mingus
02-05-2010, 04:34 AM
both these guys can protect the rim and shore up the defense potentially better than Blair can. it's 40 games into the season, and it pisses the hell out of me that a guy once deemed a prospect for this team hasn't gotten any pt, besides that one game, in which he ACTUALLY SHOWED ABILITY.
Ratliff has shown that he still has defensive ability in him too. despite his age he's got a ton of athleticism left in him, and his sense timing sure hasn't left him.
w/o Bowen Blair's exposed. he doesn't pose any sort of threat defensively, and with Duncan not being where he was defensively in his prime, it compounds the interior defense issue, and it's one of the main reasons this team isn't where it was defensively in prior years.
and i'm not saying they'll ever get to that point defensively again with this team - a testament to how great Bowen was - but Pop isn't helping matters by not trying to compensate for it by inserting a second big in the rotation that can block shots. Pop has got to come to the realization that neither Boguns nor RJ can have anywhere near the effect that Bowen did on this team for our perimeter defense, and lift this team to being elite or close to it defensively. just give it up. imo, he's got to go the alternative route of at least attempting to make amends for that deficiency by shuffling with the big rotation. when the guards get into the lane they'll have a difficult time scoring, which they aren't so much now.
the nd
Ratliff has shown that he still has defensive ability in him too. despite his age he's got a ton of athleticism left in him, and his sense timing sure hasn't left him.
w/o Bowen Blair's exposed. he doesn't pose any sort of threat defensively, and with Duncan not being where he was defensively in his prime, it compounds the interior defense issue, and it's one of the main reasons this team isn't where it was defensively in prior years.
and i'm not saying they'll ever get to that point defensively again with this team - a testament to how great Bowen was - but Pop isn't helping matters by not trying to compensate for it by inserting a second big in the rotation that can block shots. Pop has got to come to the realization that neither Boguns nor RJ can have anywhere near the effect that Bowen did on this team for our perimeter defense, and lift this team to being elite or close to it defensively. just give it up. imo, he's got to go the alternative route of at least attempting to make amends for that deficiency by shuffling with the big rotation. when the guards get into the lane they'll have a difficult time scoring, which they aren't so much now.
the nd