By Steve Luhm
The Salt Lake Tribune
Published Dec 4, 2010 04:28PM
Updated 16 minutes ago Updated Dec 4, 2010 11:42PM
Utah Jazz coach Jerry Sloan praised back-up center Kyrylo Fesenko’s performance against in Friday night’s 93-81 loss to Dallas. Sloan just wishes he could have kept Fesenko on the floor a little longer.
“He was pretty active,” Sloan said. “He went in and got the ball.”
During a seven-minute stretch in the first half, Fesenko scored his five points and grabbed seven rebounds. He helped Utah wipe out a 25-20 deficit and take a 30-29 lead before Sloan replaced him with 6:38 left in the second quarter.
When Fesenko came off the floor, he was obviously winded as he sat down on the bench.
“He got tired,” Sloan said. “That’s what we tell him. You should be able to play 48 minutes. That’s the way the game is set up and that’s what you should condition yourself for.”
If Fesenko was in top shape, Sloan said, he could “ … stay out there longer and have more of a chance to have success.”
Besides conditioning, Fesenko’s has also struggled with free-throw shooting.
He made 1 of 2 against Dallas, meaning he improved to 3 of 15 for the season.
“He’s got to make his free throws — learn how to make his free throws — because right now other teams don’t care if they foul him,” Sloan said.
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I think the coachin 101 book tells ya that anybuddy who out of shape and cant make no free throws should be played until he drops from either exhaustion or bein fouled 24/7, don't it?
That's funny. In the last minute before he was foolishly pulled (after the Fes and the backups had brought back the jazz from a deficity to a lead for the umpteenth time this season), he scored one of his two crazy hook shots, pulled down his seventh rebound, and logged his second of two loose ball fouls. You wouldn't typically associate loose ball fouls with being out of shape; it's more of being too aggressive.
In KF's second cameo of the game, at the beginning of the fourth quarter, conditioning didn't apply either, but turnovers did--by three of his four teammates. This was the stretch when Sloan probably made the biggest of his multiple mistakes in the game--not sitting down Deron to rest him as Sloan usually does. DW, AK, and Elson took turns committing stupid turnovers; Elson's TO (his fourth in 12 minutes) resulted in a Marion fast break dunk off of a Terry steal and assist, yet Fesenko's the one that sits down when Sloan--too little too late--gives Deron a rest after the Mavs build their lead from 4 points to 15 points from the start of the quarter to the 9-minute mark. If Big Fes was
walking up and down the court, that's probably less damaging than Elson's rate of one turnover every 3 minutes. Who gets more PT anyway? Your 4-point, ONE-rebound, 4-turnover thirtysomething Dutchman who goes by the nickname of Frisco.
Fesenko's free-throw shooting is bad; you probably don't play him in the last minutes of Q4 when the game is close. (BTW, although Fes rarely makes two FTs consecutively, there is only one game in the entire season that he has missed more than one free throw, so it's not like he's been a big liability per game on a FT basis, and other team's certainly aren't clued on the "hack-a-Fes"--not that he's usually out there enough to give them a chance, nor is he out there long enough to get in any shooting rhythm, although it would be nice if he (and any other player) could hit them every time).
Sloan's excuse-laden comment is relevant as a general developmental explanation but doesn't apply specifically here, because Fes more than made it up with the other things that he did. If the standard on FTs were applied equitably, then Kirilenko would've not played 30 minutes, either, as he scored the same number of points, had the same number of blocks, points, and FTs (including FT%) and had fewer rebounds in that game. Conditioning isn't a major factor in Fes's sub-10 minutes per available game; Sloan's inequitable treatment of players and disinterest in further developing height--clearly the #1 problem against contenders such as the Lakers (last season and still probably this season) and the Mavericks and the Spurs--is a bigger factor.
The lineup that would've won that game was DW-CJ-AK-PM/AJ-KF; for startes, I'm just asking for 5 or 10 minutes, give or take 5 minutes, just for kicks and giggles, given that the 5-inch advantage that Dallas had on Millsap was NOT working. Another lineup (that could've helped against the backups at least) would've been EW-RP-CJ-FE-KF, as usual. Sloan used very little of either, because he makes in-game adjustments by consulting his own ***.
How ironic that Sloan accuses Fesenko of not watching what is going on when Sloan couldn't even notice that the Mavs pwned the Jazz umpteen times in that game due to height--and that putting more height (sure, throw in a 4-turnover Elson, if you prefer! He clearly deserves it!) was working and would've worked more.
