GAME 57: Clippers (38-18) @ Pistons (16-38)—Wednesday 5PM PDT

[esqtvd]

Doom Patrol MIA lol

Props to Mr Playaloc, Reggie's faithful supporter. Don't make us look up who was calling Reggie "unplayable." He is playable. He won us this one tonight.

The man is just turning 31 and is playing the best ball of his career. At the moment, REG is our x-factor, and with Bev missing so many games, I can't even imagine where we'd be without Reg stepping up.

KL-PG-Batum-Ibaka-Bev Plus+4.6
KL-PG-Batum-Ibaka-Reggie Plus +4.8

Sad that some would write him off because he had a few lapses of judgement last year. Is it so shocking that there is such a concept of "improving"? Reggie has been an absolute pro. Out of the rotation, benched, starter... Doesn't matter, he still plays with the same confidence. Earlier in the season when he called that time out when there were none left, his reaction was that of a guy who actually gives a damn...

I was fully expecting a loss and I would've been okay with it, given that 3 starters were missing and the game wasn't a blowout. But for the guys to get so locked in during the final minutes, that was just beautiful. It's these types of wins that will be big for the bench's confidence.

The best part is Reggie making his haters eat a big shi*itburger.

[Kelphus]

Great team win. plus vs. minus or fahrenheit vs. Celsius, it was a great win. Some guys who at the beginning of the season looked to be unreliable are as of late having their hero moments - Morris, Kennard, Jackson, Mann, Batum.. and I hope we keep Cousins. Didn't get a whole lot of time but contributed... he gives us muscle down low and still has a mid-range shot to guard.

I see lots of reasons to be more optimistic about this year's playoffs than last... we just need Ibaka back soon. Dude's missed a month and I can't find much information about how bad he is or how close he is. I am hoping there is a quiet plan to give him as much rest as they can, and not bring him back until the last minute. If that's the plan, it sure has been working so far, with 7 straight wins.

[esqtvd]

Were you this hyper-focused on +/- when Zu was playing w the starters last year too? If TMann was playing w the starters, he would have similar if not better +/- numbers too obviously. I thought you were a big Trez fan and not in the 90% pro Zu camp last year.

All I said was that Trezz earned his minutes. I said at the beginning of 2019-20 that Zubac earning 20 minutes might be key to our success, since Trezz's ideal workload is no more than 24. I was VERY happy with Zu starting. But I also thought he got fatigued at 20 minutes or so, esp as we got to the end of the 3rd quarter. [His first halves were consistently very good-to-excellent.]

All this came to fruition when the COVID hit. We were peaking. Trezz was peaking. Our offensive rating was peaking. It was working. And if you do the plus/minus, Trezz was slightly but measurably better even playing with the KL-PG lineups. Then the COVID hit. Trezz came into the bubble out of playing shape, missed most of the mini-season, and was a complete emotional wreck as well--his game never came back [although he was our leading scorer in the Game 7 debacle vs the Nuggets].

And FTR, Zu came to the bubble in great shape and played the best ball of his career--maybe the only Clipper who was and did. He averaged 24.6 mpg in the playoffs; Trezz only 18.7. Adjustments WERE made--Zu and Trezz were flip-flopped in their mpg.

As for this year re Serge and Zu--frankly I don't know. Like Marcus, Zu is doing better with the starters. But is the unit better with TWO new starters? Will Serge be cool with coming off the bench? Will he be as effective as Batum has been? Unfortunately, we have not been able to experiment with any of that.

[RingColluder]

I have doubts Serge even comes back this year.

[playaloc916]

Doom Patrol MIA lol

Props to Mr Playaloc, Reggie's faithful supporter. Don't make us look up who was calling Reggie "unplayable." He is playable. He won us this one tonight.

The man is just turning 31 and is playing the best ball of his career. At the moment, REG is our x-factor, and with Bev missing so many games, I can't even imagine where we'd be without Reg stepping up.

KL-PG-Batum-Ibaka-Bev Plus+4.6
KL-PG-Batum-Ibaka-Reggie Plus +4.8

Sad that some would write him off because he had a few lapses of judgement last year. Is it so shocking that there is such a concept of "improving"? Reggie has been an absolute pro. Out of the rotation, benched, starter... Doesn't matter, he still plays with the same confidence. Earlier in the season when he called that time out when there were none left, his reaction was that of a guy who actually gives a damn...

I was fully expecting a loss and I would've been okay with it, given that 3 starters were missing and the game wasn't a blowout. But for the guys to get so locked in during the final minutes, that was just beautiful. It's these types of wins that will be big for the bench's confidence.

A few lapses of judgement? He was a disaster on both sides of the court in the playoffs last year. Basically unplayable, not that it stopped Doc from playing him.

It's nice to see Reggie playing better lately, but the only way for him to prove the doubters wrong is to do this in the playoffs. Until then, there's always going to be a question mark with him no matter how well he plays in the regular season.

Right on cue, I was expecting this exact kind of a post from you He wasn't without his faults, but he was one of the better three point shooters during the playoffs, at 53%. There were times where his shooting could've helped a lot.

I guess it will be an interesting playoffs, since there will be two players trying to prove doubters wrong, PG and Reggie (though the year before, Reggie averaged 18 and 7 with the Pistons during the post season).

[playaloc916]

Doom Patrol MIA lol

Props to Mr Playaloc, Reggie's faithful supporter. Don't make us look up who was calling Reggie "unplayable." He is playable. He won us this one tonight.

The man is just turning 31 and is playing the best ball of his career. At the moment, REG is our x-factor, and with Bev missing so many games, I can't even imagine where we'd be without Reg stepping up.

KL-PG-Batum-Ibaka-Bev Plus+4.6
KL-PG-Batum-Ibaka-Reggie Plus +4.8

I don't want to mention again that Reggie is going to get exposed in the playoffs like Lou Williams, but you're giving a lot of ammunition with these, "Doom patrol" comments.

We can only hope our new coaching staff actually puts our players in positions to succeed, rather than positions to fail. They've been doing a pretty good job of this recently...

[RingColluder]

Doom Patrol MIA lol

Props to Mr Playaloc, Reggie's faithful supporter. Don't make us look up who was calling Reggie "unplayable." He is playable. He won us this one tonight.

The man is just turning 31 and is playing the best ball of his career. At the moment, REG is our x-factor, and with Bev missing so many games, I can't even imagine where we'd be without Reg stepping up.

KL-PG-Batum-Ibaka-Bev Plus+4.6
KL-PG-Batum-Ibaka-Reggie Plus +4.8

I don't want to mention again that Reggie is going to get exposed in the playoffs like Lou Williams, but you're giving a lot of ammunition with these, "Doom patrol" comments.

We can only hope our new coaching staff actually puts our players in positions to succeed, rather than positions to fail. They've been doing a pretty good job of this recently...

They have, but saying Reggie is a better fit on the 2nd team with a player like Rondo who doesn't shoot and defends well (vs on a starters lineup with a ton of shooters who like having the ball) is not a slight on Reggie. This is not an ego battle, I want us to do well in the playoffs. I like a lot of what Ty's done this season, but he still isn't big on the younger guys.

[esqtvd]

We can only hope our new coaching staff actually puts our players in positions to succeed, rather than positions to fail. They've been doing a pretty good job of this recently...

We have an embarrassment of riches--11 or 12 guys where we only need 8. Nobody needs to play anywhere but at their optimum positions, matchups, and minutes. Last year Shamet got 18.7 mpg in the playoffs and J-Myke got 17.1. On this year's squad, I think they'd barely get any.

[playaloc916]

I don't want to mention again that Reggie is going to get exposed in the playoffs like Lou Williams, but you're giving a lot of ammunition with these, "Doom patrol" comments.

We can only hope our new coaching staff actually puts our players in positions to succeed, rather than positions to fail. They've been doing a pretty good job of this recently...

They have, but saying Reggie is a better fit on the 2nd team with a player like Rondo who doesn't shoot and defends well (vs on a starters lineup with a ton of shooters who like having the ball) is not a slight on Reggie. This is not an ego battle, I want us to do well in the playoffs. I like a lot of what Ty's done this season, but he still isn't big on the younger guys.

Also, it might be a minutes preservation thing too. Rondo needs to be on the floor if/when things start getting stagnant near the end of close games. Right now we're not sure how many minutes Rondo can handle. I think the rotations will be more flexible to account for this.

[RingColluder]

We can only hope our new coaching staff actually puts our players in positions to succeed, rather than positions to fail. They've been doing a pretty good job of this recently...

They have, but saying Reggie is a better fit on the 2nd team with a player like Rondo who doesn't shoot and defends well (vs on a starters lineup with a ton of shooters who like having the ball) is not a slight on Reggie. This is not an ego battle, I want us to do well in the playoffs. I like a lot of what Ty's done this season, but he still isn't big on the younger guys.

Also, it might be a minutes preservation thing too. Rondo needs to be on the floor if/when things start getting stagnant near the end of close games. Right now we're not sure how many minutes Rondo can handle. I think the rotations will be more flexible to account for this.

it's amazing how we just needed a PG and everything fell into place. If Rondo is out we aren't winning a ring, but with him we have a decent chance. And of course PG has to continue shooting well.

other than Kawhi who is mr shy guy, we really were a team without any championship experience. so it finally works out.


of course let's see how we look after Philly tomorrow

[donemilio21]

Kawhi and PG13 out. Marcus Morris out. Serge Ibaka out. Pat Bev (of course) out.

Yet we're 10 point favorites... Do the gambling degenerates see something we don't? Like maybe a bench that is really gelling? Still 10 points on the road....

Fuggedabowdit, I believe. another W coming.

I mean, if I were a betting man, I'd put money on Pistons. But as a Clippers fan, I know that rest of our team is on par with Pistons. I think Reggie Jackson has a huge game, Mann and Paterson each contribute in the 15-20 point range and we pull off a win.

I got Reggie right, but man I was off quiet a bit for Patterson

[TrueLAfan]

I've been a pretty big Reggie fan—basically I think that people that complain don't recognize his role. He's a #4/#5 guard that, at times, has played his way into the #3 guard position. For what he's paid, that's fantastic. And I’ll even contest the idea that Reggie was garbage in the playoffs. Reggie was garbage in the second round—I go with that. OTOH, how much of that was because he … didn’t get any court time? Dude played 33 minutes in a 7 game series; had 11 total minutes in the last five games. The reason his playoff numbers look bad is because he played lousy for … 33 minutes. 6 games—he had a DNP, with

5.5 mpg, 0.5 ppg, 0.2 rpg, 0.2 apg, .200 FG%, .250 3P%

Against Dallas, it was a totally different story:

22.8 mpg, 9.3 ppg, 3.3 rpg, 1.7 apg, .465 FG%, .571 3P%

Yeah, I’m cool with a guy who off the bench who gives me that in 23 playoff mpg. Wish there were more dimes, but his A/TO ratio was 2.5 to 1. He had a good +/-.

When you get right down to it, we had *no* good guard play against the Nugs. (Just one of many things that went wrong.) Sham was as bad or worse than Reggie (and played 15 mpg). Lou was a disaster out there in his 26 mpg. PatBev was okay—shot well, but only gave us 6 ppg in over 20 minutes. Lou and Sham played a combined 40+ minutes a game—and gave us 90 points on 103 shots. That’s a trainwreck. Reggie’s bad play in 33 total minutes didn’t help at all—but nothing was going fix 41 crap minutes a game from Lou and Sham. And, yeah. Reggie's been great for us this year.

This is where I think Rondo is great. I think Rondo makes almost all of the other guards better. I don’t agree that Rondo is a lousy shooter; he’s a lousy shooter like Jason Kidd was/is. Like Kidd, the secret was getting a decent 3 point shot. Rondo shot .252 in his first seven years in the league; he’s shot over 35% since 2014. What he does is shoot well enough to keep that part of his game from being a liability; you can’t leave him open. And that keeps passing lanes open. And, well—he’s an elite passer. Absolutely elite. So I would describe his shooting as good enough. If Rondo shoots 42% and hits 35% of his threes, he's money for your team because of everything else he brings.

And like I said in another thread or two, that works with Luke. It works with Mann. It works with Reggie. We have more guards this year and, more importantly, better ways of juggling the guard lineup.