GT: Hornets @ Cavs Sun Nov 13 3:30PM EST

[KingCat]

That Frank post up just shows that our bench makes some really mind boggling questionable decisions on offense

[Braggins]

No way we win this without Lin. Not even worth watching.

[fatlever]

I hate to keep harping on it, but you can't roll with Sessions, Marco, MKG, Frank and Hawes for 7 straight minutes in the 4th quarter of a close game on the road vs a team like the Cavs, especially since they had Lebron out there for that entire stretch. That lineup might be fine for a similar stretch in the 2nd quarter, but that won't fly vs good teams in 4th as the defense tightens up and the Lebron types start looking to take over the offense.

Obviously if this was a must win game in late season or playoffs, Cliff would have a different rotation. Maybe he wanted to stick with the bench to see what they were made of? Maybe he is sending a message to Cho that when push comes to shove, he still needs an upgrade on the bench. Maybe he just wants to keep this pattern in order to keep minutes low for Marv, Cody, Kemba and Batum - odd that MKG played 42 with a hurt back.

Just feels like we had a legit chance to steal a game and provide the team with a huge confidence boost that would have lasting effects and we didn't go for it.

[Joest2003]

Cliff blew this game. How do you rest the starters that long in the fourth quarter in Cleveland? Even my girl who doesnt know anything about basketball was yelling to put the starters back in. Pathetic

[Eoghan]

Maybe he just wants to keep this pattern in order to keep minutes low for Marv, Cody, Kemba and Batum - odd that MKG played 42 with a hurt back.

Yeah, this is the kind of stuff that keeps me from getting on board with Clifford. It always seems like injured guys are pushed too hard and healthy guys played too little. We've had too many seasons in a row with bad injury history to chalk it up to luck at this point.

[Sauce_Castillo]

Maybe he just wants to keep this pattern in order to keep minutes low for Marv, Cody, Kemba and Batum - odd that MKG played 42 with a hurt back.

Yeah, this is the kind of stuff that keeps me from getting on board with Clifford. It always seems like injured guys are pushed too hard and healthy guys played too little. We've had too many seasons in a row with bad injury history to chalk it up to luck at this point.

I don't think you can blame Clifford for injury problems, he has always aired on the other end of playing people heavy minutes. Kemba gets around 32 min per game, when many feel he should get closer to 37-38, same with Batum. I think you have to look at medical staff for that problem. Teams like dallas and the suns who have been known to have great medical staffs have revived careers. A good medical staff is a much greater adv than people see it being IMO.


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[BigSlam]

Sessions is killing us.

I'd rather be playing BRob as our back up PG - at least he can hit from range.

Sessions can't hit from range, doesn't make creative passes to get others involved and can't seem to be able to finish at the rim any more. Just brutal.

Combine that with fact that our PF' totally sh*t the bed cost us the game. Marv missing wide open shot after wide open shot and Frank looking like he should be on the Swam roster rather than the Hornets roster.

On the plus side: I thought MKG killed James on D and Bats looked aggressive and smooth.

Such a frustrating loss. We should have had this one.


"BBMF'ers"

[euphorbus]

I don't think you can blame Clifford for injury problems, he has always erred on the other end of playing people heavy minutes. Kemba gets around 32 min per game, when many feel he should get closer to 37-38, same with Batum. I think you have to look at medical staff for that problem. Teams like Dallas and the Suns who have been known to have great medical staffs have revived careers.

Last season, Walker averaged 35.6 minutes per game. That tied him for 13th in the league, equal to LeBron James. So many times, Coach Clifford left him and Batum in games when the outcome was already decided. We now know that he had a knee injury in the playoffs that required surgery. I kept saying in March and April that if you ride your horses too hard, they will break down in the end.

This season, he is nowhere among the league leaders, and that is a good thing for the team. As I stated in the preseason thread, this is Walker's team, the one indispensible player the Hornets have. (Not everyone agrees.)

Not to revisit history, but there was no excuse for Michael Kidd-Gilchrist to play so many minutes once he returned to action last winter. That decision also rests with the head coach. What was he thinking? Michael kept saying "I'm fine, I'm good," and every time he hit the deck, you could see the pain in his face.

I agree, however, that the medical staff is nowhere near as good at the ones in Dallas and Toronto.

[Braggins]

Yeah, that was really frustrating seeing Kemba and Nic on the bench until 4-5 minutes left while that bench unit got waxed. Theres really no excuse for that. There was a time out at just under 9 minutes and another around the 7 minute mark. I can see waiting till around 7 minutes, but waiting til less than 5 minutes when we were getting outplayed so bad is just insane.

[Diop]

Sessions is killing us.

I'd rather be playing BRob as our back up PG - at least he can hit from range.

"BBMF'ers"

you know we're going to have to force Clifford's hand here, he won't just make the change.

Someone needs to liquor Pooty up and point him at Sessions knee or something

[LamarMatic7]

Sessions is killing us.

I'd rather be playing BRob as our back up PG - at least he can hit from range.

Time to call up..... XAVIER MUNFORD!

[Braggins]

I honestly kind of wish we kept Andrews and gave him a shot at backup PG.

Id be 100% on board with going for Roberts for a bit to see what hes got. Hes smaller and worse than Sessions defensively, but I'm actually fairly confident hes better offensively pretty much across the board. He doesn't get many turnovers and is probably the second or third best shooter on the team. Sessions wild attacks at the rim have been extremely ineffective and hes never been a good shooter.

I think our second unit could handle Roberts defensively once we get healthy. Roberts/Marco/Lamb/Frank/Roy. That seems like a pretty balanced 5-10 for the regular season. In the playoffs and when matchups dictate you can always just mostly cut the backup PG to stagger more starter minutes with the second unit.

[Zombiesonics]

cliffords stubbornness didn't just stop at waiting to put in starters, he refused to match up wit the cavs small line up letting frye torch CHA because he was dealing with a slow slow frank/hawes fc. its almost like he wanted to prove he WASN'T ADJUSTING to lue's experimental line ups.

[fatlever]

cliffords stubbornness didn't just stop at waiting to put in starters, he refused to match up wit the cavs small line up letting frye torch CHA because he was dealing with a slow slow frank/hawes fc. its almost like he wanted to prove he WASN'T ADJUSTING to lue's experimental line ups.

True. Cody would have made a lot more sense. Yes, Cody had 4 fouls, but he was fresh and ready to play entering the 4th and what is the point of saving Cody's fouls at that point? Hawes should have been taken out much earlier in favor of Cody. But, then you have Sessions, Marco, MKG, Frank and Cody and you lose another shooting playmaker in Hawes, so the smart thing would have been to add one of Batum or Kemba back as well.

[yosemiteben]

I'll be honest - I'm not super worried about the loss or how it happened. I watched it, but it was later on after I watched the Panthers lose and after I already knew the Hornets lost so I didn't really invest the same sort of energy in the game. With that said, I kind of like sticking to our normal rotation, given that our bench has been a pretty significant strength recently (and in the first half of this game).

I've decided I will always like limiting Kemba's minutes early in the season, so I'm totally fine with that decision. Given Kemba's importance to this team, I'm now significantly more concerned about his knee than I am with MKG's entire body, we need to keep Kemba as fresh and as healthy as possible.

We've had a number of injuries and are still trying to figure out how the new pieces on this team fit together, especially that big rotation. I can totally understand sticking with a fixed rotation just to see how they respond in that situation, so I have a hard time getting upset about it.

[BigSlam]

cliffords stubbornness didn't just stop at waiting to put in starters, he refused to match up wit the cavs small line up letting frye torch CHA because he was dealing with a slow slow frank/hawes fc. its almost like he wanted to prove he WASN'T ADJUSTING to lue's experimental line ups.

If Frank is too slow to keep up with an older, always been heavy footed, pretty much just hangs out at the arc and bombs 3's Frye then he has more problems than just not hitting shots.


"BBMF'ers"

[Eoghan]

cliffords stubbornness didn't just stop at waiting to put in starters, he refused to match up wit the cavs small line up letting frye torch CHA because he was dealing with a slow slow frank/hawes fc. its almost like he wanted to prove he WASN'T ADJUSTING to lue's experimental line ups.

If Frank is too slow to keep up with an older, always been heavy footed, pretty much just hangs out at the arc and bombs 3's Frye then he has more problems than just not hitting shots.


"BBMF'ers"

He did look a step slow for some reason. Seems like he was quicker last season. Hawes to me actually looks more sprightly this year than I can remember seeing him in a long time. If there just wasn't some sort of disconnect between his great basketball brain and his almost Biyombo-esque touch he'd be killing it.

[Robot Rock]

Ramon Sessions is a good guy but he was a horrible signing. Not getting Seth Curry was a huge, glaring mistake.