Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
Only Ben struggled all night long again,while Landry blew a golden opportunity after he was given the start, stunk the place up, and never returned to the game. Way to impress the new coach.
Meanwhile numerous guys excelled, Andre Miller played like he was 29, not 39, and his saavy and floor generalship was something we haven't seen around here since...I dunno. Beno at least. Bibby maybe. Made a huge difference.
Omri Casspi may have found his perfect match in Karl, a guy who can respect a hardworking roleplayer who likes to pass.
Boogie brought the effort bigtime. Sometimes too much as he almost got himself kicked out of this one early before pounding out 31pts 15reb...and 9 TOs.
Jason woke back up from his coma and gave us one of his better effort games of the season.
McCallum and DWill both flared in the first half, Rudy came alive after half and wrapped up his night with 28pts.
24 turnovers aside -- and its hard to put 24 turnovers aside -- we were fun to watch again for the first time in forever. Been 8 years now when this board has cleared out after the All Star break like somebody has scrreamed Fire!. This might finally been the year when it works the other way. The playoffs are gone, yes. But the season may just be getting restarted after 2 months of hell.
Boxscore
Stats: 38min 28pts (9-18, 2-5, 8-8) 5reb 4ast 1stl 3blk 3TO
Gay ( B+ ) -- Rudy got off to a lousy start to the Karl era as the Celtics jumped out to an 18-4 lead to start this thing, and Rudy was making major contributions to that score. His shots, aside from a corner 3 attempt which is more a Karl shot than a Rudy shot, were forced, he started things off with a bad pass turnover in the middle of the court and came dangerously close to several more, and sat down really having contributed nothing. When he came back in he made a nice crosscourt pass to DWill for a three, but had another turnover in the mid 2nd when he turned and threw a pass so quickly he didn't even look to see where Cuz was reposting before trying to pass. And that really seemed to be the impression here for a lot of our guys -- they were amped and trying to do the things Karl was asking, but not used to it. So they were playing too fast, and making quick, poor decisions. In the last minute of the half Rudy got an offensive board and finish to still find his way up to 10 points in the half, but the offense didn't really come online until the third when he started heating up, and after Cuz left the game he immediately stepped up in a big way with back to back scores and then a kick to Miller for a corner 3. After we got a gift on an idiotic Crowder turnover to close the quarter, Rudy got a chance to go down the lane the other way, get fouled and get up to 22pts. There were a few shaky ballhandling plays down the stretch that neither Rudy, nor Karl I think were terribly pleased with. A bad pass turnover up top at the 1:00 mark that let Boston go the other way and hit a three to make it a 6pt game was particularly poor. But Rudy also chipped in 6 points down the stretch, and blocked a Smart three attempt with 30 seconds to go. There was effort, just not always execution. For some reason the overall package here felt like a "B" to me. But then you look up at 28pts on 50% shooting, 5reb 4ast 1stl 3blks...yeah, that's a B for Lebron maybe. Still, the first half wasn't much, and it felt less steady than thus numbers, so less than an A. --Brick
Stats: 5min 0pts (0-0, 0-0, 0-0) 1reb 0ast 0stl 0blk 1TO
Landry ( INC ) -- It was such a great game, it was so much fun to watch...and NONE of that was due to Carl. Landry got the surprise start, and Karl decided that we were going to switch absolutely everything. Landry was completely and totally useless in this scenario. He spent his five minutes getting switched onto guards, he ended up giving up an easy jumper to Smart and an open three to Bass (not a switch). He barely touched the ball on offense at all - the Kings were completely discombobulated in the first 5 minutes, and I don't think it was all Landry's fault by any means, but he got no shots, and when he finally got his hands on an offensive rebound, he jumped in the air to pass it and ended up double-clutching, coming down with it and turning it over. And that was it. Landry never saw the court again, and with the play we were getting from Williams and Casspi, he didn't deserve to. All right, Carl. I can't do it. I can't give you an F for only five minutes when your coach was asking you to switch everything on D and you couldn't get a touch on offense for your teammate's turnovers. You get an incomplete. You can make this grade up tomorrow night. --Capt.
Stats: 36min 31pts (12-18, 0-0, 7-9) 15reb 3stl 2stl 1blk 9TO
Cousins ( A- ) -- games like this...how do you factor in 9 TOs for a center? How do you account for the opposing center scoring 13 first quarter points, not really against Boogie, but against our eternally confused pick and roll defense? I dunno. What I do know is that Boogie came out in this one really amped, and in fact in the early going despite joining all of his teammates in trying too hard and trying to do too much, he was the onyl one so talented he was going to have some productivity anyway. Unfortunately his scoring 3 of our first 4 hoops and assisting on the other still left us in a big hole by the time he left. And the thing was, the combination of our suck, and Zeller's roll, roll, roll scoring really pissed Cuz off, to the point that we nearly lost him. He started getting very upset at noncalls, actually got a T after not getting a call on the break and sitting on the floor, and he wasn't quite done yapping even after that. But there was never any slacking off. In fact quite the opposite. Very active and phsyical
again after returning, but the turnovers continued to pile up as he tried to do too much as a passer -- Karl like everyone else wants to make use of those skills, but the huge spike in turnovers since its started makes it dubious. Things really turned into a war in the third Started the third on back ot bakc raged offensive plays, getting blocked inside, and forcing a long near corner three that airballed. But he came back with multiple big power moves knocking bodies out of the way. Was back and forth with Celtics on foul calls as guys kept running into his back and falling down to get calls, and Boogie himself flopped at least once, and also had a great hustle play chasing down Marcus Smart on the break, fouling him, not getting caleld for it, and saving the hoop. With the crowd already lathered up he broke out for the spectacular fullcourt rumble and monster dunk in the late third posting above that makes all the trunovers on those things worth it, venting his frustration and getting the crowd to its feet. When he returned in the 4th it was more of the same, another bad pass turnover, a great step through a double team for a score -- just things only a handful of elite guys have ever been able to do. Big moment though was when out of the timeout at the 3:30 mark, Boogie stepped forward as a defender, not an offensive player, notched a block and a steal on our next to possessions to key our opening the lead back up. And with the Celts fouling and desperating heaving in the final minute, he was upin the rare air of 30 and 15 (been done 14 times n nearly 800 games this season, 4 of the 14 by Cuz) by the end of it. --Brick
Stats: 41min 10pts (3-13, 2-7, 2-3) 1reb 2ast 0stl 0blk 4TO
McLemore ( D ) -- Darn, I would have loved to give Ben a higher score on a night when Karl got his first victory as the head coach of the Kings. And, turnovers aside, which would require a very large shovel, it was a very entertaining game. To put it mildly, Ben struggled tonight. On both ends of the court. He couldn't shoot a pea into the ocean going 3 for 13 overall, and 2 for 7 from the three. His most important shot came toward the end of the 1st quarter, when he put the final touches on the Kings comeback by hitting a corner three. But that was about it for heroics. It's hard to believe that he played 41 minutes, and only managed to pull down 1 rebound. he did have 2 assists, but he nullified those by turning the ball over 4 times. Most of his turnovers came from being aggressive, and frankly, trying to do things he's not yet capable of. Defensively he had the misfortune of running into Avery Bradley, who came into the game already on fire. The dude couldn't miss. And to be fair to Ben, a lot of Bradley's shots were well contested. But some were wide open shots coming off screens. It didn't seem to matter to Bradley because everything he threw up was going in, including a botched fast break pass that left Bradley in the air with his back to the basket, throwing up a prayer without looking at the basket, which went in. I thought it was interesting that Karl played Ben that many minutes. Makes me wonder if Stauskas will get a lot of minutes in the next game since he didn't play tonight. There was more ball movement in this game than I've seen in any game all year. Cut down the turnovers, and you have a blueprint for victory. By the way, nice to see a PG out there that knows what he's doing. Hopefully McCallum can learn a few things. I loved seeing Miller barking at his teammates. --Baja
Stats: 25min 8pts (3-7, 2-4, 0-0) 5reb 4ast 0stl 0blk 5TO
McCallum ( B- ) -- Ray got the start tonight and had a decent, if uneven game. Initially, he was hitting shots and being aggressive while still keeping his teammates involved. He had two big three pointers early in the game to keep the first quarter from being an absolute travesty. All 8 of his points came in the first quarter, but they helped spark the run that brought the game back to even. He played pretty good defense on Marcus Smart, limiting him to 16 points on 20 shooting possessions. Unfortunately, he was part of the carelessness with the ball tonight, dribbling into traffic, and getting his pocket picked as he brought the ball up the floor a few times, which brings his grade down a full letter. I liked what I saw from McCallum tonight, and if he can do this for 20 minutes per game, we will have a pretty decent point guard rotation once Collison is healthy. --Hadlowe
Last edited:
