Uncia03
Starter
Today there were six games being played. As with Day 4, I was only able to watch four of the six. The games I saw were:
Knicks vs Pistons
Bucks vs Bulls
Kings vs D-League
Nuggets vs Wizards
Game 1: Knicks vs Pistons
I was looking forward to this game. On the one side we had the New York Knicks. Now I’m not a big fan of the Knicks, however, we are going to be playing them in our final Summer League game, so I was happy to get to watch them play once to get a read on this team.
On the other side we had the Pistons. If you’ve read my reports you’ll recall that on Day 2 Austin Daye had one of the best games from an individual player that I’ve seen this week, so I wanted to see if he was still carrying on his strong play.
Knicks: Jordan Hill
Hill was the primary guy I was watching for the Knicks, and he had a decent game. He started off active on the offensive end, but just couldn’t get anything to go down. He looked to post up, play the pick n roll, and hit the open 10-12 foot shoot. So a lot of activity, but I think by the end of the 1st quarter he only had 4 points.
He ended the day with 14 points on 6/14 shooting, 2/4 from the FT line, along with 5 rebounds, two TOs, and one blocked shot.
On defense, he was matched up most of the time against Jonas Jerebko and did a decent job defending Jerebko. Jerebko has shown good instincts on the offensive glass in previous games, and Hill was unable to prevent Jerbko from pulling down 4 offensive rebounds. In fact considering that Hill was the biggest, tallest, most mobile big on the Knicks, he did a fairly poor job on the boards today.
For a small stretch he was matched up against Austin Daye for some reason, and Daye was just too quick for Hill to handle. I think a Hill/Thompson match-up will be fun to watch on Friday, so I hope they square off against each other.
Knicks: Toney Douglas
Douglas was the floor leader for the Knicks, and he did a very solid job in the game. He didn’t seem to have too much ability to get into the lane, but instead looked to come of screens in order to set up his teammates. His shot was not falling, and I think that hurt his ability to drive, as Singletary was able to give him some space.
He ended the game with 5 points on 1/6 shooting, 0/3 from 3pt land, and 3/3 from the line. He did however, have 10 assists and only 2 TOs, which is what you want to see from your floor general, especially when the shot isn’t falling.
On defense he was covering Sean Singletary, and Singletary did have success using his quickness to get past Douglas and into the lane.
No-one else really stood out for the Knicks. In a way, it’s a bit disappointing because other than Jordan Hill, this team didn’t really show a lot from a personnel standpoint, so the game with the Kings might not be too exciting, we’ll see.
Pistons: Austin Daye
Austin looked good out there today. Even though his statline probably looks better in today’s game compared to Saturday’s game, I thought he played far better in Saturday’s game. With that said, a lot of people were talking about Austin’s game during the course of this contest, as he stood out as the best player on the floor in this game.
He put up 27 points on 9/17 shooting and 8/10 line. He also had a huge game on the boards with 13 rebounds. However, he had 5 turn-overs and zero assists. At the start of the game he made a couple of passes to try and get teammates involved, but none of them were converted for points, and he made a couple of bad passes. After that, it looked as if he was just looking to be aggressive on the glass and look for his own shot.
In the last two games, he’s made a couple nice pull-ups from the corner for a banked shot. So it looks as if it’s something he works on.
On defense he was matched up against Morris Almond for most of the game and held Almond to 4/11 shooting and 11 points. Almond also only finished the game with 1 rebound. So Daye kept Almond in check on both the boards and the scoring.
So he had another good game, but in his lack of setting up his teammates in this game, it felt like a lesser game than the one I saw earlier, even though he had more points and a far stronger game on the boards.
Piston: DaJaun Summers
If you’ll recall Summers had a strong game against us, and in the other game I covered, started off slow, but ended up having an even better game due to his aggression in attacking the rim.
Today’s game was a tale of two halves. In the first half he was very passive, and it almost looked as if he was going through the motions. He ended the half with 4 points on 6 shots.
In the second half he took 15 more shots, going 9/15 and ended up with a 26 points for the game. He was also more active on the boards, pulling down 6 rebounds in the 2nd half for 8 total for the game.
He was scoring the same way he did in the 2nd game I saw him in. He was hitting the set shot when it was dished to him, but otherwise quite aggressive in attacking the basket and getting the ball to the rim.
So a very strong 2nd half for Summers allowed him to end up with a strong game. I think the biggest thing with Summers is that he’s going to be undersized for the 4 spot, and will probably have problems defending that position, so we’ll see how well he does once the regular season starts.
Detroit: Sean Singletary
Singletary had a good game today. He shot the ball well (5/8 field, 4/6 line) for 15 points and ran the team well dishing out 6 assists with only 1 turn-over. He was able to use his quickness to get into the lane to either pull up for a jump-shot or set up a teammate.
He also did a good job keeping Toney Douglas out of the lane while on defense.
Game 2: Bucks vs Bulls
I was looking forward to this game as I wanted to see the Rose vs Jennings matchup. Unfortunately, Rose didn’t play today, and I didn’t even see him at the game. He might not be participating at all in Summer League. So with Rose out, the game became a lot less exciting.
Bulls: James Johnson
Johnson was the Bulls early 1st round pick and I was watching him closely to see how well he’d perform. All in all he had a very poor game.
He shot the ball poorly and didn’t do much on the boards considering his supposed strength in that area. In 34 minutes of play he was 4/15 from the field and 8/11 from the line for 16 points. In addition he had 4 rebounds and 1 assist.
Johnson picked up most of his points in the 4th quarter (9) and just didn’t really seem to have much impact on the game at all. He didn’t control the boards, didn’t work to set up his teammates, and didn’t hit his shots.
He did a decent job in guarding Luc Mbah a Moute, but Luc has been having a dreadful summer league, so I’m willing to bet the issue was with Luc and not steller defense on Johnson’s part.
Bulls: Taj Gibson
Taj looked way undersized to me to play the 4 position. He’s 6’9 and only 225 pounds, and he looked it out there on the court. He was in charge of guarding Joe Alexander, and Alexander looked to be both bigger and quicker than Taj.
What really hurt Taj were the fouls, as he picked up four quick fouls in the early minutes of the game, and I don’t think he ever really got into rhythm.
Gibson kept his scoring opportunities to the catch and finish type around the rim and did well going 6/9 for 12 points. He also collected 8 boards which was good for only 24 minutes of play.
Unfortunately he did end up fouling out of the game.
Bulls: DeMarcus Nelson
The bulls really lacked a floor general in this game. Nelson seemed to be the dominant ball-handler. He did a good job getting into the lane, and I thought he made a number of nice passes, though he only ended up with 1 assist.
He spent a good amount of time being guarded by Jennings, and just killed him on the offensive end. Jennings was not able to stop Nelson at all in getting to the spots he wanted.
On the defensive end, Nelson was able to keep Jennings from getting into the lane, but Jennings was still able to hit open teammates for shots through-out the game.
Bucks: Brandon Jennings
His game looked very similar to the game he played against the Kings. He couldn’t shoot the ball well (4/10), he had difficulty getting into the lane against Nelson, he couldn’t stop Nelson from getting into the lane, and he was able to find teammates who knocked down their shot for the assist.
Bucks: Joe Alexander
Alexander was pretty active in this game. For all of his activity he didn’t have that great of a game. He didn’t shoot it too well (7/16), and he didn’t rebound well (5 boards).
He only had 1 assist, but he made a couple of very nice passes, which were not converted for buckets. He also had 3 blocks on the night.
Not too much more to discuss for Alexander, as his game was again similar to what we saw against the Kings, with his offense being mostly the face-up game with the drive to the rim, or the 7-8ft pull-up.
Bucks: Amir Johnson
Amir looked to be the best player on the court in the first quarter or so. He then slowed way down as the game continued, but still had a very good game.
He only played 24 minutes, but he was 5/6 from the field and 7/11 from the FT line. In addition he picked up 8 boards, and had 2 blocked shots.
He was very active on getting position on offense to make the quick conversion once the pass was made to him, and he did very well controlling the boards and playing both man defense and weak-side defense. I think this was the best game I’d seen from him so far this week.
Bucks: Jodie Meeks
Another nice catch and shoot game from Meeks. He shot the ball well and ended up with 16 points on the night. Most of the damage was done with coming off the screen and playing the catch and shoot game, with a small bit of driving to the basket if the seam was clear enough.
He also had 2 assists, with one of them a really nice drop-off to Amir Johnson on a fast break. Just another solid game from Meeks.
Knicks vs Pistons
Bucks vs Bulls
Kings vs D-League
Nuggets vs Wizards
Game 1: Knicks vs Pistons
I was looking forward to this game. On the one side we had the New York Knicks. Now I’m not a big fan of the Knicks, however, we are going to be playing them in our final Summer League game, so I was happy to get to watch them play once to get a read on this team.
On the other side we had the Pistons. If you’ve read my reports you’ll recall that on Day 2 Austin Daye had one of the best games from an individual player that I’ve seen this week, so I wanted to see if he was still carrying on his strong play.
Knicks: Jordan Hill
Hill was the primary guy I was watching for the Knicks, and he had a decent game. He started off active on the offensive end, but just couldn’t get anything to go down. He looked to post up, play the pick n roll, and hit the open 10-12 foot shoot. So a lot of activity, but I think by the end of the 1st quarter he only had 4 points.
He ended the day with 14 points on 6/14 shooting, 2/4 from the FT line, along with 5 rebounds, two TOs, and one blocked shot.
On defense, he was matched up most of the time against Jonas Jerebko and did a decent job defending Jerebko. Jerebko has shown good instincts on the offensive glass in previous games, and Hill was unable to prevent Jerbko from pulling down 4 offensive rebounds. In fact considering that Hill was the biggest, tallest, most mobile big on the Knicks, he did a fairly poor job on the boards today.
For a small stretch he was matched up against Austin Daye for some reason, and Daye was just too quick for Hill to handle. I think a Hill/Thompson match-up will be fun to watch on Friday, so I hope they square off against each other.
Knicks: Toney Douglas
Douglas was the floor leader for the Knicks, and he did a very solid job in the game. He didn’t seem to have too much ability to get into the lane, but instead looked to come of screens in order to set up his teammates. His shot was not falling, and I think that hurt his ability to drive, as Singletary was able to give him some space.
He ended the game with 5 points on 1/6 shooting, 0/3 from 3pt land, and 3/3 from the line. He did however, have 10 assists and only 2 TOs, which is what you want to see from your floor general, especially when the shot isn’t falling.
On defense he was covering Sean Singletary, and Singletary did have success using his quickness to get past Douglas and into the lane.
No-one else really stood out for the Knicks. In a way, it’s a bit disappointing because other than Jordan Hill, this team didn’t really show a lot from a personnel standpoint, so the game with the Kings might not be too exciting, we’ll see.
Pistons: Austin Daye
Austin looked good out there today. Even though his statline probably looks better in today’s game compared to Saturday’s game, I thought he played far better in Saturday’s game. With that said, a lot of people were talking about Austin’s game during the course of this contest, as he stood out as the best player on the floor in this game.
He put up 27 points on 9/17 shooting and 8/10 line. He also had a huge game on the boards with 13 rebounds. However, he had 5 turn-overs and zero assists. At the start of the game he made a couple of passes to try and get teammates involved, but none of them were converted for points, and he made a couple of bad passes. After that, it looked as if he was just looking to be aggressive on the glass and look for his own shot.
In the last two games, he’s made a couple nice pull-ups from the corner for a banked shot. So it looks as if it’s something he works on.
On defense he was matched up against Morris Almond for most of the game and held Almond to 4/11 shooting and 11 points. Almond also only finished the game with 1 rebound. So Daye kept Almond in check on both the boards and the scoring.
So he had another good game, but in his lack of setting up his teammates in this game, it felt like a lesser game than the one I saw earlier, even though he had more points and a far stronger game on the boards.
Piston: DaJaun Summers
If you’ll recall Summers had a strong game against us, and in the other game I covered, started off slow, but ended up having an even better game due to his aggression in attacking the rim.
Today’s game was a tale of two halves. In the first half he was very passive, and it almost looked as if he was going through the motions. He ended the half with 4 points on 6 shots.
In the second half he took 15 more shots, going 9/15 and ended up with a 26 points for the game. He was also more active on the boards, pulling down 6 rebounds in the 2nd half for 8 total for the game.
He was scoring the same way he did in the 2nd game I saw him in. He was hitting the set shot when it was dished to him, but otherwise quite aggressive in attacking the basket and getting the ball to the rim.
So a very strong 2nd half for Summers allowed him to end up with a strong game. I think the biggest thing with Summers is that he’s going to be undersized for the 4 spot, and will probably have problems defending that position, so we’ll see how well he does once the regular season starts.
Detroit: Sean Singletary
Singletary had a good game today. He shot the ball well (5/8 field, 4/6 line) for 15 points and ran the team well dishing out 6 assists with only 1 turn-over. He was able to use his quickness to get into the lane to either pull up for a jump-shot or set up a teammate.
He also did a good job keeping Toney Douglas out of the lane while on defense.
Game 2: Bucks vs Bulls
I was looking forward to this game as I wanted to see the Rose vs Jennings matchup. Unfortunately, Rose didn’t play today, and I didn’t even see him at the game. He might not be participating at all in Summer League. So with Rose out, the game became a lot less exciting.
Bulls: James Johnson
Johnson was the Bulls early 1st round pick and I was watching him closely to see how well he’d perform. All in all he had a very poor game.
He shot the ball poorly and didn’t do much on the boards considering his supposed strength in that area. In 34 minutes of play he was 4/15 from the field and 8/11 from the line for 16 points. In addition he had 4 rebounds and 1 assist.
Johnson picked up most of his points in the 4th quarter (9) and just didn’t really seem to have much impact on the game at all. He didn’t control the boards, didn’t work to set up his teammates, and didn’t hit his shots.
He did a decent job in guarding Luc Mbah a Moute, but Luc has been having a dreadful summer league, so I’m willing to bet the issue was with Luc and not steller defense on Johnson’s part.
Bulls: Taj Gibson
Taj looked way undersized to me to play the 4 position. He’s 6’9 and only 225 pounds, and he looked it out there on the court. He was in charge of guarding Joe Alexander, and Alexander looked to be both bigger and quicker than Taj.
What really hurt Taj were the fouls, as he picked up four quick fouls in the early minutes of the game, and I don’t think he ever really got into rhythm.
Gibson kept his scoring opportunities to the catch and finish type around the rim and did well going 6/9 for 12 points. He also collected 8 boards which was good for only 24 minutes of play.
Unfortunately he did end up fouling out of the game.
Bulls: DeMarcus Nelson
The bulls really lacked a floor general in this game. Nelson seemed to be the dominant ball-handler. He did a good job getting into the lane, and I thought he made a number of nice passes, though he only ended up with 1 assist.
He spent a good amount of time being guarded by Jennings, and just killed him on the offensive end. Jennings was not able to stop Nelson at all in getting to the spots he wanted.
On the defensive end, Nelson was able to keep Jennings from getting into the lane, but Jennings was still able to hit open teammates for shots through-out the game.
Bucks: Brandon Jennings
His game looked very similar to the game he played against the Kings. He couldn’t shoot the ball well (4/10), he had difficulty getting into the lane against Nelson, he couldn’t stop Nelson from getting into the lane, and he was able to find teammates who knocked down their shot for the assist.
Bucks: Joe Alexander
Alexander was pretty active in this game. For all of his activity he didn’t have that great of a game. He didn’t shoot it too well (7/16), and he didn’t rebound well (5 boards).
He only had 1 assist, but he made a couple of very nice passes, which were not converted for buckets. He also had 3 blocks on the night.
Not too much more to discuss for Alexander, as his game was again similar to what we saw against the Kings, with his offense being mostly the face-up game with the drive to the rim, or the 7-8ft pull-up.
Bucks: Amir Johnson
Amir looked to be the best player on the court in the first quarter or so. He then slowed way down as the game continued, but still had a very good game.
He only played 24 minutes, but he was 5/6 from the field and 7/11 from the FT line. In addition he picked up 8 boards, and had 2 blocked shots.
He was very active on getting position on offense to make the quick conversion once the pass was made to him, and he did very well controlling the boards and playing both man defense and weak-side defense. I think this was the best game I’d seen from him so far this week.
Bucks: Jodie Meeks
Another nice catch and shoot game from Meeks. He shot the ball well and ended up with 16 points on the night. Most of the damage was done with coming off the screen and playing the catch and shoot game, with a small bit of driving to the basket if the seam was clear enough.
He also had 2 assists, with one of them a really nice drop-off to Amir Johnson on a fast break. Just another solid game from Meeks.
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