Wolves at Jazz, 8:00 PM, My29

[LOBO 7]

That's what I hate about the wolves. No heart. We just come off a tough loss and instead of using that anger to blow these fools out, we come out like a deer in headlights and get steamrolled. The Jazz defense completely suffocated us tonight.

More than anything we suffocated our selves with some of the silliest turnovers in the world. Somebody should make a 45 minute youtube clip of some of our stupidest TOs this season with those silly ass sound effects they used to use in sports bloopers movies.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUYbu5DJA1U[/youtube]

The Benny Hill theme song would work.

Haha, yeah, that would work. If the Pups were forced to watch 45 minutes of that every day they might learn to value each possession a little more.

BTW, that is the craziest car chase I have ever seen!

[LOBO 7]

I knew the game would end the way in did when the 2nd half started.

Again, we are a much better team when we run the offense through Mike, but we went away from that and froze him out for some reason. He sits for way way to long, and when he comes back in he starts forcing all sorts of garbage. I just don't get it..28 minutes for Beasley.

I know I will get killed probably for saying this, but this team is much better when the offense is run through Mike and not Love. I don't know how many games I have seen now were we look deadly when the offense goes through Mike but then turns sloppy when we don't and then Mike will try to force the issue and then he looks stupid racking up turnovers.

That's just it. Beas is far from reliable when we run the offense through him. At times it looks great, at times it looks atrocious. The same can be said for everyone on our team though. Beas in particular seems to struggle with his focus, and games when he is not focused are the games when he gets fewer minutes. I agree that ideally he would average about 38 minutes a game, but until he can maintain his focus for that long and consistently stay out of foul trouble, it's just not gonna happen. I think Rambis is showing plenty of patience with him and giving him plenty of opportunity to take a leadership role. Beas is still very young with a LOT of potential, but he still has a long ways to go.

[Piecake]

The problem with last game was that Rambis sat him for 10 minutes and that got him out of focus/rhythm. He was playing great before that.

[LOBO 7]

Another winnable game lost because of too many turnovers. Prediction: when the Wolves get turnovers to under 18 a game, they will win half or more of their games.

I think you're probably right. So many of our close losses have been in games where we had like 23+ TOs. If you think of it in terms of, say, however many TOs over 18 we had in a game, give us that many extra possessions after the final buzzer has buzzed. No possessions for the other team, just a bunch of possessions for us in a row, where we have to try and score as much as possible. Also, if we turn the ball over on these possessions, we get another free one, so as to keep our TO total at 18. With how effective our offense is, for the most part, we would probably have no trouble making up the difference in most games. In that scenario, I think we would be close to a .500 team.

Take last night for example. We lost by 8, we had 25 TOs. At the end of the game, give us 7 possessions in a row to try and score 8 or more points.

Obviously, I don't think the league is gonna let this fly. But it does a good job of showing just how costly TOs are for this team. As bad as our defense is, it is not our biggest problem. The horribleness of our defense is inflated by our pace and by our silly TOs, because so many of them lead directly to fast break points for the other team. No team in the league would look good on D when the other team is given so many transition scoring opportunities. Again, I'm not saying that our D is great, but that it's horribleness can be overstated. Whereas the costliness of our TOs simply cannot be overstated.

EDIT: http://espn.go.com/nba/statistics/team/ ... rder/false

After looking at those stats^ we average 17.4 TOs per game, dead last in the league. Taking that into account, I think 15 is a more fair number than 18 for the scenario above. If we could just average 15 per game, which is still bottom third in the league, we would be a much better team.

As many of you know, I am a big Rambis supporter. I feel that you can't blame silly unnecessary TOs on the coach. For the most part, he has this team playing much more competitive basketball than most would expect, but is consistently let down by some of the silliest turnovers seen this side of youth basketball leagues.

[LOBO 7]

The problem with last game was that Rambis sat him for 10 minutes and that got him out of focus/rhythm. He was playing great before that.

Maintaining focus throughout the game is on the player.

[Piecake]

The problem with last game was that Rambis sat him for 10 minutes and that got him out of focus/rhythm. He was playing great before that.

Maintaining focus throughout the game is on the player.

Thats bull. Would it be nice if Beasley could sit for a long time and get back has rhythm immediately, sure. But that is not the kind of player that Beasley is now, and so it was just a nonsensically stupid move by Rambis to sit him for 10 minutes and take him out of his rhythm for no apparent reason.

[LOBO 7]

The problem with last game was that Rambis sat him for 10 minutes and that got him out of focus/rhythm. He was playing great before that.

Maintaining focus throughout the game is on the player.

Thats bull. Would it be nice if Beasley could sit for a long time and get back has rhythm immediately, sure. But that is not the kind of player that Beasley is now, and so it was just a nonsensically stupid move by Rambis to sit him for 10 minutes and take him out of his rhythm for no apparent reason.

If I remember correctly he had bricked a couple of bad shots right before Rambis took him out. Also, Wes had played so well in the first half that Rambis wanted to get him some extended burn. Webster is the one who probably got too many minutes but he also showed a few signs of life in the first half so I assume Rambis wanted to see if he could get into a rhythm, which would benefit this team greatly. Beas has been given plenty of opportunity. Is it Rambis' fault that he doesn't consistently stay focused? I swear, people dig very deep sometimes to find a reason to blame a loss on Rambis.

[Piecake]

If I remember correctly he had bricked a couple of bad shots right before Rambis took him out. Also, Wes had played so well in the first half that Rambis wanted to get him some extended burn. Webster is the one who probably got too many minutes but he also showed a few signs of life in the first half so I assume Rambis wanted to see if he could get into a rhythm, which would benefit this team greatly. Beas has been given plenty of opportunity. Is it Rambis' fault that he doesn't consistently stay focused? I swear, people dig very deep sometimes to find a reason to blame a loss on Rambis.

Am I blaming the loss on Rambis? Have I ever blamed a loss on Rambis? All I am saying that he made an incredibly stupid decision for sitting Beasley for 10 minutes and then sticking him in the final portion of the game, expecting him to be as effective as he was before when he has not shown that he could do that all year. He needs consistent minutes to maintain his rhythm. A lot of players are like that.

I don't remember him taking a couple of bad shots before Rambis took him out.

[LOBO 7]

If I remember correctly he had bricked a couple of bad shots right before Rambis took him out. Also, Wes had played so well in the first half that Rambis wanted to get him some extended burn. Webster is the one who probably got too many minutes but he also showed a few signs of life in the first half so I assume Rambis wanted to see if he could get into a rhythm, which would benefit this team greatly. Beas has been given plenty of opportunity. Is it Rambis' fault that he doesn't consistently stay focused? I swear, people dig very deep sometimes to find a reason to blame a loss on Rambis.

Am I blaming the loss on Rambis? Have I ever blamed a loss on Rambis? All I am saying that he made an incredibly stupid decision for sitting Beasley for 10 minutes and then sticking him in the final portion of the game, expecting him to be as effective as he was before when he has not shown that he could do that all year. He needs consistent minutes to maintain his rhythm. A lot of players are like that.

I don't remember him taking a couple of bad shots before Rambis took him out.

I'm fine with agreeing to disagree on this one.

I remember it differently and think I remember saying to myself that Beasley needed to be yanked. Whatever.

[Piecake]

In the 3rd quarter Beasley was 1/2 with 4 rebounds, 2 assists, and 2 TOs. Not bad except for the 2 TOs. I guess you could say he deserved to be yanked for those 2 TOs, but if Rambis did that we wouldn't be able to field a team. For example, Webster also had 2 TOs in that quarter as well.