Game Thread: Charlotte v. LA Lakers 2-11-08 7:00pm

W_HAMILTON · Post #81 » by **W_HAMILTON** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 2:31 am

We competed!

FYI, it's the 1st time this month we haven't lost by double-digits!

The pox is off! Thank you, Jeff McInnis!

fluffernutter · Post #82 » by **fluffernutter** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 2:31 am

Kobe has learned to be efficient. That's a little bit scary to think about.

Post #83 » by **BigSlam** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 2:34 am

W_HAMILTON wrote:We competed!

FYI, it's the 1st time this month we haven't lost by double-digits!

The pox is off! Thank you, Jeff McInnis!

We competed for a qtr and a half.

I guess that's "something"?

Griever24 · Post #84 » by **Griever24** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 2:34 am

Good game guys .. i knew this would be close .. you guys always bring it Versus the Lakers ...

See you again in march and good luck the rest of your season .. until then Kudos

W_HAMILTON · Post #85 » by **W_HAMILTON** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 2:35 am

BigSlam wrote:-= original quote snipped =-
We competed for a qtr and a half.

I guess that's "something"?

Compared to our previous efforts, yes, very much so!

Post #86 » by **BigSlam** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 2:36 am

Thanks for stopping by Griever. All the best for the [post season.

bynumsbreakout · Post #87 » by **bynumsbreakout** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 2:40 am

Good game guys. You guys stole Nazr and he is much more effective for you guys than he was on the Pistons and Spurs. Good luck the rest of the year!

10scott10 · Post #88 » by **10scott10** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 3:16 am

bynumsbreakout wrote:Good game guys. You guys stole Nazr and he is much more effective for you guys than he was on the Pistons and Spurs. Good luck the rest of the year!

they're giving him PT and shots

amcoolio · Post #89 » by **amcoolio** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 4:17 am

All I want to know is....just what the f*** was Vincent doing in the 4th with Emeka Okafor and Matt Carroll...unless I missed something and Okafor was injured..

1 substitution all 4th quarter and it only came when McInnis hurt himself defending someone.

GoBobcats · Post #90 » by **GoBobcats** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 11:41 am

amcoolio wrote:All I want to know is....just what the f*** was Vincent doing in the 4th with Emeka Okafor and Matt Carroll...unless I missed something and Okafor was injured..

1 substitution all 4th quarter and it only came when McInnis hurt himself defending someone.

I was wondering that as well

W_HAMILTON · Post #91 » by **W_HAMILTON** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 1:46 pm

It's probably not much different earlier on, when Okafor was in his slump and Mohammed was playing well; this is one of the few times in awhile that Mohammed has outplayed Okafor, so like before, Mohammed got most of the playing time in the 4th while Okafor got benched.

That's what I figured, unless it was due to a minor injury or something like that.

SamBone · Post #92 » by **SamBone** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 5:57 pm

Wasn't it just last week that Stupid Sam said that McMinus is the 3rd PG, behind Ray and Earl? Mostly to get Naz and Mek on the court together? And now Ray is at the 2, McMinus is at the PG spot and Earl pays only 8.5 minutes and Mek is on the bench the entire 4th? This coach confusses use, what are the players thinking???????

W_HAMILTON · Post #93 » by **W_HAMILTON** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 6:54 pm

You did watch the previous games, right?

I imagine Vincent thought the same thing. "It's that darn McInnis' fault!"

So, he banished him to the bench.

Next game, McInnis got zero minutes.

And we lost by 16.

Next game, McInnis only got garbage minutes because we were getting blown out again.

We lost by 14.

Next game, McInnis was apparently sick, so he got zero minutes.

And we lost by 14 on our home-court to a team that had lost 13 of their last 16 games.

Next game, we score 7 points in the first 9 minutes, and are down big again. McInnis, apparently no longer banished to the bench, gets big minutes as the backup PG.

Next game, McInnis is given his starting spot back, and while we lose, it's the first time this month we haven't lost by double-digits.

It's actually pretty easy to see the progression going on here. I don't think Vincent exactly likes Mcinnis, but his job is probably on the line, and for whatever reason -- we play better when he starts. He gladly banished McInnis to the bench when we got Boykins, and we proceeded to suck, arguably moreso than we had been sucking.

So, back into the starting lineup he goes.

fluffernutter · Post #94 » by **fluffernutter** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 10:43 pm

Boykins is an incredible drain on defense. Watch it sometime. The opposing team just goes straight at him, every time. It's tough being 5'5" or whatever he is. (at least when you are an NBA player)

Post #95 » by **Paydro70** » Wed Feb 13, 2008 5:04 am

I hate to default straight to "blame Vincent," but I have to speculate that this is his fault. Boykins is by no means good on defense, and consistently hurts his teams. But right now he's hurting us to the tune of 17 points per 100 possessions, which is surreal. On the Nuggets last year, he IMPROVED the defense, and on the Bucks it was only -6, and on the Nuggets before that -6.8, the year before that -1.5. All of these numbers are quite bad, but right now he's TRIPLE as bad on defense as he has ever before been.

I doubt he's worse than he used to be, at this point he's probably learned to be as good as he can be at 5'5". But something's going wrong.

fluffernutter · Post #96 » by **fluffernutter** » Wed Feb 13, 2008 2:34 pm

Paydro70 wrote:I hate to default straight to "blame Vincent," but I have to speculate that this is his fault. Boykins is by no means good on defense, and consistently hurts his teams. But right now he's hurting us to the tune of 17 points per 100 possessions, which is surreal. On the Nuggets last year, he IMPROVED the defense, and on the Bucks it was only -6, and on the Nuggets before that -6.8, the year before that -1.5. All of these numbers are quite bad, but right now he's TRIPLE as bad on defense as he has ever before been.

I doubt he's worse than he used to be, at this point he's probably learned to be as good as he can be at 5'5". But something's going wrong.

I think we are extremely bad at "hiding" poor defenders. We allow the other team to exploit bad defenders (aka Boykins) much too easily. I don't have a good explanation for how to stop it exactly. I do know that I was keeping a running tally in my head as I watched this game when Boykins came in. And he was directly responsible, through mismatches and the like, for something like 8 of the first 10 shots taken by the Lakers (post Boykins insertion) being much easier than they should be. It might have been posting up over him, or passing over his head (very easy to do, you get excellent visibility he is your defender), or other issues like we ran a man to help out Boykins and they immediately found the open player and he dunked or got a layup.

We have to be able to hide Boykins on defense. They need to practice this if we are going to play him, because there is no way he can score enough to offset his defense. He'd have to be shooting 60% from 3 point land, and shooting on 80% of possessions, to make up for his defensive ineptitude on our current team.

Post #97 » by **Paydro70** » Wed Feb 13, 2008 3:48 pm

Perhaps our inability to run zone is part of the issue?

Sadly enough, unless we can figure out what the Nuggets and Bucks used to do, McInnis is actually preferable to getting destroyed every possession on defense. When I advocated for Boykins, I assumed we could get similar production; Boykins has shot badly, which I assume will improve (we're only 6 games in of course), enough to at least make his defense bearable. Boykins will never be a positive +/- player, but he can be less bad than McInnis.