Must be Christmas, the mail is overwhelming

You know what?

I like mailbags like this. You’ve done a really good job this week, you zany readers. Good questions about a variety of topics that are challenging to answer and allow me to step outside the usual “they have to run more high screen-and-roll” stuff of a grunt’s life.

Thanks.

Now, get reading!

-

Q: Doug, a question about the blog and the "new media" you do for the Star. First and foremost, I think you do a good balance of tidbits in your blog that you can't get anywhere else and also general informal analysis of the team. I'm curious if this just became the norm, or if you sit down with a Star staff member that specializes in new media to go over the demographics of who reads the blog? I guess to elaborate it seems likely that anyone who is tech savvy enough to hit up blogs is probably also savvy enough to watch the post-game interviews on Raptors.com and is real-time current with the goings on in the NBA. How does this change your reporting, and how does the inevitable incorporation of new media and the print version of the Star get handled on a "Sports department" level?

Mr. C, Kingston

A: You know, this thing really has just evolved over the years and I appreciate the fact you think we do a good job of tibits and analysis because that’s exactly what I strive for. It’s mostly come from my own little cluttered head, actually, rather than from meetings or focus groups or whatnot. I’ve always held that the single hardest part of my job now is finding ways to make stories informative and interesting knowing that by the time most people are reading them, they know the score, have seen the highlights and, often, heard the interviews. I try to make a concerted effort to write game stories more analytically than in the past, kind of like reviews, for that very reason. It’s hard.

Take today, for instance. The game is at 12:30 p.m., I will endeavour to have a game story on the website by 4 p.m. or so that will include some post-game quotes and will be a more traditional approach to writing about an event.

But that won’t do for people who won’t get their paper until overnight because it will be old, old, old news by then. So I’ll sit there, probably with a glazed and confused look on my face, and try to come up with some different “angle” for a story that will appear in the paper tomorrow morning and be on the website about 4 a.m.

And it’s changed the reporting process in one tangible way: I think I’m much more aware of the need for “tidbits” to feed this beast every day; I find myself seeing things and thinking, ‘hey, that’d a good little blog item’ when I used to think ‘hey, that’s a good little thing I can’t report because there’s no room in the paper.’

And while we used to have two separate editing desks at the paper, we are moving to one that will handle web and newspaper copy.

-

Q: Hello Doug. Simple question. What are the three things that fans don't see (or don't understand) about professional basketball. Here's my guess for one--that coaching 15 personalities with different needs, widely different salaries and at different stages of their careers is extremely difficult, much more difficult than drawing up plays and substitution patterns. It's one thing analysts never talk about, but surely it is a big thing.

Olga B, Toronto

A: Hard question, you mean.

I think your guess is bang on and would definitely be on my list; I can’t put it any better than you did and I presume you know how difficult it would be to do all those things

Two others?

I don’t think people understand the media demands, especially on coaches. On a typical game day, Jay and the players are available to the media after shootaround for 45 minutes or so, league rules mandate they be available for a 45 minute period starting 90 minutes before tip off and again after the game. That’s a lot of time answering the same questions from different people, all the while having to be mindful that they don’t want to say something either stupid or inflammatory.

A third?

This may draw chuckles but it’s the difficulties of travel.

Now, with charters and five-star hotels, it’s not the hardship that, say, I deal with but it’s not all fun and games. It’s a lot of late-night flights and middle-of-the-night arrivals, they have to sit through equipment delays, late buses, different accommodations and a whole lot of time sitting around with not much to do. It’s not a huge burden but it’s a greater one than some think.

Of course, as a guy who flies Sopwith Camels to Cleveland to take another to Milwaukee after a 4 a.m. wakeup call the morning after a 1 a.m. finish to a game night, I have little sympathy.

-

Q: Doug, I'm stealing this from Simmons' The Book of Basketball. In the book, he finishes with a chapter where he fills out a 12 man roster with historical players at their best (e.g. 1992 Jordan, 2001 Kobe, etc). He calls it the Cellar. What would be your starting 5 for the Raptors Cellar?

Kevin R, Toronto

A: Good one. Hard. Quite subjective. But fun.

By position? I’d go with Damon’s rookie year as my point guard, I might make Doug Christie in 1999-2000 my two-guard, Vince’s 2000-01 as the small forward, this year’s Bosh as my starting power forward and that leaves the black hole of the franchise: Centre.

Since they really haven’t had a true centre who was any good ever, I’m kind of at a loss.

I guess we have to go with Antonio Davis, either in that 2000-01 season or, better yet, the same guy who gave them so much at the end of the 2001-02 season.

-

Q: When BC said after the first Atlanta game that the onus was on him because he put the team together, didn't it imply that the flaw was more in the potential than the performance? Was he just trying to be a good GM, or is there some genuine pessimism there?

And, do Bosh and Bargs have much of an inside-outside game? Wouldn't that open up Bargs outside, while letting Bosh repost and whatnot? Maybe switch up from the pick and roll look?

Dave H, Waterloo

A: He was taking the bullet – rightfully so -- for a horrible game by a team that’s got flaws. And I presume the day after that game there was rampant pessimism. Just as there was rampant optimism about 72 hours later.

The second part of your question I don’t quite understand.

They have by their very nature an inside-outside game since Bosh plays inside and Bargnani plays outside. But if you’re asking whether they should use Bargnani to throw entry passes to Bosh on the low post, I’d say no. It would crowd one side of the court with too many bigs.

-

Q: Hey Doug, always a pleasure reading your hard work. Two issues I'd be interested in hearing your opinion:

1) In a piece at the start of the year, M Grange said regarding Bosh: "... I can’t say I know him in any meaningful sense. I like him. He’s friendly and approachable; more willing than most professional athletes to engage in conversation, but what he really stands for I’m still not clear." How do you see it?

2) In the pre-season, there was a lot of talk about how Reggie is 'bringing it' to every practice, and the intensity level stays high. I know the Raptors haven't had that many practices with this schedule so far, but any word if they maintained that level?

Yony B, Montreal

A: I think Mike’s assessment of Chris is pretty bang on; he is a very good kid, quite engaging in smaller groups of conversation but he’s also 25 years old and I don’t imagine he really knows what he “stands for.” Which is not atypical.

And, no, they haven’t maintained the level of pre-season practice intensity for the simple fact no pro sports team can. Once the season begins and the games come fast and furious, practice is for tinkering and maintaining rather than “getting at it” daily. Coaches wish it was different but it can’t be.

-

Q: Hey Doug, this is not a basketball related question, but it has to do with sports journalism. With Peter Gammons calling it a career after 20 years of ESPN, I was curious what are your thoughts about his retirement. He was essentially a pioneer for journalists who had TV aspirations. Which got me wondering, have you ever had TV aspirations (besides the occasional gig with Primetime Sports) or were you always satisfied being in the print media?

Dave R, Markham

A: Peter Gammons was a giant and forever changed our industry in one very tangible way: He was the first to do a weekly Sunday “notes” package that everyone eventually emulated. A weekly notes thing is what spawned what you’re reading here as a matter of fact. This began as a notebook in the paper, morphed into a notebook on the web and grew to what it’s become today.

And while I really enjoy the odd television appearance and would welcome more (any producers out there reading should feel free to write) I’d never do it at the expense of writing. This is too much fun and, I think, a better way to connect with, and educate, readers.

A quick update to tide everyone over

Just a quick update before I write, if you understand what I mean by that.

Jose limped out of the practice court a couple of hours ago – I had some things to do so it’s taken a while to get settled into work-mode – and there’s no way he plays on Sunday and while no one’s saying anything, I’d be stunned if he made the trip to Florida.

But that’s given Jay a chance to mix things up and it sounds like he’s going to.

Jarrett Jack starts at point, as expected, but Jay said there’s a chance Marco Belinelli will get some time as his backup and Hedo Turkoglu’s ball-handling role should expand, too. Especially when he's on the floor with Jack and the other starters.

Said Jay:

“Turk will have the ball a lot more. (Jack) can sit in the corner and make shots and on swing action he can make a play on the other side of the floor. Not that Jose couldn’t, I think we have to find ways to get Turk more involved.”

Marcus Banks will get some time, in specific matchups, especially against smaller point guards who’d try to pick up Turkoglu or Belinelli full court and pester them all 94 feet. Neither have the greatest of ball-handling skills against defensive pressure.

But there will be moments when there’s an entirely different look to the offence and maybe kickstart Belinelli into more consistent production.

“It’ll put the ball in his hand a little bit more and put the ball in the hands of Hedo a little bit more so hopefully it gives those guys more touches and a chance to get it going offensively.”

Anyway, that’s it for now. Gotta go get something done for the paper because there’s a big neighbourhood shindig later.

At least it didn't last long

We’re glancing at our boxscores while waiting for Jay to begin his post-game dissertation and this comes to me:

Of all the numbers on the sheet of paper, the most significant to me, by far, was 2:07.

As in time of game. If you’ve got to sit through nights like that, best that it’s over quickly.

And on that note …

-

THREE THINGS I LEARNED

What to do, what to do

Yes, it was a bad loss to a good team and at no point in the evening did it ever occur to me that Toronto could win the game. And there will be more like that as the season progresses, just like there will be times when things click and they win.

But I do think they need to tweak the rotation, a point I’ve been hammering home for a few weeks now and something that I’m hearing from people in the organization now.

The bench isn’t producing like it did, the starting unit is okay but inconsistent and maybe some roles need to be altered.

So, what do I do?

Well, nothing to the starting lineup that’s for sure.

But, again, I say give Weems the minutes that Wright’s getting, I’d run Belinelli out there a bit more to see if he’ll respond to more responsibility and, last night’s horrible effort notwithstanding, I’d get the rookie some more fourth quarter minutes.

That’s a tightening of the rotation if Jose’s going to be out, going with eight guys mainly – the five starters, Belinelli, Weems and Johnson – but maybe that’s worth a try for a few games.

I will also caution you of this:

There is still a lot of time left, the season is not over by any stretch of the imagination and they will actually win some games and play well doing it.

-

Not taking orders

I don’t know if you remember this play, but it’s sort of telling in a “they don’t listen” kind of way.

Sonny Weems finishes a break with a dunk, a pretty impressive runout on a night when they had so few, and he’s got a couple of teammates near the basket with him and, I think, maybe two Hawks.

A perfect time to apply some pressure in the backcourt, to stay up, maybe force the Hawks into a turnover and keep the momentum.

The coaches thought so, too.

Jay’s up off the bench, Marc’s up off the bench, Reggie Evans is up off the bench screaming “stay up, stay up, stay up” while waving their hands indicating they would like the Raptors to, you know, STAY UP!

What happens? All the guys in the front court retreat, the Hawks walked the ball up the floor and take the air out of the moment.

Not a big thing but something.

-

Déjà vu all over again?

Remember back in the day, after they lost a Sunday afternoon game to Orlando and really didn’t play that poorly? It was suggested then but some that the simple fact was that the better team had won and that usually happens?

Well, how about we dredge that up again and suggest the better team won last night.

The Raptors could play the Hawks 10 times and I’d set the over and under on Toronto wins at 1.5 and maybe take the under (if I was a gambling man, that is).

The Hawks are everything Toronto isn’t. Long and athletic, great finishers and able to break you down at nearly every position.

I don’t know if they can win the East because they don’t have a lot of front court depth and they’re not overly large – which could be fatal flaws against Orlando – but I like that team a lot.

I also don’t know if they can keep it together – Joe Johnson’s destined to make a lot of money as a free agent and the Hawks didn’t even think about re-upping him last summer – but they are a very good team.

I said it during the in-game blog and I’ll say it here:

I’d rather have that roster one through nine than Cleveland’s right now.

-

More of this, and some of that:

-

We have nothing new right now on Jose. He had an MRI overnight, Jay said it’d be good speculation to think this is a longer-term situation (and, no, I have no idea what kind of timeline he was talking about and he hadn’t even spoken to the trainers at the time) and that’s very troubling.

Marcus Banks is not the answer as a backup and maybe it’s time to unleash Belinelli a little bit as Jack’s backup at PG.

We saw a little of Turk at that spot in the second half last night, sharing the court with Marco, and it might be worth seeing if Belinelli can bring the ball up and run some stuff when Hedo doesn’t have it in his hands.

Can’t hurt, can it?

-

Here’s one that’ll rile up a whole bunch of you.

I can see the end coming for Pops.

(Don’t throw things, hear me out)

Later this month, right around the 20th, I believe, maybe a couple of days later, his contract becomes fully guaranteed if he’s still on the roster.

And with it looking more and more like they’ll need the flexibility of a roster spot, either for a trade, maybe a third point guard, maybe a big, I can certainly see that spot being created by his departure.

This has as much to do with money as ability – there is no one else they can waive and save money doing it – so it might turn out to be the logical move.

-

I’d love to tell you what the beat dudes at the Atlanta Journal Constitution wrote about that one but none of them actually traveled here. So you’ll have to do without.

Instead, here’s what’s going on with Houston, seeing how tomorrow’s going to be a mailbag day without the usual delights.

-

Nice of Canada Basketball to trot out Rowan Barrett and let the crowd cheer at halftime and it was nice to see a few members of the national women’s and men’s programs introduced before the game.

But you know what? They missed a guy who’s in the building every day, who does a lot to further the cause of basketball in the country and a guy who did an awful lot in his playing days.

Where, I wonder, was Sherman Hamilton when all this Canada Basketball love was going on?

He should have been somewhere so the fans could have cheered.

-

Hmm.

Seventeen turnovers.

Seventeen assists.

That’s a boxscore anomaly you don’t see very often.

-

I mentioned this in the in-game blog but I need to elaborate because it’s a pretty good story.

Marvin Williams, who is really under-sized and a bit of a tweener, gets by on the post and on the boards because he’s got, well, he’s got a large derriere. And that makes him tough to move and gives him a good base.

The one and only Doc Ryan, former national team assistant in Canada, a long-time CIS coach in Nova Scotia and a man of some bulk himself, once enthralled a group hanging in a bar with the following story:

There are two kinds of bums that basketball players have, especially big guys who do the dirty work on the boards.

You either have, Doc was telling us that night eons ago, a “pro butt” or a “bucket ass.”

Pro butts are large and make you immovable – think Charles Barkley – and are much desired. Bucket asses are just there and make you weak and easily shoved aside.

There you go, Basketball Anatomy 101.

You’ll be checking out rumps for days now, won’t you?

-

Speaking of Canada and the world championships (a trip I’m going on, right boss?) they’re giving out the four wild cards to the 2010 men’s tournament today and the main draw is Tuesday in Turkey.

My spies – and I have them spanning the globe – tell me Russia, Germany, Lithuania and Nigeria have the inside track on the four spots.

Cameroon maybe sneaks in there and only a true cynic would point out that they’ll get a spot if they write a big enough cheque.

(This just in: My sources were close; they gave the wild cards to Russia, Lithuania, Germany and Lebanon. Three out of four right isn't bad).

Anyway, for the draw, Canada Basketball will be represented by the inimitable Maurizio Gherardini, who’ll drop by Turkey to take part in the festivities during a globe-trotting scouting tour of half a dozen countries or so.

It’s Tuesday, in the morning our time, which means we can deconstruct it during the game-day chat to set up the Miami game later that night.

-

The Goods On The Game, Hawks at Raptors

A full house -- at least where the Raptors lineup is concerned -- is ready for this one tonight.

And so, therefore, are we.

Raptors will be at full strength

The Raptors will have a full roster available when they face the Atlanta Hawks in about an hour at the Air Canada Centre.

Coach Jay Triano just told us both Jose Calderon and Andrea Bargnani will be back in the starting lineup. Bargnani missed Wednesday’s game in Milwaukee with a sore right ankle; Calderon returns after missing two games with a sore left hip.

How long they play is anyone’s guess.

Triano said they team will limit their minutes – he didn’t say at what level – because they want to lessen the risk of having them re-injured.

GruntTV sets up Hawks-Raptors, The Sequel

Raptors pre-game chat

Doug Smith held a live Q&A Friday at noon, as the Raptors prepared to face off against the Atlanta Hawks.

Wondering how tonight shakes out

Join Doug Smith for a live Q&A at noon Friday, as the Raptors prepare to take on the Atlanta Hawks.

I had to get this done a wee bit more quickly than usual this morning because it’s time to search the closets for parkas, gloves and hats.

Ack.

Best thing about first cold snap: Super Dog becomes Super Cranky Dog and the walks are much shorter than usual.

On that note …

-

What’s this one mean tonight?

Not an awful lot in the big picture and as I mentioned, when I brought up the subject of redemption to a few folks the other night in Milwaukee, there were a lot of “just another game” replies.

I wonder if that’s true.

Now, the game in Atlanta last week (the Raptors were edged 146-115 in a thriller, if you don’t recall) was far, far more about Toronto’s lack of effort than anything the Hawks did, so it’s not as if Atlanta ran it up or anything.

But I suspect that deep in their heart of hearts, these fellows are thinking about putting up a bit more fight tonight, for no other reason than to show the world they can.

Of course, putting up more fight needs to be the nightly goal but I believe that this game will have a little bit more juice to it than another run-of-the-mill regular-season outing.

It won’t be the defining moment of the season and if they lose, they lose, but the manner in which they achieve the result will be something of a telling sign.

-

Know what I’d like to see tonight against the Hawks, if Jose can’t play?

(And I am virtually sure all we’ll find out this morning at shootaround is that they’ll make the decision at game time, so it’ll be a non-news day).

I’d like to see Turkoglu, Belinelli and Wright out on the court with Bosh and either Bargnani (same scenario as Calderon’s, I think) or Johnson when Jack needs a blow.

Marcus Banks has been okay but if they want to get Turk going or Belinelli going (more on that later) giving them some extra time and a chance to share ball-handling skills might be a good move.

It’s a different look, one the Hawks wouldn’t have seen or had time to prepare for, and is probably worth a shot.

It’s not like Toronto’s been a well-oiled machine on offence the last two games.

-

Oh yeah, we’ll be here to answer questions at noon so feel free to join in. Attendance has been pretty good – we haven’t cracked the 1,000 barrier yet but it’s growing – and I know there are probably a lot of you frustrated that your questions don’t get through.

Well, for the Bucks one, for instance, we were on the air for 66 minutes and got 248 questions. That’s a lot, I think. We were able to answer just over 70 (these are all figures I’m getting from the company software we use and trust they’re accurate) and that was among the busiest days we’ve had.

So, keep plugging away, we try to get to as many as we can.

-

I get the boarding passes for the trips this week, Toronto to Cleveland, Cleveland to Milwaukee and back again, and I notice every one’s an ‘A’ seat, like 14A, 12A, 19A and 1A.

Shoot, I think. I’m much more an aisle guy than a window guy, but they’re short flights so I’ll be okay.

Well, turns out ‘A’ seats are both aisles and windows since there’s only one seat on that side of the aircraft.

Cozy? Oh yeah.

-

Hawks won’t have Josh Joe Smith on Friday, he’s out with a dislocated thumb. At least what it says here in the AJC piece from the morning paper.

-

Guess all those people who felt the need to be so critical of the group of us who left Chris Kaman off the all-star ballot don’t have the courage of their convictions.

If they felt so badly about the snub, they could write him in as a starter, but the first returns don’t show him anywhere in the top 12.

Maybe their pens ran out of ink.

-

Speaking of Milwaukee, here’s a Did You Know.

Picking up this week’s New Yorker at a newsstand in the airport, I notice among the gum and candy and sundries that are for sale you can also buy cheese curds.

Don’t see that delicacy in too many airport shops, that’s for sure.

But seeing how the press room meal included spinach au gratin and mashed potatoes with cheddar, it’s not a surprise that the state’s greatest product – now that all the breweries are closed, that is – is available in many versions everywhere.

-

Back to the all-star ballot for a second.

See that both Bosh as a forward and Bargnani as a centre are third in the first returns.

Makes sense, I guess. But as an irregular pointed out in the comments section, the gap between Bosh and leaders LeBron and Garnett is a lot larger than you’d think.

Now, I am convinced that, if things stay the way they are, there is no doubt in my mind that coaches put Bosh on the team and if they don’t they should have their voting privileges revoked.

The interesting thing to me is that Bosh is right now ahead of Paul Pierce in voting for forwards. Pierce is having a good year but Bosh is having a far, far better one. Guess fans notice that. Which is odd.

-

This is a day or so old, but I hope a lot of you saw Jay’s quote from my early game story the other day about the handling of Belinelli as it affects his play right now.

"The way I play him, it’s my fault. If I don’t get him in early enough, I just don’t feel like he gets into a flow. I think we’re starting to find that out with a couple of guys. We have to get them a little bit earlier and get them a feel for the game. When that happens, they seem to play better.

“When I leave him (Belinelli) on the bench for a little bit because DeMar’s going well or I put a different sub in, he kind of gets lost. I don’t know if he starts thinking he’s not valuable or he’s not going to help us and I take the blame for that.”

It’s a nice quote and all that, went a long way to helping a quick game-over story have some oomph, but really it’s little more than a coach taking a bullet for an under-achieving player.

I guess the only rotation thing I’d do, if Jay really believes that, is make Belinelli the first sub – putting him in for DeRozan – and bringing Antoine Wright in a few minutes later for Turkoglu.

Not sure that works, though, because there seems to be a continued desire to stretch out the rookie’s first-half minutes and taking him out first cuts him back a bit.

A quandary, indeed.

But it’s easily solvable.

Maybe Belinelli, who has some very good games in the exact same rotation, should just play better more often.

-

Hey, you gals and guys did a good job filling the mailbag on the off-day. Didn’t see one “When’s Reggie coming back?” question, very few “woe is them” rants of despair. Good questions about the process and the league.

Way to go. But with a shindig to attend Saturday night (which is usually the Answering Hours) it’s going to have to get pretty much finished Saturday during the day, which leaves you just today to get more in.

Send ‘em here, as usual.

-

See ya.

It's bright and early and here's some stuff for you

All right, I’m not messing around with travel crap and Mother Nature today. Up bright and early here to get this finished so you can all be enthralled and have something to do when you should be working or studying.

Heckuva guy, aren’t I?

Anyway, here we go from cold, cold Milwaukee:

-

THREE THINGS I LEARNED

He has to be better

Hedo Turkoglu, that is.

That was exactly the kind of game he had to take over and he didn’t and unless they start getting more and getting it more often from him, there’s no way they do anything other than muddle through.

Now, you know I never think one game’s entirely on one guy but, c’mon man, do something.

Go off for 30. Get a bit selfish. Take 20 shots.

Do something.

The big free agent signing’s been good some nights but never really great and it’s time he has one of those great games everyone’s expecting.

I know it’s not lost on his coaches, and I’m sure it’s not lost on his teammates. They are disappointed and know he can do so much more. A couple people with titles are already making mention of it in private conversations; nothing too harsh but the criticisms are there. And they might get louder.

I think he will improve and have a greater impact on a greater number of games. But I think he better do pretty soon or the grumblings are going to get louder.

Don’t know for sure if he needs as one insider put it “a foot up his ass every minute of every day,” but something has to start getting through to him.

I know he’s got more game than he’s shown, I’ve seen it, you’ve seen it and the folks who gave him a $53 million contract have sure seen it.

About time we see it again.

-

A chatty fellow

We have a pretty good seat at Bucks games, on the baseline right by the visiting team bench, and it’s about as close as I’ve been at any game this season.

And let me tell you, Chris Bosh was in full throat last night.

I mentioned a couple of times in the Minnesota game that he was very talkative on defence right in front of us on the court but last night – maybe because there was no noise in the joint – saw it on the bench as well.

He was calling out screens, exhorting teammates and just talkative.

Didn’t work but still …

He was asked post game about one moment on the court, where he was getting after some teammates. And said this:

"Everybody listens. We were behind a little bit and it was all about trying to get back in the game. I was just telling everybody to keep your head up. It's a long game. We can't get hung up over one run or two quarters, anything like that. We just keep playing hard. We got back in it a little bit. We gave ourselves a chance, but we didn't stick to our principles."

-

A big deal?

Or not.

A couple of guys I talked to last night entirely downplayed the game with Atlanta on Friday night and it’s redemptive significance.

Yes, the Hawks drilled them a week or so ago; it was the worst moment of the season by far.

But it was far, far more about what the Raptors didn’t do rather than what the Hawks did do and that’s what they need to concentrate on.

As we saw in Washington and Chicago and to a lesser degree against Minnesota but not in Milwaukee, they can get it done.

The fact that it’s the Hawks shouldn’t matter a lick.

-

And in other news.

-

I presume this news from Canada Basketball got widespread distribution yesterday.

It’d be a helluva thing to get the Olympic qualifier in Canada – and specifically in Toronto, which has the requisite number of top-notch game and practice facilities – and it’s probably going to come down to one thing.

Money.

Lots of it.

Canada Basketball needs to find a guy, or a couple of guys, or a couple of companies, to write some big old cheques to win the bid.

And unless that happens, I’m afraid Leo’s Road Warriors will be on the road again.

So if you’re out there, call Canada Basketball. They need you.

-

Good to see Roko last night.

And good to see him have a good game.

I like his game – and I don’t like his jump shot but I do like his game – and I think he’s an NBA player.

As I mentioned in the notes in the paper, he was a bit frustrated about his role but he got a chance to play last night and played well.

And coach Scott Skiles noticed.

“Roko is a guy that every day is the same. I probably should have given him some more looks before this, he certainly earned some more looks now. He’s good with the ball, he made shots and he’s got a burst of quickness and you can certainly tell it’s evident when he’s out there.”

-

A few days ago, we gave you a somewhat sappy but heartfelt list of five things I like about the game. It wasn’t comprehensive, I’m sure there’s more, but it was a nice jumping off point.

So today, let’s do the other side of the coin. The things that irk me. Again, not comprehensive but maybe it’ll give someone something to talk about.

Thunderstix and those goofy balloons they hand out to fans behind the stanchion.

They don’t do anything except make an infernal racket and I’m sure the use of voices and/or hands would make just as much. Of course, the night in Season One at the Dome when they handed them out at the wrong end and the fans still waved them was pretty comical.

Isolation plays.

It’s a game of movement and teamwork and cutting and passing. Ballet on hardwood. Four guys standing around while one guy goes one-on-one generally does nothing for me.

Piped-in music.

Thunderstix taken to the next level. Heard it last night in Milwaukee, see it in Jersey, too. All of a sudden there’s screaming and yelling and clapping and you look up in the stands and everyone is sitting there, sedate. Bogus. Make it go away.

Timeouts.

Now, I’m as big a fan of the June Taylor Dancers and The Chicken as the next guy but, really, there can be up to six timeouts in the final two minutes of a close game and that just kills it for me. Maybe that’s why I had respect for Butch Carter as a coach, he generally let ‘em play through those final frenetic seconds. Loved it.

The schedule

Yes, I know it’s got to do with TV and arenas and the like but back-to-backs, three-games-in-four-nights and four-games-in-five diminishes the product, wears down the athletes and, quite frankly, leads to some horrid basketball.

I suppose it’ll never change but if they were to lop off two weeks or so off the never-ending pre-season, that’d at least give them a little more time between games.

The product would be better, the health of the players would be better and the pre-season would be shorter.

Win. Win. Win.

-

Speaking of Milwaukee, where it was bitter cold this morning by the way, here’s what they read in the paper today.

-

Mail time, folks. There are a few in there that I can use but here’s your shot to get more in before the weekend hits.

-

No practice today – it’s the usual after back-to-backs – but there will be some action around the arena, I’m sure.

The two most recently injured guys, Calderon and Bargnani, are sure to be in for some treatment and to head off the inevitable questions, I don’t know when they’ll be back.

They’ll get treatment today, go through shootaround tomorrow and then they’ll see how everyone feels.

There. That should save you from asking.

-

Okay, off to catch the puddle-jumper to Cleveland to catch another puddle jumper to Toronto. I have no idea what time we’ll be back at the machine so if your comments take a while to get posted, well, tough noogies.

I’ll get to ‘em when I can.

-

The Goods On The Game, Raptors at Bucks

I presume you've all seen the news about Andrea?

Might make for an interesting night.