Point Blank – January 27, 2017
Things to do while ignoring the Pro Bowl…Case studies in basketball consciousness – How Bearish should we be on the Bulls; can Coach Cal get his sell across (tough to sell loyalty in Lexington, when some guys are just stopping by); Coach K is having some real back pain…
There is a lot of ground to cover across many fronts today – the Super Bowl props are beginning to hit the board (over 400 unveiled at the Westgate last night); the Pro Bowl and Senior Bowl give the football-starved something to do this weekend (if the former can truly be called football, which I will get to in a moment); and with a major theme this week touching upon the Freudian/Jungian aspects of handicapping the hardwoods, there are pertinent case studies across several fronts that matter to the immediate betting boards.
With all of that on tap the jukebox does get plugged in for some background, in memory of Butch Trucks, the drummer who kept the time while the Allman Brothers were going off on so many legendary musical adventures. The unfortunate circumstances of his passing earlier this week are the sort of thing that can only bring speculation, not answers. Some days sports are like that, and since we are heading into some challenging handicapping waters with some of today’s topics, how about one of the best ways to make sense of anything – clear your mind with the Allman Brothers, “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed”.
Now time to get to work…
Item: Regarding the Pro Bowl, I just don’t give a damn
I just don’t.
Item: Regarding the Senior Bowl, let’s wait a bit
As of 8 AM Pacific on Friday morning I have not see a price yet, so I will hold back the details until someone sets the marketplace. As noted here in the past, these games can bring edges for those that do their homework, scanning the rosters for talent gaps; looking for coaches legitimately trying to win the game instead of just have it be a try-out week for the NFL scouts; isolating QB/WR/TE/RB combinations from the same school to bring some added chemistry, etc.
Might we be able to get some of those edges in play this time? There may be some opportunity from a practice week for each team that would be best described as uneven. But I will leave it at that for now, and re-visit once betting options are available.
Now time to sort the non-stats component of the power ratings for a whole lot of hoops teams hitting the board this weekend.
Item: How Bearish should we be on the Bulls
It has a chance to get real messy in Chicago, where the Bulls brought some optimism with an 8-4 opening, only to gradually crumble into an ill-fitting on-court mix that has them at 23-24. They fell below .500 with a late meltdown vs. the Hawks on Wednesday, a 105-97 Chicago lead with 4:14 remaining being turned into a 119-114 Atlanta win, and frustrations boiled over in the aftermath.
Let’s start with Dwyane Wade - “Everyone don’t care enough…I don't know how you fix it. It just doesn't mean enough for guys around here to want to win ball games. It pisses me off. Games are supposed to hurt. You're not supposed to sleep. You're not supposed to want to talk to anybody. I don't know if that is in guys in this locker room. Hopefully, they can prove me wrong. But I will challenge them to see if losses like this hurt.’’
And along that theme, from Jimmy Butler - "If you don't come in this (expletive) pissed off after you lose any game, something is wrong. I want to play with guys who care, guys who play hard, who want to do well for this organization, who want to do whatever it takes to win.’’
Why were they so angered? Because the duo had combined to play a hell of a game, 73 points on an efficient 27-46 shooting, with nine rebounds, five assists, five steals and only two turnovers. Many of the others naturally didn’t play well, hence the outcome, and the end-game included missed 3-point attempts by Paul Zipser, at 1:24 when the Bulls were down by one, and Nikola Mirotic at 0:25, when they were down by two.
So now more from Wade in an unveiled take on those late missed opportunities - "My thing is if you're going to shoot those shots, you better have made that shot a lot of times and you better have put the work in. And I don't see that enough."
That is pretty harsh, and rather specific, the sort of thing that can take place in a locker room, but not often outside of one. But we are in a modern media era that changes flows, and among those changes came this response, from Rajon Rondo on Instagram -
My vets would never go to the media. They would come to the team. My vets didn't pick and choose when they wanted to bring it. They brought it every time they stepped in the gym whether it was practice or a game. They didn't take days off. My vets didn't care about their numbers. My vets played for the team. When we lost, they wouldn't blame us. They took responsibility and got in the gym. They showed the young guys what it meant to work.
Even in Boston when we had the best record in the league, if we lost a game, you could hear a pin drop on the bus. They showed us the seriousness of the game. My vets didn't have an influence on the coaching staff. They couldn't change the plan because it didn't work for them. I played under one of the greatest coaches, and he held everyone accountable. It takes 1-15 to win. When you isolate everyone, you can't win consistently.
I could devote a full column to the various sub-elements of that, in particular starting with “my vets”, because there has been an issue with Rondo not meshing with the team from the start, either from his ability to play competent PG, or to simply fit in as a teammate. (FWIW, he played a non-descript 10 minutes in the loss to Atlanta, the Bulls going -5 when he was on the floor.)
Why am I not using anything from Fred Hoiberg? The nature of the comments may already be telling us about his abilities to be in charge. Hoiberg was a good college coach that may have taken a leap far too soon, and perhaps the single biggest indictment of the state of affairs in Chicago is that the players are speaking the way that they are about each other, not acknowledging Hoiberg as the true guy in charge.
I expect awkward times ahead because there are already genuine basketball issues at play. Now the question becomes whether there is an integrity of purpose by the coaches and players to solve them, which keeps the Bulls under a magnified view for the games ahead. If Hassan Whiteside’s ankle is good enough to go tonight, there may be a flutter out there on the Heat, who have played quite well since getting three consecutive days off two weeks ago.
Item: On Coach Cal’s crusade (and Bill Self has some issues as well)
Kansas/Kentucky on Saturday night would not have needed any magnification to create an interest, the 90-84 overtime win by the Jayhawks at Phog Allen Fieldhouse last January among the better college games I have ever seen. But there is a whole lot more going on than just studying the stats and trends.
Kentucky enters Saturday’s game off of an 82-80 loss at Tennessee, one in which defensive breakdowns were easy to spot – a young and inconsistent Volunteers edition broke them down to the tune of 18 assists vs. only nine turnovers. What became fascinating in the aftermath is that it was how his young Wildcats played on the other end of the court that bothered John Calipari even more -
"Tom Brady made a statement that these guys aren't listening to. Doing what's right for the team sometimes may not be right for you, but that's how you win. That's not getting through to some guys and I told them after, 'You'll continue to lose.' I've done this 30 years. You cannot do this stuff that they're doing and win basketball games. You cannot do it. I don't want to call guys out, but I could go right down the line: 'Here's what I'm asking you to do and you refuse to do it’.
"Everybody that's watched this team, you know what we usually look like? Pass, pass, pass, pass, in, out, drive, kick, go. You know what everybody's doing right now? Whoever has it holds it as long as they can, until they make a pass, and the pass they want to make is the hero scoring pass. We're just not playing how we were two weeks ago. Maybe we got arrogant. It comes back to what I'm accepting as a coach, and obviously I'm accepting this kind of play from young kids. I've got to do a better job, and I will."
This is an annual problem for Calipari, of course. He brings in several of the most talented freshmen in the land each year by promising to help get them NBA-ready in one season, but the things that get a player ready for the Association aren’t always going to align with developing chemistry and teamwork at the NCAA level. Kentucky has managed to win through this process because the talent level has been so high, not necessarily because of how well the pieces fit. In Calipari’s post-Tennessee comments he touched directly on the prime issue – young players may not sacrifice parts of their game to make the team better. But then again, if they are only going to be a part of that team for a couple of months, what is their motivation to do so?
Because of a general eye test on Kentucky in recent weeks, and the natural experience edges that the Frank Mason/Devontae’ Graham back-court brings the Jayhawks, I had noted on this week’s NCAA Podcast (link below) that Kansas could be a fit on the money line here, an expectation of their experience and savvy holding up on the road. Note that even in losing at West Virginia this week the offense had more assists than turnovers, which is not easy to do against that defense on that court this season, and that a legitimate case can be made that Kentucky in Lexington is actually an easier challenge than WVU in Morgantown this particular season.
But that was before it became known to me that the Jayhawks have some distractions of their own, a police investigation on what has been alleged as a sexual attack at McCarthy Hall, the dorm in which several of the players live. From Bill Self –
"It's certainly been a distraction in the last 24 hours and I'm sure it will continue to be that way until more information is given to us. I've been given zero information that would warrant us doing anything at this point in time, to suspend or whatnot. We'll have to wait and see how it plays out…It's going to be a situation [in which] guys are going to have to use the basketball court as a way to kind of bond together rather than to be talked about off it."
And then there was more, 6-10 sophomore Carlton Bragg Jr. being suspended for at least this game, for what Self has called a “violation of team rules” that is unrelated to the McCarthy Hall incident. That laves a scramble here in many ways, and from a basketball standpoint a key issue will be the Jayhawk rotation being thinned.
More from Self on that front – "We want to play man (man-to-man defense). But the reality of it is, with our depth situation and certain things and maybe depending on how they're shooting the ball that day or whatnot, it may dictate that we play some zone."
A lot of plot twists out there for what should be an interesting setting in Rupp Arena. But Calipari and Self are not the only big-time coaches facing conundrums.
Item: Meanwhile as Mike Krzyzewski rests his ailing back…
After struggling for a bit based on both personnel issues (injuries have the team several weeks behind development schedule) and the absence of Coach K, Duke seemed to turn a corner last Saturday night, in a strong second half domination of Miami. But what followed was a late Blue Devil meltdown at home vs. N. C. State on Monday, and then Miami nearly seeing one get away at home vs. Boston College the following night that took much of the luster from Saturday’s win anyway.
Instead of remaining in his rehab mode, Krzyzewski had a team meeting at his house on Tuesday night, and the follow-up indicated that there was a players-only meeting afterwards. One of the results is that the players are now banned from the Duke locker room, or wearing Blue Devils gear anywhere in public, which comes across as being a bit silly, but it wouldn’t be the first time such punishments have been used.
How effective will this be? It is a major question, as the team prepares a road swing from Wake Forest on Saturday to Notre Dame on Monday night. But there is one particular issue at play that was not there in the past – this is happening on Jeff Capel’s watch. Capel is in a most delicate position, and you could sense that in his comments to a local radio station - "Really can't speak on it. Disappointing when stuff that's supposed to stay in the locker room gets out."
And while much of this off-court stuff makes for a challenge in setting the best power ratings, sometimes the numbers themselves bring their own unique issues…
About Last Night – on grading Xavier/Cincinnati
Cincinnati opened as -6 for that annual cross-town shootout against Xavier last night (the schools are a little less than four miles apart), before dropping as low as -3.5, and the game flow was right around what the markets had projected – the Musketeers led at halftime, before the Bearcats rallied to take it 86-78. Someone only watching the score flow might not take a second glance, but there was so much more to see.
The reality is that Cincinnati beat the hell out of Xavier is so many aspects of play. The Bearcats had 12 more rebounds, four fewer turnovers and six more blocked shots, which led to advantages of four more FG attempts, and 14 more FT tries. That would ordinarily equate to a comfortable win in double figures.
Here is why it didn’t, and hence the challenge of grading the game. Trevon Blueitt likely turned in the best offensive game we will see all season, given the quality of competition. He supplied more than half of the Xavier scoring, 40 points, on a sizzling 12-15 from the field that included 9-11 from 3-point range. The latter is as good as we will ever see from a player against the caliber of defense Blueitt was facing. Meanwhile Cincinnati was awarded 37 FT attempts, but only made 18 of them. The Bearcats are indeed weak at the FT line, but not that bad – their season rate coming in would have called for them to have made 25.
For Blueitt to have had the game that he had, and Cincy to have left so many points off the board at the FT line, and still have it be a Bearcats win and cover, tells quite a tale. Adjust accordingly.
Item: So while you are ignoring the Pro Bowl…
Here it comes, the full list of Super Bowl props from the Westgate, courtesy of Todd Dewey and the Las Vegas Review Journal.
For your listening pleasure -
Some early Super Bowl chatter is up in this week's NFL podcast, with the game predictions to follow next week -
And to help set you up for a great weekend on the college hoops board, including Kansas/Kentucky and Virginia/Villanova -
In the Sights, Sunday NBA…
So many times the better schedule settings across the long NBA season do not bear fruit for the bankroll because the markets step in and factor them properly, in particular when it is a question of an abnormal short-term cycle. I believe there is one in play this evening that has not been factored at all into the pricing because it is more of a long-term setting, and that will put #840 Indiana (6:05 Eastern) into pocket, with +3.5 available in the early Sunday trading, and this one working at +3 or better.
The Rockets are in a long and grueling grind that has them playing for the 15th time in 25 days, without any back-to-back days off during the stretch, this being 10th road game, and fifth in a row. It has taken a toll – after getting out to a 31-9 opening they are just 4-6 SU and 3-7 ATS over the last 10 games, and there is a particular reason to focus on the number 10. While it is 15 in 25 for Houston, it will only be game #10 for Indiana through that same time period, including only eight games in 17 days since returning from London. I believe the long-term fatigue aspect matters in what will be a high energy game.
The Pacers are at their best when they are attacking the passing lanes, rating #7 in the NBA in steals and #4 in turnovers forced, which can disrupt the wide-open Houston attack (only the Nets and 76ers have turned the ball over more than the Rockets), and also create open-court opportunities against what has been a sagging Houston defense – in the last three games on this road trip the Bucks/Celtics/76ers combined to average 121.7 points on 54.6 percent shooting. Mike D’Antonio had the following lament after Friday’s win at Philadelphia - "Defensively, we're soft sometimes, just soft. Soft on switches. We don't get up on people. We're soft in the moments that win the game. We have to get tougher.” But improving that toughness is unlikely to come until there is some downtime, when they can get their bodies refreshed, and get on the practice courts. In this one that defense will be given a challenge I don’t expect them to solve.
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