SB Nation - Donte Greene

Kings Lose Game of the Century, If the Century is the 1300s

Ziller — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 13:27:28 -0000

More photos » by Ann Heisenfelt - AP

You see, because in the 1300s, things basically sucked, what with the Black Death and all, so I figure there wasn't much time for basketball, so the games were bottled disaster, much like Friday's loss in Minnesota. At least with most Kings losses this season there has been entertainment value -- like the final Lord of the Rings film, you can be aggravated at the ending (a Hobbit tickle fight?! what the Frodo!) but still have enjoyed those three hours of your life. Not this game. This game was like paying $6 to see Phantom Menace in the theater: it blew, you're never getting that time back, and it actually helped ruin that which came before it (the Washington win, in our example; the New Hope trilogy in the malformed analogy). I'll never look at you the same way, George Lucas!

Just a brutal, brutal affair. In some losses, the Kings have had multiple runs at the lead -- like a half dozen, in the case of the second Spurs defeat. The Kings had negative two runs Friday night. I don't know how that happened, but it did. Tyreke Evans had his worst game in ages (despite eight assists, would have been more if the team had shot better than 43 percent from the field), Donte Greene didn't score a point in 18 minutes, Kenny Thomas didn't score a point in 20 minutes, Spencer Hawes had zero defensive rebounds in 20 minutes off the bench, the team shot 4-27 from three against a dreadful defensive club, and the team gave up 112 points in 106 possessions to the league's third worst offensive oufit. BRUTAL.

You want a bright side, beyond Omri Casspi (another brilliant scoring effort)? As this Sam Amick video attests to, Kevin Martin is shooting again ... and he's even dribbling with his left hand.

Holy talent infusion, Batman!

Blazers Mount Comeback, Edge Kings 95-88

Ziller — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 14:02:27 -0000

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As Paul Westphal told the media and the cameras, the Kings did not play smart basketball in the fourth quarter, particularly on offense. But there's an asterisk: the Blazers threw something at the Kings that the players on the floor were unable to adjust to. Portland so wanted to stop Tyreke Evans (who was murder in sneakers all night) they pulled Joel Przybilla all the way across the lane to provide help on just about every Evans touch. The Kings tried to clear a side to allow Evans to go one-on-one against Brandon Roy or Andre Miller, but the help came anyways. Evans was unable to get the ball efficiently to the other side of the floor, and the Kings offense went blank.

The Kings ran a couple picks-and-rolls to create space, and it worked a bit. But not enough. It wasn't the only problem for the Kings, that fourth quarter offense, but it was the one most directly tied to Sacramento's defeat. Defensive rebounding was (surprise!) the problem. Portland had 12 offensive rebounds in 37 opportunities, and every last one came from a Blazer starter. You can't blame Jason Thompson (eight defensive rebounds in 40 minutes) or Evans (seven in 33 minutes). You can, however, blame Spencer Hawes (one defensive rebound in 28 minutes), who had perhaps his worst performance of the season on both ends. I don't remember one good possession on either end for Hawes. He couldn't keep LaMarcus Aldridge from his favored spots. He couldn't keep Aldridge or Joel Przybilla off the glass. He couldn't help facilitate the offense. He couldn't score. If not for Kenny Thomas's inability to make even the most clear lay-ups and Jon Brockman's shoddy free throw stroke, Hawes would have had no reason to be on the floor. Just a massive drain. I'm sorry to rip the kid, he's one of my favorites to watch when he's on. But he was off, way off, and it needs to be written.

The problem is that when players like Thompson or even Brockman are off, they still matter. On the defensive boards. On loose balls. On defense. On the offensive glass. It's just not the case right now with Hawes, and that's both a huge personal/personnel disappointment and also a gaping hole on the court. Przybilla is mostly an offensive zero (except on the glass). But he plays great defense, and boards like a beast. When Hawes is an offensive zero, he needs to be a wall to justify playing time.

Beyond that, the Kings can find more silver lining in the 10th road loss of the year. Sacramento owned most of the game. Before Evans drew the instant doubles, he did whatever he wanted. Nate McMillan told the media he thought Evans "has a little Magic in him." The Kings competed on the road against a good team without Sergio Rodriguez adding anything, with Donte Greene and Andres Nocioni playing iffy on offense, and with Hawes a disaster. It's still progress. It's not progress we long for -- a road win, .500 again -- but it's the progress we've got. It's hard to complain too much at this juncture.

Notes:

Greene's bucket with a minute left ... wow. When you see such smooth, confident moves from The Show, you can forget a lot of turnovers or quizzical drives.
The next possession, the Kings down three: Greene plays basically perfect defense on Roy, forcing him into a leaning jumper from 15 feet, in which Roy attempts to draw the foul after failing to get a step, but Greene essentially pulls the carpet out. Blazers get an offensive rebound which essentially seals the game (or at least leads to the Jerryd Bayless baseline drive which seals the game). How did Portland get that offensive rebound? Like they get most other offensive rebounds, of course! Evans, who was guarding Aldridge on the possession (seriously), got possession for the board, but didn't turn around to box out. When the shot bounced off the rim, Aldridge grabbed Evans's left arm, holding 'Reke to the ground, effectively. Aldridge released in time to grab the board himself. Mario Elie and Bryan Gates EXPLODE on the Kings bench at the no-call. I would call it a travesty of justice if a) Portland didn't do something similar on basically every missed attempt (which means the Kings need to sell it or strike pre-emptively) and b) Thompson does the same thing. You get offensive rebounds in this league by being aggressive and a bit dirty. Portland is a lot dirty. It's why they win.
On to actual travesties of justice: those two Przybilla charges drawn? PFFFFTTTT. We have this thing in the NBA called a restricted area. Dick Bavetta should look it up on Wikipedia.

Sacramento's Sucking Defensive Void: What's the Problem?

Ziller — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 21:30:13 -0000

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With eyes coated glassy from gimlets of joy here in points west, there remains one striking, sucking void in the burgeoning success of the Sacramento Kings: the defense remains absolutely awful. The world's worst a year ago, the Kings defense again ranks among the dregs of the league. The real problem for armchair analysts like me is that there is no easy answer.

The team's shooting defense sucks. The team doesn't create many turnovers. The team can't rebound regularly on the defensive end. The team fouls too much.

In every aspect of defense, the Kings are worse than par. Sacramento has stayed afloat (or exceeded expectations, more like it) based on a booming offense which has rung bells from McKinley to Kilimanjaro. (Well, it's currently 7th in the league. Without all but five games of Kevin Martin. I heard at least some decorative plates rattle.) The defense has attempted to again sink this team, like a malformed anchor of youthful blindness or community distraction. (Optimists, still here, will grasp for the former.)

Rebounding is easy to diagnose: our defensive rebounders suck. Jason Thompson has improved on that end, and in total is a fine, fine rebounder. He could do well to boost his defensive rebounding more, but he's not so much a problem as a concern. Spencer Hawes is a concern, absolutely. His defensive rebounding (21 percent last year, less than 18 percent now) is abysmal -- Mikki Moore level, in fact. This isn't blame so much as observation: Hawes has devolved as a rebounder, and he was subpar for his position and size already. Now he's atrocious. Moving on out of reach of the cyanide, Andres Nocioni has been a sink, of sorts -- his 9 percent overall rebounding rate is Salmonsesque (not good) and below the sinewy, frantic Omri Casspi (nearly 10 percent). Donte Greene has not been rebounding well, either. Kenny Thomas and Jon Brockman are champions, thank you.

Turnovers fit into the team defense conceit we'll discuss more later, and fouls split time between there (later) and this easy-to-grasp statement: Jason Thompson has really got to calm down on the fouls. Brockman and Thomas actually foul more frequently than J.T., and The Show actually isn't far behind, but as Thompson plays so many minutes (necessarily, because he is awesome) his matter most. It's not fair, but the cover of Good Housekeeping ain't free, Holmes.

Shooting defense. A riddle wrapped in prosciutto. Rancid prosciutto bartered from the Slovenian black market, in our example. (Apologies, underground meat salesmen of Celje. I mean no offense. I simply take the simplest path to WTF I can find, and today that route crossed your unfortunately, smelly bridge.) Shooting defense is really tricky to unfurl, even at the team level. On an individual basis, yes, guh, muy difficulto. But at the team level, it's still tricky.

Shooting defense, to me, can be broken off into two branches: shot distribution and actual shot defense. In other words, what locations do your opponents shoot from, and how well do they hit them?

Hoopdata.com has made serious strides in public availability of this sort of data this season. Truly fantastic, in my book, which is the one you're reading. I can give you the last page right now, if you're the type who reads that. But first,

SPOILER ALERT

The Kings' opponent shot distribution ranks 15th; that is, if opponents shot league average against the Kings in every shot zone, the Kings would have the 15th ranked shooting defense. But the Kings have the 22nd ranked shooting defense, because the Kings defense actually underperforms from average; that is, the Kings let opponents shot better than they ought to.

END SPOILER ALERT

First, shot distribution. Do opponents get lots of so-called easy shots -- near the rim, threes -- against the Kings?

Sacramento is middle-of-the-pack in the frequency of opponent attempts at the rim ... a bit surprising really. (We'll come back to interior defense in a moment.) No team gives up more non-layup/dunk shots inside the paint than the Kings, though. The Kings allow the sixth lowest rate of "midrange" 10-15 foot shots, and the 10th lowest rate of long twos. (Long twos are the worst shot in basketball, by category. More specifically, long twos by Chris Duhon are the worst shot in basketball.) The Kings give up the 7th lowest rate of threes, which is a positive.

So, essentially, Kings opponents end up taking a lot of short jumpers, compared to the league at large.

But when those opponent do get to the rim, well. Damn.

The Kings have the second-worst shot defense at the rim. There's that bad interior defense peeking out. (Out of where, well, this is a family blog, let's just move on.) This can potentially be attributed to having the league's fourth-worst block rate, and also, anecdotally, not being terribly good in transition.

Moving out, the Kings actually defend short jumpers (5-10 feet) really well, like, "third best in the league" well. From 10-15 feet, Kings opponents don't hit too much, with Sacramento having the league's eighth best shot defense from there. The Kings rank 27th in shot defense from 16-23 feet (ick), but know that 16-23 foot jump shot shooting percentages tend to vacillate wildly. (Proof: Tyreke Evans is shooting 48 percent from there this year. If that lasts, I'll eat Truck Robinson's sweatband.)

The Kings don't give up a ton of three-point attempts, but they do give up a ton of makes, with the 9th-worst shot defense from beyond the arc. Opponents shot 36.5 percent from three against Sacramento, which is the equivalent of shooting 54.7 percent from two. It's not nearly as bad as last year (where opponents actually shot better than 40 percent from downtown, if you can believe it). But it's still not good.

So there you have it. The Kings have an average opponent shot distribution, but let them make way too many attempts near the rim and from behind the arc.

Now, the big question ... whoooooooo? I can't pretend to know that answer, though I will put on the record that 82games.com reports that opponent guards and centers haven't shot too terribly well against the Kings this season, but forwards have. Small forward has been the most sour defensive spot, by this source. Andres Nocioni and Omri Casspi account for 67 percent of the team's minutes at the position. It's hard to figure this with any certainty (without more data, like game-by-game, possession-by-possession data), especially considering that Paul Westphal uses such varied line-ups and Jim Eyen has installed a couple of zone schemes the team turns to often enough. It's really impossible to lay any blame on the shooting defense on any one, two or three players given the info I have. I think we can recuse the center (Hawes, who has played 56 percent of the team's center minutes, and against whom centers are shooting far worse than they have against other Kings with minutes at the position, namely Thompson), but no one else at this point. (Guard penetration affects shooting percentages across the board -- we can't blame Nocioni if a guard gets past Evans or Udrih and forces rotations which leave Nocioni's man with airspace.)

I have thrice begun a paragraph in which I blame a player thoughtfully given the information I have, but ... nope. Wouldn't do it. I can't say for sure, and I'd rather be silent than wrong.

Spurs Offense Explodes, Kings Fall 118-106

Ziller — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 14:00:05 -0000

More photos » by Darren Abate - AP

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San Antonio is hardly known for its offense -- that's why management paid a premium for a new starting small forward, one Richard Jefferson. The former Net and Buck has always been a frequent scorer, and that's what the Spurs decided (correctly) they needed. And it paid off Wednesday night, with Jefferson torching the Kings defense to buoy a Spurs offense that ended up performing very well despite middling production from its big men.

Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili helped a ton, and the Spurs shot 8-9 on threes despite fairly decent perimeter defense. The issues with the Kings defense weren't gaping -- they had trouble stopping Parker's penetration (unsurprising, as few stop Parker) and didn't get back in transition in the first half. Basically, this was a phenomenal performance for the Spurs. That the Kings constantly put pressure on the home team in the second half, with run after run after "you know I'm not dead" run is a minor coup.

Jason Jones of The Bee notes just how young Paul Westphal went: the only King with at least three years of NBA experience to play more than 20 minutes was Beno Udrih. This was basically a bunch of college-age players against a team whose core has won three championships this decade, and whose star has four and happens to be the best power forward of all-time.

And the Kings fought. The 14-0 Spurs run in the second quarter should have killed them ... but the Kings stormed back. And so it happened three more times in the second half: the Spurs opened up the lead to 10+ ... and the Kings brought it back within three or four, even taking a brief 1-point lead at one point.

Omri Casspi was a beast with 20 points on 14 FGAs, with seven rebounds. Tyreke Evans wasn't terribly inefficient, his worst game of the four-game stretch. But he still 20/4/5 and four steals. So, you know, not bad, rook. Jason Thompson and Spencer Hawes combined to play Tim Duncan as well as you can ever expect, with Thompson showing good offensive touch in the second half after Hawes had opened up the game looking sharp. Donte Greene made some late-game miscues on offense, but brought every bit the energy the situation called for, ripping a rebound out of Matt Bonner's hands for a putback, and not taking no lip when the Red Rocket later attempted to return the favor.

I'll take "Encouraging Losses" for $500, Alex.

Preview: Kings at Hornets

Ziller — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 21:00:16 -0000

by Steve Yeater - AP

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THE OPPONENT

The Kings know no opponent better than the Hornets, because the teams have already faced off twice. This will be the Kings' second foray into New Orleans Arena. In the first match, the Hornets pulled out a narrow victory with both Chris Paul and Kevin Martin. The Kings knocked out the Hornets minus Paul in Sacramento during the last homestand. Paul has since returned.

New Orleans has played only once in the past week: Friday's home win over Minnesota in Paul's re-entry. Paul played lovely, with 16 points, 15 assists and eight steals. (Yes, eight steals. New Orleans gained nine steals, and Paul had eight of them. Good grief.) Each of Devin Brown, David West and Emeka Okafor scored at least 17 points in that win, too. Al Jefferson was the only Wolf who got off (20 points).

The key question in Paul's return was how the minutes of surprising rookies Darren Collison and Marcus Thornton would be affected. Collison played 18 minutes off the bench, occasionally playing in the same unit as Paul. Thornton tallied only 12 minutes. Upon taking over the team, Jeff Bower made it a point to insist Collison and Thornton would get playing time. We'll see if that increases tonight, especially considering the Hornets play tomorrow on the road, and again at home Friday.

			FG			3PT			FT			Rebounds			Misc
	G	M	M	A	Pct	M	A	Pct	M	A	Pct	Off	Def	Tot	Ast	TO	Stl	Blk	PF	PPG
Chris Paul	11	34.4	8.3	14.2	58.3	1.8	2.9	62.5	4.7	5.5	85.2	0.3	3.4	3.6	9.7	2.2	2.3	0.1	2.8	23.1
David West	19	35.0	6.3	14.1	44.6	0.1	0.2	25.0	2.8	3.4	84.4	2.6	4.2	6.8	2.6	1.7	0.8	0.8	2.5	15.4
Peja Stojakovic	17	27.8	3.9	10.5	36.9	2.5	6.5	37.8	1.2	1.3	90.9	0.9	3.1	3.9	1.2	0.6	0.5	0.1	1.5	11.4
Marcus Thornton	14	19.4	4.2	9.8	43.1	1.4	4.0	33.9	1.4	1.9	74.1	0.6	0.9	1.6	0.9	0.9	0.7	0.0	1.7	11.2
Darren Collison	15	22.5	3.9	8.9	43.3	0.5	1.1	41.2	2.7	2.9	90.9	0.5	1.7	2.3	4.2	1.8	0.9	0.0	1.1	10.9
Emeka Okafor	19	30.1	4.5	8.2	55.5	0.0	0.0	0.0	1.8	3.4	52.3	3.2	6.9	10.2	0.5	1.5	0.6	1.9	2.9	10.8
Devin Brown	15	22.3	3.1	8.1	37.7	1.2	3.3	36.7	2.3	2.9	79.5	0.9	2.4	3.3	2.3	2.0	0.7	0.1	1.8	9.7
Bobby Brown	17	16.4	3.2	7.9	40.3	0.9	3.4	25.9	0.4	0.4	100.0	0.0	0.9	0.9	2.6	1.4	0.5	0.1	1.4	7.6
Morris Peterson	7	16.4	2.1	6.7	31.9	1.0	4.0	25.0	0.3	0.3	100.0	0.3	1.3	1.6	0.3	0.1	0.1	0.0	1.4	5.6
James Posey	19	22.4	1.7	4.4	39.8	1.1	2.7	39.2	1.0	1.2	86.4	0.4	2.9	3.3	1.5	0.9	0.7	0.3	2.3	5.5
Darius Songaila	19	15.4	2.4	4.5	52.3	0.0	0.1	0.0	0.6	0.6	100.0	0.7	1.9	2.6	0.9	1.1	0.8	0.3	2.1	5.4
Julian Wright	15	13.9	1.4	3.4	41.2	0.1	0.3	25.0	0.5	0.6	77.8	0.7	2.1	2.8	0.7	1.0	0.2	0.2	0.7	3.3
Hilton Armstrong	15	14.4	1.1	3.0	35.6	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.9	1.6	54.2	1.1	2.7	3.7	1.0	0.8	0.5	0.4	2.7	3.0
Sean Marks	5	7.4	0.4	1.0	40.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.2	0.4	50.0	2.4	1.6	4.0	0.4	0.4	0.0	0.4	1.6	1.0

THE KEY BATTLE

Paul vs. Tyreke Evans. This was a dandy of a knife fight the first time around, and I expect nothing less. Paul's quickness versus Reke's strength versus Paul's passing ability versus Reke's penetration ... a bevy of weapons.

INTERESTING SIDESHOW

Given how out-of-control and manic Sergio Rodriguez was during his 12 minutes Sunday, I'll be interested to see whether a) he plays much better, like Sergio! and not Sergio?!?, and b) how short of a leash Paul Westphal puts on him otherwise. I mean, the Kings have a great starting point guard, and a back-up point guard who has played phenomenally this year. If Sergio were, say, a player like Bobby Brown, there'd be no reason to play him ever, except in cases of foul trouble and injury. Third-string point guards get little play around the league. The reason you play Sergio is because he's awesome. If he's not, you can hide him.

BOLD PROCLAMATION

Donte Greene will outscore Devin Brown.

NUMERIC PREDICTION

Kings by 1. And New Orleans will never forget the name Bron Jockman.

DETAILS

5 PM Pacific tip-off. Game thread at 5 PM. Game thread No. 2 at 6 PM. Post-game thread at 7:45 PM. Recap at beer-thirty.

Kings Take One Step Back, Lose 115-102 to Heat

Ziller — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 11:52:07 -0000

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The Kings and Heat as currently performing are basically equals. (This is without Kevin Martin.) The Heat are fifth in the East, the Kings 10th in the West. That's a fact no amount of improbability can change. But then, how did the Kings lose by 13, never getting closer than six points in the second half?

Well, one stretch in the second quarter really undid Sacramento. And unfortunately, it came with the team's best (healthy) players on the court.

Just after the six-minute mark in the second quarter, the Kings trailed by seven. Tyreke Evans (who had another monster box score -- 30 pts, 4 reb, 4 ast, 3 steals, 2 tov) entered the game for Jon Brockman, joining Beno Udrih, Jason Thompson, Spencer Hawes and Donte Greene.

Over the next eight possessions, the Kings scored ... two points. In nine possessions during that span, Miami scored ... 14. The Kings had three turnovers in the stretch, and shot 0-5 from the floor, 2-4 from line. Miami shot 5-8 from the floor (including two threes) and 2-2 from the line ... and had zero turnovers. Just a brutal stretch of play in which Dwyane Wade dictated the game on both ends.

The Kings and Heat basically played even the other 43-1/2 minutes -- Miami was +1, but the last minute of the game featuring your usual desperation madness. You can see this as a bad thing: the Kings had basically 25 minutes to go on a similar run of their own, or to make up all that lost ground at home, and didn't. But in the spirit of continual positivity, think of it this way: this wasn't so much a 13-point loss as it was a really really crappy 4-1/2 minutes of basketball bookended by a decent performance on the back end to two games in two nights.

The Kings won the rebound war, both according to the TV version (34-33 in raw totals) and by percentages (85 percent on the defensive glass, 30 percent on the offensive glass ... both solid). The turnovers were too frequent, and not just in that second quarter stretch. Who was the worst culprit? The amazing Sergio Rodriguez, who didn't so much return back to Earth as he crashed violently into the middle of a prairie, and not so much like Superman did but more like a race of dumb aliens who for some reason think the method of winning a basketball game is passing the ball to as many courtside spectators as possible. Just some brutal, brutal (not brutale!) turnovers there from Sergio. Five in 12 minutes.

Omri Casspi was smoking off the bench (not literally, his hand was figuratively smoking due to high heat), hitting all four threes, including a spectacular fading three at the buzzer ending the third quarter. The bench was actually perfect from beyond the arc (Beno Udrih hit two of his own), but the starting five went 2-16 from downtown, led (in a bad way) by Andres Nocioni (1-7), who refused to say die, unless you look at it realisitically, in which case Nocioni said "Die!" to the Kings offense. When he's on, he can really put these Martin-less, Garcia-less Kings on another dimension offensively. But when he's not, he has no filter in his head, and he begins shooting even more frequently than usual, which is weird, because when most non-stars aren't htting shots, they let someone else take them and find other ways to contribute. El Chapu did indeed have good energy, and hit the boards well (two offensive, four defensive in 30 minutes). But Nocioni isn't deadeye enough to shoot himself into a game. Ray Allen, Martin, Steve Nash, Rashard Lewis can do that. Nocioni can't.

Evans is now averaging 19.9 points, 5.0 rebounds and 4.9 assists. Over his last 10 games, he's at 23.1/5.6/5.4 on damn near 50 percent shooting. Unbelievable.

Preview: Kings at Suns

Ziller — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 21:30:14 -0000

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THE OPPONENT

The Suns are 14-5. The only good thing about that, for Kings fans, is that the Suns were at one point 14-3, which means the Suns have lost two straight. One loss came at the hands of ... New York (guh), an embarrassing blow-out defeat in which Danilo Gallinari lashed out at the creation of MTV's new hit Jersey Shore. The other loss came at Cleveland, which is a bit more understandable. Actually, it's completely understandable. Cleveland is pretty incredible.

Steve Nash refuses to obey human physiology, and Alvin Gentry's gambit (that getting back up to speed would improve the offense more than starting Channing Frye would hurt the defense) has worked. (That will now be dubbed the Gentry Gambit, by the way. It differs from the Bonner Gambit in that the latter states that if you have a good enough defense from positions 1-4, you can play a tall shooting guard at center.)

			FG			3PT			FT			Rebounds			Misc
	G	M	M	A	Pct	M	A	Pct	M	A	Pct	Off	Def	Tot	Ast	TO	Stl	Blk	PF	PPG
Amare Stoudemire	19	33.8	7.2	12.5	57.1	0.0	0.1	0.0	4.8	6.4	75.4	2.1	5.0	7.1	1.1	2.9	0.6	1.2	3.5	19.2
Jason Richardson	17	31.4	6.2	12.4	50.5	2.5	5.6	44.2	1.8	2.5	72.1	0.9	4.1	5.0	1.7	0.9	0.8	0.4	2.1	16.8
Steve Nash	19	32.3	6.1	11.7	52.3	1.6	3.6	44.1	2.7	2.8	94.4	0.5	2.3	2.8	11.5	3.8	0.4	0.2	1.2	16.5
Channing Frye	19	30.1	4.6	9.9	46.8	2.7	5.7	46.8	0.9	1.2	78.3	0.8	4.9	5.8	1.4	0.8	0.8	0.8	3.4	12.9
Grant Hill	19	30.2	4.6	9.6	47.5	0.4	1.0	42.1	2.4	3.0	78.9	1.4	5.3	6.7	2.1	1.3	0.6	0.3	1.6	11.9
Leandro Barbosa	14	21.4	4.6	9.4	48.5	1.2	3.0	40.5	1.2	1.7	70.8	0.3	1.6	1.9	2.0	1.1	0.6	0.1	2.0	11.6
Jared Dudley	19	22.1	2.8	6.3	44.5	1.5	3.3	46.0	1.5	2.2	70.7	1.5	2.3	3.8	1.2	0.8	1.0	0.2	1.9	8.6
Goran Dragic	19	15.9	2.5	5.6	43.9	0.7	2.1	35.9	1.1	1.9	56.8	0.6	1.7	2.3	2.9	1.6	0.5	0.2	1.7	6.8
Louis Amundson	18	15.2	1.9	3.6	53.8	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.9	1.6	58.6	1.8	2.7	4.4	0.4	0.9	0.1	0.9	1.9	4.8
Alando Tucker	7	6.1	1.3	3.0	42.9	0.1	0.6	25.0	1.9	2.4	76.5	0.6	0.3	0.9	0.4	0.3	0.0	0.0	0.1	4.6
Robin Lopez	4	9.8	1.8	2.8	63.6	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.8	1.0	75.0	1.5	1.8	3.3	0.0	2.0	0.3	0.8	2.0	4.3
Earl Clark	15	10.3	1.7	3.7	45.5	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.3	0.5	50.0	0.6	1.1	1.7	0.5	0.7	0.3	0.4	0.5	3.6
Taylor Griffin	1	8.0	1.0	2.0	50.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	1.0	1.0	0.0	1.0	0.0	0.0	1.0	2.0
Jarron Collins	11	7.3	0.5	0.7	62.5	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.2	0.8	22.2	0.5	1.5	2.0	0.1	0.3	0.0	0.3	1.2	1.1

The Suns are a bad rebounding team (13th on offense, 30th on defense) so feast away, Mssrs. Jason Thompson and Jon Brockman! The real battles are at ... well, hold on.

THE KEY BATTLE

I think that, assuming at some point Paul Westphal wants to bring Beno Udrih back into the starting unit as he did to open the second half of the Pacers game, this is not the right game to do it. We know factually that Beno can't guard Nash. We assume Tyreke Evans will also have problems, but the chance Evans can slow Nash a bit (plus make him work hard on the other end) plus the idea that Donte Greene will cause more problems on defense for Jason Richardson than Evans would, and ... I think you go Evans/Greene again. The issue would be whether Westphal wants to keep up with Phoenix (score every time they do) or to slow them down enough to keep pace (spend energy defending, hope you make enough shots). Ideally, both. But this is a real world, you know? As such,

Guards vs. Guards.

INTERESTING SIDESHOW

I have no idea whether any current Phoenix residents actually lived there during Westphal's tenure. But if so, this is like ... Dick Motta returning, right? How would I react if Dick Motta got hired by the Grizzlies and came to ARCO? Hmm. I hope I don't spend the first quarter ignoring the game while pondering this.

BOLD PROCLAMATION

Florida's white helmet-white uni motif is worse than the Kings' short-lived gold lamé kits.

NUMERIC PREDICTION

Suns by 5.

DETAILS

This will be a 6PM Pacific tip. Game thread at 6, post-game thread at 8:45. Recap under the sea.

The Reformation of Donte Greene

Ziller — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 10:51:52 -0000

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"Ask me to be excused, I won't go die politely"

-- Fugazi, "Dear Justice Letter"

***

If Donté Greene flared out like Quincy Douby, it would have been disappointing. Greene was basically one half of the Ron Artest trade, and while getting "something" for Artest wasn't exactly required to justify trading Artest, given the circumstances, getting "something" was important for the mental health of both the Sacramento front office and the fans of the team. With no offense to Kenny Thomas, Shelden Williams or Andres Nocioni, the trades of most aging Kings starters haven't resulted in a ton of promise. The Chris Webber trade brought established, lesser players. The Mike Bibby trade brought Williams (who didn't pan out here, but will apparently stick in the league) and cap space. The Brad Miller/John Salmons trade brought cap space and Nocioni, who happens to be a really solid roleplayer, but one which is closer to the end of his career than the beginning, and one who will never be consider above-average in his current position as a starting small forward.

Greene is something, and that's not a small thing, especially considering his positioning both last season (as one of the league's worst players statistically, and a player who didn't exactly lay waste to the D-League during his five-game stint in Reno) and through this year's training camp, during which coach Paul Westphal was publicly dismissive and privately aggravated by Greene's game. Particularly, it's what Greene is that is a bit amazing.

Greene hasn't become an NBA player by scoring 30 points a couple of times. He hasn't turned into the tall edition of J.R. Smith, or even Casey Jacobson. He has, instead, focused his attention of offensive control and defensive energy. Turnovers aside, the Wednesday night game against Indiana is an apt example: Donté's two best plays were an alley oop finish and the game-sealing steal of a Pacers inbounds pass. Greene attacked on both ends, and he earned two highlights for his effort. Even beyond that, the fact that Westphal inserted Greene for defensive purposes ... and it wasn't a Douby-takes-the-potential-gamewinner concession. Westphal felt that Donté needed to be on the court on key defensive possessions in order for the Kings to have their best chance at winning. That's a huge leap forward, on December 2, of a season in which opening night expectations for the player could not have been lower.

Everyone with the team is quick to credit both Greene and assistant coach Mario Elie. There's time for that in the future. I'm just glad there's something here, with Donté, and I can't wait to see how it unfolds.

Kings Hold Off Nets 109-96

Ziller — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 14:38:10 -0000

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When Lawrence Frank went to the Hack-a-Jew strategy, intentionally putting Omri Casspi on the free throw line late in the fourth quarter with the winless Nets down by three possessions, I knew this game had ended.

It was spooky until then, with New Jersey quickly erasing Sacramento's 17-point halftime lead to get the game within two possessions in the third quarter. The Nets hung around, allowing the Kings a few spurts but always answering. It was just as nerve-wracking as that Parcheesi game I mentioned Friday. Basketball is a crazy game (cliche!), and when you get into a close game, it doesn't matter what your record is. Anything can happen.

But Frank, still coaching his ass off, decided to put the game in Casspi's hands. Omri has shot three-pointers about as well as free throws. But when Frank put him on the line, Casspi nailed 3-4 and ended that strategy quickly. And, oddly, though Omri has had his struggles from the stripe, I had a great feeling about each of those shots. There's something about Omri, some burgeoning swagger that leaks out in grimaces and chest pounds, but still somehow feels like it's being kept in check by an invisible lid. All this spirit we see from Casspi, and it's just the surface. This well runs deep.

The first quarter was a rather brilliant span of basketball for Sacramento, resulting in a 33-20 lead. The Kings defended well, holding N.J. to those 20 points over 25 possessions. A key was keeping the Nets off the offensive boards -- the Kings gave up two N.J. offensive rebounds in 14 opportunities in the first. That was the biggest difference between the first and the third, where New Jersey tallied nine offensive rebounds in 17 opportunities -- just a ridiculous number. One other second half problem was that the Kings didn't grab a single offensive rebound in the third or fourth quarters, a shocking finish given how good the Kings have been on the offensive glass this season. (Jason Thompson didn't have a single offensive rebound all game. Only Spencer Hawes -- with two -- had more than one among all Kings. Josh Boone had five, Chris Douglas-Roberts had three.)

Speaking of Douglas-Roberts: he's the reason Donte Greene received only six minutes in the second half. Greene didn't play poorly -- he's just not quick enough to guard two-guards like CD-R, and that seemed like a real problem with this particular starting line-up once Devin Harris warmed up his engine. (Harris was awful in the first half, great in the third, OK in the fourth.) Tyreke Evans (another great game, with 21 points on 18 shooting possessions, and eight rebounds) had trouble staying in front of the lightning quick Harris on a few consecutive possessions, and with Lopez demanding attention in the paint, CD-R was able to go one-on-one with The Show, and CD-R won. That resulted in a second half full of two- and three-PG line-ups. Thankfully, both Beno Udrih (21 on 12) and Sergio Rodriguez (six points, three assists, one turnover) played well. In the paint, Kenny Thomas eventually got his shot (after Sean May stunk up the joint in relief of the sore Hawes) at Lopez, and K-9 did fantastic work.

None of that good work matters, of course, if Omri misses a couple free throws to validate Frank's strategy. But the kid has swag, and it showed.

Has Donte Greene Changed His Game?

Ziller — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 17:41:57 -0000

Given the recent explosion of The Donte Greene Show, I thought it'd behoove us to look at what's really changed in Donte's game. Has it been shot location ... where he takes his shots? All data from Hoopdata.com.

There have really only been minor changes to Donte's shot location chart: he has replaced half of his 16-23 footers (the worst shot in basketball) with shots at the rim, in the paint and in the short mid-range. Greene has only cut his share of shots which come from behind the arc a small amount -- from 43 percent last season to 40 percent this season.

The real change in Donte has been his efficiency: he is hitting his shots. On threes, Greene has an eFG% of 72.5 percent this season. Last year, it was 39 percent. A monumental difference.

There's one more potential answer: when Donte pulls the trigger. Last season, every three Greene hit was assisted. But we all remember ton of threes off the dribble -- none of which, apparently, went in. This season, upwards of 93 percent of Greene's threes have been assisted, which means he has hit a few off the dribble. But -- while there are no public numbers which can confirm or deny it -- I'd venture that Donte has taken far fewer unassisted three-point attempts.

Whatever the case, it's working right now, and we all hope it continues.