Portland 109 - Clippers 87 - Incoherent

Kaman being the stiff he is and Baron hogging the playing time he doesn’t deserve. If neither one of them doesn’t show the sense of pride against the Hawks tonight, they should sit out the rest of the season and let the “real” players get a shot at their playing time (ie DJ, Gordon, and Bobby). If Baron and Kaman still want to play significant minutes after another mediocre performance against the Hawks, maybe they both should be traded because I don’t give a damn anymore. Not showing up for your team is one thing, but not showing up for the fans who pay to watch this team is plain disgusting.

Bench Baron and Kamen. That’s all there is to it. If they are simply going through the motions it’s not fair. Put guys out there that have something to play for, be it pride or the next contract. This means a lot more of DJ and Smith. Bassy and Blake should each get 20+ MPG. And the Clips should be all up-tempo all the time.

The logic behind playing Bassy more is twofold: A) He always gives maximum effort regardless of record or score, and B) If he shows what he can do for the last 20 games of the season, he’ll position himself better for another contract and will be far more likely to opt-out .

Playing the guys that have something on the line may not win many games, but the team will hustle and the games will at least be competitive for three quarters and they’ll steal a few.

Well all this talk is really depressing, so I just wanted to bring up a few point about last night that I liked.

- EJ actually took a lot more shots. I think he realized Kamen and BD just didn’t have it last night. This is the Gordon I want to see more in the future!

- DJ’s defense. Earlier in the game I thought he played a lot better defense than from the beginning of the season, where he’s consistantly leaving his man open inside for a dunk when trying to get a block. He’s changed up his habit finally and played better interior D.

- Brown’s play. He clearly wanted to play A LOT MORE than Baron last night. Let him get some mins.

Kaman has done nothing in this league has not led this team to anything what a waste of a player

seriously, some of you get mad because Kaman took too many shots. He took 6 last night. Some of you prayed for our offense to be perimeter oriented with EJ leading the way. It is now that way and our offense is still struggling. Some of you wanted to blow up the team. I have a feeling some of you guys complain just to complain

I posted here after the last time we played. At that time I was effusive in my praise for Camby. I can’t believe we got him. This is obviously a move to blow up the Clips and start over yet again. I also posted last time that I would get rid of Baron. I still would. If you have a PG with the talent he has then you have to have leadership skills to go along with it. The reason being because he will be the default leader anyway because of the nature of the position.

You are going to like Blake. The guy is a pro. Maybe a Chauncy light sort of. Still while you will wish he had more athletic ability, you won’t be bemoaning dumb plays as I am sure is the case with Baron. Still Blake can only get you so far as we have found out.

Travis on the other hand could be the real deal. He has had huge games for us and never really played starters minutes. He also has hit a few last second shots for us.Last shot of the game, if it ain’t Roy it was Catfish. He also was known as our chemistry guy, maybe the most liked guy on the team and Roys best friend on the team. Right away he will be a better player than anyone on your team outside of Kaman.

I wouldn’t worry about last nights game. We are a better team already, were lifted by news of the trade, lifted by Roy playing, and you guys were deflated after the trade news and on the road. I would not use last nights game as a barometer.

As I said last time I was on this site, you have the real deal coming back from injury, our announcers were wondering if the Camby move also wasn’t made to free up time for DJ, Move Davis, and you will be in the playoffs next year with the addition of Outlaw and Griffin.

Brutal, as SP says. But let’s sit back and take a breath and not lose our minds screaming at the obvious targets, BDavis and CKaman. What’s actually going on? Unlike SP, I was eager to watch this game, curious to see the new big man rotation.

So we know one thing: the Clippers aren’t as good as they’ve been this season when they’ve played their best, without Marcus Camby. Was Camby a glue guy who is essential to the lineup having any success? Perhaps. He didn’t hurt.

Kaman did look a little more active on the defensive boards. That’s obviously going to be crucial. DJordan looked good…against Juwan Howard. Against no credible center on the other team. How did the Clippers, with Kaman and DJordan, not get the ball inside for good shots and play much better?

Portland did a good job of defending BDavis and the Clipper wings. But what was really missing was MDSr’s plodding, unimaginative offense, which would make it a priority to get the ball on the block to Kaman, time after time, ad nauseum. And in the meantime exploit the mismatch.

It really is amazing to see how few shots Kaman got and how few touches and how generally discombobulated he was, even for him. It was only a couple of weeks ago that he was getting something like 10 or 15 shots in the first quarter. Not that he was finishing games or maintaining his frequency. But the Clippers, who are indeed incoherent right now, don’t seem to have a mindset of making Kaman a priority in the offense. His scoring is going to go way down, I would think. The new system, whatever it is, just doesn’t seem like it’s going to make him the focal point where he scores his 20 every night. He may have some more big nights, and he may show up and play in some exciting new way on occasion, at some point. But the consistent production could be gone now.

As far as BDavis goes, we can all look forward to how he responds to having a steady guy who doesn’t make mistakes and hits shots pestering him for playing time. Baron can obviously bring it at times, and he’s had some great stretches this season. Things can get ugly with his game when there are big adjustments going on. Playing against Miller and the Blazers without Camby, and thinking about Steve Blake suiting up, seems to have caused him to lose his focus pretty quickly last night.

The interesting quote last night wasn’t just Milph’s statement to MDSr about bloggers, but the exchange with Steve Blake about Nate McMillan and how he used Blake, how things would be chaotic and his job was to put the team in order and function as a coach on the floor. This dialogue was going on right at the time that the Clippers were stumbling around and turning the ball over and missing shots and looking incoherent and downright stupid at times. But let’s not kid ourselves, we’re talking about Steve Blake here. He’s better than Bad Baron and he’s better than Mardy Collins. Bobby Brown made a valiant, desperate attempt to show his value, but his days are probably numbered, no? Maybe Steve Blake can help the Clippers find some coherence and help them institute the new system, whatever it is. They must have some plays they want to try to run, but we just can’t see them yet, it doesn’t seem.

Another note was how Dain Blanton quoted Hughes saying that Kaman and DJordan would never be out on the floor together, and then of course there they were and it was an obvious and semi-effective piece of the rotation. Milph was skeptical from the outset about Craig Smith as a starter, although it was interesting to learn that he started 31 games in Minnesota last year, after Al Jefferson was hurt. Still waiting to see if Brian Skinner makes sense. Novak got an early call and a few minutes, but he wasn’t effective.

Incoherent is exactly right. Another game tonight!

too much arch on his free throws, just to a straight shot at the rim