Post Game Thread - vs Memphis Grizzlies, Home

[bobheckler]

Obviously, without Mike Conley, they are a different team.  The two-man game they almost killed us with last time wasn't there.  The fatal flaw in the Memphis Grizzly roster has been bared:  they have no depth.  They don't have a Rozier, they don't have a Kelly (or even a Zeller) so when either Conley or Gasol go down they are a ragdoll with a couple of pieces gone.  Nevertheless, they grinded it out because that's what they do.  Gotta respect that, even emulate it.

We dropped 113 points on the #1 defense in the league.  They are only giving up 100.7 points/game.  They only give up 36.2 points in the paint/game, we had 46.  What made this a closer game than it could have and maybe should have been were their awful frito shooting, 69% on 20-29, and they made 14 steals.  Sloppy, lazy passing by us.  Something for Brad to talk about.  We could have won this by 20 if we had just taken better care of the ball, and that's even if they did hit their fritos.  As it is, they were able to get a double digit lead down to 3 before we rallied and broke their backs at the end.  They were 8-0 in 2nd game of back-to-backs this year, the longest streak in the league, and they made a good show of it and gave themselves a good chance to go 9-0 but we remembered we are a 4th quarter team and pulled away in the last few minutes, but it was just 4 with 2:00 left.

We outrebounded them 47-37.  Man, bottle this.

JaMichael Green, who killed us on the boards last week, ended up with only 5.  Good job.

Gasol started out 5-5 and ended up 9-20.  That's 4-15 the rest of the way.  3 blocks.  The Gasol boys turned out ok.

Amir's chest must be hurting today from all the times Zbo drove his shoulder into the middle of it.  That was old school pound-them-into-paste ball.  Amir, to his credit, didn't flop and go for the whistle.  If he had maybe that would have disrupted Randolph's raging bull moose game.  He also started guarding Gasol after Horford picked up some quick fouls, so a night of difficult defensive assignments for him.  A 6'8" mini-Shaq and a 7', 265# center.  10 boards for Amir.  He has really played well the last week or so after disappearing for a few weeks.

Bradley has turned into an amazing 2-way player.  Of his 17 fgas only 6 were outside the paint.  The rest were all at the rim.  The old, baseline back-cutting Bradley showed up last night.  At about 1:50 or so of the game highlights video you see a beautiful give and go from Jerebko to Smart, back to Jerebko who dishes it to the cutting Bradley.  

Smart was a Smart-esque 3-9, but he is a pressure player.  He hits his clutch fritos, he hits his clutch shots.  It's during the rest of the game he is bad.  Defensively, he rips the ball out of people's hands once every couple of games.  Last night he did that to Marc Gasol.  One second it is firmly in Gasol's two hands and then Smart is running down court with it.  If he is getting a reputation for being a flopper, understandably, then he is also getting a reputation for being very dangerous to be around when he is on defense and the ball is anywhere near him.  6 assists and only 2 TOs.  He is turning into a pretty decent point guard and floor general.  He isn't a missile coming up court like IT and Rozier, but he does look up and pass up to guys ahead of him.  At 6:14 of the game highlight film there is a jump ball that Amir wins, Smart gets his hands on it and immediately looks up court and hits the streaking Bradley.  His real strength as a point guard is in the half court.  Him and Bradley with one more, Rozier, in the oven.  We have a helluva defensive back court.  If Rozier starts hitting his shots again, and if Smart can limit the damage he does with his, we will be awesome.

Kelly got a rung up real fast, so he only played 18 minutes, but he had 7 boards.  Now he'll have 4 games with 2.

The big story, of course, was Gerald Green.  19 points in 19 minutes, 7-10 and 3-5 from 3.  Like most streak shooters when they feel it, they feel it and he felt it last night.  If Brad is smart he will set up a play for Gerald that gets him inside on his first fga, so he can see/feel the ball go through the rim.  That's all it will take for him, and every other streak shooter, to feel it.  He also had 5 rebounds, 3 offensive.  For a while he was everywhere.  This is what Danny signed him to do.  We haven't seen it this year, a glimpse vs NY, but this was the real deal.  If he can do this with almost any consistency at all he will be the X-factor this year.  With him scoring and Smart and Jerebko and Rozier holding down the defense our 2nd unit could be pretty potent.  At about 2:55 of the game highlight film you see him grab an offensive rebound off an IT 3pt miss, pull it out to 3 and then just turn and drain it.  No hesitation, no thought, pure zone.  That's a streak shooter.  At 8:12 or so of the game highlight film you'll see IT miss a 3pt fgas and then Gerald Green do his thing.

http://www.espn.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=400899914






bob


.