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WAS has really struggled lately - they are 4-6 in the month of December, and those six losses include losses to LAL, HOU (guess that doesn't look so bad since they've played a little better lately), NOP (same as HOU), and a blowout to a struggling MEM squad. Then again, in the month of DEC they also have wins against CLE, MIA (11 point win), and DAL, so the potential is there.

It was announced on December 12 that Beal would be out for two weeks, so either Garrett Temple or Gary Neal is going to be in the starting lineup (both have started in the two games since Beal was hurt).

WAS is coming off a three day rest, so hopefully they will be a bit rusty themselves.

Random Wiz gif:

May the swarm be with you.

[instagram]https://www.instagram.com/p/_cuMhZOPyq/[/instagram]

https://www.instagram.com/p/_cuMhZOPyq/

Foul, he didn't clear the hurdle. Got some head in there. Nice recovery block but that's a foul.

Starters have to build lead, not leave it up to the bench. It's a concerning pattern. It didn't happen yesterday but yesterday wasn't the normal lineups. Starters seem flat in the 1st and play from a deficit, Kemba starts bringing them back, bench slowly builds lead and then it's trade baskets into the half. 3rd starters are usually much better. That needs to stop happening.

bws94 wrote:Starters have to build lead, not leave it up to the bench. It's a concerning pattern. It didn't happen yesterday but yesterday wasn't the normal lineups. Starters seem flat in the 1st and play from a deficit, Kemba starts bringing them back, bench slowly builds lead and then it's trade baskets into the half. 3rd starters are usually much better. That needs to stop happening.

I think this will correct itself when Jefferson comes back.




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[tweet]https://twitter.com/hornets/status/677976292705222656[/tweet]
https://twitter.com/hornets/status/677976292705222656

spaceballer wrote:[tweet]https://twitter.com/hornets/status/677976292705222656[/tweet]
https://twitter.com/hornets/status/677976292705222656

OMG - hilarious! I love Spencer's serious expression!

Sauce_Castillo wrote:

bws94 wrote:Starters have to build lead, not leave it up to the bench. It's a concerning pattern. It didn't happen yesterday but yesterday wasn't the normal lineups. Starters seem flat in the 1st and play from a deficit, Kemba starts bringing them back, bench slowly builds lead and then it's trade baskets into the half. 3rd starters are usually much better. That needs to stop happening.

I think this will correct itself when Jefferson comes back.

Actually, the 3Q starters are not "usually much better" than in the 1Q -- the starters have regularly stunk it up in the 3Q for much of the season.

These are the quarter splits for the first 24 games (and excludes the recent Raptors game because Lin was moved to starters, which is irregular):

NetRtg across quarters:
1Q: +2.7
2Q: +14.6
3Q: -8.3
4Q: +10.5
http://stats.nba.com/team/#!/1610612766/stats/advanced/?Season=2015-16&SeasonType=Regular%20Season&Period=1&DateFrom=10%2F28%2F2015&DateTo=12%2F16%2F2015

The pattern has been that the starters, who play most of the 1Q, do not achieve much positive separation. Then in the 2Q, the 2nd unit is largely responsible for a huge +14.6 NetRtg. Then the starters play most of the 3Q and leave a significant deficit, resulting in a NetRtg of -8.3. (Even when the deficit keeps growing in the 3Q, Cliff is rigid with his rotations and will stick with them for too long, regardless of how flat they are playing.)
The 4Q is hard to analyze because the closing lineups are varied and mixed, and the 4Q includes garbage time.

This is probably the only winning team in the league in which the bench often outperforms the starters, and the bench makes many of the comebacks.

It is difficult to play from behind, because you have to take more risks to "make something happen." Hero-balling, along with chucking early in the shot clock, happens more often when the team is behind because players want to bring the team back ASAP. And if the shots miss, then the sense of urgency increases and it becomes a vicious cycle, and they have to keep forcing the issue, especially when they must play at a pace that is faster than they are used to, and faster than they can execute properly, in order to cut the deficit.

It is really important to get significant separation in the 1Q, because it's tough to play from behind. Good teams don't win by being 'clutch' in the 4Q but rather by not needing to be clutch at all, because they achieved separation before the endgame.

sidestep wrote:

Sauce_Castillo wrote:

bws94 wrote:Starters have to build lead, not leave it up to the bench. It's a concerning pattern. It didn't happen yesterday but yesterday wasn't the normal lineups. Starters seem flat in the 1st and play from a deficit, Kemba starts bringing them back, bench slowly builds lead and then it's trade baskets into the half. 3rd starters are usually much better. That needs to stop happening.

I think this will correct itself when Jefferson comes back.

Actually, the 3Q starters are not "usually much better" than in the 1Q -- the starters have regularly stunk it up in the 3Q for much of the season.

These are the quarter splits for the first 24 games (and excludes the recent Raptors game because Lin was moved to starters, which is irregular):

NetRtg across quarters:
1Q: +2.7
2Q: +14.6
3Q: -8.3
4Q: +10.5
http://stats.nba.com/team/#!/1610612766/stats/advanced/?Season=2015-16&SeasonType=Regular%20Season&Period=1&DateFrom=10%2F28%2F2015&DateTo=12%2F16%2F2015

The pattern has been that the starters, who play most of the 1Q, do not achieve much positive separation. Then in the 2Q, the 2nd unit is largely responsible for a huge +14.6 NetRtg. Then the starters play most of the 3Q and leave a significant deficit, resulting in a NetRtg of -8.3. (Even when the deficit keeps growing in the 3Q, Cliff is rigid with his rotations and will stick with them for too long, regardless of how flat they are playing.)
The 4Q is hard to analyze because the closing lineups are varied and mixed, and the 4Q includes garbage time.

This is probably the only winning team in the league in which the bench often outperforms the starters, and the bench makes many of the comebacks.

It is difficult to play from behind, because you have to take more risks to "make something happen." Hero-balling, along with chucking early in the shot clock, happens more often when the team is behind because players want to bring the team back ASAP. And if the shots miss, then the sense of urgency increases and it becomes a vicious cycle, and they have to keep forcing the issue, especially when they must play at a pace that is faster than they are used to, and faster than they can execute properly, in order to cut the deficit.

It is really important to get significant separation in the 1Q, because it's tough to play from behind. Good teams don't win by being 'clutch' in the 4Q but rather by not needing to be clutch at all, because they achieved separation before the endgame.

Unfortunitly with our team that is the case: average starters and above average bench. Perhaps when MKG comes back the situation will be better, but right now that is the limitation we have to live with. It will all comes down to how Cliff manage the rotation based on match ups.

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I didn't realize the 3Q was so bad from the starters.

sidestep wrote:

Sauce_Castillo wrote:

bws94 wrote:Starters have to build lead, not leave it up to the bench. It's a concerning pattern. It didn't happen yesterday but yesterday wasn't the normal lineups. Starters seem flat in the 1st and play from a deficit, Kemba starts bringing them back, bench slowly builds lead and then it's trade baskets into the half. 3rd starters are usually much better. That needs to stop happening.

I think this will correct itself when Jefferson comes back.

Actually, the 3Q starters are not "usually much better" than in the 1Q -- the starters have regularly stunk it up in the 3Q for much of the season.

These are the quarter splits for the first 24 games (and excludes the recent Raptors game because Lin was moved to starters, which is irregular):

NetRtg across quarters:
1Q: +2.7
2Q: +14.6
3Q: -8.3
4Q: +10.5
http://stats.nba.com/team/#!/1610612766/stats/advanced/?Season=2015-16&SeasonType=Regular%20Season&Period=1&DateFrom=10%2F28%2F2015&DateTo=12%2F16%2F2015

The pattern has been that the starters, who play most of the 1Q, do not achieve much positive separation. Then in the 2Q, the 2nd unit is largely responsible for a huge +14.6 NetRtg. Then the starters play most of the 3Q and leave a significant deficit, resulting in a NetRtg of -8.3. (Even when the deficit keeps growing in the 3Q, Cliff is rigid with his rotations and will stick with them for too long, regardless of how flat they are playing.)
The 4Q is hard to analyze because the closing lineups are varied and mixed, and the 4Q includes garbage time.

This is probably the only winning team in the league in which the bench often outperforms the starters, and the bench makes many of the comebacks.

It is difficult to play from behind, because you have to take more risks to "make something happen." Hero-balling, along with chucking early in the shot clock, happens more often when the team is behind because players want to bring the team back ASAP. And if the shots miss, then the sense of urgency increases and it becomes a vicious cycle, and they have to keep forcing the issue, especially when they must play at a pace that is faster than they are used to, and faster than they can execute properly, in order to cut the deficit.

It is really important to get significant separation in the 1Q, because it's tough to play from behind. Good teams don't win by being 'clutch' in the 4Q but rather by not needing to be clutch at all, because they achieved separation before the endgame.

Sounds like the only solution is to play the bench 48 minutes per night. Either that or petition the league to remove the third quarter from games entirely

Or, switch starters and bench in couple games and see how it works.


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I'm not sure it is the personnel starting that is the problem. It may be a energy, focus, execution from the jump urgency missing. I can't say it's Alfense because he hasn't been in there and the same thing keeps happening. It's like, maybe just not turning it on early enough and just relying for whoever is coming off of the bench to provide the spark. I know that's the bench's function, but the starting guys, whoever they are, need to bring it from the beginning.

Flip Murray wrote:

sidestep wrote:

Sauce_Castillo wrote:
I think this will correct itself when Jefferson comes back.

Actually, the 3Q starters are not "usually much better" than in the 1Q -- the starters have regularly stunk it up in the 3Q for much of the season.

These are the quarter splits for the first 24 games (and excludes the recent Raptors game because Lin was moved to starters, which is irregular):

NetRtg across quarters:
1Q: +2.7
2Q: +14.6
3Q: -8.3
4Q: +10.5
http://stats.nba.com/team/#!/1610612766/stats/advanced/?Season=2015-16&SeasonType=Regular%20Season&Period=1&DateFrom=10%2F28%2F2015&DateTo=12%2F16%2F2015

The pattern has been that the starters, who play most of the 1Q, do not achieve much positive separation. Then in the 2Q, the 2nd unit is largely responsible for a huge +14.6 NetRtg. Then the starters play most of the 3Q and leave a significant deficit, resulting in a NetRtg of -8.3. (Even when the deficit keeps growing in the 3Q, Cliff is rigid with his rotations and will stick with them for too long, regardless of how flat they are playing.)
The 4Q is hard to analyze because the closing lineups are varied and mixed, and the 4Q includes garbage time.

This is probably the only winning team in the league in which the bench often outperforms the starters, and the bench makes many of the comebacks.

It is difficult to play from behind, because you have to take more risks to "make something happen." Hero-balling, along with chucking early in the shot clock, happens more often when the team is behind because players want to bring the team back ASAP. And if the shots miss, then the sense of urgency increases and it becomes a vicious cycle, and they have to keep forcing the issue, especially when they must play at a pace that is faster than they are used to, and faster than they can execute properly, in order to cut the deficit.

It is really important to get significant separation in the 1Q, because it's tough to play from behind. Good teams don't win by being 'clutch' in the 4Q but rather by not needing to be clutch at all, because they achieved separation before the endgame.

Sounds like the only solution is to play the bench 48 minutes per night. Either that or petition the league to remove the third quarter from games entirely

Sarcasm makes for great conversation.

the truth is i don't care which group plays 48 minutes as long as lin is in that group

Maybe, just maybe, the bench unit wouldn't have a net positive rating if they played against the other team's starters every night. I know that's an crazy theory, but one worth considering. And even crazier than that, perhaps if the starters played against the other team's bench every night they might have a better positive rating. Again, just spit-balling theories here...

Seriously, not sure why this is a conversation. The strength of the team is our depth. We don't have any superstars or franchise players, but we have great depth and chemistry. Our starters are average compared to other starting groups around the league. Our bench is above average compared to other bench groups around the league. Makes sense that our bench would have a better net rating.

fatlever wrote:Maybe, just maybe, the bench unit wouldn't have a net positive rating if they played against the other team's starters every night. I know that's an crazy theory, but one worth considering. And even crazier than that, perhaps if the starters played against the other team's bench every night they might have a better positive rating. Again, just spit-balling theories here...

Seriously, not sure why this is a conversation. The strength of the team is our depth. We don't have any superstars or franchise players, but we have great depth and chemistry. Our starters are average compared to other starting groups around the league. Our bench is above average compared to other bench groups around the league. Makes sense that our bench would have a better net rating.

seriously, you still don't understand our lin fans' logic

PJ like many others such as Goran Dragic are starting to pick it up now, think this has a lot to do with conditioning. I hope PJ can keep it up now and it was purely him not being in basketball shape.

fatlever wrote:Maybe, just maybe, the bench unit wouldn't have a net positive rating if they played against the other team's starters every night. I know that's an crazy theory, but one worth considering. And even crazier than that, perhaps if the starters played against the other team's bench every night they might have a better positive rating. Again, just spit-balling theories here...

Seriously, not sure why this is a conversation. The strength of the team is our depth. We don't have any superstars or franchise players, but we have great depth and chemistry. Our starters are average compared to other starting groups around the league. Our bench is above average compared to other bench groups around the league. Makes sense that our bench would have a better net rating.

I'm questioning the focus of any of the starters, not the personnel. Basically, when the team starts, where's the organization and execution in the first 8 minutes or so? This makes Kemba have to be the one to score baskets and bring the deficit down. Then the bench usually, but not always, can climb back and get a small lead. That's not sustainable and won't work with every opponent. Some teams have benches just as strong like Boston seemed to and the Magic. SA's is stronger.

I hope Lamb can get his mojo back. It's not good when your #1 bench scoring option and 6th-man capable SG is only getting 15 minutes in an OT game. Hope he's back to at least his average of 23 minutes and making his contributions like he did earlier in the year.

On the positive side, Frank is looking really good. Defensively he's been good.

Nic probable looks good that he's in tonight. Firstly hope he's feeling better and then hope he's able to play near his capability.