re: greg minor

[jmc@ptc.com (Jonathan McIntyre)]

Gregg Allen said:
> Have you been watching the Celtics since they Dee Brown and Billups?  If you
> have, you'll have noted that Greg Minor has seen some substantial playing
> time.  He's been very effective in some games, and I don't recall a game
> where he was stinking up the joint.  For the most part he has proven that he
> is a solid player.  He's certainly not "trash that we would give away if we
> could."  IMO he is a decent backup at the 2 and 3 spots.

  I think Greg Minor made 2 of the best passes in the game Wednesday night, 
which completely surprised me because I didn't know he had any passing 
ability.  Maybe he's been watching Anderson. 

  One was on a fast break in the first quarter, where McCarty got a 
steal, passed up to Minor running up the middle near the top of the 
circle, with Edney or Barros on the right baseline and McCarty coming 
up the left side, and one defender in the lane.  Minor took one step 
straight toward the defender and looked slightly to the right, pinning 
the defender deep in the lane, leaning away from McCarty, then he
flipped the ball softly back to McCarty for the dunk. 

  I can't remember the other pass but I remember being impressed with 
another Minor pass in the same game. 

  On the subject of passes, one of my favorite was also in the first (when 
all the good stuff happened).  With McCarty and Minor (I think) pressing, 
a soft pass was deflected by Knight at midcourt, then picked up by Antoine, 
who dribbled up the middle, with McCarty on the left baseline, Minor on 
the right side of the lane, Barros behind Walker on the right, and Knight 
moving to the left.  There was only one defender underneath, but they only 
had a split second 2 on 1 opportunity with Minor and McCarty as Gatling 
quickly got back to help.  Knight drew the other defender with him, leaving 
Barros and Walker uncovered (2 Nets still were in the backcourt).  I was 
afraid Walker would try to take it himself and ignore the beautiful
spacing of his teammates, but instead he held his ego in check for once,
and made a soft underhand pass to Barros on the right so Barros could
step right into a wide-open 3-pointer.  Then showing even more confidence 
in his teammate, Walker turned and headed up the other end of the court 
before Barros even caught the pass.  Of course, you could also call it head-up
defense because otherwise there are 2 undefended Nets still back there.  

Of course, Barros drained it to push the lead to 10, and the Nets called time
while the crowd went crazy, as this came on the tail end of several 
consecutive turnovers, all of which led to baskets.  Because of that 3-pointer,
the Celtics actually had a points-off-turnovers to turnovers ratio of BETTER 
than 2 to 1!  They had 13 points off 6 turnovers in the first quarter. 

Jon Mc