Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
Well, we're still in preseason form here at the Consortium. We'll be using a new format this year, and I don't have a full + final list of participants yet, so I don't have our annual Consortium banner made yet. This will fill in for the time being:
The grey haired one is Baja. Assuming he still has any hair.
Alright...well, in kinda predictable #Kangz fashion we saved the most erratic preseason game for last (and of course the only televised one to really fire up those fans for the season). And we got a tight final score out of a series of 15-2 runs by either side that resembled a Rocky fight. A godawful 2nd quarter though really left the Clips with the solid win, and a scruffy but competitive 3rd, terrible early fourth, and great fake hustle close got us to the decptively close final score. We started an experimental backcourt that did not work at all, and unfortunately it ended up being too much like past seasons when Cuz on the floor = competitive, and Cuz off the floor = duck! Until those final 6 minutes of course.
In any case, new format. The Grading Consortium is back, we'll get everybody's letter grades this year and a final average grade for the group, and I'll be shortening the writeups back to the way The Grades originally started some 15 years ago -- short, quick, often snarky, and up quickly to provide fodder for post game discussions. Meanwhile every game a Consortium member will take a more in depth look at 1 featured starter every game. Given the less rigorous format, we're still taking applications if somebody wants to provide letter grades every (or nearly every) night.
(I'll make that prettier -- promise
)
Link to Boxscore
Starters
Gay ( F ) -- just...no. I mean, you can say maybe he was distracted by the new trade rumor. or maybe he was checked out because he knew it was happening. Or you might get closer if you guessed Chris Paul slipped him a little gas money before the game. Just absolutely awful from the getgo, forcing shots, turning it over, and a huge part of the problem tonight.
Cousins ( A- ) -- drops to a minus because he let the team's struggles damage his calm and got a little wild, but his play was mostly excellent again as he tried to one-man carry us most of the night. 23pts 8rebs on 10-17 in 26min (a per36 32-11 pace).
Koufos ( B ) -- didn't seem like a good fit against this frontcourt, but really was our most effective roleplayer out there, and rolling to the hoop was precisely part of it. Banged aroudn behind Cuz with Jordan and Blake, who were more spectacular than hugely productive.
McLemore ( C ) -- really bad pairing with Temple, as Temple is an uncreative PG, and Ben, is, well Ben. And was missing wide open shots again for most of the game, because Ben, is well, Ben. Made mistakes on D, but he played with more confidence, which is un-Ben, he showed some ability to play in the passing game, and he was multi-dimensional enough to keep the grade from falling through the floor.
Featured Grade
Ben started off the game by getting caught in a couple of picks which freed up Reddick who hit a both shots. Ben did manage to hit an 18 footer coming off a pick, and playet sometimes very good defense, and sometimes not so much. He did pass the ball very well managing 5 assists, and only one turnover on a night when it was in vogue to make turnovers. after missing a couple of open three's to start the 2nd half, he finally managed to hit some shots, but the game was mostly out of reach by that time. Ben hustles to a fault. The problem is, a lot of it is wasted hustle. He just doesn't have a good feel for the game. -- Baja
Temple ( D- ) -- we saw some of this when he was running point for the kiddies in the first preseason game, but while he can play PG, he creates absolutely nothing, and not only was he unproductive, but the team was unproductive with him at the position (in particular with Ben). Was better when sliding over for one of the natural PGs, made a few nice defensive plays, and in that garbage run, finally a little productivity. This was an F after 3Q.
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Bench
Tolliver ( C+ ) -- the wart here was normally a pretty big one: he missed all his shots, which is to say almost all threes, on a night when nobody on the team hit them until the final minutes. But he continued to feel very solid at everything else, made some nice defensive plays, and we won his minutes handily.
Casspi ( C- ) -- this grade is about how you balance the garbagetime run, because Omri was quite bad for most of the game, missing everything and combining with Rudy to give us 10 Tos from our SFs, and then he suddenly snapped to in the final minutes, hit two threes, and got into an up and down rhythm. Still not sure which way its going to go for him in the regular season.
Cauley-Stein ( C- ) -- another player who really struggled for 3 1/2 quarters, and then was part of the closing rush to deodorize his game a bit. Guys started finding him for plays at the rim, and he overcame his boarding allergy. Defensively though continued to make mistakes, in guarding perimeter guys in particular, and I think the final numbers more solid than the actual game.
Collison ( C+ ) -- in an experiment, Joerger went with his two bigger less creative guards as starters, and they failed. And then he went full Karl with the backup guards, and played Lawson and Collison together. In the first half it actually worked, at least while Cuz was with them. Lot of talent. But after half it failed as you might think it would andCollison played some strong defense, but just missed everything.
Lawson ( C- ) -- paired with Collison in the mighty mini backcourt experiment, Lawson tried to compete on defense despite his lack of size. On offense he made a few nice passes, but looked increasingly uncomfortable as a scorer, and after the initial burs from he and DC, it was an out of rhythm struggle.
The grey haired one is Baja. Assuming he still has any hair.
Alright...well, in kinda predictable #Kangz fashion we saved the most erratic preseason game for last (and of course the only televised one to really fire up those fans for the season). And we got a tight final score out of a series of 15-2 runs by either side that resembled a Rocky fight. A godawful 2nd quarter though really left the Clips with the solid win, and a scruffy but competitive 3rd, terrible early fourth, and great fake hustle close got us to the decptively close final score. We started an experimental backcourt that did not work at all, and unfortunately it ended up being too much like past seasons when Cuz on the floor = competitive, and Cuz off the floor = duck! Until those final 6 minutes of course.
In any case, new format. The Grading Consortium is back, we'll get everybody's letter grades this year and a final average grade for the group, and I'll be shortening the writeups back to the way The Grades originally started some 15 years ago -- short, quick, often snarky, and up quickly to provide fodder for post game discussions. Meanwhile every game a Consortium member will take a more in depth look at 1 featured starter every game. Given the less rigorous format, we're still taking applications if somebody wants to provide letter grades every (or nearly every) night.
(I'll make that prettier -- promise
)
Link to Boxscore
Starters
Gay ( F ) -- just...no. I mean, you can say maybe he was distracted by the new trade rumor. or maybe he was checked out because he knew it was happening. Or you might get closer if you guessed Chris Paul slipped him a little gas money before the game. Just absolutely awful from the getgo, forcing shots, turning it over, and a huge part of the problem tonight.
Cousins ( A- ) -- drops to a minus because he let the team's struggles damage his calm and got a little wild, but his play was mostly excellent again as he tried to one-man carry us most of the night. 23pts 8rebs on 10-17 in 26min (a per36 32-11 pace).
Koufos ( B ) -- didn't seem like a good fit against this frontcourt, but really was our most effective roleplayer out there, and rolling to the hoop was precisely part of it. Banged aroudn behind Cuz with Jordan and Blake, who were more spectacular than hugely productive.
McLemore ( C ) -- really bad pairing with Temple, as Temple is an uncreative PG, and Ben, is, well Ben. And was missing wide open shots again for most of the game, because Ben, is well, Ben. Made mistakes on D, but he played with more confidence, which is un-Ben, he showed some ability to play in the passing game, and he was multi-dimensional enough to keep the grade from falling through the floor.
Featured Grade
Ben started off the game by getting caught in a couple of picks which freed up Reddick who hit a both shots. Ben did manage to hit an 18 footer coming off a pick, and playet sometimes very good defense, and sometimes not so much. He did pass the ball very well managing 5 assists, and only one turnover on a night when it was in vogue to make turnovers. after missing a couple of open three's to start the 2nd half, he finally managed to hit some shots, but the game was mostly out of reach by that time. Ben hustles to a fault. The problem is, a lot of it is wasted hustle. He just doesn't have a good feel for the game. -- Baja
Temple ( D- ) -- we saw some of this when he was running point for the kiddies in the first preseason game, but while he can play PG, he creates absolutely nothing, and not only was he unproductive, but the team was unproductive with him at the position (in particular with Ben). Was better when sliding over for one of the natural PGs, made a few nice defensive plays, and in that garbage run, finally a little productivity. This was an F after 3Q.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Bench
Tolliver ( C+ ) -- the wart here was normally a pretty big one: he missed all his shots, which is to say almost all threes, on a night when nobody on the team hit them until the final minutes. But he continued to feel very solid at everything else, made some nice defensive plays, and we won his minutes handily.
Casspi ( C- ) -- this grade is about how you balance the garbagetime run, because Omri was quite bad for most of the game, missing everything and combining with Rudy to give us 10 Tos from our SFs, and then he suddenly snapped to in the final minutes, hit two threes, and got into an up and down rhythm. Still not sure which way its going to go for him in the regular season.
Cauley-Stein ( C- ) -- another player who really struggled for 3 1/2 quarters, and then was part of the closing rush to deodorize his game a bit. Guys started finding him for plays at the rim, and he overcame his boarding allergy. Defensively though continued to make mistakes, in guarding perimeter guys in particular, and I think the final numbers more solid than the actual game.
Collison ( C+ ) -- in an experiment, Joerger went with his two bigger less creative guards as starters, and they failed. And then he went full Karl with the backup guards, and played Lawson and Collison together. In the first half it actually worked, at least while Cuz was with them. Lot of talent. But after half it failed as you might think it would andCollison played some strong defense, but just missed everything.
Lawson ( C- ) -- paired with Collison in the mighty mini backcourt experiment, Lawson tried to compete on defense despite his lack of size. On offense he made a few nice passes, but looked increasingly uncomfortable as a scorer, and after the initial burs from he and DC, it was an out of rhythm struggle.
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