Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
How do you grade this?
This was really a game about desperation. We came out in the first half and just laid down like dogs. Mangy dogs. Maybe it was the start time. Maybe the news about the sale. Maybe who knows. But it was pretty much an embarrassment as we just largely quit out there. You could see it. Eveyrbody just quit. No effort. No nothing. It was pathetic. And then we came out of halftime after what must have been a major tongue lashing or bit of soul searching, and we played desperate. And Smart coached desperate, knowing with the team sold his Maloof safety blanket is gone and he has to either win and mount an improbable run, or he's fired. And so behind 3 main guys, Cousins, Reke and IT, and with just a little bit of help from JT and Outlaw (at "PF" of course) we mounted a huge comeback, and if we just hadn't played like mangy dogs before half, we would have been right there. We cut a 27 point lead down to 7 late in the game, but when you start that far back all it takes is one mistake, them hitting one tough shot, and you're done. And we were. So grades are going to be difficult.
Given the comeback, but still eventual loss, for the first time in a bit we'll go with a non-Girls thems. Theme tonight will be Tiny Houses.
We've got the full (well for the time being, more recruits needed) Grading Consortium back online for this one.
The Grading Consortium is:
Bricklayer
Bajaden
Capt. Factorial
Boxscore
Stats: 29min 5pts (1-4, 1-2, 2-2) 1reb 4ast 1stl 0blk 0TO
Salmons ( C -) -- John only took 4 shots in the game, one being a 3 pt'er which he made. He also had 4 assists, all packed into 29 exciting minutes. Well, maybe not so exciting. He started the game with a nice bounce pass to Cuz for a basket. He then lost Aminu at the other end who scored on an alley oop. He made a pass to JT in traffic for a basket, and took his first shot of the game at the 9 minute mark of the 1st quarter and missed. He later drove to the basket and had his shot blocked, and went to the bench. He came back into the game with around 2 minutes left in the half. He got tripped going to the basket and converted two freethrows for his first points of the game. In the second half, he played good defense on Aminu, at one point stopping the ball on a break and causing a missed shot. His shooting didn't get any better as he missed a pullup from 7 feet. He went almost 7 minutes in the 4th quarter without touching the ball. Finally, he gets a pass at the top of the circle where he hits a 3 pointer. All in all, John didn't really much inpact on the game one way or the other, but its hard to downgrade a player too much, when no one passes him the ball. --Baja
A mere $24k can get you one of these.
Stats: 17min 7pts (3-4, 0-0, 1-2) 6reb 1ast 0stl 0blk 3TO
Thompson ( B- ) -- there was a little mystery to JT's limited minutes in this one, as he was generally effective, at least compared to most on the roster, and yet still played short minutes each half and watched from the bench for the last 18 minutes. Got off to a quick start with a d-board and then a couple of little layups set up by teammates -- one nice trait in this game was how many easy ones our big guys got from us passing in there. Was finally on the boards a little too, a very welcome sight after weeks without it. Quickly slowed as did the rest of the team and ended up watching our backups completely refuse to guard Ryan Anderson as he destroyed us in the second quarter. And as we progressively threw TRob, JJ, Salmons and Cisco at the problem to no effect I could not help thinking that Smart had outsmarted himsel again, anticipating a problem with JT guarding Anderson on the perimeter, and then going and creating a larger problem for us by taking him out, losing his rebounding, and having Anderson destroy the guys we threw at him anyway. Started the third with a little tip follow of an IT miss and we agian saw some aggression on the glass as he actually waded back in traffic to snatch boards rather than passively fluttering about. Threw a terrible pass over Reke's head in the mid 3rd as our first attempt at a push fizzled, and then although he was not playing terribly aside from the TOs he was abrubtly pulled with 4 min left in the third to be replaced by Travis Outlaw of all people. Should be noted BTW that Ryan Anderson had started the third, and had no points aginst Jason. In fact Anderson drained 7 threes on the night -- and not 1 of them came while Jason was on the floor, so if that was the matchup problem we feared, we were fearing the wrong thing. One other interesting thing though -- while JT was not playing poorly, coincidence or not Outlaw's arrival coincided with us going on a huge 17-0 run down the stretch of the 3rd that got us right back into the game.--Brick
Thing is, as ridiculous as that house looks like outside, inside they've managed to stuff all the comforts of a studio apartment. You've got a kitchen with a little oven, microwave, sink, counter. A sleeping loft over a bathroom, with a shower. Its tight, but a clever use of space.
Stats: 41min 29pts (11-17, 0-2, 7-9) 13reb 3ast 0stl 0blk 2TO
Cousins ( A ) -- another big thumping effort as the Cousins prophecy continues to be fulfilled. His January numbers remain at 21.9pts 12.6reb 3.6ast on .505 shooting, in the last 10 its 22.4-12.1-3.5, in the last 5 its 23.0-13.0-3.8. Looking back its sad to see what might have been if he had just had his revelation back in training camp rather than two months into the season. Might have been the only King to come out of the first half with a grade above the Ds, and got off to a strong start with a nice pass, a finsh inside, a jumper. But then got quiet and somewhat forgotten about by the other Kings who really should know better by this point. When retiurned late in the half had a great matchup inside but we could not consistently take advantage of it. Dribbled the ball off his own foot trying to get the 2 for 1 in the last seconds of the half, kinda epitomizing our first half collapse. Its funny how few notes I have about his play after half given how dominant he was. But the thing was there was a little different flavor this tiem, because he was dominant and highly efficient this time more as an off the ball player than by creating shots on his own. Reke in particular was finding ways to get the ball to him again and agian inside, It was hitting him in there, and he was just using that big body for power slams, throwing those shoulders around, and generally beasting with very few dribbles or jumpers involved. Left all alone in there on the glass when we went to Outlaw, but generally took care of business for us by hismelf. While Reke and IT caused havoc on the perimeter, Cousins was the big engine in the middle, and I finally after some thought just decided to follow the numbers on this grade. I keep on finding reasons to give him an A-, but if you aren't going to give a guy an A for 29pts 13rebs on 11-17 shooting, when are you? That's Shaq in his prime numbers, and he was about that unstoppable for the Hornets. --Brick
Looking back the other way -- see? All the comforts of home.
Stats: 37min 16pts (5-12, 0-2, 6-7) 2reb 4ast 2stl 0blk 1TO
Evans ( B- ) -- kind of epimozed the team's game tonight. Very briefly looked energetic in the opening minutes, was wearing Gordon early on defense but being frozen out on offense. But once he was fianlly involved, you kind of wished he was refrozen because things went south for him at the same time they did for us. Missed both his early jumpers and had an odd looking turnover where it looked like he intended to switch hands in mid air and just did not take into account that Robin Lopez's body was between his hands. Got a layup blocked by Davis as well, and even his defense sagged as Gordon got by him repeatedly. After sitting forever watching Marcus chuck up brick after brick, finally finally got back into Gordon defensively in the final minues of the first half., but it was still a poor half for him, and a terrible one for us. Things turned in a big way after the break though. Was more involved from the getgo in the third and was finding inventive ways to get big Cuz the ball. Looked clumsier thn normal on his drives, but had a number of big swoopers. But it was on the other end where he really shined, getting up on Gordon and smothering him and creating all kinds of problems for the Hornets tryign to bring it up. As soon as Outlaw entered the game, backed his dribble out, iso'd his man, then beat him with a spin dribble into the middle and kick to Outlaw for a corner three that dropped the lead to 16. Got switched over to Vasquez to being the 4th, as IT was getting killed and the Hornets had put in Roger Mason. Came up with a great steal on a pass intended for Vasquez up top in the early 4th, and finished it with an alley oop pass to Outlaw. But wasn't able to wrap Vasquez up quite as tight as Gordon, and the jumper never came online. He teamed with ocusins to give us a heck of a push, and they were working very well together, slapping hands after plays and in general playing with the moxy of a team's tow best players on a mission. But the mission got started too late unfortunately. --Brick
At 312 square feet, this itsy bitsy Toronto home seemed appropriate to precede IT's grade.
Stats: 40min 20pts (8-14, 1-1, 3-3) 1reb 3ast 1stl 0blk 4TO
Thomas ( B ) -- Thomas did not have the strongest of first halves. The good that he did, including hitting a streaking Tyreke on the break and leaking out himself for an easy layup, was somewhat counteracted by a few mistakes (a blown alley-oop pass, a soft inbounds pass that he must not have seen because it sauntered right in front of him and out of bounds) and the fact that the Kings were down 25 at the half. The second half started hardly better, including a sequence where Thomas committed an offensive foul and a defensive foul on Vasquez in a total of 7 seconds. But about midway through the third the Kings turned it on, and IT was a big part of it. He hit our first three of the game, and followed that up by driving to the hoop for two and stealing an inbounds pass for another breakaway, all shortly after drawing a charge on an out-of-control Vasquez. Unfortunately, the comeback kind of stalled there and eventually Vasquez' deep 3 (with IT 5 feet away behind the three point line) put the dagger in it. On the bright side, IT scored 20 points on 14 shots while still seemingly spending most of his time setting up Cuz and Tyreke. His defense took a step up today, and at times he did a better job getting through screens and once or twice stymied a drive attempt. But for the amount that the New Orleans offense was focused on Ryan Anderson and Eric Gordon (38 shots between them), Vasquez managed to quietly score 13 points on him and many of his assists, including an alley-oop early in the first quarter that set the tone for the half that eventually killed us. --Capt.
This was really a game about desperation. We came out in the first half and just laid down like dogs. Mangy dogs. Maybe it was the start time. Maybe the news about the sale. Maybe who knows. But it was pretty much an embarrassment as we just largely quit out there. You could see it. Eveyrbody just quit. No effort. No nothing. It was pathetic. And then we came out of halftime after what must have been a major tongue lashing or bit of soul searching, and we played desperate. And Smart coached desperate, knowing with the team sold his Maloof safety blanket is gone and he has to either win and mount an improbable run, or he's fired. And so behind 3 main guys, Cousins, Reke and IT, and with just a little bit of help from JT and Outlaw (at "PF" of course) we mounted a huge comeback, and if we just hadn't played like mangy dogs before half, we would have been right there. We cut a 27 point lead down to 7 late in the game, but when you start that far back all it takes is one mistake, them hitting one tough shot, and you're done. And we were. So grades are going to be difficult.
Given the comeback, but still eventual loss, for the first time in a bit we'll go with a non-Girls thems. Theme tonight will be Tiny Houses.
We've got the full (well for the time being, more recruits needed) Grading Consortium back online for this one.
The Grading Consortium is:
Bricklayer
Bajaden
Capt. Factorial
Boxscore
Stats: 29min 5pts (1-4, 1-2, 2-2) 1reb 4ast 1stl 0blk 0TO
Salmons ( C -) -- John only took 4 shots in the game, one being a 3 pt'er which he made. He also had 4 assists, all packed into 29 exciting minutes. Well, maybe not so exciting. He started the game with a nice bounce pass to Cuz for a basket. He then lost Aminu at the other end who scored on an alley oop. He made a pass to JT in traffic for a basket, and took his first shot of the game at the 9 minute mark of the 1st quarter and missed. He later drove to the basket and had his shot blocked, and went to the bench. He came back into the game with around 2 minutes left in the half. He got tripped going to the basket and converted two freethrows for his first points of the game. In the second half, he played good defense on Aminu, at one point stopping the ball on a break and causing a missed shot. His shooting didn't get any better as he missed a pullup from 7 feet. He went almost 7 minutes in the 4th quarter without touching the ball. Finally, he gets a pass at the top of the circle where he hits a 3 pointer. All in all, John didn't really much inpact on the game one way or the other, but its hard to downgrade a player too much, when no one passes him the ball. --Baja
A mere $24k can get you one of these.
Stats: 17min 7pts (3-4, 0-0, 1-2) 6reb 1ast 0stl 0blk 3TO
Thompson ( B- ) -- there was a little mystery to JT's limited minutes in this one, as he was generally effective, at least compared to most on the roster, and yet still played short minutes each half and watched from the bench for the last 18 minutes. Got off to a quick start with a d-board and then a couple of little layups set up by teammates -- one nice trait in this game was how many easy ones our big guys got from us passing in there. Was finally on the boards a little too, a very welcome sight after weeks without it. Quickly slowed as did the rest of the team and ended up watching our backups completely refuse to guard Ryan Anderson as he destroyed us in the second quarter. And as we progressively threw TRob, JJ, Salmons and Cisco at the problem to no effect I could not help thinking that Smart had outsmarted himsel again, anticipating a problem with JT guarding Anderson on the perimeter, and then going and creating a larger problem for us by taking him out, losing his rebounding, and having Anderson destroy the guys we threw at him anyway. Started the third with a little tip follow of an IT miss and we agian saw some aggression on the glass as he actually waded back in traffic to snatch boards rather than passively fluttering about. Threw a terrible pass over Reke's head in the mid 3rd as our first attempt at a push fizzled, and then although he was not playing terribly aside from the TOs he was abrubtly pulled with 4 min left in the third to be replaced by Travis Outlaw of all people. Should be noted BTW that Ryan Anderson had started the third, and had no points aginst Jason. In fact Anderson drained 7 threes on the night -- and not 1 of them came while Jason was on the floor, so if that was the matchup problem we feared, we were fearing the wrong thing. One other interesting thing though -- while JT was not playing poorly, coincidence or not Outlaw's arrival coincided with us going on a huge 17-0 run down the stretch of the 3rd that got us right back into the game.--Brick
Thing is, as ridiculous as that house looks like outside, inside they've managed to stuff all the comforts of a studio apartment. You've got a kitchen with a little oven, microwave, sink, counter. A sleeping loft over a bathroom, with a shower. Its tight, but a clever use of space.
Stats: 41min 29pts (11-17, 0-2, 7-9) 13reb 3ast 0stl 0blk 2TO
Cousins ( A ) -- another big thumping effort as the Cousins prophecy continues to be fulfilled. His January numbers remain at 21.9pts 12.6reb 3.6ast on .505 shooting, in the last 10 its 22.4-12.1-3.5, in the last 5 its 23.0-13.0-3.8. Looking back its sad to see what might have been if he had just had his revelation back in training camp rather than two months into the season. Might have been the only King to come out of the first half with a grade above the Ds, and got off to a strong start with a nice pass, a finsh inside, a jumper. But then got quiet and somewhat forgotten about by the other Kings who really should know better by this point. When retiurned late in the half had a great matchup inside but we could not consistently take advantage of it. Dribbled the ball off his own foot trying to get the 2 for 1 in the last seconds of the half, kinda epitomizing our first half collapse. Its funny how few notes I have about his play after half given how dominant he was. But the thing was there was a little different flavor this tiem, because he was dominant and highly efficient this time more as an off the ball player than by creating shots on his own. Reke in particular was finding ways to get the ball to him again and agian inside, It was hitting him in there, and he was just using that big body for power slams, throwing those shoulders around, and generally beasting with very few dribbles or jumpers involved. Left all alone in there on the glass when we went to Outlaw, but generally took care of business for us by hismelf. While Reke and IT caused havoc on the perimeter, Cousins was the big engine in the middle, and I finally after some thought just decided to follow the numbers on this grade. I keep on finding reasons to give him an A-, but if you aren't going to give a guy an A for 29pts 13rebs on 11-17 shooting, when are you? That's Shaq in his prime numbers, and he was about that unstoppable for the Hornets. --Brick
Looking back the other way -- see? All the comforts of home.
Stats: 37min 16pts (5-12, 0-2, 6-7) 2reb 4ast 2stl 0blk 1TO
Evans ( B- ) -- kind of epimozed the team's game tonight. Very briefly looked energetic in the opening minutes, was wearing Gordon early on defense but being frozen out on offense. But once he was fianlly involved, you kind of wished he was refrozen because things went south for him at the same time they did for us. Missed both his early jumpers and had an odd looking turnover where it looked like he intended to switch hands in mid air and just did not take into account that Robin Lopez's body was between his hands. Got a layup blocked by Davis as well, and even his defense sagged as Gordon got by him repeatedly. After sitting forever watching Marcus chuck up brick after brick, finally finally got back into Gordon defensively in the final minues of the first half., but it was still a poor half for him, and a terrible one for us. Things turned in a big way after the break though. Was more involved from the getgo in the third and was finding inventive ways to get big Cuz the ball. Looked clumsier thn normal on his drives, but had a number of big swoopers. But it was on the other end where he really shined, getting up on Gordon and smothering him and creating all kinds of problems for the Hornets tryign to bring it up. As soon as Outlaw entered the game, backed his dribble out, iso'd his man, then beat him with a spin dribble into the middle and kick to Outlaw for a corner three that dropped the lead to 16. Got switched over to Vasquez to being the 4th, as IT was getting killed and the Hornets had put in Roger Mason. Came up with a great steal on a pass intended for Vasquez up top in the early 4th, and finished it with an alley oop pass to Outlaw. But wasn't able to wrap Vasquez up quite as tight as Gordon, and the jumper never came online. He teamed with ocusins to give us a heck of a push, and they were working very well together, slapping hands after plays and in general playing with the moxy of a team's tow best players on a mission. But the mission got started too late unfortunately. --Brick
At 312 square feet, this itsy bitsy Toronto home seemed appropriate to precede IT's grade.
Stats: 40min 20pts (8-14, 1-1, 3-3) 1reb 3ast 1stl 0blk 4TO
Thomas ( B ) -- Thomas did not have the strongest of first halves. The good that he did, including hitting a streaking Tyreke on the break and leaking out himself for an easy layup, was somewhat counteracted by a few mistakes (a blown alley-oop pass, a soft inbounds pass that he must not have seen because it sauntered right in front of him and out of bounds) and the fact that the Kings were down 25 at the half. The second half started hardly better, including a sequence where Thomas committed an offensive foul and a defensive foul on Vasquez in a total of 7 seconds. But about midway through the third the Kings turned it on, and IT was a big part of it. He hit our first three of the game, and followed that up by driving to the hoop for two and stealing an inbounds pass for another breakaway, all shortly after drawing a charge on an out-of-control Vasquez. Unfortunately, the comeback kind of stalled there and eventually Vasquez' deep 3 (with IT 5 feet away behind the three point line) put the dagger in it. On the bright side, IT scored 20 points on 14 shots while still seemingly spending most of his time setting up Cuz and Tyreke. His defense took a step up today, and at times he did a better job getting through screens and once or twice stymied a drive attempt. But for the amount that the New Orleans offense was focused on Ryan Anderson and Eric Gordon (38 shots between them), Vasquez managed to quietly score 13 points on him and many of his assists, including an alley-oop early in the first quarter that set the tone for the half that eventually killed us. --Capt.
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