Mr Puddles wrote:ginobiliflops wrote:lol at you all. Complaining about a guy who gets us 16 and 6 on near 50% shooting. Not to mention he's our best shooter down the stretch.
When your team is near the bottom of the league in rebound differential and allows the most second chance points in the NBA, asking your starting power forward to box out is not an outrageous complaint.
I'm not in the trade Keiff camp, but less than 6 rebounds per game on a team which is 5th in the NBA in field goal attempts (both offence and defence) is pretty damn bad. Rebounding is especially important for this team because of our issues on defence (one and done) as well as our ability to run the fast break (outlet passes).
Loved the effort on the boards tonight though, hope Markeiff (and the rest of the Suns) keep this up. I'm a big fan of the bigger Len/Wright line-up as well, too bad Alex was in foul trouble most of the night so we didn't really get a chance to see it much but I'm hopeful Hornacek will use it again against Memphis.
As someone who isn't able to watch games, how often do they have Len and Wright on the floor at the same time? Because I agree. If we could play 10-15 minutes with both on the court, with PJ, either of Goodwin/Bullock and EB on the floor during those times, our D would be pretty darn good. Like, maybe, last night when we had a 10 pt lead with about a minute to go, those are the situations, IMO, where we get that combo on the court, is when they would be best suited to be the group we put on the floor, right? Our offense would suffer a bit, but if they practiced that group together, and get it into EB's head that during those times, you feed Wright or Len down low, or he takes it to the hoop before shooting, they'd get that higher percentage shot, plus surely several fouls along the way. And with Wright's 72%, and Len's near 73% FT%, we should be able to make 7 out of 10 of those free throws, to keep us ahead. And just for reference, Bullock is a 80%, Goodwin is a 70%, EB is a 82%, and PJ is a 78% FT shooter. So they really don't have a good option of players to intentionally foul (Goodwin being the best option for opposing teams--Shock! Awe! lol).
And BTW, a couple of other notes:
1. We are 3-2 so far on this 8 game 'prove it' stretch, but with likely our 3 most difficult opponents of the stretch yet to face.
2. Since mid-December, we are 16-6; here are team records we are most concerned about:
-- OKC - 11-10
-- SAS - 13-9
-- NOP - 13-10
-- LAC - 15-8
-- POR - 13-9
-- DAL - 13-9
And before anyone counters with our soft schedule, we've played 11 home, 11 away, and 13 of 22 against teams currently "in" playoffs, and 14 of 22 against teams .500 or better, of which we are 8-6.
So while it seems we are not doing as well as we'd like, and not good enough to get into the playoffs, I'd argue that we are playing about as good as we should expect, and even if we lose the next 3 games, which seems fairly likely, we'll still be 16-9 since mid-Dec, which would be good enough to STILL be as good or better than any of the teams above, minus NOP. So just trying to put things into perspective a bit. I'm not saying we are a shoe in for that 8th seed, or that we don't have some serious issues to iron out. Just saying that we aren't "doomed" to lose that 8th seed, so long as we play as well as we have since mid-Dec, and I'd argue we are more likely to get the 7th seed, than lose the 8th seed, should we continue on this current pace, and the teams ahead of us continue their play as well.
