[Grades] Grades v. Nets 11/13/2013

Who's arrival made the difference tonight?

  • Jason Thompson

    Votes: 6 8.8%
  • Grevis Vasquez

    Votes: 39 57.4%
  • Marcus Thornton

    Votes: 23 33.8%

  • Total voters
    68
  • Poll closed .

Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#1


Well that was exactly what was needed if we were going to make any sort of go of it this season. A bounceback game after a lineup change, renewed energy, a first real appearance of Grevis and Marcus, who separately excelled where they had scrubbed it up together. And of course, a victory.

Meanwhile the big guy picked up his third foul with 1 minute to go in the 2nd quarter, which had me slapping my head because that's precisely the sort of foul that can change entire games. And sure enough he got called for a fourth on a cheap little nothing in the early third, and if we'd truly needed him, we were going to be in a lot of trouble. Instead the reappearance of JT as a second big filled the gap, and Grevis orchestrated a blowout. So yay and all that.

We complete our Grading Consortiuum tonight with the permanent addition of MassachusettsKingsfan and Rainmaker to the ranks, as well as the return from a lost week of debauchery by bajaden and Uncia03. So tonight your graders will be:
Bricklayer
Henkel
MassachusettsKingsFan
Bajaden
Uncia03


Boxscore

Stats: 31min 7pts (3-5, 0-0, 1-1) 1reb 2ast 2stl 0blk 0TO
Salmons ( C- ) -- So everyone expected that someone would replace John Salmons in the starting line-up after Malone said that changes need to be made. I was looking at the ‘Guess the new starting line-up thread’ and basically no-one guessed that Salmons would maintain his starting job. So…..SURPRISE! So did Salmons justify his position as a starter in today’s game? Of course not. He pulled the same invisible act that he’s been famous for. In 30 minutes of play he took 5 shots (made three of them) grabbed a single rebound (which bounced right to him) and got 2 assists (one of which came on the 1st offensive play of the game when he was the inbounder and threw a long pass to Cousins who hit a tough contested jumper to beat the shot clock). Yay! On the other hand he didn’t have any turn overs and didn’t hurt the offense by missing a lot of shots. He also played solid defense the entire night, doing a good job bothering both Pierce and Joe Johnson. (Though he let Pierce get the baseline drive twice against him). Overall, he was out there. He didn’t really do much to help the team, but he didn’t do anything to hurt the team either. So for his efforts I’ll give him a C- mostly due to the lack of rebounding and call it a day. --Uncia

Stats: 26min 9pts (4-12, 0-0, 1-4) 11reb 0ast 0stl 0blk 0TO
Thompson ( C+ ) -- If not for JT's bad shooting night, he would have had a higher score. For the most part, he did everything else fairly well, especially rebounding, where he pulled down 11 boards. He had the tough assignment of guarding Lopez, and made him work hard for his points. Offensively, he just wasn't present in the first half, scoring most of his points in the third quarter, where he got hot hitting three jumpers in a row. The string ended with a missed heat check from 20 feet. He went to the line 4 times and missed three of four. JT did set some good picks in the game, but in my opinion, he has a long way to go to emulate Hayes, who is like a brick wall out there. Defensively he played hard for all 26 minutes he was on the floor. It wasn't perfect, but the effort was there. Its hard to give a C+ to a player that grabs 11 rebounds and plays good defense, but I know he's capable of more, and thus the grade. --Baja

Stats: 22min 15pts (5-14, 0-0, 5-6) 9reb 1ast 1stl 3blk 1TO
Cousins ( B- ) -- Due to foul trouble did most of his damage in the opening minutes. Almost all of his touches were coming up top as he looked to face up the bigger Lopez. With the dominance inside this season it's easy to forget how comfortable Cousins looks in the high post. Showed Lopez that he wasn't afraid to take the outside shot early which transitioned into some nice drives. Missed a couple which you'd expect him to normally makes but overall was shouldering the load on offense once again. Should be noted that with JT out there Cousins avoided a match up with Lopez. Considering Cousins ongoing issues with foul trouble it's nice to have the option to hide him and let JT take the tougher match up at four or five each night, which wasn't an option every night with the undersized Patterson. Came back in mid way through the second, had some nice looks that he was unable to finish. Picked up a weak first tech due to a frustrated outburst that didn't seem directed at anyone in particular. Didn't complain or pout afterwards and unlike past foul trouble which was the result of a frustrated Cousins spiraling out control I didn't feel that's what happened here. He pick up two quick fouls once again playing defense too much with his hands. He can be disruptive, just look at all the steals he picks up, but overall it plays into his biggest and most persist weakness at this point. I don't think he made it more then two minutes into the third before he picked up his fourth foul. Came back in in the fourth with Brooklyn on a run and provided a steadying presence. With a small lineup for both sides outside of the center spot he cleaned up on the glass and got to the line. Managed to pick fouls five and six as well. The production for 20 something minutes of action is outstanding, but tonight was an exception and in general the number one key to this teams success is having Cousins on the floor. --Henkel

Stats: 15min 2pts (1-8, 0-2, 0-0) 0reb 2ast 0stl 0blk 1TO
McLemore ( D+ ) -- Pretty typical ‘first start of your NBA career’ type game from Ben tonight. He showed his usual flashes, but never really got going. I’m going to chalk it up to nerves more than anything else. You could tell he was making a conscious effort to score instead of letting the game come to him. We’ve seen this from McLemore in the past, (summer league) when he’s forcing and trying to create his own shot bad things happen. It was by no means a disaster; he held his own defensively against Joe Johnson, he put his athleticism on display on the fast break connecting on a smooth alley-oop from Vasquez (his only 2 points), and generally looked OK outside of the forced shots and marginal overall impact on the game. I went back and forth between a C- or a D for his grade tonight, but ultimately decided that he didn’t actively hurt the team enough to warrant a D. The Kings won the game comfortably, and he only played 15 minutes. Here is your one free pass, Ben. --Mass

Stats: 33min 17pts (7-13, 2-6, 1-1) 4reb 12ast 1stl 0blk 2TO
Vasquez ( A- ) -- This was Gre-Ivis's first real floor generalesque game of the year. The first time he looked something like what we hoped he might be. The first quarter might actually have been his weakest, and yet it wasn't weak at all. Was doing a pretty good job of pushing it and got McLemore his first hoop as a starter on an alley oop that of course got the crowd up. He hit an early three off a broken play, then missed a second one off a Cuz kick. And maybe most importantly he was not having any real problems on defense against the slower Nets. His size finally came of some use too as he spent time checking Pierce and did fine. In fact a little better than Outlaw did after checking in for him. Returned in the late 2nd and helped us stop a Nets' comeback attempt as he hit back to back shots and got us organized. Deron started the second half attacking him off the dribble for his only extended stretch of defensive trouble, but Gre-Ivis had the last laugh as after we lost Cuz Gre-Ivis really picked things up and played a really strong offensive 3rd orchestrating our blowout with slick passes and some saavy barely contested sneaks to the hoop. Returned to the game in the early 4th with us again spiraling, and once again helped us regain control. It was a very distinct effect he had all night in classic floor general fashion. He pushed IT over to SG, took the ball, and resumed setting people up and throwing in occasional running flips. Just a quality game pretty much start to finish, and major step forward from the impotence we have seen thus far. Now we'll just have to see if this was an old and slow opponent special, or if eh can achieve this same control and comfort level against quicker teams too. --Brick
 
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Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#2
Bench

Stats: 26min 19pts (5-11, 2-3, 7-7) 6reb 6ast 1stl 0blk 1TO
Thomas ( B- ) -- this grade is a bit of an oddity. Its one of IT's best rounded statlines of the season. And his allowing and facilitating the reemergence of MT during his minutes was a major factor. And yet IT himself simply did not have the impact these numbers indicate. In fact he had several scruffy stretches during the game, and repeatedly Gre-Ivis was brought back in the game to regain some of the control that the IT led squads were losing. Came into the game ragged at the end of the first quarter. Not so much selfish as just out of rhythm. But he started the 2nd quarter off setting up Thornton for a three, and then hitting an open three of his own on a kickout. And we started to open the lead as he and fellow gunning soul Marcus took over the quarter, both with scoring, and in IT's case with some good hustle plays as well. Predictably things started to get loose as that shoulder chip of his rattled loose and shortcircuited his brain for a few minutes, leading to a stretch of overdribbling, one of those dumb threes off his dribble on the break etc. But the difference tonight was that we had an option and an answer when that happened, and Malone showed no hesitation in bringing Gre-Ivis back in to calm things back down. After Gre-Ivis' strong third, IT was not back until the 4th, and hit a second scruffy patch. While it is hard to blame IT exclusively as the whole team looked like it had just lost its mental edge in the early 4th thinking the game was over, nonetheless IT took over for Gre-Ivis and within 3 minutes we had lost 9 points off our lead and it was a game again, necessitating another quick move by Malone to get Gre-Ivis back in there, shifting IT off the ball to SG. Again those minutes were not horribly impressive, and the points he was getting were as often off of broken plays or in the open court as they were anything special. So by the end of the game you had a guy putting together exactly the sort of statline you would like to see every night. You had him allowing room for a shared scoring load off the bench. Yet IT himself just wasn't as big a straw as the numbers might make you think this time. --Brick

Stats: 26min 8pts (4-8, 0-3, 0-1) 10reb 0ast 0stl 0blk 1TO
Patterson ( B ) -- This was one of Patterson's better rebounding games of the year, maybe his career with the Kings. Didn't take the time to look it up, but he pulled down 10 boards. Regardless of how he accomplished that, its what we need from him on a nightly basis. While he only scored 8 pts, he did it on 4 0f 8 shooting, and played the exact amount of time, 26 minutes, that JT did. Once again he struggled with his outside shot, and scored all of his points at the basket. Three of his baskets came off of text book pick and rolls with Vasquez as the creator. The other basket was a tip in of a JT miss. Patterson also played very good defense on Garnett, and defended the pick and roll very well. All in all, despite his poor outside shooting, it was one of his best games this year. To be honest, I'm not sure I saw much difference with having JT start instead of Patterson other than to light a fire under the two of them. --Baja

Stats: 34min 24pts (10-19, 4-9, 0-1) 4reb 2ast 1stl 0blk 0TO
Thornton ( A- ) -- Hey Marcus! Nice of you to show up. Entered the game towards the end of the first quarter to the collective groan of most Kings fans, particularly those wishing to see Jimmer Fredette get some burn. Credit Malone for sticking with Thornton, because we needed him tonight. He hit back-to-back 3’s early in his first stint off the bench and you could sort of tell he had a little bit of his swagger back. We saw pullup jumpers, spot up jumpers, hard drives to the basket, and even a few smart passes on the break that lead to layups or free throws for his teammates. It wasn’t a perfect performance. There were forced shots, a few gambles on defense, you know, typical Marcus Thornton stuff, but even that was a nice change from the watered down MT we’ve been watching all year. He made an impact, finally! With Cousins in and out of the lineup due to foul trouble, we needed someone to shoulder the load offensively and that guy was Thornton. He played the most minutes, scored the most points, took the most shots, didn’t get burned on defense, and it ultimately lead us to a blow out win against decent team (on paper). He looked like the old Marcus Thornton tonight, and this team needs that guy. It’s way to early to call him ‘back’ but this was a good step in that direction. --Mass

Stats: 8min 0pts (0-0, 0-0, 0-0) 3reb 1ast 0stl 0blk 0TO
Hayes ( C ) -- All his minutes came in the first half. With MT and IT remorselessly gunning it up Chuck wasn't involved on the offensive end, which I'm pretty sure is a good thing. Blended in and grabbed a few boards while playing decent position defense. Nothing out of the ordinary for Chuck who when asked to do the few things he's capable of and nothing else can looked like a decent role player for stretches. Malone decide to go with the more versatile Mbah in the the second half. --Henkel

Stats: 16min 6pts (2-4, 0-1, 2-2) 2reb 0ast 1stl 0blk 0TO
Outlaw ( C ) -- Outlaw played sixteen minutes, with about 4 of them as an undersized PF. When he first got into the game Pierce’s eyes seemed to light up as Pierce went at him two times in the row, blowing by him at the top of the key. (Pierce missed a little jumper the 1st time and dunked it the 2nd time) After that Outlaw played better defense against Pierce, doing a decent job denying penetration and challenging his shot. Outlaw wasn’t able to repeat his performance on the glass and ended the game with only 2 rebounds which hurt especially due to his inability to block out Reggie Evans and allowing Evans to get two offensive ebounds around him. He only took 4 shots and made two of the three shots which were set catch-and-shoot shots. The one time he tried to create for himself by taking a dribble then shooting it…he got it blocked by Livingston. Ouch! So by and large he played with-in the offense, hit his set shots when given the opportunity, played fairly solid defense after the first couple of possessions and allowed Reggie Evans to muscle him out of at least 2 rebounds while playing the undersized PF position. (Not really his fault there) Not a horrible game, but since he ended up with almost as many points as Salmons and double the rebounds in half the minutes I’ll give him a slightly better grade than Salmons on this one. --Uncia

Stats: 4min 0pts (0-0, 0-0, 0-0) 0reb 0ast 1stl 0blk 0TO
Mbah a Moute ( INC ) -- Mbah only got 4 minutes in this one and it came during our attempts to match the Nets with a small-ball line-up. (Our 3 ‘bigs’ in the game were Mbah, Outlaw, and Patterson…*wince*) It was probably the worst stretch for the Kings in the game, but I’m not going to blame Mbah on this one. On offense all he did was run to the right corner and stay there until a shot was either made or missed. He never touched it once. On defense he didn’t really have an impact but didn’t hurt us. He let Joe Johnson get into the lane and score once, but that was it. So, really only in there for four minutes, the team did terribly, but it had more to do with the entire concept of the line-up rather than anything having to do with Mbah himself, so…to me that’s deserving of an INC. --Uncia

Stats: 1min 0pts (0-0, 0-0, 0-0) 0reb 0ast 0stl 0blk 0TO
Ndiaye ( INC ) -- finally just in for the final play of the game. --Brick
 
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#5
Based off of today, I actually think that salmons can fit with the new starting lineup. Provides a secondary ballhandler and he doesn't get in the way of our primary options. Ben can grow into the second option without too much pressure with DMC next to him and provides some much needed athleticism. Outlaw and Thomas provide energy off the bench and Thorton and P-pat can chuck all they want without having to worry about Demarcus. Great lineup imho.
 
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VF21

Super Moderator Emeritus
SME
#6
We complete our Grading Consortiuum tonight with the permanent addition of MassachusettsKingsfan and Rainmaker to the ranks, as well as the return from a lost week of debauchery by bajaden and Uncia03. So tonight your graders will be:
Bricklayer
Henkel
MassachusettsKingsFan
Bajaden
Uncia03
Um, what?
 

Bricklayer

Don't Make Me Use The Bat
#7
Brickie - It's GREIVIS. I think he earned the right to having his name spelled correctly tonight. :)
People should quit having strange names if they want them spelled right. What's the matter with "Bob"? Works. Quick, easy to say, its a palindrome...almost impossible to screw up. But no. First Isaiah, now Greivis, everybody gets grandiose and wants to throw random extra vowels in their name. You know what happens when you throw a random extra vowel into "Bob"???
 
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Capt. Factorial

trifolium contra tempestatem subrigere certum est
Staff member
#9
People should quit having strange names if they want them spelled right. What's the matter with "Bob"? Works. Quick, easy to say, its a palindrome...almost impossible to screw up. But no. First Isaiah, now Greivis, everybody gets grandiose and wants to throw random extra vowels in their name. You no what happens when you throw a random extra vowel into "Bob"???
But he's a Venezuelan, so it can't be "Bob", it would have to be "Bobo". And in Spanish, "bobo" means "fool". Do we really need to saddle Greivis with that now that he's playing like we had hoped?
 
#12
Nets are a train wreck. To think this was the easiest game on their schedule this west coast swing. KG, Terry, Pierce are below average-average players and shells of their former selves. Kidd had no business being hired. Personality-less, young, without any experience. Deron Williams was once one of the better players in the NBA, and what is he now?

Our rotations were much better, and I will be interested to see what we do against other competition
 
#14
Greivis Josué Vásquez Rodríguez - on his birth certificate.

Various nicknames over the years: In Venezuela it was (believe it or not) - Loco. I heard Kevin Durant called him "General G" but no confirmation. Also, known as El Soldadtio (Tin Soldier). Greivis or GV is good enough for me.
 
#17
Key stats of the night:

-BK shooting %- 37.8 (23% from 3pt)

Kings Ast-TO ratio- 26/6

21 rebounds from PF position

18 assists and 3 TO's from PG position
 
#21
I'm also pleased with Cousins' seemingly increased interest in blocking shots.

As for the poll...tough one. I think GV's game had the most impact, but MT's climb was the greatest. So, going with MT.
 
#24
this was a hard one. it was nice to see mt show up, but gv not only played well, but he got others involved as well so he got my vote. i would have liked to see jimmer at least get some garbage time minutes but i would sacrifice seeing that every night if kings continue to get victories
 
#27
Great game.

Is there any way we could set up a feed somewhere on this site directly to Coach Malone's post game pressers, whether posted by news10 or kings.com? Somewhere in the media feed?

I think it would be cool to make them more interwoven into the discussions on a regular basis. The teams progress is chronicled well by him in those assessments.
 

VF21

Super Moderator Emeritus
SME
#28
Great game.

Is there any way we could set up a feed somewhere on this site directly to Coach Malone's post game pressers, whether posted by news10 or kings.com? Somewhere in the media feed?

I think it would be cool to make them more interwoven into the discussions on a regular basis. The teams progress is chronicled well by him in those assessments.
Good idea.
 
#29
Good game overall, liked the lineup change, helps the rebounding and balances the rotations more. I don't know what to think of that Nets team, they probably would be championship contenders five years ago.
 
K

KingMilz

Guest
#30
My thoughts

#Great all around team effort
#Thornton was MT today him and Vasquez were the two most impactful players, Vasquez controlled the whole game and Thronton broke it wide open and let the flood gates down
#IT was very solid again did a bit of everything he's atm the clear 6th man of the year leader atm
#Thompson and Patterson did a great job, JT needs to kind of be the opposite of Cousins and take thos long two's when he does not hesitiate the dude is cash and his defence 2night was great. Patterson was active and imo the guy is a very underrated athlete and imo should use him athletic ability more by simply being active the way he exploded to the rim/jumped for tip in's was very impressive
#The coaches need to have a talk with Cousins about his shot selection/his movement off screens he's far to slow to roll or he doesn't move quickly enough to provide a option, it's the only things that are holding him back from greatness his defence and hustle was great but.
#Outlaw got banged on twice by the two most unlikely candidates but I thought his defense and contesting of shots was terrific and he played well again
#I didn't notice Salmons which is a huge positive as well
#Keep starting Ben Mac he will get better and he makes plays that bring the house down, he looked nervous out there but it will get better with time
# Mike Malone is a good coach