RealGM

Where: STAPLES Center in Los Angeles, CA

TV:

Radio:





The Starters

PGuard: #3 - Chris "CP3" Paul * SGuard: #4 - J.J. Redick

SF: #1 - Lance Stephenson * PF: #32 - Blake Griffin

Center: #6 - DeAndre Jordan

The Supporting Cast


34 - Paul Pierce * 11 - Jamal Crawford * 5 - Josh Smith

* 25 - Austin Rivers * 33 - Wesley Johnson * 45 - Cole Aldrich

9 - Pablo Prigioni * 22 - Branden Dawson * 30 - C.J. Wilcox

44 - Chuck Hayes * 12 - Luc Mbah A Moute




Starters

Shaun Livingston * Klay Thompson * Harrison Barnes * Draymond Green * Festus Ezeli

Reserves

Ian Clark * LeAndro Barbosa * Brandon Rush * Jason Thompson * Marreese Speights



Inactive List:

None to report.


Andrew Bogut (Broken Nose), Stephen Curry (DNP-CD), Andre Iguodala (DNP-CD) and Kevon Looney (Right Hip) are out.

Interested to see how Lance will go with the starters since he isn't a great catch and shoot player.

probably just due diligence to see if he might be good. it's not a great fit for him and i expect wes johnson to take the spot in the RS.

austin's jumper looks much improved. that's a good thing.

surprisingly i haven't seen jamal crawford his usual terrible everything.

DJ trying to get that Ben Wallace hair

if it makes him have any of the defensive capabilities of wallace then keep on growing it out lol

I'm actually up watching the game and just saw Chris get tossed. I'm not too sure what he said.

austin's shot looks like, a lottttt better lol

Blake's jumper is looking so sweet.

blake hitting step back jumpers off the dribble.... oh man

austin looks a LOTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT better lol

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eSV0fqTD1c[/youtube]


[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgRHh3p1TfM[/youtube]

BlzMwt wrote:blake hitting step back jumpers off the dribble.... oh man

He was in China for almost 2 weeks with Kemba Walker then comes back with his signature step back lol. Blake keeps adding moves like that it's going to be ugly for the rest of the western conference.

Joest2003 wrote:

BlzMwt wrote:blake hitting step back jumpers off the dribble.... oh man

He was in China for almost 2 weeks with Kemba Walker then comes back with his signature step back lol. Blake keeps adding moves like that it's going to be ugly for the rest of the western conference.

Did they actually work out together? That's pretty funny lol

Also, forget who mentioned it on the ESPN broadcast but apparently Blake played handball all summer, I'm assuming for his cardio?

some team handball legend. he did it to improve his hand-eye coordination. also worked with a sprinter to improve his run technique.

it was really all just some cross-athlete redbull promo thing. he did say he learned some things about sprinting though and it might help him out some.

Joest2003 wrote:

BlzMwt wrote:blake hitting step back jumpers off the dribble.... oh man

He was in China for almost 2 weeks with Kemba Walker then comes back with his signature step back lol. Blake keeps adding moves like that it's going to be ugly for the rest of the western conference.

most every star tries to add one of something in the offseason that expand that player's game while still retaining their identity. but blake's game at this point is a ridiculous chameleon-like level of things. he just keeps adding more and more, and he's borderline unrecognizable compared to the player you saw in his rookie year.

he said this offseason he worked on everything but he had a focus on all the mid-range stuff that GUARDS do. like shooting off screens, curls, the things jj might do or cp3 might do. and if he's learning step back jumper type stuff, that's just off the charts now lol.

blake would have been better off, imo, really just working on adding a solid 3 point shot to his arsenal, but who knows. maybe he already has and he just hasn't shown it off yet. he used to be fun to watch cause you wanted to see what dunks he'd unleash. but now you can't miss any possession at all because he can do most anything possible on the court now. if he starts crossing people over i'm gonna just lose it lol.

and that's not even counting the playoffs for when he really steps it up. i'd say both he and AD are the two must watch players when it comes to the post season. this season should be a pretty good ride.

nickhx2 wrote:

Joest2003 wrote:

BlzMwt wrote:blake hitting step back jumpers off the dribble.... oh man

He was in China for almost 2 weeks with Kemba Walker then comes back with his signature step back lol. Blake keeps adding moves like that it's going to be ugly for the rest of the western conference.

blake would have been better off, imo, really just working on adding a solid 3 point shot to his arsenal, but who knows. maybe he already has and he just hasn't shown it off yet. he used to be fun to watch cause you wanted to see what dunks he'd unleash. but now you can't miss any possession at all because he can do most anything possible on the court now. if he starts crossing people over i'm gonna just lose it lol.

I know exactly what you mean. Paul is definitely my favourite player but it seems like every time i watch a game i have myself wishing for them just to pass it to blake to see what he can do lol

Even just watching him hitting jumpers feels satisfying considering the many years when he would hesitate and not shoot and try to force some unbalanced shot. Or shoot with the hitch in his shot.

Blake's jumper actually looks better fluidity wise, at least from the shots he took yesterday, so that defnitely looks good, hopefully he keeps the consistency with that.

Austin looks like he can actually make mid-range jumpshots off the dribble, so the work with Cassell might be paying off.

Of course you don't want him getting carried away, but considering these are his career numbers:

10-16 feet: 30.4%
16-<3PT: 29.1%

If he improves to the high 30's in those spots, considering they have still been about 16% of his FGA, it helps, especially if he continues on the path from last season where he finished 59% of his FGA attempts at the rim for the season, a career high by 5.4%.

og15 wrote:Blake's jumper actually looks better fluidity wise, at least from the shots he took yesterday, so that defnitely looks good, hopefully he keeps the consistency with that.

Austin looks like he can actually make mid-range jumpshots off the dribble, so the work with Cassell might be paying off.

Of course you don't want him getting carried away, but considering these are his career numbers:

10-16 feet: 30.4%
16-<3PT: 29.1%

If he improves to the high 30's in those spots, considering they have still been about 16% of his FGA, it helps, especially if he continues on the path from last season where he finished 59% of his FGA attempts at the rim for the season, a career high by 5.4%.

it definitely looks smoother. based on his progression over the past couple years i suspect by next year he'll be tops among shooting bigs.

the only thing i don't like is the number of those shots that he took. unless he's shooting an ungodly percentage, those are still the shots you'd rather not be taking.

Blake looked like Melo out that there with that step back jumper falling and Austin just needs to be consistent. Team looked cohesive as a group last night and hopefully that carries over to Thursday vs Rip City as well as into the regular season.

the team definitely looked a lot more cohesive. i wonder if part of that had to do with taking stephenson out of the 2nd unit and starting him.

i don't necessarily think he belongs with the starters but they looked significantly better without his duplicated skills coming off the bench.