The Morning After The Night Before, XXXII, with a twist

Who should get traded today? How about fired? Bench? Bought out? Oh, wait, they won! The coffee tastes a bit better today, doesn't it? And there's a spring in your step. It's a beautiful day. Until the next loss when it all come crashing down.

Gonna change things up a wee bit; we’ll still stick with the things I learned because you can never learn enough but we’ll sprinkle some other stuff in as well.

Way more fun this way.

And away we go:

Three Things I Learned

It’s 1-Up Reverse

Notice a new wrinkle in the Raptor offence last night? Chris Bosh isolated at the left elbow, point guard at the top, three others spaced out on the right side? Worked pretty well, too. Got Bosh to the rim more easily and also created a couple of open jump shots off ball reversal.

Asked an advance scout at the game about it. He said it was something they ran a lot last year, he's got it as 1-Up Reverse, but something he hadn’t seen in a handful of Toronto games this year.

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MIKE CASSESE/REUTERS

The Jamario Moon we love.

Do you cringe, too?

Love Jamario Moon’s defence and his athleticism and he’s the best shot-blocker they’ve had here since Marcus Camby, although Keon Clark might be in that conversation.

But when he spots up beyond the three-point arc, it’s scary.

He’s now shooting 26.2 per cent from long-range after missing two threes last night and I fear at some point Sam Mitchell’s head is going to blow apart when Moon launches one from out there.

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Who is this kid ref?

I’m a big fan of NBA refs, I think they’ve got an impossible job but do it well. And it takes time to learn the intricacies of the game.

We can only hope the young fella working last night – Mark Lindsay – is a fast learner.

You don’t often see one mistake corrected in a game, the dude did it twice last night.

Once blowing a block-charge call on Rasho, I think it was, ‘cause he didn’t see the Sixer was inside the restricted area and one of his co-workers corrected him.

Then he called a loose ball foul and was going to give the ball to Toronto before he actually looked at the colour of the uniforms and changed it to a call against the Raptors. A correct call but, still …

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First trip to the mailbag

Q: Where in the world is Maceo Baston?  Why sign him to sit?  Did Colangelo like Baston's cheerleading skills? Can't they at least eat some garbage (minutes) or package them for Steve Nash?

On a related note, how much does this team miss Garbojosa for the mere fact of eating minutes in the frontcourt with good basketball and his rebounding?  I'm going to guess somewhere between... a lot and A LOT.

Mike L, Beamsville

A: Steve Nash? Why stop there? Why not do Maceo and Darrick for Nash and Marion? Sure, there’d have to be some cap filler but Colangelo’s creative.

Maceo was in uniform last night, for the fifth straight game, I might add, but there was no garbage time.

They miss Garbo as much as you think. And more. He’d be a huge addition to this team.

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Still with the mail, here’s the weekly (or weakly) call to load up the inbox with your questions for tomorrow.

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Ran into Todd MacCulloch last night, he was in town doing his gig with the Sixer radio crew.

Aside from picking up some tips about places to frequent on the road – Todd’s an accomplished pinball player and knows all the places to go – he was telling me his feet are still bothering him a bit.

He’s got Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, a disorder that affects balance and mobility. Says he’s tried surgery, rest, acupuncture, various natural remedies and nothing’s worked.

That sucks.

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Saw a little note in the paper today that Portland’s Steve Blake left last night’s game with an injury.

Fans here better hope it’s not too serious because if it is, there’s no way the Blazers would even consider dealing Sergio Rodriguez.

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Back to the mail

Q: Who do you think gets fired first, Isiah Thomas or John Ferguson?

Evan G, Thornhill

A: Who is this Ferguson chap I keep hearing so much about and why does everyone want him fired?

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GM, who is a regular poster in the comment section, wondered yesterday about shootarounds and what we could possibly get there.

Here’s how it works:

We, well I because for the others would be a tad presumptuous, use shootarounds to gather material for early stories and other pieces we might be working on and, frankly, just to nose around.

This interweb thing, at least at our place, has created a need for a staff-written story to put up the moment the buzzer sounds. And because I cannot believe that anyone wants to read dry, boring, descriptive play-by-play copy off a game they’ve most likely seen, I like to write that web story with some quotes, and insight. I get those at shootaround.

And, every now and then, something newsworthy happens at shootaround. Like Oak throwing a ball at Jeff McInnis, or Oak slapping Tyrone Hill, or Oak saying something crazy (sense a theme here?). Or, in the absence of Oak, we get same to jokingly slag his marketing team or game ops folks for scheduling a Sam Dalembert tribute before a game.

And then I try to get that up on this site as quickly as possible so you can comment on it. After all, it's all about you folks. A true service industry we are.

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Speaking of Sam Dalembert, that was a very nice “framed commemorative piece” they gave him.

Not as nice as the maple doughnuts the nice folks at Canada Basketball dropped off for a peckish beat grunt before the game, but nice nonetheless.

I presume the soapstone carving is being carved?

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Here’s what the view from Philadelphia was of last night’s affair to remember (hey, someone should do a movie by that name!). I could have asked my man Phil to file me his story when we were sitting in the Harbour Sports Grille (home of worn out beat grunts of all ilk) but this is just as good.

Comments

[DougG]

"Who should get traded today? How about fired? Bench? Bought out? Oh, wait, they won! The coffee tastes a bit better today, doesn't it? And there's a spring in your step. It's a beautiful day. Until the next loss when it all come crashing down."

You are right to mock us but I still think they are missing toughness, rebounding and an inside game, like they were before the season started. If they can get their shooting back perhaps those problems will be disguised better.

Sam seems to have found the solution to the backup point guard problem. Play Calderon for the whole game.

[Dinosty]

A win's a win's a win, but there just wasn't the fire displayed yesterday to satisfy after the demoralizing loss against Lebron.

6 first quarter turnovers? 17 extra possessions (off o-boards)? We did NOT play well, despite the outcome, and that is cause for concern over here. Not nearly as confident walking into MSG as we should be.

Blogger's note: Toronto 109, Philadelphia 96. That's enough to give 'em some confidence. Doesn't matter what happened in the first 12 minutes, they cruised to an easy win.
And, you know, I understand what you mean, but "we?"

[Bryden]

I really liked the "1-Up Reverse", it seemed to work very well. I would love to see more off-ball cuts when Bosh is down low like that. I still think Bargnani needs to play more, especially in the fourth quarter. Throw him in the fire!!!

[Susi]

When I watch basketball the guys who seem to get rebounds are the ones who jump up, push themselves into position and generally just seem really eager to get the ball.

Isn't that something Bargnani and others could try?

[Shrugz]

I don't think anyone notices bosh's one rebound last night ahhaha i guess it doesn't matter happens once in a while

if you think about it Yao ming who is 7 foot 6 grabs 10 RPG
definitely think he should be getting around 13 at least

so it's not about size it's more about strength and mobility which D howard has and Garnett. Do you think Bargnani has the mobility/strength to get at least 10 RPG??

Blogger's note: Since there were seven players in the entire league who averaged 10 or more rebounds a game last year, I'd say no.

[abc]

How many unique hits do you get on this blog a day?

Blogger's note (I really gotta come up with a better one than that): To be honest, I have no idea. I know my bosses are pleased with the way it's working out and that's fine with me.

[GM]

I don't think it's all that surprising about the posts. It's a .500 team afterall. It's not like it's the same bipolar posters doing both. The doom and gloom people come out after losses or "bad" wins and the rose-tainted glasses people come out after the wins or moral victories. And that makes sense. Coaches are fired after losses, usually, not wins. And the press isn't immune, although usually not so reactionary. I mean, how often have we heard that Kris Humphries or Juan Dixon (to name but two) are useless when they struggle then the answer when they string together two decent games?