December 5, 2007
Raps vs. Suns Preview
Jay wrote this today:
Get ready to run. You would think that with Nash turning 34 this year that the guy would be slowing down a bit, that he would be trying to pace himself a little more, that maybe he would be thinking about having energy at the end of the season. Well, so much for that. Nash is putting up great numbers again, leading the league in assists with 11.1 per game. But wait, Jose and TJ are 9th and 10th in assists, which isn’t too shabby.
I said earlier that I thought this was a game the Raptors would be able to compete in without Chris Bosh. If the Raptors are going to play an uptempo game, you would think that they would need a big man who can actually get up and down the court, which Bosh can. It defies logic, but I think that if they do not have Bosh in the lineup, the Raptors are going to focus on a lot of quick ball movement and won’t have to worry about Bosh’s patented hold it for 4 and then decide what to do move.
Speaking of deciding what to do with the ball, I never mentioned Gatorade Graham’s name the other night. Joey had that nice spin move dunk, which was great to see because as soon as he got the ball, he made the move and went to the basket with authority. If you see a guy with a body like that and momentum coming down the lane, you’d better be built like a truck if you plan on any contact. One other quick point: Apparently TJ was all over Joey in practice, playing D on him and trash talking him. Looks like that motivated him a bit, because nobody likes to be punked in front of his teammates, especially by a little guy.
So back to the preview. “Hi, I’m Shawn Marion. I want to be traded. Ah, you know what? Forget it, I don’t want to be traded. I’m just going to says it’s all behind us now and go average a double-double on the season if that’s okay with everybody.” How exactly does this happen? How does it happen that one week you’re the biggest news in Phoenix for wanting out from a team that has a legit shot at the title, the next week, all’s well? Word is that he just wanted to play more at SF, not PF as D’Antoni wants him to. He just wants to play against smaller guys. So my guess is they had one of those, “You will play where we tell you to” conversations and they reminded him the team he was playing for. Maybe they threatened to send him to the Knicks. That’s enough to scare anybody.
You have to like a team that can walk Grant Hill and Leandro Barbosa off the bench. I also think getting Alando Tucker in the draft was a beautiful pickup. He will be a solid player in this league some day.
Keys for the Raptors? Well, you can laugh when we say that Nash has to be shut down, but last year, the Raptors had him shut down until the final few minutes of the fourth quarter, when Nash decided to take over and single-handedly win the game for the Suns. We all know that Nash isn’t that great on D, so they need to try to exploit that fact, make him work harder on D and wear him out as much as they can. In addition to his passing ability, Nash also has the scoring touch, which makes things that much more difficult. Personally, I think your best bet is to play off him a bit and make him beat you with the shot, because once he puts the ball on the floor, he has too many options and is quick to the basket.
The Suns score a lot, but they also give up a lot of points. They’ll drop 108 on you, but they can’t stop you from scoring over 100 either. The Raptors need to stay in it early, because if they fall behind in the first half, they are not going to want to run in the second half, trying to play keep up with the Suns.
Alright, enjoy the game.
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