Whew!
Okay...now if the Clippers can just somehow pull out the miracle against the Cavs, we will have largely made up for the embarrasing Denver gaffe, and can look forward to the showdown vs. the Wizards next week as an opportunity to really seize control again.
Theme theme theme theme...have three in the hopper that require some research before I break them out, need something that does not....hmmm...got it (piggybakcing on some independent research I did recently): Fun With Astronomy (Things You Maybe Didn't Know About Our Solar Neighborhood)
Nocioni ( B ) -- was fairly quiet to start this one again at SF. Got worked over by Malik Rose in the latter part of the first after moving to PF, but his hustle plays down the stretch of the first half brought us back. Played some bad defense on the not quite offensive juggernaught Kyle Weaver in the third, but after being popped over to PF again when Jason left began to really get into Jeff Green on defense where Thompson could not and took away the Thunder's #1 weapon on the night. Thoroughly flustered Green and caused him to all of a sudden turn into a turnover machine -- looked like an All Star against Jason, a flustered kid against Noc. But Noc got a little wild down the stretch trying to win the game for us, and it hurt us. Amazingly had the chance to pay the hero at the end and ended up the goat -- got himself a wide open side pop to tie the game up and send it to OT with 3 seconds to go (his man had fallen down, this was WIDE open) and damn near airballed it. How you like that for tanking OKC? Ha!
Pluto -- (the above picture showing an artist's conception of what a bitterly cold little ball it must be with the sun so far distant) Wasn't quite sure how to start this theme, because its all interrelated, so I decided to start with what is already fairly well known. Pluto, the erstwhile 9th planet, famously demoted a few years ago (yes for all you not so kids who grew up with 9 planets, your kids will tell you there are only 8). Pluto sits 50 AU away from the sun (an AU means "astronomical unit" and = the distance from the Earth to the sun, so 50 AU = 50x as far from the sun) and takes nearly 250 years to complete its orbit (so a Pluto "year" is 250 years long.
Thompson ( D ) -- continued his late fade here with a sloppy game where he also got lit up. In the early going was bouncing around inside on the glass but getting little done. The only hoop was an open dunk the result of a nice behind the back feed by Spencer. Largely got his *** handed to him again by Jeff Green (who lit him up last time they met too) in the first half and threw in a batch of sloppy turnovers down the stretch of the half as well. Was unable to turn things in the third, and with Noc so effective pestering Green, Jason was given the opportunity to go sit down and keep Kevin company for the entire 4th quarter.
So what happened to Pluto as a planet? Well this was part of it. Pluto is really small. Its smaller than our moon in fact. In fact its smaller than most of the big moons in the known solar system. The picture above shows Pluto as the pink/orange ball at the bottom right, compared to and smaller than Ganymede, Titan, Calisto (across the top -- moons of Jupiter and Saturn), Io, the moon, Europa, and Triton (across the bottom -- moons of Jupiter, Earth and Neptune).
Hawes ( A- ) -- Spencer's 2nd 20pt game in a row, and his first ever 20-10 game. A good sign for us even as our other young big struggled and raises questions. And unlike last game, when he flukily hit three threes to start the game to power the 20pts, this one was much more solid. Got of to the quick start againstr Krstic -- just too big and too long for him. Was a major factor early, but then was kind of forgotten about, and Robert Swift of all peope held him down for a while. Took a hard fall in the second quarter when he went paratrooping on Jeff Green and upended himself. Came down out of the air face first and tried to catch himself -- good way to break a wrist. I know. I've done it. Rather stupidly gunned a long shot next time down the floor for an airball. Immediately after a big fall that must leave you sore? Duh. In fact one fo the few duhs for Spencer tongiht was the unfortunate encouragement his three point spree from the Denver game gave him -- shot 10-19 on the night, but it would have been 10-16 had he not chosen to chuck up three bricked threes as well. I halfway expected him to stiffen up at halftime and maybe even have to sit out the 2nd half, but he was back out and showing no ill effects. Immediately caused more problems for the Thunder with the jumper, which was just on. But after a long night of dominating the matchup with Krstic all game, he got a little sloppy, got into foul trouble, and lost control of Krstic down the stretch as Nenad set a career high for rebounding and just waded inside for key finishes to hold us off. That., combined with generally sloppy ballhandling, and illegal screen, and several other mental errors for turnovers amke the minus here. Otherwise this was one fo the stronger games we have seen from Spencer.
Eris -- a bigger problem for Pluto's planethood emerged in 2005, with the discovery of a big ole rock named Eris. Eris is way out. WAY out. Pluto is 50 AU out -- Eris is nearly 100 AU out. And its bigger than Pluto. Quite a bit bigger -- closer to the size of our moon. When it was discovered there was initially some thought of calling it the 10th planet, but because we now realize there could be a lot more things of that size out there (see below) we decided to just strip all the objects fo that size of planet status instead. Eris has a hugel elliptical orbit BTW (a big oval rather than a circle). Its so far out it takes it nearly 600 years for a single orbit, but at its closest it will actually get in closer than Pluto. If any of you happen to be awake some night in 2257 you will probably be able to spot it with a backyard telescope.
Martin ( C+ ) -- well this was an odd one -- started promisingly, but ended in controversy. Got off to the slow start on offense, but was once again more active on defense putting to rest any of the 'he can't" school of thought on his defense (he was just being lazy and/or selfish). Good work on the defensive glass too, coming back to help. This was again entirely an effort/attitude change, nothing more. It was game 2 of Kevin as a good teammate ratehr than a prima donna. Came on in the second quarter to get his customary 12pts in a half, but it too was different than the nromal routine. The points were more timely, more what the team needed, and less of the one man "oh there goes Kevin chucking/flopping again" routine. So it was all going well, and then...everything just pretty much dried up in the third -- he had 12pts and 6rebs at half. He had 12pts 6rebs and one really not smart turnover leading to a dunk by the end of the third. Shot 0-3 in the quarter, and Thabo Sefalosha, despite being bigger/slower, really began to get the better of him. Which all led up to the controversial part -- kevin did not play int he 4th. Not one minute. He was playing poorly after half, McCants and Garcia were playing well, we were makign a run (Kevin ended up once again with the lowest +/- on the team) and he just never returned. Natt said it was because Kevin told him the ankle stiffened up. Kevin did not talk to the media, but sent a text emssage instead saying he would support the decisions but wish he had played. The conspiracy theorists will all no doubt say "tanking!". But in any case....there it was. My biggest thing is just that for a half, Kevin was where we need him to be going into the future. So whatever else this meant, you just hope he does not draw the wrong lesson from this and drift back to the soft, selfish flopaholic all offensive ways as a way to guarantee his minutes.
Kuiper Belt -- once upon a time when Pluto was first discovered (circa 1930) the Solar System was thought of as a relatively tidy place. There were 9 planets, an asteroid belt, some random comets, and that was it. Well, its nto. And our increasing ability to see out into space was the final nail for Pluto as planet. Hence, the Kuiper Belt. The Kuiper Belt, named after a 1950's astronomer who hypothesized its existence (actually he thought it had once existed in the past but had been dispersed by today, but they still gave his name to it), is a huge scattered ring of smaller objects, kind of like the rings aroudn Saturn, except way out there around the sun. Pluto is part of the Kuiper Belt -- the Belt generally lies from 30 AU to 55 AU out there (remember, Pluto is 50 AU), but one of the things that lost it its plannthood is that there are a lot of objects out there nearly as big. The computer model above shws all the ones they have mapped since the belt was discovered in 1992 (over 1000) and many many more are expected to be found. No huge ones are postulated, and they seem to be mostly great balls of ice rather than rock, but its a vast stable system of little planetoids out there beyond Neptune. We now have a space explorere headed out there named New Horizons, due to reach Pluto in 2015, and then to hopefully move on to another obejct out there afterwards (target undecided yet). Here's another thing -- not only do other stars have planets...they probably all have Kuiper Belts too. Billions of stars in billions of galaxies with dozens if not hundreds of planetoids apiece...we small.
Okay...now if the Clippers can just somehow pull out the miracle against the Cavs, we will have largely made up for the embarrasing Denver gaffe, and can look forward to the showdown vs. the Wizards next week as an opportunity to really seize control again.
Theme theme theme theme...have three in the hopper that require some research before I break them out, need something that does not....hmmm...got it (piggybakcing on some independent research I did recently): Fun With Astronomy (Things You Maybe Didn't Know About Our Solar Neighborhood)
Nocioni ( B ) -- was fairly quiet to start this one again at SF. Got worked over by Malik Rose in the latter part of the first after moving to PF, but his hustle plays down the stretch of the first half brought us back. Played some bad defense on the not quite offensive juggernaught Kyle Weaver in the third, but after being popped over to PF again when Jason left began to really get into Jeff Green on defense where Thompson could not and took away the Thunder's #1 weapon on the night. Thoroughly flustered Green and caused him to all of a sudden turn into a turnover machine -- looked like an All Star against Jason, a flustered kid against Noc. But Noc got a little wild down the stretch trying to win the game for us, and it hurt us. Amazingly had the chance to pay the hero at the end and ended up the goat -- got himself a wide open side pop to tie the game up and send it to OT with 3 seconds to go (his man had fallen down, this was WIDE open) and damn near airballed it. How you like that for tanking OKC? Ha!
Pluto -- (the above picture showing an artist's conception of what a bitterly cold little ball it must be with the sun so far distant) Wasn't quite sure how to start this theme, because its all interrelated, so I decided to start with what is already fairly well known. Pluto, the erstwhile 9th planet, famously demoted a few years ago (yes for all you not so kids who grew up with 9 planets, your kids will tell you there are only 8). Pluto sits 50 AU away from the sun (an AU means "astronomical unit" and = the distance from the Earth to the sun, so 50 AU = 50x as far from the sun) and takes nearly 250 years to complete its orbit (so a Pluto "year" is 250 years long.
Thompson ( D ) -- continued his late fade here with a sloppy game where he also got lit up. In the early going was bouncing around inside on the glass but getting little done. The only hoop was an open dunk the result of a nice behind the back feed by Spencer. Largely got his *** handed to him again by Jeff Green (who lit him up last time they met too) in the first half and threw in a batch of sloppy turnovers down the stretch of the half as well. Was unable to turn things in the third, and with Noc so effective pestering Green, Jason was given the opportunity to go sit down and keep Kevin company for the entire 4th quarter.
So what happened to Pluto as a planet? Well this was part of it. Pluto is really small. Its smaller than our moon in fact. In fact its smaller than most of the big moons in the known solar system. The picture above shows Pluto as the pink/orange ball at the bottom right, compared to and smaller than Ganymede, Titan, Calisto (across the top -- moons of Jupiter and Saturn), Io, the moon, Europa, and Triton (across the bottom -- moons of Jupiter, Earth and Neptune).
Hawes ( A- ) -- Spencer's 2nd 20pt game in a row, and his first ever 20-10 game. A good sign for us even as our other young big struggled and raises questions. And unlike last game, when he flukily hit three threes to start the game to power the 20pts, this one was much more solid. Got of to the quick start againstr Krstic -- just too big and too long for him. Was a major factor early, but then was kind of forgotten about, and Robert Swift of all peope held him down for a while. Took a hard fall in the second quarter when he went paratrooping on Jeff Green and upended himself. Came down out of the air face first and tried to catch himself -- good way to break a wrist. I know. I've done it. Rather stupidly gunned a long shot next time down the floor for an airball. Immediately after a big fall that must leave you sore? Duh. In fact one fo the few duhs for Spencer tongiht was the unfortunate encouragement his three point spree from the Denver game gave him -- shot 10-19 on the night, but it would have been 10-16 had he not chosen to chuck up three bricked threes as well. I halfway expected him to stiffen up at halftime and maybe even have to sit out the 2nd half, but he was back out and showing no ill effects. Immediately caused more problems for the Thunder with the jumper, which was just on. But after a long night of dominating the matchup with Krstic all game, he got a little sloppy, got into foul trouble, and lost control of Krstic down the stretch as Nenad set a career high for rebounding and just waded inside for key finishes to hold us off. That., combined with generally sloppy ballhandling, and illegal screen, and several other mental errors for turnovers amke the minus here. Otherwise this was one fo the stronger games we have seen from Spencer.
Eris -- a bigger problem for Pluto's planethood emerged in 2005, with the discovery of a big ole rock named Eris. Eris is way out. WAY out. Pluto is 50 AU out -- Eris is nearly 100 AU out. And its bigger than Pluto. Quite a bit bigger -- closer to the size of our moon. When it was discovered there was initially some thought of calling it the 10th planet, but because we now realize there could be a lot more things of that size out there (see below) we decided to just strip all the objects fo that size of planet status instead. Eris has a hugel elliptical orbit BTW (a big oval rather than a circle). Its so far out it takes it nearly 600 years for a single orbit, but at its closest it will actually get in closer than Pluto. If any of you happen to be awake some night in 2257 you will probably be able to spot it with a backyard telescope.
Martin ( C+ ) -- well this was an odd one -- started promisingly, but ended in controversy. Got off to the slow start on offense, but was once again more active on defense putting to rest any of the 'he can't" school of thought on his defense (he was just being lazy and/or selfish). Good work on the defensive glass too, coming back to help. This was again entirely an effort/attitude change, nothing more. It was game 2 of Kevin as a good teammate ratehr than a prima donna. Came on in the second quarter to get his customary 12pts in a half, but it too was different than the nromal routine. The points were more timely, more what the team needed, and less of the one man "oh there goes Kevin chucking/flopping again" routine. So it was all going well, and then...everything just pretty much dried up in the third -- he had 12pts and 6rebs at half. He had 12pts 6rebs and one really not smart turnover leading to a dunk by the end of the third. Shot 0-3 in the quarter, and Thabo Sefalosha, despite being bigger/slower, really began to get the better of him. Which all led up to the controversial part -- kevin did not play int he 4th. Not one minute. He was playing poorly after half, McCants and Garcia were playing well, we were makign a run (Kevin ended up once again with the lowest +/- on the team) and he just never returned. Natt said it was because Kevin told him the ankle stiffened up. Kevin did not talk to the media, but sent a text emssage instead saying he would support the decisions but wish he had played. The conspiracy theorists will all no doubt say "tanking!". But in any case....there it was. My biggest thing is just that for a half, Kevin was where we need him to be going into the future. So whatever else this meant, you just hope he does not draw the wrong lesson from this and drift back to the soft, selfish flopaholic all offensive ways as a way to guarantee his minutes.
Kuiper Belt -- once upon a time when Pluto was first discovered (circa 1930) the Solar System was thought of as a relatively tidy place. There were 9 planets, an asteroid belt, some random comets, and that was it. Well, its nto. And our increasing ability to see out into space was the final nail for Pluto as planet. Hence, the Kuiper Belt. The Kuiper Belt, named after a 1950's astronomer who hypothesized its existence (actually he thought it had once existed in the past but had been dispersed by today, but they still gave his name to it), is a huge scattered ring of smaller objects, kind of like the rings aroudn Saturn, except way out there around the sun. Pluto is part of the Kuiper Belt -- the Belt generally lies from 30 AU to 55 AU out there (remember, Pluto is 50 AU), but one of the things that lost it its plannthood is that there are a lot of objects out there nearly as big. The computer model above shws all the ones they have mapped since the belt was discovered in 1992 (over 1000) and many many more are expected to be found. No huge ones are postulated, and they seem to be mostly great balls of ice rather than rock, but its a vast stable system of little planetoids out there beyond Neptune. We now have a space explorere headed out there named New Horizons, due to reach Pluto in 2015, and then to hopefully move on to another obejct out there afterwards (target undecided yet). Here's another thing -- not only do other stars have planets...they probably all have Kuiper Belts too. Billions of stars in billions of galaxies with dozens if not hundreds of planetoids apiece...we small.
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