Splitting the Difference

Please don’t give Kevin Ollie any credit for the victory last night. A big reason that the kings made it a game at the end was because Ollie was in there. The offense looked terrible during the 4th when Randy was out (2 of Foye’s TO’s were actually nice penetrations and passes by him that Gomes dropped). That was a huge coaching blunder, Wittman got lucky. That being said we need to keep Al involved throughout the game. That and we need a good option to score points at the end of games. That option should involve our 2 best offensive players. You want Rashad to blossom? Why not put it in his hands in close games at the end and have him run pick and rolls with Al? He is able to get to the rim so easily. He could at least get up a good shot or hit Al on the roll, and then K-Love can crash the boards. My $.02…..

…check out PopcornMachine’s GameFlow:

http://popcornmachine.net/cgi-bin/gameflow.cgi?date=20081029&game=SACMIN

Ollie was +6 in both major stints and he was key in responding to SacTown’s move to a small lineup in the closing seconds. Witt had some questionable rotations for sure, but Ollie had a very nice game off the bench and was quite instrumental in the team’s 9-0 and 16-6 runs. +13 with no TO and 3 asts in 16:36 is a pretty nice series of numbers from your backup point. The 2nd unit won this game with Shaddy, Brewer, Smith, Love, and Ollie posting the best +/- numbers.

…going to start the Mario Chalmers watch. Starting point from day 1 for the Heat.

7-13 from the field with 1-2 from beyond the arc. +2 with 7 boards, 8 assists, and 17 points in 35:46 minutes.

Just one turnover from Chalmers, as well. I love that guy.

I know some got tired of the garment-rending over giving away Chalmers for likely nothing (okay, some cash and a 2nd round pick; but you don’t find a player of Chalmers calibur too often in the 2nd round), but man I have a bad feeling about that deal. Even if you’re not as big a Chalmers fan as I am (I liked his chances of being the team’s starting PG by mid-season), at the very least he could have saved Taylor the money he spent on Telfair.

Oh well.

Anyway, it was a fun game. I’m looking forward to this season for the first time in a long time because I believe they’re finally moving forward, not drifting aimlessly as they were during KG’s last few seasons or digging through the rubble like last year. Last night was a game they should have won, and I believe the closer-than-comfortable margin was the result of some uncharacteristicly poor charity-stripe work and the feeling-out process on the rotation/match-ups.

Also, are the Wolves who we thought they were? I found it amusing many of the strengths and weaknesses we all thought would be there seemed pretty much accurate on day one. (Although I expect some more threes in the future; although nobody—most notably Shaddy, but nobody else either—was kicking it out on the dribble drives. They were mostly going for their own or dishing it to a big. Jefferson seemed too eager to score on double and triple teams, as well, although the shooters weren’t exactly crisp moving around to make it easier for him).

Random thought: Jim Pete said Wittman didn’t allow rookies to wear headbands? L-A-M-E.

Not Foye’s best game to be sure, but I do think Wit rode Ollie too long in the 4th. Sacramento adjusted after the wolves went up 9 and they doubled off Ollie and it was clear Ollie didn’t want to shoot. I think they needed to go more offensive-minded there and Foye would have had a chance to make them pay. +/- isn’t a stat to get too excited about after one game, particularly against the kings, but it’s obvious that the Wolves are a deeper team with more defined roles this year. The question is are we going to see more of the good Brewer/Love (which i think we got last night) or more of the inexperienced Brewer/Love? I think that will tell us how this year is going to go, along with how Foye and McCants develop (or not).

And I think if the Wolves make their free throws (which they normally do) the game wouldn’t have been that close. Also, McCants missed some chippies that he should normally make — it was good to see him get in the lane with relative ease. On the minus side, their bigs abused us offensively and whoever Miller/McCants was guarding pretty much had their way (mostly Salmons). Defense is going to be a challenge for this team, particularly when teams have two bigs who can apparently step out and shoot the 15 footer (Dallas isn’t one of those teams, with the Dampier/Diaw combo). We’ll see if they can improve defensively as we get Collins back and guys get comfortable playing with one another.

A win’s a win.

I don’t think I was giving Ollie any credit for the win last night, but when your starting point guard is not performing well and your backup is suspended, I’d rather have Ollie than Ahearn. Would Ahearn have been able to guard Martin last night during Sac’s last possession? I don’t think so. I agree that the point guard play got away from them in the fourth, but if the Wolves (e.g. – Mike Miller) hits his free throws (Sterno’s point), it gets less nail biting at the end.

I’ll also agree that generally the third PG on most clubs is pretty situational; for Wittman to have given that much time to Ollie—especially in the fourth—is not good, but again a lot of those minutes would normally have gone to Telfair. Ollie would probably have been in for that last possession, because that’s a situation.

A couple of other things: Foye’s last pass to Gomes in the fourth was NOT a good pass, BTW. It was at the knees, when I think the idea was for Gomes to go baseline. It should have been at the waist, allowing Ryan to either shoot a jumper or slide to the hoop, in rhythm. And, I still think the Shaddy/Wittman dynamic is a work in progress. Shaddy’s going to have to prove he can be a clutch scorer. I imagine he’ll get those opportunities in other games.

and I watched him last night, flipping between the Wolves, Knicks/Heat, then Rockets/Grizz. At the risk of beating a moot subject to death, I’m with S-N-P, the Wolves probably blew it big time on him.

keep in mind Love was playing terrific but only got less than 20 minutes of playing time. That’s a nice outlook for the future that when he gets his conditioning up (when he’s not a rookie anymore) we’re gonna have this guy on the court more .. and this wouldn’t have been such a close game.

Also the people that responded to the “our interior defense is going to be weak with Love and Jefferson” with “the other team has to be even more concerned about their own interior defense” seem to be right: 58 points in the point to significantly less for the Kings…
We’ll defenitly have enough with one bench defensive big guy, just for those moments that you need a stop.

Also, they might have lacked garcia and miller but we also didn’t have Telfair. Ok, on talent alone garcia and miller are worth more but PG is a potition we’re very thin on. We played our 3rd PG for a long stretch here … + he played good, shows how deep our bench is becoming.