As MEbenhoe pointed out, 25% of regular season games have now been played so it's a pretty good time to give a few players some recognition. As people post their awards, we can update this post to aggregate everyone's opinion. I'll start with my mine and give a little writeup.
Most Valuable Player: Chris Paul
Honorable Mentions: Dwight Howard, LeBron James, Pau Gasol
This early in the season, the top teams are all pretty close so no top player has really been that much more valuable than his peers. I give it to Paul because I think he has the least to work with AND has also been slightly the best. What he's doing on offense is just totally incredible. He's sporting a 61.2 TS% and setting up his teammates in a ridiculously efficient way. To put it in perspective, he has a higher AST% than Steven Nash while turning it over even less. Rajon Rondo is considered by pretty much everyone to be a top 5 PG in the NBA. Well Chris Paul is Rondo if Rondo could shoot and turn it over 10 less times per 100 plays.
Rookie of the Year: Blake Griffin
Honorable Mentions: Landry Fields, John Wall
This is probably as easy an award to give as any NBA award will ever be. I don't think I really have to say much here, so I'm just going to post this.
Defensive Player of the Year: Dwight Howard
Honorable Mentions: Kevin Garnett, LeBron James
I think Dwight and KG are really close, and to KG's credit, Boston has been the best defensive team in the league this year, but I think he has a decent amount more help than Dwight. This award is pretty much Dwight's to lose for the next few years and he hasn't done anything this year to give it away.
Most Improved Player: Russell Westbrook
Honorable Mentions: Al Horford, Roy Hibbert, Raymond Felton
All four of these guys have made some unexpectedly drastic improvements. I give the slight edge to Westbrook because he's playing at a superstar level while shouldering a superstar workload. His numbers speak for themselves and he's been vital to Oklahoma City staying relevant while Durant struggles with his jumper and with injuries. There is no question that Westbrook has been the best player on his team and given that his running mate is supposed to be a top five player, that's pretty impressive.
Coach of the Year: Stan Van Gundy
It's pretty dumb for people to speculate about this because they really have no clue what they're looking at. I'll just give it to Stan because he's the best coach in the league in my meaningless opinion.
6th Man of the Year: Wilson Chandler
This is another award that I don't really like so I don't feel like wasting any time on it either. It's dumb that the criteria is Games Started. You should have to be sixth or worse in minutes per game.
TZ's Awards:
TUt
MVP: Chris Paul
ROY: Blake Griffin
DPOY: Dwight Howard
MIP: Russell Westbrook
COY: Stan Van Gundy
6MAN: Wilson Chandler
MEbenhoe
MVP: Dwight Howard
ROY: Blake Griffin
DPOY: Dwight Howard
MIP: Roy Hibbert
COY: Gregg Popovich
6MAN: Brandon Bass
Monday, December 6, 2010
Monday, November 29, 2010
Five to Watch: Week 6
1. Passions - As Miami Turns: The new smash NBA daily soap roles on. This month has been a complete disaster for the Heat. If anyone was actually fanned up in Miami, they might be hearing some boos or calls to "Fi-re Spoe-lstra!" (clap-clap-clapclapclap). The schedule-makers have given them a decent shot at getting right, though with home games to Washington and Detroit before the Lebron Tar and Feathering Party and the Q on Thursday.
2. Ship Be Sinking Alerts: Tough schedule for the wobbling Bucks, at Utah and Denver, home to Orlando. On the other hand, aside from Wednesday's trip to Boston, Portland has a chance to get right against the likes of Washington (sensing a theme here) and Philadelphia. Phoenix doesn't have the toughest schedule in the world, (home to the 'Zards and Indy, away to GSW), but neither the Woyas nor the surprisingly frisky and possibly for real Pacers will be pushovers.
3. Hornets/Spurs the Rematch: After yesterday's VERY impressive win in New Orlenas, the two teams do it all over again this Sunday in San Antonio. Big big game for the Hornets, who have started to wobble a little after their blistering start. Jarrett Jack just loses games, obviously.
4. The Hot Seat: We're starting to get into the part of the season where teams might decide that coaches need to spend more time with their families. Favorite candidates are the aforementioned Spoelstra, the egregiously bad Paul Westphal, the almost as bad John Kuester in Detroit, Lionel Hollins of the underperforming Grizzlies, and my dark horse candidate, Doug Collins. His health problems provide the perfect cover for him to step away from a situation that's to be a much bigger mess than it originally seemed. My guess is he would trade places with Steve Kerr in a heartbeat right now.
5. Trade Time!: With the moratorium on trading players signed to contracts this summer being lifted soon, I expect the rumors to start flying fast and furious. My personal favorite: Francisco Elson, CJ Miles, Jeremy Evans and whatever sweeteners (cash/2d round picks) might be needed to Phoenix for Josh Childress. Phoenix gets to take on 2 expiring contracts to get out of paying their 4th string small forward $6.5 Mil for the next 5 years, plus they get another somewhat serviceable big in Elson and a jumping jack prospect in Evans. Not to mention they save $1 mil + this year in addition to whatever cash is received, which is not nothing to their penny pinching ownership. On the other side, Utah addresses their glaring need on the wing as Childress's defense and energy are a definite upgrade on Raja Bell and the departing Miles. Additionally, if they wanted to explore trading Kirilenko's expiring contract, Childress is capable of filling a very similar role. Win-Win!
I'm also desperately trying to figure out a way for Denver to ship Melo to New Orleans, but it probably can't happen until January when New Orleans can use Marcus Banks' Expiring Contract as part of a deal probably including Trevor Ariza, Marcus Thornton and picks/cash/other prospects.
What's everyone else looking forward to?
2. Ship Be Sinking Alerts: Tough schedule for the wobbling Bucks, at Utah and Denver, home to Orlando. On the other hand, aside from Wednesday's trip to Boston, Portland has a chance to get right against the likes of Washington (sensing a theme here) and Philadelphia. Phoenix doesn't have the toughest schedule in the world, (home to the 'Zards and Indy, away to GSW), but neither the Woyas nor the surprisingly frisky and possibly for real Pacers will be pushovers.
3. Hornets/Spurs the Rematch: After yesterday's VERY impressive win in New Orlenas, the two teams do it all over again this Sunday in San Antonio. Big big game for the Hornets, who have started to wobble a little after their blistering start. Jarrett Jack just loses games, obviously.
4. The Hot Seat: We're starting to get into the part of the season where teams might decide that coaches need to spend more time with their families. Favorite candidates are the aforementioned Spoelstra, the egregiously bad Paul Westphal, the almost as bad John Kuester in Detroit, Lionel Hollins of the underperforming Grizzlies, and my dark horse candidate, Doug Collins. His health problems provide the perfect cover for him to step away from a situation that's to be a much bigger mess than it originally seemed. My guess is he would trade places with Steve Kerr in a heartbeat right now.
5. Trade Time!: With the moratorium on trading players signed to contracts this summer being lifted soon, I expect the rumors to start flying fast and furious. My personal favorite: Francisco Elson, CJ Miles, Jeremy Evans and whatever sweeteners (cash/2d round picks) might be needed to Phoenix for Josh Childress. Phoenix gets to take on 2 expiring contracts to get out of paying their 4th string small forward $6.5 Mil for the next 5 years, plus they get another somewhat serviceable big in Elson and a jumping jack prospect in Evans. Not to mention they save $1 mil + this year in addition to whatever cash is received, which is not nothing to their penny pinching ownership. On the other side, Utah addresses their glaring need on the wing as Childress's defense and energy are a definite upgrade on Raja Bell and the departing Miles. Additionally, if they wanted to explore trading Kirilenko's expiring contract, Childress is capable of filling a very similar role. Win-Win!
I'm also desperately trying to figure out a way for Denver to ship Melo to New Orleans, but it probably can't happen until January when New Orleans can use Marcus Banks' Expiring Contract as part of a deal probably including Trevor Ariza, Marcus Thornton and picks/cash/other prospects.
What's everyone else looking forward to?
Friday, November 26, 2010
Black Friday Power Rankings: Part 2
Part 1: Teams 30-18 - remember these rankings are not intended to be scientific, nor a representation of where I think the teams will end up, more just a representation of how they are playing now combined with how they are building for the future if they are going nowhere this year.
We Can Rebuild Them
Not good yet, but there are pieces and perhaps a roadmap in place:
17. Indiana - Granger, Hibbert and Collison really is a nice core of complimentary young players. They are only on the hook for roughly $35 million in salary next season. They have $25 million or so in expiring contracts this year. And they are actually playing pretty decent basketball this season, though you wouldn't know it by the deserted island that is Conseco Fieldhouse on gamenights. All that said, good luck getting anyone who matters to come to Indianapolis.
16. New York - A few days ago, I probably put these guys in the "I didn't sign up for this shit" category, but they seem to have found a nice little rhythm, with Galinari in particular being far more aggressive since the rumors of him being traded for Melo faded a bit. Despite the huge, gaping, cavernous, enormous, echoing, visible-from-space hole in the middle of this team, a team with this much talent not making the playoffs as the 7/8 seed in the East would reflect very poorly on Amare, or on D'antoni or both.
15. Golden State - They've had a rough time of it since David Lee discovered that Wilson Chandler's mouth is a germ-ridden as that of a grizzly bear. But given the quality perimeter scoring and reasonable contributions of Biedrins, with Lee's interior scoring and rebounding back in the fold, I fully expect them to claim their rightful place as the 10th seed in the West who inspires columns wondering why do we have to have conference-based playoffs.
Welcome to the Real World
These five have all sent messages to their fans to enjoy the good times, but get real, this isn't going to end well
14. Phoenix - You are still tons of fun to watch, but the guys who have probably been your best two players are a combined 75 years old. With no real young talent being developed, no interior presence and not enough firepower to simply outgun teams a la the 05-08 versions of the Nash Express, shouldn't you be at least be exploring moving Steve at this point?
13. Portland - Of your 4 most importantly players 2 are about 196 years old and the others have about .5 healthy knees between them. Still you guys play hard, have a really good coach and have more than enough talent to be a tough opponent for anyone on a night you can actually make some jump shots. Really, though, you know you just don't have enough to really compete in the playoffs.
12. Denver -
11. Atlanta - You have a big time bright spot in that Al Horford is balling his ass off. But Joe Johnson is starting to show all the hard miles you put on his tread during the Mike Woodson "Stand And Watch Joe Do It" offensive years. Josh Smith thinks he's a 3 point shooter again. Larry Drew might actually be a downgrade from Woody. In short, LOL Hawks.
10. Mavericks - Deshawn Stevenson. Caron "
Stay On Target
These teams are in the conversation, but all of them are most likely either a move, or a player unexpectedly emerging from nowhere away from being true contenders.
9. Utah - With their string of huge comeback victories, the Jazz have showed they have balls. But they just don't have the horses, even once Okur comes back. They just desperately need some wing scoring. The problem, their main asset to acquire such a scorer, Andrei Kirilenko and his expiring contract is probably too much to give up terms of production for the SG/SF they'd likely receive in exchange. Maybe Gordon Hayward grows into the role, but for now they are stuck with Raja Bell and CJ Miles. Yech.
8. Bulls - Considering they've played the entire season without Boozer, they have to feel they are right where they want to be. That is assuming Boozer doesn't break up the solid defensive rhythm they seem to have established and that Taj Gibson, who's emerged as a quality NBA big early in the season, doesn't go into a funk.
7. Thunder - Like the Better Knicks, desperately need some size and rebounding. But with Durant and especially Westbrook, they still have a puncher's chance against anyone. They may have moves to make, but they've consistently stated and showed that they aren't going to do anything "rash". They really could have used a contribution from Cole Aldrich, but he's down in the Dl-league down, so he's clearly not ready.
6. Hornets - Have already made several moves, though results have not gone their way after the acquisition of Jarret Jack. They could probably use one more shooter, or for Marcus Thornton to step into the phone booth and emerge as the BucketsMan of the second half of last year. But really, as always, it's all about Chris Paul.
Omar Comin!
The real contenders.
5. Heat - This is the lowest I could in good conscience put them. Enough ink has been spilled about them already. Who knows what happens when/if etc etc etc.
4. Magic - Not at all a believer because Vince Carter is a wuss, Rashard Lewis is decomposing, HGH shooting fts etc etc etc. But they win games and blow out bad teams in the regular season. The one question I will ask is if they are starting shooters at the 1-3 spots, might they be better served by going bigger at the 4 with Bass or even Gortat?
3. Celtics - KG looks not "all the way back", but certainly much more mobile than last year. Shaq has been giving them great minutes and is a good fit, style-wise. The classic deep, talented veteran team built to beat the crap out of people in the playoffs like a body punching boxer.
2. Spurs - Boring boring Spurs. Death, taxes, and San Antonio Spurs basketball.
MEGATRON!
1. LA Lakers - As I said on Monday:
With all due respect to Chris Paul, Pau Gasol is the 1/8th Season MVP in my book. Shannon Brown is either still playing out of his mind or has just gotten lots lots better. Blake and Barnes combine with Shamwow to give them an extremely effective bench, and both Ebanks and Caracter have shown signs of being promising prospects. In short, I hate them.I can't emphasize the last point enough.
Black Friday Power Rankings: Part 1
Watching last night's Blake GriffinClippers-Kings game, I was struck by one thing over all else: the Kings are currently the worst team in the league. And then I realized I needed to rank the teams 30-1 just to get a sense of where everyone stands. I don't particularly care about records at this point, more who is playing the best and, for bad teams, who is at least showing signs of a better future. So without further ado, my Roughly 1/6th season power rankings in two parts, 30-18 here and 17-1 in a bit.
"Ship be sinkin'" - Michael Ray Richardson.
30 - Sacramento: Yes, they have more wins than the Clips and Sixers, but that doesn't accurately reflect the overwhelming sense of helplessness, hopeless and pure suck permeating their entire team. The bright spot this season, if you can call it that, is the surprisingly non-shitty play of Luther Head. That's basically it. I say fire the coach, who's doing no one on the team any favors by yo-yo'ing minutes, not settling on any sort of meaningful rotation and doing all he can to ensure Tyreke Evans regressed and Demarcus Cousins is put in situations to demonstrate all the worst aspects of his game and personality. On the verge of being a completely wasted season, 15 game in.
29 - Detroit: Can't even tank competently. This is a team that if it ran perfectly could sneak into the playoffs as an 8-seed before losing in four straight to Miami/Orlando/Boston in a series in which they'd be lucky to keep the total point differential under 3 figures. "Running perfectly" includes not having a coach who is either clueless or getting extremely mixed signals from the front office or both.
At this point, it's patently obvious that the Pistons are going absolutely nowhere with this "core" so they need to either try and sell off the "veteran pieces" for whatever it can get, or simply bury them and let the young guys learn through there mistakes. What they should NOT do is play Rip Hamilton and Tayshaun prince just enough so they are key pieces yet put up extremely underwhelming bulk numbers so as to depress their trade values well into the negative while limiting the opportunity of Monroe and Daye to progress by trotting out Jason Maxiell and Chris Wilcox, all while the coach does his best to piss off the one youngish piece (Stuckey) who might actually fetch a nice return so that he goes into a funk including taking multiple games off. So basically, exactly what they are doing. All while managing to win just enough games to minimize their chances in the Harrison Barnes sweepstakes.
28 - Philadelphia: Doug Collins has missed games due to symptoms of vertigo, and I can't think of a more perfect metaphor for the 76ers season. Previously indestructible Andre Iguodala has been in and out; Evan Turner at first confounded the depressed expectations for him by demonstrating a surprisingly mature floor game off the bench, before finding ways to disappear and/or choke games away as a starter. Elton Brand has gone from rejuvenated to thuggish. Lou Williams has either been a dynamic scorer off the bench or a poor man's Monta Ellis (09-10 edition). Somehow have managed to accumulate 2 of the 5 worst losses of the young season in more or less the same manner away to the same opponent in the Wizards. At the very least the team appears to be getting along and competing minimally hard on a nightly basis, which is far more than I can say for the first two squads.
27. Houston - Hope pinned on Yao's health. Whoops. Also, suffered a little bit of runbad (a Yao injury doesn't really count as runbad at this point) with injuries keeping Martin, Brooks and Lowry out for stretches. The injury to Brooks was particularly a killer since not only did they lose him and Yao in quick succession, but the timing of his injury meant they couldn't clear the roster spot occupied by Ish Smith to sign Erick Dampier, who probably would have helped hold down the fort for Yao. He would certainly have weighed it down...
None of these teams are good, but all have some degree of hope for the future.
26. Washington - Avoid the "complete trainwreck" category basically by virtue of John Wall being legit, Javael McGee looking like he has a chance, and Gilbert Arenas looking like he might have just enough left in the tank to convince some contender needing backcourt scoring (looking at you, Orlando, or even Utah just for sheer comedy's sake) to take a huge gamble on him. They still have my man Andray Blatche playing a prominent role though:
25. New Jersey - The hope hear is Derrick Favors. Full stop. Lopez is putting up some of the emptiest big numbers in the league
24. Minnesota - I mean with Ricky Rubio, suddenly a starting lineup of Rubio/Wes Johnson/Beasley/Love/Darko doesn't seem that bad, and would certainly be a strong playoff contender in the East. That said, Darko can't be for real NOW can he?
23. Toronto - Genuinely the toughest team for me to rank, because I'd like to see them do well for personal reasons. But they also are playing with a lot of passion and heart, especially at home. Reggie Evans and Amir Johnson are complementing Bargnani's aversion to touching the ball immediately after it has contacted the rim. Calderon seems to mesh much better with the young wings in Derozan and Weems, the latter of whom has been pretty impressive of late. If Derozan can develop just that little bit of consistency, they can give teams some mathcup problems with all their good perimeter scoring options. They aren't and won't be "good" but they'll give the fans their money's worth.
22. L.A. Clippers - The injuries to Kaman and Fat Diddy Davis might turn out to be a blessing. Probably not in terms of record, but in terms of forcing Eric Gordon and Blake Griffin to become the leaders of the team while allowing Aminu and Eric Bledsoe to get reps in an environment with very little pressure. We all know Blake has been great:
but Gordon has been almost more impressive by the fact that despite shooting wretchedly from 3 (14 of 67 on the year despite being a career 38% shooter from deep for his career) he's still playing at a near all-star level and has cataloged his own impressive list of highlights on the year.
Fuck All Y'all
21. Cleveland - Everyone knows what they lost, but they seem to have embraced life as the scrappy losers who occasionally come good and simply refused to be the doormats that most expected them to be. Have had a few very impressive wins already including the Celtics and the game vs. Milwaukee where you would expect a less professional and motivated team to have rolled over and died instead of coming all the way back from 20+ down to win on a buzzer beater. Big negative (aside from lack of top end talent) is Byron Scott's apparent desire to crush JJ Hickson's career. We've seen this movie before from Scott and his refusal to give young players any rope (Bass, Brandon. Thornton, Marcus.)
Pre-season high hopes already more or less dashed in depressingly familiar ways.
20. Charlotte - FREE TYRUS THOMAS. I am not a great admirer of Ray Felton's game, but he was at least serviceable. No matter what his gaudy assist:turnover stats might be, I don't feel the same way at all about DJ Augustin, and I would venture to guess that Gerald Wallace would agree. Here's guessing that when and if he thinks about it, Larry Brown is silently cursing MJ for putting the kibosh on this past summers Boris Diaw/Jose Calderon swap which would have A) given the team some real, non-terrible set up play; B) have Freed the aforementioned Tyrus Thomas; C) have allowed them to play Derrick Brown even more. As it is all their best players are 2-3-4 tweener types and simply can't be on the floor together that much. Additionally, Stephen Jackson seems to be especially...testy this year.
19. Memphis - Good thing they locked Conley up. Oh wait. I have a sinking sensation that they are going to end up using the constraints of that contract as an excuse to sell OJ Mayo (admittedly in a pretty horrid funk of late) for .35 cents on the dollar and then justify the deal by saying "hey, it wasn't as bad as the Gasol Trade!"
18. Milwaukee - Any time Bogut misses for them is just devastating, but the subtler loss has been Carlos Delfino, who hasn't played in weeks since basically playing through getting knocked the fuck out in a game a few weeks back. This team just can't score (last in ORtg) and Delfino provides a little scoring punch without the huge defensive liability that is Corey Maggette (though given the Bucks are first in DRtg at the moment, maybe sacrificing a little bit of D for some scoring wouldn't be the worst thing.) Jennings hasn't progressed quite enough yet, and Skiles, per his wont has relied too much on stiffs like Luc Richard Mbab a Moute and Jon Brockman at the expense of getting quality time for Larry Sanders, who could well turn into a difference maker down the line.
Abandon All Hope
"Ship be sinkin'" - Michael Ray Richardson.
30 - Sacramento: Yes, they have more wins than the Clips and Sixers, but that doesn't accurately reflect the overwhelming sense of helplessness, hopeless and pure suck permeating their entire team. The bright spot this season, if you can call it that, is the surprisingly non-shitty play of Luther Head. That's basically it. I say fire the coach, who's doing no one on the team any favors by yo-yo'ing minutes, not settling on any sort of meaningful rotation and doing all he can to ensure Tyreke Evans regressed and Demarcus Cousins is put in situations to demonstrate all the worst aspects of his game and personality. On the verge of being a completely wasted season, 15 game in.
29 - Detroit: Can't even tank competently. This is a team that if it ran perfectly could sneak into the playoffs as an 8-seed before losing in four straight to Miami/Orlando/Boston in a series in which they'd be lucky to keep the total point differential under 3 figures. "Running perfectly" includes not having a coach who is either clueless or getting extremely mixed signals from the front office or both.
At this point, it's patently obvious that the Pistons are going absolutely nowhere with this "core" so they need to either try and sell off the "veteran pieces" for whatever it can get, or simply bury them and let the young guys learn through there mistakes. What they should NOT do is play Rip Hamilton and Tayshaun prince just enough so they are key pieces yet put up extremely underwhelming bulk numbers so as to depress their trade values well into the negative while limiting the opportunity of Monroe and Daye to progress by trotting out Jason Maxiell and Chris Wilcox, all while the coach does his best to piss off the one youngish piece (Stuckey) who might actually fetch a nice return so that he goes into a funk including taking multiple games off. So basically, exactly what they are doing. All while managing to win just enough games to minimize their chances in the Harrison Barnes sweepstakes.
28 - Philadelphia: Doug Collins has missed games due to symptoms of vertigo, and I can't think of a more perfect metaphor for the 76ers season. Previously indestructible Andre Iguodala has been in and out; Evan Turner at first confounded the depressed expectations for him by demonstrating a surprisingly mature floor game off the bench, before finding ways to disappear and/or choke games away as a starter. Elton Brand has gone from rejuvenated to thuggish. Lou Williams has either been a dynamic scorer off the bench or a poor man's Monta Ellis (09-10 edition). Somehow have managed to accumulate 2 of the 5 worst losses of the young season in more or less the same manner away to the same opponent in the Wizards. At the very least the team appears to be getting along and competing minimally hard on a nightly basis, which is far more than I can say for the first two squads.
27. Houston - Hope pinned on Yao's health. Whoops. Also, suffered a little bit of runbad (a Yao injury doesn't really count as runbad at this point) with injuries keeping Martin, Brooks and Lowry out for stretches. The injury to Brooks was particularly a killer since not only did they lose him and Yao in quick succession, but the timing of his injury meant they couldn't clear the roster spot occupied by Ish Smith to sign Erick Dampier, who probably would have helped hold down the fort for Yao. He would certainly have weighed it down...
WE CAN BUILD ON THIS
None of these teams are good, but all have some degree of hope for the future.
26. Washington - Avoid the "complete trainwreck" category basically by virtue of John Wall being legit, Javael McGee looking like he has a chance, and Gilbert Arenas looking like he might have just enough left in the tank to convince some contender needing backcourt scoring (looking at you, Orlando, or even Utah just for sheer comedy's sake) to take a huge gamble on him. They still have my man Andray Blatche playing a prominent role though:
25. New Jersey - The hope hear is Derrick Favors. Full stop. Lopez is putting up some of the emptiest big numbers in the league
24. Minnesota - I mean with Ricky Rubio, suddenly a starting lineup of Rubio/Wes Johnson/Beasley/Love/Darko doesn't seem that bad, and would certainly be a strong playoff contender in the East. That said, Darko can't be for real NOW can he?
23. Toronto - Genuinely the toughest team for me to rank, because I'd like to see them do well for personal reasons. But they also are playing with a lot of passion and heart, especially at home. Reggie Evans and Amir Johnson are complementing Bargnani's aversion to touching the ball immediately after it has contacted the rim. Calderon seems to mesh much better with the young wings in Derozan and Weems, the latter of whom has been pretty impressive of late. If Derozan can develop just that little bit of consistency, they can give teams some mathcup problems with all their good perimeter scoring options. They aren't and won't be "good" but they'll give the fans their money's worth.
22. L.A. Clippers - The injuries to Kaman and Fat Diddy Davis might turn out to be a blessing. Probably not in terms of record, but in terms of forcing Eric Gordon and Blake Griffin to become the leaders of the team while allowing Aminu and Eric Bledsoe to get reps in an environment with very little pressure. We all know Blake has been great:
but Gordon has been almost more impressive by the fact that despite shooting wretchedly from 3 (14 of 67 on the year despite being a career 38% shooter from deep for his career) he's still playing at a near all-star level and has cataloged his own impressive list of highlights on the year.
Fuck All Y'all
21. Cleveland - Everyone knows what they lost, but they seem to have embraced life as the scrappy losers who occasionally come good and simply refused to be the doormats that most expected them to be. Have had a few very impressive wins already including the Celtics and the game vs. Milwaukee where you would expect a less professional and motivated team to have rolled over and died instead of coming all the way back from 20+ down to win on a buzzer beater. Big negative (aside from lack of top end talent) is Byron Scott's apparent desire to crush JJ Hickson's career. We've seen this movie before from Scott and his refusal to give young players any rope (Bass, Brandon. Thornton, Marcus.)
I didn't sign up for this shit
Pre-season high hopes already more or less dashed in depressingly familiar ways.
20. Charlotte - FREE TYRUS THOMAS. I am not a great admirer of Ray Felton's game, but he was at least serviceable. No matter what his gaudy assist:turnover stats might be, I don't feel the same way at all about DJ Augustin, and I would venture to guess that Gerald Wallace would agree. Here's guessing that when and if he thinks about it, Larry Brown is silently cursing MJ for putting the kibosh on this past summers Boris Diaw/Jose Calderon swap which would have A) given the team some real, non-terrible set up play; B) have Freed the aforementioned Tyrus Thomas; C) have allowed them to play Derrick Brown even more. As it is all their best players are 2-3-4 tweener types and simply can't be on the floor together that much. Additionally, Stephen Jackson seems to be especially...testy this year.
19. Memphis - Good thing they locked Conley up. Oh wait. I have a sinking sensation that they are going to end up using the constraints of that contract as an excuse to sell OJ Mayo (admittedly in a pretty horrid funk of late) for .35 cents on the dollar and then justify the deal by saying "hey, it wasn't as bad as the Gasol Trade!"
18. Milwaukee - Any time Bogut misses for them is just devastating, but the subtler loss has been Carlos Delfino, who hasn't played in weeks since basically playing through getting knocked the fuck out in a game a few weeks back. This team just can't score (last in ORtg) and Delfino provides a little scoring punch without the huge defensive liability that is Corey Maggette (though given the Bucks are first in DRtg at the moment, maybe sacrificing a little bit of D for some scoring wouldn't be the worst thing.) Jennings hasn't progressed quite enough yet, and Skiles, per his wont has relied too much on stiffs like Luc Richard Mbab a Moute and Jon Brockman at the expense of getting quality time for Larry Sanders, who could well turn into a difference maker down the line.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Five to Watch: Week 5
After missing last week, where nothing really happened...
erm, my bad.
Anyway, what's going down this week?
1. Spurs at Hornets, Sunday: Under the radar, Los Spurs are 11-1 without really getting a whole lot (by his standards) from Tim Duncan and vaunted addition Tiago Splitter still working his way into the rotation. The Hornets have made a little more noise while also jumping out to an 11-1 start, and we're about a week away from a raft of "Chris Paul is Back!" stories focusing on how he never really wanted to leave and so on. Predictable media narrative is predicable. In any event, this is a huge matchup between the teams vying for the position as "most likely sacrificial lamb for the Western Conference Finals."
2. This week in As The Heat Turn, Udonis Haslem is on the shelf for a bit with a very painful sounding injury (dislocated big toe? yech). Depending on Wade's health, the Heat are down to between 2 and 3.5 guys who qualify under my extremely unscientific and arbitrary "Actual NBA Player" rubric - I give Methuselah Ilgauskas between 1/2 and one on that scale. Time for Lebron James to go into his "get on, folks" routine, but also a big opportunity for the much maligned Bosh to get some of the critics off his back.
3. Relatedly, the travel across Florida for a rematch with Orlando. We all know what happened earlier in the season when Miami completely wood-shedded the seconf half. If they can repeat that feat with their current roster, in Orlando, this would be a huge huge statement win for Miami and probably a pretty crushing loss for Orlando. This would be a nice time for Dwight Howard to go nutty.
4. Thursday night on TNT, I probably won't be watching, nor will anyone else, but the over/under and Charles uttering a variation of "these are two turrible games" over the course of the night has to be around 13.5. I'm sure Sacto/LAC seemed like a good idea at the time to the NBA schedule makers.
5. Finally, the Lake Show in Utah on Friday. I'm basically looking for any sign of a challenge to the Laker's dominance this year. With all due respect to Chris Paul, Pau Gasol is the 1/8th Season MVP in my book. Shannon Brown is either still playing out of his mind or has just gotten lots lots better. Blake and Barnes combine with Shamwow to give them an extremely effective bench, and both Ebanks and Caracter have shown signs of being promising prospects. In short, I hate them. I really hope that the one time BTTITW can do what needs doing here.
What's everyone else looking for?
erm, my bad.
Anyway, what's going down this week?
1. Spurs at Hornets, Sunday: Under the radar, Los Spurs are 11-1 without really getting a whole lot (by his standards) from Tim Duncan and vaunted addition Tiago Splitter still working his way into the rotation. The Hornets have made a little more noise while also jumping out to an 11-1 start, and we're about a week away from a raft of "Chris Paul is Back!" stories focusing on how he never really wanted to leave and so on. Predictable media narrative is predicable. In any event, this is a huge matchup between the teams vying for the position as "most likely sacrificial lamb for the Western Conference Finals."
2. This week in As The Heat Turn, Udonis Haslem is on the shelf for a bit with a very painful sounding injury (dislocated big toe? yech). Depending on Wade's health, the Heat are down to between 2 and 3.5 guys who qualify under my extremely unscientific and arbitrary "Actual NBA Player" rubric - I give Methuselah Ilgauskas between 1/2 and one on that scale. Time for Lebron James to go into his "get on, folks" routine, but also a big opportunity for the much maligned Bosh to get some of the critics off his back.
3. Relatedly, the travel across Florida for a rematch with Orlando. We all know what happened earlier in the season when Miami completely wood-shedded the seconf half. If they can repeat that feat with their current roster, in Orlando, this would be a huge huge statement win for Miami and probably a pretty crushing loss for Orlando. This would be a nice time for Dwight Howard to go nutty.
4. Thursday night on TNT, I probably won't be watching, nor will anyone else, but the over/under and Charles uttering a variation of "these are two turrible games" over the course of the night has to be around 13.5. I'm sure Sacto/LAC seemed like a good idea at the time to the NBA schedule makers.
5. Finally, the Lake Show in Utah on Friday. I'm basically looking for any sign of a challenge to the Laker's dominance this year. With all due respect to Chris Paul, Pau Gasol is the 1/8th Season MVP in my book. Shannon Brown is either still playing out of his mind or has just gotten lots lots better. Blake and Barnes combine with Shamwow to give them an extremely effective bench, and both Ebanks and Caracter have shown signs of being promising prospects. In short, I hate them. I really hope that the one time BTTITW can do what needs doing here.
What's everyone else looking for?
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Why Is Brook Lopez Becoming Andrea Bargnani (Sans the 3s)
I've watched every single Nets game this year and I've been growing infuriated with Brook Lopez. In his third year, with arguably the best supporting cast he's had, he should be tearing it up given how promising he looked in the last two years. He's been off to a terrible start though (relative to expectation). I don't know what happened to him but he's afraid to grab a rebound for some reason. Luckily Kris Humphries has really stepped up and Favors has been a beast in his bench minutes. Humphries new found swag might very well be the result of the recent rumors that he's dating Kim Kardashian.
Brook has been touted as a legit Center of the future, but he hasn't played anything like it. His lines look eerily similar to Andrea Bargnani, only he's shooting long twos instead of threes.
http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/pcm_finder.cgi?request=1&sum=0&p1=lopezbr01&y1=2011&p2=bargnan01&y2=2011
One possible turning point I noticed was when they played the Orlando Magic the second time. After getting crushed by Dwight in their first meeting, Brook hardly ventured near the rim the second time, instead opting for longer shots, that he happend to be hitting that night. Since then he's really fell in love with playing on the perimeter and I don't think he's a good enough shooter that it's okay. All his numbers are pretty much down and he's disappointed for a team that I think should really contend for a playoff spot (lol east).
Another annoying habit of his that I've noticed is that he constantly makes himself smaller. He often crouches down and plays below the rim and it's been leading to him getting blocked a concerning amount of the time for a man his size. He usually has the size advantage and they really need him to start using it. Avery Johnson has already questioned his toughness and played Humphries extended minutes over him in one of their games and I wouldn't shocked to see that trend continue.
Brook has been touted as a legit Center of the future, but he hasn't played anything like it. His lines look eerily similar to Andrea Bargnani, only he's shooting long twos instead of threes.
http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/pcm_finder.cgi?request=1&sum=0&p1=lopezbr01&y1=2011&p2=bargnan01&y2=2011
One possible turning point I noticed was when they played the Orlando Magic the second time. After getting crushed by Dwight in their first meeting, Brook hardly ventured near the rim the second time, instead opting for longer shots, that he happend to be hitting that night. Since then he's really fell in love with playing on the perimeter and I don't think he's a good enough shooter that it's okay. All his numbers are pretty much down and he's disappointed for a team that I think should really contend for a playoff spot (lol east).
Another annoying habit of his that I've noticed is that he constantly makes himself smaller. He often crouches down and plays below the rim and it's been leading to him getting blocked a concerning amount of the time for a man his size. He usually has the size advantage and they really need him to start using it. Avery Johnson has already questioned his toughness and played Humphries extended minutes over him in one of their games and I wouldn't shocked to see that trend continue.
Monday, November 8, 2010
What to Watch: Week 3.
Story lines to look for, ignoring the still simmering Rambis/Love apparent feud in Kahhhhn-land.
What's everyone else looking for?
- Ship be sinking in Los Angeles (Clippers version) and Washington. Two teams I kinda sorta thought might not be totally terrible this year. The takeaway is don't forget that guys who are on bad teams their whole careers are there for a reason. If Andray Blatche is your team leader...
- What's going on in Houston? With Yao still limited in minutes (and the frankly bizarre decision to sit him vs. San Antonio so he could play 17 minutes of the mauling of the T-Wolves on the back end of the BTB), and Aaron Brooks out for 4-6 weeks, the Rockets might be in trouble in the loaded west. Though it's possible that giving Brooks' minutes to Kyle Lowry and the surprisingly spritely Ish Smith could help them as they get better defensively and start feeding Scola even more.
- Atlanta vs. Orlando, tonight. Chance for the Hawks to bounce back from their first loss. Jameer Nelson is out for Orlando. Chance for both teams to make an early season "statement" but the game potentially means more to Atlanta who need a legit win after dropping their first real test of the season.
- On the other side of the coin, Minny at the LakeShow on Tuesday. Do the Lakers double them up or merely win by 40. I think the crowd might start chanting for tacos at around the 3 minute mark of the first quarter.
- Thursday Night: While the TNT slate of games is pretty huge (Celtics vs. SuperFriends; Lakers in Denver), the third game is perhaps the most interesting with the very frisky Warriors visiting the up and down Bulls. While it's a little early yet to start thinking in these terms, the Dubs are going to have to pick up a few of these types of games if they want to crash the playoff party. The Bulls are fairly fortunate to be playing in what looks the worst division in the NBA, but they still have to be very disappointed with starting 2-3.
What's everyone else looking for?
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