Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
How are we behind even this team in home attendandance again?
Salmons ( C- ) -- different story aginst Gay this time with Rudy lighting Salmons up from 3pt land in particular in the early going. John is our best defender, but I've noticed that he does not do as good a job of challenging 3pt shooters as he does at cutting off penetration. Was at least scoring back the other way in the first quarter, but that quickly faded. Quit scoring in the second quarter and was never a major offensive factor therafter. Nor did he ever get anything else going in any other aspect of the game. 18pts 1reb 0ast and shaky defense...was a Kevin Jr. game. Salavaged what grade he got just for being our leading scorer despite the mediocrity of the effort.
Thomspon ( B- ) -- a B- may seem a little harsh for a guy who gave us 12 and 9, but if you watched the game you know what I'm talking about. Most of the numbers came in extended garbagetime -- while the game was still kinda on, Jason was actually not even mediocre, he was pretty bad and could have been in the Ds. Did ok against Arthur. Got torched by Warrick (along with everyone else again -- we are the only team in the league he does this against with this consistency. Put up very modest numbers himself until the game was over and it was run and junk time. Caught a nice alley oop pass from Douby as his garbage highlight. But for much of the game I was saying "Yoohooo....Jasoooon....what happened to superook?" and even after he recovered in garbagetime, I still was not entirely sold on the B-. But pushing it over the top was this little fact: Jason Thompson had a block! Jason Thompson had a block! And on Rudy Gay too. In fact not only did he have A block, he had three of them. This of course all remarkable because thus far in his young career he has blocked shots like Kenny Thomas. This was the first evidence we have seen that maybe he can swat at this level. Only one game, but you take what positives you can from something like this.
Miller ( D ) -- completely flat performance against Pau's big lummox of a brother inside. Since we now know that a Brad F looks like 2-19, this ain't one, but he did nothing for us out there. Still amazes me that Marc Gasol has been effective as a rookie, as he and Brad were having a great slowoff out there. Felt like I was watching one of those Comcast commericals with the two turtles who like their slowness. Gasol did not dominate, but was able to work moderately effectively inside without any serious resistance, while Brad came back the other way and...did nothing. No shooting, passing, rebounding. Nothing. Just cashed the paycheck and went home this time.
BJax ( B ) -- surprise starter, and helped in the early going at least by giving us an extra passer out there -- Kevin is not a passer, and John only does so if you force him to. Was shooting well too, at least for a while. Was one of the few guys doing anything to start the third quarter, which unfortunately led him to start firing wildly from 3pt land in an extended heat check. This was more a B- type performance for most people in a game like this, but from what I have seen from Bobby this year its hard to imagine him coming up with too many much better games, so going with the flat B here. For those brief moments while this was respectable, Bobby was amajor reason.
Udrih ( B ) -- Bit of a question where to go with the grade here, since this was truly a sucky game overall, but Beno himself did pretty well for a while. Aggressive start, which mean that at least one King was trying out there for at least 5-10 minutes. Around the ball lot and came up with 4 steals, and was hitting open Kings all over court. And was really Beno who kept us in it in the second quarter as the Grizzlies (!) were bordering on blowing us out by half. Very little after half before being pulled. Beno and Bobby combined for a remarkable defensive effort in the third just before being replaced for the final time -- one of the Grizz guards, maybe Quinton Ross, caught the ball on the elbow 18 feet from the hoop. Both Beno and Bobby were standing right next to each their within 5 feet of him. Their response? Synchonized back turning as he calmly drained the shot. No challenge, not even a raised arm, nothing.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hawes ( B+ ) -- came in as a perimeter shooter again in the face of the ferociousness that is the Grizzlies frontline, may have pissed Reggie off, because he gave him a quick first quarter hook before reinserting him when Thompson got his second foul. Nor was Spencer happy about it -- I almost pity Reggie trying to coach this kid, but I imagine its not too different from what high school coaches across the country have to deal with (including my own). Settled in after returning as a scorer, but wasn't doing much else and ended up in quick foul trouble. Never missed a shot, and as long as the Grizzlies were willing to guard him with 6'7" tweener forwards, even felt up to trying some post moves. Debated whether to + him, or anybody else, in this mess of a game. Just did not feel that special, and Spencer, like the rest of the team, was less active and aggressive than he has been. But the perfect shooting performance tilted the balance.
Douby ( F ) -- came in missing badly, including back to back airballs, and looking lost. Hope the recent chokes have not broken him. Was a little better in the second half (mostly garbagetime) in that he did a few things other than shoot. But the shooting itself? An 0-9 apocalypse. Have to wonder if one day 20 years from now Quincy will still be looking back at this stretch with regret as the one that killed his NBA chances. Thinking to himself, if I had just hit that first game winner....it could all have been different. But now with choke, choke, 0-9...and maybe only 1 more game to go before Kevin gets back, the window is almost shut again. And how many times can it open for him?
Brown ( D ) -- the second part of our backcourt duo of doom (doom for us that is) off the bench. For a while there in fact was going worse than Douby (although he lacked the impressive Douby back to back airball salute). Wasn't even much of that overconfidence which is always tempting him down the path of selfishness, just kind of idle chucking. Finally hit a couple of shots in garbagetime to salvage a bit more than Douby.
Williams ( B- ) -- muddled around inside in the late second quarter, getting to the line and helping a little, and then got back on for a chunk of the garbagetime (with Reggie going with Shelden rather than Hawes for most of the garbageime -- maybe a compliment to Hawes that he is beyond garbagetime, or an insult as there appears to still be some tension between the team's two biggest egos, not sure). Nothing revlatory from Shelden int he garbagetime, but did pretty well and got his shots to fall.
Greene ( C- ) -- got in late in the 2nd quarter and did not make an argument for staying, badly clanking his only shot. But Reggie, again displaying a much better attitude about kiddie development, then brought him back to play the entire 4th quarter with this one over and us showing no energy. Reggie even, just to be ridiculous again, stopped play to draw a play up for Greene with us down 16 and 18 seconds to go. Grenne missed it unfortunately, as he did most of his shots on the night. Defense was not much, getting run out of there on one play by Gasol, and having to check Rudy Gay for a significant chunk fo the quarter. But there were, as always, some flashes, a couple of hit shots, an attempted flying blocked shot that resulted in a goaltend, etc. Just nothing sustained. Stiil, good development time. The silver lining to blowout with garbagetime.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Theus ( D ) -- Ahhh...back on the road again. Verily are we the Road Warriors. (TM). Came out of the gate in this one with an innovative defensive scheme apparently centered around confusing the opponent by not covering anyone, hence giving their PGs too many options to consider and hopefully resulting in them just turning the ball over out of indecision. I'm thinking it did not work as well as we had hoped. We actually briefly got some defensive effort after half, with some full court pressure that looked like it was almost going to work but kept on breaking down at the end. Of course the effort faded soon enough, but where was it to start the game? Not the full court pressure, but the pride? Whatever mildly effective speeches Reggie has been saving for halftimes, maybe he should bump up to the pregame. Just go on the safe assumption that we're going to suck on the road, and lay into the team before we even step onto the floor and see if it will goose them into action. Not that we exactly came roaring out of the lockerroom after half either. Our version of really coming out gunning for a comeback was impressively cutting a 17pt halftime deficit down to only 19 by the end of the quarter. Did setup Reggie for his finest (only?) moment of the game however, as he just said screw it and started the 4th quarter with a 5 kid lineup: Brown, Douby, Greene, Thompson, Hawes (later replaced by Williams). Most of the little grade he gets in this one is in fact again because he is showing a willingness to play the kids, although starting BJax to maintain our old guy/kid ratio with Mikki out was not exactly a kiddie development move. However, the defense was embarrassing, and we did not compete, so a little bump for being willing to play the kids after you have just gotten spanked by one of the league's worst teams still isn't going to to carry you far. In the final 30 seconds got treated to another one of Reggie's oh so special "coaching" moves as rather than letting the game just mercifully end, he called a timeout with us down 16 so he could draw up a magnificent series of plays that would allow us to score a point a second for the remainder of the game to steal the win. Displays our vast potential once again however -- how many teams have 16 point plays in their playbooks?
Salmons ( C- ) -- different story aginst Gay this time with Rudy lighting Salmons up from 3pt land in particular in the early going. John is our best defender, but I've noticed that he does not do as good a job of challenging 3pt shooters as he does at cutting off penetration. Was at least scoring back the other way in the first quarter, but that quickly faded. Quit scoring in the second quarter and was never a major offensive factor therafter. Nor did he ever get anything else going in any other aspect of the game. 18pts 1reb 0ast and shaky defense...was a Kevin Jr. game. Salavaged what grade he got just for being our leading scorer despite the mediocrity of the effort.
Thomspon ( B- ) -- a B- may seem a little harsh for a guy who gave us 12 and 9, but if you watched the game you know what I'm talking about. Most of the numbers came in extended garbagetime -- while the game was still kinda on, Jason was actually not even mediocre, he was pretty bad and could have been in the Ds. Did ok against Arthur. Got torched by Warrick (along with everyone else again -- we are the only team in the league he does this against with this consistency. Put up very modest numbers himself until the game was over and it was run and junk time. Caught a nice alley oop pass from Douby as his garbage highlight. But for much of the game I was saying "Yoohooo....Jasoooon....what happened to superook?" and even after he recovered in garbagetime, I still was not entirely sold on the B-. But pushing it over the top was this little fact: Jason Thompson had a block! Jason Thompson had a block! And on Rudy Gay too. In fact not only did he have A block, he had three of them. This of course all remarkable because thus far in his young career he has blocked shots like Kenny Thomas. This was the first evidence we have seen that maybe he can swat at this level. Only one game, but you take what positives you can from something like this.
Miller ( D ) -- completely flat performance against Pau's big lummox of a brother inside. Since we now know that a Brad F looks like 2-19, this ain't one, but he did nothing for us out there. Still amazes me that Marc Gasol has been effective as a rookie, as he and Brad were having a great slowoff out there. Felt like I was watching one of those Comcast commericals with the two turtles who like their slowness. Gasol did not dominate, but was able to work moderately effectively inside without any serious resistance, while Brad came back the other way and...did nothing. No shooting, passing, rebounding. Nothing. Just cashed the paycheck and went home this time.
BJax ( B ) -- surprise starter, and helped in the early going at least by giving us an extra passer out there -- Kevin is not a passer, and John only does so if you force him to. Was shooting well too, at least for a while. Was one of the few guys doing anything to start the third quarter, which unfortunately led him to start firing wildly from 3pt land in an extended heat check. This was more a B- type performance for most people in a game like this, but from what I have seen from Bobby this year its hard to imagine him coming up with too many much better games, so going with the flat B here. For those brief moments while this was respectable, Bobby was amajor reason.
Udrih ( B ) -- Bit of a question where to go with the grade here, since this was truly a sucky game overall, but Beno himself did pretty well for a while. Aggressive start, which mean that at least one King was trying out there for at least 5-10 minutes. Around the ball lot and came up with 4 steals, and was hitting open Kings all over court. And was really Beno who kept us in it in the second quarter as the Grizzlies (!) were bordering on blowing us out by half. Very little after half before being pulled. Beno and Bobby combined for a remarkable defensive effort in the third just before being replaced for the final time -- one of the Grizz guards, maybe Quinton Ross, caught the ball on the elbow 18 feet from the hoop. Both Beno and Bobby were standing right next to each their within 5 feet of him. Their response? Synchonized back turning as he calmly drained the shot. No challenge, not even a raised arm, nothing.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hawes ( B+ ) -- came in as a perimeter shooter again in the face of the ferociousness that is the Grizzlies frontline, may have pissed Reggie off, because he gave him a quick first quarter hook before reinserting him when Thompson got his second foul. Nor was Spencer happy about it -- I almost pity Reggie trying to coach this kid, but I imagine its not too different from what high school coaches across the country have to deal with (including my own). Settled in after returning as a scorer, but wasn't doing much else and ended up in quick foul trouble. Never missed a shot, and as long as the Grizzlies were willing to guard him with 6'7" tweener forwards, even felt up to trying some post moves. Debated whether to + him, or anybody else, in this mess of a game. Just did not feel that special, and Spencer, like the rest of the team, was less active and aggressive than he has been. But the perfect shooting performance tilted the balance.
Douby ( F ) -- came in missing badly, including back to back airballs, and looking lost. Hope the recent chokes have not broken him. Was a little better in the second half (mostly garbagetime) in that he did a few things other than shoot. But the shooting itself? An 0-9 apocalypse. Have to wonder if one day 20 years from now Quincy will still be looking back at this stretch with regret as the one that killed his NBA chances. Thinking to himself, if I had just hit that first game winner....it could all have been different. But now with choke, choke, 0-9...and maybe only 1 more game to go before Kevin gets back, the window is almost shut again. And how many times can it open for him?
Brown ( D ) -- the second part of our backcourt duo of doom (doom for us that is) off the bench. For a while there in fact was going worse than Douby (although he lacked the impressive Douby back to back airball salute). Wasn't even much of that overconfidence which is always tempting him down the path of selfishness, just kind of idle chucking. Finally hit a couple of shots in garbagetime to salvage a bit more than Douby.
Williams ( B- ) -- muddled around inside in the late second quarter, getting to the line and helping a little, and then got back on for a chunk of the garbagetime (with Reggie going with Shelden rather than Hawes for most of the garbageime -- maybe a compliment to Hawes that he is beyond garbagetime, or an insult as there appears to still be some tension between the team's two biggest egos, not sure). Nothing revlatory from Shelden int he garbagetime, but did pretty well and got his shots to fall.
Greene ( C- ) -- got in late in the 2nd quarter and did not make an argument for staying, badly clanking his only shot. But Reggie, again displaying a much better attitude about kiddie development, then brought him back to play the entire 4th quarter with this one over and us showing no energy. Reggie even, just to be ridiculous again, stopped play to draw a play up for Greene with us down 16 and 18 seconds to go. Grenne missed it unfortunately, as he did most of his shots on the night. Defense was not much, getting run out of there on one play by Gasol, and having to check Rudy Gay for a significant chunk fo the quarter. But there were, as always, some flashes, a couple of hit shots, an attempted flying blocked shot that resulted in a goaltend, etc. Just nothing sustained. Stiil, good development time. The silver lining to blowout with garbagetime.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Theus ( D ) -- Ahhh...back on the road again. Verily are we the Road Warriors. (TM). Came out of the gate in this one with an innovative defensive scheme apparently centered around confusing the opponent by not covering anyone, hence giving their PGs too many options to consider and hopefully resulting in them just turning the ball over out of indecision. I'm thinking it did not work as well as we had hoped. We actually briefly got some defensive effort after half, with some full court pressure that looked like it was almost going to work but kept on breaking down at the end. Of course the effort faded soon enough, but where was it to start the game? Not the full court pressure, but the pride? Whatever mildly effective speeches Reggie has been saving for halftimes, maybe he should bump up to the pregame. Just go on the safe assumption that we're going to suck on the road, and lay into the team before we even step onto the floor and see if it will goose them into action. Not that we exactly came roaring out of the lockerroom after half either. Our version of really coming out gunning for a comeback was impressively cutting a 17pt halftime deficit down to only 19 by the end of the quarter. Did setup Reggie for his finest (only?) moment of the game however, as he just said screw it and started the 4th quarter with a 5 kid lineup: Brown, Douby, Greene, Thompson, Hawes (later replaced by Williams). Most of the little grade he gets in this one is in fact again because he is showing a willingness to play the kids, although starting BJax to maintain our old guy/kid ratio with Mikki out was not exactly a kiddie development move. However, the defense was embarrassing, and we did not compete, so a little bump for being willing to play the kids after you have just gotten spanked by one of the league's worst teams still isn't going to to carry you far. In the final 30 seconds got treated to another one of Reggie's oh so special "coaching" moves as rather than letting the game just mercifully end, he called a timeout with us down 16 so he could draw up a magnificent series of plays that would allow us to score a point a second for the remainder of the game to steal the win. Displays our vast potential once again however -- how many teams have 16 point plays in their playbooks?
Last edited:
.
