Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
Second verse, same as the first. Which in this case kinda sucks since the first verse was fugly. Anyway, the starters suck and get no minutes. The scrubbies come in and play for contracts and glory. Cole Aldrich has another career game. Sound familiar? Well here's something that changed: only 1 game of Smart left to go.
Grading Consortium Rotation tonight (aka Grades sans Brick!):
Rainmaker
bajaden
Uncia03
Capt. Smellypants
hrdboild
Boxscore
Stats: 24min 4pts (2-8, 0-3, 0-0) 5reb 3ast 0stl 0blk 1TO
Salmons ( C- ) -- This was quite an underwhelming performance, and that's probably being a bit kind. When you're starting SF scores 4 points on 2-8 shooting while giving up 29 points on 10-16 shooting to the guy he was guarding most of the night, it's going to be tough to find anything positive to say. John was pretty much invisible on offense while not having any impact defensively on Durant. Hit a jumper early, then added a dunk late in a second off a pass from Jimmer, had a couple assists early as well and that pretty much sums up his offensive contribution tonight. Came out trying to force the issue a little more in the 3rd, probably in response to Reke being out and nothing came of it. Missed 3 FGA's, forced a bad pass, fouled Durant on a jumper and picked up a tech all in the first six minutes of the 2nd half. Also gave up 7 points to Durant in that span. At that point OKC's lead had jumped from 11 at the half to 20 and it was cruise control for the Thunder from there on out. He did have 5 rebounds which was third on the team and was tied for the most assists on the team with 3, but in my opinion that's more an indictment on the team's overall performance tonight. John did have spurts of good defense but the results just weren't there, both because he had little help from his teammates and because sometimes the offensive player just has more talent, which both Westbrook and Durant have and good defense isn't enough. There's a reason they are All Stars, and even though John did compete against them at times when guarding them, they got the best of him tonight and neither John nor anyone else was able to really even slow them down. --Rain
Stats: 28min 7pts (2-8, 0-1, 3-6) 3reb 0ast 1stl 0blk 0TO
Thompson ( D ) -- The good news is that JT did a great job on PnR defense and rotated very well on help defense. He had a good number of defensive plays. He also hustled on the offensive boards and though he was only credited with 1 offensive rebound, he worked to keep the ball for the Kings on a few other plays. The bad news is that he consistently found himself out of defensive rebounding position and was beat to the ball multiple times and ended the game with an abysmal 3 rebounds in 26 minutes of work, which is unacceptable. In addition, he shot the ball poorly. He knocked down his first attempt (a wide open 18ft shot from Tyreke) early in the 1st quarter and wouldn’t make another shot till 5 minutes left in the 4th quarter. He missed multiple gimme’s around the basket all night long and only hit half his free-throws. He was re-inserted with about 5 minutes left in the game and had zero impact. He knocked down his 2nd field goal, but missed a number of shots including taking a 3pt shot which he clanked. If JT is taking 3pt shots you know that there isn’t any sort of accountability out there for these guys with the season winding down. An inefficient (2-8) 7 points and 3 rebounds from your starting PF isn’t going to get it done. --Uncia
Stats: 25min 7pts (2-9, 0-0, 3-4) 6reb 2ast 0stl 0blk 5TO
Cousins ( D- ) -- My my, where do I begin? I'm a huge fan of Cousins, but he just stunk the place out tonight. Actually, most of the starting unit did, for the second night in a row. Its starting to smell in the kitchen! Let me see, what can I find thats positive? Well, Cuz grabbed the first rebound of the game. So there you go! Good start, no? Unfortunately he followed that by getting his shot blocked on the other end. He avoided getting his shot blocked the next time down by cleverly traveling with the ball. I must admit, I rewatched that play over several times in slow Mo, and I didn't see a travel. But Oh well, it is what it is. But bear with me, he wasn't done yet. On his next possesion, he tried to pass the ball over Thabeet, and forgot that he's 10 feet tall. Another turnover. He managed 5 on the night in 25 minutes. Lets see, on his next posession, he drove from the right wing, and had the ball stolen. At this point, he got angry! Probably at the ref's for not giving him some calls (he was fouled a couple of times), and at himself, for playing so poorly. It all came to a head with him dunking the ball and then firing the ball to the ref with a lot of heat on it. Lucky he didn't get a tech at that point, but the ref bit the bullet and let it go, probably knowing it was just Cuz releasing his frustration. He did make another basket in the second half, when he wove his way through 4 defenders and laid it in. Probably the only time in the game he looked like himself. The rest of his points came at the freethrow line. For the most part, it seemed that if he wasn't getting his shot blocked, he was traveling and turning the ball over. I'm sure this isn't the way he wanted to end the season, so I'm hopeful that wednesday's game will be better. I don't know if this is his worse game of the year, but its certainly in the running. --baja
Stats: 10min 8pts (4-5, 0-1, 0-0) 0reb 1ast 1stl 0blk 0TO
Evans ( A-/INC ) -- For 10 minutes, Tyreke had a heck of a game out there. Two shots in transition, one of two on jumpers, and a nifty layup...that cost him the rest of the season with a quad strain when he went down awkwardly. Fortunately it wasn't anything more serious. Tonight Tyreke spent the first quarter playing more on the ball than we have seen for most of the season, and he did a pretty good job of it - only one assist, but he had at least five good setups (twice to Cousins for a drive into the lane) and saw his recipient come up empty. On the defensive end, about half the time he was playing well, like the time he hustled back in transition and bothered a full-head-of-steam Westbrook into missing a layup, and the other half of the time Westbrook beat him but tended to come up empty. In the end, Russell missed six shots against Tyreke while only coming up with one hit and a pair of free throws. It's just too bad Tyreke didn't get the chance to guard him all game. --Capt.
Stats: 28min 16pts (5-10, 4-8, 2-2) 4reb 2ast 0stl 0blk 5TO
Thomas ( B- ) -- This was a rollercoaster performance for IT. At one point I had him sitting in D/F territory but he did have an impact in the third scoring the ball and he fought all night on defense against some tough matchups. Started off on a rough note getting stripped near midcourt for a breakaway layup on the opening posession. He followed that up by passing on a three to drive into the paint and miss badly. To start the game Smart was hiding him on Thabo defensively and it seemed to be working out alright. He drew an offensive foul on him on one play but was forced to foul him to stop a basket the next time down. Had a humurous sequence near the end of the first when he lost the ball trying to dribble through Thabeet's legs it seems and moments later stopped a 3 on 1 Thunder fastbreak by standing still. It was painfully apparent all night that OKC was going to take full advantage of his size though with their big guard lineups and as the game went on, and our best hope in countering Westbrook left the floor with a leg injury, Thomas was a constant target for post-ups and drop-off dunks. He got hot in the third hitting two jumpers off of inbounds plays, a wide-open straightaway 3 after Jimmer got doubled and trapped on the sideline, and finishing it off by stepping into another 3 off a long rebound. He took and missed a number of threes during the same stretch as the tendency to go hero took over for a bit, but he was the only thing we had going offensively at the time and this never really turned into the full blowout many of us were expecting. The scoring was counter-balanced by a sloppy night handling the ball as the turnovers kept adding up and eventually outnumbered the assists 2 to 1. There's been a lot of discussion lately about Isaiah's heart and I'll weigh in with this -- there's no question the guy competes out there. He drew the Westbrook matchup in the third and while Westbrook inevitably went off as he usually does, Thomas was bothering him at times with his speed, slipping under screens and slapping at the ball. Durant, Westbrook, Sefelosha, and Jackson all took turns shooting over him and his limitations really stand out against a big athletic team like Oklahoma who utilize a lot of screens to create mismatches all over the floor. Unfortunately heart alone does not win basketball games. Earl Boykins put together a long career as a scorer off the bench who used his size and speed as an advantage to elude defenders. And that's probably what IT should be aiming for. He's not a bad PG, but as the lead guard his defensive limitations are magnified over the course of a game and like Boykins he's really at his best when he's aggressively looking to score. --hrd
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