Side Stories

Last night was ugly. Went to the game with my fiance, and was happy to see us play pretty well in the 1st half, especially Kaman. Phoenix was missing a lot of shots in the first half, and then in the 2nd, no one could hit anything from outside, and there wasn’t much of an attempt to re-establish an inside game. Ricky Davis pulled another disappearing act, Paul Davis was solid at times, and ineffectual at others. Thornton is still forcing too many shots, and overall we need more ball movement. Phoenix seems like the same team, even without Nash. Moving the ball, very active.

More significant, I left feeling not so great about our backup point guard situation. Hart is very mediocre, and with all the flashes we see from Mike Taylor, he is a bit reckless and makes too many mistakes to trust. My feeling is that we should play Hart to spell BD when the game is close, and throw in Taylor if we need a spark to come from behind.

Skinner looked solid, McCoy’s 2:25 felt like about 10 minutes too long. I really wondered why DeAndre didn’t get more time in a game like this. He definitely provided a spark while he was out there, and was the only player to record a positive plus/minus in his 7 minutes. Gordon looked pretty strong overall, but his shot just wasn’t falling.

Kaman & Davis(3) got a lot of time together with mixed results. After watching them play, you have to hope Camby can put back/dunk a lot of Kaman’s point blank misses. It’s the one thing stopping Kaman from being a real force, and with Camby’s offensive rebounding potential, I’m optimistic they’ll complement eachother well.

We know we’re a lot better team with BD, and it’s clear he helps everyone else find their role. With BD & Camby, there’s still a lot to be hopeful for, but overall I’m a lot more “cautiously” optimistic about the team’s prospects than I was before. Hopefully some guys can bounce back a little tonight.