Game 2: Phoenix Suns @ Denver Nuggets, Friday, Oct 25th, 6 PM MST

[Crives]

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[Fo-Real]

Tough loss, but WE GOOD FELLAS!!! Our team defense is so much better, we look like an actual team. Booker has been convinced to actually play defense AND I LOVE IT!!! We compete, we play hard, we are a team to be taken seriously again!! We had some players who could not throw a ball in the ocean last night. I LIKE WATCHING BASKETBALL AGAIN!!!!

[m1chal]

A very encouraging loss, if I may say so. It seems we finally have a team instead of bunch of random players. An OT loss to one of the contending teams, on their floor is more than I expected to be honest. We are going to surprise quite a few teams this season.

Go Suns!

[Fo-Real]

Booker being engaged on defense is the worth the price of admission for me. His offense will come as he get more accustomed to the new flow but he is all out effort on defense and that has me stoked!!!

[Saberestar]

So close to win this game...so close.

The problem starting Baynes is that he will always fouled out. He plays too hard, and he is perfect for 20 mpg, but he needs to play over 30 now for us.

We will see if he can adjust a bit his game.

Kaminsky up. Saric down.

[skywalker33]

Good game tonight, Rubio has really made a difference call me surprised. You gonna surprise quite a few more teams this year, Good Luck against all but my Nuggets !!

Enjoy that homecourt reffing you guys got tonight. Those three OT foulouts in the first minute were just over-the-top biased calls.

Right...I saw fouls on each replay, sorry your bias doesn't allow you to be a real man about it.

Didn't bother to mention the goal tending missed call on Baynes did ya ?? And what about the other 5 fouls both Oubre and Baynes got, were those phantom calls too ??? Regardless, I'm sure it was worth it to pay off the refs, I'm sure our season will be made with this one victory. It has GOT to put us over the top.

[Qwigglez]

Damn man I woke us this morning a little upset. Trying to figure out why then I realized it’s because the Suns lost. This would have been such a huge win to start the season...

[Mystical Apples]

The only redeeming quality for Saric is his post defense. He held up great against Jocic last night, but where is his stretch game? Brutal. 1-7 in two games is not good.

Booker's shot was off, and I felt like he was never in rhythm with the team... chalk it up to good D by Denver, I guess. We were close. I feel like if we had Ayton... it would have been a win.

Think Monty kinda co-owns both of these issues. He let Denver off the hook at tad by allowing long stretches of Jokic cross-matching defensively on the Suns PF. Idea being Grant is involved in defending perimeter screening action while Jokic conserves some energy.

Bridges and Oubre at 3/4 in that spot would’ve forced Denver’s hand. Grant is a good player but not someone that commands a ton of attention on the offensive end.

[denial]

I’m not a big fan of the nba coaching strategy of “in crunch time give it to your best player and let him win or lose it”.
I think it’s a cop out. But then again I think coaching is undervalued in general where people think it’s all players winning or losing.
And book specifically. I’ve seen him hit wild shots in crunch time, but never in iso in the last play in half court where we drew it up that way. Usually on broken plays and wild sequences like what we saw at the end of regulation. But never when we clear out for him with 20 seconds left. He always misses those. And rightfully so. No rhythm. No passing. Easy to defend.
Coaches should draw up a play to hit the winning shot. It can still be for book. And if the play breaks down then we let him go rogue. He would hit those almost always imo

[Sunsss]

I’m not a big fan of the nba coaching strategy of “in crunch time give it to your best player and let him win or lose it”.
I think it’s a cop out. But then again I think coaching is undervalued in general where people think it’s all players winning or losing.
And book specifically. I’ve seen him hit wild shots in crunch time, but never in iso in the last play in half court where we drew it up that way. Usually on broken plays and wild sequences like what we saw at the end of regulation. But never when we clear out for him with 20 seconds left. He always misses those. And rightfully so. No rhythm. No passing. Easy to defend.
Coaches should draw up a play to hit the winning shot. It can still be for book. And if the play breaks down then we let him go rogue. He would hit those almost always imo

Umm, you might wanna watch these:

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

As for the final call in this game... I didn't have much of a problem with it, but Booker would have been better off if he pulled up from 10-15 ft. He was more interested in drawing a foul and Beasley did a good job avoiding it.

[lilfishi22]

I’m not a big fan of the nba coaching strategy of “in crunch time give it to your best player and let him win or lose it”.
I think it’s a cop out. But then again I think coaching is undervalued in general where people think it’s all players winning or losing.
And book specifically. I’ve seen him hit wild shots in crunch time, but never in iso in the last play in half court where we drew it up that way. Usually on broken plays and wild sequences like what we saw at the end of regulation. But never when we clear out for him with 20 seconds left. He always misses those. And rightfully so. No rhythm. No passing. Easy to defend.
Coaches should draw up a play to hit the winning shot. It can still be for book. And if the play breaks down then we let him go rogue. He would hit those almost always imo

I get what you're saying. I don't think he always misses those but he certainly misses enough that we should look at better sets from the playbook rather than just to give him the ball to create. If it breaks down then sure, we can go to iso-Book but I would prefer if we had run a play.

The only thing I would say as well is that Booker is getting good experience from these do-or-die shots. We're ultimately not trying to win a championship this season so this is when we should be OK with making the mistakes and learning from experience. This time he went with an attempt closer to the basket where (I assume) he also tried to draw the foul and unfortunately for us, he didn't get the call and his attempt got blocked. 0 for 2. Next time I would imagine he would try and pull up for the mid-range shot.

At the end of the day, the difference between a star and a superstar is that one can run the play, execute and score, the other will create the play, execute and score when asked of him. Both are important but any really good player can run the play and take the best shot they can but the difference maker is the one that can get their own shot and make their shot when the play is broken, there is no play or there just isn't enough time to run a play.

[denial]

I’m not a big fan of the nba coaching strategy of “in crunch time give it to your best player and let him win or lose it”.
I think it’s a cop out. But then again I think coaching is undervalued in general where people think it’s all players winning or losing.
And book specifically. I’ve seen him hit wild shots in crunch time, but never in iso in the last play in half court where we drew it up that way. Usually on broken plays and wild sequences like what we saw at the end of regulation. But never when we clear out for him with 20 seconds left. He always misses those. And rightfully so. No rhythm. No passing. Easy to defend.
Coaches should draw up a play to hit the winning shot. It can still be for book. And if the play breaks down then we let him go rogue. He would hit those almost always imo

Umm, you might wanna watch these:

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

As for the final call in this game... I didn't have much of a problem with it, but Booker would have been better off if he pulled up from 10-15 ft. He was more interested in drawing a foul and Beasley did a good job avoiding it.

I’m a suns homer and Devin apologist normally. But these clips don’t refute my assertion at all tbh.
The first video, he got a switch and had a mismatch and there were 38 seconds left.
The second video was legit.
The third video was fairly legit; slightly different because it was inbounding from side.

So you got one or maybe two examples of it working. I’m not interested in disparaging Book so I won’t find links but I suspect there are many more videos that show him missing.
I love book but if we run a play we are more likely to win. If it ends up in books hands or we run a play for him that’s fine. I’m even fine with him starting with the ball in his hand. But set a screen or move some bodies at least. Don’t just clear out and let him go 1 on 5.

Edit: to be fair I said “never” in my original post. That was hyperbole. I should say he “rarely” hits them.