Game 41: Los Angeles (26-14) vs Houston (22-20)

[TheNewEra]

Things:

JJ was superstar tier. Why doc refuses to run more plays for him later in the game boggles my mind. I believe it was said that our end game offensive turning derivative in the end is fine because blake and cp3 are so good but i disagree 100%. If our greatest strength is our core 4, then just letting cp3 (and jamal) freestyle nullifies that. It's extremely unfortunate that a guy with a career game can be relegated to afterthought status.

CP3 was great. Watching him operate without blake's screening late in the 4th is scary though and not a sustainable way to score effectively. I don't see why we don't utilize dj more for that with blake gone. This team needs blake badly and tonight it showed. Anyone who thinks blake isn't necessary to this team's success or that it should trade him for "depth" is an utter moron.

Pablo was ass. Like, he was really bad. Everyone gets to be bad once in a while though, especially if you're a role player so i guess i can't be too mad at him. But the team's had a pretty lenient week in terms of games played so it's a bit surprising. And all that said i would have rather had him continue than see austin/jamal dominate the ball and be the "ball-handlers" of the second unit. That's just asking for disaster no matter what and tonight was no different.

Cole was great. He should have gotten more burn, i thought.

Love wes shooting the corner 3. Hate wes shooting from literally anywhere else. Really hope he either learns how to shoot that wing 3 or just drive down the lane (use your athleticism!). I thought his defense was ok to mediocre but he still needs more minutes than jamal.

Jamal's stat line won't show it but he took some shaky shots that were very fortunate to go in. And of course this went hand in hand with his usual awful brand of defense. Him and pierce being in for defense was unreal.

Pierce was crap on defense, not cause he isn't trying or because he's got zero bball IQ like jamal, but cause he's not a freaking big man. He can't help like one and he definitely can't rotate as fast as a typical SF. Was no small wonder dj was alone on many an island against d-ho.

That said, dj was crap against d-ho anyway. I felt like he was brutalized all night against the guy and on many of howard's scores, dj didn't even seem anywhere near the vicinity. Call me an ass if you want for being harsh on him coming off a serious illness, but if you're jumping higher in the air than even howard himself to throw down monster slams then you can play better freaking D and maybe box out for once.

Doc made several questionable decisions. This game felt like one of those games early in the season where doc was all over the place.

I hope blake gets healthy sooner rather than later.

Seeing as Cole had 4 fouls in 11 mins you should be more grateful DJ played. Cole should of been used more to help spot DJ on his first game back but all the same Cole was on track to foul out quickly. On top of that Dwight is still a damn good player that is on a role and can play at elite levels at times.

Dj could of played better but again this could of been worse. Smith having to play C and not being played at PF to give the bigs any help on Dwight was questionable.

[Ranma]

This is such bull in my opinion we were up 8 with ten seconds if they screwed that up again this we have bigger problems than that going ahead. You want to know why the rest of the guys were sitting still it's because the bench unit let the Rockets back into the game to start the 4th.

If Doc tries to bring this up I tell him to kiss my behind and let Austins shooting and defense save him. Lance and Josh are still the X factors. Actually using them when Jamal and Pierce can't hit shots or play d would help.

As I stated on the previous page a little bit later, I agree that the game was practically over at that point and that everyone else was lamenting how we finished the game despite the win. Then why didn't Lance and Josh? Yeah, they didn't play so they weren't as invested in the meltdown. Fine. It's probably no big deal and an overreaction on my part, but it says something that the fans in the seats behind them didn't feel like celebrating while Josh and Lance were goofing around. Blake Griffin in a suit and tie was still focused on the game.

What's a bigger deal is that we've been able to win without these two. Yeah, it was against mostly inferior competition but we've clearly made progress since benching both of them. Stephenson has shown glimpses of contributing but in a small sample size. Smith, however, hasn't shown much beyond his weakside defense and passing. He may be built like a power forward with athleticism to spare but he relegates himself to being an outside shot-chucker, which we don't need with our over-reliance on perimeter play.

You may think of both of them as X factors but Josh Smith is unlikely to change or even recapture his glory days as an athletic wonder. He seems steadfast in trying to contribute primarily as an outside shooter. There may still be some hope left for Lance Stephenson, but as long as Jamal Crawford is on the team, there's little incentive for Doc to play him despite Stephenson's better defense.

Personally, I'd rather dump all 3 to prevent Doc from using any of them for more reliable and steady contributors rather than wait and hope for any of those 3 to play beyond expectations at any given moment.

[Ranma]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/DanWoikeSports/status/689359762056675328[/tweet]

[mkwest]

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFPK-iODifo[/youtube]
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BS0iBywqyFA[/youtube]
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXz3cWbvCDc[/youtube]
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHmeIF8qSO4[/youtube]

[QRich3]

Yeah I have zero problems with Lance and Josh goofing around at that point, I've actually been very pleased with their attitude. Dudes are watching their NBA careers die sitting on the bench, and they're still in good spirits, having fun and genuinely supporting their teammates when they have good games. Props to them, all that nonsense Reggie Miller was spitting was nothing but brainless cliches.

Doc was pretty bad last night yeah, some puzzling decisions at times. leaving Austin for the final possessions was an awful decision, he kept putting him in as a defensive sub late in the game, and Austin kept letting Thornton get comfortably to the 3PT line in both shots late to tie it. So much for 'defensive trust'. Your son is not any sort of defensive stopper, stop trying to act like he is.

It's still a good win though, I had this one marked as a loss for a while, even while we were on our winning streak. The fact that we clawed to the win without Blake and with a rusty DJ is nothing but good news, even if we let them come back and score on us easily. You can focus on how bad Pierce is defensively, or you can focus on how we score at will when he's at the 4. You can focus on how DJ just seems to rotate to wrong place every time, or you can focus on how he draws three men every time he rolls to the rim. Both are equally true, it's just a matter of perspective I guess.

JJ is just on godly mode, he's just unstoppable, and I was glad we went to overtime just so he and Howard could keep padding stats for my fantasy team

And Paul is quietly back to point god mode too, he's been playing MVP level basketball for a month or two and that's the best news we could have really. Let's just hope Blake takes his time and we're fully healthy when the post season comes around. We're not gonna be favorites, but I wouldn't want to see us were I a Warriors or Spurs fan.

[Ranma]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/basketballtalk/status/689414168798048256[/tweet]

[mattd13]

great win. being a huge jj fan it was great to see him play like that. he could have had 50 if they had continued to pass to him. after they got the lead you saw pierce and others try to score and overlook jj when he was open a number of times and didn't get the ball. well I guess I should not be greedy. I also have to agree with the posts of nick and Q. we seem to have similar opinions of the state of affairs concerning the clips. it is sad to see the way doc uses his son when he clearly has major issues with his game.

[Dynamix]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/basketballtalk/status/689414168798048256[/tweet]

That's... Redickulous.

[Ranma]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/FlyByKnite/status/689496581809172480[/tweet]
[tweet]https://twitter.com/DanWoikeSports/status/689506776413110272[/tweet]

[Ranma]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/FlyByKnite/status/689540471966666752[/tweet]
[tweet]https://twitter.com/FlyByKnite/status/689548216988119040[/tweet]

[Ranma]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/DanWoikeSports/status/689644893359079424[/tweet]
[tweet]https://twitter.com/FlyByKnite/status/689644144088604672[/tweet]

[og15]

With a larger sample size, the bench still needs some help:

Rivers / Crawford / Johnson / Pierce / Smith was awful, 73 mins / 76.6 Ortg / 106.5 Drtg / 35.5 REB%

The new main bench lineup is better, but still struggling:
Prigioni / Rivers / Crawford / Johnson / Aldrich: 72 mins / 98.1 Ortg / 108.2 Drtg / 41.0 REB%

Techncally the best lineup has been:
Rivers / Crawford / Stephenson / Pierce / Smith: 80 mins / 92.5 Ortg / 99.6 Drtg / 42.8 REB%

So this new lineup still has the rebounding problem, which makes sense as the SF is Jamal and the PF is Johnson. This is why I have mentioned trying to get Bass. He's a guy who won't kill spacing as he's an excellent mid-range shooter and can even hit the corner 3PT shot, and he will help on the glass and defensively with this lineup. He also gives another option for bigs and he can be played with Blake for stretches without it being too much of an issue.

That "best" lineup is obviously still not "good", but if I'm a coach, when Blake returns, I would probably think of trying out a bench lineup of:

Prigioni / Crawford / Stephenson / Pierce / Aldrich

...of course this removes Austin from the lineup, but it could possibly help balance out the lineup while giving more help on the rebounding department.