Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
Tick Tick TICK...
Still a bit agitated from last night, and not really in a theme mood this weekend, although Thigns That Go Boom, or Big Explosions both suggested themselves.
Salmons ( C+ ) -- back in as a starter as we smallballed, and predictably looked more comfortable early. Got quiet while everything went through Kevin, but rememerged as part of our second quarter surge. Even after Mikki made it to the arena, our continuing smallball ways had him on the court for most of the second half, but you would not have known it. Not bad exactly. Just very quiet with all the other guys who wanted the ball in the lineup around him, and the small vs. big mtachup of John v. Kirilenko went decisvely to the big, who was able to operate almost unimpeded by the little gnat buzzing around his ankles. I coould have gone B- here, but with Kirlenko going for three times his season average, and John producing very few numbers besides the 13pts (6-8 shooting), including only 1 rebound in 37 minutes as a small forward....C+ it is.
Artest ( D ) -- well, well...most of the game comments about him are of course going to be overwhelmed by the meltdown. And the meltdown is quite worrisome -- that's 4 of the last 5 games where there has been some kind of incident involving Ron, and the only one where there was not was the easy home blowout over the Nets. This is frankly something we as Kings fans have not seen from Ron before -- since coming here he has normally been very much in control while he has been on the floor (as opposed to all the off court stuff). But is is something that fans in his previous stops have seen, and those are ghosts better not raised. The game had already gotten off to an unusual start with Mikki having to miss the start for personal reasons, and us smallballing against one of the biggest frontlines in the game. Put Ron at PF matched against an All Star caliber PF, although in the early going we wisely tried to hide Ron over on Okur and have Brad take Boozer. Hiding Ron on defense...that may be a first. Ron put up very modest numbers again in the first half, which was kind of surprising given how aware you were of him in the offense. Might have just been the extra attention drawn by the unusual early matchup with Boozer. Might also have been the tough matchups all across the frontline for Ron -- from the even stronger power player in the Boozer, to the much bigger Okur, to the impossibly rangy fellow defensive stopped Kirlienko.
Meltdown section -- Problems started when Ron inexplicably starting woofing at the crowd telling everybody how great he was in the mid-3rd, which might have been less ridiculous if he in fact was doing anything great. No idea what started that, but at the time the crowd was relatively sitting on its hands, there was no Matt Harping on the court, and Ron himself was having an indifferent game. Then all of sudden he starts beating his chest at the crowd, pausing while the game is going on to throw back his head and howl, and just generally acting nutty. And I think he actually fired the Jazz and their crowd up. When all of the taunting started, the game was close. Mayeb tied or a two or three point game at most. But then Ron starts his schtick, the crowd turns ugly, the Jazz seemed to feed off the energy, and they immediately started pushing the ball right down our throat. Ran off 10 points, and jumped out to a big lead before we had to call timeout. Meanwhile of course Boozer continues to kick our butt inside, at one point sitting on a record pace by hitting his first 13 shots of the gmae, which could not have been helping Ron's mood any. Of course the kicker was when Sloan inserted Matt Harping into the game. Harpring is one of the league's truest tough guys. Lot of guys talk the talk or woof, or pose. Harping doesn't bother with any oif that, he just is. Backs down from nobody, and if you want to bang, he's always ready and willing. Well....Ron was ready, Matt was willing, and so it started. And between the brahma bull matchup, and Ron's constant howling at the crowd and the crowd's howling back the other way...the end result was inevitable. This is Ron Artest we are talking about. Got a technical. Lost his cool. Got a delay of game. Got a second technical for waving his arms and was tossed. Now the technicals did not have to be assesed -- neither of them involved something so egregious that it had to be called a T. But I think Ron more or less got himself tossed with the woofing at the crowd and general state of agitation he had thrown the whole arena into.
And so back to the effect on the game: and here is where this really impacts Ron's grade. We were doing fine before all that stuff started. Were right in the game. Then Ron starts up, gets the crowd fired up, gets the Jazz fired up, and the Jazz win going away. Nor was any of it about us as a team. This was about Ron vs. the crowd. Ron vs. the world. And the basketball game, the team, the score, all became secondary. Cost us two points on the techs, cost us one of our starters when he got tossed, and fired up the whole arena against us while we were trying to sneak off with a win. And that's not good for us no matter if you are a win now or a trade Ron person. Whatever is bugging Ron, he has got to straighten it out and calm down. His game itself might have been a C or C+ without the extracurricular stuff. But of course you can't separate them, since they all contribute to Ron's impact on the final score.
Miller ( B- ) -- quiet first half matched against his mirror image in Okur. Got his points in the third in sort of random fashion. Mostly early in the quarter, a three, some FTs, support stuff. Never really got his passing game going, as the Jazz were sitting on the back cutters, but made a couple of nice ones, along with twice as many turnovers. Never really did get on the glass this time out, and it wasn't because he was chasing Okur around the perimeter -- the normal match was Brad vs. Boozer down inside. Of course that highlights another problem -- Boozer was 13 of his first 13 and finished with 33pts on 15-19 shooting. Not the numbers you want to see if you are the guy guarding him.
Martin ( A ) -- slow start missing his first three shots, but then came on strong to finish the first quarter as the leading scorer. Was doing more than just scoring too, as he used his quickness to set up several Kings for open looks int he first half too -- not something we always see out of him. Continued hot into the third, when he and Mike were carrying us and keeping us even, but slowed late in the quarter before hitting a single three to tug us back under 10. Got upset when Harpring set a hard pick on him in the 4th --bleeding off of the Ron energy perhaps because it didn't look like it was THAT hard of a hit and Kevin almost never gets chippy like that. Still a good competitive response. Benefitted tonight from the refs calling a lot of breathing fouls. Not only for Kevin, for everybody, but those games always benefit the finesse guys and Kevin had at least a pair where he was literally not touched. Defense was not stellar, as Kyle Korver found plenty of room to operate the other way, but gave us the overall numbers this time out -- not only 32pts, but 7rebs and 4asts as well. There were enough flaws here that a minus was possible -- only shot 7-17, defense -- but I'm thinking A for the bounceback game as clearly our main guy.
Still a bit agitated from last night, and not really in a theme mood this weekend, although Thigns That Go Boom, or Big Explosions both suggested themselves.
Salmons ( C+ ) -- back in as a starter as we smallballed, and predictably looked more comfortable early. Got quiet while everything went through Kevin, but rememerged as part of our second quarter surge. Even after Mikki made it to the arena, our continuing smallball ways had him on the court for most of the second half, but you would not have known it. Not bad exactly. Just very quiet with all the other guys who wanted the ball in the lineup around him, and the small vs. big mtachup of John v. Kirilenko went decisvely to the big, who was able to operate almost unimpeded by the little gnat buzzing around his ankles. I coould have gone B- here, but with Kirlenko going for three times his season average, and John producing very few numbers besides the 13pts (6-8 shooting), including only 1 rebound in 37 minutes as a small forward....C+ it is.
Artest ( D ) -- well, well...most of the game comments about him are of course going to be overwhelmed by the meltdown. And the meltdown is quite worrisome -- that's 4 of the last 5 games where there has been some kind of incident involving Ron, and the only one where there was not was the easy home blowout over the Nets. This is frankly something we as Kings fans have not seen from Ron before -- since coming here he has normally been very much in control while he has been on the floor (as opposed to all the off court stuff). But is is something that fans in his previous stops have seen, and those are ghosts better not raised. The game had already gotten off to an unusual start with Mikki having to miss the start for personal reasons, and us smallballing against one of the biggest frontlines in the game. Put Ron at PF matched against an All Star caliber PF, although in the early going we wisely tried to hide Ron over on Okur and have Brad take Boozer. Hiding Ron on defense...that may be a first. Ron put up very modest numbers again in the first half, which was kind of surprising given how aware you were of him in the offense. Might have just been the extra attention drawn by the unusual early matchup with Boozer. Might also have been the tough matchups all across the frontline for Ron -- from the even stronger power player in the Boozer, to the much bigger Okur, to the impossibly rangy fellow defensive stopped Kirlienko.
Meltdown section -- Problems started when Ron inexplicably starting woofing at the crowd telling everybody how great he was in the mid-3rd, which might have been less ridiculous if he in fact was doing anything great. No idea what started that, but at the time the crowd was relatively sitting on its hands, there was no Matt Harping on the court, and Ron himself was having an indifferent game. Then all of sudden he starts beating his chest at the crowd, pausing while the game is going on to throw back his head and howl, and just generally acting nutty. And I think he actually fired the Jazz and their crowd up. When all of the taunting started, the game was close. Mayeb tied or a two or three point game at most. But then Ron starts his schtick, the crowd turns ugly, the Jazz seemed to feed off the energy, and they immediately started pushing the ball right down our throat. Ran off 10 points, and jumped out to a big lead before we had to call timeout. Meanwhile of course Boozer continues to kick our butt inside, at one point sitting on a record pace by hitting his first 13 shots of the gmae, which could not have been helping Ron's mood any. Of course the kicker was when Sloan inserted Matt Harping into the game. Harpring is one of the league's truest tough guys. Lot of guys talk the talk or woof, or pose. Harping doesn't bother with any oif that, he just is. Backs down from nobody, and if you want to bang, he's always ready and willing. Well....Ron was ready, Matt was willing, and so it started. And between the brahma bull matchup, and Ron's constant howling at the crowd and the crowd's howling back the other way...the end result was inevitable. This is Ron Artest we are talking about. Got a technical. Lost his cool. Got a delay of game. Got a second technical for waving his arms and was tossed. Now the technicals did not have to be assesed -- neither of them involved something so egregious that it had to be called a T. But I think Ron more or less got himself tossed with the woofing at the crowd and general state of agitation he had thrown the whole arena into.
And so back to the effect on the game: and here is where this really impacts Ron's grade. We were doing fine before all that stuff started. Were right in the game. Then Ron starts up, gets the crowd fired up, gets the Jazz fired up, and the Jazz win going away. Nor was any of it about us as a team. This was about Ron vs. the crowd. Ron vs. the world. And the basketball game, the team, the score, all became secondary. Cost us two points on the techs, cost us one of our starters when he got tossed, and fired up the whole arena against us while we were trying to sneak off with a win. And that's not good for us no matter if you are a win now or a trade Ron person. Whatever is bugging Ron, he has got to straighten it out and calm down. His game itself might have been a C or C+ without the extracurricular stuff. But of course you can't separate them, since they all contribute to Ron's impact on the final score.
Miller ( B- ) -- quiet first half matched against his mirror image in Okur. Got his points in the third in sort of random fashion. Mostly early in the quarter, a three, some FTs, support stuff. Never really got his passing game going, as the Jazz were sitting on the back cutters, but made a couple of nice ones, along with twice as many turnovers. Never really did get on the glass this time out, and it wasn't because he was chasing Okur around the perimeter -- the normal match was Brad vs. Boozer down inside. Of course that highlights another problem -- Boozer was 13 of his first 13 and finished with 33pts on 15-19 shooting. Not the numbers you want to see if you are the guy guarding him.
Martin ( A ) -- slow start missing his first three shots, but then came on strong to finish the first quarter as the leading scorer. Was doing more than just scoring too, as he used his quickness to set up several Kings for open looks int he first half too -- not something we always see out of him. Continued hot into the third, when he and Mike were carrying us and keeping us even, but slowed late in the quarter before hitting a single three to tug us back under 10. Got upset when Harpring set a hard pick on him in the 4th --bleeding off of the Ron energy perhaps because it didn't look like it was THAT hard of a hit and Kevin almost never gets chippy like that. Still a good competitive response. Benefitted tonight from the refs calling a lot of breathing fouls. Not only for Kevin, for everybody, but those games always benefit the finesse guys and Kevin had at least a pair where he was literally not touched. Defense was not stellar, as Kyle Korver found plenty of room to operate the other way, but gave us the overall numbers this time out -- not only 32pts, but 7rebs and 4asts as well. There were enough flaws here that a minus was possible -- only shot 7-17, defense -- but I'm thinking A for the bounceback game as clearly our main guy.
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