before the start of the season, so many people said brooks was an ok back up...some even refered to him as a john lucas or another moochie norris. what happened to those people. brooks finishing the game is a great combo when alston starts them. this guy is a special player that is underated defensively and becoming a solid playmaker w/penetration and a nice shot. i always knew he would be good and scoff at how many people dissed him earlier in the season.
So true that charge he took on Pierce....nice......and who has been calling him a chucker? Oh the irony that the game was won on his penetration and dish to a wide open Von Wafer baby !! DD
He sucked for about 6 games. It wasn't just the bad shooting, either. His bad shooting took away all his confidence and it was affecting other parts of his game (less effort on defense, forcing bad shots, etc...). His stock went down deservedly as a result. I do think he hit some kind of a wall given the increase and variation in playing time this season but he will adjust. He is a much better player than he looked to be for the past several games before tonight. A lot of players have been bad recently, too - not just Brooks. The whole team was slumping to various extents. Perhaps the Grady situation had something to do with it. Maybe not. He came out tonight looking confident. That was a good sign. There is no question he is a good shooter/scorer. He has a pure release and the ability to score inside and out. It all comes down to how much he develops as a decision-maker... knowing how to change speeds and when to look for his shot versus moving the ball. He has the tools to be a good player in this league. It will come down to his work ethic off the court and how much he elevates his bball IQ.
did your guys watch the game, i know brooks was making some shots, but he was doing horrible job to passing the ball to yao, who is so hot tonight only gets 13 shots. There are too many times brooks and wafer try to play one on one.
maybe they learn from tmac and ron-ron? at least wafer and brooks actually run the offense. both will get better as they grow as players.
I'm willing to bet Adelman asked Brooks to play that way. It wasn't an accident that other players, including Yao, were setting picks up high for him. Maybe Adelman is sick of the one-dimensional predictability of dumping it to Yao constantly. That is effective but it becomes useless if all your perimeter players are doing nothing. We have to get some offense out of our perimeter players to open things up for Yao. Brooks is a willing shooter but he is also willing to hold back if that is what is asked of him. I believe Brooks' shot volume is based on what Adelman wants from him.
Brooks has potential but some of the blame for the losing streak has to be on him. He was shooting horribly. RA has been increasing his minutes, today he had more minutes than Rafer, slowly but surely Brooks is easing into the starters job.
Brooks sucked for the last 6 games and really for a big part of this game. He also almost lost the ball before he passed to Wafer on the game-winning shot and was very lucky to regain his handle on the ball. It also seems to me that sometimes, with his unbelievable speed, when he dribbles into the defense, he gets lost and doesn't know what to do with the ball, other than to shoot. He still knows where the basket is, but he loses sight of his teammates. That being said, I think his dribble penetration can be a great weapon. Perhaps with more experience and team training, his ability to instinctively know where his teammates are when he dribbles toward the basket will improve. I still like him as a backup point guard. Too bad that he is probably better (at least in crunch time) than our starting point guard already...
He is young, he is going to make mistakes, but at least he makes them at full speed and with maximum effort. It is not a coincidence that Brooks playing PG with the ball in his hands regained his confidence.....he is nails that way....NAILS. DD
Recap on NBA.com "Garnett blocked Brooks and came down with the rebound, but Boston couldn't score and after Brooks nearly lost the ball, he chased it down and dished it to Brooks for the 3." Man, Brooks is all over the place! Dishing the ball to himself for a 3? That's uncanny! http://www.nba.com/games/20090107/HOUBOS/recap.html
Another relatively insignificant thing I like about Brooks is his willingness and desire to shoot full court shots with the clock running out at the end of quarters. He's done that at least a couple times recently, including tonight (he would have been 8/15 instead of 8/16 if he was worried about his own numbers). Rafer and Grady like to hold onto those to preserve their already crappy shooting percentages.
On the play with like 12 seconds left when he dished it to Landry and then Yao grabbed the rebound and put it in was incredible. I mean he just BLEW right past Rondo, and Rondo was out of the play just like that. Brooks took him right out of the play.
Brooks penetrating and putting pressure on a tired Celtics' defense at the end made all the difference.
