He was a 40%+ threepoint shooter with high volume last season in Washington. I don't understand it honestly and it annoys the **** out of me. I feel like the offense looks so much smoother with Brewer in the game and both hustle hard on defense.
POR has played the fewest conference games of any West team. After tonight's matchup vs MIL, they will play 14 consecutive conference games. Expect them to continue to fall in the standings. HOU, MEM, LAC, and GS will battle for HC. Don't count out SA either.
Yes, and that's what confused me. The fact he shot well last season but completely face-planting with us. What makes this even more annoying, is that he is getting ideal looks -- thanks to Mr. Harden. Whatever the deal is, it needs to be addressed by either Morey or McHale.
They had Beal to kick it out to as well, which probably gave Ariza some more open looks. Quite frankly, we'd be killing it if we shot the 3-ball just a little bit better.
You know what's crazy though, "we're not even that good." I don't mean that in a negative way (though those turnovers last night wtf) when T Jones gets back to some heatlhy minutes in rotation, a healthy Dwight, Ariza finds his shot, the bench provides when the starters are out...........man watch.
What's going to be really interesting is seeing how we do without Howard for an extended period of time. So far we're 4-0 in the four games he's been out. Two over bad teams LAL and BOS. The other two over possible 7 or 8 seeds in PHX and DAL. I'm looking forward to see how our lineup mixes it up with the strong teams w/o Howard on the court. Remember, the last two games The Beard has been quiet. Have you noticed that when Howard and Harden don't dominate the offense, we have five or six guys scoring in double figures?
We're 11-4 without Dwight this season(I won't include the win at Phoenix since he technically started that game). That's no small sample either. That's nearly 1/5 of the schedule. So we can hold down the fort with him gone. I just hope we're all given some sort of timetable on his return. I hate this "out indefinitely" stuff. It sounds like Yao all over again.
My only complaint with McHale is that he hasn't been able to convince Howard that his post ups are inefficient and that he needs to do something else be that as the pick man on the PnR or as the 3rd wheel patrolling the baseline when others run the PnR or work the high/low post game with any of the other bigs. His stats as from the pivot are abysmal , his stats when assisted are about as efficient as you can get , finishing 78% of those with a bucket. Add to that he will take a lot less banging when he isn't posting up ..... To me , McHale's job this year is to convince Howard to post up only when he has a clear advantage - Do it when you can dominate and do something else when it isn't working.
I wouldn't. But .... Howard is already under contract and you have to extract as much value from that as possible. Posting him up , having 40% of those possessions resulting in turnovers , 42% shooting from those shots he does take and shooting ~50% from the charity stripe is not efficient. That's not value. Shooting 78% from assisted shots .... That's efficient if he takes one shot or 20.
I never thought I'd say this...but Smith's defense has been REALLY good. The league has moved on to the PF position being what will hurt you as opposed to C as it used to be, and PFs haven't been burning us as much with Smith defending them. On a sidenote, TJ's D has improved too
Read and react is predecated upon team chemistry/trust. We dont need anymore pieces just time to gel and everyone to fit and settle into their roles. This is not a video game... 1. Josh Smith will stop having to prove something and play naturally, 2. Ariza will accept himself as a defender and will settle into his three point shot, beverly and cf will accept that he is not a true pg, 3. harden is the best combo guard in the league and mvp, 4. Howard will heal completely from his injury, 5. Dmo will emerge as a top 3 scoring big man in the west, will average double doubles by the end of the season, 6. Tjones will regain his early season form, 7. Brewer will headup the best reserve unit in the league 8. Capella does a huge leap and begins to contribute in the second half of the season, doing a DMO 2.0 in the process.
I don't think Howard is the problem, but how we are using him. Centers like Howard don't really work in today's game. Personally I feel like we should try to get him passing more. Sort of like Bogut or Marc Gasol. On the recent championship teams, it was really guard/forward play that controlled the game and helped the team win. From kobe to lebron to Parker/green/Manu. Of course Duncan and Dirk played a huge role but howard doesn't have that mid range shot or fundamental post up. If we use Howard to pass, play defense, and rebound and then work the offense through harden and implement this ball movement we have been showing, we could be even more dangerous come playoff time.
I do not believe Howard's knee injury are as bad as Yao's. The latter suffered fractures (even hairline). Those are much tougher to recover, and as we painfully know, can be career ending.
Who will he pass: Anthony Davis, Aldridge, or Cousins? Considering he averages 8 rebounds per 36 minutes, how will he average 10?
What's the point of the rule that makes division leaders automaticly in the top 4? They don't get home court... The only thing that changes is the number next to them...
