Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
In a game that was fugly despite featuring a number of things we have been calling for: IT, who seems to have along with his TV apologists heard the whispers turned roar, was really looking to pass, and until some padded scoring stats in the final minute actually was threatening maybe the first game of his career with more assists than points. Ben was more involved...for a quarter, and responded with strong play...for a quarter, before turning back into TRob and ending up benched for Travis Outlaw. We played defense, at least at times. Things got physical, although Malone missed a golden opportunity to insert new acquisition Reggie Evans to show the Celts how that is done. The offense was democractic...but almost too democratic as it looked like something out of the Keith Smart handbook and we never did do anything that felt remotely dominant.
So, we won, but somehow the end result was fugly. We never did put them away. There was constant chirping vs. the refs. Flops on both sides. Cousins was back physically, but not mentally, and was really bothered by Humphries pushing and shoving all night. It was a throwback to old Boogie, as in old rookie/sophomore easy to distract Cousins. Somebody please drop him a tweet and tell him that he has to focus now -- half of the All Star vote is the second half of the previous season. Now's when you get yourself in position for it. It was a win, at a time when the whispers will grow whether that is what we want to do, but it wasn't pretty.
Your Consoritum Graders tonight:
Bricklayer
Uncia03
Bajaden
Capt. Factorial
Rainmaker
Boxscore
Stats: 31min 22pts (8-18, 2-3, 4-4) 7reb 2ast 0stl 0blk 3TO
Gay ( B+ ) -- This game didn't start off that well for Rudy as he seemed quite sluggish and any aggression was pretty much non-existent. Came out misfiring in the 1st, going 0-3, all perimeter jumpers. Started to fight his way into the game in the 2nd as started getting into the post instead of settling. Hit two short jumpers near the elbows which increasingly appears to be a favored area on the floor for him to rise up. Also drilled a pullup 3 off his own dribble. Still, even though he started forcing himself into the game in the 2nd and finding a rhythm, he didn't seem that into the game. Lethargic would be a great adjective to use as a description for his play overall in the 1st half. The lethargic play continued in the 3rd. He hit a pullup 3 on the left wing, a few mins later hit another pullup jumper from almost the same exact spot but that's all he really did on the offensive in for the quarter. What stuck out to me was he wasn't really seeking out the ball. Just passive. Then the 4th rolled around, game got a bit chippy, Landry hammered Olynyk and that foul, a flagrant, appeared to fire up the entire team, Rudy included. Rudy turned up the aggression, sought the ball and stopped settling for outside jumpers. Hit a big right wing jumper off a pass from Boogie, also attacked the rim twice and finished off two baskets inside. Attacked and got to the FT line as well. Defensively had an alright evening. Green had some success but much of Green's success came when Rudy wasn't matched-up against him. Green did shoot 7-25 on the game and Rudy deserves credit for some of that. Did well on the glass as well. I'm still adjusting to Rudy's style of play, as he's so smooth I might mistake how easy he makes things look for a lack of aggression at times. He did however float around too much for my liking the first 3 quarters and the difference was apparent when he turned it up a notch in the 4th. 22pts on 8-18, 7 rebs, good defensively for the most part and some big shots for us down the stretch is a pretty good night. It speaks to his talent that I think he can do a decent amount more. --Rain
Stats: 26min 10pts (5-7, 0-0, 0-0) 6reb 1ast 2stl 1blk 1TO
Thompson ( B ) -- solid is as solid does, and after last game's maybe trade deadline inspired meltdown, this time out Jason was rock solid. His offensive touches were widely scattered across the game, but almost everytime he did get his once every five minutes opportunity, he hit whatever it was. Twice he went inside over Bass and Humphries with nice little post moves in the first and third. After returning in the second he smoothly stroked a little midrange jumper from Cuz. He began the third with dunk down the lane as the Celtic just parted the waters fro him. And after Landry petered out in the 4th, he returned to the game and helped us seal it with another hit inside at the 4min mark and a nice pass over the top to Cuz (who fouled Humphries for about the 12th time on the play) at the 2:40 mark. rebounding was meh, but I felt his rebounds were a little more aggressive/legit than Carl's (both player put up 10 and 6, but slight edge to JT). --Brick
Stats: 34min 13pts (4-8, 0-0, 5-8) 7reb 2ast 2stl 0blk 6TO
Cousins ( D ) -- you know, frankly I could have gone lower than this. This was a frustrating game on a number of levels. Chicken and egg and probably zygote as well. We suddenly got democratic so Cuz did not get any shots...or Humphries hacked Cuz so he did not get any shots...or Cuz did not come mentally prepared to play and so he whined and flopped and got pushed around and so he did not get any shots...or the Celtics doubled and fouled and focused on stopping Cuz so he did not get any shots...or... In any case, the end result was that Cousins was never a factor tonight, except in the complaining department. Humphries was standing him up, help was often coming. The boards seemed constantly to be getting knocked out of his hands or flying off at odd angles. There was constant banging going on, and Cousins responded to it like a *****, not a badass. On a lark I recently rewatched Rambo III -- the Rambo where they lionized the Afghan freedom fighters who would later go on to become Al Queda and do the same things to us they were doing to the Soviets. There is a hilarious scene in that one where Rambo performs self surgery, pulls a wooden spike out of his side, breaks open a bullet, pours the gunpowder in the wound, and lights it to send flames shooting out of both sides of his body to cauterize the wound. THEN he goes back in to singlehandedly wipe out the Russian army.
Did Rambo complain? Did Rambo whine about how he'd been done wrong? Not on your life. Rambo merely kicked ass, shot about 1000 people, survived a head on game of chicken with a helicopter, and partied with the Taliban. Cousins needs to watch that movie. You can't be a badass when you meltdown everytime you are beat up and should have fouled out and been ejected 3 or 4 times in response. Humphries is very strong and used it on Cousins. That's the big man life. Got to suck it up, but instead Cuz was constantly worried about the reffing and borderline cheap shotted Humphries every chance he could get. Result was one of his worst basketball games of the season, because eh was far too distracted to play basketball. Maybe reminscient of his early season suckass effort vs. Atlanta. -- BrickStats: 27min 11pts (4-9, 1-3, 2-2) 4reb 0ast 0stl 0blk 1TO
McLemore ( B ) -- It's good to see Ben have a game where he just goes out there and plays confident. He came out in the first and hit two of four jumpers, and also got to the line on a post mismatch against Phil Pressey. He was playing decent defense on Jeff Green, who is definitely a tough matchup for him size-wise, and Green ended up missing all four of his shots in the first while being checked by McLemore (though some of those were pretty open and some of that falls on Green). During Ben's short stint in the second he went completely quiet, getting blocked on a drive but other than that not much affecting play on either side of the court. In the third quarter, he scored on a nice offensive rebound and putback, and was the recipient of a lead pass for a dunk on the break, but missed both of his three-point attempts, one of those an airball. Green finally started to heat up in the third quarter and scored on Ben a few times, but Ben made a couple of nice plays on D, including bothering a Brandon Bass shot in the lane into a miss. In general, Ben did a very good job at covering the paint from the weakside on D while not getting lost off of his man, definitely an improvement off of his early season efforts. He didn't play at all in the fourth quarter except to come in for free throw purposes for the late game play that resulted in Brad Stevens and Gerald Wallace getting rung up, perhaps to save a bit of his legs for tomorrow night's Mile-High back-to-back. --Capt.
Stats: 37min 21pts (6-12, 0-1, 9-10) 4reb 12ast 0stl 1blk 4TO
Thomas ( A ) -- Very good game for Isaiah tonight. Wasn't perfect, but it was one of his best games in some time. 21 points on 12 shots is very efficient. More importantly, he took the shots within the flow of the game. He started the game off with an assist on a pass to an open McLemore in the corner for a two pointer. He should have had another when he made a pass to a cutting Cousins who missed, but was fouled. Cuz repaid him with a pass where he hit his first basket, a 16 footer. A bit later Isaiah put a beautiful fake on Humprey's in the post and laid it in. He followed that with another pass to an open McLemore in the corner for a three. My favorite move of the night came a little later when he drove into the key, hesitated, and then did a JWill move where he fakes a pass behind his back, but keeps the ball and lays it in. An entertaining sequence came when Williams had the rebound, passed it ahead to Isaiah, who was ahead of everyone, and Isaiah threw an alley opp pass off the backboard for a trailing Williams who slammed it home. But as I said, his game wasn't perfect. He had 4 turnovers in the game. One of which he almost managed to steal back, but he was fouled on the play. He also had some trouble guarding Bayless, who just shot over him a couple of times. But it wasn't for lack of effort. He did do a better job of guarding Pressey when he was in there. Tonights game is the kind of game I'd like to see from Isaiah every time out. There was a point in the game, in the second half, when Grant said that Isaiah had 17 points, and I thought to myself at the time, wow, I don't remember him taking enough shots to have 17 points. Efficiency is the answer. Tonight he did a great job. Well done Isaiah!--Baja[/I]
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