Celt's bench: Was "How could Antoine..."

[opi@unesco.org]

Dan Forant wrote:

> Don't ask these question from George Bush. You don't have to be a sportsman
> to see Battie, McCarty, Barros, Eric Williams cannot perform and look bad
> to boot. 2 of 4 are projects, the other 2 wouldn't be on a good team. We'll
> kill Anderson before half the season is up and go downhill from there. Last
> glimmer of hope on this list is Fortson, I don't buy into that.

C'mon, Dan. I truly enjoy reading your posts because you go to such extreme
reactions from one game to the next (the Celtics are pretty great....the Celtics
totally suck). BTW, I fully agree with George W Bush that "Waltah" isn't the
current president of Pakistan, but that he should be praised for taking power in
a coup d'Etat. :-)

The salient point is that all four guys you mention above would have (or did)
start on Pitino's 36-win team. They represent a huge improvement over the bench
of the last two years. The 3-20 shooting game is a fluke. Nothing more, nothing
less. Really.

What Pitino needs to determine is whether or not his bench rotation is working.
You shouldn't have five guys who can't pass, much less rebound or defend
effectively at the position they are assigned to play. I wish I could remember
the last time I saw any of those four guys (plus Cheaney) make a memorable or at
least an intelligent pass (maybe McCarty). That's sad.

As you know I love Pitino's personnel moves over the past twelve months, but his
two most recent moves seem recklessly casual and even stupid given our needs. He
has capped out the team for the season by signing Doug "Female Gonad" Ovary and
Marty Conlon without so much as a tryout. I wouldn't make this criticism (the
"not even a tryout" part) if these were solid veterans way past their prime, but
these guys never even had a prime.

In the end Pitino MUST have had a good reason based on watching his team practice
twice a day, but I think a lot of fans would be more patient with the growing
pains of Wayne Turner because of his exhibition season defense, hustle and
passing and Eric Washington's (did he EVEN get a chance?) defense and shooting,
than the two permanent DNP-CD's that Pitino signed (Ovaltine, Conlon).

Wayne Turner had stage fright in his first game, and now he's gone. I think we
all sense what it feels like to have the ball stripped bringing it upcourt (with
your hometown friends watching) and to subsequently lose all confidence and fall
apart for a finite amount of time (usually the length of a game or at least the
half). Then you usually wisen up and put the mistakes behind you.

I'm sure by this point in the season that Turner would be doing a little better
than Overhill's 0 assists or Conlon's 0 rebounds. The Celtics bench now looks
likes like it could use a team chemistry player like Turner....someone whose unit
always seems to score more points than the opposition while he's on the floor,
even if he looks like the weakest link out there.

I guess we all kind of overrated him. Obviously, Pitino MUST have had a good
reason, considering how familiar he was with the kid and how much it had to hurt
the hometown kid to be told such stunning news one week into the season. I love
BTW that he was a graduate of "Beaver Country Day School". What a great name
(good school academically, also).

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