Offensive woes and the list of the favourite Chickens

So Jay terms his team a “fair-weather defensive team” right now – a bang-on assessment of a club that derives a lot of its energy from its offence, as troubling as that may be – and there are a couple of reasons that’s pretty dangerous.

First, it’s the trap they fell into last season and we know how that all worked out, don’t we? Shows a wee lack of mental toughness because the one thing that should be constant is defensive effort and, for most of this season, we’ve seen that this group works hard. But there has been some slippage that needs to be corrected. The other troubling aspect?

This team can’t shoot.

At least not well enough so far this season.

The HOTH are firmly ensconced in the bottom third in field goal percentage, shooting about 44.8 per cent as a group, and, lately, not nearly enough of them can make a shot.

Even before the season began, the world coming out from them that offence wasn’t an issue, that even without the guy who got ‘em 24 points a nights they’d find ways to score.

And seeing how they’ve only shot 50 per cent from the field in one of their first 17 games, it would behoove them to get better at that end of the floor.

Or it would at least be wise for them to get better defensively because on the (increasingly occurring) nights when shots don’t fall, that’s how they stay in games. As the coach knows:

“As good as we were playing in the fourth quarter of our win streak, we haven’t been able to get to the fourth quarter feeling good about where we are. It’s a matter of breakdowns, letdowns and a loss of focus sometimes by some of the players.

“Against some teams, you can get away with it; against good teams, they’re going to make you pay.”

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Ah, this tweeting thing is something, right?

Where else are you going to learn that Reggie Evans is having surgery later this week? Yep, he spilled the beans last night, I’m told. No real details – I’ve got to figure they’re going to go in and put a tiny screw in the little broken bone – but we have to be talking more than a month at the very least.

Which means in about three weeks we’ll have daily “what’s up with Regggie, when’s he coming back?” questions and it’ll be exactly like last year.

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It’s raining out at 6:15 a.m. and it’s already about 5 C and it’s almost December and what do I hear at the Favourite Starbucks (hi, Hurontario and Harbord): Christmas carols.

Way, way, way too early, methinks.

Reminded me of the morning Stumpy and I are standing outside the LAX Marriott about 4 a.m., some November morn waiting for a shuttle to the 6 a.m. flight to go to a game and finish some dopey back-to-back and it’s really warm out and the carols are all over the loudspeaker.

We look at each other with the same thought: Bleep Christmas.

And I have to tell you, if it’s not Bing and Bowie doing Little Drummer Boy, I am so not ready for carols at the moment it’s ridiculous.

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So now, all of a sudden, it’s a coaching issue in Miami? Erik Spoelstra’s getting killed everywhere you look because those three guys can’t figure it out on the court?

I thing Mssrs. James, Wade and Bosh need to man up and play better.

I don’t think Spoelstra got stupid all of a sudden and it just goes to me oft-stated opinion that coaches get too much blame when things go bad and too much credit when they go good.

At some point, don’t the guys on the floor – supremely talented and quite full of themselves – need to play better? Play smarter? Do their jobs?

But the train wreck of a season so far has been fun to watch, no?

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Let’s go get this one out of the file of lists I’m slowly compiling (and if you’ve got one, click here and send it along with any other questions you’ve got and I’ll take a look):

Q: Doug, here's a list for you. The Raptor is by far the best mascot in Toronto pro sports. Not sure if you've done it before, but how about top 5 mascots in the NBA? What about baseball mascots from back in the day when you covered baseball? Just curious about what makes a great mascot and who's got one.

Christa M, Barrie

A: Top five stuffed animals-slash-Chickens?

Sure, I’m all over that.

I am putting The Chicken from here at the top of the list and that’s not homerism, he/she/it is the best in my opinion.

After that?

I’m going with the Gorilla in Phoenix, I kind of like the Bison they have in Oklahoma City, and Rocky out in Denver always seems to put on a good show. Rounding it out? I’ll put Squatch of Seattle, RIP, just because he was excellent before his untimely demise.

Now, what makes a good Chicken? Silly antics, acrobatics and the ability to warm up the crowd without being intrusive. Oh, and they have to look cute, too. Cute’s big.

Now, you have to know that from baseball I’m all over the Original Chicken but I was huge Youppi fan and the Philly Phanatic was/is outstanding.

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Kind of missed the Peja update in the morning missive from the newspaper (which is here for all of you who somehow didn’t click on it).

He didn’t practice yesterday and according to one guy close to him, there’s a chance he misses the next couple of games.

Swelling’s down in the knee and that’s a good sign, just needs a little bit more time for it to calm down.

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Speaking of questions and answers, we’ll be here at noon for an hour if anyone’s in interested.

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The things you see in the practice court every now and then.

As we’re chatting with players and coaches after practice Monday, there are people draping two tables against the wall with paper Thomas The Tank Engine tablecloths.

I’m figuring it might be The Young Onez having some sort of clinic or bash, but no …

It’s a birthday party for Usher’s offspring, we’re told, and we high-tailed it out of there before they brought in the jumping castle.

Or the kids.

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Comments

[Al]

Robert Bertuzzi... it's a conspiracy. There is no Doug Smith; it's Bryan Colangelo in disguise. And the Raptors own the Star, don't you know??

[Kate Condon]

Hi Doug!

Great blog as usual, you bring us info we just don't get anywhere else.

Re - what makes a good chicken? I agree whole-heartedly that ours is one of the best, if not the best, and excels at "silly antics, acrobatics and the ability to warm up the crowd without being intrusive". However, I'd add another important factor, and it's one that I'm always talking up about our guy/gal/thing - good with the kids. He/she/it is remarkably skilled as adapting his behaviour to his "audience" - goofing around with adults, but being really quite good and careful with the children. I've always admired this about the Raptor - long may he live! I believe it's been the same guy/gal since 95... if so, do you know what his remaining career expectancy is?

Kate C

Blogger's note: He/she/it is indeed a Day 1'er and I don't think there are any plans to hang up the costume quite yet

[joeu]

Al .... Don't fall for the trap ! Robert Bertuzzi is actually the Star's Advertising manager, looking to stir up the comments ... monetizing "interactions" dontchya know.

[doug]

Youppi was a classic, he cracked me up, just the way he moved, his mannerisms...i miss those old Expos....I read your Q and A, you said cool a lot, your regressing back to your teenage years...the thing with Miami that irks me is 1) just how childish and petulant the players are being, they should be thankful they have Spo and not Sloan...amd 2) is Riley's behaviour, I never liked him and his ego is just as large or larger then the Big 3, why denigrate Spo by sitting in the stands and taking notes openly??..how boorish, get your butt in a press box and do it properly, they say leadership starts at the top, well maybe the Big 3 are just following their leaders example...also speaking of lack of leadership with the Heat even before I signed LeBron I would have stated NO cloud burst before the game , were a team not a individual side show..imagine Phil allowing it? or Sloan or Pops..no way...they need LeBron to knock it off...what message does that give??.that we accept prima donna behaviour...

[GM]

* Little doug, you can't imagine Phil allowing a cloud burst before a game? Uh, where do you think LeBron got it from? From Jordan, who made a big show of the clap of powder at the scorer's table before every game, always in the face of the Bulls' broadcaster. It was a tradition. As for egos, I've always thought Phil had the biggest one of all the coaches. And I've always like Riley. So there we are.
* As for Spoelstra, some are saying he didn't stop being a good coach. He was a good coach last year and therefore he's a good coach this year. I have no opinion on it, but on a larger level I'd say every single coach in the NBA is a "good coach" for a particular team. But a big part of coaching is adapting and developing a system for that year's players that best suits their strengths and weaknesses, and managing egos and personalities. So it's quite possible that Spoelstra isn't the right coach for that particular collection of players. Doesn't mean he's a bad coach. But to always insist the coach has nothing to do with anything is stretching things.

[Ian Murray]

Hey Doug,
Like the new chat format you started using, but one little complaint. There doesn't seem to be anyway to turn off auto-scrolling. Also not a complaint, but it's kind of weird following one these chats when it's scrolling up instead of down! Never seen that before.

[Lorie]

I think it has been said that the word "cool" is the only "example of "slang" whose use has been considered fashionable without pause since post-World War II and has always been used to refer to a perferred state of being, or behaviour. And while what constitutes the specific attributes of what it is to be "cool" over time, the concept of "coolness" remains unchanged, and is perhaps best expressed by Homer himself (Simpson, that is): "Maybe if you're really cool, you don't need to be told you're cool." Rock on, Doug - if we can't be forever young, let's be forever cool.

[The J]

doug (the commenter) - isn't Lebron's cloud burst just an extension of MJs dusting his hands in front of the play-by-play guys. So when you say "..imagine Phil allowing it?", he always allowed something that was at least similar.

[joe]

Doug,
Excellent points about the Big 3 debacle in Miami. You've got to feel for Spoelstra. To me, it looks like James and Co. are setting him up for a big fall. Purely a guess, but I think Riley waits until after the holidays to can him and take his spot. I think the Heat will get beaten quite handly by the Lakers on Christmas Day. That will give Riley the ammunition to fire Spoelstra. What a mess this has become. I never thought that Wade and James could function well on a court because their style of play is too similar. The solution to the problem would be to trade James for an elite point guard. A combination of say Chris Paul and D. Wade would work way better because Paul has the court vision to find Wade and get him the ball. He'd also do wonders for Bosh since someone could feed him the ball too. Bosh also seems to be a poor fit because he doesn't play down low in the post enough. His preference of hanging around the elbow tends to clog things up. I think Amare Stoudemaire would have been a better fit since he will bang down low. Regardless, the more things are a mess in Miami, the better it is for us. We have their 1st round pick and the worse they do, the higher the pick for us.

[danny p]

Somebody in the Q&A asked about Amir's improvement in free throw % and I noticed that DeJuan Blair has had quite a turnaround as well.