Captain_Caveman wrote:
[snippy snipped]
If that's the only thing that ever happens with the guy, who cares?
But now there are a couple more incidents here of him completely losing his cool over nothing and reacting in ways that are completely inappropriate and borderline intent to injure. Bitch moves, to put it another way.
None of this is either here nor there except it may exhibit the beginning of a trend of bad character behavior from a guy whose alleged best attribute was character. It's enough at this point to make me question if he is more Artest than KG, and how he's going to react under pressure in big games when guys are trying to push his buttons.
I was ringing this bell bigtime this time last year in the draft thread. I didn't like Smart for a variety of reasons (not a PG, not ultra-athletic) but the biggest thing I didn't like was that he was a raging hothead. I actually
like hotheads in moderation (John McEnroe being one of my idols), my problem with Smart's version of hothead is that it was indiscriminate, he was as likely to lash out at a teammate or a fan as he was at the opposing players or the refs. To me, that belied a deeper anger issue, something beyond mere emotionality, a deep trigger point that once crossed completely overtook all his decision making faculties. In other words, someone you couldn't completely count on or trust.
Imagine my surprise then when he came into this season and showed none of those tendencies (initially). He was patting officials on the butt after a bad call, being humble with his teammates, showing zero reaction to bad calls or cheap plays by opponents. I remember it was sometime in January where I started thinking "this kid has really turned a corner". All that red flag behavior I saw in college hadn't transitioned to the pros. I figured it'd take him YEARS to get his anger under control and here he had done it in 6 months. Sure, he wasn't playing as well as we all thought he would, but he appeared to have gotten his anger under control.
No sooner than I say that and he slowly reverted. More animation on the court. Actual complaining to refs. His body language matching his level of play (strutting when playing well, or frustrated head-hanging when he didn't). The stoic, humble kid from November was slowly replaced with good ole OK ST Marcus Smart. It seemed the more he unleashed the less refined parts of his game, the penetration and questionable shot selection, the more he revealed his true inner emotional state. At first, I thought this is great, he's getting comfortable, letting his inner dog out, and getting confident and he's really going to start balling real soon.
And he did really start balling. Won Rookie of the Month in February. But the progression from cautious humble Marcus to brash confident Marcus revealed the true rub: to be the best he can be, he must play on the edge of his emotions and being on the edge brings out what appears to be an (at times) uncontrollable temper.
There's no going back to cautious humble Marcus. That guy sucked anyway (in comparison to Rookie of the Month Marcus). What it's about going forward is accepting who Marcus is (a hothead, which isn't the worst thing in the world because he actually cares just doesn't know how to show it) while also working with him to first of all direct that anger at only the more acceptable targets (other players and refs or fans) and then as more suspensions happen and he gets older, use the suspensions as motivation to get him to slowly work on directing that anger at the only real truly acceptable target, which is on the court making actual winning basketball plays and not nut punches in 20 point blowouts 'cause you don't like how screens are being set.
To his credit (IMO), none of his anger has been directed at his own teammates and coach (as far as we know). This is good, it means his emotionality--which is at the heart of his greatness as a competitor and player--can still be harnessed productively. He might not ever get all the way there but if can maintain some kind of line he won't cross, then you can work with that and learn to trust it.
The leaks are real...the news is fake.
I'm just here for the memes.
