What are your biggest concerns/questions so far?

[yosemiteben]

...at what point does patience run thin and things that shoulda been changed get changed.

Tough to make changes when major role players are injured and you don't have days off to practice. When people are healthy and we have time to implement changes and we don't improve, then I'll really get worried.

[Braggins]

None of our losses this season have really surprised me or concerned me like the loss to Indiana tonight has. Given the context of all that we are dealing with this season you could reasonably see all of the other outcomes. However, the Indiana team that just beat us is absolute trash. Hibbert sat out most of the game with back issues which means we just lost to a team led by Coca-Scola complemented by a bunch of fringe backups. We literally just got beat by Donald Sloan, Rodney Stuckey, Chris Copeland, Ian Mhimni, etc. There is no reason Indiana should have even been in this game with the talent we have (even despite the injuries). I'm hoping this was a fluke game, which aren't uncommon in the NBA regular season, but something seems to be really off with us right now.

[trins]

What this team miss is heart. This team lost its heart after the playoffs. This team is like just like playing with the motions, no heart at all. Especially Kemba, he was visibly the leader last year, he will this team to victory. Right now after getting his contract, he plays like he has no heart no passion. Face it this team regressed last year because the effort isn't there.

[Braggins]

I just realized that we only have one PG, SG, or SF shooting over 40% and thats MKG. Literally every other player on our team 1-3 is shooting below 40%. How can we pretend that something about our offensive system is making things difficult for our guards or at least not helping them get good looks? Lance shot 50% and 35% in Indiana and in our system so far is 37% and 23%. After a breakout season Kemba's efficiency dropped off a cliff under a the new system. Neal, Hairston, Roberts, and Pargo are all good shooters and they are all shooting awful percentages. Either we are just on a bad cold streak and there is no need to worry or we are doing something terribly wrong.

[MasterIchiro]

I just realized that we only have one PG, SG, or SF shooting over 40% and thats MKG. Literally every other player on our team 1-3 is shooting below 40%. How can we pretend that something about our offensive system is making things difficult for our guards or at least not helping them get good looks? Lance shot 50% and 35% in Indiana and in our system so far is 37% and 23%. After a breakout season Kemba's efficiency dropped off a cliff under a the new system. Neal, Hairston, Roberts, and Pargo are all good shooters and they are all shooting awful percentages. Either we are just on a bad cold streak and there is no need to worry or we are doing something terribly wrong.

Consider the context of the shooting. Our offense is not moving the ball around thus opposing defense rests and keeps fresh legs, lunging for balls, sticking defenders, closing passing lanes, deflecting balls, hustling for loose balls, just overall disrupting offense and degrading the shot clock.

There has been some missing of wide open shots but that's just a small slice imo. Our shots are contested by defenses with high energy because we don't have a system that burns out, tires and demoralizes. We have a system that emboldens them. To top it all off, we have an interior defense that emboldens them as well. Our morale is low because we don't have a system that demoralizes opponents and their morale and energy increases as a result. I saw us deflating somewhere in the middle of the Pacers game and knew right then it was a loss. You can check the game thread.

Shooting is a lot about the system you run's impact on energy levels. Negative mental energy impacts physical mechanics.

[dre4bobcats]

shooting,shooting, shooting,and floor spacing... this team only looks good offensively when gary neal is on the floor

[dre4bobcats]

I just realized that we only have one PG, SG, or SF shooting over 40% and thats MKG. Literally every other player on our team 1-3 is shooting below 40%..

Drop the mic and close the thread after that comment...

[yosemiteben]

shooting,shooting, shooting,and floor spacing... this team only looks good offensively when gary neal is on the floor

Neal is also below 40% from the field on the season.

[catch20two]

This look like the perfect thread to let me vent.

I'm concerned that Messy Marv's mere presence will rub mediocre-ness all over our team. He's one helluva role model for MKG if he ever wanted to be a #2 overall bust that couldn't cut it at SF so he had to reinvent himself as a PF. I wouldn't mind him on our team as a backup SF/PF for about 2 mil a year but we starting him and paying him 7 mil a year so you damn right I'm concerned, concerned about what might be going on in Cho's head.

I'm concerned that MKG might not get starter minutes and like previous seasons will split his minutes with Hendo, Neal, Hairston, and whoever Clifford think can shoot nevermind they'll get scored on on the other end because they can't defend the SF position.

I'm concerned that Brian Roberts isn't a good backup PG for Kemba so we'll run Kemba into the ground with 40 minutes a night just to stay in games like the end of last year. No wonder he was shooting 30%, he was tired, tired of being backed up by bums after we traded Sessions.

I'm concerned that Cliff might make Maxiell's end of the road ass our backup C in front of Biz because he's so old fashioned that he remember when Maxiell was half decent on the Pistons in the mid 2000s.

I'm sure there's more but those are my main concerns.

Bump. Quoted from October. Here you go Yosemite.

[yosemiteben]

That's obviously a perfect summary of the state of our team.

[BeesWax]

That's obviously a perfect summary of the state of our team.

Hey he was half right about Marvin and correct about MAx early so he is hitting on about 31%.

[catch20two]

Out of all the flavors you can pick I don't know why some prefer salty.

[mrknowitall215]

If we're on this subject, I almost feel like a prophetic swami looking back at my post in October/November

[yosemiteben]

Out of all the flavors you can pick I don't know why some prefer salty.

I don't care if you were right or wrong. This whole defending yourself thing started by me saying that some (i.e. not just you) owe Maxiell and Roberts an apology. I didn't think Maxiell was being as effective as he has shown himself to be recently, so I included myself in that group.

Honestly I don't care if people are right or wrong in their predictions. If you make a prediction I'm probably not going to remember it anyway (unless it's practically all you talked about for an extended period of time, like you did with Marvin or Roberts or MI did with MKG), but even if I remember it it's not like I will think more of you if you were right or less if you were wrong. We can have reasonable differences in opinions of the value of players, and, as this team has shown, players can dramatically change the level of their play based on a wide range of variables.

[catch20two]

Out of all the flavors you can pick I don't know why some prefer salty.

I don't care if you were right or wrong. This whole defending yourself thing started by me saying that some (i.e. not just you) owe Maxiell and Roberts an apology. I didn't think Maxiell was being as effective as he has shown himself to be recently, so I included myself in that group.

Honestly I don't care if people are right or wrong in their predictions. If you make a prediction I'm probably not going to remember it anyway (unless it's practically all you talked about for an extended period of time, like you did with Marvin or Roberts or MI did with MKG), but even if I remember it it's not like I will think more of you if you were right or less if you were wrong. We can have reasonable differences in opinions of the value of players, and, as this team has shown, players can dramatically change the level of their play based on a wide range of variables.

Thank you.