Suns vs Jazz thread

[goldseraph]

Look at all the new pieces on our team, and also having Stat and Diaw not in shape. This team is going to take some time to gel, but it's going to happen. Even if we started 10-10 I wouldn't be panicking. We have too much talent and experience to struggle for long.

 

[Bufalay]

10 and 10 is a crap record, but what about when the suns are 1-5 next week?

 

[TucsonDevil]

I only watched the first half of this game, but you could see a few "bad" signs. I promised to hold my tongue until Christmas - but I am making a list. This game is on my list.

Regarding Amare - when he is in, he does hustle. It's obvious that he is not as 'quick' with the first step on defense, but he is trying hard. He hustles for rebounds and presents a low post defensive presence that, sadly, no one else does. Marion is great on the wing and weakside help, but once JJ, Banks, Diaw, or Nash get beat - they better be praying for Marion, because KT/Diaw are doing little to discourage layups. I think that changes with Amare in the game - a noticeable change. And yes, I do see Amare getting 'frozen-out' on the offensive end... that is in my notebook...

BTW, if the Suns could hit some outside shots, WIDEOPEN outside shots *cough Bell/Banks/Barbosa* we wouldn't be losing leads - or games.

 

[elindholm]

This is a very normal D'Antoni line up... last year Bell played over a quarter of his minutes at SF.

Oops, I misread the post that I quoted. Yes, Nash-Bell-Barbosa is pretty common. The lineup I was complaining about (and which cly2tw then changed in his response) was Nash-Barbosa-Banks. In fact I suspect that cly2tw meant the same thing and just mistyped.

 

[fordronken]

This team's gonna be fine. I think it'd get annoying if the Suns don't win the division, but I don't think we're out of the race yet. We're dead last in our division, but only 2 games out!

 

[Nasser22]

You guys need to have some patience. I still like Banks, he did a good job vs. the Clippers and just struggled in a couple games. It takes time to find out how to play everyone together especially with the addition of Amare. I expected a very slow first month and this is what we are getting. I just hope D'Antoni eventually figures it out but I'm not going to say Banks sucks when he just got on the team. I think he can give us a lot off the bench. Not the "future point guard" that some thought but him and Barbosa on the floor at the same time have been dangerous at times. As for Amare, he needs to cut the attitude, like Edgerrin James, and just play. Neither are what they think the are right now, at least not yet for Amare. When he's open he gets the ball but other times he just stands there behind Boozer with another defender close by. He can't expect to be the focal point of the offense now. He just needs to get in shape and strengthen his knees and get used to being on the court again. As the season goes on he will get the ball more and do better.

Everyone, the team and fans included, just needs to have some patience. This could be a dominant team at the end of the season.



This loss was very dissapointing though. I really thought they could win it. They were playing so well in the 2nd and 3rd quarter on D and everything but those stupid technicals and all those missed 3's let Utah slowly come back. Hopefully it's just the new ball and they'll get used to shooting with it. I can't believe how bad Nash, Bell and Barbs were shooting yesturday.

 

[Errntknght]

Marion got two firsts in the game - first technical foul and set his first non-P&R screen (on which he got called for an offensive foul.) Neither one is likely a career first but I don't recall him doing either before. Too bad about the O foul - he'll probably never try it again.

 

[Errntknght]

I probably shouldn't have given the team such props for their cuts in the Clips game, they compensated for it in this one. Very few of any kind and none on the baseline.

Bell continued to drive to hoop and he looked pretty good doing it - he said that was one thing he worked on over the summer and planned to add to his game. Jr tried it again, too, and didn't look so good. I really liked his double teams though - I know we got turnovers out of two them. His overall help D and rebounding were good, but Harpring abused him some. He hit another 3, too.

It will be interesting to see how Diaw copes with being taken out of the starting line-up. It looked worse than just that to me - when Bell, playing SF, fouled out at the end D'Antoni went first to Banks and when that was shown to be a big mistake he then went to Jones who actually fared no better against Harpring. I thought the natural move would have been to insert Boris then so I concluded that he was in D'A's doghouse. Hopefully, it will light a fire under Boris but its not off a brilliant beginning.

I totally disagree with the coach diddling with the starting lineup after two games - if he wants to play Leandro more he could just do it and leave the starting lineup alone for a while. He's said that his plan is to force other teams to match up with us, so I don't expect he going to make a habit of juggling the starting line up from game to game. In other words being taken out of the starting lineup can't help but be construed as a demotion. And now if Diaw starts to play well then Leandro is probably going undergo a demotion and I don't think that will be a happy occasion for him.