As I said in the previous post-game thread, I'm mainly looking for positive signs for the development of our players. There was a number of those signs tonight, despite the lopsided score. So, let's talk about them.
Myles: He was looking for his shot aggressively tonight and, honestly, he was rather efficient. He scored 16 points on 12 shots, shooting 7/12 from the field. He went 0/2 from 3 which means that he shot 70% (7/10) inside the arc. He also added 6 boards, 2 blocks, 2 steals and 1 assist to his 16 points. That's a good stat-line but I'm not going to focus on the stat-line itself. I'm going to focus on some of his offensive takes. Namely, there were two takes (both late in the second quarter) that were very promising to see. The first was a take against Kevin Durant. Myles got the ball about 20 feet away from the basket in the elbow, faced up Kevin Durant, drove on him, stopped on a dime and canned a pull-up jumper. Pretty nice stuff. Myles is not good at creating his own shot in the post but he can create some shots as a face-up player. His first step is good for a Center. The second take was in our final possession of the half. Our offense wasn't going anywhere so Myles demanded the ball at the top of the key. DC passed him the ball, Myles motioned to him to clear out for him and then proceeded to take his man off the dribble. He crossed his man over, threw out a nice hesitation move that opened up an angle to the rim and then he exploded and finished with a dunk.
Here's a clip of this second take:
Domas: There's no denying that he struggled against Cousins and that he didn't shot well. But it wasn't all bad. He was able to find Leaf on cuts and he was a reason why Leaf had a good game. Those two showed some nice two-man chemistry tonight and that's a positive since Leaf will be a Pacer for the foreseeable future (unless he's traded). So, even in a rough game for Domas, he still did some good stuff.
Sumner: People may look at his 1/10 shooting and assume that he had a bad game. Well, he definitely didn't shoot the ball well but his overall game wasn't bad. I'd even say that it was above average. He made some really nice plays on both ends like that time where he stripped Curry and forced him to foul him or the time where he quickly drove to the rim and dropped it off to DC for the lay-up. Look, these were the first real minutes that Sumner has played. They were the first non-garbage time minutes. And his mission was to defend Klay Thompson, which as we all know is very tough to do. Sumner showed that he belongs to the league athletically. He is fast, he is long and he is explosive. He can cover a good amount of ground. His defensive potential, imo, is really-really good. A lot of people have been clamoring for a defensive-minded wing and Sumner may develop exactly into that. I see potential in this young man despite the bad shooting. He'd definitely have to fix it if he wants to have a bigger role but he can always start by focusing on the defensive end of the floor and let the offense come to him.
Holiday: 4/5 from 3 with 4 assists. Only two turnovers. He did a good job tonight. I'm glad that he found his shooting touch and he did a decent job at creating for others too. He had a very nice pocket-pass to Sabonis on a PnR and he made the extra pass (like that time when he was open for 3 in the corner but he threw it to the even more open Sumner at the elbow 3). I liked what I saw out of Aaron tonight and I think that a Holiday/Sumner back-court has some great length and defensive potential.
Leaf: Very nice game by Leaf tonight. His cuts to the basket were good and he made himself available for Domas to hit him with the nice pass. As I said in the Domas section, I saw some good chemistry between those two. My bet would be that Leaf will keep getting minutes now that Dipo is down and we won't be shooting for HCA so the more chemistry that these two can develop, the better. Leaf had a very nice take against Iguodala early in the fourth. He was at the FT line and he was trying to get the ball to Domas who had deep post position but Iggy and Cousins made such a pass impossible. So, Leaf improvised. He recognized that Iguodala was back-pedaling to prevent the pass to Domas and drove hard to the left. A good first step got him past Iguodala so all Iggy could do now is foul him. Leaf retained his balance in the air and finished for a very nice and-1. There's no doubt that Leaf's value lies on his offensive ability. He is not someone who will create for others or stop his opponent on the defensive end (especially if he's put at the PF spot, he struggles moving side to side). But he can develop into someone that comes in off the bench and gets you about 8 points and 4-5 boards in 15-18 minutes. That would be good enough for a back-up big.
Alize: Played for the last 2:45. Had the chance to hit a 3 but he missed it badly. Not a lot to say about Alize tonight as he didn't really see the ball enough in those few minutes he played.
Reed: Played for the last 2:45. Had the chance to hit a 3 and he canned it. He also had an assist (for an O'Quinn jumper) and a missed pull-up jumper.
So, that's it for tonight. I'm encouraged by the signs that Myles, Sumner, Holiday and Leaf showed. We can build on those. Using those games to develop our younger players is the way to go, imo.
Myles: He was looking for his shot aggressively tonight and, honestly, he was rather efficient. He scored 16 points on 12 shots, shooting 7/12 from the field. He went 0/2 from 3 which means that he shot 70% (7/10) inside the arc. He also added 6 boards, 2 blocks, 2 steals and 1 assist to his 16 points. That's a good stat-line but I'm not going to focus on the stat-line itself. I'm going to focus on some of his offensive takes. Namely, there were two takes (both late in the second quarter) that were very promising to see. The first was a take against Kevin Durant. Myles got the ball about 20 feet away from the basket in the elbow, faced up Kevin Durant, drove on him, stopped on a dime and canned a pull-up jumper. Pretty nice stuff. Myles is not good at creating his own shot in the post but he can create some shots as a face-up player. His first step is good for a Center. The second take was in our final possession of the half. Our offense wasn't going anywhere so Myles demanded the ball at the top of the key. DC passed him the ball, Myles motioned to him to clear out for him and then proceeded to take his man off the dribble. He crossed his man over, threw out a nice hesitation move that opened up an angle to the rim and then he exploded and finished with a dunk.
Here's a clip of this second take:
Domas: There's no denying that he struggled against Cousins and that he didn't shot well. But it wasn't all bad. He was able to find Leaf on cuts and he was a reason why Leaf had a good game. Those two showed some nice two-man chemistry tonight and that's a positive since Leaf will be a Pacer for the foreseeable future (unless he's traded). So, even in a rough game for Domas, he still did some good stuff.
Sumner: People may look at his 1/10 shooting and assume that he had a bad game. Well, he definitely didn't shoot the ball well but his overall game wasn't bad. I'd even say that it was above average. He made some really nice plays on both ends like that time where he stripped Curry and forced him to foul him or the time where he quickly drove to the rim and dropped it off to DC for the lay-up. Look, these were the first real minutes that Sumner has played. They were the first non-garbage time minutes. And his mission was to defend Klay Thompson, which as we all know is very tough to do. Sumner showed that he belongs to the league athletically. He is fast, he is long and he is explosive. He can cover a good amount of ground. His defensive potential, imo, is really-really good. A lot of people have been clamoring for a defensive-minded wing and Sumner may develop exactly into that. I see potential in this young man despite the bad shooting. He'd definitely have to fix it if he wants to have a bigger role but he can always start by focusing on the defensive end of the floor and let the offense come to him.
Holiday: 4/5 from 3 with 4 assists. Only two turnovers. He did a good job tonight. I'm glad that he found his shooting touch and he did a decent job at creating for others too. He had a very nice pocket-pass to Sabonis on a PnR and he made the extra pass (like that time when he was open for 3 in the corner but he threw it to the even more open Sumner at the elbow 3). I liked what I saw out of Aaron tonight and I think that a Holiday/Sumner back-court has some great length and defensive potential.
Leaf: Very nice game by Leaf tonight. His cuts to the basket were good and he made himself available for Domas to hit him with the nice pass. As I said in the Domas section, I saw some good chemistry between those two. My bet would be that Leaf will keep getting minutes now that Dipo is down and we won't be shooting for HCA so the more chemistry that these two can develop, the better. Leaf had a very nice take against Iguodala early in the fourth. He was at the FT line and he was trying to get the ball to Domas who had deep post position but Iggy and Cousins made such a pass impossible. So, Leaf improvised. He recognized that Iguodala was back-pedaling to prevent the pass to Domas and drove hard to the left. A good first step got him past Iguodala so all Iggy could do now is foul him. Leaf retained his balance in the air and finished for a very nice and-1. There's no doubt that Leaf's value lies on his offensive ability. He is not someone who will create for others or stop his opponent on the defensive end (especially if he's put at the PF spot, he struggles moving side to side). But he can develop into someone that comes in off the bench and gets you about 8 points and 4-5 boards in 15-18 minutes. That would be good enough for a back-up big.
Alize: Played for the last 2:45. Had the chance to hit a 3 but he missed it badly. Not a lot to say about Alize tonight as he didn't really see the ball enough in those few minutes he played.
Reed: Played for the last 2:45. Had the chance to hit a 3 and he canned it. He also had an assist (for an O'Quinn jumper) and a missed pull-up jumper.
So, that's it for tonight. I'm encouraged by the signs that Myles, Sumner, Holiday and Leaf showed. We can build on those. Using those games to develop our younger players is the way to go, imo.
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