Wow over a mllion post for Ghost Writer, I don't think I have ever seen that.
Miami is coming out of the east unless Detroit gets their act together.
Are we still underrating Seattle this badly?
You might want to see who rates #1 in FT per 48 (10 FT per game against our team and hits .855 for the season to boot) before you say they have nothing inside. He's the key to their play when things slow down -- something Phoenix doesn't have.
Aggie Hoops Fan...you're an idiot....just reading your BS makes me laugh...Wade better than Kobe...sure he is...better for Shaq than Kobe...where do you come up with this stuff...It's pretty sad. Yes, the Heat are good team...put them in the west they would be middle of the pack.
Put them in the west and they would be ahead of the Lakers, making them at least 5th team.
"it's like you expect playoff intensity on a nightly basis"
It's exactly like I DON'T expect playoff intensity. I expect the Spurs to play their average game consistently, and find ways to win games to weaker teams on bad nights, just like they will have to find ways to win against the better teams in the playoffs.
Here's what I expect, per the 5 giveaway losses:
1. @TOR, no Vince Carter. We blow them out for 3 qtrs, then collapse in 4th. inconsistent
2. SEA. We play them even first quarter, then totally disappear for 2nd quarter, offense scores only 12!! @SBC, defense allows 29. Go to the half -19. Blow Sonics out the 3rd qtr, and outscore them in 4th qtr, but -19 was too much. inconsistent for 1 qtr.
3. @SAC was an entire game suck job by some strange guys in Spurs uniforms, way below avg spurs pefomance. tim/tony/bruce sucked end-to-end, so Pop plays the suckers in crunch time, rather than the guys who weren't sucking, we lose to inferior team who is playing a mediocre game, 15+ pts below their avg PPG.
4. MEM, probably a non-playoff team, early in the season. Doesn't take playoff intensity to beat those guys. We are better than we were in the playoffs sweep, and they are worse. They are an inferior team. If Spurs play 75% of their game, they win.
5. ORL. Level at the half, ORL blows us out in 3rd qtr (12-28, @SBC!), then we blow them out in 4th qtr (28-15) to save the win, whew. but the 3rd qtr?? Then we go to ORL, our offense sucks and defense let's ORL play their avg game, ORL wins. Bad game to inferior team.
The fastest start in Spurs history, 27-6, and they still gave away 5 games that could have been 31-2. 4 losses to inferior teams. I don't mind "getting beaten" in good games by MIA, MIN, DET, IND, PHX, SEA, DAL. I do mind "giving away" the 5 losses teams above because the Spurs can't bring consistency, at least defensive consistency when the shots aren't falling, qtr to qtr, game to game.
The milk is spilt. It's still a great season so far.
But I really don't want to have a remaining Jan where the Spurs have the excellence and consistency to go 6-1 or 5-2 or even 4-3 in this group:
Indiana
Dallas
@ Houston
@ Phoenix
@ Sacramento
Sacramento
@ Seattle
and then have inconsistency/suck job to give away even one game to this inferior group:
Denver
@ Utah
Milwaukee
Washington
L.A. Clippers
@ Portland
New Orleans
Last edited by boutons; 01-05-2005 at 07:03 PM.
I think the Spurs should play with play-off intensity every game.
There's no excuse not to. Why wouldn't you?
It's almost like saying, don't start trying until the play-offs, that's what counts..
which is wrong.
Playing with intensity will make the Spurs get used to it, so they will do it more often.
Boutons, remember that what the Spurs are doing on the court is their job. They're getting paid like crazy, might as well play the best you can every game
The biggest concerns for the Spurs right now:
1. Health
2. Ghost Writer is optimistic
Dude, Ghost predicting a Championship in Janruary? Holy , now I KNOW we're not going to win it.
Hey Medvedumbass...
Dwyane Wade
PPG 24.1
RPG 5.4
APG 7.5
SPG 1.65
BPG 1.03
FG% .500
FT% .758
3P% .273
MPG 39.1
TO/G 3.9
EFF 25.16
Kobe Bryant
PPG 28.5
RPG 6.9
APG 6.8
SPG 1.45
BPG 1.10
FG% .401
FT% .805
3P% .319
MPG 43.1
TO/G 4.69
EFF 25.00
I'll give you Kobe's scoring a bucket more a game, and turning it over nearly one more a game (Kobe is #1 in the league in turnovers by the way), but about the only thing Kobe is doing better than Wade right now is leading his team to a .500 record (Wade is well above that one).
Kobe's a has been. His defense sucks, he wanted personnel and coaching moves done to suit him, they have been, and now his team sucks.
And like I said originally, Wade is a better compliment to Shaq than Kobe is or was.
Their skills are more complimentary, and Wade treats Shaq like a teammate, not as a verbal punching bag.
Wade's legacy will be greater than that of Kobe, but both will be eclipsed by King James.
It's not as easy as that. Good teams and bad teams both have some talent. The difference is that good teams turn their talent into wins on a fairly regular basis. They win more consistently, even if they don't play their best every night.and then have inconsistency/suck job to give away even one game to this inferior group:
The 'inferior' teams have NBA talent, too. And while they might not have the talent that SA has, they certainly can put together a good game now and again. On any given night Charlotte can play better than Phoenix and Golden State can play better than San Antonio. It's not going to happen often, but any team can beat any other team on any given night. We're talking about NBA talent here, and any team can put together a great game once in a while.
That's why it's unrealistic to expect the Spurs to beat every 'inferior' team they play. It simply can't be done, and it's never been done.
Dammit, I'm obviously not talking about the well-known "on any given night" where you really "get beaten" (not "give away") by an inferior team, or even by one player, having an extraordinary performance (Alan Houston @SBC spring 03, TMac @HOU recently).
I'm talking about all the other nights when the Spurs "give away" a game, not being able to produce an average effort, "find a way", sufficient to win, when playing inferior teams who are playing their average inferior ball.
I agree with Aggie H. - the Miami is a clear threat. Shaq with any team should not be taken lightly. I predict they will come a top in the east and win ECF.
Why is it that Sacramento, which has a better record than Minnesota, Detroit, Indiana, and Dallas, isn't in that group? Aren't you being a bit subjective now?
Last I checked, in their loss at Sacramento, the Spurs held the Kings substantially under their season average points (as you say, 15+ points). It may not have been the best defensive game the Spurs ever played, but 86 points allowed is one basket (or so) above the Spurs' season average -- and, frankly, its about as good as you can realistically expect to do in Sacramento. So, basically, the Spurs shot the ball horribly, but played a good defensive game on the road against a good offensive team (and a team with a top 5 record, regardless of how you view them), held that team well under its seasonal average, and you're upset about that loss!!
Look, I agree that the loss in Toronto was a bad one. I would agree that the Memphis game was another that the Spurs could have gotten -- but as you acknowledge, there are going to be those any given nights in the NBA; that night in Memphis may have been one of those (and it's not like Memphis played without any motivation -- they certainly had great motivation to beat the team that convincingly swept them out of the playoffs, and the Spurs, playing their 4th game in 5 nights on the road, and their 5th in 7 nights overall in November, were ripe for the picking -- it happens).
Beyond that, though, this team has been about as consistent as you'll find in the NBA. Really, who's been more consistent than San Antonio? Just name me the team. I'm curious about who you think is more consistent (other than New Orleans, which is simply atrocious every night).
I rather beat every playoff team and drop one to ty teams now and then.
WTF, put SAC in there if you want, it was an oversight. They obviously should be in that group of Top 5 or 6 in WC, and a couple from EC.
The low-scoring game by SAC was due to the pace of the game, or something, (anomalously, the "game time" was kinda fast, 2:01) where FB points were quite low, Spurs 10, Kings 4, rather than Spurs "holding" SAC, who still shot their near-avg 44% FGs, and 47% 3Gs (typical Spurs weak defense on 3's), and were not disrupted from getting their avg number of ASTs.
ie, I maintain the Spurs game was sub-average (I'm only looking for a more clustered average performances with less swings hi and lo), giving the game away (rather Spurs playing well but getting beat) to an inferior but close team, rather than their avg performance, which would have won the SAC game easily.
Spurs year-on-year consistency is the best, but the Spurs don't play years, they play quarters, they play games. So, I'm not talking about anything but this "special" season, and, furthermore, only about the Spurs give-away losses.
"Who is more consistent?", in my context of this season only? Very clearly, Suns.
Last night was typical, PHX got out front all game, HOU O sucked, HOU was going to lose pretty bad. Amare ejected (like Spurs losing Tim), HOU wakes up, but not much, and gets within a basket, and PHX holds on to win without Amare.
ie, PHX was supposed to beat HOU, and they did.
SA was supposed to beat HOU, but played a ty game and lost (the Miracle was only possible because Spurs let down in the crunch time and let HOU gets close enough for the miracle, and the Spurs played the last minutes pretty badly).
If you look at PHX's 4 losses, PHX was CONSISTENTLY "beat" by only the top teams (@CLE, SAC, MIN, @SA), from the upper band of teams. PHX has not "given away" games to inferior HOU, ORL, TOR the way the Spurs have. PHX has yet to lose a game by playing so badly they give it away to an inferior team.
I completely believe SA is the best team, better than PHX (only because of the Spurs defense. We'll see if the Spurs D holds 21 Jan). But their losses show very clearly that SA is not playing as consistently as PHX, so SA has 7 losses to PHX's 4.
I'm not ing, I'm observing that the Spurs are better than their record indicates. But PHX, so far, is playing better. Had the Spurs not given away games, had played as consistently as PHX, the Spurs would be, are good enough to be, at least, 30 - 3.
Will PHX maintain their consistency?
Will the Spurs reduce their consistency?
I'm a more than a little greedy and spoiled. If PHX can do it this year, the Spurs can do it. Let's see how it looks on 20 April.
I'm skeptical about Wade. I think he's overachieving, along with some of the other players on the team. He's not nearly as good an outside shooter as Kobe, and when teams figure out how to keep him out of the paint, the Heat are in trouble.
That said, he'll still end up putting together a better season than most of us expected.
Wade is an awesome player and damn near elite at his position already.
If he keeps this up he will be right up there with pretty much any SG in the league.
I am also curious to see if Wade can keep this scoring efficiency up while still racking up assists and rebounds etc...
Wade right now is better than pretty much any PLAYER in the league at getting to the FT line. He is easily the best SG at it relative to his shot attempts. Thats not particulaly lucky. But perhaps as time passes he won't get to the line as much as he does now.
But you can't argue against his 24ppg 7.5apg 5.4rpg and near 50% shooting and elite ability to get to the line. He is a special player despite not having shooting skills. One thing he can do however, is shoot off the bounce under heavy defensive pressure. Maybe not from deep range, but he has a way of manufacturing a shot even if the player is laying off of him.
Right now Shaq and Wade are a deadly combo, and with those shooters Miami has, I think they can be a championship team if healthy.
The Heat will come out of the East.
Seattle might win one playoff series. Defintiely not 2. They are predicated too much on jumpshooting with no inside presence.
I see the Spurs only potential flaws as:
1. 3s stop falling
2. Parker's consistency
3. Beno's inexperience (Claxton did well in his first playoffs, so this may not be an issue)
4. Rasho, Rasho, Rasho
5. Free throws
6. Fourth quarter scoring
If we sign Malone, we win the le.
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