Artest ( B ) -- For a half there, looked like we had an answer for the Spurs. Ron got off to the huge start, and the Spurs looked confused about how to handle all 3 of Bibby/Martin and Artest. In any case, they had no answer for Ron himself, who had nearly 20 by halftime, and was doing it efficiently while also setting up teammates. But in the second half things fell apart -- it began to get ragged, Ron's shots began to miss, and then he got overexcited and started throwing up junk trying to save us as we started to slip. To make matters worse he injured a finger there and was in and out of the linuep afterward, and only hit one shot -- a layup. Defensively you rarely noticed him tonight, and on the glass he was just soso. An A first half, and then almost an incomplete and distrtacted second half. At least maybe that first half give sus a formula going forward, if Ron can duplicate it.
Thomas ( D ) -- well no surprise, but just too small to handle Duncan inside, as Tim went for 20pts 8rebs in the first HALF. And then in the late second quarter had insult added to injury as he got smacked in the mouth for his futile efforts, sending him straight to the lockerroom for stitches. A good question would be why Muss didn't make the switch and put Reef on Duncan more often. In any case, not going with the F here simply because this is 6'7" Kenny Thomas vs. 7'0" HOF MVP Tim Duncan, and this result was perfectly predictable to anybody not in the Kings front office apparently. Other than his obligatory blown layup, Kenny was moderately solid and didn't actually hurt us other than by getting squashed defensively, and the injury mitigates a bit. But an absolute wipeout either way.
Reef ( B+ ) -- had a good solid first half in most categories, scoring 12, grabbing 5 rebs. And the first few minutes of this one saw Reef come up with a couple of blocks in there. Not dominant, but steady throughout. Only real negative was a dumb and unnecessary technical foul arguing with Joe Crawford of all people in the first quarter. Slowed down offensively after half, and even threw up a dumb panicky three to join our self-destruction, but stepped up as our only significant rebounder. Not much better luick against Duncan than Thomas or Corliss actually, although there was at least some feeling of resistance. In any case this was just a solid effort. Never felt dominant. Never felt shaky. Just solid and working hard inside for the whole game, and unfortunately just outclassed in there.
Martin ( B ) -- got off to a pretty good start -- Spurs were paying a lot of attention to him, but interestingly not with Bowen. But after picking up his second foul kind of mysteriously did not return until the 3rd quarter. Saving him for the second half? Kind of an odd decision by Muss. In any case, after half quietly began to pile up points and ended up back at his familiar range with 20pts by the end of the third quarter, this time while often being checked by Bowen (although actually rarely went rigth at him + picked his spots on switches and whatnot). Not much late and despite some solid stretches just no real impact on this one.
Bibby ( D ) -- very very quiet start. Bizarrely invisible in fact. Not as in awful and trying while just missing shots, but as in seemingly just not even trying. Just dribbling it up, passing it off, and disappearing. Kind of have to believe the injury just had to be a factor given that passivity. In any case after half he did startt trying, but the results were decidely pukey. Most notable player for us to really not show up. Scored a few points at the line, but considerably padded his total in more or less garbagetime with us down 16 in the final 4 minutes. Bad non-effort from Mike. You see 16pts 4ast in the boxscore and you go, oh no THAT bad, but if you watched the game you barely even knew he was on the court.
Cisco ( C+ ) -- came back with a solid first quarter this time, generally staying in control, grabbing rebounds, and hitteng a shot. Did however repeatedly lose Brent Barry around the perimeter resulting in a predictable rain of threes. Was back in there late in the first half, and involved in an unfortunate sequence of events to close the half that saw us give up 4 pts to the Spurs in the final 5 seconds -- a weak loose ball foul on Manu, and then a bad decision on the inbounds play resulting in a TO and Duncan hit going into the half. With Ron nursing a bad hand played a lot of minutes in the second half to no appreciable effect at all. Maybe almost too cautious or something. In any case, you were rarely aware he was on court.
Corliss ( B- ) -- our backup center had an effective first half offensively, scoring in a variety of ways. Defensively was doing fine hidden away on the Obertos and Horrys, and then doomsday struck as Kenny had to leave and Corliss ended up staring at Duncan's belly button. Spent much of the rest of his time out there in that matchup, and not surprisingly it didn't go well. This was a decent effort by Corliss, but just giving up too much size for most of the night.
Price ( C ) -- Ronnie's best "play" of the game might have been running over Brent Barry at the end of the second quarter and sending him to the lockerroom to get stitches (before he returned late in the game looking like a brain surgery patient with a giant bandage alongside his head and headband to hold it on). Otherwise, would barely have known he was on the floor. I almost gave him the C here just because I had nothing to really grade him on, so go for the middle.
Douby ( INC ) -- garbagetime, nothing really
Hart ( INC ) -- garbagetime, gunned like Iverson, and helped make the score look closer than the game with 7pts in 2 minutes
Muss ( C ) -- 3 in a row now for no defense, and this time we only got a half of good offense. Still, could have been worse -- we were missing several guys, and they were more or less healthy, and yet we hung with the Spurs for a half before running out of steam. I think Muss made a mistake from the beginning in this one trying to guard Duncan with his defensive ace KT, when SAR was probably our best and only hope there. Although if SAR had gotten into foul toruble trying to stop Duncan, then there would have gone our only inside game, so maybe it can be argued. In any case, clearly our vaunted ability to shut down post players wasn't so vaunted here, and much of it just came down to size. Duncan just played over everybody's head. And I again have to question if Mike should be up there if he just can't perform and isn't healing. Of course after this one we are looking like a damn Mash unit, and Mike might be realtively healthy compared to Kenny (stitche) Price (stitches?), ron (finger) Salmons (still out with thigh) Brad (foot). Ugh. And now we get 9-1 Utah.
Couple of Muss related notes here: first, at the enjd of the first half he tried what I thought was a cute and sneaky inbounds play underneath our basket where he had TWO guys stand on the baseline, Reef pass it to Cisco (the other guy ont eh baseline) and then had Reef streak up court where Cisco was supposed to hit him with the pass. Well, sneaky, cute, but a fiasco when the inbounder just flat out misses and throws the ball into the stands. Ended up costing us two points. Secondly, I'm sorry because I never thought I'd ever find myself saying this, but...VITALY. Gawdammit coach, you were defnding Tim Duncan with Corliss. Just throw the big lug in there some night and see what happens. Third, pulling Kenny after he was ineffective after coming back in the second half made sense, even if it did leave us with Corliss on Duncan, but a couple of other absences were odd. First, Kevin picked up his second foul in the early 2nd quarter I think, and then bizarrely he never returned for the rest of the half. Strangfe for your leading scorer to not even let him play again and hope he doesn't get number thrre. And second, wiht about 5 minutes to go, Muss pulled Ron in favor of Cisco, but lef thte rest of the main guys out there. Unless Ron said somehtng to him about that finger, was that surrender? Partial surrender? Wisdom? Not sure. If he pulls everybody, its surrendering too early. But just pulling Ron...was he waiting to see if we got closer before putting him back in? Just felt odd while we were still technically kicking. Anyway -- Spurs are better than us. They won. Not a disaster. Just a rather predictable loss.
Duncan ( ) -- he's tall. Must be nice, having tall guys. That was what most of his dominance tongiht was about -- being tall. Shot over us, rebounded over us. protected the interior. Tall = nice.
Thomas ( D ) -- well no surprise, but just too small to handle Duncan inside, as Tim went for 20pts 8rebs in the first HALF. And then in the late second quarter had insult added to injury as he got smacked in the mouth for his futile efforts, sending him straight to the lockerroom for stitches. A good question would be why Muss didn't make the switch and put Reef on Duncan more often. In any case, not going with the F here simply because this is 6'7" Kenny Thomas vs. 7'0" HOF MVP Tim Duncan, and this result was perfectly predictable to anybody not in the Kings front office apparently. Other than his obligatory blown layup, Kenny was moderately solid and didn't actually hurt us other than by getting squashed defensively, and the injury mitigates a bit. But an absolute wipeout either way.
Reef ( B+ ) -- had a good solid first half in most categories, scoring 12, grabbing 5 rebs. And the first few minutes of this one saw Reef come up with a couple of blocks in there. Not dominant, but steady throughout. Only real negative was a dumb and unnecessary technical foul arguing with Joe Crawford of all people in the first quarter. Slowed down offensively after half, and even threw up a dumb panicky three to join our self-destruction, but stepped up as our only significant rebounder. Not much better luick against Duncan than Thomas or Corliss actually, although there was at least some feeling of resistance. In any case this was just a solid effort. Never felt dominant. Never felt shaky. Just solid and working hard inside for the whole game, and unfortunately just outclassed in there.
Martin ( B ) -- got off to a pretty good start -- Spurs were paying a lot of attention to him, but interestingly not with Bowen. But after picking up his second foul kind of mysteriously did not return until the 3rd quarter. Saving him for the second half? Kind of an odd decision by Muss. In any case, after half quietly began to pile up points and ended up back at his familiar range with 20pts by the end of the third quarter, this time while often being checked by Bowen (although actually rarely went rigth at him + picked his spots on switches and whatnot). Not much late and despite some solid stretches just no real impact on this one.
Bibby ( D ) -- very very quiet start. Bizarrely invisible in fact. Not as in awful and trying while just missing shots, but as in seemingly just not even trying. Just dribbling it up, passing it off, and disappearing. Kind of have to believe the injury just had to be a factor given that passivity. In any case after half he did startt trying, but the results were decidely pukey. Most notable player for us to really not show up. Scored a few points at the line, but considerably padded his total in more or less garbagetime with us down 16 in the final 4 minutes. Bad non-effort from Mike. You see 16pts 4ast in the boxscore and you go, oh no THAT bad, but if you watched the game you barely even knew he was on the court.
Cisco ( C+ ) -- came back with a solid first quarter this time, generally staying in control, grabbing rebounds, and hitteng a shot. Did however repeatedly lose Brent Barry around the perimeter resulting in a predictable rain of threes. Was back in there late in the first half, and involved in an unfortunate sequence of events to close the half that saw us give up 4 pts to the Spurs in the final 5 seconds -- a weak loose ball foul on Manu, and then a bad decision on the inbounds play resulting in a TO and Duncan hit going into the half. With Ron nursing a bad hand played a lot of minutes in the second half to no appreciable effect at all. Maybe almost too cautious or something. In any case, you were rarely aware he was on court.
Corliss ( B- ) -- our backup center had an effective first half offensively, scoring in a variety of ways. Defensively was doing fine hidden away on the Obertos and Horrys, and then doomsday struck as Kenny had to leave and Corliss ended up staring at Duncan's belly button. Spent much of the rest of his time out there in that matchup, and not surprisingly it didn't go well. This was a decent effort by Corliss, but just giving up too much size for most of the night.
Price ( C ) -- Ronnie's best "play" of the game might have been running over Brent Barry at the end of the second quarter and sending him to the lockerroom to get stitches (before he returned late in the game looking like a brain surgery patient with a giant bandage alongside his head and headband to hold it on). Otherwise, would barely have known he was on the floor. I almost gave him the C here just because I had nothing to really grade him on, so go for the middle.
Douby ( INC ) -- garbagetime, nothing really
Hart ( INC ) -- garbagetime, gunned like Iverson, and helped make the score look closer than the game with 7pts in 2 minutes
Muss ( C ) -- 3 in a row now for no defense, and this time we only got a half of good offense. Still, could have been worse -- we were missing several guys, and they were more or less healthy, and yet we hung with the Spurs for a half before running out of steam. I think Muss made a mistake from the beginning in this one trying to guard Duncan with his defensive ace KT, when SAR was probably our best and only hope there. Although if SAR had gotten into foul toruble trying to stop Duncan, then there would have gone our only inside game, so maybe it can be argued. In any case, clearly our vaunted ability to shut down post players wasn't so vaunted here, and much of it just came down to size. Duncan just played over everybody's head. And I again have to question if Mike should be up there if he just can't perform and isn't healing. Of course after this one we are looking like a damn Mash unit, and Mike might be realtively healthy compared to Kenny (stitche) Price (stitches?), ron (finger) Salmons (still out with thigh) Brad (foot). Ugh. And now we get 9-1 Utah.
Couple of Muss related notes here: first, at the enjd of the first half he tried what I thought was a cute and sneaky inbounds play underneath our basket where he had TWO guys stand on the baseline, Reef pass it to Cisco (the other guy ont eh baseline) and then had Reef streak up court where Cisco was supposed to hit him with the pass. Well, sneaky, cute, but a fiasco when the inbounder just flat out misses and throws the ball into the stands. Ended up costing us two points. Secondly, I'm sorry because I never thought I'd ever find myself saying this, but...VITALY. Gawdammit coach, you were defnding Tim Duncan with Corliss. Just throw the big lug in there some night and see what happens. Third, pulling Kenny after he was ineffective after coming back in the second half made sense, even if it did leave us with Corliss on Duncan, but a couple of other absences were odd. First, Kevin picked up his second foul in the early 2nd quarter I think, and then bizarrely he never returned for the rest of the half. Strangfe for your leading scorer to not even let him play again and hope he doesn't get number thrre. And second, wiht about 5 minutes to go, Muss pulled Ron in favor of Cisco, but lef thte rest of the main guys out there. Unless Ron said somehtng to him about that finger, was that surrender? Partial surrender? Wisdom? Not sure. If he pulls everybody, its surrendering too early. But just pulling Ron...was he waiting to see if we got closer before putting him back in? Just felt odd while we were still technically kicking. Anyway -- Spurs are better than us. They won. Not a disaster. Just a rather predictable loss.Duncan ( ) -- he's tall. Must be nice, having tall guys. That was what most of his dominance tongiht was about -- being tall. Shot over us, rebounded over us. protected the interior. Tall = nice.
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