Game 29: Atlanta Hawks (20-7) @ Denver Nuggets (19-9)

[pickaxe]

uh I can see the desert analogy, and knowing Phil Jackson likes to walk burning sage through his locker room after a loss, I would offer up the same mentality - eliminate the bad energy surrounding you and rejoice in what you do have, a dude that can hit long range like JR and appears to care about his work enough to step it back up after a couple of crappy games - there are sixth men in the league who don't step it up after 82 games

the free throws for JR have always been around 70% so that's still a long term thing he needs to improve - and now if we are looking for discipline and consistency from JR, he should probably set it as a goal to hit 85% of his free throws by end of season

[KAVK]

Snake man please!

He has some decent points though, Billups was unable to go so J.R took himself seriously into this game & delivered. Team will take it. it is not like he gonna jack up this many shots every night to limit others attempts. Important thing is he is getting his confidence back & when CB comes back he will balance the team like he does often. I am all down for balanced team effort over a 1 , 2 , 3 man explosion show but everyone else had decent game. This team plays with energy & emotion fed from each other, so we need a spark plug guys like Melo, J.R, Ty to spark the team for energized game.

Blake definite choice against quality teams. Now need a darn road Win.

[el loco]

J.R.'s great games like this one are so sexy I know it's too hard to resist... you'll go "imagine if he has games like this we'll be invincible"


My take is if we had Chuck Hayes/ Carl Landry or big men playing like true big men and Shane Battier, we wouldn't need to have "offensive explosion" from someone to "take care of business at home". We'd be dominant every game played at home.


Counting on explosive games from someone to show we're a dominant team when they come once in a blue moon is moronic... no matter how "tempting" it is. It's even showing our weakness and dependence on someone's big game to beat someone at home.

I'm sure Lakers folks saw this, shrugged this off, and laughed... it's nothing to be concerned or scared about... because it's not a weapon when it fires only once in a year.

The Nuggets have the best home record in the NBA, so I would say that they are dominant enough at home, and asking someone to step up his game in the absence of a starter is pretty common place around the league.

[pickaxe]

Karl I'm sure left him in because he saw the fan value in it, and the confidence it can bring for the next few efforts. Nuggets had to play D and recover a wide margin lead and then only then was JR really allowed to keep going off.

Not to say if it wasn't a close game JR wouldn't be shooting, but forced shots without passing the ball would have been more frowned upon.

The only thing I really hope JR takes away from it is no matter how much you want a record, it's not automatic. If he plays to pass and receive the ball back I bet he makes 13 shots from downtown last night. The fact he failed on his last few attempts should be a little lesson mixed in with everything else.