At
some point in Sunday’s game against the Dallas
Mavericks, new head coach Nate McMillan - who watched
the game from the bleachers - must have understood
why Mo Cheeks so often sat with his head in his hands. As
good as the Blazers looked on Wednesday, and apparently
on Friday, (I couldn’t go to that game, the whole
gotta work to feed the family thing,) they looked just
about that bad on Sunday. Sebastian Telfair threw
a couple of dazzling passes to no one in particular,
Travis Outlaw’s jumper went from sweet to adventurous
and Martell Webster’s dribbling skills did not
improve noticeably.
There
were a couple of bright spots: Ebi Ere (whose three
letter name I managed to misspell on Thursday) continues
to show a solid game and strong leadership on the
floor, and Webster’s jump shot is pure and
effortless. In the highlight-reel play of the
night, which probably didn’t please the coaches
as much as it did the crowd, Telfair threw the ball
down hard on the floor at the end of a breakaway,
setting up a bounce pass alley-oop to Outlaw who
finished with a monster jam.
My
three picks for best player of the game, in order:
Ere, Telfair and Outlaw. Ha was plagued by
fouls all night and really never seemed to get any
kind of a feel for the game. Sinanovic continued
to unimpress, although it was fun to hear the announcer
call his name with a different pronunciation on every
try.
In
the third quarter, in the scariest moment of the
night, Telfair either jammed his hand or hit it on
something and came out of the game in a lot of pain. From
where I sat it looked like the trainer iced it pretty
heavily for the rest of the night. My sense
was that it was a sprain; hopefully it was nothing
more than that. To that point Telfair was showing
his usual flair and leadership while missing almost
everything he threw up.
It’s
hard to see how Ebi Ere can break into the Blazer’s
roster, but I think he will land somewhere before
the season is over and eventually become a solid
backup swingman. He is the kind of player who
could relieve a starter for long minutes and not
hurt the team. |
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Webster
is a solid player with an NBA body and a deadly J. His
defense is serviceable but could stand a lot of improvement. He
seems to lose the ball about one out of three times
that he puts it on the floor, but as a spot up shooter
he’s deadly.
The
game was pretty much over at halftime but the Blazers
did seem to wake up for the fourth quarter, which
they lost by four points anyway, but at no point
did they start mailing it in. The final score
was 82-60, Mavericks.
I
don’t know if there are MVP awards given out
in summer league, but having now watched seven games,
and parts of a couple more, my choice so far would
have to be Nate Robinson of the Knicks. Nate dazzles
the crowd on almost every play (often to the dismay
of his coach) and probably has the highest vertical
leap I’ve ever seen. In fact all three
of the Knicks first round draft picks, Channing Frye,
Robinson and David Lee, look like winners. The
weakest of the three so far is Frye. Lee is
a very strong finisher and, at least at this level,
seems to be able to go to the hole at will.
In
the celebrity watch on Sunday: as already reported,
Nate McMillan was in the house, along with Rick Adelman,
Mike Dunleavey, and three Maloofs. Local star Clint
Holmes sang America,
the Beautiful. On Saturday: Don Nelson
(who I would have expected on Sunday but I didn’t
see him), Mark Cuban, Antawn Jamison, Shawn Marion
and Floyd Mayweather were in attendance. I’d
like to give props to Mayweather. Most of the
other stars pretty much kept autograph seekers at
bay by either shooing them or just plain ignoring
them, but Mayweather sat in the bleachers and signed
everything that was put in front of him (often putting
down the food he was eating to do so) and let a great
many people pose with him for photographs. The
man was pure class.
-Ken
Fuller, aka krf
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