Game 1: Trail Blazers @ Suns, Wednesday, Oct 18th, 7PM PT

[bwgood77]

For me, the things that irk me the most are:

1. It was our home opener. After we were up 9-2, we let the fans down (in house or at home).
2. Losing by this much means we came into the season unprepared. Even the preseason we didn't look good. Not sure if that's on Watson or just that we're a very young team still.

I don't expect we'll see a loss close to that one the rest of the way (I think we'll win our next game actually) but if we are worse than last season, or we don't see any development from our young players, then Watson will be on the hot seat.
If nothing else, there's no way we keep Bledsoe and Chandler should we not improve.

I did fall asleep mid-2nd and never woke back up (on the east coast coming off just a few hours sleep after a foo fighters show the night prior).
Can someone just give me a run down of the good and the bad?
Did Jackson look bad or just lost because the team is new to him?
What about Ulis, Peters, DJJ, and Mike James?

There are a few details of the (very little) good and most of the bad in the Nashty/Cactus thread.

[bwgood77]

I foresee myself turning into BurningHeart if this continues!

What ever happened to that guy? I loved his passion

I messaged him sometime in the past year. He hasn't watched much but said he may tune in this year. If he watched this game then I assume he won't be watching another one for a while.

He's still logging in quite a bit. Last time I checked months back it was that same day he had logged in and just pulling up profile now it says last logged in at 1:08 am today. memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=45332

[SUN]

so...this is the power of suns basketball..whoa...

[ATTL]

For me, the things that irk me the most are:

1. It was our home opener. After we were up 9-2, we let the fans down (in house or at home).
2. Losing by this much means we came into the season unprepared. Even the preseason we didn't look good. Not sure if that's on Watson or just that we're a very young team still.

I don't expect we'll see a loss close to that one the rest of the way (I think we'll win our next game actually) but if we are worse than last season, or we don't see any development from our young players, then Watson will be on the hot seat.
If nothing else, there's no way we keep Bledsoe and Chandler should we not improve.

I did fall asleep mid-2nd and never woke back up (on the east coast coming off just a few hours sleep after a foo fighters show the night prior).
Can someone just give me a run down of the good and the bad?
Did Jackson look bad or just lost because the team is new to him?
What about Ulis, Peters, DJJ, and Mike James?

How many foos did they fight?

[Stark]

I want to say so much things about this performance but i'm just going to copy paste my comment after our first pre-season game against Portland.

I don't blame Bender btw i think Watson is the problem. Players doesn't have strict roles in our team. We have three potential 20 point scorer in our team (Warren/Bledsoe/Booker) and we are still playing lottery ball. Coach should be someone who can punish players when they slack off or should be someone with a system. Watson doesn't have one, he just flatters players and tells them that they are the next big thing so players love him and his attitude. Who doesn't want a boss that just go easy on you but if you want to be efficient you need somebody who can push your limits, especially in sports.

[Jstock12]

How did Bender look? I noticed he got 7 boards in just 21 minutes. Also a block and a steal. That's pretty good.

[bwgood77]

How did Bender look? I noticed he got 7 boards in just 21 minutes. Also a block and a steal. That's pretty good.

He looked as good as anyone. Probably our most active defensive guy and our leading rebounder with only 21 minutes, a very nice block and a lot of disrupting shots around the basket. Didn't shoot well but didn't shoot much. Two of his misses were trying to tip back a ball around the rim with a few defenders jumping up trying grab the rebound.

If we ever get to a point where we have good ball movement and he can play some with Jackson and hopefully a PG who moves the ball more I think our offensive flow could be good since he has good court vision and bbiq.

[Jstock12]

How did Bender look? I noticed he got 7 boards in just 21 minutes. Also a block and a steal. That's pretty good.

He looked as good as anyone. Probably our most active defensive guy and our leading rebounder with only 21 minutes, a very nice block and a lot of disrupting shots around the basket. Didn't shoot well but didn't shoot much. Two of his misses were trying to tip back a ball around the rim with a few defenders jumping up trying grab the rebound.

If we ever get to a point where we have good ball movement and he can play some with Jackson and hopefully a PG who moves the ball more I think our offensive flow could be good since he has good court vision and bbiq.

He's only turning 20 next month too. Hopefully he gets more playing time this year.

[ImNotMcDiSwear]

is it just me or has Watson had mobile bigs like Chandler/Bender dropping consistently during PnR defense?

don't remember them doing that as often last year.

That's coaching. Each year since Tyson's been here, at least. Our centers do not guard the shot, and if the coaches didn't want that, it wouldn't continue to happen.

[ImNotMcDiSwear]

Didn't we start like 0-11 or 0-13 one year and Ainge was coach and got fired? And then we made the playoffs or something? Something close to that happened but I might be wrong on record and coach.

0-13. Then we traded Finley and Cassell for Kidd. Kidd got injured quick, but we came back and made the playoffs that year starting Kidd, KJ, Chapman and Person 1-4. That was the smallest ball I've ever seen the Suns play. Chapman was amazing for us that year... including the shot! A great series against Seattle, almost pulled off the upset. What a year. That offseason, we got McDyess and added Cliff Robinson. Things were really looking up before the lockout.

Good times, good times.

[darealjuice]

Man, I'm still so frustrated by that game. It's only the first game, but how is it even possible for a team that supposedly worked together for the entire offseason to play with nearly no chemistry, shoot like crap, and lay a bit fat egg on their home opener celebrating 50 years of Suns basketball? No one is going to be fired yet, but if we don't look like a completely different team tomorrow against the Lakers then it's hard to imagine there isn't some serious internal discussion on what needs to be changed. I think most people expected a loss, but there's not a soul that expected us to be down 58 at one point to the McCollum-less Blazers.

Bledsoe might have been the most frustrating to watch of the bunch last night. In what world is jab stepping multiple times on the perimeter only to jack up a contested 3 considered good offense? And what was that soft ass scooping shot attempt during 3rd quarter? That's something you pull when you're messing around, not when you're supposed to actually give a ****, and I heard people audibly shout 'What the hell was that' around me in the crowd when he did it.

I'm not a big fan of what Watson did with our lineups last night either. TJ and Jackson are too similar of players at this point to start the game together, especially when our opponents don't respect either of them from 3-point range. I don't understand why he talks about wanting to lead the league in 3-point attempts when he puts TJ and JJ on the floor together, they'd both rather put the ball on the deck and go to the basket/mid-range than shoot a 3. Let Chriss (or even Bender) start, he has no problem spotting up for 3 and we need him to get chances to start making them consistently for us so we can develop some spacing. One of TJ and JJ needs to come off the bench to provide scoring and a spark, especially because we don't have anyone I'd consider a go-to player off the bench with how Ulis has been struggling a bit since preseason.

This team flat out needs to start executing. It falls on everyone to do that, but regardless of the system we're running on offense I don't think Watson is setting us up well for success with the starting and bench lineups as they were last night. Starting lineup doesn't mean just put your best 5 players on the floor and hope it works. 10 assists in a game is pitiful, that means that we shot like **** and we played way too much isolation basketball. There were really no bright spots to that game.

[tyguy]

as Bad as Amare was defensively he was Dennis Rodman compared to Chris. Bledsoe and Chandler act like they are pissed they haven't been traded yet or are expecting it. The concerns i have are Booker thinks he's better than he is, he is atrocious defensively too and has a bit of that prima donna air about him, he hasn't earned that yet. Warren mailed it in on both ends too. Trying not to over react to one game but the veteran mentoring we were supposed to get from Chandler and Dudley hasn't translated to defensive or rebounding effort

Why aren't more people critical of Booker? The only thing he brings to the table is scoring and he doesn't do it very efficiently because he has poor shot selection. He needs to shoot way more threes. 40 + % of his shots need to be coming from three. He shoots the midrange and long two at about the same % he shoots the threeball, yet he takes 39% of his shots from mid to long 2.

[collidingNeurons]

as Bad as Amare was defensively he was Dennis Rodman compared to Chris. Bledsoe and Chandler act like they are pissed they haven't been traded yet or are expecting it. The concerns i have are Booker thinks he's better than he is, he is atrocious defensively too and has a bit of that prima donna air about him, he hasn't earned that yet. Warren mailed it in on both ends too. Trying not to over react to one game but the veteran mentoring we were supposed to get from Chandler and Dudley hasn't translated to defensive or rebounding effort

Why aren't more people critical of Booker? The only thing he brings to the table is scoring and he doesn't do it very efficiently because he has poor shot selection. He needs to shoot way more threes. 40 + % of his shots need to be coming from three. He shoots the midrange and long two at about the same % he shoots the threeball, yet he takes 39% of his shots from mid to long 2.

i think it's because he represents the closest thing to hope the Suns fans have, with Jackson.. and he looks good while shooting inefficiently ... but my main issue is he doesn't even seem to try when he isn't scoring and he doesn't mesh well with Bledsoe, which is partly Bledsoe's fault... mainly one handles the ball while the other one watches

[bwgood77]

as Bad as Amare was defensively he was Dennis Rodman compared to Chris. Bledsoe and Chandler act like they are pissed they haven't been traded yet or are expecting it. The concerns i have are Booker thinks he's better than he is, he is atrocious defensively too and has a bit of that prima donna air about him, he hasn't earned that yet. Warren mailed it in on both ends too. Trying not to over react to one game but the veteran mentoring we were supposed to get from Chandler and Dudley hasn't translated to defensive or rebounding effort

Why aren't more people critical of Booker? The only thing he brings to the table is scoring and he doesn't do it very efficiently because he has poor shot selection. He needs to shoot way more threes. 40 + % of his shots need to be coming from three. He shoots the midrange and long two at about the same % he shoots the threeball, yet he takes 39% of his shots from mid to long 2.

He has plenty of critics, but the hype machine for him in Phoenix is big and they have stroked his ego a bit too much that it may end up being tougher to get him to change such habits. He's another one of those guys who wants to play like Kobe, when the game has evolved to where you need to take the smartest efficient shots (3s or at the rim). I think (and hope) eventually he will shoot more 3s at a higher percentage, but he may have shied away last night after not hitting his first few. It's hard to be too critical with him last night though when he actually was active doing some other things, like getting some boards, assists, steals and a block without any turnovers. His shot wasn't falling at a good rate overall, but it was better than most of the rest of the team.

[tyguy]

as Bad as Amare was defensively he was Dennis Rodman compared to Chris. Bledsoe and Chandler act like they are pissed they haven't been traded yet or are expecting it. The concerns i have are Booker thinks he's better than he is, he is atrocious defensively too and has a bit of that prima donna air about him, he hasn't earned that yet. Warren mailed it in on both ends too. Trying not to over react to one game but the veteran mentoring we were supposed to get from Chandler and Dudley hasn't translated to defensive or rebounding effort

Why aren't more people critical of Booker? The only thing he brings to the table is scoring and he doesn't do it very efficiently because he has poor shot selection. He needs to shoot way more threes. 40 + % of his shots need to be coming from three. He shoots the midrange and long two at about the same % he shoots the threeball, yet he takes 39% of his shots from mid to long 2.

i think it's because he represents the closest thing to hope the Suns fans have, with Jackson.. and he looks good while shooting inefficiently ... but my main issue is he doesn't even seem to try when he isn't scoring and he doesn't mesh well with Bledsoe, which is partly Bledsoe's fault... mainly one handles the ball while the other one watches

He's got good shooting mechanics and I bet he would bump his 3pt % up getting more of those shots assisted. 76 % of his threes are assisted vs someone like klay who has 96 +% assisted. He needs to eliminate most of those mid range and long twos. You can get those shots whenever you want, so I see them as a lazy shot. It's either get all the way to the rack and finish or kick out. Frankly he should also be a better rebounder as well. He has a ton of things to improve on, but first he needs to shore up his shot selection.

[Blackification]

It’s so weird cause it seems like these guys all get along, they say all the right things, they are in the gym all the time, how can they play this bad together? You have the bulls beating up eachother in the locker room and other teams with players who hate eachother. Watson has a group with none of those issues, yet he can’t get them to run basic plays, especially a simple pick n roll

[Kuwolves12]

as Bad as Amare was defensively he was Dennis Rodman compared to Chris. Bledsoe and Chandler act like they are pissed they haven't been traded yet or are expecting it. The concerns i have are Booker thinks he's better than he is, he is atrocious defensively too and has a bit of that prima donna air about him, he hasn't earned that yet. Warren mailed it in on both ends too. Trying not to over react to one game but the veteran mentoring we were supposed to get from Chandler and Dudley hasn't translated to defensive or rebounding effort

Why aren't more people critical of Booker? The only thing he brings to the table is scoring and he doesn't do it very efficiently because he has poor shot selection. He needs to shoot way more threes. 40 + % of his shots need to be coming from three. He shoots the midrange and long two at about the same % he shoots the threeball, yet he takes 39% of his shots from mid to long 2.

He has plenty of critics, but the hype machine for him in Phoenix is big and they have stroked his ego a bit too much that it may end up being tougher to get him to change such habits. He's another one of those guys who wants to play like Kobe, when the game has evolved to where you need to take the smartest efficient shots (3s or at the rim). I think (and hope) eventually he will shoot more 3s at a higher percentage, but he may have shied away last night after not hitting his first few. It's hard to be too critical with him last night though when he actually was active doing some other things, like getting some boards, assists, steals and a block without any turnovers. His shot wasn't falling at a good rate overall, but it was better than most of the rest of the team.

He may take Kobe like shots but he sure as hell doesn’t play defense like Kobe nor is he competitive like Kobe. Unfortunately, I think Booker is a lot like some other young guards in the league now, high volume shooter who might put up good looking numbers but never really helps a team win

[bwgood77]

Why aren't more people critical of Booker? The only thing he brings to the table is scoring and he doesn't do it very efficiently because he has poor shot selection. He needs to shoot way more threes. 40 + % of his shots need to be coming from three. He shoots the midrange and long two at about the same % he shoots the threeball, yet he takes 39% of his shots from mid to long 2.

He has plenty of critics, but the hype machine for him in Phoenix is big and they have stroked his ego a bit too much that it may end up being tougher to get him to change such habits. He's another one of those guys who wants to play like Kobe, when the game has evolved to where you need to take the smartest efficient shots (3s or at the rim). I think (and hope) eventually he will shoot more 3s at a higher percentage, but he may have shied away last night after not hitting his first few. It's hard to be too critical with him last night though when he actually was active doing some other things, like getting some boards, assists, steals and a block without any turnovers. His shot wasn't falling at a good rate overall, but it was better than most of the rest of the team.

He may take Kobe like shots but he sure as hell doesn’t play defense like Kobe nor is he competitive like Kobe. Unfortunately, I think Booker is a lot like some other young guards in the league now, high volume shooter who might put up good looking numbers but never really helps a team win

Yeah, we were not talking about defense, but the type of shots he takes. He's yet to put up good looking numbers shooting outside of specific nights though.

[bwgood77]

It’s so weird cause it seems like these guys all get along, they say all the right things, they are in the gym all the time, how can they play this bad together? You have the bulls beating up eachother in the locker room and other teams with players who hate eachother. Watson has a group with none of those issues, yet he can’t get them to run basic plays, especially a simple pick n roll

I think they could really use Dudley on the court as well, particularly with the 2nd unit.

[denial]

There is a trend with some teams to play this silly iso ball as their SYSTEM. Its crazy to me. I saw the Cavs do it last year in the finals. And I notice a lot of the young club teams rarely focus on team concepts. Its all about individual fundamentals, skill drills, and the same fast-break drill that dominates most of the practices I see with young (like high school age and younger) teams. The literally spend the majority of practice just throwing up intentional misses in order to practice boxing out, rebounding, outlet pass, run-run-run. Everybody is a guard. Everybody has the green light.

I love running basketball. I'm a Suns fan. But you need to know how to play actual basketball too.

I wonder if that method of running a team is leaking up to these young so-called coaches in the NBA (or maybe that's just the way basketball teams are run. I'm no expert)