Seattle not going away
- Thread starter Mr. S£im Citrus
- Start date
As am I.
Its got to happen though. This is still basically the same team that they had last year + Danny Fortson. Teams with no personnel changes don't just jump from dregs to elite. But if they get a big enough running start here before coming back to earth they could still be in the playoff hunt come April. With a 13-3 mark, they would only have to go 32-34 from here on out to get to 45 wins and have a chance.
Its got to happen though. This is still basically the same team that they had last year + Danny Fortson. Teams with no personnel changes don't just jump from dregs to elite. But if they get a big enough running start here before coming back to earth they could still be in the playoff hunt come April. With a 13-3 mark, they would only have to go 32-34 from here on out to get to 45 wins and have a chance.
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Brick, these are all good points and what you are saying logically makes sense except that it is not so black and white. Lets consider the following:
1. Rashard Lewis is having his best year as a pro, it seems as if he is figuring things out.
2. Radmanovic is having his best year as a pro coming off the bench. He is playing the 3 spot and on occasion the 4 instead of being forced to play the 4 like last year.
3. Ridnour is playing alot better then last year and is now more mature.
4. Antonio Daniels has come into his own.
5. Danny Fortson has stopped thugging around and is playing like he did in his best days in Golden State
6. The #1 reason they are playing better is because Ray Allen is in a contract year and is playing for his contract!!
When you take these things into consideration it can help explain some of the so called anomolies.
1. Rashard Lewis is having his best year as a pro, it seems as if he is figuring things out.
2. Radmanovic is having his best year as a pro coming off the bench. He is playing the 3 spot and on occasion the 4 instead of being forced to play the 4 like last year.
3. Ridnour is playing alot better then last year and is now more mature.
4. Antonio Daniels has come into his own.
5. Danny Fortson has stopped thugging around and is playing like he did in his best days in Golden State
6. The #1 reason they are playing better is because Ray Allen is in a contract year and is playing for his contract!!
When you take these things into consideration it can help explain some of the so called anomolies.
yeah, somebody has to get those guys the memo saying they're susposed to fade now. 
This hasn't been a schedule thing, they've been smacking around the big goys as often as the softies. Got us once, San Antonio twice, Dallas...not a fluke.
Still think the falloff will happen -- again, jumps like this without major personnel changes just don't happen. But the longer this goes on, the better the chances are that they secure a playoff spot at the very least.
This hasn't been a schedule thing, they've been smacking around the big goys as often as the softies. Got us once, San Antonio twice, Dallas...not a fluke.Still think the falloff will happen -- again, jumps like this without major personnel changes just don't happen. But the longer this goes on, the better the chances are that they secure a playoff spot at the very least.
Hate to be the 1 advocating for Sonics but here it is....
Sonics will make the playoffs, make no mistake about it, and I'm not sure about this one but it could easily be that eventually they command one of the top 4 seeds. Why or how ?
Eric Neel had a nice article at Page2 and I'll go with him on most of the stuff there, but just a few points I feel need to be underlined...
First of all, major personal changes don't necessarily translate into moving multi-million contracts in and out, few of the changes in Seatlle actually did happen and some off those went so far under radar that it is hard to even recognize them...they have Barry off the point and although Barry is a much better overall backcourt filler, Ridnour is the one with better passing decissions, with much better as/to ratio and with Daniels off the bench teams up for the best duo in league in the as/to category(Daniels 4th, Ridnour 5th). Sonics don't need Barry since they have plenty of outside weapons that do the damage, they just need what they have now, a steady, tempo-controling point guard who takes care of the ball very well and makes good thing happen. That is a major upgrade looking back just a year ago...
And then the Fortson/Evans thing. Talking about agresivness on glass on both ends of the court
...how about Fortson, second in ft attempts per 48min (14.43 per 48min), and he cashes in on 87% of them, now that's ridiculous. Evans and Fortson are the ones responsible for Sonics being the top team in business when it comes down to opponents rebounds, they held them to 35 rpg, now that's amazing, remember the best team in this category....
I'd say the points will slightly go down, especially from the 3pt department, but that don't matter. Their defence shows up every night, that's why they may not win games like they do know, but they'll still be good enough for the top4 seeds come May...
Sonics will make the playoffs, make no mistake about it, and I'm not sure about this one but it could easily be that eventually they command one of the top 4 seeds. Why or how ?
Eric Neel had a nice article at Page2 and I'll go with him on most of the stuff there, but just a few points I feel need to be underlined...
First of all, major personal changes don't necessarily translate into moving multi-million contracts in and out, few of the changes in Seatlle actually did happen and some off those went so far under radar that it is hard to even recognize them...they have Barry off the point and although Barry is a much better overall backcourt filler, Ridnour is the one with better passing decissions, with much better as/to ratio and with Daniels off the bench teams up for the best duo in league in the as/to category(Daniels 4th, Ridnour 5th). Sonics don't need Barry since they have plenty of outside weapons that do the damage, they just need what they have now, a steady, tempo-controling point guard who takes care of the ball very well and makes good thing happen. That is a major upgrade looking back just a year ago...
And then the Fortson/Evans thing. Talking about agresivness on glass on both ends of the court
I'd say the points will slightly go down, especially from the 3pt department, but that don't matter. Their defence shows up every night, that's why they may not win games like they do know, but they'll still be good enough for the top4 seeds come May...
Top 4 will be very tough for them. Figure they'd have to go off and win 55 or so to be guaranteed of that. Have to either hold off Minnesota to win the division, or have a better record than ANY team in the conference who doesn't win its division (us/Phx, Dal etc.). Tough to pull off.
And teams can improve from within. The Sonics clearly have. But improve by 30 wins from within with an only moderately young team? Not likely.
Every year some team or teams puts on an early show. Rarely are the same ones around come April/May. The Sonics are making a good run at it right now, but they're fighting history here bigtime. If they even MAKE the playoffs they will have already exceeded expectations by leaps and bounds. To actually be a factor would be almost unprecedented.
And teams can improve from within. The Sonics clearly have. But improve by 30 wins from within with an only moderately young team? Not likely.
Every year some team or teams puts on an early show. Rarely are the same ones around come April/May. The Sonics are making a good run at it right now, but they're fighting history here bigtime. If they even MAKE the playoffs they will have already exceeded expectations by leaps and bounds. To actually be a factor would be almost unprecedented.
I'm with you there, playoffs are another story and "surprises" there are possible although rarely, but I'll wait for the end of April to judge on their playoff luck...but while talking about 82 games, one of the top4 seeds could indeed be far fetched for them although pretty doable having in mind the things that propelled them early on...and few of those are pretty constant in terms of 82 games, especially defense-realated (holding down opp. at 35.75 rbpg, best in league,their opponents have a steal average of 6.05 spg, also best in league)...
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No crystal ball here but I would be supprised if the Sonics can keep shooting THIS good for the remainder. They are a healty team plying a peek performance,a nd while there is no particualr reason to suspect this will end, expecience with reality tell me it will. They are good. Fortson imporved their inside presnece making a BIG impact on a long ball team. Ridenour no longer looks like Frodo Baggins... he has a much more mature game and great moves to the hoop. BUT they are not a top 5 team in the West, maybe top 8. I would be supprised to see them fall out compleetly and would like to see nothing better than for them to take the number 8 spot jsut ahaed of the Lakers, ook thats not true I'd rather see the CLIPERS take the neumber 8 spot just a ahead of the Lakers. But how well they do in the paly offs will be entirely dependat on how they are playing at the END of the season. I honestly can see them either blown out in round one or playing in the WCF.
I apologize in advance that this will be a very long post. I'll try to tell you why we are successful till now. We had only one game nationally televised and people really do not know much about us.
We are a good shooting team. That's for sure. But nothing extraordinary than previous years. Also, we do not only have one or two guys that can shoot the ball. We have Ridnour, Ray, Rashard, Vlad, AD that can shoot the ball from anywhere. And we have Flip Murray coming from IL this Saturday. Some people even say that Mateen Cleaves can throw a towel from 3 point line
. That means that we spread the floor well, and if one or two guys are off, you still have plenty others to hand the ball.
One poster from our board put the following numbers on our board:
Ray Allen
This season: 43.6% from field, 44.0% from 3.
For his career: 44.8% from field, 40.2% from 3.
Rashard Lewis
This season: 47.8% from field, 39.4% from 3.
For his career: 46.0% from field, 38.2% from 3.
Antonio Daniels
This season: 46.8% from field, 28.9% from 3.
For his career: 45.2% from field, 33% from 3.
Vladimir Radmanovic
This season: 41.6% from the field, 39.2% from 3.
For his career: 41.7% from the field, 37.6 from 3.
Luke Ridnour
This season: 41.5% from the field, 47.2% from 3.
For his career: 41.4% from the field, 37.9% from 3.
You can actually see that aside from Luke, and this is his only second year, there is not much improvement in our shooting. AD even has worse 3 point shooting right now while Ray has better but Ray's FG percentage has not changed a lot. We can assume to cool off a bit, but not much I suppose.
Rebounding is probably the biggest factor for us to win the games though. I thank Fortson for that. He is the kind of guy that you like when he's on your team and despise when he is not. We were giving a lot of second chance opportunities to the opponents last year. Now this turned around. Many games are decided by small margins and those rebounds become even more important. When combined with nice shooting, teams cannot do zone against us, they have to pull their bigs out for screens and we end up even having more rebounds. Last year our guys were afraid of going after the rebound. But now whereever the ball goes you see our guys rushing over there. They are not afraid of being hit, hurt, etc. I believe this also has a lot to do with Fortson. During the practices you face that guy then at the game anybody is OK
.
Our defense has vastly improved. First, because of rebounding, we do not need to work again and again on the defensive side. And on the offensive side we make the other teams defend again and again and get them tired. We are still not a great one on one defending team but now teams cannot get inside at their own will, unless they accept a couple of bruises here and there.
The rule change, do not touch the guy if he is on top of the key, has also favored us a lot. Previously there was a lot of holding happening against us and it was OK. Now, all those are fouls and we go to free throw line more often. We are one of the better free throw shooting teams.
Schedule worked in favor of us. We started with a horrible Clippers loss. But we had Atlanta at home afterwards for a win. And then we played at home for sometime, which helped us to build our confidence. I believe if we started our season against Spurs and Dallas and then played against Kings and Suns we would lose all the games and then we could even lose to Bobcats later on.
This brings me to another point. Chemistry. The team chemistry is unbelievable right now. Win or lose, after every game the players come together on the center court and they huddle. Somebody (believe it or not mostly Jerome) gives a talk and they go to locker room afterwards. Even though for many of them it is their contract year, rather than looking for their own numbers they try to work for the team.
Luke and Vlad improved a lot. Luke became a very nice PG suddenly, while Vlad fights for the rebounds crazy and puts his body everywhere. The soft European image of Vlad is going away. Well, he still takes lots of threes but he defends the post guys. Luke is not rushing the offense. Many times we use the clock to the last 5 seconds. He really helped us a lot to have an effective half court offense.
Nate is doing an amazing job and the players actually listen to him. Nate was always my favorite. Even when the team was doing horrible, all the people on our boards were favoring Nate and wishing Wally Walker (Operations of Basketball whatever...) to be fired. We actually collected money among fans, made a banner, paid to Key Arena and put a "Fire Wally" banner. It is still there
.
I am hopeful. We may not win the championship or may not even go to second round, we are going to see our chances when that time comes. It is even too early to talk about next week. But I am very happy for whatever this team has given to me up till now.
We are a good shooting team. That's for sure. But nothing extraordinary than previous years. Also, we do not only have one or two guys that can shoot the ball. We have Ridnour, Ray, Rashard, Vlad, AD that can shoot the ball from anywhere. And we have Flip Murray coming from IL this Saturday. Some people even say that Mateen Cleaves can throw a towel from 3 point line
One poster from our board put the following numbers on our board:
Ray Allen
This season: 43.6% from field, 44.0% from 3.
For his career: 44.8% from field, 40.2% from 3.
Rashard Lewis
This season: 47.8% from field, 39.4% from 3.
For his career: 46.0% from field, 38.2% from 3.
Antonio Daniels
This season: 46.8% from field, 28.9% from 3.
For his career: 45.2% from field, 33% from 3.
Vladimir Radmanovic
This season: 41.6% from the field, 39.2% from 3.
For his career: 41.7% from the field, 37.6 from 3.
Luke Ridnour
This season: 41.5% from the field, 47.2% from 3.
For his career: 41.4% from the field, 37.9% from 3.
You can actually see that aside from Luke, and this is his only second year, there is not much improvement in our shooting. AD even has worse 3 point shooting right now while Ray has better but Ray's FG percentage has not changed a lot. We can assume to cool off a bit, but not much I suppose.
Rebounding is probably the biggest factor for us to win the games though. I thank Fortson for that. He is the kind of guy that you like when he's on your team and despise when he is not. We were giving a lot of second chance opportunities to the opponents last year. Now this turned around. Many games are decided by small margins and those rebounds become even more important. When combined with nice shooting, teams cannot do zone against us, they have to pull their bigs out for screens and we end up even having more rebounds. Last year our guys were afraid of going after the rebound. But now whereever the ball goes you see our guys rushing over there. They are not afraid of being hit, hurt, etc. I believe this also has a lot to do with Fortson. During the practices you face that guy then at the game anybody is OK
Our defense has vastly improved. First, because of rebounding, we do not need to work again and again on the defensive side. And on the offensive side we make the other teams defend again and again and get them tired. We are still not a great one on one defending team but now teams cannot get inside at their own will, unless they accept a couple of bruises here and there.
The rule change, do not touch the guy if he is on top of the key, has also favored us a lot. Previously there was a lot of holding happening against us and it was OK. Now, all those are fouls and we go to free throw line more often. We are one of the better free throw shooting teams.
Schedule worked in favor of us. We started with a horrible Clippers loss. But we had Atlanta at home afterwards for a win. And then we played at home for sometime, which helped us to build our confidence. I believe if we started our season against Spurs and Dallas and then played against Kings and Suns we would lose all the games and then we could even lose to Bobcats later on.
This brings me to another point. Chemistry. The team chemistry is unbelievable right now. Win or lose, after every game the players come together on the center court and they huddle. Somebody (believe it or not mostly Jerome) gives a talk and they go to locker room afterwards. Even though for many of them it is their contract year, rather than looking for their own numbers they try to work for the team.
Luke and Vlad improved a lot. Luke became a very nice PG suddenly, while Vlad fights for the rebounds crazy and puts his body everywhere. The soft European image of Vlad is going away. Well, he still takes lots of threes but he defends the post guys. Luke is not rushing the offense. Many times we use the clock to the last 5 seconds. He really helped us a lot to have an effective half court offense.
Nate is doing an amazing job and the players actually listen to him. Nate was always my favorite. Even when the team was doing horrible, all the people on our boards were favoring Nate and wishing Wally Walker (Operations of Basketball whatever...) to be fired. We actually collected money among fans, made a banner, paid to Key Arena and put a "Fire Wally" banner. It is still there
I am hopeful. We may not win the championship or may not even go to second round, we are going to see our chances when that time comes. It is even too early to talk about next week. But I am very happy for whatever this team has given to me up till now.
Radmanovic stats looks pretty much the same as last year, but he did hit some big shots for Seattle this season. Don't count on this for too long, he is the most unreliable guy and can become one of the biggest wastes of athleticism that I have ever seen. You think that Pedja disappears; Radmanovic is able to completely take himself out of the game.
Yeah, looks like the 3 balls are not falling for seattle tonight, Ray Allen 0 for 6 from 3, team 5 for 16 from the arc.
Interesting that its the other meen green 3-ball machine to be winning (yeah, I know, that was 2 seasons ago but still cool that its Garry vs. the Sonics, and the Celtics were the last green team to rely so heavily on 3's (even more than Dallas).)
Interesting that its the other meen green 3-ball machine to be winning (yeah, I know, that was 2 seasons ago but still cool that its Garry vs. the Sonics, and the Celtics were the last green team to rely so heavily on 3's (even more than Dallas).)
As Piksi said, every strike ends. So ours ended as well.
I was out tonight, so I taped the game. I just finished watching it. We definitely couldn't make our shots. Not because we executed bad, or we relied on long jumpers. It just didn't happen. Ray, at one point, missed two consecutive lay ups. We got 15 offensive rebounds. We outrebounded them. They had more turnovers than us. We went to the free throw line 33 times, again 8 more than them, but the ball just didn't go in. The hustle was there, so I am happy with it. Sometimes it just does not happen.
But if there is a loosing team, there is a winning one as well. Boston executed really well. They had good ball movement and they got into rhythm early in the game. They shot 54.2% from the field. At the end of 3rd quarter they were shooting 60%. In the last quarter we forced them to turnovers and missed shots and cut their lead to 3, but we missed 6 free throws in that stretch. Props to them they responded well after that point and came back with 5 more points with well executed plays. That finished the game.
They beat us twice this year. Props to them.
I was out tonight, so I taped the game. I just finished watching it. We definitely couldn't make our shots. Not because we executed bad, or we relied on long jumpers. It just didn't happen. Ray, at one point, missed two consecutive lay ups. We got 15 offensive rebounds. We outrebounded them. They had more turnovers than us. We went to the free throw line 33 times, again 8 more than them, but the ball just didn't go in. The hustle was there, so I am happy with it. Sometimes it just does not happen.
But if there is a loosing team, there is a winning one as well. Boston executed really well. They had good ball movement and they got into rhythm early in the game. They shot 54.2% from the field. At the end of 3rd quarter they were shooting 60%. In the last quarter we forced them to turnovers and missed shots and cut their lead to 3, but we missed 6 free throws in that stretch. Props to them they responded well after that point and came back with 5 more points with well executed plays. That finished the game.
They beat us twice this year. Props to them.
live and die by the 3.... sonics died by it tonight. 0-10 for allen OUCH! this is why this team won't be anything special in the playoffs ( if they make it) they will not shoot this way in the playoffs. the league will adjust to their play as the season progresses.
hahah the celts have beaten the sonics twice, yet the spurs have lost to them twice. whodathunk!
edit: no apology is needed gocemen, i actually enjoyed reading your long post, it's intresting to hear it from a sonics fan POV.
hahah the celts have beaten the sonics twice, yet the spurs have lost to them twice. whodathunk!
edit: no apology is needed gocemen, i actually enjoyed reading your long post, it's intresting to hear it from a sonics fan POV.
The Boston Celtics are a very underrated team and it does not surprise me at all that they beat the Sonics. The Sonics were bound to start missing shots from 3 point range eventually. Now let's see if they can manage to bounce back in their next game. This might be the beginning of the end for the Sonics.
