Phil Talks “Eleven Rings,” Phantom 12th

May 24, 2013  ·  12:49AM

CHICAGO – Phil Jackson has been hitting it hard on his book tour this week, talking up his latest work on late-night TV and national radio broadcasts. Still, in a spate of appearances in the city where his unparalleled NBA coaching success began, the talk invariably has veered back to the one that got away.

The book is titled “Eleven Rings: The Soul of Success” (Penguin Press, 2013). People in Chicago, where rings are hard to come by, still wonder about that missing 12th.

Oh, there wasn’t much Jackson or anyone else with the Bulls could do about the 1994 and ’95 NBA titles seized by Houston during the first of Michael Jordan‘s three NBA retirements. And no one in the audience Thursday night at the Palmer House Hilton, where Jackson appeared as part of the Chicago Tribune’s Printers Row literary series, cared much about the Lakers’ failure to win again in 2011 and finish off what would have been Jackson’s fourth three-peat.

But many in the Windy City crowd of about 750 wanted to know: What about 1999? That was the NBA’s first lockout-shortened season, a schedule that seemed perfect for a veteran-laden team like the Bulls.

And yet, they didn’t even try. The band broke up, the run was over. Jackson famously rode off on a fat motorcycle and Chicago’s NBA team all but went dark for the next half dozen seasons.

W-w-w-what happened?

“I know how hard it is, so many people in Chicago say, ‘You could have continued to win,’ ” Jackson told the audience. “Yes – maybe.”

Ultimately it was Jerry Krause, the Bulls’ determined general manager, who brought that run to its end, the Hall of Fame former coach said.

As stubborn as Jackson or Jordan (and often butting heads with both), Krause had made it clear to the Bulls coach that his run there was over. Team chairman Jerry Reinsdorf asked him to return but Jackson declined. “I just felt our relationship had deteriorated such that, for me to come back, it would be too difficult for Jerry Krause.”

That was the first domino. Jordan didn’t want to play for another coach and, besides, he cut his finger – with a cigar cutter, the story went – badly enough to need surgery. Dennis Rodman essentially was done as an NBA player. Scottie Pippen, Luc Longley and Steve Kerr went elsewhere to get paid better than in their Chicago stays.

It’s doubtful Krause would fill a downtown ballroom on a night the NHL Blackhawks were active in the Stanley Cup playoffs, touting a book titled “Organizations Win Rings” or something like that.

“Right up until the end, we worked well together,” Jackson said, after acknowledging their different temperaments. “We had a wonderful time as a team for three years and we really appreciated it.”

In a 45-minute “conversation” – think “Inside the Actors Studio” format, with longtime Bulls beat writer K.C. Johnson in the James Lipton role – Jackson touched on a variety of topics, including:

  • “Eleven Rings” is the seventh book written by the NBA’s resident Zen master. He might wind up with more books than rings eventually. “I guess being a reader is the reason I’ve written books,” said Jackson, who co-authored this project with Hugh Delehanty, his collaborator on 1995′s “Sacred Hoops.” “There’s that personal feeling that you get from dialogue with a reader and with an author when you’re participating in a book. I think it’s brought me closer to individuals. It gives an inside look at a very varied career that I’ve had.”
  • The title was spun from “The Book of Five Rings,” a 1643 work by duelist and samurai Miyamoto Musashi. That book, according to Amazon.com, “is one of the most influential texts on the subtle arts of confrontation and victory ever to emerge from Asia.” Said Jackson: “That’s the concept of which 11 rings come out of. I was hoping it was going to be 12 – didn’t make it.”
  • Doesn’t sound like he will, either. Similar to how he’s been responding all week through these interviews, Jackson said: “I have no intention of coaching. My fiancée Jeanie Buss says, when people ask you that question, say, ‘Jeanie thinks I can still coach.’ But I have no intention of coaching.”
  • Getting pre-empted on a return to the Lakers in November – when GM Mitch Kupchak called Jackson at midnight Sunday with the news of Mike D’Antoni‘s hiring, rather than wait to hear Jackson’s decision on Monday – still appears to sting him. Yet he said: “The idea that I didn’t have to coach was a relief. Because it felt I was going to have to come back and … go through rescue process.” He had done that, he felt, when he went back to the post-Shaquille O’Neal Lakers in 2005. “Even though my fiancée is part of that family and part of that organization, I didn’t want to get pulled in.”
  • Still, the idea of a basketball operations gig in Seattle – said to be Jackson’s for the taking, had entrepreneur Chris Hansen wrested the Kings out of Sacramento – holds great appeal. And for a very personal reason: “The sideline triangle offense that we promoted all those years and thought was such a fine system has really been denigrated over the last three or four seasons,” he said.
  • Never mind Kurt Rambis‘ failure in Minnesota or the half-baked versions tried briefly elsewhere, Jackson said. “A lot of people point to all those situations and the triangle as too difficult to run and too difficult an offense for present-day NBA basketball. And I don’t think it’s true,” he said. “Basketball is still basketball. The princples of offense are still the same. And there’s a group of people who would be willing to listen to that.”
  • Something Jackson loved about that offense – or maybe just his special place in the game, after tutelage from assistant coach Tex Winter, as its biggest proponent – was the buy-in it required from all involved. “One bonus about triangle offense,” he said, “it wasn’t a coach telling player what to do. It was about system, a standard to live up to.”
  • Jackson’s favorite game as coach? “I guess it would be the first championship, the final game that helped us win [in 1991].” After that? Jackson quickly mentioned the 1993 title clincher against Phoenix, when the Bulls’ “blind pig” play eventually got the ball to John Paxson for the 3-point dagger.
  • Asked which players actually read the books Jackson was known for distributing, he laughed. “I usually buy books appropriate for the players. “Beavis and Butthead” was one of the books I gave Stacey King (former Bulls center now working as the team’s colorful TV analyst).”
  • Here’s Jackson on current Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau, known for his workaholic tendencies. “Tom’s a good coach,” he said. “He works really hard at it and I just hope it doesn’t kill him.”
  • Stepping away for a day from the Jordan-Kobe Bryant comparisons, Jackson found himself faced with a third superstar to evaluate: LeBron James. “He’s working on those rings,” Jackson said. “When he gets those rings, five and six, then he’s right there.”
  • Of his recent entry to the world of Twitter as @PhilJackson11 Jackson said: “It’s a weird world out there. You have to have a thick skin.” He admitted that one of the few players he follows on the social media site is current Bulls center Joakim Noah, whose offbeat personality seems somehow in synch with the coach 40 years his senior.

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Heat’s D Exposes Granger’s Absence

May 23, 2013  ·  8:22PM

MIAMI – This is where the Indiana Pacers really miss Danny Granger.

Despite the absence of one of their best players for all but five games this season, the Pacers took a step forward. They became the No. 1 defensive team in the league, have advanced a round further than they did a year ago, and just might have what it takes to knock off the defending champs.

Paul George has stepped into Granger’s go-to-guy shoes and Lance Stephenson has stepped into a starter’s role, enough that we sometimes forget that this team is missing a former All-Star who averaged 21.6 points over the previous five seasons.

But the Pacers did regress offensively without Granger, falling from ninth in offensive efficiency last season to 19th this year. They’ve overcome his absence thus far, but this may be the time when his knee injury hurts the most.

The Miami Heat are an aggressive defensive team on the strong side of the floor, looking to deny the post, trap pick-and-rolls and force turnovers. That in itself is an issue for the turnover-prone Pacers, but if they can move the ball successfully to the weak side, they can get open shots.

The problem is that the Pacers don’t have anybody on the weak side to really take advantage of the Heat’s aggressiveness. Their best 3-point shooters are George and George Hill, who are the guys handling the ball on the strong side.

Stephenson is most often the guy left open from beyond the arc, but he’s a career 30-percent shooter from 3-point range. He missed all five of his 3-point attempts in Game 1 on Wednesday (including one that could have given the Pacers a six-point lead with 1:21 left in overtime) and has missed his last 10 threes, going back to Game 4 of the conference semifinals.

The Pacers could ask Stephenson to run more pick-and-rolls so that George or Hill is on the weak side, but Stephenson is often very passive on high pick-and-rolls, rarely forcing the defense to rotate with penetration.

Granger has shot 38 percent from 3-point range over his career. Though he shot 1-for-10 from beyond the arc in Games 1 and 2 against the Heat last year, he made 11 of his next 23 treys and would obviously be a bigger weak-side threat than Stephenson. Not only that, he’d be another ball handler who could free George or Hill on the weak side.

“It’s a factor,” Pacers coach Frank Vogel said of Granger’s absence on Thursday. “You got to be able to shoot the ball from the weak side against this team that loads to the strong side. So I think Danny Granger would have a profound impact on a series like this. But we got guys who have gotten the job done all year.”

Category: 2013 Conference Finals: Pacers-Heat, 2013 NBA Playoffs / Tags: , , , , , , , , / 3 Comments /

Are Grizzlies In Need of Lineup Change?

May 23, 2013  ·  6:23PM

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HANG TIME HEADQUARTERS – Locations change. Games change. Series change. Nobody knows that better than the Spurs and the Grizzlies.

This time a year ago, the Spurs were in precisely the same spot with a 2-0 lead and halfway home in the Western Conference finals. Then the Thunder reeled off four straight wins and suddenly it was summer in San Antonio.

Barely a month ago, the Grizzlies fell behind 0-2 in the first round of the playoffs to the Clippers. Then Zach Randolph, Marc Gasol, Mike Conley and the NBA’s best defense ripped off four in a row and began their deepest playoff run in franchise history.

Lineups change.

That could be what it will take now for the Grizzlies to get up off the floor and keep moving forward.

There’s little doubt that for the Grizzlies to win four out of five games against San Antonio, they’re going to need an effective Z-Bo in the middle of their offense, throwing around his bulk and wreaking havoc in the low post.

But, while Randolph did miss more than a few easy shots at the AT&T Center (“tightest rims in the league,” he said), there has also been the matter of a Spurs defense that blatantly collapses and doubles on Z-Bo because the Memphis perimeter shooting has been so horrid.

For all of his high energy and ability to make something out of nothing at times, Randolph does need room to operate with the way the Grizzles are misfiring so bad from the outside, he’s apt to continue getting smothered by the Spurs.

The Grizzlies‘ starting pair of Tony Allen and Tayshaun Prince has made just 8 of their 24 shots from the field in the first two games. Prince has been especially woeful at 3-for-10, and it could be time for coach Lionel Hollins to put Quincy Pondexter into the starting lineup at small forward for Prince — and even consider getting Jerryd Bayless onto the floor much earlier in games.

It was the combination of Conley, Pondexter and Bayless playing with the Randolph and Gasol that enabled the Grizzlies to find an offensive rhythm for the first time in the series during the second half of Game 2.

Prince has had production go steadily downhill since the first round of the playoffs, and it’s gotten to the point where he is also a liability on defense. It be too early to say where this is just a bad match and bad series or whether the 33-year-old former defensive stopper is showing his age. But there’s no mistaking that his opposite number, the 21-year-old Kawhi Leonard, is winning the matchup easily. Leonard has size, strength, quickness and energy to run the floor, get rebounds, chase down loose ball and make shots against Prince.

It was always going to be difficult for Memphis to keep up with a Spurs offense that likes to play at a faster tempo and has more weapons and more ways to score. But the Grizzlies can’t afford to dig themselves a deeper hole by employing a lineup that is only 3/5 of a threat to score, even if they should get a bounce from being at home in the Grindhouse for Games 3-4.

History says that in the history of the NBA playoffs have lost the first two games of a best-of-seven series and come back to win. Of course, both of these teams have experience with that history, although from opposite sides.

“We’re in a great spot, but if you look at it, it’s the same spot we were last year,” said the Spurs’ Manu Ginobili. “It doesn’t mean at all that we’re going to make it just because we won the first two. We have to go there and try to win one.

“If it’s the third [game], it’s better. We’ve been here. We know that it’s not over until you win the fourth. So we just have to stay humble, keep working hard, definitely try to get one [in] Memphis.”

Locations change. Games change. Series sometimes change.

But sometimes it takes a lineup change to make it happen.

TEAMS THAT HAVE RALLIED FROM 0-2 IN A BEST-OF-SEVEN PLAYOFF SERIES

–Celtics vs Lakers 1969 NBA Finals
–Lakers vs. Warriors 1969 Western Division semifinals
–Bullets vs. Knicks 1971 Eastern Conference finals
–Trail Blazers vs. 76ers 1977 NBA Finals
–Bulls vs Knicks 1993 Eastern Conference finals
–Rockets vs. Suns 1994 Western Conference semifinals
–Rockets vs. Suns 1995 Western Conference semifinals
–Lakers vs. Spurs 2004 Western Conference semifinals
–Mavericks vs. Rockets 2005 Western Conference first round
–Wizards vs. Bulls 2005 Eastern Conference first round
–Heat vs. Mavericks 2006 NBA Finals
–Jazz vs. Rockets 2007 Western Conference first round
–Cavaliers vs. Pistons 2007 Eastern Conference finals
–Spurs vs. Hornets 2008 Western Conference semifinals
–Thunder vs. Spurs 2012 Western Conference finals
–Grizzlies vs. Cippers 2013 Western Conference first round

Category: 2013 Conference Finals: Spurs-Grizzlies, 2013 NBA Playoffs, HT News, Uncategorized / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , / Comments (1) /

Aldridge: Chalmers Will Play Game 2 Despite Bruised Shoulder

May 23, 2013  ·  4:12PM

NBA.com

Miami guard Mario Chalmers (bruised left shoulder) said today he expects to play in Friday’s Game 2 of the Eastern Conference finals against Indiana, reports TNT Analyst David Aldridge. Chalmers suffered the injury when he ran into Pacers forward David West in the second half.

Heat coach Erik Spoelstra indicated that Chalmers could have played in Game 1 after the injury.

Category: 2013 Conference Finals: Pacers-Heat / Tags: , , , , / No Comments /

HT Time Machine: Future All-NBA Team

May 23, 2013  ·  2:49PM



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HANG TIME HEADQUARTERS – The 15 players selected to the All-NBA team every season earn a place in NBA lore that is rarely celebrated the way fans do All-Star bids.

Weighing the two, however, is a battle that shouldn’t be a fair fight. An All-star nod is often based on reputation and how well someone is playing early in a given season. The All-NBA team measures the best of the very best the league has to offer in a season. The team consists of the 15 best players (by position) in the league.

It doesn’t get much better than that.

Thursday, the NBA released this year’s squad.  But what about the future? What might that team look like in say, three seasons, when Kobe Bryant and Kevin Garnett and Tim Duncan, stalwarts on All-NBA teams the past two decades, are no longer active?

What is the makeup of the All-NBA team in the future? What does the league look like three seasons from now?

We take a look, courtesy of the HT (Hang Time) Time Machine, at the future All-NBA Teams …

2015-16
All-NBA First Team

F LeBron James, Miami Heat: No one was sure if LeBron would stick around South Beach after the Heat won those back-to titles in 2014 and 2015. But he watched his good friend Dwyane Wade retire after the last one and vowed to finish his career in a Heat uniform as well. There are no signs of his skills diminishing either. He bounced back masterfully after the Heat were beaten soundly by the Memphis Grizzlies in The Finals in 2013. James has reinvented himself as the epitome of a point forward during the second act of his Hall-of-Fame career, leading the league in assists this season with 12.7 per game. He’s still chasing Michael Jordan‘s six championships standard, though the comparisons to Magic Johnson are much more appropriate, and at 32 he still has plenty of time left.

F Paul George, Indiana Pacers: Three straight trips to the Eastern Conference finals without a breakthrough performance would be a mental and emotional setback for most stars, but not George. He’s done nothing but build on that All-Star berth in his third NBA season. George has blossomed into the closest thing to a legitimate challenger to LeBron’s throne. He interrupted LeBron’s MVP flow in 2015, when he stunned the hoops world by averaging a triple-double (24.2 points, 10.2 rebounds and 10.0 assists) while leading the Pacers to a franchise-record 63 wins and finished as the MVP runner-up this season. The only threshold left for George to cross is to lead the Pacers past LeBron and the Heat into The 2016 Finals.

C Marc Gasol, Memphis Grizzlies: Gasol served as the backbone for the Grizzlies’ 2013 championship team, though Zach Randolph walked away with Finals MVP honors, and solidified his status as the most complete big man in the game with his performance each season since. While he’s never piled up the kind of impressive numbers that would allow him to stick out historically among players at his position, Gasol does have three Kia Defensive Player of the Year awards on his mantle and a championship on his resume. If Ed Davis can replace Randolph as Gasol’s tag-team partner in the low post, the Grizzlies could have another run or two in them before it’s time to break this veteran crew up and start over.

G James Harden, Houston Rockets: The two-time (and counting) scoring champ, Harden has supplanted his former teammate and friend Kevin Durant as the league’s most prolific scorer. He’s averaged 30 or more points in three straight seasons, including this one (31.7) and has led the Rockets to the playoffs in each of his four seasons in Houston. Harden has evolved into more than just a scorer, too, leading the Rockets in assists (7.6) and steals (2.3) while adjusting to playing alongside Patrick Beverly in the starting lineup instead of sixth man Jeremy Lin. Harden’s career went to another level since he radically changed his look in training camp before the 2013-14 season by shaving off his trademark beard and mohawk in favor of a bald head and clean-shaven face. Who knew?

G Steph Curry, Golden State Warriors: With his ankle injuries behind him, the sweet-shooting Curry finally claims the first-team spot from Chris Paul and a crowded, star-studded point guard field. Curry’s work as a shooter — he’s shot 45 percent or better from beyond the 3-point line every season since 2011-12 — overshadows the fact that he’s become the consummate playmaker and leader for the league’s most exciting team. Curry put together a 20-10 season at the point (23.6 points and 10.4 assists), the only point guard to do so in the past three seasons, while leading the Warriors to a top four finish in the Western Conference playoff chase for the third straight season. With Curry and Klay Thompson (still the league’s best-shooting backcourt) as the catalysts, the Warriors are trying to crash the conference finals party.  

Category: HT News / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , / 11 Comments /

Colangelo-Krzyzewski Combo Keeps USA Basketball Solid For Years To Come

May 23, 2013  ·  10:58AM



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HANG TIME HEADQUARTERS – You couldn’t ask for a better fit … or better results.

Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski is a Hall of Famer, an icon and living legend in his profession. And yet, he’s found a way to step aside and allow the spotlight to shine exactly where it needs to when he’s coaching the U.S. Men’s Senior National Team — on the NBA stars in he leads in international competition.

That’s what makes his return to his post great news for USA Basketball and chairman Jerry Colangelo, who hand-picked Coach K to take over as coach in 2005, and the future of the program. The continuity this dynamic duo brings is what will propel the program for years to come. Sure, it helps having the best talent on the planet to choose from. But the pipeline was full of talent before Colangelo and Krzyzewski got together and the results looked nothing like the 62-1 mark the Men’s Senior National Team has compiled under them.

This is one of those times when the numbers do not lie. There is something special about the bond Coach K has forged with the core members of the program that was on full display at the 2012 London Olympics. He found a way to succeed with superstars like LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Durant, Chris Paul, Carmelo Anthony and others while also continually integrating new and different faces into the mix. Under him, the U.S. won back-to-back gold medals in Beijing in 2008 and London four years later.

He found roles for guys like Kevin Love, Andre Iguodala and even a rookie like Anthony Davis, all stars in their own right and also all guys who might have been marginalized in years past on this stage. Things haven’t always run as smoothly as they have in recent years with the NBA stars involved with the program.

The all-time low point was the 2004 Athens Olympics. During that debacle, an ill-fitted group of NBA stars attempted to rescue the program’s honor on the global stage but ended up disappointing and finishing with a bronze medal. Rock bottom actually came four years earlier at the World Championships in Indianapolis in 2002, when a team coached by reigning NBA Coach of the Year George Karl was humbled on the world stage, becoming the first team with NBA players to fall in international competition while finishing an ugly sixth in the competition on home soil.

I was there in Indy and, as a fan of the international game and the fact that it’s played differently than the NBA style, it was as brutal to watch the U.S. struggle with that adjustment as it was to see them come apart at the seams.

Those back-to-back failures led directly to Colangelo and then Krzyzewski coming on board to help rehabilitate the program, complete with the formation of a robust Men’s Senior National Team roster that included commitments from many of the game’s biggest current stars. And they had to be willing to subject themselves to a grueling tryout process that could bruise plenty of egos along the way.

It wasn’t just about piling up a bunch of stars and throwing them into the unfamiliar international mix, where national teams from Argentina and Spain were gaining major steam. It was about rounding up the right stars that would embrace the team dynamic in ways that the players on the ’02 and ’04 teams refused to or simply could not.

You know the cupboard is stacked when you have All-Stars like Kyrie Irving, Jrue Holiday and other young stars willing to give up their summers to try to earn a place on the teams that will compete in the 2014 World Championships in Madrid and the 2016 Olympics in Rio De Janeiro.

Things have changed for the better with the power structure USA Basketball employed to help them regain their stature as the best in the world. And there’s no reason to assume they’ll do anything but continue that reign and improve upon that rock-solid foundation for years to come with Colangelo and Coach K at the helm.

Category: HT News, USA Basketball / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , / 3 Comments /

Small Markets Scrap For Success

May 23, 2013  ·  10:57AM

memphis-fans

HANG TIME SOUTHWEST – When a couple small-market Western Conference teams battled for seven grueling games in the semifinals of the playoffs two years ago, who could have foreseen that they would meet again this postseason — after each was forced to deal with the inescapable repercussions of the new Collective Bargaining Agreement?

Rudy Gay was injured and out of that postseason two years ago. But at only 24 and locked into a lucrative contract, the No. 8 pick of the 2006 NBA Draft was a central figure for the fast-rising Memphis Grizzlies. Yet on Jan. 30, 2013, Gay, the team’s leading scorer, was traded to Toronto.

In Oklahoma City, the Thunder were coming off a loss to the Miami Heat in the 2012 NBA Finals when, days before this season began, Thunder general manager Sam Presti dealt former No. 3 pick James Harden, just 23 and an integral part of the team’s success, to Houston.

In a postseason marked by a surprising domination of small-market teams — all four teams remaining in the playoffs are in the bottom half of the league in market size — the second-round showdown between the Grizzlies and Thunder (won by the Grizzlies in five games) demonstrated just what many teams have to do to thrive in the era of the still-new CBA.

“With the rules set up the way they are, there’s minimal room for error,” said Jason Levien, the first-year CEO of the Grizzlies under a new ownership group led by one of the world’s youngest tech billionaires, Robert Pera. “You’ve got to be very thoughtful in your approach to how you build your team, how you build a roster, and you’ve got to keep the cap and the tax in mind.”

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Avoiding the taxes

Cap and tax are at the forefront of the strategy the Oklahoma City management team is using under the ownership of billionaire energy mogul Clay Bennett. Presti, who has managed to re-sign superstars Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, plus emerging power forward Serge Ibaka, to long-term deals that fit within the team’s cap structure, chose to hold firm to a policy of not commenting on matters related to the CBA.

In Memphis, where the Grizzlies will look to start digging out of a 2-0 hole against the San Antonio Spurs in Saturday’s Game 3 of the West finals (9 p.m., ESPN), Levien has defended the trade of Gay (for veteran small forward Tayshaun Prince and youngsters Ed Davis and Austin Daye) as being made to improve the team.

While that might be true — Memphis won a franchise-best 56 games after a strong start with Gay — the Grizzlies also got out of the $37.2 million owed to Gay over the next two seasons. Memphis will pay Prince, Davis and Daye a combined $26 million over that span ($22 million if Daye is not retained beyond next season). With Zach Randolph, Marc Gasol and Mike Conley owed a combined $40.9 million next season, keeping Gay and a payroll under the tax line (this season it was $70.3 million) would have been a near-impossibility.  

Category: 2013 NBA Playoffs / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , / Comments (1) /

Commence The Torching Of Frank Vogel

May 23, 2013  ·  2:38AM


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MIAMI – Indiana Pacers coach Frank Vogel has called Roy Hibbert “the best rim protector in the game.” That same Vogel took that same Hibbert off the floor on two critical defensive possessions late in overtime of Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals on Wednesday.

The result? Two LeBron James layups and a 103-102 Miami Heat victory in overtime. Commence the torching of Vogel.

Vogel is very good at his job, the architect of the No. 1 defense in the league. But on more than one occasion in these playoffs, he has been caught over-coaching. This isn’t the first time he’s sat Hibbert on a late-game defensive possession, but it’s the time that decision came back to really bite him in the rear end.

Indiana was in position to steal Game 1 and home-court advantage in the series. Paul George got them to overtime with a 32-foot bomb at the end of regulation and, after James’ first Hibbert-less layup, got them a one-point lead with three clutch free throws with 2.2 seconds on the clock in OT.

After the Heat called timeout, Hibbert was on the floor.

I repeat, Hibbert was on the floor. And it was just one possession earlier when James beat George Hill off the dribble and got a layup because Hibbert wasn’t on the floor.

But Vogel looked at Miami’s lineup and called his own timeout, for the sole purpose of replacing Hibbert with Tyler Hansbrough. Over-coaching 101.

“That’s the dilemma they present when they have Chris Bosh at the five spot and his ability to space the floor,” Vogel said afterward. “We put a switching lineup in with the intent to switch, keep everything in front of us, and try to go into or force a challenged jump shot.”

Vogel’s fear was that, if Hibbert stuck by the basket to protect the rim, Bosh could free up a teammate with a screen or knock down an open jump shot.

The Pacers did switch as the Heat set multiple screens on the inbounds play. But when James caught the ball at the top of the key, George closed out a little too hard. The Heat had the floor spaced well, so when James blew by George, there was no one in position to help or protect the rim. James laid the ball in with his left hand and the buzzer sounded.

Game over. Opportunity lost.

“Obviously, with the way it worked out, it would have been better to have Roy in the game,” Vogel said. “But you don’t know. If that happens, maybe Bosh is making a jump shot and we’re all talking about that.”

And maybe if Hibbert was on the floor and James just scored over him, we’re talking about the Heat’s offensive mentality. After attempting 11 mid-range shots in the first quarter (and only five from the restricted area), they attempted just 13 mid-range shots (and 31 from the restricted area) over the remaining 41 minutes.

They didn’t let Hibbert’s presence keep them away from the rim. They smartly attacked the Pacers’ defense both from the middle and from the baseline, drew Hibbert’s attention, and dumped the ball off to cutters for layups and dunks.

“We’re an attacking team,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “It takes a great commitment and effort to be able to do it together, to get our attack. So you play a very good defensive team like this, you might not necessarily get it on the first option of your attack. And you have to have the poise and patience to work your offense, get to the proper spacing, move bodies, and have those opportunities in the paint.”

(Someone send that quote to the New York Knicks.)

“The first quarter, it was more of taking the first available look,” Spoelstra continued. “And a lot of times, it was that pull-up or long jumper.”

After averaging just 30.7 points in the paint in three regular season meetings against the Pacers, the Heat had almost twice that (60) on Wednesday. And all of their biggest buckets of the night came at the rim, including a Dwyane Wade layup over Hibbert in the final minute of regulation and a Bosh put-back over Hibbert in the final minute of OT. So it’s not as if Hibbert was stopping everything.

But you have a much better chance of protecting the rim with Hibbert on the floor than with him on the bench. In his 12 minutes off the floor in Game 1, the Heat were 9-for-12 in the restricted area and just 1-for-9 elsewhere. And if the 7-foot-2 guy is in the game and protecting the rim on that final possession, you can certainly live with the elsewhere.

Hibbert was obviously disappointed afterward, but he had his coach’s back.

“I could see why Coach wanted to take me out,” he said. “With 2.2 seconds left on the clock, they can throw it to Bosh and I’m over-committing in the paint and he can hit a jump shot. My mentality is always to protect the rim. I wish I was in there, but I have complete faith in Coach’s decisions.”

If the situation comes up again, the decision might be different.

“I would say we’ll probably have him in the next time,” Vogel said.

The Heat have now won 46 of their last 49 games. Opportunities to beat them do not come often. Vogel can only hope that there is a next time.

Category: 2013 Conference Finals: Pacers-Heat / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , / 146 Comments /

The Play Of The Game: What Would You Do?

May 23, 2013  ·  12:56AM





HANG TIME HEADQUARTERS – We’ve got plenty of time to debate the final play of the Miami Heat’s 103-102 overtime win over the Indiana Pacers in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals. Game 2 isn’t until Friday night. So let the second-guessing begin.

The question is simple, should the Pacers have had their rim protector extraordinaire Roy Hibbert on the floor for the final play of a game? There were just 2.2 seconds to play and LeBron James spun to the basket and finished with the lefty layup to win it, thanks to Paul George‘s defensive gaffe (he overplayed the pass after seeing Ray Allen fly past him to the wing on a beautifully designed play). Pacers coach Frank Vogel has already said that if he had it to do over again … kudos to him for coming clean, many of his colleagues around the league would bark at us for questioning him.

Watch the play (above) again and play coach. Would you rather go small and give up those last two layups LeBron scored (the first was a driving layup on George Hill) or do you take your chances with Hibbert, praised by Vogel recently as the best rim protector in the game, and force the Heat to beat you with a lower percentage shot from distance?

George answered the question for me when he admitted afterwards that he needed to force LeBron to take a jumper rather than give up the clear lane to the basket. Had Hibbert been on the floor, that path would have at least been a bit cluttered. Tyler Hansbrough, who was fantastic earlier in the game, was chasing Allen on that last play but did not close off the lane the way Hibbert might have if he were in there.

I know it’s hindsight now and that everything but what Vogel did looks like a better option now. Sorry. That’s the way it works when we all get to play armchair coach after the fact.

So again, what would you do?

Category: 2013 Conference Finals: Pacers-Heat, HT News / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , / 161 Comments /

This Isn’t About The 2014 Draft For Cavs

May 22, 2013  ·  6:18PM

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Of course the Cavaliers are going to consider trades for the No. 1 pick. That’s not news and that’s not a Cleveland thing. Nerlens Noel has serious holes in his game – mostly anything to do with offense – and is coming off a torn knee ligament, and the Cavs have lived the youth movement long enough, so the only real development would have been to not open the phone lines.

There is the Lake Erie-sized bit of flawed logic being tossed around in the wake of the lottery win Tuesday night, though: One benefit to going with Noel over Kansas shooting guard Ben McLemore is that the Kentucky power forward-center does not expect to return until around Christmas, allowing the Cavaliers to build a better roster while simultaneously positioning themselves for a high pick in the loaded 2014 draft. Yes, because if there’s one thing fans should want after years of losing it’s to angle for another season of missing the playoffs.

Welcome to the Andrew Wiggins Effect. Wiggins is a Canadian who just played his senior season of high school in West Virginia, the son of former NBA veteran Mitchell Wiggins, and bound for Kansas. He would have, at the very least, challenged Anthony Davis for No. 1 in the 2011 draft as a junior, would have lapped the field this year, and is projected as the clear favorite to go first in 2014. Beyond Wiggins, several other major prospects could be in the next draft, from elite one-and-done freshman to returnees like Oklahoma State point guard Marcus Smart to international shooting guard Mario Hezonja.

The Bobcats, the Kings, the Pelicans, the Suns, the Magic – they are at least a year away from a playoff push. This isn’t that. The Cavaliers are in go mode. You take Noel if he is the best prospect on the board and then deal with the delay, not because missing months is a benefit.

Cleveland should absolutely be thinking postseason, as colleague John Schuhmann noted in his report from the lottery. It missed by 14 games in 2012-13, a pretty good distance, except that the team that finished eighth, Milwaukee, could lose important free agents, plural, while the Cavaliers are clearly in an upward trajectory. Anderson Varejao is expected back after being limited to 25 games, Kyrie Irving can be counted on for more than 59 games, and Dion Waiters and Tyler Zeller will be off the rookie learning curve. Fourteen games in the Eastern Conference is not exactly insurmountable.

The draft options are a trade, to add experience, or McLemore because he grades out as a better two-way prospect, even after taking Waiters in the lottery last June. Orlando, picking second, would then take whoever is left between Noel and McLemore, or possibly Trey Burke to address a need at point guard.

If the Magic don’t take him, Burke, the college Player of the Year from Michigan, is in a precarious spot. The Wizards are third, and they have John Wall. The Bobcats pick fourth and are liking Kemba Walker enough that point guard is far from a pressing concern. The Suns will pick fifth one season after spending big on free agent Goran Dragic and taking Kendall Marshall in the lottery. The unknown in Phoenix is the view of new GM Ryan McDonough, without any track record in the job.

That scenario gets Burke to the Hornets/Pelicans at six. That, in turn, would be trouble for Austin Rivers, but there was always a question whether New Orleans reached by drafting him to be a true point when a lot of teams saw combo guard. It’s hard to imagine Burke getting past the Hornicans. If he does, there is Sacramento with its annual point-guard decision in the draft.

The Burke picture is not unlike Damian Lillard in 2012, when he went into the draft as the top prospect at the position and lasted until No. 6 because many of the teams picking at the very top were already committed. Davis was the obvious No. 1 for New Orleans, followed soon after by the Wizards with Wall at 3, the Cavaliers with Irving at 4 and the Kings at 5 a year after they spent a lottery pick on Jimmer Fredette. Things seemed to work out for Lillard.

Category: 2013 NBA Draft / Tags: , , , , , , / 23 Comments /

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