I'm a basketball enthusiast. That's why I love to watch tense and quality basketball games. Every once in a while I'll rewatch a whole game and I'll share what I think about it. Fellow Jazzfanz' feel free to discuss with me about the NBA season here.
With Derrick Rose's return it was clear for me to watch their first couple of games, which happened to be against serious contenders.
While I decided to go to sleep at halftime in the Miami match because Chicago couldn't stop their early offense, was ice cold from the 3pt line and also the refs decided to screw with them I had more fun watching Miami yesterday and watched a big portion of it again today.
First guy we talk about is this ACL boy of course. He scored only 8 points in the half court and most of his misses came there. While during preseason he got almost every call he wanted to get he hasn't had much luck in the first two games. Against New York he had some narrow misses in the half court, but forced the occasion a little bit too much for my taste. His release mechanics on his jumper look really good. The arc and rotations are solid. But he struggles with (IMO the easiest part in shooting) the pulling up from the floor. He's very inconsistent pushing himself off the ground, resulting in very short awkward 3s that barely hit the front iron. Is that lack of focus? I don't know.
New York was very strong taking the driving lanes away from him and he became quite inefficient in stretches because of that. On that game winning play he had a passing lane to Noah who was cutting and freed himself from the rotating Chandler and had Melo in his back. Instead Rose opted into his comfort zone push tear drop over 2 defender. But he hit.
Melo also had problems all night coming to the basket and was most efficient in his highpost/elbow back to the basket moves. His jumper wasn't accurate and while he had an 'OKAY' look to win it in the end he didn't make the difficult pull off with Deng guarding him.
I've never realized before how bad Bargnani was. Maybe because all his Raptor teams were horrible on D when he was actually playing. But you could see how he only impacted the game positively when he had a good stretch in the 3rd to shrink the Bulls lead. It's pretty unreal how bad a team defender he is. I mean if I was slow laterally and not very athletic like Bargs I'd watch tape, work on my rotations and try to deny passes. I'll look at his D again at the end of the year if Woodson can get him to play smarter.
Shumpert looked very overagressive most of the game. I generally like watching Shumpert but he really hurt the Knicks with stupid fouls and giving up easy opportunities when close out too hard.
Kirk Hinrich though looked really solid on both ends off the floor. Haven't seen him play so good since he was traded away. I have no clue how he commited 5 TOs, but I'm sure the recipients of passes were most often the main reason for it.
The last player who surprised me positively was Carlos Boozer. He's taking better opportunity of his isos he's getting on the elbow. Defensively he wasn't bad so that's a plus for him as well. His rotations were correct. Passing was good, took good care of the ball when last years he often was sloppy with the ball in his hands and ran into traps/double teams.
Metta World Peace is a miracle to me. Ever since he joined the Lakers I'm feeling he's stopping to play offense, but still takes a volume of shots. Yesterday was no different. He took 5 mid range pull ups that he clearly doesn't practice enough. The stats suggest I'm right, but I'm wondering why? He hasn't had a PER above 15 since age 29, the season before he came to New York. You don't somehow completely lose your skills normally. Maybe he's a relic of the mid 2000's when NBA was very iso focused who somehow became no longer a viable option on offense. Metta World Peace if you want New York to advance far this year, stop taking shots other than layups and 3s and focus on your D. Thank you.
As far as the game went, Chicago had control over it until the start of the 4th quarter. They started strong establishing an early 10 point lead. With Rose trying to "return" they gave up possessions in the first and New York closed the gap. When he went out a strong defensive effort paired with solid offense of a group around Kirk Hinrich brough the lead back to around 10 and when Rose came back in they lost some of that until halftime. In the 3rd Rose hit two 3s on consecutive possessions and with that the Bulls extended their lead to 12. New York still not opening the lanes came back within 4 on a strong 9 point run of Bargnani. In the fourth quarter it was all New York as they changed their defense. They didn't allow Chicago to get into offensive sets by overplaying passing lanes that also resulted in steals and transition baskets. Chicago often drained the clock and created a switch only to throw a low percentage jumper over a bigger defender. Also Rose was still allowed to take many half court possessions that weren't successful. But since Chicago got moderate production from fast breaks and using confusion after an offensive board they maintained a narrow lead. It came down to the final possession as Chicago's defense was good enough to not let New York take a lead. In the final seconds Rose hit his first tough shot.
With Derrick Rose's return it was clear for me to watch their first couple of games, which happened to be against serious contenders.
While I decided to go to sleep at halftime in the Miami match because Chicago couldn't stop their early offense, was ice cold from the 3pt line and also the refs decided to screw with them I had more fun watching Miami yesterday and watched a big portion of it again today.
First guy we talk about is this ACL boy of course. He scored only 8 points in the half court and most of his misses came there. While during preseason he got almost every call he wanted to get he hasn't had much luck in the first two games. Against New York he had some narrow misses in the half court, but forced the occasion a little bit too much for my taste. His release mechanics on his jumper look really good. The arc and rotations are solid. But he struggles with (IMO the easiest part in shooting) the pulling up from the floor. He's very inconsistent pushing himself off the ground, resulting in very short awkward 3s that barely hit the front iron. Is that lack of focus? I don't know.
New York was very strong taking the driving lanes away from him and he became quite inefficient in stretches because of that. On that game winning play he had a passing lane to Noah who was cutting and freed himself from the rotating Chandler and had Melo in his back. Instead Rose opted into his comfort zone push tear drop over 2 defender. But he hit.
Melo also had problems all night coming to the basket and was most efficient in his highpost/elbow back to the basket moves. His jumper wasn't accurate and while he had an 'OKAY' look to win it in the end he didn't make the difficult pull off with Deng guarding him.
I've never realized before how bad Bargnani was. Maybe because all his Raptor teams were horrible on D when he was actually playing. But you could see how he only impacted the game positively when he had a good stretch in the 3rd to shrink the Bulls lead. It's pretty unreal how bad a team defender he is. I mean if I was slow laterally and not very athletic like Bargs I'd watch tape, work on my rotations and try to deny passes. I'll look at his D again at the end of the year if Woodson can get him to play smarter.
Shumpert looked very overagressive most of the game. I generally like watching Shumpert but he really hurt the Knicks with stupid fouls and giving up easy opportunities when close out too hard.
Kirk Hinrich though looked really solid on both ends off the floor. Haven't seen him play so good since he was traded away. I have no clue how he commited 5 TOs, but I'm sure the recipients of passes were most often the main reason for it.
The last player who surprised me positively was Carlos Boozer. He's taking better opportunity of his isos he's getting on the elbow. Defensively he wasn't bad so that's a plus for him as well. His rotations were correct. Passing was good, took good care of the ball when last years he often was sloppy with the ball in his hands and ran into traps/double teams.
Metta World Peace is a miracle to me. Ever since he joined the Lakers I'm feeling he's stopping to play offense, but still takes a volume of shots. Yesterday was no different. He took 5 mid range pull ups that he clearly doesn't practice enough. The stats suggest I'm right, but I'm wondering why? He hasn't had a PER above 15 since age 29, the season before he came to New York. You don't somehow completely lose your skills normally. Maybe he's a relic of the mid 2000's when NBA was very iso focused who somehow became no longer a viable option on offense. Metta World Peace if you want New York to advance far this year, stop taking shots other than layups and 3s and focus on your D. Thank you.
As far as the game went, Chicago had control over it until the start of the 4th quarter. They started strong establishing an early 10 point lead. With Rose trying to "return" they gave up possessions in the first and New York closed the gap. When he went out a strong defensive effort paired with solid offense of a group around Kirk Hinrich brough the lead back to around 10 and when Rose came back in they lost some of that until halftime. In the 3rd Rose hit two 3s on consecutive possessions and with that the Bulls extended their lead to 12. New York still not opening the lanes came back within 4 on a strong 9 point run of Bargnani. In the fourth quarter it was all New York as they changed their defense. They didn't allow Chicago to get into offensive sets by overplaying passing lanes that also resulted in steals and transition baskets. Chicago often drained the clock and created a switch only to throw a low percentage jumper over a bigger defender. Also Rose was still allowed to take many half court possessions that weren't successful. But since Chicago got moderate production from fast breaks and using confusion after an offensive board they maintained a narrow lead. It came down to the final possession as Chicago's defense was good enough to not let New York take a lead. In the final seconds Rose hit his first tough shot.
