Re: Antoine Thoughts

["Jim Meninno" <jim_meninno@hotmail.com>]

>From: Josh Ozersky <josh_ozersky@yahoo.com>
>I really do think Antoine is seriously out of shape or
>has some kind of physical problem or drinking problem.
>  He is falling apart physcially out there.  Nothing
>else explains losing the dribble, rebounding poorly,
>and the rest.  I don't even think he can dunk the ball
>right now.  Has he dunked yet this season?  I bet he
>hasn't in the last month.  I think there's something
>we don't know.

Yes, he has dunked in the last month.  There was a play that was so nice it 
got described to the list, but was screwed up in the translation.  It was a 
fast break where almost the whole team touched the ball.  At the end, 'Toine 
flipped it to Pierce [not Kenny] who gave it back to 'Toine [not Pierce] who 
flushed it.  I'm not sure what that proves.  I never thought he really got 
up very high myself.  He's also always seemed to have a lot of shots 
blocked, which I attribute more to almost never using fakes.  He could be 
out of shape.  The ankle might not be 100% yet, although it's been a long 
time and he doesn't have a limp or anything.  I think the drinking problem 
speculation is a real stretch of the imagination.  I remember hearing him on 
the Rick Pitino show saying that he doesn't even drink.  Neither did 
Billups, although Mercer said he sometimes did.

We certainly disagree on Antoine's dribbling.  He used to lose his dribble 
far more than he does now.  I believe he has worked a lot on that.  Most of 
his turnovers come from travelling calls and offensive fouls, many of which 
seem like they wouldn't be called against almost any other player.  I think 
his rebounding and "the rest" come largely from being used differently this 
year.  He is not playing for stats like he did in his first two years.  I'm 
sure his numbers will be up while Pierce is out.  The team will probably not 
win very much though.  Won't that make for some interesting posts?

Jim

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