HOOPLAH.. NATION

NEW JERSEY NETS (26-32)
SAN ANTONIO SPURS (40-17)

Nets Stats
PF: 94.6 PA: 99.3
Last 10: 6-4

Spurs Stats
PF: 96.2 PA: 90.9
Last 10: 9-1

It’s very obvious that I usually start treads like this by saying the Spurs suck, we’re gonna beat their ass down or whatever, but this time this preview is going to be so short, I’d just have to say, KILL GINOBILI EVEN IF WE LOSE!

Before the lineup overhaul, this team was struggling both on the defense and on offense, even with the same team that from two years ago whichc was one of the best defensive teams in the league, the team slowly deterioriated to the point of last season where on certain games they could lock teams down defensively to this season where teams would just steamroll over them.

Then came all the trades which saw the blog favorite Jason Collins traded for Stromile Swift and Kidd and Antoine going over to Dallas, it all points to the new guys like Harris, Hassell, Swift (and of course Diop, but we’re talking about offense here) to score more, to shoot higher percentages compred to the other three. Prior trade, none of the three ex-Nets were shooting over 41% while the trio of Hassell, Harris, and Swift has Hassell shooting 44% which is the lowest among them three. So basically the offense’s going to improve over time correct?

Yeah, but the point is, if you can’t stop anyone, you can’t win games even if you’re scoring 120 or 130. The focus on this team has to be on defense, because no matter how many points they can score, this team isn’t equipped to be Phoenix East or Golden State East, the Nets just don’t have the personnel to do that, the reason we lost against the Magic, was because coach Frank wanted to keep up with the scoring charts therefore five players ended the game playing 38 minutes and only one reserve played over 20 minutes, and in the end the team suffered. During crunchtime when stops are important, we couldn’t get any because the entire lineup on the floor was fatigued and Frank isn’t trusting enough to put any new guys on the court.

if kids could D up, why can’t we?

Which comes to the next point, player rotation, we all heard what the Hassell’s, Diops and Swift could do, they CAN play defense, but if the coach isn’t going to play them, they can’t do their jobs no? If the reserves don’t get playing time, players like VC and RJ, Harris would suffer at the end fo close games when we need a closer, we need our star players to be fresh to make plays; not be tired and choke.

We have so many players on this team that’s capable of playing stellar defense so why not we utilize them? Let’s say this team needs to score, yeah the starters can score all they want, but when it’s the 2nd quarter, a time for runs, why not but a few of those guys in and let them play defense, let’s say a 2nd quarter lineup of Harris, Carter, Hassell, Diop and Williams. It’s the balance between offense and defense that matters.

I’m sure if the team focuses on D, guys like Maurice Ager would play defense when they are on the court, he certainly has the tools, but he’s trying to hard to show everyone how good he can sore the basketball, hence his lousy stats. Frank needs to give defense a shot but everything starts with trust, he has to trust the new players and give them minutes, put the emphsis on D and the scoring will come, because I don’t see the Suns winning any championships yet.

Devin Harris came out smoking and shut me up, showing no ill effects from the ankle sprains by throwing some very impressive throwdowns in yesterday’s matchup against the Bucks.

First he came out and sparked a big run for us to take the lead, then he came back in during the fourth to stem the Bucks’ tide with some pretty amazing plays, he showed great quickness while only in his first game back, I’m sure he would get faster real soon.

As for his point guard companion, Marcus Williams did nothing to drop his own stock, with 11 points and 8 assists, although he made 2 threes, his shooting is probably worse than Jason Kidd right now. But it’s all about Devin Harris right now, 21 minutes, 21 points and 5 assists? that’s sick, add in the fact that he’s +17 on the court, if he keeps this up the next game, we could see a TJ Ford/Calderon back court tandem growing here.

NEW JERSEY NETS (25-32)
MILWAUKEE BUCKS (22-35) 

 
Can we start Marcus Williams and play Devin Harris off the bench just to see how he does? because if he does start, all he gonna do is mess up the game, I don’t think we should rush him back to the court that quick, because you never know with ankle sprains, they never go away sometimes, so we better be save than sorry, furthermore I would wanna see how Marcus does this time in probably his last start of the season.

Ah yes, we’re playing the Bucks remember? Probably the scariest team on earth right now, They have a pyscho looking coach, a gay star in Michael Redd, a hairless Villanueva, a blabbering Bogut, a disgruntled Charlie Bell who can’t shoot even for money, a Chinese in Yi, a bad free throw shooter in Mason, a dude from the Netherlands Gadzuric, oddballs make a team and there you have it, the Milwaukee Bucks.

While Magloire is still wondering why he didn’t get the minutes he was supposedly promised, I myself did some wondering too, I wonder if Vince Carter tonight has what it takes to stop Michael Redd as watching him shoot his way to the win against the Cavs, I have to say that the Bucks are red hot right now. Bogut may never live up to his no.1 pick billing but then again, he is more than a match for Boone and Boone will have to step it up tonight. As for Diop, there’s tons of people out there who’s saying he’s the sleeper in the trade for Kidd, and I agree, all he does is just sleep during games. Why?? because Lawrence Frank ain’t gonna give him no minuteshe’s gonna play 5 player 40 minutes and give the reast of the 50 minutes to be shared among the rest. Sleeper indeed.

We just can’t beat the Magic can’t we, we managed to hold Dwight Howard to being less dominant, Jameer Nelson didn’t go off as he usually does, but we totally forgot that they shed out max money for Rashard Lewis. Oh did we forget about Hedo Turkoglu? both of them just killed us from everywhere.

Because it’s very obvious that the both of them are the players that’s gonna kill us, we still didn’t make any extra effort on offense to stop them. Especially Turkoglu, 17 points in the fourth, come on man, I know he’s tall and all but 17 points? all the free throws and threes. shit. First Rashard Lewis kept us at bay, and then Hedo finished up the job, man both of them combined for 50 points, and it’s pretty much obvious that Nachbar isn’t going to stop either of them, why not try Hassell? but shit no, he gets what 15 minutes and he doesn’t even do shit.

What I don’t like now is that if Nenad still can’t fully contribute to the team, then don’t start him, let him get back to where he was before you even start to play him, get someone in taht can help us on D, whether its Diop or Sean anyone, we need help!

Marcus Williams with another strong performance sending a fucking message to Devin Harris, and the rest of the guys need PT, there’s too much talent on this team than just them playing 10 minutes per game. We even got dunked on by Mo frickin Evans.

NEW JERSEY NETS 92-102 ORLANDO MAGIC

NEW JERSEY NETS (26-31)
ORLANDO MAGIC (36-22)

Hey, after that ultra convincing win against the Pacers, we just had to go into this game against the DC Comcs team with confidence, but then again, games against the Magic usually starts with high hopes of an upset or whatever but ends off with a dud, getting blown out by the Magic or something.

But hey, at least we know that everytime we underestimate Jameer Nelson, he comes up big, so this time, I’d say Jameer is going to own Marcus’ his ass, but if Williams sticks to his gameplan from the other night, I’d say this game is 40% won. There’s of course the other 60% where he have to contain Dwight Howard, Rashard Lewis an Turkolgu. This 6-10-11 tandem will give us fits and that’s an understatement, hell anyone can say what they want about Rashard Lewis’ his max contract but taht guy can play, coupled with Howard against Boone? We’re in a world of pain, and considering how the Magic despatched Sac-town? yeah..

I still have hopes of an upset tho, after watching how Washington took care of business against New Orleans, man if Deshawn Stevenson can score 33, there’s no reason why Vince Carter or RJ couldn’t. Damn if Antoine Wright is still here. Sean Williams will be useful tonight, but I don’t think Nenad should play much in this game. They would just punish him. And after how RJ talk smack about us making the playoffs and being the most talented among the bunch, we have to prove something no?

Richard, your car’s being towed. classic.

I’m telling you, if the Nets plays like this every game for the rest of the season, they would be very hard to beat, but then again this game is against the Pacers, one of those teams that we should really beat, so it doesn’t really say much.

Right now, the equation is Marcus Williams plays good, Nets win, and when even the best player on the opposing team says you’re good, it means you’re really good, and if Marcus keeps this up by just shooting less jumpers and focusing on passing the basketball which in the meantime allows Vince to get back more into scoring, this is the result we would probably get.

And when Vince starts scoring, the pressure on RJ lessens and he can get into the scoring act as well, with 36 points, and when RJ and Vince are clicking, other players gets open as well, as for this instance its Josh Boone, finishing with a strong double double, the missing Kidd link we needed to replace isn’t Kidd’s scoring, it’s his passing, not his rebounding or his scoring, when he rebounds, Kidd made other bigs from not being able to rebound and carve out their spots, with him gone, we see guys like Boone grabbing a whole lot of borads together with VC and Nachbar, I think the 55-37 rebounding advantage is one of the biggest we’ve got this season.

With Marcus Williams taking over from Kidd, it’s not about replacing Kidd’s his scoring, we all know that Kidd’s shooting woes, and the amount of shots he takes, Marcus is obviously a better shooter right now, so he should seriously just focus on the passing instead of trying to score too much, where we could see in this game 13 assists equals victory, and add in the fact tha Travis Diener is on Marcus, which makes his job easier.

The bench couldn;t hit a shot even if they wanted to, but I like the Trenton Hassell, Boki Nachbar punch coming off the bench, defense and offense from, I haven’t seen much from Maurice Ager, but if the scouting reports are what it says it is, the atlhtlecism and speed is a very ineresting package. Tonight was a good win against the Pacers and it puts us at 26-31, 2 games behind the Bullets.

New Jersey Nets (24-31)
Indiana Pacers (22-33)

Hah, You know what, when you dont play him, just waive him, that’s what the Nets did with Jamaal Magloire, and this time his situation is even worse than Marc Jackson, at least Jackson got us Boki Nachbar, Magloire gave us tons of promises and he couldn’t even deliver half of it, thanks to the coaching staff nontheless, it’s quite hard to prove your point when your’re only playing 8 minutes per game yeah.

The Pacers beat us last night in Indiana even with a strong night from both RJ and Boki Nachbar, but this will be the third game in which there’s no Jason Kidd in the line up, and Lawrence Frank still wants Vince to man the point? Marcus Williams is back and running already so why can’t he just let Marcus play the point, and let Vince revert to his scoring ways?

It’s pretty much obvious that Stromile Swift won’t get alot of minutes under Frank because Frank loves stiff bigs, but aganst the Pacer bigs, athletic bigs are our advantage, I don’t see no Troy Murphy blocking Sean Williams’ dunk attempt, that won’t happen, Marcus Williams against Travis Diener is a mismatch and it would bode well for the team if they attacked this matchup, Diener is nothing compared to Williams’ speed.

We have to start playing steady basketball and pick up wins to move in at least into the sixth position in the East to avoid getting a team like Detroit, and these are one of those games where we should capitalize on, Sean Williams on Danny Granger would be seriously interesting.

Trophy Love comes in at number 10, which is the closest one would see Kidd on a Net uniform with the championship trophy

I always thought Jason Kidd would be a Net for the rest of his career, you know first of all he isn’t that young anymore so he won’t be playing that much longer anymore so it would be wise for him to stay in Jersey for the rest of his career right. But then again, what Kidd wants is to play in a team that’s contending for a championship and right now, it’s very obvious that New Jersey is not a championship caliber team so Kidd moving on was probably the best choice for both teams, Dallas getting the piece they think would take them to the next level.

The thing is now that Jason is gone, whose team does the Nets belong to? Marcus Williams? haha, Vince Carter? why? because he has the fattest contract on the team? or because he’s the only player on the team that made the All-Star team more than once?  yeah that’s probably it, Richard Jefferson as well, now it’s their team, and they have to carry the load while we officially move into rebuilding mode.

I still think that even with Kidd gone, the Nets is still a very formidable team, after al considering the progress that both Josh Boone and Sean Williams made, I have to admit that the Nets do have a decent frontcourt now that Jason Collins and “chuck mad” Allen is out of town. With the addition of Stromile Swift from the Collins trade, the Nets have officially made the transition from a slow and unathletic frontcourt to the complete opposite of it, but one thing still remains the same, we have no one who can score down low, unless you can Jamaal Magloire who gets like 8 mpg into the equation.

And which rebuilding team can say they have the 7th seed in the East even though they have a suck ass record like ours? answer is none. The problem now is that with Kidd gone, This team has got to find its own identity as fast as it could, could it be them converting into a running team with Devin Harris at the helm, or a half court team with Marcus Williams running sets? But no matter what, it has to start with this team beating teams like the Pacers and not the other way round.

Jason Kidd is the reason why I watch the Nets, Jason Kidd is what brought the Nets to two straight NBA Finals appearances and six straight playoffs appearances, Jason Kidd is the reason why players like Lucious Harris, Rodney Buford, Aaron Williams, were considered solid role players. Jason Kidd is the person who brought excitement to the Nets, from the numerous triple doubles, the back to back threes he hit against the Pacers, the alley oop to VC against the Magic, the layup which was blocked the Pavlovic, the memories the good or the bad, is what Jason Kidd left to us and is what that defined one of  the most memorable chapter in Nets basketball folklore. Thank you Jason, and may your quest for a championship in Dallas succeed.

Sick of the losing and inconsistency? get rid of the moustache and we’ll start talking, thanks to Jake for the heads up and be right back in maybe awhile

New Jersey Nets (17-16)
Charlotte Bobcats (ask MJ)

Wow, it’s been awhile huh, I don’t know if it’s just me but everytime i check up on the Nets, they seem to be playing the Bobcats, what the fuck? but it’s cool, I mean hey it’s the Bobcats, we’ve got a chance to win, and if none of you guys had notice, the Nets are currently the hottest team in the league, eat that Blazers, i foresaw that, and we need this win to keep us at the summit and at least widen the gap between us and the dinosaurauses.

I don’t know what happened as well, but Vince Carter’s finally playing like someone worth his money and so do Richard Jefferson although that isn’t necessarily a good thing, but to see guys like Josh Boone and Weed coming into the starting lineup and providing the energy as well as the added reciepients to Jason Kidd’s alley-oops, I’m alo wondering how long an ankle sprain can keep Antoine Wright out especially when he’s form was dipping when he got injured and when he comes back who’s giving him playing time? Moreoever, Boki seems to have found his jumper behind some luggage in the terminal of some crack airport. Wow. All thest points to a New Jersey win unless Nazr Mohamed decides to spoil the party. cheers!