Post#193 » by j4remi » Tue Dec 5, 2017 2:26 pm
Repeat after me, you cannot preach defense for 20 games and roll out a starting frontcourt of Beasley and Kanter while expecting to be taken serious. In the first game of this nightmarish back to back, I mentioned that Beas was getting confused and dirty looks from teammates. In this one, Kanter picked up his 1st foul of the game in the third quarter and had words for Beasley because dude being out of position led to it. So part one of this is Beasley and floor positioning are allergic to each other. Two is Kanter as sole rim protector with no fouls mid-third does not bode well for the team. No KP, no THJ and some really bizarre line-ups combined to make this near unwatchable. There was a chunk of second quarter minutes devoted to Willy/Kanter as a 4/5 tandem. We got killed inside all night, Ramon Sessions again found floor time and Courtney Lee who played an absurd amount of minutes the night before WITH a respiratory infection spent the game passing to Pacers so I'm guessing he had a fever also. This was ugly, so if you didn't watch...understandable. Here's some recap:
Jack: Jarrett Jack switches a lot, it saves him the trouble of actually guarding a PG attack. But what happens when he switches onto a PF that attacks? He still gets blown by. I'm not gonna list his numbers or mention his offensive play after a night where his defense was that bad. How about his assignment? 10,10 and 4 plus 3 steals and 2 blocks for Collison. You can't hide this guy without a shotblocking presence inside and good defensive communication.
Beas: 13 pts and 5 boards in 14 minutes isn't supposed to be so ugly. But he managed 10 shot attempts, 0 assists and 5 TO's in under 15 minutes to go along with an astounding lack of defensive fundamentals. There are times where he hustles hard enough to make up for poor defensive decisions (not knowing when to switch, tunnel vision on one offensive player, standing too far away from his man, etc.) but after 3 starts, it's glaring how bad he is for everybody. Not just himself but everybody. If he starts again, I might skip the next recap because I'll break my remote or tv watching this dude and Jarrett Jack switching.
Lee: 8 pts, 1 ast, 3 TOs on 4/7 shooting. He threw some UGLY passes and looked like he never recovered from the night before where he was ready to collapse at the end. Am I gonna hammer a sick dude who played over 35 minutes the night before but still showed up to play for his undermanned team? Nah. But he looked hurt out there and surrounded by subpar defenders, having him labor meant we were REALLY screwed.
Kanter: 7 and 6 on 3/8 in 19 mins. Lack of efficiency is gonna happen when the defense doesn't have to worry about anybody else so his 1 ast to 3 TO's and lower output makes sense. Defensively, we know he's not a world-beater and with so many defenders getting blown by Kanter's footspeed wasn't enough to challenge guys consistently. For as much as I liked him calling out Beasley who had been killing everybody, that play seemed like one where the awareness was there but his feet weren't fast enough to get the stop.
Dotson: Dotson's defense stood amid the muddle of confusion that followed the rest of the starters. At times he forced TO's from the awkward yet inexplicably effective ball handling of Lance Stephenson. I haven't had a chance to do this for a while, so shout out to the dude's rebounding instincts and effort. On offense he was pretty timid for a lot of the game but when he was out there with the second unit and the youth crew, he started to assert himself and show something. Talk about impacting areas of the game; 9 pts, 7 boards, an assist, 2 steals and a block and he knocked down two trey's out of 5 attempts (one assisted by Noah who hyped Dot up for it which was cool even if we were down 30). Minutes for this guy are gonna be good, we'll see how much comfort and confidence he can develop with different crews. I'd like the starters to look for him a bit, a little encouragement from Noah went a long way later on. That's what vets need to be doing.
Frank: Frank went 2/11 in 27 minutes with no three pointers in 3 attempts. He put up a pedestrian 7 pts, 2 asts and 1 board; So why was I happy? Well for one, he was a pace pusher. Even on some makes, he got the ball and shot up court to try and make something happen with the likes of Lance Thomas and Ron Baker as running mates. For two, you could see him toying with speed changes. He would sprint up court and as the first man across half approached, shoulders would shoot back for a slowdown and then he'd press turbo again. This got his feet into the paint repeatedly and the key word is repeatedly. He missed lay-ups, his jumper was flat, his best passes were wasted on poor offensive partners...but the aggression was a step up from what we've seen before for the second straight game. The shot will fall some nights, the finishing inside requires repetitions but I'll take the ugly stat-line because what we saw on the court is what many have been asking for from the kid. Be aggressive, find your shot and become a dual threat to both pass or attack. It's coming...
Doug: Nice bounceback from a disappointing one the night before as a scorer. Not so nice on boards or playmaking and forgettable on defense. 5/8 from the field for 12 pts, 2 asts, 1 board. He got starter's minutes and wasn't bad...not good but certainly not bad. That sets him apart from Beasley and Lance who were both pretty bad.
KOQ: I wanna point this out before I get into the other bigs...Kyle's been stepping his energy up recently and it showed in this game with 4 points, 6 boards and an assist in just 8 minutes. He was 2/6 which hurts the aesthetic a bit but he was doing good things out there. The blowout meant that his time got clipped HARD right as he's started building momentum and as much as I love seeing Willy get minutes or Noah leading things...I felt for KOQ who was getting big minutes while looking unenthusiastic only to see single digit play on his third straight game of "I'm trying again coach, look."
Willy: Reminded everybody of the good and the bad of a Willy Hernangomez performance. 14 pts, 10 boards, 3 assists on 7/10 from the field (7/9 not counting a last second three pointer) all tallied in just 17 minutes. Dude is fun to watch work offensively with superior vision to the average big and a legit collection of post moves both finesse and power. On defense...ghastly. To the kid's credit, he seems to settle in on that end the longer he's out there. It's like the game starts off at hyperspeed to him and slows down to just "too fast" by the time he's had 10 minutes of adjustment. Kanter has slow feet but with pressure from everybody, he usually finds himself in the right place or trying to do the right thing at minimum. Willy hasn't shown that since late last season. There's a caveat though, a chunk of Willy's time was spent at the 4 with Kanter in the middle and it was ugly. No excuse for the poor D, but starting out of position and in an awkward front court pairing definitely doesn't help a guy get in a rhythm on either end.
Noah: 3 pts, 3 asts, 4 boards in 8 mins...that's pretty impressive tbh. He looked more fluid handling the ball than he ever did last year and his passing ability showed a bit. The really likeable part though was his energy. The team was down like a 64 seed in the NCAA tournament but Noah was out there working and yelling encouragement when Dotson hit a three. He saw Dotson hit and fed the man again. That sort of little stuff is cool to see with the young guys and I don't think even our PG's have so actively sought to get a youngster going.
Lance: 2/7 4 pts, 1 assist, 1 steal and the low output isn't for lack of touches. He got too many opportunities to impact the offense in his 17 minutes...it's just not the role for him. Defensively, things were so ugly that for most of the game he couldn't change much.
Ramon: If we want a short, poor defending, slashing PG whose instincts are better taking the shot than passing...might as well try Trey Burke out since he's younger and has some athleticism left. Sessions put up 5 and 2 in 14 minutes where he jacked 8 shots up surrounded by young guys that we want to see work (I'm staring at the Noah section and wondering why our old man PG's can't get the memo). Willy was the only one with chemistry with Ramon and that makes sense because it was the pick man. Don't let his +/- fool you, he was not fun to watch out there. Also, he got fourth quarter minutes again while we could have kept giving a lottery developmental piece extra burn. Jeff's gonna make us hate him when it's not dude's fault...well the shooting is but Jeff's not stopping him.
Baker: 22 minutes, 9 pts, 4 assists on 2/3 from the field (all three's). He passed up way some WIDE OPEN chances and not for better shots. But he chases on defense and if the second guard can handle the ball, he's at least not going jack up nonsense. Honestly, I'm so tired of Jarrett Jack and Ramon Sessions (I know only two games with him back but that's enough) that I'm now supporting any movement to bench the old dudes and let Frank/Baker learn by fire to deal with on-ball pressure. Things will likely get uglier before they get better but we'll at least be TRYING to have the defensive identity that faded with our lead in Cleveland and hasn't been back.
Jeff: I've scratched my head at some of his decisions and last night was no different. He Pair Beasley with Kanter, then in the second quarter paired Willy with Kanter; what did Enes Kanter do you Jeff? Frank's best passes went to Lance, Ron and Sessions...yikes. Kid's assist totals might look different with players that actually know how to put the ball in the hoop nearby. But at least that second situation has forced Frank to shoot...and shoot....and shoot. So maybe it's a mindgame. The Kanter pairings with our worst defensive players though...not forgivable. I don't care how much offense we're lacking, you erase our entire "defense matters" identity which was already teetering on edge with those front court situations.
Random: I've never seen someone throw more no-look passes into the stands than Sabonis. It's hilarious and bizarre.
PG- Haliburton | Schroder | Sasser
SG- Grimes | Dick | Bogdanovic
SF- Bridges | George
PF- Hunter |Strus| Fleming
C- Turner | Powell | Wiseman
