Game Day: Clippers @ Suns

[darrkin]

BTW, Amare played great, just a great all around team effort, we are clicking...if we really manage to get a healthy Barbs back we will be real deep

[Philbert]

Lopez is now the 5th player to hit 30pts for us this season.

If this site was polled in the offseason to pick the 5 who would score 30, how many votes would Dragic and Lopez have received, combined?

[Xylus]

Lopez is now the 5th player to hit 30pts for us this season.

If this site was polled in the offseason to pick the 5 who would score 30, how many votes would Dragic and Lopez have received, combined?

Interesting fact: The Rockets had 3 players score 30+ points tonight against the San Antonio Spurs. Scola, KMart, and Brooks all tore it up tonight. Meanwhile, 3 of the Spurs' starters went scoreless.

[Philbert]

Lopez is now the 5th player to hit 30pts for us this season.

If this site was polled in the offseason to pick the 5 who would score 30, how many votes would Dragic and Lopez have received, combined?

Interesting fact: The Rockets had 3 players score 30+ points tonight against the San Antonio Spurs. Scola, KMart, and Brooks all tore it up tonight. Meanwhile, 3 of the Spurs' starters went scoreless.

the rest of the team contributed 15 points combined. i can't recall a scoring distribution quite like that before. where is elias sports bureau when you need them?

[singh]

I admit i ddnt watch much of the game, but looking at the box score, 3 rebounds from Amare is dissapointing. Happy for the win, wish he had more boards

[Xylus]

Dudley, on his 2nd dunk of the season:

"I was at least 35 inches off the ground. I wanted to make sure to slow down so it wouldn't be declared a technical foul. I was thinkin' of throwin it off the glass, but I just said, 'I'm gonna relax, I'm gonna take the two hand."

[AZSportsFan]

I admit i ddnt watch much of the game, but looking at the box score, 3 rebounds from Amare is dissapointing. Happy for the win, wish he had more boards

I am not too concerned since JRich literally took 3 rebounds out of his hands, and another 2 or 3 he could have clearly gotten instead of teammates after boxing out. He did struggle with Craig Smith though. It would have been nice for Amar'e to get 10 boards after getting a low number last game as well.

[INFORMER]

the suns are so good, steve nash doesn't even play in the 4th qtr.

There have been a couple of times this season where I wished that Gentry had just let Dragic finish the game.

[INFORMER]

wow thats an unblvbl line from Kidd ...assume they won lol.

Yeah, ATL blew another lead, just as they did against GS in their previous. That GS game had a tremendous ending, btw, and Steph Curry is playing out of his mind.

4 OT games tonight. The Hornets with a nice win over the Magic. The Suns are helped by the Kings knocking off Utah (bad loss) and the Rockets knocking off San Antonio (although that may make SA harder to beat on Sunday).

Amazing game from Lopez tonight, but I'm even more please with Dragic's 10 assists/2 turnovers.

[DarkHorse]

They were just the Clippers. Understandable that the Suns relaxed a little, but I don't like seeing it, because there's no guarantee that the D can pick up where they left off.

Lopez and Amare starting has been a very good find. Works on offense and defense. Just hope Lopez doesn't get it in his head that he should score first, rather than defend. Please keep this one guy gritty on defense. Don't let him catch the disease.

The only other criticism I have is that Gentry is just as terrible with his use of timeouts as D'Antoni. I know they want to let the team figure it out, but come on. It's so easy to see when the team loses focus with an early 12 pt lead. Call a f*cking timeout for once, instead of giving it back like it's nothing. It doesn't matter if you have nothing to say. Just do it to break the rhythm of an opponent getting back into the game. If you don't learn to do it against the Clippers, how will you know it when it matters in the playoffs?

[AlanS]

I admit i ddnt watch much of the game, but looking at the box score, 3 rebounds from Amare is dissapointing. Happy for the win, wish he had more boards

I am not too concerned since JRich literally took 3 rebounds out of his hands, and another 2 or 3 he could have clearly gotten instead of teammates after boxing out. He did struggle with Craig Smith though. It would have been nice for Amar'e to get 10 boards after getting a low number last game as well.

Amare didn't have a great game individually, but when you look at the big picture, that was no problem. The Suns out-rebounded the Clippers 40-34, that's a +6 rebounding differential.

Consider that for the season, the best rebounding team in the NBA - The Cavs - have a rebounding differential for the season of 3.9. So if a team is getting 6 rebs more than your opponent, it's doing a good job on the glass, despite what any one person is contributing.

I would add that the Suns recent rebounding numbers make for a remarkable turnaround. These were the Suns rebounding stats around January 28th or so:

Suns rebound differential, Season /rank: -2.0 / 25th
Suns rebound differential, Last 10 /rank: -2.9 / 24th

These are the Suns rebounding numbers before yesterday's game:

Suns rebound differential, Season /rank: -0.5 / 22nd
Suns rebound differential, Last 10 /rank: +5.6 / 2nd

For the month of February, the Suns have been one of the top 3 rebounding teams in the NBA.

Some extra passion from Amare on the boards recently (NOT seen in the Clippers' game, though) has been a help. But the big difference has obviously been the insertion of Lopez into the starting line-up.
***

Regarding JRich: This was pointed out recently, he's one of the top 3 rebounding guards in the NBA. He's been a big help that way, and contributes even when his shot is off.

[SwingMan]

I believe it's safe to say that Lopez has more than justified my vehement defense of him since he supplanted Frye in the line-up - who's laughing at who now?

Right up there with the points and boards is this fact from Lopez' line last night:

0 fouls in 36 minutes - and that's with notorious Suns hater Bennett-fucking-Salvatore heading the ref crew.....

[JustWinBaby]

I believe it's safe to say that Lopez has more than justified my vehement defense of him since he supplanted Frye in the line-up - who's laughing at who now?

Right up there with the points and boards is this fact from Lopez' line last night:

0 fouls in 36 minutes - and that's with notorious Suns hater Bennett-fucking-Salvatore heading the ref crew.....

It's too bad Lopez got hurt in the pre season and sat out November. Everyone said he had a very good training camp. When he came back for spot minutes he looked horrible and Frye was making every 3 pointer in sight. Maybe that January slump was the best thing that has happened to this team in a while. Fryes shooting slump also played a major role in a positive way.

Swing don't you wish we still had Boris playing the center spot?

[Mori_Chu]

I admit i ddnt watch much of the game, but looking at the box score, 3 rebounds from Amare is dissapointing. Happy for the win, wish he had more boards

AlanS's post pretty well summarizes what I'd say about this (better than I would have said it!). We are rebounding extremely well *as a team* right now. I won't be mad at Amare if his individual rebounding numbers are down. I didn't feel like I saw many possessions where he blew a rebound and let the other team grab it. He is doing better at boxing out. The actual rebound doesn't always go to him; sometimes he just stops his man from getting it, so that a teammate can pick it up.

Plus, we won. We should always soften our criticisms if we got the W. If we lose and Amare gets 3 boards, THEN let's propose some trades.

[Mori_Chu]

And what a great game this was. Everything is clicking for us right now. Robin gets the game ball here, obviously, but I won't comment more on his monster game. There are 3 others I am especially proud of in our recent run of success:

Grant Hill: He has clearly paced himself for the stretch run and is playing at a very high level. My avatar does not disappoint.

Goran Dragic: Still a bit up and down; his shot isn't always there lately, and he makes some youngster mistakes/TOs. But I never have the slightest fear when he comes into the game any more. It's a small thing, but actually it's a huge thing. It has been literally 6 years since I ever felt that way about Nash coming out of the game. "Oh, Nash is going out for a while. No biggie." Have we ever, ever been able to say that during the Nash era? For that, Goran Dragic, thank you.

Jason Richardson: His shot is back, clearly, which is huge. But I'm more pleased that he is rebounding like a beast lately. I will see him just sky up there and yank the ball off the glass, over the big men even. He really wants it. He has had at least one 10-rebound games even. Awesome; we need that.

I think it's easy to forget that he hurt his wrist pretty badly a few months ago. It took him a long time to fully recover from that, and while he was gimpy, he couldn't really shoot. He had a 1-2 month slump where he wasn't really reliable on offense, but I don't think it was just poor play or lack of effort. The guy wasn't healthy. It's great to see him back at 100% to see what he can really do. I also think this is probably the moment where he is finally starting to see clearly what his role should be on this team. He has been trying to fit in and find that role, but he was relegated to being a spot-up shooter in too many games. Now he's starting to see what we need and what else he can provide.

Great to see this. If he keeps playing like this, that's when I start wondering if we might be contenders after all. We really do need a 3rd scoring option like him to get anywhere in the playoffs.


If you want to nitpick anything about how we're playing right now, I'd say that we have seen reduced contributions from some of our former stalwarts like Dudley, Lou, and Frye. But I think we can handle it at the moment. I hope the others off the bench figure it out.

[ShelC]

The bench thing is definitely true and i get the feeling like a guy like Duds is trying too hard to be that offensive threat, rather than just playing his game and letting the shots come. When he first got here and at the start of the season, he was just hustling his ass off, making plays and bringing energy and defense. The offense he was giving us was just gravy. Now i get the feeling like if he's not giving us offense, we're disappointed. He needs to lead with defense and get back to being the 2nd unit captain, of sorts.

[Nodack]

Whatever mojo is going on I like it. Just when we were ready to cash the chips in we get a full house and stay in the game.

[sunsdotcom]

I won't be mad at Amare if his individual rebounding numbers are down. I didn't feel like I saw many possessions where he blew a rebound and let the other team grab it. He is doing better at boxing out. The actual rebound doesn't always go to him; sometimes he just stops his man from getting it, so that a teammate can pick it up.

amare rarely box out. he just stands there waiting for the rebounds to fall to him.

[Indy]

I won't be mad at Amare if his individual rebounding numbers are down. I didn't feel like I saw many possessions where he blew a rebound and let the other team grab it. He is doing better at boxing out. The actual rebound doesn't always go to him; sometimes he just stops his man from getting it, so that a teammate can pick it up.

amare rarely box out. he just stands there waiting for the rebounds to fall to him.

I have to agree with sdc here. It was so frustrating to watch everyone 'take' rebounds away from Amare because they actually moved toward the ball.