Just got back from the game and my observations are as follows: Staples was dead; just no energy in there at all. I was definitely the loudest person in my section and I wasn't all that loud. The cheering only gets going when they do the free T-shirt give away. The Kaman MVP chant was a little much - I think even he was laughing about it. The Clippers made the game way harder than it needed to be. So many missed shots that could have put it away. Gordon definitely was off. Bottom line though, a win is a win.

i find it interesting that NOBODY HAS ISSUES WITH DUNLEAVY AS LONG AS WE GET A WIN.

hmmmm......

i find it interesting that NOBODY HAS ISSUES WITH DUNLEAVY AS LONG AS WE GET A WIN.

hmmmm......

First, congrats to Sacramento on their first win too.

They took care of business and Tyreke is getting better everyday.

WITH THAT SAID lol... Clips FINALLY get their first win and although i'm very happy...

does anyone else think we came way too close to losing?

i mean cmon, it's minnesota!

What's next? a nail biter against OKC?

Dunleavy is such an atrocious coach it is insane he has a job, hey here are my 2 offensive plays iso, or a Gordon curl from a screen set on the baseline.... Seriously that is every single play, really think about it!

haha If you are calling Dunleavy a championship coach, than you guys are delusional. The offensive movement, off ball and on ball are minimal at BEST. It is good to exploit positions where you have an advantage w/ Iso's but not every play down the floor. Every other championship level team I watch moves the ball considerably more! Furthermore I seldom see it where one guy sits and hold the ball for 7-8 seconds of the shot clock waiting to make an entry post into the post. I am really happy with many of our players, Baron's shooting is still plain unacceptable, but it seems insanely clear to me that the lack of execution, typical 8 minute Clipper scoring droughts are predominantly to blame on Dunleavy.

i find it interesting that NOBODY HAS ISSUES WITH DUNLEAVY AS LONG AS WE GET A WIN.

hmmmm......

About Dunleavy I really congratulate him for replacing Thornton in the starting five but I'm a bit worried about his time distribution. IMO our starters are playing too much. Reserves as DJ should get at least 10 minutes and Novak could see some minutes as well

it seems like people are always bringing up ISO. considering our fastbreak output so far this season, most of the situational ISO blame goes to butler, thornton, and baron (they tend to think and force too much). otherwise, we're moving the ball around with regularity this year.

you cant blame lack of execution and turnovers on coaches.


side note:
one thing i DID notice was that camby was LAGGING it during the 2nd half. i kept my eye on him once i noticed it and saw him constantly walking up the court on offense and literally standing still at the elbow. he did this some 75% of the time. everyone else was making their cuts and moving off-ball.

Just got back from the game and my observations are as follows: Staples was dead; just no energy in there at all. I was definitely the loudest person in my section and I wasn't all that loud. The cheering only gets going when they do the free T-shirt give away. The Kaman MVP chant was a little much - I think even he was laughing about it. The Clippers made the game way harder than it needed to be. So many missed shots that could have put it away. Gordon definitely was off. Bottom line though, a win is a win.

im not so sure butler's an upgrade from thornton. both are black holes when it comes to ball movement.
i might be inclined to hope griffin gets the call @ the 3 when he's healthy.

I started the MVP chant in the first and I was surprised it caught on to everytime he shot a FT. I figured that every team needs a MVP to boost their morale.. and Kaman was that MVP.

I swear to god, Dun deserves his share of blame for this but c'mon...a team averaging almost 20 TO's a game is not the coaches fault. Furthermore, most of those TO's are plain and lazy passes. And If Dun uses 90% of his plays on ISOs ( for kaman), that means we have a 90% of winning cause the others sure ain't pulling their weight. The reason we have such a high shooting % as a team is basically Kaman making his shots.

We almost lost to the freakin Timberwolves.

It concerns me that this game was close.

Thank too, probably wouldn't make it to the locker room. So many missed open shots.

3-15....ouch. Not even Al could do that bad haha.

i find it interesting that NOBODY HAS ISSUES WITH DUNLEAVY AS LONG AS WE GET A WIN.

hmmmm......

Can't leave out Gordon (49.2%) and Camby (53.1%).

I'll try to make some sense of last night and do what i do best, which is keep it optimistic.

It's apparent that turnovers are a major issue for us in this early part of the season. The turnovers last night were highlighted by Minny scoring off almost all of them. It's very hard to win a game with 20+ turnovers even on your home court, which it ended up being very hard to win. Our players are only making it harder on themselves. Careless lazy passes are sticking out like a sore thumb in these first 5 games and it needs to be hammered into their heads that they need to take better care of the basketball.

Other major issue to me is the lack of production from the SF position. I was very pleased to see Dun go with Rasual to start and in my opinion its a better fit for the starting group, especially with Kaman playing the way he is. The typical Thornton that we are used to seeing would be an amazing sixth man and the go to scorer in our 2nd unit, only problem is the only thing we've seen this year that remotely resembles Thornton is the "black hole" part of his game. Rasual also hasn't put together an all around good game since preseason. Getting only 20% from the field from him last night made this game much harder to win. If Rasual just puts up just 20% better (at 40% would still not be a great night) and goes 2/5 from behind the arc (he was 1/5) then not only do we get a much easier victory, we also cover the spread . It was very nice to see him clutch up and hit the free-throws down the stretch though.

Baron's jumpshot is still no where close to being on point, but i still like what he's doing and the impact he's having on the games. I see him distributing the ball and trying to be the on court leader. I love seeing him gather up the team at the free-throw line late in games. His rebounding and assist lines are consistently good. I also see him playing scrappy defense and making hustle plays every game. Flipside, I will agree that he has his "brainfart" moments where he does some things that receive nothing but a facepalm from all of us, but I'm seeing a different Baron who is trying to be the guy we thought we were getting last year, and i can only see it getting better. I'm one of the biggest Baron supporters on this forum, so maybe I'm biased.

Kaman continues to beast it. Every game there's still a "oh Kaman" moment where he stumbles over his own feet, but these are now thankfully few and far between, and he's doing everything else right. An amazing moment for me was seeing him finally catch a pass from Baron off the pick and roll and score it. Maybe i'm reading too far into it, but that to me is a HUGE step in chemistry and showing that we are starting to gel on the court. I also laughed very hard at the moments that followed where Baron kept trying to hi-five him and he just pushed Baron away after missing the hi-five like 3x. He's still very goofy, and probably will always be that way, but he's the current beast in the west so who cares.

5 games in 7 nights, including 4 against really good teams is tough on any team. This time, as opposed to Dallas, Dunleavy went with a closing group comprised of our starters and it worked out. They held it down on the defensive end and got the clutch free-throws. It was a very sloppy performance, but a WIN is a WIN and a step in the right direction!

Thanks to Hooch, I was at the game last night. I have a couple quick observations... Part of the turnover problem is from trying a little bit too desperately at times to jam it into the post. When Pheonix was playing well, they had very few turnovers, usually because they were taking lots of shots early in the clock and putting pressure on team to get out to their shooters, which opened the middle... We don't have the outside shooting for that and the result is, we've become predictable... Particularly in the second half. Our pace of play slows way down. Everything gets difficult as we return to Dunleavy ball.

Second, Gordon is putting up nice stats, but he's still only taking 12 shots a game. He's making a high percentage of them and his points per shot is once again, outstanding... Still, he needs to begin asserting himself much more in games. He's our best shooter and with Kaman, our most reliable scorer... He needs to be taking 15-20 shots a game. Instead, he tends to float, taking what the defense gives him. True stars take what they want. As long as he has this attitude, he'll never be an all-star. I know he's only in his second year and only 20 years old, but he needs to realize that every shot he doesn't take is one that Baron takes, or Thornton or Butler. He needs to be a bit more selfish for the good of the team... He needs to impose his will on the game.

Thanks to Hooch, I was at the game last night. I have a couple quick observations... Part of the turnover problem is from trying a little bit too desperately at times to jam it into the post. When Pheonix was playing well, they had very few turnovers, usually because they were taking lots of shots early in the clock and putting pressure on team to get out to their shooters, which opened the middle... We don't have the outside shooting for that and the result is, we've become predictable... Particularly in the second half. Our pace of play slows way down. Everything gets difficult as we return to Dunleavy ball.

Second, Gordon is putting up nice stats, but he's still only taking 12 shots a game. He's making a high percentage of them and his points per shot is once again, outstanding... Still, he needs to begin asserting himself much more in games. He's our best shooter and with Kaman, our most reliable scorer... He needs to be taking 15-20 shots a game. Instead, he tends to float, taking what the defense gives him. True stars take what they want. As long as he has this attitude, he'll never be an all-star. I know he's only in his second year and only 20 years old, but he needs to realize that every shot he doesn't take is one that Baron takes, or Thornton or Butler. He needs to be a bit more selfish for the good of the team... He needs to impose his will on the game.

ramon sessions? were people really that obsessed with that guy this offseason?

^^^ I'd trade Baron Davis for him right now. That would leave me ten million a year to bring in someone else...

The other thing I liked about Sessions was that he really got out and pushed the tempo. The Wolves made their comback when they benched Flynn for most of the second half and played Sessions... He doesn't have the flash of Baron Davis, but he's a solid player whose about making his teammates bette. Even though his numbers didn't impress, his play did. He's quick and smart and defends.