Seattle game

["Berry, Mark S" <berrym@BATTELLE.ORG>]

Friday's was one of those games I just don't know how to take. The Sonics
were playing their fourth game in five nights, all on the road, including a
double-OT game and a single-OT game. They should have been road kill for the
Celts. Instead, the Celtics reverted to Obie-ball and launched early and
often from 3-point land. This against a team that wasn't moving its feet and
was playing Vin Baker and rookie Vlad Radmanovic big minutes inside. If ever
there was a situation screaming for moving without the ball, passing crisply
and attacking the basket, this was it. Instead, the Celts kept the Sonics in
the game by firing up the first easy shot.

But they won the game, and in the NBA, that's the only thing that matters.
You're going to play well and lose and you're going to play poorly and win.
Against the Sonics, the Celts played poorly and won.

Antoine reverted. It wasn't an awful performance, but nowhere near what we
saw against the Wizards. First time I've ever seen Antoine in any kind of
foul trouble. Of course, most of his fouls were offensive fouls. By the way,
you want to cut way down on technicals in the NBA? Make the technical foul
also count as a personal foul. You'd see these guys (Antoine included) clean
up their act pretty quickly when they saw their minutes and shots threatened
because they suddenly were in foul trouble.

I love Joe Johnson's game. The preseason worried me because he just seemed
too passive, which was the knock on him at Arkansas. But since Williams went
down and Joe's minutes and role went up, he's really come into his own. He
doesn't force anything. How good  could Antoine be with Joe Johnson's court
sense? And how incredible is it that I'm saying that about a rookie in his
first month? There's a long way to go, but I don't see why, with his
approach, he can't sustain this kind of success. Of course, he's not going
to shoot 56 percent from the field, but I'd be thrilled with 46 percent. One
request... please, please, please Obie, don't turn this kid into a spot-up
3-point shooter. He's so much better than that.

Finally, I'm afraid Paul M. is right. We (mostly me) can gripe all we want
about the way this team is constructed (smallball), the style they play
(Obie-ball) and the like, but it's not going to get us anywhere. Chris
Wallace thinks Battie, Blount and Potapenko are good enough. He thought Joe
Forte was a better pick than Jamaal Tinsley or Tony Parker. Obie thinks the
key to winning is having four 3-point shooters on the floor at the same
time. He believes Eric Williams is a defensive stopper. They both believe
"Antoine will play 40 minutes a game at power forward..."   As much as all
this might fly in the face of what I believe about winning in the NBA (big
men win rings, a good point guard is like gold, swingmen are a dime a dozen,
the 3-pointer is fool's gold, Eric Williams, Battie, Blount and Potapenko
all stink), that's the way it's going to be until it doesn't work. This year
should tell us if it will work or not. Unlike Paul, I'm not completely
convinced by last year's 24-24 finish. I think they were let out of
Pitino-jail and responded well, which is predictable in those situations.
This year is the test. (Although let me go on record that I believe Chris
Wallace is going to leave the roster pretty much as it is for this season
and next, regardless of what happens. I think he's shooting for that summer
after Kenny comes off the books as the summer of significant change. Just a
hunch. And it may be the right thing to do. We'll see.)

Mark