Sacramento (32-40) @ Seattle (17-56)

[pillwenney]

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1. For many people the game is show and entertainment, there guys who enjoy good defense and defensive execution, but there is a reason why every general NBA fan knows Steve Nash lies on his back when out, Suns are popular and entertaining.
2. And it goes back to your example of Hawes and frustration from the attitude, great offense (Brad and Vlade's vision and passing for example) is a talent and feel that you won't get from training hard, average defense can be, you'll never make an elite interior defender or rebounder out of Miller, but when healthy, fit and motivated he can be decent, Diop on the other hand will never be anything close to decent offensively, so the sum is usually greater with Petrie type of picks, it won't let us compete, unless we get a Webber like player again, but it's better than other available options.

That's just not true. Well, it may or may not be true in Diop's case, but generally speaking, it's not fair to say that bad offensive players can't improve. I mean just look at like, Bruce Bowen, Raja Bell, Mutombo, Dalembert, Chandler, Haslem, Varejao (to a lesser extent so far), Camby, Biedrins, Udoka--the list could go on for a while more. Now of course, not every defensive player becomes a solid offensive player, but the exact same thing can be said the other way around.

[a-rod]

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Yeah, unfortunately, I am. Well, hey, can I at least insult him once or twice in a year?

no man your a class act, lets keep it that way. but let me take a shot on your behalf, Kenny Thomas didn't play any minutes in the last 50 games but he still screwing the kings some how.....





bang!

[KF10]

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no man your a class act, lets keep it that way. but let me take a shot on your behalf, Kenny Thomas didn't play any minutes in the last 50 games but he still screwing the kings some how.....

(picture)

(picture)

bang!

Oh, umm, thanks for seeing me as a class act? lol...I just consider myself as a normal poster, I guess...lol... But at your insult of Kenny Thomas:



I liked the "bang!" part and a random pic of a person

EDIT: Nevermind the pic is Mike Breen...

[_SRV_]

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That's just not true. Well, it may or may not be true in Diop's case, but generally speaking, it's not fair to say that bad offensive players can't improve. I mean just look at like, Bruce Bowen, Raja Bell, Mutombo, Dalembert, Chandler, Haslem, Varejao (to a lesser extent so far), Camby, Biedrins, Udoka--the list could go on for a while more. Now of course, not every defensive player becomes a solid offensive player, but the exact same thing can be said the other way around.

What do Bowen, Udoka and Bell have to do with the discussion? And what offensive skills do they have? wide open corner 3s (Bell is actually better than that), there's a reason these guys were bench warmers on their former teams, and Chandler is a great example for what I'm talking about, Chandler doesn't have any offensive skill, it took him to be with the best penetrator and passer in the league to start being somewhat of a factor on the offensive end, Dalambert and Haslem are mid range spot up shooters, nothing else, Camby and Biedrins have skills, they knows where to be on offense and they're a good finishers.
None of these guys can create offense, you would need to depend on a dominant big man or guard system to succeed with them, which brings us back to what we have and what we want.
And if competing is what we're talking about, since there is no denying that you can have a good team w/o interior defense, then please point to me at what big man of those plays on a competing team, after you do that, take out the teams that have top 5 players in the league (Cavs and Hornets), then tell me what's left.
I'd love to bitch and moan about our lack of interior defense, but I do realize that other options are just not better.

[pillwenney]

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What do Bowen, Udoka and Bell have to do with the discussion? And what offensive skills do they have? wide open corner 3s (Bell is actually better than that), there's a reason these guys were bench warmers on their former teams, and Chandler is a great example for what I'm talking about, Chandler doesn't have any offensive skill, it took him to be with the best penetrator and passer in the league to start being somewhat of a factor on the offensive end, Dalambert and Haslem are mid range spot up shooters, nothing else, Camby and Biedrins have skills, they knows where to be on offense and they're a good finishers.
None of these guys can create offense, you would need to depend on a dominant big man or guard system to succeed with them, which brings us back to what we have and what we want.
And if competing is what we're talking about, since there is no denying that you can have a good team w/o interior defense, then please point to me at what big man of those plays on a competing team, after you do that, take out the teams that have top 5 players in the league (Cavs and Hornets), then tell me what's left.
I'd love to bitch and moan about our lack of interior defense, but I do realize that other options are just not better.

You said "nothing close to decent" to describe Diop. Those guys are all--at the very least, not liabilities offensively. Sure Chandler is helped by playing with Paul, but the fact is that he's a very useful player offensively in that situation.

I wasn't saying that any of those guys were stars offensively, I'm saying that they're decent--just like if guys like Brad Miller work their butts off defensively, they can be decent.

Regarding your point about winning, let's go through competing teams and see which ones have mainly defensive big men--Boston (Perkins), Detroit (Maxiell arguably--at least by your definition), Orlando (none that are only there for D), Washington (Haywood), Toronto (Rasho), Cleveland (Wallace and Varejao), Philly (Dalembert), GSW (Biedrins), Denver (Camby), Dallas (Dampier), Houston (Mutombo and Hayes), Utah (arguably Millsap), Phoenix (none), Lakers (arguably Bynum and Turiaf), And SA (Thomas).

And I'm not saying that it's more important or that we'd be better off going offense for defense entirely or anything, just that the general feeling throughout the organization has been out of balance, generally speaking.

[_SRV_]

Orland, Washington, Trornto, Philly and GS are competing teams? What are you talking about?

[pillwenney]

Orland, Washington, Trornto, Philly and GS are competing teams? What are you talking about?

I was going with playoff teams (or GSW's case, a potential 50 win team out of the PO's). If you'd like, I can take them off the list, and my point still completely stands.

[_SRV_]

No it doesn't stand at all, we had essays written before on 2004 Kings and how they weren't good enough team for contention (you actuallt said that), and I'll take this team before most of the teams you're talking about, and they didn't have interior defense, which is a proof for Petrie's concept, you can be equally successful and better also w/o interior defense, and with shooting and passing big men, the ones you sarcastically written off in this thread, what you can't be is a real contender.
And some of your examples are just absurd, Bynum is mainly defensive big man? Cleveland, SA and Dallas have LeBron, Duncan and Nowitzki, I'd like to see what these teams are worth w/o them, I said having top 5 players don't count, let's not relate Spurs success to having Thomas, it's insulting.

[pillwenney]

No it doesn't stand at all, we had essays written before on 2004 Kings and how they weren't good enough team for contention (you actuallt said that), and I'll take this team before most of the teams you're talking about, and they didn't have interior defense, which is a proof for Petrie's concept, you can be equally successful and better also w/o interior defense, and with shooting and passing big men, the ones you sarcastically written off in this thread, what you can't be is a real contender.
And some of your examples are just absurd, Bynum is mainly defensive big man? Cleveland, SA and Dallas have LeBron, Duncan and Nowitzki, I'd like to see what these teams are worth w/o them, I said having top 5 players don't count, let's not relate Spurs success to having Thomas, it's insulting.

My point still stands because I'm also talking about all contending teams. You can ignore them, and the other teams that are relevant still mostly follow the rule. If you want to just look at the main contenders, they still have a defensive big man.

One of your points seems to be that it doesn't count when teams have an elite player because the elite player is the main reason that those teams are successful. I mean....duh. Of course I wasn't arguing that. I'm arguing that almost every recent legitimate contender has had a very good defensive big man while very few have had one with Brad's skillset. Sometimes those defensive big men are also dominant offensively, and sometimes they are separate from the main offensive big, but there is always someone patrolling the middle.

I'm not arguing that you don't also need great offensive players, I'm arguing that you need both.

[Ballings7]

And what sums up what mitch is talking about (as have him and I in the past about direction discussions) - balance.

Sooner or later, whether it's half a season, one season, two seasons, three seasons, four seasons, five seasons, etc. - every team needs paint defense with significance to be a title contender. Now, of course along with that, you have to be competitive and above-average offensively.

Cleveland and Phoenix are two examples of teams that aren't credible title contenders. Cleveland is just a mediocre, limited offensive team (yet this gets mostly overlooked by the media because of LeBron), and Phoenix is, at best, a passable defensive team. Usually, the Suns are inconsistent defensively, ranging from poor-ordinary in that inconsistency (along with the spurts and games when they're best). That trickles down to their mind-set and lacking personnel. Phoenix also has other issues that go against them as a championship-caliber team.

You win games on the road and in the playoffs, on defense. While it works in the regular season, relying on offense to be successful, ultimately just doesn't work, because offense is a variable. From a collective stand-point, solid team defense beats offense. You have to be able to fall back on your defense and rebounding when you're not scoring that well, because those two areas can be a constant.

You'll always have a good chance to win when you have the ability to defend and rebound. Even when you're not that good offensively (which is kind of beside things here, but still).

In addition, here's a great quote from Jeff Van Gundy a little while back:

"The teams that can play consistently well, are the teams that can defend, rebound, take care of the ball, and get to the free throw line. Because, you

[_SRV_]

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My point still stands because I'm also talking about all contending teams. You can ignore them, and the other teams that are relevant still mostly follow the rule. If you want to just look at the main contenders, they still have a defensive big man.

One of your points seems to be that it doesn't count when teams have an elite player because the elite player is the main reason that those teams are successful. I mean....duh. Of course I wasn't arguing that. I'm arguing that almost every recent legitimate contender has had a very good defensive big man while very few have had one with Brad's skillset. Sometimes those defensive big men are also dominant offensively, and sometimes they are separate from the main offensive big, but there is always someone patrolling the middle.

I'm not arguing that you don't also need great offensive players, I'm arguing that you need both.

Let's see, we don't have the Duncans, Nowitzkis or LeBrons of the world, but it's the Kurt Thomas, Diop and Varejao that we need right now, got it.

[pillwenney]

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Let's see, we don't have the Duncans, Nowitzkis or LeBrons of the world, but it's the Kurt Thomas, Diop and Varejao that we need right now, got it.

Yup. That's exactly what I said. Boy you just read me like a book. When I said "I'm not arguing that you don't also need great offensive players, I'm arguing that you need both", I really meant "you just need defensive role players." Like a book.

[_SRV_]

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Yup. That's exactly what I said. Boy you just read me like a book. When I said "I'm not arguing that you don't also need great offensive players, I'm arguing that you need both", I really meant "you just need defensive role players." Like a book.

Hey Mitch, just in case you forgot, here is how it started

No. Just shooting and passing. If you can shoot and pass, that means you're a good basketball player.

[pillwenney]

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Which I would think would be taken as "shooting and passing aren't the only things that make up a good basketball player (or more importantly, a good team)". That doesn't mean that a team doesn't need to be able to shoot and pass well, just that it's not necessarily the most important thing in the world.

[Ballings7]

I want 1 or 2 of our big men to defend and rebound the crap out of the ball

Now generally that's a bit of an exaggeration (though maybe we actually do get somebody like that), but there will need to be strength in those areas as a group. I expect emphasis in these areas going foward, with the oppurtunities being available and better than in past years.

That's what should be wanted too on this team

[_SRV_]

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Which I would think would be taken as "shooting and passing aren't the only things that make up a good basketball player (or more importantly, a good team)". That doesn't mean that a team doesn't need to be able to shoot and pass well, just that it's not necessarily the most important thing in the world.

I know and I've already responded that role playing defensive big men are just role players who don't make a difference and need really special players beside them to succeed, and those who can play offense are out of reach, but what's new, you keep reiterating the same again.

[pillwenney]

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I know and I've already responded that role playing defensive big men are just role players who don't make a difference and need really special players beside them to succeed, and those who can play offense are out of reach, but what's new, you keep reiterating the same again.

Role players certainly do make a difference. They're a lot more interchangeable that superstars but that doesn't mean that if you don't have them, you can still succeed.

But the important thing is that everybody needs special players by them to succeed. Nobody was saying they didn't. Hell, most of the time, special players need special players by them to succeed.

[_SRV_]

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Role players certainly do make a difference. They're a lot more interchangeable that superstars but that doesn't mean that if you don't have them, you can still succeed.

But the important thing is that everybody needs special players by them to succeed. Nobody was saying they didn't. Hell, most of the time, special players need special players by them to succeed.

I missed that.
I still don't F'ing understand, you need the superstar to win after that you need the role player w/o him, why the hell should this team care about defensive big men when the main piece beside this role player is missing? You buy car then you buy the car's cover, that's at least what most people will do, we don't know what our team will look like, we don't know who's going to lead this team, how we're going to score and defend, any discussion about a role player is useless right now.

[BMiller52]

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I missed that.
I still don't F'ing understand, you need the superstar to win after that you need the role player w/o him, why the hell should this team care about defensive big men when the main piece beside this role player is missing? You buy car then you buy the car's cover, that's at least what most people will do, we don't know what our team will look like, we don't know who's going to lead this team, how we're going to score and defend, any discussion about a role player is useless right now.

Eh I dunno if that's really true that you need a superstar no matter what. Look at the Pistons, they play great D and they play team ball on O and they are as good as anyone.

Or you can look at the Celtics who have 3 superstars but none of them were really succesful as a #1 by themselves. Yea they were all stars, but even on KG's TWolves teams at times he was more like option 1b to Cassel and Spree. Pierce never did anything without Walker. But now KG is playing more of a defensive type of role, kind of like Sheed on Detroit(except he has a lot better stats and is a better scorer). Pierce I guess you can say is their superstar but even he has been playing a role as a defender/passer at times. Allen became more of a 3 point shooter than a go to guy like he was in Seattle so none of them ever had success until they started playing more D and scoring less.

Or you can look at the Kings during the year Chris didn't play 3/4 of. That team had a lot of guys who were role players, like Vlade and Miller were rebounders and passers. DC was a stopper/ball handler at SG. Mike/Peja were the #1/#2 and I don't know if they would've been that on any other team in the league. Of course that doesn't support Mitch's point of defensive role players but still... it supports the point that you need roleplayers!!

Houston right now has a bunch of role players. TMac is a superstar, yeah, but he's not Kobe or Bron either. A lot of their succes is because of Mutumbo, Scola, Alston, and Battier. All play solid D and Mutumbo is the type of guy Mitch and Ballings are talking about really. Everybody has a role on that team really. TMac is the scorer, but he doesn't score a ton like Kobe or LeBron does. He gets like 22, which is less than Kevin. He is more of an all around star(kinda like the perimeter KG I guess) than superstar.

I don't see how a guy who blocks shots and grabs boards would hurt. The less weaknesses a team against you can attack the better, it takes away your proverbial achilles heel or whatever it's called. I don't really see how a big man who did that playing next to Spencer and/or Brad+Shelden is a bad idea. Also, on another note-I'm less opposed to putting Brad and Spencer on the court at the same time than I was before.

[pillwenney]

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I missed that.
I still don't F'ing understand, you need the superstar to win after that you need the role player w/o him, why the hell should this team care about defensive big men when the main piece beside this role player is missing? You buy car then you buy the car's cover, that's at least what most people will do, we don't know what our team will look like, we don't know who's going to lead this team, how we're going to score and defend, any discussion about a role player is useless right now.

I wasn't really talking about our situation right now, but the general attitude of the franchise. But if we're looking at the franchise, of course we can't really tell what the young talent is like right now, but it's more likely that we have our main offensive big man.