Sixers 106 - Clippers 80

by Steve Perrin on Mar 3, 2008 11:42 PM PST in News Comment 20 comments

When you play a team that pressures the ball, you have to make them pay by getting easy buckets. If they press, you have to beat the press and convert with your numbers advantage. If they overplay the passing lane, you go back door and get a layup. If they front, you lob over the top. These are not things the Clippers do well. The players are among the less intuitive in the NBA, and the coaching does not emphasize improvisation. As a result, the Sixers pressure creates a win-win. Sometimes it results in a turnover - and even when it doesn't, the Clippers don't make them pay, but rather stubbornly insist on getting into their offense, only now it's with 10 seconds or fewer left on the shot clock. The Clippers did not run a coherent set all game - not once.

Analyzing these generic Clipper games becomes completely pointless on some level. Outrebounded by 20 against the Wizards? What to do, what to do? If only we could find a top 10 career NBA rebounder somewhere who we could insert into the game. As it happens, in this game the difference maker is not Elton Brand, but rather Shaun Livingston. It's one thing to press and double team Brevin Knight and Dan Dickau. But Livingston's handle, and importantly his size, would easily pick apart this type of defense.

But without Brand and Livingston (and Tim Thomas), there was nothing but bad news in this game. Among the low-lights.

After a season-low 4 points in the first meeting with the Sixers, Chris Kaman posted a season low 5 rebounds in this one. But what's really disconcerting is that he looks like the Kaman of last season. He's distracted, he's jumpy, he's all over the place. In November and December, every defensive rebound was his. Anything he could get to, he got to it. But lately, even when he's in the best position for a rebound he often comes away empty. In this game he got only tow defensive boards in 27 minutes. That just wasn't happening before. And it's not acceptable.
It was a record tying game for Al Thornton - no Clipper has ever had more than his 10 turnovers in single game. Only a blown call kept Al from getting the record all to himself with 11. Putting your head down and going one on one is a bad idea against a team that is doing a good job on help defense. The Sixers always had a defender in his path, or someone coming from the blind side. He's got to do a better job of recognizing the situation and getting the ball to the open man. That will come with time - but today was a really tough lesson.
Dan Dickau has apparently forgotten how to shoot. He's now made 15 of his last 50 shots (30%) after going 0 for 4 in this game. Wasn't he supposed to be the point guard who could score? None of his shots tonight were even close.

Losing to the Lakers, Celtics and Pistons by wide margins is one thing. Losing to the Sixers - by 26 - at home - for the second time in a couple weeks. Well, that's just ugly. Yes, they're playing well. Yes, they made a lot more jump shots than anyone thought they would. But you can't lose at home to that team. Not like that.

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No energy.

None at all. There was nothing to cheer for in this game, and I don't blame the crowd. I didn't see any effort to win this game from Chris Kaman, who had no hustle at all to get rebounds. And I saw Al trying way too hard to take over, which led to a crapload of sixer points from turnovers.

I mean, I understand it's tough to go out there and TRY to put on a show when you're the joke of the NBA this season, but if the Clippers don't give a hoot about the game then why should the fans? Staples Center is starting to look as empty as American Airlines Arena...

It's not even the fact that the team is depleted, but it's also demoralized beyond comprehension. How does it feel going into the game reading this? The Clippers have lost their swagger, their star player for the season, and their future point guard, and now OC Register is confirming Maggette leaving. Add on no All-Star appearances for any Clipper and another Al Thornton snub, but this time for Rookie of February. Not to mention the ownersh*t has hit the fan. Chris Kaman can only speak negatively of the team, and it shows that he just wants to end the season now. I'm with Chris; I sure as hell want this season to end right now for the Clippers.

I'll give my Clips the benefit of the doubt though, and believe that they are completely demoralized and depleted. But on the other hand, the fans care about the team and whether it wins or not. At the moment, I feel like the team has just spat on me tonight with such an unenthusiastic performance. The fans deserve better, and the Clippers need to give it more effort against the Kings or lose ticket sales faster than a Spice Girls concert.

I'm sorry, I had to rant.

/rant off

by Redmosa on Mar 4, 2008 12:28 AM PST reply actions 0 recs

pathetic

last night's game was such an embarassment that I felt hiding myself underneath a tunnel. Mike Smith was right that last night's game should not have been a 20+ point blowout. The team played like they had no energy and they did not seem to care. That's dangerous especially when the team's star player is sitting on the sidelines watching this pathetic performance and wondering if he should renew his contract with the Clippers. Now with Maggette planning to leave (and why wouldn't he given the current situation of this team? He's just filling up the stat sheet just so he can build a resume for other teams to look at.) and everything happening in a negative way, there doesn't seem to be much to look forward too. I didn't believe Kaman's quote that things probably won't get better for the rest of the season. But now I am starting to believe. And there's no doubt that this team is in turmoil. For those of you who wrote all those 'fix the clips' entries, you may want to revise your ideas because it will probably be another decade before this organization will compete for the playoffs.

I'm sorry for the rant but after watching last night's game, I have nothing positive to look forward to except that baseball season is just right around the corner.

by laclipperfan42 on Mar 4, 2008 7:16 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Newspaper Headlines

Headlines are written separately from the article, by an editor who's trying to grab readers. Sometimes they don't get it. That headline, With Maggette leaving, eyes turn to Ross, was incredibly misleading - it presented pure conjecture as fact. It didn't even make sense, since Q Ross is guaranteed to be a restricted free agent while Maggette still has to opt out. And if they are both free agents this summer, the question will be exactly the same - how much do the Clippers want to spend to keep them? So they might as well say "Ross is gone, will they keep Corey" as the other way around. Both sentences are equally inaccurate.

The headline implied that it was a foregone conclusion that Maggette was gone, and for those of us who watch the situation closely, that something had changed. Neither is true.

Still, headlines like that, quotes like Kaman's 'we won't play well again this year'... these things have a way of becoming self-fulfilling prophecies. Kaman can make his prediction come true, because we all know that the team can't win if he sucks. After last night's game, he looks like Nostrodamus.

by Steve Perrin on Mar 4, 2008 9:23 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Andre Miller article

thought you guys might find this interesting

http://www.philly.com/philly/sports/sixers/20080304_76ers_Andre_Miller_named_NBAs_Eastern_Conference _Player_of_the_Week.html

I have to watch the game yet, later

by Ricky Sixers4guidos on Mar 4, 2008 3:46 AM PST reply actions 0 recs

Worse time

I've had at a Clipper game since the 2nd half of the Lamar Odom rookie year. What a pathetic effort.

by Phil Gurnee on Mar 4, 2008 7:29 AM PST reply actions 0 recs

Long lost twins?!

Andre Miller
The resemblence...

Shaun Livingston
...is uncanny...

Just pointing that out...

by Redmosa on Mar 4, 2008 9:27 AM PST reply actions 0 recs

Dark Days

The Clippers resurgence is long overdue, and things are really a mess right now. In a brief aside, Patrick whatever-his-name-is said that EB is ready to practice, but the problem right now is that the team is playing too many games. The Clips are way past the after-the-all star game juncture. After passing the 25-games-left mark, the hope now is for EB to play 20 games.

What's this news about Maggs definitely leaving?

Rather ironically, Thornton looked downright Maggette-like last night, plowing right through people, throwing bad passes. This generic team needs the Maggs-Thornton duo to be sharp and effective, with Kaman charging in on their heels. But all of the flow is gone right now.

Another postgame interview has Mobley saying that he really hasn't been "right" since November 7th. Duh. But it never questions the fact that he played through the injury, and has continued to do so. This remains one of the stupider elements of this very stupid season. Mobley stayed on the court and played hurt because... No, there's no good reason.

Not to give Kaman an excuse, but with the Sixers shooting 60% and seemingly making every jump shot, there weren't a lot of rebounds to get.

Dickau's failure to hit a shot is almost as upsetting as Kaman's inability to rebound or score. Well okay, not really. But a guy like Dickau is in a position to step up, and he's really blowing an opportunity to help out and help himself at the same time. We know he can shoot, but the ball's not going in. But maybe it's just part of the general demoralization.

Yeah, it's pretty bad. And now people/reporters are piling on. It's like there's a concerted effort to destroy the goodwill that the franchise has built. The Lakers rise and the Clippers fall. We get it. But does it seem like the media wants Brand and Maggette to opt out, wants DTS to fire Dunleavy out of spite, and put the team back to square one?

by zhivclip on Mar 4, 2008 9:36 AM PST reply actions 0 recs

I suspect that many are missing the point

The offense last night looked horrible. MDSr has lost the team. Some of us weren't enamored with the offense even when the team was healthy. There are a number of teams with young players who are playing well (sixers for example), so that is not an excuse. Complain about the media all you want, but they are just stating the obvious.

by Jax on Mar 4, 2008 11:48 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

What team?

Dunleavy "losing the team" presupposes that there's a real team there to lose. On top of that, whatever team there is, has little or nothing to play for.

No Brand, Cassell, Livingston, Thomas last night. Mobley admits after the game that he has been subpar and injured all season.

Kaman's problems and issues are the focal point right now. He carried the team for the first 2 months, but he's not who he was.

So that leaves Maggette and promising rookie Thornton. The next tier is Brevin Knight and Q Ross. After that you're into third stringers like Powell and Dickau and Aaron Williams. And then you go to guys on 10-day contracts.

This isn't about getting young guys to play hard. It's more about keeping a team, after an injury bomb has gone off, going through the tail end of the season.

by zhivclip on Mar 4, 2008 12:18 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

With all due respect

most of these issues were for the most part known at the beginning of the season. Some of you thought that they could somehow reach the playoffs this year with the personnel they had. I was not one of those people. Please spare me the injuries to Cassell, Mobley, etc. arguments. These are older players who are prone to injury. Davis is not an NBA level player. Need I go on?

Again, you miss the point. It's not just that the team isn't playing hard. The personnel is wrong. The plays are wrong. The attitude is wrong. The coach publicly argues with the owner. Management is not professional and seem to do nothing to right the ship. Generally they seem to have no clue about what to do, their short and long term gameplans, or anything else.

You can keep giving all the excuses you want to for MDSr and Company, but I would suggest that Clipper fans start demanding some accountability. Otherwise, we are destined for more of the same. MDSr is very quick to defend himself when slighted, but he has never explained what happened last year for example. He never explained their theories on the players that they sign. His offensive schemes are boring, predictable and sophmoric. He doesn't let the players just PLAY. And if someone questions him he immediately rips the owner in public.

If nothing is done to rectify this immediately, EB and Corey will WALK.

by Jax on Mar 4, 2008 12:34 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

Agreeing for the most part

My earlier comment was a response to the statement that the Sixers, as well as some other young teams, are fighting and playing well, while the Clips have given up on Dunleavy. The basic response is that the team is so depleted and injury-ravaged that "giving up" doesn't seem to apply. And when you throw in the fact that the Sixers are a playoff team in the East, it's hard to make the comparison.

Yes, it was obvious that the Clippers weren't going to make the playoffs, but as fans some of us wanted to hold out some hope. Is the Dunleavy regime one that deserves hopefulness? No. Would any of us have bet money that the Clippers would make the playoffs? No. So let's say that we all agreed on the bleak outlook in spirit.

But it's also not just about making the playoffs--it's about being respectable, being smart, getting the most out of what you have. And that's where injuries to Mobley, Cassell, and even Davis matter. I said that the Clips rode on Kaman's back for the first two months, and that is clearly true. It was a pleasant surprise. Maggette could have been playing at his current level at the beginning of the season, mixing in 30+ games while making 20+ games seem routine. Did Thornton get enough run while Patterson was on the roster, and before Thomas was banged up? Isn't he more productive than those guys? These and other smaller things are the details of a season of extraordinary futility, even with the lowest of expectations.

That gets you to "the personnel is wrong. The plays are wrong. The attitude is wrong." In a vacuum, this is clearly true. But in Clipworld, things have actually been much much worse than they are right now. Relative to the pre-Dunleavy era, you can say "the personnel is better, the plays are better, the attitude is better."

This shouldn't be an excuse for Dunleavy. CS has pointed out many times that Brand's injury gave Dunleavy a free pass for this season. It's ironic, because you're completely correct in pointing out that there has never been an explanation for last season, and that this season was a time for accountability if there ever was one. Dunleavy has managed to dig his hole a little deeper and make things worse. There are no winners when you're forced to choose between Sterling and Dunleavy.

When you're a Clipper fan, sometimes you just have to appreciate the sheer weirdness. It's bizarroworld, and I said earlier that as the Lakers shall rise, the Clippers shall fall. Getting rid of the maddening Dunleavy is one very simple solution, but it's just not going to happen. And there's no telling that the vacuum would be filled in any satisfactory way. So that leaves us in a classic Clip position: the worst is not while yet we can still say this is the worst.

But now the d

by zhivclip on Mar 4, 2008 1:55 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

You're letting him off too easy...

Jax - Other than 'fire MDsr' what exactly did you want to happen? Since Livingston went down, I personally OBSESSED on this blog about the point guard situation. Of the available options, whom did you think was the answer this season? Steve Blake? Smush Parker? Hell, they tried to get Steve Francis. But they ended up with Brevin Knight and Dan Dickau and frankly, it could have been much, much worse, and I fail to see how it could have been significantly better.

Cassell, Mobley, Thomas... these guys are indeed 30. And they were signed to guaranteed contracts when Brand went down. And no one complained about them when the Clippers were in the playoffs in 2006 (obviously Thomas wasn't there at the time, but I've defended his signing as reasonable, and I would do it in the future).

You're saying it was inevitable that they'd all be hurt for significant portions of the season. Why? Because they're old? Because they're injury prone? Neither Cat Mobley nor Tim Thomas have been injury prone in their careers. Sam Cassell is unusually old for an NBA player, and I'll grant you that it was disconcerting to have to rely on him. But we've already discussed that the point guard situation was not easily fixed.

Are injuries inevitable? Are they inevitable in older players? Well, Detroit starts 4 guys in their 30's, one of whom is the poster boy for injury-prone (McDyess). None of them have missed more than 3 games this season. So excuse me for thinking that injuries have in some way negatively impacted the Clippers season when, you know, they have.

Finally, what is this about holding the team responsible? I'm a Clipper fan. Have been for over 20 years. The organization has been bad, the team has been pathetic, the future has been hopeless for the vast majority of my fandom.

MDsr or Alvin Gentry? Puh-leeze.

We are where we are. You seem convinced that Elton will opt out. If he does, it's very bad news for the franchise. But he won't. MDsr has one more season to try to get this right before it's back to square one.

And I'll still be a fan of whatever team they put on the floor.

by Steve Perrin on Mar 4, 2008 2:14 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Duh, its like a magic wand

Fire Dunleavy and the Clippers will win at least 48 games next year and scratch and claw their way to the Western Conference Finals thanks to their new system of not having any plays and just getting out there and behaving randomly. Just let them play, you know. All the great franchises have that outlook. Nothing slow or methodical about the Spurs or Pistons or Jazz or Mavericks or any of them. EB and Corey will stay, possibly at significant pay cuts, and Agent Zero will probably agree to sign for the mid-level. But it won't matter because with the 6th pick they will draft a first year all-star who can play the 1 or 2 and is a polished master at both. Anything will be possible then!

Just ask the Kings (Twice!). Or the Bulls. Or the Bucks. Or the Grizzlies. Or the Pacers. Or the Sonics (Twice!). Firing your coach and/or GM pretty much solves all your problems immediately. Look at the Nuggets. Who needed Kiki? Now they are a powerhouse!

NBA-quality coaches are a dime a dozen. There has to be at least 20 available who are qualified and can get to the playoffs under the constraints of the Clippers' organization. At least!

No need to worry about cutting off your nose to spite your face in this situation. Chop it right off. It will grow right back!

In fact, I suggest the Clippers institute a policy of not ever having the same coach for more than 3 years. Its almost guaranteed that at least one of the years the Clippers will miss the playoffs so there will be plenty of justification. If there is one thing that succeeds in the NBA its inconsistency and turnover. Always keep your opponents guessing!

No need to ever provide any details beyond fire Dunleavy. Obviously everything else will just fall into place. AND we will get to enjoy his soothing tones in the TNT booth. Win/win!

by John R on Mar 4, 2008 3:15 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Ah - fear of change in all its glory

by Jax on Mar 4, 2008 4:00 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Ah make it about me

A Jax trademark.

But you missed the juicy nugget that I laid out in somewhat mocking fashion.

You premise is that EB and Corey will opt out if MDSr isn't fired. While rediculous on its face, its also 100% backwards thinking. When a team gets a new coach it takes a couple years to gel. If you bring in a new coach now, you ensure that those two are gone.one year hence. With MDSr the team has some non zero chanve to be good. Without they don't.

On second thought, Corey would probably stay even if they won 10 games. He always struck me as a Joe Johnson.

by John R on Mar 4, 2008 6:36 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Your strawman argument won't work

I ignored it because I didn't say it. I didn't say they'd walk if MDSr wasn't fired. What I said was that I think that they will walk if they don't see things restructured in a way that indicates that they are willing to field a winning team with competent management. Some things DTS has done, like complete the new practice facility.

This is a sad situation because I truly believe that DTS and MDSr were working together. I personally don't believe that MDSr is capable of doing what he set out to do and the management team similarly isn't competent. This is why the situation is so sad - they had sold this to DTS. One thing is certain - DTS does not work well with insubordinate fool err employees.

by Jax on Mar 4, 2008 6:47 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

So

You don't want MDSr fired?

This isn't the point of every single one of your comments?

This is a major change in direction for you.

It isn't a strawman if I am attacking your main point, and doing it very, very well.

by John R on Mar 5, 2008 9:05 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

It's not

that they are injury prone. It's that they are getting older and thus are more likely to (a) get injured; and/or (b) prove increasingly unable to function at an NBA level.

by Jax on Mar 4, 2008 4:02 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

As I've said the team needs new management from

the top down including the coach. A complete overhaul needs to be made. We can analyze possible player pickups until the cows come home but none of that is going to help until management is in place that can run the team effectively and put in position a decision making process that is designed to create and maintain success. Consistent winning does not just happen in a vacumn. I understand that MDSr tried to do this, he just in my opinion is not the right person for the job.

By the way, I would never have signed Mobley to five years nor Thomas. Signing of older veterans is either a luxury for an already good team or laziness for a team that is trying to get better.

by Jax on Mar 4, 2008 3:58 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

what could have been

watching a bit of the laker kings game and thinking about what this season could have been like with beno udrih pushing the ball and dishing to mike dunleavy jr. for a dunk. curse you donald sterling for foiling mike dunleavy sr. master plans.

by cabezadeknuckle on Mar 4, 2008 7:41 PM PST reply actions 0 recs