Game Debrief: What Went Right And What Went Wrong?

Me too Cookie! And as mentioned in the other general trades / info thread, I don't think Luka passed once to Knecht when he was open, and he's a guy we could really use if we can get him going again from deep, since he's up trending in other parts of his game, and now with a few 3s starting to drop again.

 

This is why I said in another thread that Austin seems to get the other guys involved more.
I like Luka, of course, but the ball tends to stick with him a lot more when running the show. Maybe it’s because he hasn’t had much time with some of these “new” guys, but he did play with Jaxson, Austin, Gabe, Rui, and Knecht(a lot less) last season. I hope the coaching staff isn’t happy with this version of the offense because it’s not a recipe for a 50 win season.

 

Wins are always great, ugly wins included. We have to keep grinding em out, by the 2nd half of the season, we should be over, the standing around and gawking at Luka, for long stretches of games stuff. It's not such a huge problem now, but at full strength, we are going need some better ball movement. Luka is a friggin offensive machine all by himself, I just don't want us to get too complacent, with the let Luka play one on one, and then play team ball later. We can win 50 games or so like that, but I don't think that's a title run, type of offense.

 

There is always a correlation from offense to defense. If you expect full effort on defense a player has to feel like they are involved somewhat in the offense. Standing away from the bucket with your hands on your legs isn't conducive to offensive rebounding or defense. Plus it is just ugly basketball. Austin has been in that position and understands that.

 

Most +/- stats seem misleading. But I found this comparison interesting along the move-ball-to-win argument:

Luka and AR both start and play 39 and 36 mins, respectively.

Luka: 44/12/6 and a -2.
AR: 21/4/4 and a +15

Luka shot 52% overall; AR only 38%.

There must have been something else going on....

 

Luka for Giannis … who says No?

 

AR would, those 2 are on the top branch of a giant sycamore cracking jokes at each other. Lonzo and Kuz part deux.

 

the reason to be wary of lineup numbers is coaching/strategy, imo. luka gets thrown out with more questionable lineups because he can kind of operate as his own offense. reaves has shown the ability to do similar in stretches, but i wonder if--psychologically--everybody doesn't relax a bit when luka's on the floor in a way they don't when he's not.

more importantly, historically, luka's a huge net plus on the floor.

i think we just have some early season variance, and guys are still learning how to play together. when lebron comes back, it will happen again.

i'm just glad we've scratched out some wins despite it all.

me. luka's younger, and his game will age better. i know it's a joke, but it's important to remind ourselves that it is indeed that.

 

We've all seen move-the-move-Luka and he's fantastic. it's just that when everyone knows he's going to keep the ball and shoot it's by definition predictable, and of course Luka's a net +++ player. My only argument was I'd like to see more of a mix styles.