Game 3: Phoenix Suns (1-1) @ Los Angeles Clippers (2-0) l Sunday l 7:00pm l NBATV

bwoolf2 · Post #281 » by **bwoolf2** » Mon Oct 24, 2022 6:09 pm

I was all over not wanting to see any more of Craig but want to acknowledge that was his best game as a Sun since they reacquired him.

grumpysaddle · Post #282 » by **grumpysaddle** » Mon Oct 24, 2022 6:36 pm

bwoolf2 wrote:I was all over not wanting to see any more of Craig but want to acknowledge that was his best game as a Sun since they reacquired him.

He's a better player than he was last season, for some reason he just seemed lost and uninterested.

Jdiddy701 · Post #283 » by **Jdiddy701** » Mon Oct 24, 2022 7:12 pm

RayLight wrote:I agree that the Suns played well and smart. I would like for DA and Bridges to want the ball more. A nice game by Craig and Jock too.
Paul is in a strange form - he looks like a shell of himself and I don`t think it is something physically. Maybe mentally he is in the Dallas` series, I don`t know.

With Chris Paul taking a step back, I definitely want to see more from DA and Mikal. No reason why DA should not put up 20-22pts and 12 rebounds a game. Mikal needs to be at around 18PPG. Mikal has played very timid to start the season.

Booker has been awesome.

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Post #284 » by **bwgood77** » Mon Oct 24, 2022 7:50 pm

Jdiddy701 wrote:
RayLight wrote:I agree that the Suns played well and smart. I would like for DA and Bridges to want the ball more. A nice game by Craig and Jock too.
Paul is in a strange form - he looks like a shell of himself and I don`t think it is something physically. Maybe mentally he is in the Dallas` series, I don`t know.

With Chris Paul taking a step back, I definitely want to see more from DA and Mikal. No reason why DA should not put up 20-22pts and 12 rebounds a game. Mikal needs to be at around 18PPG. Mikal has played very timid to start the season.

Booker has been awesome.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I think Mikal played well in the first two, being a monster rebounder with 18 boards in the first two and decent offensively with 13 a game on 55% shooting. The bad thing is he didn't hit a 3 (though only took 2 total in the first 2 games).

Ayton played very well in the first game and fairly well in the 2nd...got more shots, but wasn't as efficient and didn't rebound well. He has been pretty active on defense.

I thought last night was both Ayton and Bridges' weakest games so far. Ayton had a couple bad turnovers and at allowed at least one blatantly bad offensive board by Zubac. He's gotten better at boxing out overall though, and his teammates are able to pull down more, though some just depend on the way the ball bounces and who is there and how they've switched when the ball goes up.

Ayton's hook shot doesn't seem as automatic as last year yet. His hands seem more active on defense. Some good passing at times too.

Bridges has also had 11 assists through 3 games. Now he is at 11, 7.3 and 3.7 but after 2 games his averages were 13, 9 and 3.5. I'd be happy if he could average like 14, 6.5 and 3.5 with solid D. More points would be nice but he's got to launch more 3s. Cam should score a little more and will likely shoot a lot more 3s if he can stay on the floor but won't probably do much else on the stat sheet. But if he could average 16 or 17 it would be nice. Getting 30 combined from those 2 and 45+ from Booker/Ayton would be nice. That's 75 plus hopefully 10 or so from Paul and hopefully 30 or so from our bench. That would be about a 115 avg which would have been 5th in the league last year. In fact we were 5th last year with 114.8. First was only at 115.9.

sunsbg · Post #285 » by **sunsbg** » Mon Oct 24, 2022 9:10 pm

Ayton's bad rebounding numbers are a tendency now which started mid last season. I would bet he gets less than 10rpg for the season. Used to be elite offensive rebounder and now there is nothing of that.

Post #286 » by **bwgood77** » Mon Oct 24, 2022 9:22 pm

sunsbg wrote:Ayton's bad rebounding numbers are a tendency now which started mid last season. I would bet he gets less than 10rpg for the season. Used to be elite offensive rebounder and now there is nothing of that.

I don't mind if we can have good team rebounding. I know we started switching everything a lot better once he became a lot better defender and he often ends up out on the perimeter, which impact the #s a bit. Though he still wasn't too much off his per 36 #s last year. He's just never been an elite rebounder like the best ones in the league who usually are guys who stand around the rim and don't switch (Gobert, Capela, Nurkic, Embiid, Jokic, Sabonis, Valanciunas, Vucevic, etc). He's been more mid tier, in part because he switches but he simply isn't a great rebounder either. But he was still 10th last year, and most everyone above him were guys like the ones I mentioned who only really play defense in the paint.

Often Bam, for example, doesn't have many, but he switches onto wings, etc, too.

Post #287 » by **lilfishi22** » Mon Oct 24, 2022 10:56 pm

grumpysaddle wrote:
bwoolf2 wrote:I was all over not wanting to see any more of Craig but want to acknowledge that was his best game as a Sun since they reacquired him.

He's a better player than he was last season, for some reason he just seemed lost and uninterested.

I was for the Craig trade last season but he was certainly a disappointment and I'm not totally there yet in terms of saying he's better than last season since we've only seen one good game of his so far this season but I will say getting decent minutes in the last game has helped him settle into his role. Last season he was behind Jae and CamJo on the depth chart as the PF/SF so his minutes were a bit up and down I think his role this season is just a little more clear. CamJo is going to have some ups and downs as a full time starter and having Craig as the main back up will help them both.

The guy just needs to continue to get more consistency from the 3PT shots and he's going to be a solid rotation guy.

grumpysaddle · Post #288 » by **grumpysaddle** » Mon Oct 24, 2022 11:01 pm

lilfishi22 wrote:
grumpysaddle wrote:
bwoolf2 wrote:I was all over not wanting to see any more of Craig but want to acknowledge that was his best game as a Sun since they reacquired him.

He's a better player than he was last season, for some reason he just seemed lost and uninterested.

I was for the Craig trade last season but he was certainly a disappointment and I'm not totally there yet in terms of saying he's better than last season since we've only seen one good game of his so far this season but I will say getting decent minutes in the last game has helped him settle into his role. Last season he was behind Jae and CamJo on the depth chart as the PF/SF so his minutes were a bit up and down I think his role this season is just a little more clear. CamJo is going to have some ups and downs as a full time starter and having Craig as the main back up will help them both.

The guy just needs to continue to get more consistency from the 3PT shots and he's going to be a solid rotation guy.

I didn't mean he's a better player this season, yet. I meant he's generally, in his career, a better player than we saw last season. He was great in his role with the Nuggets, and was pretty good the first season the Suns had him. With a full year and an absent Crowder until we get a trade replacement, Craig has a chance to put his name in the hat if he can defend well and hit 3s at a a good clip.