Re: Turned on the Celtics tonight and a basketball game broke out ... .

[Kim Malo <kimmalo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 10:18 PM 10/22/2003, Jim Hill wrote:
> What a pleasure to see the Celtics play fast-break basketball again.  Smoked
> the Wolves with contributors up and down the lineup.
>
> LeFrantz plays the way I like to see a guy play.  Hustle, taking open shots,
> looking for others, diving on the floor, keeping his mouth shut and playing.
>
> If they keep playing like this, some silly folks will need to eat some crow.

In fairness, Garnett sat out significant portions and Spree looked off most 
of the game and both have to be big contributors for the Twolves to do 
well.  That being said, first game I've been at this season and a few 
thoughts, mostly positive.

Biggest overall impression - how little effect player rotations had on what 
the Cs showed on the floor. This is both bad and good, with no significant 
overall drop offs (vs a few individual differences, largely a matter of 
inexperience) - a HUGE improvement from last season-  but that also meant 
consistency over sparkling highs, aside from a few plays. That's actually 
fairly amazing, considering the huge changes with recent additions and 
subtractions and style. Amazing how much Danny has managed to change the 
roster for good or evil in a short time. La Fraenz got a huge hand from the 
sparse crowd, integrated surprisingly well and played a lot more than I 
expected. Jiri looked nervous and unsure and clearly needs time. Looks more 
like a SG than PG but unfair to judge at this point. Pierce seemed to be 
making a conscious decision to distribute, wasn't hitting consistently but 
wasn't forcing it either. Surprisingly invisible except for the double 
teams he would draw. EWill on offense seems to have gone back to his 
younger days when he understood that his best game was driving to get a 
shot and/or a foul vs iffy step back outside shots with no foul shot. 
Offensive rebounds. We got them. Seems like a week's worth based on last 
season's standards. One of the first things to stand out early in the game. 
And not just one guy, which is even better. Vinnie continues to look well 
overall. Aggressive, able to move and hold on to the ball, and playing 
fairly smart. Continuing to look more like the guy we thought we had traded 
for. As to Jim's point above about fast break, no, I wouldn't say that. 
Running basketball, which is something below true break, but requires less 
familiarity among the players and is still an improvement that creates more 
open shots and is more fun to watch. Pierce flubbed attempted alley oop, 
but he tried. Then a few plays later Marcus (I think it was him not James) 
shows how it's done with one to Kedrick. I want to see a lot of that this 
season <g> Also, as to chemistry, the body language and little actions like 
a not ostentatious hug after a play indicate these guys are pulling for 
each other and seem to be integrating well despite all the changes - not 
even an old guys/new guys split. One game, but looks like things could be 
interesting to watch develop and that talk of change is not the lip service 
it's been in the past.

Ah, and one last thing for the conspiracy mavens among us - the guy next to 
me picked up a new keyring with a soft plastic uniformed Cs character 
attached to it. Who looks shockingly like LaFraenz. Looks like it was fated 
<key up Twilight Zone music>

Kim