"You Gotta Love It Baby" Official Jazz thread

[HuskyFreeNorthwest]

Agreed. Navy blue and purple are practically fraternal twins anyway, so it's just a subtle spin on the old colors. I dig it.

Plus you don't have to own any Husky colored apparel.

[HuskyFreeNorthwest]

Bayless and Roy are both really good, imagine when they get the boost players get when they leave the career suck that is Portland, like Drexler, Z-Bo, Rod Strickland and on and on.

Roy will probably win an MVP somewhere else, and Bayless will be an All-Star.

[MarkGrace]

Kal El made a 3pter. That's odd.

[Donuthole]

Kal El made a 3pter. That's odd.

Also, a Memo Okur sighting. The night grows ever stranger.

[MarkGrace]

Also, a Memo Okur sighting. The night grows ever stranger.

Wow...Yeliz must have had her baby.

[MarkGrace]

Kudos to whoever put AK47 in the time machine.

[HuskyFreeNorthwest]

Kudos to whoever put AK47 in the time machine.

If it was just tonight I would say he was just getting lucky against bad defender Martell Webster, but it is more than just tonight.

[LiveCoug]

So, will Harpring be a permanent fixture on the Jazz broadcasts? I assume he officially retired after being traded to OKC?

[MarkGrace]

Another nice game. 32 teams assists, 63% from the floor, and what seems like a season best 29-32 from the FT line.

Just need to do a better job on the O boards than we have been lately.

[smokymountainrain]

Kudos to whoever put AK47 in the time machine.

You must be talking about time as in minutes, right? That would be Sloan by way of a calf strain.

Bottom line is that AK started having problems with his game when his minutes were significantly cut and now that he's playing 35 per again, he's getting it done. I hope nobody is surprised by this.

[MarkGrace]

You must be talking about time as in minutes, right? That would be Sloan by way of a calf strain.

No. He played 37 minutes in two of the four games before Booz went out. The other two in that stretch he played 20 (because we were beating Jersey by 30) and 25 (foul trouble early at Portland).

As I already stated above, he played 35 mins or more 12 times before Booz went out. Through the first 14 games of the season, he [I]averaged[I] 36 mpg with Booz in the lineup. It was only after sitting out 6 games with an injury that his minutes seem to take a nosedive.

Bottom line is that AK started having problems with his game when his minutes were significantly cut and now that he's playing 35 per again, he's getting it done. I hope nobody is surprised by this.

Bottom line is that AK's play correlates to minutes, not vice versa. Simply playing 35 minutes a game is not going to make his game magically reappear. If AK makes hard cuts to the hoop, goes up strong, takes care of the ball, moves without the ball to get open and pick up garbage, and shoots the ball with confidence, he's going to get big minutes. If he hangs around the perimeter, constantly loses the ball in traffic, clanks every jumpshot, flails his arms like a pterodactyl in the lane, complains about his touches, and acts too proud to get garbage points because he's a high paid player, then he's not going to play big minutes. Unfortunately most of the last two seasons have been plagued by the latter -- in recent weeks he's doing the former.

Forget Booz, this has almost zero to do with him. There are two things I have legitimately wondered, however. The first is that Deron finally seems to not be freezing him out of the offense. Deron is getting him the ball more when he's open, something he wasn't doing in previous years. And quite frankly, I never blamed him given how dreadful AK's offensive game has been (I know, I know, efficiency! -- Sorry, with his extremely limited offensive skills I'm not buying it). But even then, I think you have to still put some of the blame on Deron. Despite AK's offensive woes, I'd be willing to bet that Stock would still get him the ball when open to try and get him going.

The other thing is AK the starter vs. AK the bench player. He can say that starting doesn't mean anything to him, but I get the feeling that it does. Maybe it affects his ego, or confidence, or whatever, but he seems to play much better as a starter.

As a starter (18 games) he's playing 33 mpg and getting 14 ppg on 55.5% from the floor. Off the bench (23 games) he plays 26 per and gets 10 ppg on 44.6%. I'd be willing to bet that this trend extends beyond just this year.

[Jacob]

I think it's a combination of things that has made AK less effective over the past several years. Part Deron (not passing him the ball), part Boozer (hogging the ball and taking all the minutes at AK's best position), part Sloan (not playing him, not keeping his fragile mental state in tact, not helping Deron see that he needs to keep AK involved), and of course you have to blame AK for not being able to deal with it--the fact is he hasn't performed.

But while most (including you, I'm guessing) had given up on AK, some of use still held out hope and saw what he could do on defense and believed that if used properly, he would play much better. That is now panning out. We'll see if it's a short-term thing, or if he, and they, can keep it up.

But AK didn't all of a sudden learn how to shoot, or how to play in the post, or how to pass. There's been nothing magical. If it is simply a matter of him playing harder, or smarter, then someone better figure out what it is that's made him do it. IMO, it's the fact that he's playing more and he's more involved. So, lets blame him for being a weak-minded, novella-loving, bad-haircut wearing, Dolph Lundgren look-a-like. But let's try to keep him doing what he's doing. Again, to me that's playing time and being involved in the offense, and it always has been.

[MartyFunkhouser]

Bayless and Roy are both really good, imagine when they get the boost players get when they leave the career suck that is Portland, like Drexler, Z-Bo, Rod Strickland and on and on.

Roy will probably win an MVP somewhere else, and Bayless will be an All-Star.

Funny but you do realize that Drexler played his best basketball in Portland and Strickland had some damn good seasons in Portland. It isn't like his career took off after he left Portland. Bayless and Roy are going to be Blazers for a long time.

[smokymountainrain]

No. He played 37 minutes in two of the four games before Booz went out. The other two in that stretch he played 20 (because we were beating Jersey by 30) and 25 (foul trouble early at Portland).

As I already stated above, he played 35 mins or more 12 times before Booz went out. Through the first 14 games of the season, he [I]averaged[I] 36 mpg with Booz in the lineup. It was only after sitting out 6 games with an injury that his minutes seem to take a nosedive.

In those 14 games, he averaged 15 and 7. He scored in double figures in 13 of the 14 and had 6 or more rebounds in 10 of the 14. Those are '03-'04 numbers. He played well, yet when he came back from his injury, he never got more than 30 minutes until he got 37 against SAS on 1/17 and scored 26 on 11-15 FGs. So I'm not sure I can agree that AK's play correlates to minutes as you mention.

I realize I criticize Boozer in just about every other post, but this is not about Boozer. It just happens they both play in the frontcourt and therefore an injury to Boozer means more minutes to AK. Same thing would happen if Memo or Millsap went down.

FWIW, I agree about Deron freezing him out. I think that was a big part of his struggles as well. But this year, not only is he looking for him, it seems he's going out of his way to look for him - even above other teammates.

As a starter (18 games) he's playing 33 mpg and getting 14 ppg on 55.5% from the floor. Off the bench (23 games) he plays 26 per and gets 10 ppg on 44.6%. I'd be willing to bet that this trend extends beyond just this year.

I tend to agree that he plays better as a starter, but we also get back to the minutes argument - 33 mpg to 26 mpg. I think you would be hard pressed to find a stretch in his career where he played 33-37 minutes a game in which he didn't play like the "old" AK.

[MarkGrace]

I realize I criticize Boozer in just about every other post, but this is not about Boozer. It just happens they both play in the frontcourt and therefore an injury to Boozer means more minutes to AK.

But like I said, based on what? You've already contradicted this paragraph in your first paragraph by citing how many minutes AK played in the first 14 -- that was with Boozer! We've already seen that he plays 35+ with Boozer in the lineup if he's playing well (12 times this season before Booz even went out), and without Boozer last year we didn't see a notable spike in his minutes by virtue of simple absence.

I think you would be hard pressed to find a stretch in his career where he played 33-37 minutes a game in which he didn't play like the "old" AK.

Of course I couldn't, because his play correlates to minutes. If he plays well, Sloan is going to leave him out there for a good chunk of time. If he's sucking, there's no way he's staying out there beyond 33 minutes. Cause and effect, not effect and cause.

But, all of this discussion may be moot because as Jacob said, "we'll see if it's a short-term thing." He had two stretches like this last year before disappearing into the play we've been accustomed to for the last 2-3 years. I'm hoping he can keep this up, but I'm not convinced.