Sixers rip Bucks for record setting win

Simple as that.

It doesn’t happen often to see this kind of trashing so even a tanker like me has to enjoy the 112-69 win over the Bucks (18-28, .391) that will go down as “the largest win in 12 seasons at the Wachovia center”.

I was almost embarassed to see Milwaukee being buried like that and with our margin getting wider and wider I was thinking about my friends Alex & Frank from Brew Hoop, the fine Bucks blog. Hey, no bragging at all here, we’ve been so many times on the other side, the losing one, that we know how it feels and don’t want to can’t make fun of our opponents.

Bucks were playing on the second night of a back-to-back, and starters Micheal Redd and Desmond Mason didn’t even suit up because of injuries, bust this doesn’t take anything out of the Sixers performance, and shouldn’t be used as an excuse for them either. We simply outplayed them in every possible way, from start to finish.

No need to go with the quarter by quarter analysis this time (to sum it up: we gained the lead at 8-6 in the first and progressively extended it to 51-32 at the break, 77-47 in the third and 99-52 in the fourth: that was +47 folks…),  let’s focus on few interesting flashes.

Blogger MVP/ROY Rankings – Round 5

You perhaps remember that the first italian Sixers blog hosted Round 4 of the Blogger MVP/ROY rankings.

Well, two weeks passed since then, and it’s time for Round 5, hosted by PickaxeAndRoll.com, the SB nation Denver Nuggets blog (comments welcome there).

I took part to this round as well, of course to screw up the rankings with my european ignorance, and I think I did it, considering who is up there at #2 (LOL).

Thanks to Jeremy for collecting the votes and putting them together.

Just for the record here are MY rankings (10 and 5 are for the two top candidates) that I sent Sunday morning:

First win in Charlotte Arena is dumb

Apparently Sixers never won at the Charlotte Bobcats Arena before.

Well, I would have preferred that they waited at least one more year, because I am afraid this 103-96 win vs the Bobcats is one of those that we will regret in the weeks before the lottery. Whatever.

Our record is 17-28 (.378) and we are dangerously close to the 8th seed in the East: currently Indiana is there at 19-26, this means we trail them by only 2 games… that eighth spot would mean a sweep in the first round by the Celtics and no top pick: you tell me if there is anything worse than that.

Yes, I am in full tanking mode, in case you didn’t notice, but I am always trying to be positive so let’s take the good things out of this otherwise useless win.

1) Thaddeus Young got his first start in the NBA. This is the best news of the night to me. “Young vet” didn’t have a spectacular game, but he did make a solid contribution after a slow start. Props to Mo for the move (or, if you want to be evil, blame Mo for waiting 44 games before realizing that Evans simply can’t be a starter in this league)

Smart loss at MSG

Well done guys (in the pic, Lou Williams and Andre Iguodala congratulating each other*).

Play hard, fight until the end and then lose the game. Whether it’s for missed free throws, lack of outside shooting (like it was last night) or whatever else, I don’t care. We need more of those ping pong balls in the lottery.

Let the Knicks and other franchises rise to useless 33-35 wins, we need to stay below that number and get a top pick. In the meantime, it’s ok if you play like this, and with Mo at the helm, there is still more hope. He didn’t make any particular mistake last night, to be honest, but he can always f’k a game up with his decisions.

Some fellow tanker on the Sixers board of Philly.com described the matchup vs New York as a “must lose game”. Another poster followed him saying this is a “must lose weekend” (tonight we play the Bobcats). I second that. And that’s why the 81-89 loss (16-28, .364) has a sweet taste. Three losses in a row, 2-11 in 2008? Fine with me. Just let the young plays play, develop them, make them improve.

Versus the emerging (?) Knicks we saw one more time what is good and what is bad with this team. Among the good things:

“Both teams played bad”

I’m gonna pull a Rasheed Wallace to comment your usual, routine loss to the Pistons, this time 78-86 at home, for a 16-27 (.372) record.

I don’t know if Pistons fans enjoy this type of games wins but anyway I must say that all the games we played with them in the last XXX years were damn boring, and believe me I like almost any kind of basketball game, reguardless of how the final score is. It’s barely a surprise that the first loss of this year came in similar way and we even scored the same (low) amount of points, 78.

I was also thinking that the last time we beat Detroit in a serious game was in Wilt Chamberlain’s rookie year or something, but I eventually learned that they won only 13 of the last 15 games, which is pretty good….

Overall the “baby reaching for a bottle that is out of reach” expression that Steve King used is funny and gives you the idea of how the game went. I also had the impression that Pistons were playing with us, putting minimum effort to come out with a win after an uncharacteristic three games losing streak. That’s what veteran teams do, after all, we have only to take note and try to learn from them.

(This recap comes late due to “technical” reasons – couldn’t open the game on League Pass for a long stretch – so let’s try focus on things that you perhaps didn’t read elsewhere yet, quarter by quarter)

The best thing I noticed in the FIRST QUARTER was that we wore the cool throwback uniforms again (in the picture, Willie Green): even Detroit commentators said they look “great” (I always have to write a specific article about this, but it will come, don’t worry).

Cheeks and rims are tankers’ best allies

Kinda depressing.

After the 103-110 home loss to the Indiana Pacers (16-26, .381) I switched to New Orleans-Milwaukee and I watched all that I would like to see from my team: full court intensity, organized basketball, hustle plays, spectacular baskets, MADE SHOTS, an enthusiastic crowd, A TRUE LEADER on the floor… the contrast with what I had just seen earlier was stunning. I hope we will reach all those soon.

As of now, I am here commenting another disappointing home loss to a below average team (exactly like us), that was without its best player (Jermaine O’Neal) and that had another key contributor in the first half sidelined by an injury in the second (Troy Murphy). It was definitely a sweet comeback home for Philly guy Jim O’ Brien.

So we are here heading for the lottery again.

Tankers now have some secret allies: one is on our bench and is a human being, the others are inanimated, immobile things that Sixers players often “use” to lose games: the Wachovia center’s rims.

Who follows this blog knows perhaps that I was never a great Cheeks fan. A legend as a player, good guy and everything, but not exactly a great baskebtabll mind, in my humble opinion. To his credit he was never given lot of talent to work with, this year more than ever. But you have some signs that indicate that he didn’t great even when he had some (how about the 5-19 start of last year for a team with Iverson, Webber and Iguodala ??) But let’s focus on present.

Green and Evans lead Sixers over Toronto

Time to give them credit. And a rare chance to be on Sixers4guidos’ front page (LOL).

Reggie Evans (in the picture, looking actually a good offensive player…) and Willie Green were Sixers’ best players in a 99-95 win over Toronto, that marks the midseason term. Sixers are 16-25 (.390) and it looks that keeping this pace my 31 W prediction will be pretty correct.

The game wasn’t exactly memorable, both teams were in the second night of a back-to-back, Toronto was playing for the fourth time in five nights, Sixers for the fourth time in six.

Not suprisingly the start was slow, in the FIRST QUARTER Sixers shot 35% (6/17) with Andre Miller missing oll of his 5 attempts, and Toronto 35% (7/20). Our offense was just stagnant, we saw Dalembert shooting a three (!!), Lou Williams and Thaddeus Young launching two airballs. A wonderful baseline dunk by Jamario Moon was the best thing in those ugly 12 minutes (15-18).

Boston throws its usual three point party

(Memo to Ed Stefanski: we all got that the Korver trade was made in order to create cap space, and you even stated that publicly to our friend Brian/Depressed fan in a famous interview, but please sign a three point shooter next summer, besides the PF that we desperately need. Well, a couple of them, while you are at it. You saw it last night, it’s nice to have shooters !

Memo to Mo Cheeks: we got that this team hasn’t much talent, after all we  appreciate what you are doing with a roster where two stiffs like Evans and Green “must” start, we give you credit for the fact that these guys play hard every night, but please… fix that f’n perimeter defense !!! It’s not funny to watch all other teams raining threes on us on a daily basis, I swear)

If you didn’t watch the game, don’t let the final 89-116 score fool you (15-25, .375). Celtics didn’t have any fun for 43 minutes. They more than made up for it in the final five.

Here is the story of another early lead that turns into a loss (remember the Bulls game), and of another, merciless three point barrage (remember the three Raptors games, or also the first one vs Boston).

But I am not disappointed, at the end of the day. Low standards, maybe. Or maybe long term view. I just try to see the half full (ok, 1/3 full) part of the glass.

When you will read this post, you will perhaps already know what the boxscore and the main reports clearly tell you: the low percentage from the line, the stunning difference from downtown (2 vs 14 three pointers made, with one of our two coming from a desperation shot by Reggie Evans, the first trey of his career !!!). So let’s focus on other aspects, as usual.

Texas trip ends on a sweet note

(Guys first of all a short premise. I know these recaps come late, but it’s really impossible for me to watch live the games played West when I have to go to work the next day, due to the time zone difference.

So I watch the archived game when I get back home and then write down my BS.

I chosed to do like this to assure at least some original content having real knowledge of facts, instead of throwing out some meaningless crap early in the morning after checking the boxscore… hope you understand my point and forgive the delay).

Dear old, cool throwback uniforms and arguably the best quarter of the season gave the Sixers a really exciting 111-107 win at Houston, snapping a 7 games losing streak (15-24, .385).

I don’t know what make me happier, to see those beloved unis again or the comeback win on the road (we were trailing by sixteen in the third, 67-83 with 2.20 left) with our young guys playing a major role in the decisive stretch.

Ok then I’ll list the things that I liked:

1) Dalembert’s game overall, and his impressive first quarter. He knocked down his first five shots, all on long jumpers that left Yao speechless. Immediatly after knocking down his fourth (if I recall well) the camera showed Sam with a cool smile ( in the picture he screams) that meant like “Hey, why are you surprised, I can do that !!”. Yes, his range is way longer now and he is effective also from the distance. That is really nice, we need more weapons on offense. He finished the first period with 12 points on 6/7 shooting and had 14 at the break (7/10).

Blogger MVP/ROY rankings – Round 4

The first italian Sixers blog is proud to host the fourth round of the “Blogger MVP/ROY rankings”. 

The Brew Hoop crew had initially the idea to put together some of the best NBA blog(ger)s and ask them to vote who they think should be the MVP and the ROY of the season so far. A guido blogger was allowed too, just to show that americans are open minded and democratic: you know, US Government’s public relations tricks…

Anyway, results of the poll are published every two weeks, and this was the first round (Dec 3rd at Brew Hoop), while Clips Nation hosted the second (Dec 17th) and 3 Shades of blue did it with the third (Dec 31th).

Time for the fourth round, then. Voters were:

• Seth from Posting and toasting (Knicks blog)
• College Wolf from… College Wolf (Timberwolves blog)
• Ryan from Hornets 247 
• Ben from Third quarter collapse (Magic blog)
• David from 20 second timeout (NBA blog)
• Brett from Queen City hoops (Bobcats blog)
• Matt/Corndogg from Hardwood Paroxysm (NBA blog)
• Jeremy from PickaxeAndRoll.com (Nuggets blog)
• Guys from We rite goode (NBA blog)
• Frank & Alex from Brew Hoop (Bucks blog)
• ClipperSteve from ClipsNation (Clippers blog)
• Jim from Green Bandwagon (Celtics blog)
• Tom from Celtics blog
• Ricky from Sixers4guidos (yeah, the euro nerd that they let in…)

Votes were given from 10 (top) to 1 for the MVPs, and from 5 (top) to 1 for the rookies.

Here are the results of this round, with selected comments, the race was really tough and close, decided by few votes, like you can see looking at the differences bewteen the first four players. Enjoy !!