Point Blank – April 26, 2017
On the Gospel of Isaiah’s in Boston…Can the Wizards pull some points in the paint out of their hats…You just can’t credit Jordan Zimmerman with a win from Tuesday night…
The Rockets secured their spot in the next round of the NBA playoffs on Tuesday, albeit in a fashion that was not good for the pocket of backers (the fact that they won by a half dozen despite making only 6-37 from 3-point range spoke volumes about the realities of that matchup), while the Spurs and Jazz made strong statements in going up 3-2 in their series, seemingly grabbing control of the proceedings.
Now the focus shifts to the Eastern Conference tonight, where Hawks/Wizards is legitimately up for grabs, but a less competitive expectation in Boston, despite Bulls/Celtics being at 2-2. Time to get to work, once again using “The Game Inside the Game” method of focusing in on one key matchup aspect that will play a major role in the scoreboard outcome.
ATLANTA/WASHINGTON – Yes, the Wizards missed good looks again in Game #4, but they were good looks, not great ones
The post-mortem talk from the Washington locker room after falling down early in Game #3 at Atlanta, and never really getting into the hunt, was predominantly about how the Wizards felt they were getting good looks, and just hadn’t knocked them down. That was made a feature topic here on Monday leading up to the Game #4, and as that one played out the eye test agreed with much of what had been said. The problem is that the offense generated a lot of good shots, but not enough great ones.
If one were to review the video, they would find that the vast majority pf Washington shots were open looks on Monday, even though they were only converted at a 42.4 percent rate. And psychologically that is how players can view the flow; they know when something is open. The problem is that far too many of the shots were not close to the basket, the Wizards settling for jumpers instead of getting the ball to the rim, which lead to this –
Game #4 Points in the Paint
Hawks 44
Wizards 30
And that was on the heels of –
Game #3 Points in the Paint
Hawks 60
Wizards 34
Yes, Washington is among the better perimeter scoring teams out there, but during the regular season the Wizards were #11 in the NBA in scoring in the paint at 44.8 ppg, and for comparison the Hawks were #18 at 43.0.
A big part of this has been flat-out domination from the Atlanta front-court in winning the last two games at home. Let’s look at a comparison of the starting trios, Millsap/Prince/Howard for Atlanta, and Morris/Porter/Gortat for Washington -
Min Pts Reb
Hawks 186 96 60
Wizards 180 42 42
In particular the matchup between Paul Millsap and Markief Morris was one-sided in Games #3/#4, Millsap with 41 points and 20 rebounds and Morris with only 18 & 10.
But now a key question for a team that does not have a legacy of playoff success – might some of this also be a patience issue? Marcin Gortat is not a go-to offensive threat, and you certainly don’t want to have him attacking Dwight Howard. But Gortat averaged 9.5 field goal attempts for every 36 minutes on the court during the regular season; that fell to 4.5 in the two losses in Atlanta. Something like that can take an offense out of their usual playing rhythm.
I likely won’t have anything in pocket when this one tips off, but one of the key issues for In-Running will be watching the Washington offense early, to see if the Wizards are at least getting some touches in the paint, and balancing out their attack.
CHICAGO/BOSTON – The pressure is on Fred Hoiberg now (and that is likely not a good thing)
One of the prime talking points when this series began was that if a chess match unfolded, there was a distinct advantage to Brad Stevens over Fred Hoiberg. One of the prime talking points after Chicago opened with a 2-0 advantage was in breaking down how much the play of Rajon Rondo had meant, including this quote from Dwyane Wade - “I hated him as a competitor. He knew all the plays. We can go to him and ask him questions because he watches film all the time.’’
It is all front-and-center now. While there is the prospect of Rondo possibly taking the court for pre-game warmups to see if he can make a go of it, I will proceed for now as if he will not play, and that means an Isaiah vs. Isaiah battle out front, Canaan for Chicago and Thomas for Boston. And yes, it is the Isaiah Canaan that registered a “DNP – Coach’s Decision” 29 times during the regular season, and prior to Sunday had only played more than 20 minutes once since December.
The Bulls were indeed better with Canaan on the court in Game #4, but that has to be taken with a grain of salt – he entered after they had already fallen behind by a big margin, and a fair amount of his court time could be labeled as “low leverage”. But Hoiberg is going to take a gamble, which not only puts the young PG on the spot, but the HC as well.
Let’s flesh something out here that you may have heard snippets of, from Hoeberg’s Game #4 post-game - “Let me say this: Isaiah Thomas is a helluva player. An unbelievable competitor. He’s a warrior — everything he’s going through right now, he had a helluva game tonight. But when you’re allowed to discontinue your dribble on every possession, he is impossible to guard. He’s impossible to guard. When you’re able to put your hand underneath the ball, and take two or three steps and put it back down, it’s impossible to guard him in those situations.”
At least he prefaced it well, but that was an extremely awkward thing for an NBA HC to say in front of the microphones. And there was also this - "We have to get off to a much better start if we want to have any chance of winning another game in this series.” A coach that had been around for a long time might have been able to get away with that, but does Hoiberg necessarily have an authority about him that allows for “winning another game” instead of “winning the series”?
This one is about adjustments now, and while Stevens still has only good pieces to work with, not the great ones needed to be playing in June, he can be counted on to at least come close to maximize (starting Gerald Green has indeed opened up the early offensive flow, Green scoring 26 points in 43:20 of court time in the two wins at Chicago). Hoiberg cannot be counted on for the same, and there were a variety of subtleties from the Bulls after getting swept at home that went into the files, like this from Robin Lopez - "They went small. They had more shooters on the floor. We were pretty concerned about that. We're going to have to make an adjustment to that. It's an issue of communication with us. It's tough to be both aware of Al (Horford) and then have to run back to shooters on the perimeter."
In spreading the Chicago defense out the last two games the Celtics scored at a 110.2 PP100, and had an extremely high 70.9 Assist%. This is something that the Bulls now have to counter with better tactics, and there is a major question as to whether they can do that, especially with such an inexperienced HC and PG thrust into major roles.
Baseball Being Baseball
Pitching wins are a negligible handicapping factor, in large part because of some improper rules that govern their allotment, although they do factor into the psyches of pitcher’s because they matter at contract time. Jordan Zimmernan will be forever credited with a “win” for his performance vs. the Mariners on Tuesday, which is a prime example of the silliness.
Zimmerman had three times as many home runs allowed as strikeouts generated, only fanning one of the 27 Seattle hitters that came to the plate, and while I often use “church league softball” as a definition for low SWS% counts, on Tuesday Zimmerman was “Tee-ball”, the Mariners only failing to make contact on 3.8 percent of their swings.
There really hasn’t been anything to like from Zimmerman in what the Tigers are hoping to be a rebound season, and his single-game FIP of 9.61 for Tuesday is likely the worst that will be recorded for a starting pitcher that gets a “win” all season. But while there is nothing much to like from Zimmerman’s stuff, it is a different story out West…
In the Sights, Wednesday MLB…
Sean Manaea has a lot of upside, a left-hander that can not only induce batters to miss pitches, but when they do make contact to have much of it be on the ground. Yet an 8-10/3.93 opening to his MLB career, including 1-1/4.43 through four starts this season, is only inducing yawns in the marketplace based on the Wednesday price point, which opens up some opportunity. I will make #928 LAA Team Total Under (10:05 Eastern) the path, with “4” the going rate in the morning trading. This allows me to take Matt Shoemaker out of play, because I lack confidence in his grade so far (I did not like his early stuff, but he was much more comfortable in his last outing).
Manaea begin to settle in quite well in 2016, after perhaps being rushed a bit after only three starts at AAA – his ERA of 2.67 after the All Star break was #9 in the Major’s, and it was not a fluke, with an 8.0 K/9 and 2.0 BB/9, the latter showing his confidence and development. Now his K/9 is up to 10.5 this season, and when the ball has been in play a superb 65.4 GB%. Baseball won’t allow that rate to remain so high, but it is also not a complete outlier – he has registered at least a 60.0 in every start, which shows the consistency that is developing. If a pitcher combines a 14.3 SWS% with a high rate of ground-balls, they have to resign themselves to the fact that instead of a mid-summer vacation, it may have to be a trip to the All Star game instead.
Outside of Mike Trout the Angels offense does not bring much, rating #28 in OPS, and that may well be who they are. They’ll have to get to five to ruin the ticket, possibly in only eight innings if Shoemaker throws well, and I’ll put Manaea, and an A’s bullpen that does not carry a fatigue rating, into play with confidence against that lineup.
And for your listening pleasure...
NBA Playoffs talk, mostly a general overview of some useful stuff, though not a focus on the particular games for Wednesday or Thursday -
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