of those times I'd like to remind everybody that Deng was the one player John Paxson declared "untouchable" when the Lakers were semi-shopping Kobe at the beginning of last season. FACEPALM.

Facepalm

The Bulls' end-of-game plan: "Hey guys, we're down only two points with 23 seconds left. Let's have Ben Gordon shoot an off-balance, fade-away jumper over slam dunk champ Dwight Howard with 15 seconds left on the clock to try and tie things up!" Seriously. That's the best shot, and the best use of the clock, that the Bulls could manage with the game on the line? DOUBLE FACEPALM.

Double facepalm

J.J. Redick: From sixth man to DNP-CD in only four games. That has to be some kind of record.

The Bobcats "big guns": Jason Richardson was 2-for-10. Gerald Wallace was 3-for-10. Both men were outplayed by Adam Morrison...offensively, anyway: Adam was 4-for-6, including 2-for-2 from downtown, for his 10 points.

pistons

Kwame Brown: He was actually surprisingly effective last night: 9 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 steals and 2 blocked shots and (SHOCK ALERT!) no turnovers. But -- and you knew there was a "but" coming, right? -- he was 1-for-6 from the field. And four of those misses were layups. He also inexplicably took a 15-foot jumper, which is about 15 feet out of his range.

Rasheed Wallace, quote machine: How do you feel about the trade, 'Sheed? "Do we like the trade? Maybe not. Ain't no telling. I can't talk about it until we see what happens. Who knows?" Oh, also, Wallace received his first technical of the season last night.

Jersey number disputes: Whenever a superstar changes teams, there's always the chance that somebody is going to get screwed. In the case of the Detroit-Denver trade, Rodney Stuckey will probably have to surrender his jersey number 3 to Allen Iverson. But apparently it will at least require a conversation. Said Stuckey: "We're going to have to talk about it, I guess." Talk about what, exactly? Money, perhaps? "Like I said, we'll talk about it." At any rate, it sounds like Stuckey is resigned to the change. He's already talking about his new number. "I want to do a single number, so I'll probably do something like 9 or something."

Joe Dumars' "master plan": I'm sorry, but if the plan really is to make a big run at Bosh, Wade or James in 2010, it's a flawed plan. I guarantee that Bosh and Wade are going to re-sign with their teams, and LeBron is either staying in Cleveland or bolting for New York. Anyway, here's a fun comment from Basketbawful reader anacondahl: "Perhaps the Pistons trade is an indirect way of admitting to the fans 'Yeah, we screwed up in 2003, sorry. We want to make it up to you in 2010.'" Oh, and geert had a suggestion for what to call it when the front office tries to redress a mistake they made years earlier: "What about make-up management? Like make-up calls, but by the front office of a team." I like it.

Sloppy journalism that gets it right: Basketbawful reader lord kerrance discovered a funny: "Check out this article from TSN. Not sure how long the gaffe will stay up, but right now it says the AI trade gives Iverson a chance to win a championship, something he wouldn't have been able to do with the Pistons. Inadvertantly truer words have never been spoken." Indeed. Here's the screen capture:

TSN

The Sacramento Kings: Quick quiz: When does 0-3 feel more like 0-10? Answer: When you lose those first three games by a combined 66 points. The Kings may very well be the worst team in the league.

Kevin Martin: Sacramento's future is struggling with the present: He's averaging 17.8 PPG on 38.6 percent shooting so far. This from a guy who a lot of people thought might lead the league in scoring this season. He's finding out that sometimes it's really hard to be The Man. Anyway, last night he was 4-for-10 and had the worst +/- score on the team (-27). He has, for the moment, surrendered "Best Player on the Team" status to Spencer Hawes. Yes, Spencer Hawes.

Kareem Rush: He apparently hasn't realized that his last name is "Rush" and not "Abdul-Jabbar," because he's already complaning about his lack of PT this season. "It's very discouraging. I didn't plan on this when I signed here, but it's the way it is. A lot of these guys have been here for a number of years and played with (coach Maurice) Cheeks a number of years, so I think it's a familiarity thing that he has with these guys." Yeah, or maybe Cheeks is just familiar with your career numbers.

The Golden State Warriors. They scored only 79 points. Against the Memphis Grizzlies. The Nellieballers shot 34 percent from the field (33-for-93) and 15 percent from Threeland (3-for-20). Stephen Jackson (6-for-21, 2-for-9 in threes) was the primary bricklayer, but it's worth noting that Al Harrington and Corey Maggette combined to shoot 0-for-9 from downtown. This offense would really benefit from a true point guard, and I'm not talking about Monta Ellis.

Andris Biedrins: Nice defense there, Andy. You let Marc Gasol erupt for 27 points (on 9-for-11 shooting) and 16 rebounds. Said Biedrins: "He really made us pay for not keeping attention to him. We were more worried about Mayo and Rudy Gay, and didn't think about (Gasol) so much." Uh, nice excuse. But you probably should have noticed a little sooner than after the game. Update! From Basketbawful reader Derek: "Also, on the ESPN recap the headline reads 'Gasol, Biedrins help Grizzlies end losing streak vs. Warriors,' further cementing his contributions." He's right.

ESPN header

Anthony Randolph: One trillion!

The Dallas Mavericks: They fell to 0-2 at home after getting spanked, and spanked hard, by the Cleveland Cavaliers. Their shooting was lousy -- Dirk Nowitzki was 3-for-10, including seven straight clanks -- and their rebounding was atrocious (they got pounded 52-35). If this keeps up, Dallas fans are going to start getting nostalgic for the Avery Johnson era. Once again...FACEPALM.

Cuban 2
Each time Mark Cuban suffers, a kitten is born.

The Los Angeles Clippers: Baron Davis and Marcus Camby actually played last night, but you hardly would have noticed. The Clips scored only 73 points at home and let the still Deron William-less Jazz beat them down. In particular, Paul Milsap (24 points, 8-for-12, 9 rebounds) walked all over them. Yup...they are who we thought they were.

B-Diddy

Kyrylo Fesenko and Kosta Koufos: They each submitted a Mario last night against the Clippers. That's what they get for having names that sound like they were created by Stan Lee.

Kobe Bryant: He farted in a public elevator yesterday. And he had eaten a cabbage, liver and onion burrito for lunch.

Labels: , , , , ,

47 Comments:
Blogger Austen said...
After watching last night's Jazz-Clippers game and hearing the Clippers commentators, we definitely need to add the term "MAN-type rebound" (for reference, see the final minutes of the 3rd quarter) to the Basketbawful dictionary. I just couldn't stop laughing when they started going on about the relatively-diminuitive Jazz man going up for MAN-type rebounds.

But yeah, Camby and Kaman definitely deserve Worst of the Nights for allowing 2nd-round drafted bench player Milsapp (who is 3-4 inches shorter than both of them) just dance his way around them and grab all their easy rebounds through sheer effort.

However, both teams deserve a Worst of the Night for that abysmal first half. That was just painful to watch.

Blogger tonious35 said...
As a Raptor Fan and concerning Derrick Rose, he seems right now to be a version of what happens to TJ Ford if he does not have any spinal conditions, but does not give an absolute damn about his teamates on the floor.

Thx for more terminologies: FACEPALM!

Since you love StarTrek, who, player or GM in the NBA, would be the ideal Klingon, Romulan, Quark (Ferrengi, pricks), and BORG?

Blogger ChrisH said...
valid point on Rose. I've been a little worried that he wasn't a true point. He hasnt looked like one. Bottom line, great passers pass no matter who their teammates are. And great passers are damn rare.

On the plus side he seems to be a big upgrade over Kirk and BG as a tweener guard.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
Greg Popovich for Borg. No emotions ever.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
Couple of things, I don't really understand the Iverson-Billups trade hate from non-Detroiter sports analyzers. 'Bawful, you yourself have stated numerously that Billups is NOT Mr. Bigshot and never will be. So trading one guard with a dubious "big shot" rating in recent years for another guard who is still capable of taking over games late doesn't seem like a terrible thing. As far as chemistry goes, I don't remember teammates ever complaining about playing with Iverson (well there was Chris Webber, so... yeah). Now, I have a hard time believing that a three guard rotation of Iverson, Hamilton, Stuckey is going to be worse for the Pistons than the Billups, Hamilton, Stuckey rotation of a week ago. Not to mention a line-up of Stuckey, Iverson, Hamilton, Prince, and Wallace down the stretch. 30 days from now we might even get McDyess again for the veterans minimum after a Denver buyout. So to summarize, we have traded a slower, less reliable clutch player, albeit one who is a more than competent facilitator and a class act in Billups for a dynamic scorer and bona-fide superstar who gives 100% in Iverson. Oh, and if we don't like him he can leave after this season. Explain to me how they will be worse than the "bounced in the conference finals team" of the past three years?

Anonymous Anonymous said...
I love your site, but you're wrong on this.

Do you think Detroit will make the conference finals this year? Does the team have a worse chance at beating Boston than they did last year?

If you answer "yes" to the first and "no" to the second, what is the problem? Seriously, what is the problem here? Detroit isn't made LESS competitive by adding a title-less aging superstar (unless you think Detroit WON'T make the conference finals), and will seamlessly move Stuckey into the PG spot next year. Detroit will remain very competitive while the other powers of the decade are declining. (In a few years, San Antonio, Phoenix, and even Boston will be done, and Detroit will still be contending.)

Sure; Lebron ain't coming to Detroit. He wasn't anyway. Detroit will have the money to sign the cream of this year's free agent market, and the non-Lebron cream of next year's. That will make for a very competitive team, which you wouldn't have if you kept the aging Billups and his salary for the two(?) years. Instead, you'd be re-tooling in a year (2010) that, because of this trade, Detroit will be making a title run for the 10th consecutive year.

The cost of it is Billups. But again, unless you think Detroit won't make the conference finals with this crew, this team's as good as the previous three years' teams, so Detroit gets at least a "push" this year in exchange for remaining a title-contender for the foreseeable future.

Blogger Unknown said...
Also, on the ESPN recap the headline reads "Gasol, Biedrins help Grizzlies end losing streak vs. Warriors"

further cementing his contributions.

Blogger XForce23 said...
Btw, I looked at the box score for the Dallas game when there was about 4 minutes left they had only scored THREE (3) points in the 4th quarter. Meaning the score was only slightly more respectable because there was about 3 full minutes of garbage. That's pretty bad.

Blogger Cortez said...
The funny thing about Rose is that watching him in Chicago for the past 4 years I thought his game fit the "point guard" mentality from the jump.

Mark me in the "garbage teammates" column for now.

"From sixth man to DNP-CD in only four games."

I have just regained a little faith in the basketball universe.

Redick better align his NBA expections into Steve Kerr territory quick.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
Hey, did you guys read about the old dude that is playing on a college team?

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/college/2008/10/24/2008-10-24_americas_oldest_college_hoopster_ken_min.html

Its great to see players like Ken Mink and Greg Oden defying their age for the love of the game.

Blogger Austen said...
Klingon - Mike D'antoni
Borg - Greg Popovitch
Romulan - Jerry Sloan

Blogger Lord Kerrance said...
It's not Oden's fault he sprained his foot, and microfractured his knees. Dude's just unlucky, like born-under-a-ladder-on-Friday-the-13th-with-a-black-cat-delivering-the-baby unlucky.

If they ever make a sequel to Unbreakable, we know who should play Mr. Glass.

Blogger Wild Yams said...
With Facepalm making its first appearance here, I see that yet another 4chan meme has bled over to Basketbawful so I have to ask, Mr. Bawful, are you a /b/tard? If so, might I suggest a picture of Joe Dumars with the caption "I just accidentally the Pistons title hopes this year. Is this bad?" Of course, if you're not a /b/tard you won't know what the hell I'm talking about...

No Kobe mention again, but it is kinda tough to keep bringing him up when the NBA only schedules two Laker games in 10 days (who thought that up?).

I know it's early but Marc Gasol is putting up 13 points and 10 boards for the year. If he keeps up something resembling this pace and wins the Rookie of the Year, will last year's Pau Gasol trade end up looking like as much of a heist as everyone has thus far thought it was?

Joakim Noah only got five minutes of PT last night? Is he in Vinny's doghouse or something?

Also, it looks like Morris Almond had a one trillion last night, and Brian Skinner narrowly avoided a two trillion thanks to picking up a foul.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
No offense, but didn't you contradict yourself? Yes, Rose had only 1 assist, but if half his team has a horrible shooting night, how do you rack up assists? Chris Paul didn't have 1 assist games, but frankly I'd take a 2005 David West over anyone on the Bulls roster except Luol Deng. And let's face it, Chris Paul is a far superior passer/playmaker than Derrick Rose. Offensively Rose is a better finisher and more adept at getting to the hoop, but getting his teammates more involved is just something he can/will work on. He's seen what his teammates are capable off on offense, and it's pretty putrid, so until Deng and Gordon get their shots straight he'll continue to put the offensive burden on himself.

Blogger Drake said...
As bad as Biedrins was on defense, at least he was the only one contributing competently on the other end: 16 points with 22 rebounds. Plus, he was slated to be the only Warrior who scored more points than shot-attempts, until Marco Bellinelli hit a three towards the end.

Still, it's a dubious accomplishment, along with letting Marc Gasol walk all over him.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
And another point on Rose. Just because he's not going to average 11 assists a game doesn't mean he can't be a franchise player. He's the first leader the Bulls have had for a decade, a guy who will take control of a game and accept the responsibility. After 4 games who expects him to have the court vision of Paul or Williams? Deron didn't even start half the games in his rookie season, now look where he's at.

Blogger Timmothy said...
i love this site.

Blogger AnacondaHL said...
Sorry, but no borg would ever give a beard-faced goofy-grin two- thumbs-up (see: WotN Oct 29th).

And facepalm isn't just /b/tardedness. Picard is just awesome (see: ytmnd, et al.).

Klingon: Dwight Howard (somehow I imagine him in honorable combat with a bat'leth)
Ferrengi: Mark Cuban (way too easy)
Romulan: Seconding Jerry Sloan vote
Borg: Bruce Bowen

This geekiest Bawful post ever was brought to you by AnacondaHL.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
The two-thumbs up thing was Popovich before he was assimilated and sent back in time. I reject your Bowen for Borg nomination.

The Ferengi finally hit me - Sam Freakin' Cassell. Seriously - no makeup required.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
I agree with AnacondaHL on all but the last point.

Borg: Rasho Nesterovic.

As for the trade - I'm far from certain Detroit are going to the conference finals this year. Iverson is horribly inefficient when he decides to "take over games" and he will try it far too often. There is no AI in "team."

It is true that they're going to their next generation players almost seamlessly though.

Blogger Tonewise said...
Yams... RON PAUL.

Blogger Wild Yams said...
Ron Paul, Tonewise :)

Facepalm of course isn't exclusive to 4chan (not anymore), but it's where it started, along with virtually every other internet meme. Just funny to see it show up here.

Row Row.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
Goodbye Antonio "Brian McKnight"Dyess, hello to more playing time for (Rod)Ne-yo Stuckey.

I mean these NBA Ballers kinda look like their R&B counterparts, I must say!

Blogger BJ said...
Re Mavs -- Tell me about it . . . leaving the game I felt like an exasperated parent. I don't want to look at you, I don't want to talk to you, I don't even wanna think about you right now. Why oh why do all the bars in West End close at ten?
-BJ

Blogger Basketbawful said...
austen -- Book it. MAN-type rebound will get future play on Basketbawful.

tonious35 -- I didn't want to make a TJ Ford comparison. Think I'll leave it at that...

chrish -- A definite upgrade in that area, especially since he can get to the basket and stuff. He's also much more of an Alpha Dog than those guys are. In fact, he's the most Alpha we've had in Chicago since Jordan left.

al james -- Regarding the chemistry issue, I'm not suggesting AI is going to be a malcontent or a locker room cancer. Only that a big part of the Pistons' success these last few years has been predicated on the players knowing each other so well...and for my money, that starts with Billups. I also think that AI is a loss defensively...and the Pistons have been, first and foremost, a defensive team. Furthermore, can Iverson be effective in a spread-the-wealth offense?

There are just so many questions. I will say this, though: If Dumars was going to make a move like this, at least he did it very early in the season. That gives him almost 80 games to evaluate how AI fits in and whether he'll be a part of their future plans. That would have been nearly impossible if he'd waited until the trade deadline.

anonymous #1 -- Actually, I don't think Detroit will make the Conference Finals this year. I wasn't sure they would anyway, but this trade pretty much cements it. IMHO.

derek -- Thanks! Updated.

kevin -- Wow. "Ugh" doesn't begin to describe it. Well, Rick Carlisle never was known as an offensive coach...

cortez -- Earl Watson wants to talk to you about Garbage teammates. For that matter, so does Mark Jackson, who broke John Stockton's stranglehold on the NBA annual assist title by averaging 12.3 APG playing for the 1996-97 Denver Nuggets...a team that was so awesome it won 21 whole games.

Anyway, I agree: Redick needs to camp out in the corner and spend roughly 99 percent of his practice time shooting threes.

baguete -- I did see that a couple weeks ago. I've been meaning to say something about it. Thanks for the reminder.

lord kerrance -- I'm gonna use that unlucky analogy at some point. Just so's you knows...

Yams -- No, I'm not a /b/tard, and I had no idea what that meant until now. Because, of course, I had to look it up. Basically, all images on Basketbawful are found using a simple Google image search for a word that pops into my mind while writing. The Kobe omission is fixed (and the light early schedule was provided by Stern so Kobe could recover from the Olympics and prepare for Lakers-Celtics II in the Finals this year). Ach. Almond, in fact, had a Mario last night. I will fix that. I agree Marc looks better than expected and might challenge for ROY. Joakim, I read somewhere, is a little knicked up. But I think the real issue is that he is basically a less athletic version of Tyrus...and the team is less focused on developing him.

anonymous #2 -- And my contention is that a superstar-in-the-making PG should, first and foremost, get his teammates high-percentage shots near the basket. Sure, his teammates are shooting poorly...but he's partly responsible for the kinds of shots they're getting.

drake -- Biedrins will always hit the boards and get his layups/putbacks. But God, he was a defensive nightmare. And he basically admitted he wasn't paying attention to Gasol.

anonymous #3 -- The difference with Williams is that's how Sloan chose to develop him. Whereas Rose has been handed the ball and given control of the team from the get-go. And I'm not saying that Rose can't become a competent floor leader and a franchise player, but he's got to develop his playmaking abilities, pronto. Because you'll be hard-pressed to find many shoot-first point guards who have become true franchise players in the NBA.

timmothy -- And this site loves you.

baddave -- Jesus, man. How could you forget: Reggie Miller is the Ferengi!

czernobog -- Agreed. Pistons clearly fell behind Cleveland with this trade.

bj -- I'm a little disturbed by the Mavs' start to the season. I mean, yeah, they'll probably get it together, but damn.

Blogger Cortez said...
http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/DEN/1997.html

I'll take any one of these guys in their respective postions over ANYONE the Bulls have lining up nightly with the possible exception of Deng vs. Ellis.

...and that's even a maybe!

Blogger Cortez said...
This has nothing to do with the post but did a small part of you die, as did I, when the Celtics drafted Antoine Walker?

Blogger Wild Yams said...
Derick Rose fans appear to be threatening to replace Kobe fans for unusually high amounts of whining and indignation. No matter how you slice it, Mr. Bawful is dead on by pointing out the incredibly low assist to shot and assist to turnover ratios for the kid. If that doesn't turn around then he's yet another undersized shooting guard in a point guard's body.

The AI trade may really help the Pistons in the long term with caproom, but I agree that it makes their chances of getting back to the Finals even slimmer. It probably limits their chances of even making to the ECFs again. Iverson is one of the least efficient players in the league who dominates the ball and puts up a ton of shots. His presence on the court with a bunch of other great players will probably just limit what those other guys can contribute on offense. Also, his proclivity for gambling on D will weaken the Piston's defense, which has saved their ass more than once. Finally, I have a hard time seeing him play effectively as a PG, which means that the Pistons will be splitting time trying to fit a square peg into a round hole there and thrusting Stuckey into the playmaker role a bit earlier than they probably should. It's a good long term move once AI and Sheed are gone next summer, but I don't expect it to have much upside for this season.

The Mavs and the Spurs have both stumbled badly out of the blocks this year. Luckily for one of those teams they're playing each other tonight, so someone's gonna out-suck the other and make someone look good by comparison. I read somewhere that right now the Spurs have statistically the worst defense in the league, and that is very telling, despite the SSS.

I remain completely confounded by the Spurs total lack of offseason moves this summer. How could a front office which has been nails for the last decade not see the writing on the wall after their decrepit corps ran out of gas so miserably last year? Even the most novice of hoops fans could have told you the last thing the Spurs needed was to get a year older with no real wholesale changes coming. Even more confusing is that those wholesale changes should have been relatively easy to pull off. They already have their Big 3, they just needed some younger, more athletic role players, and there's often lots of them around any given offseason.

As for the Mavs, their problem is Mark Cuban's myopia as an owner to overvalue Dirk and Josh Howard (and just about anyone else who plays for his team). Sure, getting rid of Avery was probably a step in the right direction, but Red Auerbach and John Wooden working together weren't gonna get that Mavs team to a title this year - they just don't have the parts anymore. The Mavs should have traded Dirk well before this point and tried a new mix, but instead they're doomed to a long slow death because Cuban thinks the basketball world rises and sets with Herr Nowitzki.

BTW, for anyone else who wants to see another 4chan meme get worked into the basketblogosphere, here's a horrendous Bel Air involving Kobe. What can I say? Fail.

Blogger BJ said...
No kidding. This is not a good year for Dirk's jump shot to coyly suggest they start seeing other people.

And we got outrebounded and we're having problems with 3s and our free-throw percentage stinks AND Coach can't decide on a starting two . . .
-BJ

Blogger Basketbawful said...
cortez -- You know what, by the time they drafted 'Toine, I had become so desperate that I somehow talked myself into believing in him. It's the same way guys talk themselves into dating the crazy chick or buying that fixer-upper car that only needs some suspension work and shocks. Brakes, brake pads, lining, steering box, transmission, rear-end...

But once I fully realized what had happened, then yes, a small part of me died.

Yams -- Your analysis of the Spurs and Mavs are spot on. Also, I've been meaning to ask you a few questions. Could you please drop me a line at the basketbawful@yahoo.com?

Anonymous Anonymous said...
The Los Angeles Clippers: Baron Davis and Marcus Camby actually played last night, but you hardly would have noticed. The Clips scored only 73 points at home and let the still Deron William-less Jazz beat them down. In particular, Paul Milsap (24 points, 8-for-12, 9 rebounds) walked all over them. Yup...they are who we thought they were.


That entire statement is so wrong. The Clips are 3-0, Baron Davis is having a career year, along with the rest of the players. Ricky D. is playing unselfishly. All the old dudes (Cat, Camby, you know who you are) are reverting back to their young selves, things are great.

I don't know where you get your information from.

It's great to be a Clips fan.

Ever since Elton Brand turned into a PF version of MJ and stayed for less money, things have been great.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
The sad part is I couldn't even click on ESPN's NBA bookmark this morning....

That's how awful I feel about this trade...

There are like 4 real point guards in the NBA... we just traded one of them to rent what's left of Allen Iverson. No matter HOW you slice it this move sucked...

I BLEED Piston's basketball and I'd bet 20 bucks straight up that Iverson will NOT be popular in Detroit. Despite all the frustration we liked the whole "Team" thing...

Allen Iverson needs to be at least 50% of his teams offense to be useful.

He's also not a damn PG so stop saying that.

This sucks... f*(k basketball this year man...

:(

Anonymous Anonymous said...
cortez I know the celtics didn't win much but walker was a walking triple double with the celtics with no help around him until pierce. Then there was no help around THEM

ANTOINEWALKERNBACHAMPION

*cringes*

Anonymous Anonymous said...
You read my mind about Rose word for word. The dude is a shooting guard, at this point anyway. Within a season or two he could be a 10+ apg point guard, but at this point I don't think he's fit to run a team.

I think Del Negro needs to pull a Sloan and make him come off the bench this season.

Speaking of Sloan....go Jazz.

Blogger m. Alana said...
AnacondaHL: Ooh, can we do individual comparisons? Joe Dumars=Garak. Just when you think he's good, he turns out to be awful...or is he?

Anonymous Anonymous said...
"aren't these the same guys that Drew Gooden (3 assists), Luol Deng (also 3 assists), and Kirk Hinrich (3 assists) were passing to?"

No. They were passing to Rose, that's how they got their assists

:P

Ok, now seriously, I see what you mean. And I agree to a degree that a true playmaker makes plays for others (just like a "tru warier" worries about others or something). He may not be Chris Paul, but for sure he's not Allen Iverson.

Watching the games I could see him feeding the ball in pretty good spots to Tyrus and Deng mostly, only to see them miss the shot or just hesitate to take the shot. What I did not see was him ball hogging. In fact Kirk still is the biggest ball hog on the bulls with his overdribbling at 30 feet out and his half drives followed by going back out at 30 feet for some more dribbling.

And even if he isn't the next Chris Paul, even if he won't average 10+ ast/game he can still be great and make his team-mates better. Even if he'll be a shoot first guy.

If he's somewhere in the middle between CP3 and Arenas in terms of shooting/passing, he'll be great. Yeah, I said Arenas. I know he's considered a ball hog and nowhere near a pass first PG, but he does make his teammates better. Caron and Hughes, amongst others, have had their best seasons while playing with Arenas. And Jamison's numbers were not hurt either.

Blogger Barry said...
"Said Biedrins: "He really made us pay for not keeping attention to him. We were more worried about Mayo and Rudy Gay, and didn't think about (Gasol) so much."

That's about the worst excuse ever. "Hey we were watching Bin Laden and Robert Mugabe closely but we forgot about that other guy and now thousands of people are dead, oh well, he showed us"

I'd play along with this Klingon thing but I know nothing of Star Trek.

Blogger stephanie g said...
At least the Spurs can look forward to getting Oberto and Manu back. But boy oh boy, I bet they wish they held onto Scola. He would have been pretty useful oh, I dunno, when the Lakers were making a comeback down 20 points in game 1 last year and Duncan and Parker looked gassed. Just a hunch though.

AI and Sheed on the same team? This is too good to be true.

Blogger Unknown said...
quote of the night from Starbury: "Looking back at the last two years, I kind of liked Larry Brown," Marbury said with a laugh. "I kind of liked Larry Brown. I'm like, 'Man, I wish this guy was here to drill me now.'" I didn't know Marbury liked to be drilled esp by Larry Brown

Anonymous Anonymous said...
Did anyone see Yao blow a dunk by getting blocked by the rim AGAIN against the Celtics today?

Blogger Mintz... said...
pistonsgirl4life....

there's still hope. please call a helpline before contemplating suicide.

it's not as bad as you think.

Blogger anf said...
I hope Derrick Rose won't turn out to be another Marbury...

Blogger Cortez said...
"I hope Derrick Rose won't turn out to be another Marbury..."

No fucking way.

...but if it did, you can rest assured that the universe would spilt open and swallow itself whole if that did happen.

We would be doomed anyway so it would be that major, relatively speaking.

Blogger Wild Yams said...
Michael, I did see Yao get blocked by the rim on another wide open dunk attempt, and then he got blocked by the rim again later when he tried a reverse layup under the basket. Maybe those two blown layups would have come in handy considering the Rockets lost by 4.

I have to say, the Rockets have a lot of talent on their team, but they're actually fairly undersized outside of Yao, considering he's the only center on the team. When he went out with foul problems suddenly it was like they were playing Scola and Landry at center with Artest at PF or something, and that's a rather drastic change compared to what they look like when Yao is in the game. Additionally, due to Yao's almost non-existent athleticism (as mentioned above) he seems to really be held in check quite well when he goes up against a team that has some size like Boston (8 points, 7 boards, 4-14 FG last night).

I think the Rockets need to sign another center (is Mutombo still available out there for them?) if they really want a shot at beating the Lakers and advancing to the Finals. They might have problems with the Suns as well for this same reason, though that depends on how well Shaq holds up this year. With the injury problems Yao has had recently I can't believe the Rockets front office didn't set aside one or two roster spots for backup centers, especially since Yao is currently the only guy over 6'9 on the team.

Also, last night was a good example of Ron Artest playing selfishly on offense. 3-10 from three point range? Yikes. I don't know if the Celtics' stifling defense was just baiting him and the rest of the Rockets into settling for perimeter shots, but he is nowhere near a good enough 3-pt shooter to be attempting 10 threes in a game.

Blogger ChrisH said...
"And even if he isn't the next Chris Paul, even if he won't average 10+ ast/game he can still be great and make his team-mates better. Even if he'll be a shoot first guy."


This is true. Though nobody that short has ever lead his team to a ring playing like this.

Anonymous Anonymous said...
You forgot to include Morris Almond's trillion--he, Fesenko and Koufos share the season's first "Mario Bros."

Anonymous Anonymous said...
Morris Almond had a trillion that night, too. So he, Fesenko and Koufos provide the season's first "Mario Bros."