GAME #5: SUNS (3-1) @ LAC (2-2)—THU 10/31 7:30 PM, NBA-TV

[esqtvd]

Hope everybody was home enjoying the glorious DODGERS WORLD CHAMPIONS!!

Intuit looked like they were.





Anyway, back to work!! Tough one-point loss to the Blazers but nobody was really to blame except 10-18 FTs. Onward!

[Ballings7]

KPJ coming on notably better most recently.. really good to see

[clipsfever]

Zu with the first half double-double. MIP in his 9th NBA season?

[esqtvd]

Halfway home!

[Ballings7]

Feels like a win -- shall see...

[esqtvd]

Pretty much the same as what I wrote last night. Nobody was particularly good or bad. We won the rebs and lost the TOs only 14-12.

We did hit our FTs but we did lose the 3-point game again. They were 18-39 and we were only 12-35 and that was pretty much it.

We lack a closer. Harden is a lousy one despite carrying us with a brilliant triple double 24-10-13. It's just not his thing. Zu surprised me with another 20-point game but Invisible Mann went scoreless in the second half, where we were outscored by 26 points. I don't care how many "little things" you do, you just can't leave the big things to everybody else all the time.

We could be undefeated if we had Kawhi. Or Booker [40 points on 11-18 shooting]. But that's all moot, I suppose.

[Roscoe Sheed]

15 straight shots is ridiculous. Seems like only really weird things like that happen to the Clippers. I know the defense wasn't great, but still. Seems like this season is basically hopeless. They are scrapping, but don't have enough talent unless Kawhi miraculously recovers.

Also, I think it is clear that KPJ is a very flawed player- he has some offensive ability, but plays out of control far too often- reminds me of Westbrook in that regard.

[Captain Ballmer]

We lack a closer. Harden is a lousy one despite carrying us with a brilliant triple double 24-10-13. It's just not his thing.

Lue have to gave Miller his chance. Late game situations for the 24-25 Clippers are heavily involves iso, FT shooting. Harden and Powell starts to spends their legs early, doesn't have the lift nor energy left for end game. Jordan Miller can pound the ball attack to rim for a bucket or go the line. He has no problem to not shoot that ball(ouch T-mann) we know from the preseason and Summer league.

[esqtvd]

We lack a closer. Harden is a lousy one despite carrying us with a brilliant triple double 24-10-13. It's just not his thing.

Lue have to gave Miller his chance. Late game situations for the 24-25 Clippers are heavily involves iso, FT shooting. Harden and Powell starts to spends their legs early, doesn't have the lift nor energy left for end game. Jordan Miller can pound the ball attack to rim for a bucket or go the line. He has no problem to not shoot that ball(ouch T-mann) we know from the preseason and Summer league.

Miller will get his chance but this is still a pickup team. Take Mann and Coffey out of the rotation and all we have is Beard, Zu and Powell--all playing too many minutes already.

DJJ [11 points] and KPJ [14 points] are coming along. We need POINTS. Mann is an OK glue guy but scoreless in the second half.

I mean, Mann is supposed to be our defensive stopper but Booker went off for 40. Obviously we're going to have to outscore the opps some nights.

[Bobbymcgee]

I had this team winning half their games but now I think they will be luck to win 30+ games.

If one of Harden, Zu, or Powell gets injured the Thunder are getting the number one pick this summer.

The Clippers should try and trade Leonard for Dame Lillard. At least he plays.

[HardenGoat]

agree with not having a closer. Harden can't hold up the whole game especially on back to backs. KPJ is hard to watch. Any lead will bleed with him on the court. Powell was taken out by Booker and lost his groove. Plus he's carrying a huge load the entire game as well. What we need is something like a Kawhi Leonard on the floor

[LamarWho]

Royce O'Neal and Ryan Dunn gave them a big lift on offense. KD and Book will get theirs but if their role players play like that, we can't keep up with their scoring.

KPJ was good in the 1st half but flat out awful in the 2nd half. Norm was hot earlier but pretty much invisible in the 2nd half (heard he caught an elbow or something).

If we want to win these close games, we can't afford all these unforced TOs and missed FTs. Unfortunately Harden has always been among the league leaders in bad TOs. His FG% are awful right now but I expect them to improve.

[LamarWho]

I mentioned I'll give KPJ 10 games. We are half way there.

Pts: 7.4
FG%: 33.3
3P%: 6.3 (ouch!)
Ast: 1.8
TO: 2.6

What concerns me the most is the Ast/TO ratio. It's not good when you got more TOs than assists. I hope this will not be another John Wall type of experience for us again.

[playaloc916]

If it wasn't for that disappointing Portland loss, I think the team is right about where I expected them to be. What I wasn't expecting was the strong starts by Zu and Norm, and slow start by KPJ.

And I agree about KPJ. I haven't been able to watch much of the games, but from what I've been reading online, he's been flat out bad. With a guy like Miller who's earned playing time, sitting on the bench, I hope KPJ shakes the rust off fast, or his minutes need to be given to Miller.

[og15]

There's always a balance between offense and defense, and a team can have a limit on how much offense it can produce. Mann played 12 second half minutes and went 0-1. Mann taking more shots was not going to be the salvation regardless, and if anyone is watching games thinking that, they are wasting their time.

The Clippers scored 119 and had a 121.7 Ortg

At that point, you really just needed more stops to come through for you, because you can't expect the offense to keep flowing when you're not an offensively heavy team.

Quarter by Quarter:
37, 33, 23, 26

Those are all perfectly fine, still put up 49 pts in the second half, but they gave up 73 in the second half (after scoring 70 in the first). Clippers started hot, Suns ended hot and have more offensive talent.

[esqtvd]

KPJ scored 14 points on 6-12 shooting Thursday and even with his terrible percentages, is averaging 17/9/4 with 2.3 steals per 36 minutes. It's about PRODUCTION. KPJ has played over 6000 NBA minutes, scored 3000 and is only 4 MONTHS OLDER than Jordan Miller, who has scored exactly 13 points in the NBA.

No GM, coach or fellow NBA player would chose otherwise.

[Ballings7]

smh.. well, onto the next one.

[esqtvd]

where we stand
per 100 possessions
plus/minus is last column on the right

[Clemenza]

"Give up the quarter" should be the new slogan. 0-3 in our new digs. Not good at all. Jordan Miller gets 50 games with the main team as a two-way player. We've played five games with him sitting on the bench now he has 45 games left with the main team and not one fraction of a minute played. I'm either cheering or yelling at KPJ. There's no in between. Harden is either cooked or will be by December with the way Lue is using him for everything. Gotta swap Mann or Coffey out for Bones or Jordan Miller. They're the exactg same player with the same floor and ceiling. Norm has been carrying us and DJJ is a player!

[esqtvd]

"Give up the quarter" should be the new slogan. 0-3 in our new digs. Not good at all. Jordan Miller gets 50 games with the main team as a two-way player. We've played five games with him sitting on the bench now he has 45 games left with the main team and not one fraction of a minute played. I'm either cheering or yelling at KPJ. There's no in between. Harden is either cooked or will be by December with the way Lue is using him for everything. Gotta swap Mann or Coffey out for Bones or Jordan Miller. They're the exactg same player with the same floor and ceiling. Norm has been carrying us and DJJ is a player!

worse than we thought


"The 5 man lineup of Harden - Powell - Zubac - Jones Jr + anyone NOT named Terance Mann has a +9.6 net rating together in 36 minutes including a 104 defensive rating which would rank as the 3rd best itl.

On the whole, Clippers have the 25th best defense in the league when Terance Mann is on the court (117 mins), when he is off the court (128 mins), they have the third best defense in the league."

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