Reply With Quote
he played just 6 minutes and then, got injured? hmmn...
Chicago is a good team hope the Spurs would be more aggressive with the offense and MAKE those FREE THROWS, guys
Spurs seek handle on flaw: Recent run of turnovers concerns players and coaches
Web Posted: 03/04/2005 12:00 AM CST
Mike Monroe
Express-News Staff Writer
http://www.mysanantonio.com/sports/b...102f73ab4.html
With four minutes left in the third quarter Wednesday night against the Toronto Raptors, the Spurs were cruising along, up by 19, when they turned Jalen Rose's miss into a three-on-two fast break opportunity.
Veteran backup guard Brent Barry ran the break from the middle of the court when, one dribble past midcourt, he left his feet and tried to thread a bounce pass to Tony Parker, streaking downcourt on the right wing.
A perfect pass would have produced a spectacular finish. Instead, Toronto's Rafer Alston picked off the pass and started a break for the Raptors that resulted in a foul call on Spurs center Nazr Mohammed and two free throws for Toronto.
It also produced an angry timeout call by Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, who let Barry know about the folly of his choice.
"Turnover, bad, equals 'Pop' being mad," Barry said Thursday after the Spurs finished practice. "We're posting that in our locker room."
Indeed, as the Spurs prepare for tonight's game at the SBC Center against the resurgent Chicago Bulls, whose defensive aggression has helped put them in the thick of the Eastern Conference playoff picture, Popovich will welcome anything that reminds his players to take care of the basketball.
Turnovers, Popovich believes, have become a major concern.
"When you miss free throws and turn it over, teams can come back on you," Popovich said after the Raptors rallied from 21 down to make things tense for the Spurs in the final minutes Wednesday. "Those are our two weaknesses."
For the season, the Spurs rank eighth in the NBA in fewest turnovers committed, 13.9 per game. In their past three games, though, they have been far more careless. Their home loss to the Memphis Grizzlies was a direct result of a season-high 24 turnovers, and they had 15 at Cleveland and 17 against the Raptors.
The Spurs will have to be particularly focused against a Bulls team that has discovered that defensive aggression can turn around a season. After their 0-9 start, the Bulls have won 29 of 45 games and gotten within striking distance of a homecourt advantage in the first round of the playoffs.
"Their effort night after night after night, combined with the defense they're buying into, has made them a darn good team," Popovich said. "It will be a good challenge. That pressure could cause us to turn it over. I'm anxious to see how we handle it."
Some turnovers are more evident than others. Barry knew the instant he fired his ill-advised pass in the third period Wednesday he had made a mistake and soon would hear about it.
"I just got caught in the air and saw Tony streaking, and tried to throw it ahead," Barry said. "It was a terrible decision, and Pop let me know about it right away."
How to explain the Spurs' recent spate of mistakes? Point guard Tony Parker, who had four of the Spurs' 17 turnovers Wednesday, said he and his teammates get too caught up in the frenzy of games at the SBC Center.
"I think we just have to slow down," Parker said. "We may be going too fast on offense. We're all excited playing at home. It's the crowd that makes you do crazy stuff."
Aside from emptying the arena, eliminating turnovers can be difficult. It isn't like working on shooting form to get out of a slump. There are no mechanics involved. It is all mental.
"It has to be a conscious thing," Barry said, "because you're consciously passing the ball to the wrong guys. We just have to get back into an offensive rhythm, upping our assists so more of our baskets are coming off assists, rather than trying to make individual plays. I think we just have to get into the flow of the offense better and move the ball like we were before the break, share it a little bit more. That will help us get in a rhythm."
Said Parker: "We can't forget that we have to go inside. We can't do fast break every time. We have to slow it down a little bit and play halfcourt basketball."
That might not excite the Spurs' faithful at SBC Center, but it will lower Popovich's blood pressure.
Notable: Mohammed re-aggravated his strained groin in Wednesday's game and is listed as questionable for tonight. Mohammed fell when he got his legs tangled with a Raptors player after grabbing a rebound in the third period.
he played just 6 minutes and then, got injured? hmmn...
Chicago is a good team hope the Spurs would be more aggressive with the offense and MAKE those FREE THROWS, guys
There have been quite a few games that a bad turnover by Barry has caused the Spurs to become unglued and the opponent to go on a run. What happened to the great passing, high IQ player the Spurs thought they got? I haven't seen him around lately.
P.S.
I don't get Pop's use of Nazr so far. If he's injured to the point that he can re-aggravate it by falling, then he needs to be IRed. If he's healthy enough to play, he needs to play. The season is going to be over before you know it.
There have been quite a few games that a bad turnover by Barry has caused the Spurs to become unglued and the opponent to go on a run. What happened to the great passing, high IQ player the Spurs thought they got? I haven't seen him around lately.
agreed.
But he needs more PT obviously.
Matchups that's what i'm excited about:
Argentinians - Manu vs. Nocioni matchup
Rookies - Dec ROM Beno vs. Loul Deng
hope Pops give Beno more playing time
Deng sprained his ankle in their last game. I don't know if he's going to play.
...what is this an article saying Nocioni is a physical forward who's willing to do the DIRTY work?
is he a dirty player?
^^^^^^
dude like chasing loose balls, pics, rebounding etc etc hustle play
same blood as Manu... scrappy hustler with a knack for the ball
Nocioni isn't dirty. He just does the dirty work.
Dirty Work = Rebounding, Defence, Scrapping, Diving onto the flaw in an attempt to regain the ball
Think Dennis Rodman, for all his faults he wass one of the best if not the greatest ever at scrapping/rebounding.
"MAKE those FREE THROWS"
I was looking at the Pistons@Suns box. BOTH teams, both of which could be NBA champion, shot less the 65% FTs last night.
( Pistons miss 6 FTs, lose by 3 pts, but what really lost the game was Pistons' defense allowing 34 pts in the 4th qtr (just like has happened with Spurs defense in some losses, and in some crappy wins).)
It's about time people started pointing out what Brent Barry is costing the team with his turnovers and sloppy play. The dude averages 0.72 TO’s a game, yet he still manages to get himself sporadic playing time. Screw Brent Barry and his 2.8 A/TO ratio! 1.8 TO’s per 48 minutes? Are you kidding me!? Why doesn't he just walk over to the half-court line and hand the ball to the other team every possession? His stats suck almost as much as he does.
And every stinking time he pushes the ball and tries to thread a pass in to a teammate running the break with him and the ball gets batted down or a defender playing the passing lane picks it off... I just start screaming and banging my head against the wall. It's no wonder the entire team would fall apart after a play like that, who could blame them? I know if I was on the floor and Brent pulled that garbage, I'd probably just give up the game then and there and head back to the locker room. And to make it worse, he does the exact same freaking thing every like 27 games!
We should have tried to unload his sorry ass before the trade deadline. It doesn't really surprise me no other teams were willing to pick up his dead weight though. I mean, what are we paying this joker $4.9 million a freaking year for? $4.9 for a veteran who was the starting point guard for a Western Conference team last year, and who led the entire NBA in adjusted FG%? Who was the genius that thought signing him to this contract and for two or three million less than what other teams were offering was a good idea? At this point we should just cut him and cut our losses, or at the very least put him on the IL for the rest of the year so he can't hurt the Spurs any more than he already has.
Last edited by Gerryatrics; 03-05-2005 at 08:03 AM.
Sarcastic post of the year.........
Aw crap. Just put this guy on IR, Pop. We don't have the time for him to keep re-injuring it. There just aren't that many games left.Notable: Mohammed re-aggravated his strained groin in Wednesday's game and is listed as questionable for tonight. Mohammed fell when he got his legs tangled with a Raptors player after grabbing a rebound in the third period.
How many times has Rose been on IR since 97?
Jim,
get the OVER IT!
How many times has Rose been benched or gotten a DNP-CD since 97? Just stop it with the "Rose was our savior" bs.
Gerryatrics, terrific post!
Funny post, but you do realize that Barry makes over $4M per year, not $1.1M, right?
You are soooooo east to have your buttons pushed.
BTW, have you sent my manu jerset yet?
Milkyway, just FYI -- The Bulls put Deng on the injured list.
Oops, that what I get for trying to put together an overly sarcastic review of stats at 4:30 in the morning. I wrote down the list of numbers I got from a bunch of different sites, including salary, which was listed as $4.5 million. When I wrote the post I grabbed the number and divided by the number of years of his contract without even thinking about it.I'll let my mathematical shame stand for a little while before grabbing the real numbers and fixing it. Sorry
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Posting Permissions
