Point Blank – January 30
The Weekend Edition – A “Dispassionate Play” in Hollywood…Time to hit “Select All” and “Delete” for Washington...Will it be GonzAgA on Saturday?...
Earlier this week there was the reference to Chicago’s gritty OT win at Golden State as being a “Passion Play”, two good teams getting after it at a high level of intensity. The competition was so fierce that both sides were punched out in that extra session, only combining for 10 points. Perhaps instead of a theatre reference it should have harkened back to the “Thrilla in Manilla”, the last act in the Ali/Frazier trilogy, when history accurately records Frazier’s corner as sagely preventing him from coming out for the final round, but did not attach nearly enough weight to the fact that Ali was going to have had a difficult time getting up off of his stool as well for the penultimate bell.
Then last night in Los Angeles, the Bulls were at it again. Sort of. It was another draining affair, this one going to double-OT, but it was an entirely different level of basketball than was played on Tuesday in the Bay area. For most of the evening there was little passion from anyone in a Chicago uniform, save for Pau Gasol’s sentiment at the film tribute the Lakers played of his years in Tinseltown. Tom Tibodeau’s team fell down in double figures in the first half, and was still trailing by nine with a minute-and-a-half remaining, before a 9-0 run that was fueled as much by the Lakers being inept as the Bulls being good.
Thibs made a gamble that might have ultimately cost him two losses; the one that he was likely to get anyway, but also tonight’s contest as well. It would have been easy to empty the bench when Jordan Hill knocked down a jumper at 1:29 to make it 96-87. When Thibedeau called timeout after that shot, it is what I expected. But he sent the first unit back out for what turned out to be a lot longer than 89 seconds of on-court action.
Which takes us directly to tonight, and Chicago having to limp into Phoenix at the end of this road adventure. In retrospect, would it have been better to lose to the Lakers by nine, with the reserves playing it out? Naturally there is going to be some line adjustment off of those extended minutes for the starters, and you can begin your handicap by expecting Jimmy Butler to be held out. But it could extend beyond that. A couple of weeks ago there was a take on a bad setting that Dallas was facing in Denver, tagged “Will Rick Carlisle carry a white flag to the arena?”, and he decided to sit out Dirk Nowitzki, Tyson Chandler and Rajon Rondo in a loss and non-cover against the Nuggets. This is a similar example.
So how will Thibodeau play this? Rose has logged 42:28 and 42:55 the past two games, and even though Wednesday was an off day, consider that this marks the first time he has topped 40 minutes in consecutive games since late January of 2012. Given the depth and athleticism the Suns bring at PG, would a night off for Rose be a savvy option, especially after he looked gassed in shooting 7-26 last night, missing his last five attempts? You are not going to like the first line you see on this game, since it will obviously have been adjusted. But in truth there would be nothing wrong with taking a small flier on the Suns at the get-go (perhaps a half unit or so), awaiting the information flow to come. You may be in position to work the marketplace a little, and even if he Bulls stay with the starting group, there is no guarantee that they chase hard if they fall behind in this one.
Your Washington data-base is worthless
A few days before Christmas, there was a take on just how Lorenzo Romar and Washington had put together that 10-0 opening with a particular focus on the unique long wing-spans the defense had. But first 6-10 Jernard Jarreau was lost from the rotation, and earlier this week 7-0 Robert Upshaw, who was leading the nation in blocked shots, was dismissed. The remaining pieces put up precious little defensive resistance in an 84-74 loss to Stanford on Wednesday that was not nearly as close as the final score can show – they trailed by as many as 26 points, and what had once been such a formidable defense was a shell of its former self, allowing 28-53 from the field, while only coming up with two steals and two blocked shots.
Romar was blunt about it afterwards, while also perhaps projecting what is ahead for his team - "It was different on the defensive end with them going to the basket. We had almost been accustomed to, `Oh, they're going to the basket. We're in good shape.' That's not the case now. We have to tighten up defending the perimeter. We played with some different lineups. We had not been able to even practice with those lineups."
This is yet another of those cautionary tales that get told here often – in a marketplace driven by statistics, with computers doing much of the numbers crunching, sometimes you have to step in and wipe a slate clean. Anything that the Huskies did with Upshaw on the floor just does not matter anymore, and from a confidence standpoint for the rest of the group consider how his final game played out – he had 13 points, nine rebounds and five blocked shots at Utah on Sunday, yet the Huskies were still whipped 77-56.
Even after that loss to Stanford the Washington defense will show on paper that it is #5 in the nation at defending two-point shots. The truth is that the Huskies are nowhere near that without Upshaw and Jarreau. So be prepared to adjust quickly in the weeks ahead, in terms of both the team Power Rating and Pace Rating, and consider the first 19 games to be of no value whatsoever in terms of projecting what happens next. That can put you ahead of a marketplace that is often hesitant to discard bad info.
In the Sights…
Today’s headline used CAPS for the A’s in #692 GonzAgA, and there is a reason for that – there is a call for the “A” game from the Bulldogs when they host Memphis in the Kennel on Saturday night, in front of the ESPN2 cameras. A team that has legitimate aspirations to be a #1 seed come March, and the benefits derived from that (like playing the first two rounds in Seattle), has not had a chance to stretch their legs out in dominating the WCC. Thursday’s triumph over Portland was just the latest example, with no starter going more than 28 minutes. But now things change.
The Memphis problem is two-fold. First, the Tigers are not very good; the weakest, and likely last, edition that Josh Pastner will coach for the program. Second is that the fact that they are not very good does not matter to the Saturday night host. They will be treated as seriously as some of the historically strong teams wearing those uniforms in the past, especially given the fact that they beat Gonzaga 60-54 in Memphis last February. The Tigers are carrying a major bulls-eye on their backs, which is rather ominous given the fact that they are an easy target to hit these days.
Pastner has been able to recruit well, but has not done a good job of maximizing the talent on hand. This time around the talent is not as good, which means that tactics are needed to gain favorable scoreboard results, but those game-day X’s and O’s have simply never been his strong suit. A prime example is to look at the four settings in which the Tigers have been underdogs away from home this season – an 0-4 SU and ATS in which they have come up a significant 43 points short of the market projections.
Gonzaga is far more talented and better-coached, which will obviously not be lost on the oddsmakers. But the level of intensity may be under-valued – this is the rare night in which Mark Few can have his team go hard the entire game without apology, in one of the few chances they have to make a statement the remainder of the regular season.
This Week at Point Blank
Monday – What a “Bettor Better Know” – Weekend Starting Five…Some Orange Crush, in Chapel Hill?...
Tuesday – What a “Bettor Better Know” – Super Bowl Edition…The Pistons lose a cylinder (at the wrong time)…Marcus Paige didn’t have a turnover last night (his teammates had 20)…
Wednesday – The Duke defense, revisited (and a word or two about “Scrambling”)…A third straight day of talking Cleveland defense…Derrick Rose shot 39.4 percent, had 11 turnovers, and only one assist (and the Bulls still beat the NBA’s best team)…John Beilein had a really good week…
Thursday – Raising the ceiling for the Grizzlies…Some Post-Mortems, on PGs…