Dwight wasn't lying when he said he was bone on bone. It was just in a non load bearing area of his knee, so they can manage it. However, he will have flare ups. I hate how people describe Dwight as soft. He has had lots of big injuries and has played through them. When he talks about his injuries, people call him soft. When he doesn't talk about it, people call him soft for not playing back to backs. He is the farthest thing from soft.
So if Dwight is broken down to the point where his situation is chronic I really hope we win a ring this year and then part ways with him, or he gives us a huge discount to re-sign him. He's not worth 20+ million annually.
I mean, he doesn't play up to his salary during the season. But Dwight in the playoffs has still been a beast.
Yeah, stats don't even do it just. He cleans up a remarkable amount of mistakes by the perimeter defenders.
Dwight did say that he plans on playing like 10 more seasons. I hope he can do it... We need Clint to continue to develop on the defensive end.
Yeah he is. We can not get that kind of production in the playoffs at the big spot for less than that. Hell, we can't get his production at any price. Demarcus Cousins or Andre Drummond aren't walking through that door.
He is a very good team defender, I don't think anyone doubts that. Also, what about all the positive things that Morey has said about Jones?
Didn't hear the 790 interview but I heard him on 610 and he was talking about how he was hoping the Thunder wouldn't be another 20 or loss and he also talked about how going to OT against the magic is basically a loss. Said he'll take the win tacked on to the record, but they can't have home showings like they've had.
If Dwight does need to rest during B2Bs Clint needs to get in the weight room cause i dont see much of an improvement as far as bulk from him.
The (now dying, I hope) trend of bulking these bigs up is a bad idea IMO. Especially when you realize half these guys don't know what they are doing in the weight room or with their diet. You can't have guys on multi-year, multi-million dollar contracts acting like Joe Weightlifter at your local YMCA doing nothing but bench press and curls. All these guys are doing is exacerbating muscle imbalances and weaknesses to the point they need back surgery at 24 and with the knees of a 50 year old at 27. It's weird how guys go to Phoenix and get better or how Steph Curry goes from glass ankles to an NBA iron man in GS while guys come to the Rockets and fall apart when they should be hitting their prime. I'm not blaming them for Dwight but I don't think they are necessarily helping him manage his injuries properly either.
(790-not mentioned) Pat may be out a little bit of a stretch, nothing long term serious. Terrence had his eye, it's taken longer than hoped. It's a continuing theme. We'll be stronger in the end by having [some of these] guys play now. (Why Harrell is suddenly out of the rotation) Issues there are not with him. Coaching staff is looking at how much better we're playing small. Clint & Dwight need to be at the 5 playing small. It's a lot to ask of a rookie to play the 5 as an undersized big. If we play small, it'll squeeze the minutes of a guy like Harrell. Coaches are looking for opportunities to play big but we were playing better small. On 610: Favorite show on TV? Walking Dead I think. Is that my easiest question for the morning? The follow up was is that the nickname for your team after 3 games? They do have a badass named Daryl on the show. Evaluate this team after a week. We're not where we want to be. We're trying to make that last step, the next level of championship contender. We're not there. A long way to go. These injuries will be a positive later. Capela will get more time, Harrell will develop, we've seen Thornton can contribute. Having guys in and out has hurt us on both ends chemistry wise. Big picture, it will help us down the road. The reality is we're not playing well. We need to continue to work the issues and continue make the adjustments we need to make to get better. Beyond perimeter D or offensive whatever, forget specifics, isn't it as simple as the big ticket item isn't fitting in quite yet? I wouldn't put it all on him. I said it wrong. It's not meshing yet. The position hardest to bring in on a team is a PG. There will be growing pains. To be frank, we did think we'd be further along at this point. October wasn't as good for prep as we wanted it to be. We had so many players in and out. The chemistry did not develop. We now have to do it during the season and it's affecting us. We're fighting to get back to playing as well as last year and we were hoping to fight to continue to get better. We want to peak in April. That's our goal. We sure need to win a lot of games now in the tough West and we won't come in and beat a team easy the way we're playing right now. Thunder game, down 17 in the 3rd and I said to my wife, I already think they lost a shot at the one seed if they can't win this. It sounds ridiculous after 4 games but if you fall to 0-4 and need 60 wins to get the one seed, the math is really hard. What was going through your mind before the run in the 3rd Q before maybe helping turn the beginning of the season around? During the game I can be emotional. I was thinking, goodness we cannot lose by 20 again. That went through my mind. In terms of winning one seed, beating Orlando at home, a win is a win after the game is over, but games at home that aren't western conference playoff teams, we really, really can't lose those games. That's why the Denver game was a disappointment and being in a close game with Orlando at home, more or less we've already not achieved what we want to achieve. You only lost once last year against a team below .500 at home. You checked that box the first game. We were 18-2 against non-playoff teams at home. We already dropped one. If you go to OT, you've basically not won. You've not done what you wanted to do. It's tough. It's tough to not be where you want to be. You gotta continue to focus, coaches will work on lineups, rotations and get things tighter. We're not where we want to be. On the other hand, not everything is doom and gloom. Montrezl Harrell, Thornton steps right in. That's what I was alluding to. Injuries are tough but in the big picture, can be healthy. Capela will get more minutes. He's taken such a huge leap forward. We've changed how we're having our bigs play defense. He's taking time to advance there. Harrell, when gotten minutes, has shined. Thornton didn't play early. If we need to call on him, he can give good minutes. There will be positives down the road but we're in the middle of it now and not playing as well as we'd like. To your point, 2-3 is recoverable. 1-4 or 0-5, it would have gotten difficult. How much of it, in a make or miss league, is [Harden's] going through a shooting slump? That's part of it but not all of it. Harden has gone throguh 5 game stretches where he shot similarly to this. Not many but it has happened. He has gotten more spot up looks. Not as many as we'd like. This is a make or miss league. There can be wild swings in any short stretch. He won't finish shooting 12%. There is a curse on him. [No comment] Motiejunas update? He's back on the floor, doing basketball activities. Doctors are so optimistic about how his back is looking and how good it'll be. They want to make sure the muscles around the back are back to the strength they were prior to the injury and muscles supporting it are even. We're waiting on the green light from doctors. That green light is undetermined at this point. He hasn't had incidents for a long time. His shooting looks unbelievable. His hands are bleeding from shooting. You'll see a big bump in his shooting. He's so important to our team D, team overall and it's been tough not having him. What's going through your mind when J.J. Watt tries to check in? Lets try it. He's one of the best athletes in the world and one of the best athletes probably ever. If he focused on basketball, he could have been pretty good. I wouldn't put anything past him. He's a four? He may have to be an undersized five with his current build. If he had done it his whole life, a four, yeah. Is a hotdog a sandwich? Wow. OK. I'm confused by that. A normal hotdog? I would say definitely not. <iframe id="cbsembed" width="560" height="315" src="http://cbsloc.al/1Ml07PC" frameborder="0" /></iframe>
I have a huge ego. I've been saying DMo is an amazing defender for a couple years now, when no one saw it, I did. And Morey talking about it made me c*m.
Dmo becoming a knock down shooter will open everything up for James, Ty, and Dwight, and his presence should help with team defense against bigger teams. So huge that they don't have to go small to create that spacing.
It's no coincidence that our defense was decent even when Dwight was out last year. DMo has 3 things going for him: he's 7 feet tall, has quick feet, and is smart. Not everyone has to be an athletic freak like Dwight or DeAndre to be a good defender.....look at Marc Gasol. A lot of our defensive issues will disappear when DMo gets back. The paint will be much tougher to get into with Dwight and DMo rotating to cover for Lawson and Harden.
Howard is clearly not himself, despite the stats he looked like he couldn't explode up to get a rebound or dunk. His knee wasn't right.
I'll answer this for bbholic. I remember him and Batman Jones (if Im not mistaken) having a T.Jones discussion. Morey and Batman Jones had dinner (I believe) and Morey told Batman Jones that TJones was one of the better players on the team. According to bbholic Morey was only trying to sell others on TJones. It was a marketing move and that statement didn't reflect the truth. So to answer your question: Stating how valuable DMo is = truth; Stating how valuable TJones is = trying to sell him for more than he is actually worth. :grin:
"Bububut is just the first 3-4 games of the season. What matters is how we do in the end" they said LMAO, where are those losers who said first few games of the season don't matter. Preseason was a sign that we were not ready. And dropping the first 3 games of the season HURT. You cannot ignore that when seeds are so important in the western conference.
