Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
Artest ( A ) -- I so very much wanted to give Ron the "+" for this game. For the first 45 minutes he was just magnificent, harassing the hell out of TMac at one end, and completely dominating action at the other. True superstar type performance. Only major wart in that time was one play down the stretch where he bizarrely seeemd compeltely oblivious to the shotclock and just dribbled the ball and dribbled the ball, never even looking to shoot, until time ran out. Got off to a great fast start until Muss abruptly yanked him 5 minutes into the game. Very strange. Still had a good first half, albeit down the stretch of the second quarter he got a little out of control trying to force the action leading to repeated empty trips. And was very VERY good in the third quarter, on both ends of the floor, and the Rockets struggle to find a good matchup on him also spilled over to help Kevin to a strong start when Battier had to leave to go check Ron. But after 45 minutes of dominating play, the stretch, where we once again collapsed, got scrappy. First Ron saw TMac go absolutely nutty right in his face in the final three minutes to save Houston. And second, after we had blown a 9 point lead, we still had a good chance to salvage it in regulation (courtesy of Ron actually who just ripped the ball away from Chuck Hayes on the Rockets last possession) -- and it was our ball, tie game, basically the full 24 seconds on the clock. And we came out and ran an iso for the hottest player on the court at the top of the circle. And Ron just flat out fumbled the ball away not only once, but twice. Fumbled it, picked it up, passed it to Bibby, took the return pass to restore his dribble, then fumbled it again and turned it over. Ron is probably not used to the situation -- that is something normally only drawn up for the Kobes of the world -- but after the great game Ron could hardly have flubbed that worse. Very shaky. Was ok in OT, tied his career high with 39, his shot looked ridiculous tonight on the way to 5-7 from 3pt land and 10-11 from the stripe. And we still lose. Boy.
Thomas ( B ) -- solid start finishing little opportunites around the rim, and ended up playing the majority of the game as our lone big minute "big". It was a small small game aside from Deke, and we had Colriss, Ron, Kenny manning the bigs, to be matched by Battier, 6'6" Chuck Hayes, Bonzi etc. And Kenny was solid in there. Got a little dumb a few times trying to challenge Mutumbo. Got outrebounded by Hayes in his minutes, but had more saavy than the kid (who made multiple turnovers and blown layups to help us). 10pts 9rebs 3stls. Played 44 min for those numbers, but solid.
Reef ( C+ ) -- fairly sluggish game where Reef may have actually found himself deemed too big by Muss to earn PT. Best thing he did while he was out there was pass -- hit open cutters and spot up guys this time. Had a big finish on the cut in the second quarter. Also basically airballed a side pop jumper. In the end, kind of a forgotten man as both teams worked hard to see how many natural SFs and OGs they could get on the court at one time. Er...well, Reef would have actually qualified for that. How about how many Sf and OG SIZED guys they could get ont eh court at the same time.
Martin ( B- ) -- was slowed early by Battier, but after Shane was switched off to go check Ron, Kevin got into a nice rhythm in the late first/early second, and was able to repeatedly take advantage of his size against 6'3"ish Luther Head. Pretty one dimensional effort, but the shots he was hitting in the early going were tough ones. Lot of nice confident moves wiht the defender right there. Got very quiet late. Had 19pts mid way through the mid third. And still had 19 to end regulation. Got a shot blocked by TMac after a nice fake, missed several open looks. Rolled everything off the rim. Finally barely trickled one over the front of the rim in OT to get back to his average, but really nothing for the last 20 minutes of the game. Likes the degree of diffulty on his early takes -- was creating hiw own shot. Did not like the late disappearing act or lack of anything but scoring (21pts 2reb 2ast).
Thomas ( B ) -- solid start finishing little opportunites around the rim, and ended up playing the majority of the game as our lone big minute "big". It was a small small game aside from Deke, and we had Colriss, Ron, Kenny manning the bigs, to be matched by Battier, 6'6" Chuck Hayes, Bonzi etc. And Kenny was solid in there. Got a little dumb a few times trying to challenge Mutumbo. Got outrebounded by Hayes in his minutes, but had more saavy than the kid (who made multiple turnovers and blown layups to help us). 10pts 9rebs 3stls. Played 44 min for those numbers, but solid.
Reef ( C+ ) -- fairly sluggish game where Reef may have actually found himself deemed too big by Muss to earn PT. Best thing he did while he was out there was pass -- hit open cutters and spot up guys this time. Had a big finish on the cut in the second quarter. Also basically airballed a side pop jumper. In the end, kind of a forgotten man as both teams worked hard to see how many natural SFs and OGs they could get on the court at one time. Er...well, Reef would have actually qualified for that. How about how many Sf and OG SIZED guys they could get ont eh court at the same time.
Martin ( B- ) -- was slowed early by Battier, but after Shane was switched off to go check Ron, Kevin got into a nice rhythm in the late first/early second, and was able to repeatedly take advantage of his size against 6'3"ish Luther Head. Pretty one dimensional effort, but the shots he was hitting in the early going were tough ones. Lot of nice confident moves wiht the defender right there. Got very quiet late. Had 19pts mid way through the mid third. And still had 19 to end regulation. Got a shot blocked by TMac after a nice fake, missed several open looks. Rolled everything off the rim. Finally barely trickled one over the front of the rim in OT to get back to his average, but really nothing for the last 20 minutes of the game. Likes the degree of diffulty on his early takes -- was creating hiw own shot. Did not like the late disappearing act or lack of anything but scoring (21pts 2reb 2ast).
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