WMC 12/13: Mercy kill. (0-4)

Our preseason opponent teams are too good, all legit contenders

Punk-101 wrote:I hope they just let Nash be Nash when the games start to count, rather than force-feeding the Princeton when they obviously aren't comfortable with it yet.

Oh, and the bench still sucks. I'm especially disappointed with Jamison thus far. Brown can't run 5 subs at a time.

i'm hoping it's a situation where nash, being unfamiliar with the princeton offense in comparison with p&r, is choosing to just stick to the formula during the preseason to get some experience in. he can do p&r stuff in his sleep. that's my hope anyways.

A couple of things:

1) I don't like how Nash is being used on offense. There were times where he didn't even see the ball. Has he even had 7+ assists in a game yet this preseason?

2) Transition defense

3) Bench sucked. Outside of a few highlights by Meeks and Ebanks, everyone else sucked, including Jaminson.

Nash memo to Mike Brown after the game : "Eff the Princeton offense, let me run my pick and roll offense **** !"

FREE Steve Nash !

Bench and Mike Brown= Good job, good effort

LOL! You have to love the overreaction in these threads; then again, that's what these threads are made for, right? Anyways, my WMC, is the turnovers and missed freethrows. Howard, isn't going to make many; I understand that. However, Pau missed 2, Nash missed a technical, those are points that ultimately decide a game.

The starters need more time to gel. Actually, I think Nash needs to have to dominate the ball more; He needs to set the table for everybody on that team and they need to run more P&R. I think all of this gets ironed out, though. Once it does, we will very difficult to beat...

Nash can run the P&R anytime he wants, he is probably just trying to get as much game time practice with the princeton since its preseason...I hope.

Rooscooter wrote: His defense was not that good with the exception of the blocks..... he was out of position a few times and let Cousins work him for quite a few offensive rebounds.

Wow I saw it very differently.. I'll grant that he conceded a couple of offensive rebounds, but overall I thought his defense was great.. He blocked 5 shots and really altered about 5-6 more.. He covered for everyone rather effectively and he showed on particular possessions a sneak-peak of his great P&R D, covering the guard but being just close enough of the big guy rolling, just perfect position.
It's his first real game since April, and he was awesome IMO. It's only under his own standarts that we can complain.

Didn't believe it was possible for our bench to suck worse than last year, but apparently it's true.

The other concern is that we still have a moron for a head coach.

fksteveblake wrote:

Punk-101 wrote:I hope they just let Nash be Nash when the games start to count, rather than force-feeding the Princeton when they obviously aren't comfortable with it yet.

Oh, and the bench still sucks. I'm especially disappointed with Jamison thus far. Brown can't run 5 subs at a time.

i'm hoping it's a situation where nash, being unfamiliar with the princeton offense in comparison with p&r, is choosing to just stick to the formula during the preseason to get some experience in. he can do p&r stuff in his sleep. that's my hope anyways.

This

This was something we were talking about in the gameday thread, the all-bench lineups:

Mike Trudell ‏@LakersReporter
Big diff. tonight from reg. season: Howard or Gasol will stay in to anchor 2nd unit (Sacre to bench). That'll help subs considerably.

kobe in his postgame pretty much saying the 2nd unit still needs a lot of work and they have to keep challenging them

have to say i agree

Mike Trudell ‏@LakersReporter
Big diff. tonight from reg. season: Howard or Gasol will stay in to anchor 2nd unit (Sacre to bench). That'll help subs considerably.

Based of what I've seen from Pau this preseason, I'm not sure I agree with Trudell on this one. Sacre has anchored the defense far better than what Pau is doing.

Kobe called out the bench on postgame show. He's not happy with them.

Atawn being interviewed. He agrees with Kobe. Says the bench unit is "taking too long" to figure it out.

^^Im just hopeful that Jamison really does dislike the pre-season as much as he's said he does, otherwise why would he be content watching "his" unit go to freaking Bob Sacre on offense time and time again? Gotta take charge man.

Other than that, turnovers was the biggest problem of the night, and that should be fix itself as these guys get time in together (which people do forget, they'll need time to gel). Lot's of over-passing, hesitation/second guessing and generally out-of-sync plays that will go away as time goes by.

I'm confused as to why we haven't been running some plays for Jamison, especially with that second unit.

Pau & Nash interviewed. They play the "good cop" role as opposed to Kobe and Jamison's "bad cop". They admit we're struggling out there at times, but remain positive.

BDG wrote:I'm confused as to why we haven't been running some plays for Jamison, especially with that second unit.

I guess we figure he's good at creating, so we can just dump the ball to him and have him go ISO. No concept of a team game whatsoever.

Finwë wrote:

Rooscooter wrote: His defense was not that good with the exception of the blocks..... he was out of position a few times and let Cousins work him for quite a few offensive rebounds.

Wow I saw it very differently.. I'll grant that he conceded a couple of offensive rebounds, but overall I thought his defense was great.. He blocked 5 shots and really altered about 5-6 more.. He covered for everyone rather effectively and he showed on particular possessions a sneak-peak of his great P&R D, covering the guard but being just close enough of the big guy rolling, just perfect position.
It's his first real game since April, and he was awesome IMO. It's only under his own standarts that we can complain.

Blocks are a misleading statistic.... he covered for others just like our previous center.... no one covered for him.... just like last year. He didn't rotate several times to the person driving.... not sure it was his cover however... it may have been Pau's .... They got a few offensive rebounds over him and a ton of tip-outs that cost us the game essentially....

He didn't play bad defensively..... just not that great either. He was our best defender out there but that isn't saying much with the effort we gave most of the night..... He looked gassed at times and it's his first game in a new system.... hell Pau's been in it a year and he still doesn't know when or if to rotate.....

I'd venture a guess that we gave up just as many shots at the hoop as the other night against this team.... there was a lot of baseline action behind both he and Pau all night that went largely unchecked....

Not being overly critical but the overall defense seemed to buy into the fact that he's going to cover for them.... the perimeter guys were a bunch of Matadors out there at times..... He can't cover for everyone on every possession.

He'll get it and we will get better if Pau and Kobe don't get caught standing too much....

This the end of the court where it will take the longest for everyone to gel IMHO....

Offensively he did great and we saw a little chemistry develop between he and Pau and Nash that will grow I believe. He even made a lefty hook....

Free throws hurt however... he really needs to get that corrected. The Lakers will have fewer possessions than Orlando did to overcome poor free throw shooting. It hurt us tonight.

i somewhat agree with Rooscooter. Dwight wasn't the same defender he was in previous years. I thought his timing wasn't as good, and a few times, he was out of position. He was still great overall considering how it was his first game in 6 months so I'm not too worried.

thkthebest wrote:i somewhat agree with Rooscooter. Dwight wasn't the same defender he was in previous years. I thought his timing wasn't as good, and a few times, he was out of position. He was still great overall considering how it was his first game in 6 months so I'm not too worried.

Yup.... stamina, timing and probably nerves were all playing into it. He's never played defense with these guys and defense is a team effort more than anything else in this game.... He did as good as can be expected... he just can't play defense for everyone out there..... no one can.

I did see some of the remnants of our poor rotations after the initial one by Dwight.... in fact it led to quite a few tip outs and offensive rebounds.... everyone in motion and no one putting a body on anyone.... different center nearly same results at times..... Hopefully the team figures out how to rotate better and not turn their back or lose sight of the perimeter players as much going forward.

Dwight showed me tonight that when he is in mid season form, our defense is going to be AMAZING. Nash is having some trouble adjusting to the Princeton motion reads. Duhon looked like the legit choice for back-up PG tonight. Not much to complain about, as it is preseason, but I am still nervous about how long it will take for the team to establish chemistry and a set style/rythm with each other.

Tonight was DEFINITIVE PROOF that Dwight's mere presence is not enough, on it's own, to cure our main issues. I hope we get the losing out of the way in the next few games, because things will blow up BIG TIME if we start out the season losing...Stay Tuned, I guess. Here's hoping all is well that ends well...