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BRAVEONAWARPATH

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Sheehan has been bugging me on Redskins stuff, but said something just now on the radio that I was happy to hear as I thought I was crazy....

 

For as great of a shooter as Beal seems to be, it seems like once or twice every game this playoffs he's put up some REALLY ugly shots. Air balls, bad bricks, off the side of the backboard, etc. It's just very weird to see because they're REALLY ugly shots, which stand out from what is normally a beautiful stroke.

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Randy Wittman haters, put your flag in the sand now.   The Curse of Les Boulez is counting on you.

 

 

I think it's time to accept the notion that an NBA head coach knows a little more than us internet experts.

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This is how I feel about Colorado. Absolutely hate the place due to personal reasons.

Ditto. Despise Colorado on do many levels. And that hate comes after living there for only four months. Denver in particular is a combination of crunchy liberals, burnt out pothead (Many times one and the same. And I mean my entire life I've supported legalization and living there right in middle of it has actually made me question that belief for the first time ever--I just know the route Colorado has gone ain't the answer), tore up dope fiends (black tar is so ****ing cheap compared to the powder on the East Coast (if you're ever hurting on money and like your life depends on it, make a dope connection in Denver and start bringing that **** to DC), tweakers left and right (like I've always said, if you ask a tweaker what color the sky is and he answers blue, you better go outside and check), homeless folks panhandling on damn near every single corner (and I'm not ever exaggerating--remember how bad the homeless problem was in DC just 10-15 years ago. That. But with one distinct difference. When had our problem, I'd be willing to bet 50%, AT LEAST, of them were where they were because of mental illness. Working soup kitchens remembering meeting so many Vietnam vets who were struggling mentally bad. In Denver though, I'd say 90%, of them are just drug fiends trying to hustle up money for their fix. And 90% is probably being generous. I mean think about it, you're legitimately homeless, why the **** are you in Denver? I left Sep. 8th, it snowed Sep. 9th. And they really are EVERYWHERE), the absolute WORST drivers I've ever seen in my life. And anyone who knows me, knows I probably drive more than anyone in this country, including driving back from Denver in less than 2 days (I couldn't get back fast enough.) I always made fun of and talked **** about Maryland drivers. Tell you what though, compared to Denver drivers, Maryland drivers are a genetic crossbreed of Dale Earnhardt and Tom Petty. Four months in Denver, I saw more accidents than I've ever seen in my life. Which is really saying something. (and I also saw my first hit and run. Ask me about that in RTT if anyone is interested. This post is big enough. That story will double the size. Got to say, it was pretty ****ing awesome though.) Oh yeah and the weather ****ing blows in Denver. They try to brag about it like it makes them tough or something. No, you're just a retard.

So yeah, outside of Vegas (to live (was there for a year), not to visit for a few days), Denver is easily #1 on my list as my most hated area in the country. And Vegas is much more of a personal hate. Denver just ****ing sucks.

/rant

Sorry. Can't talk about Denver/Colorado without going off

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The officiating in that game didn't bother me too much. It was a home game, you expect them to get some calls. There were only a couple of missed calls that really pissed me off, all of them involved Horford. The guy should have fouled out. They missed a plain as day charge that Pierce took that led directly to two points in a critical moment at the end of the game.

Yeah those missed charges pissed me off too. I thought the refs missed it in real time and then the replays made me really angry. But you know how it is in the NBA. You have play well enough to beat the other team ...and the refs.
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For as great of a shooter as Beal seems to be, it seems like once or twice every game this playoffs he's put up some REALLY ugly shots. Air balls, bad bricks, off the side of the backboard, etc. It's just very weird to see because they're REALLY ugly shots, which stand out from what is normally a beautiful stroke.

Yep, I've mentioned that too several times during the games. He's a real good shooter but man he has some absolutely awful misses sometimes. But with that said, I still want him shooting and being aggressive.

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Beal also forgets how to shoot free throws randomly.  He's a strange jump shooter because these just aren't things that jump shooters do.  None of that is really a problem though, his issues are that he can't seem to maintain his aggression or stay healthy.  When he's healthy and attacking on offense, he piles up the points.  He just needs to find a way to sustain that and considering his age there is no reason to think that he can't.   

 

A big positive is that he certainly shows up in the playoffs.  He rises to the occasion, just like Randy seems to do.  :)

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Kyle Korver is a pure jump shooter. Beal is something different. Again, I was shocked at how much better Beal was than Korver yesterday. Just so much more of an impact. Kyle Korver scares you when he catches the ball at the 3 pt line coming off 87 screens or trailing in transition. But that's truly the only time he does. Beal, OTOH, was out there creating shots like vintage Paul Pierce or something.

When he gets to the point where he plays like that consistently, we'll be a contender.

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This is kind of how I felt the match ups stacked up:

Wall > Teague

Beal = Korver

Pierce > Carroll

Nene << Millsap

Gortat << Horford

Wizards bench < Hawks bench

Wizards coaching <<< Hawks coaching

Yesterday it was kind of like this

Wall >> Teague

Beal >>> Korver

Pierce < Carroll

Nene <<< Millsap

Gortat < Horford (but close to a push by the end of the game)

Wizards bench >> Hawks Bench

Coaching = push

Their bigs outplaying ours wasn't a huge surprise, and I thought this would be one of the bellwethers of the series. What shocked me was how much better our bench was than theirs, and how much better our backcourt was. Wall and Beal beat the pants off two All Stars.

Otto, Gooden, and Sessions were outstanding in the first series and they kept it up yesterday. I don't expect our bench to dominate theirs throughout the series. But if they do, that negates one of Atlanta's key advantages from the regular season.

I'm also a little worried about the health of Wall and Beal moving forward. They are the biggest advantage we have over the Hawks. If they are hampered, we're going to need the front court match up to at least be a push.

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I felt like game one was a carbon copy of the Toronto series. Hawks came out blazing, we weathered the storm and took over late. That had to break Atlanta's confidence moving forward.

 

McQueen's right though. If Wall and Beal are bothered by their injuries, we won't be able to keep up no matter how we play the mental game.

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I felt like game one was a carbon copy of the Toronto series. Hawks came out blazing, we weathered the storm and took over late. That had to break Atlanta's confidence moving forward.

 

McQueen's right though. If Wall and Beal are bothered by their injuries, we won't be able to keep up no matter how we play the mental game.

I think Wall will be OK, his injury didn't seem nearly as serious. He's playing with shoulder and hand injuries and just powering through them. Beal's injury looked serious. I hope he's alright because he was a HUGE advantage in the first game. We don't win that game without that kind of contribution from him.

But I do think we can still win even if Beal is hampered so long as Nene gives us much more. If he and Gortat battle Millsap and Horford to a draw, then I think Wall and Pierce can carry us to wins.

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Randy Wittman haters, put your flag in the sand now.   The Curse of Les Boulez is counting on you.

 

Randy Wittman deserved the hate this season. Every single successful move that he has made this post season were moves most of us had been calling for back in October. Otto never really played badly this season. The small ball lineup was always our best lineup. Nene certainly plays better off the bench. The list goes on. His only excuse is that he was playing stupid. Which if that is the case, my God, this man has stones. No one in the history of basketball has hidden a lineup an entire season just to surprise opponents in the playoffs. It just goes against logic. And yet, im almost convinced that this is exactly what happened.

 

Ill give him credit with Gooden though. Seriously, there was a time that i hated this guy. He was second only to Lebron in my hatred. Maybe it was his crappy rat tail. Or that awful beard combo. Maybe its because i loved Desean Stevenson. Maybe it was just because he was on the Cavs. But i hated him. When Witt signed him last year, i was consumed with rage. And here we are in the playoffs 2 years later, and this dude has been a key contributor, again, and seems to get better each month. Gooden might just be Witt's greatest success. Wall, Beal, Porter... they all would have figured it out with minutes. But Gooden. This guy was out of the league. Hats off to Randy there. Im even cheering for Drew. What a turn around.

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Randy Wittman deserved the hate this season. Every single successful move that he has made this post season were moves most of us had been calling for back in October. 

 

 

I take you are NOT in the camp that's buying Wittman's story about saving players and even taking losses under that banner. 

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I take you are NOT in the camp that's buying Wittman's story about saving players and even taking losses under that banner.

I would buy it if he was playing Otto. But he was dnp'ing him while ras, temple, and Webster were getting minutes over him. There was no reason not to play him. Additionally... Not playing gortat In the 4th never made sense.

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In Wittman's defense, limiting the minutes of a 37 year old, especially those where he'd be going against bigger guys, is understandable. And Gortat was indeed in a major funk for a while and was being outplayed by Seraphin.

 

That said, there is no excuse for not playing Porter more. His success in the playoffs should not have come as a surprise to anyone who closely follows the team. He broke double digits in almost every game he started in during the regular season, and still made quality contributions in the few starts when he didn't break double digits. When he got catch-n-shoot 3pt opportunities from Wall (which didn't happen that much due to Porter usually playing with the backups) he did seem to make a high % of them.

 

There is also no excuse for not making adjustments more. Against bruising teams like Chicago, his regular rotations were good enough, but he should've made adjustments to include Gooden (and possibly Pierce, depending on how fresh he was) more against perimeter oriented teams like Toronto, ATL, GS, etc.

Edited by TheItalianStallion
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On Porter, I try to make myself remember that he was out most of last year, and this is his first full year.  Now, how many games do college players play in a year, and how long is the NBA season and playoffs?  Limiting a player who has never played a full NBA season to save for the stretch run seems logical to me.

 

What this assumes is that he knew Porter would be able to turn it on late in the season against the league's best teams because there were times in the middle of the season where Porter looked lost, and most of us said he needed playing time to find his way.  With the way Porter has played towards the end of the season and in the playoffs, it looks like Wittman was slightly less foolish that I thought. 

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gbear, he wasn't trying to save Porter for the playoffs. And this wasn't Porter's first year. Injury or no, he went through the grind of an NBA season last year. Wittman was doghousing Porter for mistakes and because Rasual Butler was hot shooting from three in the first two months of the season and inertia carried Randy to use him long past his expiration date. Later, after Martell got back, Randy started playing him over Porter because he wanted to get Martell back into the flow of games to see if he's still useful, and maybe salvage some trade value. I understood that decision, but it should never have come at the expense of the development of a #3 overall pick. Not only that, it was really obvious Porter was a much better overall player than either Butler or Webster--the one single thing they did better than Porter was shoot the three ball. A better coach than Randy would have found a way to get enough shooters on the floor without wasting a talent like Porter.

Shooters need consistent playing time to get in rhythm though, so Randy killed any chance of Martell or Otto finding their range by playing them so sporadically. It's a terrible way to use any player, much less a young player in the early stages of development. It's not a coincidence that now that Otto is getting consistent and predictable run (and a lot of it with John Wall) that his shooting percentages and overall level of play exploded.

There is soooo much revisionism going around to try and justify Randy's failings and pretend like he's not a bad coach to explain why the team is playing well in the playoffs. The truth is the difference in the level of coaching in the postseason is nowhere near as big as it is in the regular season. During the regular season you get no time between games. Only the legit good coaches are good enough to get their teams well prepared for unique opponents. Or run a system that flummoxes most opponents who don't have time to tailor their own systems to beat you. In the playoffs you're playing the same opponent every game and you get a ton of time to practice and gameplan over the course of a series. Any NBA caliber coach can get their team ready to play if given enough time. Playoffs is all about the talent of your top 8 or 9 players, and Randy coaches a team that has more talent than Chicago, Toronto, and probably Atlanta. That's the secret of his postseason success.

Randy isn't even close to as good a coach as Thibs or Budenholzer, but that doesn't matter in the playoffs.

Edited by stevemcqueen1
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