Friday Bolts – 10.23.09
ESPN the Mag’s preview is out and overall the team got a C-minus. The highest grade came in chemistry: 
“CHEMISTRY — A-minus … The Thunder pointed no fingers during last season’s 3–29 start, and many of them hung out and worked out together this summer. You can’t find that kind of solidarity outside San Antonio or Boston. And GM Sam Presti did his part for team-building by drafting James Harden. Call it a vote of confidence for Westbrook at point guard.”
Jeff Green apparently named his bulldog Rumble. That makes me happy.
Ime Udoka was waived by Portland and Jason Quick of the Oregonian surmises OKC might be a suitor: “Udoka said he is hoping to sign on with another team, and is awaiting word from his agent, Mark Bartelstein, who has been talking to other teams. Udoka said some potential suitors could be Oklahoma City, Denver, Sacramento and Utah.”
A lot of people are talking about last night’s piss-poor performance so I want to toss this in there as well: It was preseason. It didn’t count. It was the last game. The starters played very little. Sure, it’s a little disappointing, but just because the Thunder got whooped in a preseason game doesn’t mean there are MAJOR issues with the team. Now, a week into the season and we’re seeing the same issues? Then yeah, there could be problems. The arena was flat last night, the team was flatter and it just seemed like a walkthrough all around. Now get a full house in there and a game that counts and it happens again? That’s cause for worry. The perimeter defense is the biggest thing to fret, but I feel like that will get ironed out. I may be trying to live in denial, but I tend to not overreact about stuff and fear the worst. This season might not be any fun if I did.
Speaking of, Darnell Mayberry’s recap and he wasn’t pumped: “Once is a mistake. Twice is a habit. Three times? Well, that’s a lifestyle … Making Thursday’s thrashing more alarming was the Thunder yet again played with half-hearted effort, this time allowing Sacramento to impose its will from the opening tip. The Kings beat the Thunder to loose balls, forced Oklahoma City into turnovers and — when they weren’t draining 3s — turned the game into a layup drill.”
And more: ”Don’t think this game didn’t matter. Not for a second. If for some reason you’re still under the impression that Thursday night’s 104-89 loss to the starless Kings was simply a throw-away game, the last of this exhibition season, carefully chew on Kevin Durant’s words. “It always means something when we step on this floor,” he said. “We’re a young team. We want to get better every time we step on the floor. Tonight was a tough one. We took some steps back.” Steps. Plural.”
Video highlights of the game. Amazingly, Serge Ibaka’s monster jam was left out.
Doug Collins previews the Northwest Division.
Gary Bond of MLive.com writes that the Shock’s move was strictly financial: ”On Tuesday, the Detroit Shock, the WNBA’s best franchise this decade, was sold and will relocate to Tulsa, Okla., for the 2010 season. Tulsa is a non-NBA city where the team will be the top sport in town. It was a business move, plain and simple. The Tulsa franchise is 90 miles (the drive from Grand Rapids to Mount Pleasant) from its nearest professional competition, the NBA Oklahoma City Thunder. It won’t be fifth on the list of interest like the Shock were behind the big four: the Detroit Lions (NFL), Detroit Tigers (MLB), Detroit Pistons (NBA) and Detroit Red Wings (NHL).”
The Wall Street Journal is a little late to the party on the Kevin Durant plus/minus debate.
CelticsBlog’s NW Previews:
Denver Nuggets - Denver Stiffs | The Nugg Doctor
Minnesota Timberwolves – Canis Hoopus | Empty the Bench | TWolvesBlog
Oklahoma City Thunder – Blue Blitz | Daily Thunder
Portland Trail Blazers - Blazersedge | A Stern Warning | The Rip City Project | Blaze of Love | BustaBucket | Trail Post
Utah Jazz – SLC Dunk | True Blue Jazz
I did a quick Q&A about the Thunder for Raptors Republic yesterday. Read up.
Now only five days away. Podcast coming later today and a full on season preview after the weekend. Get happy folks. It’s just preseason.
Man, look who was on the floor during those Kings highlights. How could anyone stress about that game? Oh damn, Kevin Ollie got lit up. Saw Byron Mullens give up a layup, too. We’re doomed.
so my wife and I were considering travelling to OKC to catch the Orlando game for our anniversary. We’d head up saturday (we live in Austin), catch the night life on saturday night, then hang out in OKC on sunday, go to the game sunday night, drive back monday morning.
Is this a terrible idea? Would we have fun? Is there anything to do in OKC?
I won’t carry over my negativity from the previous two threads… I’m going to pretend that the guys were just tired and uninterested and chalk it up to preseason wonkiness.
A solid opening night against the Kings at home again will make me feel a lot better.
And on a side note, how good is Tyreke Evans? He is the first guy I’ve really seen stay in front of Westbrook – he even got a couple of nice blocks on him (yes I realize that’s not a good thing). On the offensive end he kept Russ busy and unable to fight for boards or poke around for steels. He was a real factor last night in my opinion…. or maybe Russ was just having a crappy game.
@spike
Oh yeah. I’d highly suggest going to Bricktown. Maybe eat at Toby Keith’s (fun place) or Abuelo’s and then my favorite Saturday night bar/hangout is this place call Michael Murphy’s. It’s a dueling piano bar and it’s very cool. People pay to request songs and such and the performers are very entertaining.
Granted, coming from Austin you may be a little disappointed, but there are still some nice things to do.
@spike
It’s nothing even close to Austin because most of the bars are spread all over town, but there is plenty to do in Oklahoma City. There are some nice restaurants and clubs in Bricktown (by the stadium downtown). Bricktown has the widest assortment of activities for someone who does not know their way around town…
@Dylan
The whole game was a highlight reel for the Kings… Trying to put together a highlight video must have been like doing triage in a war zone. It’s no wonder they left out both of Ibaka’s dunks and a nice one by Collison… they just couldn’t find them amidst all the bombs the Kings dropped.
Sorry all… I’ve just never left a Thunder game early before… I stayed till the end of all but 3 home games last year.
I wasn’t thrilled with the ESPN Mag’s grade. “C-” They placed the several teams higher than us, including the Clippers, Rockets and Suns.
Udoka would be an interesting fit for the Thunder. He spent the past couple of seasons in San Antonio, my first NBA love, so I’ve been following him since then. He was billed as the potential heir to the Bruce Bowen throne of defensive stopper. The Spurs – and fans – were excited to add him to the team – he was supposed to be a great perimeter defender and be able to knock down the 3, both staples in the Spurs system.
However, it never quite worked out as planned. He played heavier minutes in his first season (perhaps since the Spurs spent their mid-level exception on him and wanted badly to make it work). It’s generally known that guys who sign with SA as free agents do much better in their second year, not surprisingly, after they have gotten acclimated with the complex defensive schemes. Not so much for Udoka. He never became the perimeter shut-down guy that the Spurs wanted and instead found himself playing the 4 if and when he would play at all. 48 Minutes of Hell had this to say: http://www.48minutesofhell.com/2009/02/05/ime-udoka-what-could-have-been/
I realize he might not sign with the Thunder, but I thought it was worth a few comments. While he could always turn it around, and he might still have defensive potential, I would currently regard him as a poor man’s Thabo Sefolosha, and at this point, I think Thabo has a much higher ceiling.
@spike
Last year the Magic spanked OKC pretty hard. I’m not sure this year is going to be very different. I’ll be at the game, but I wouldn’t recommend this matching as a must see game.
@Dai
Yeah… I still remember watching Howard drop that MASSIVE triple-double on the them in the Ford Center. Although it sucked, it WAS quite the show and it made me want to pull for the Magic in the playoffs (I can’t hate every team that dominates the Thunder).
Royce, you said 6 days yesterday!
@spike
It has a chance to be really freakin’ cold in early November, and that Orlando game won’t be much of a competitive game. Bricktown is fine on the weekends, but it’s no 6th street. Think a poor man’s San Antonio riverwalk without the shopping. Mickey Mantle’s has some of the best food money can buy, but be prepared to pay for it. It’s the twice a year place I take my wife on anniversaries and birthdays. I checked the gazette and didn’t see anything interesting going on that weekend.
Apparently Darnell didn’t consult with fellow Oklahoman writer Mike Baldwin before running his article and then asking us to chew on Durant’s words about the game when Durant also had this to say about it:
“We’re not concerned at all,” Durant said. “We can’t think about this game. We’ve got to let this game go. (What I liked most in preseason) is every practice was an A-plus. Guys brought it every day.”
Newsflash – The game didn’t matter, AT ALL, it was a pre-season game. They mean more to the guys trying to make the team and the young guys trying to get their feet wet than any final score therein. Hence why Westphal (Kings coach) even said that he thought both team’s held back from showing some wrinkles in that game since they’d be playing each other again in 6 days when it really counts.
I’m usually behind Darnell, but that article wreaked of sensational journalism when there was no cause (5 starters averaged 21.6 minutes in that game for crying out loud) or justification for a Chicken Little take on the matter. Just have a look at what the Nuggets did in the pre-season and you’ll get my point (went 3-4, got CRUSHED by the Jazz (by 16), Pacers (by 18) and Lakers (by 17) in three of the four losses).
@Jax Raging Bile Duct
I think it’s obvious: I suck at countdowns.
@J.G.
Well, obviously the Thunder and Nuggets will be fighting for the league’s worst record this year.
I don’t put much stock in the Udoka deal. Bartelstein always throws Oklahoma City out there as a place where his guys may land. If you recall, he said he was going to have a signed contract in the opening minutes of free agency to bring David Lee to the Thunder.
Secondly, here I go defending Darnell again. From his blog yesterday, it sounds like Brooks told him they were going to run a fairly standard rotation last night, which obviously didn’t happen. None of us like being given wrong information (or what we perceive as wrong information). Second, Darnell’s never been as openly critical of the Thunder as in his recap. He’s generally pretty middle-of-the-road in his reporting, in keeping with the majority of his readership. So when I see him do the journalistic equivalent of Brooks’ recent late practice blow-up, I can’t dismiss it so quickly.
Look whose #6 http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/part2/091023&sportCat=nba
Wow..in that article from Simmons I posted he has Portland finishing with a worse record than us and neither team makes the playoffs…crazy
Thanks for all the comments, folks. I’m not expecting a competitive game either (but would love to be pleasantly surprised), but my wife’s not a Thunder fan and wants to see Dwight and Vince in person, so it should work out ok for both of us. Besides, that’s the weekend we have free….
Sounds like it would be worth the trip, we just want to get away for a weekend and go somewhere nobody knows us, so it might work out great.
@spike
You know, if you’re looking for hotels, the Skirvin Hilton has been newly renovated. It’s pretty shiny if you’re looking for brownie points with the wife.
@Jax Raging Bile Duct
Oh yes. The Dirty Skirv is awesome. I stayed there with my wife the night we got married. It was fantastic. It’s expensive, but outstanding.
Pre-season is over. Westbrook FG% was the worst in the league among those who took 50+ shots. Harden in the bottom 10% of same. That has to change or teams will be able to double Durant or clog the middle or both.
Just two of many problems in my opinion. But I think that Harden’s numbers are artificially low, as he really opened the preseason on a cold streak. It seemed to me that he improved as he progressed and got a bit more comfortable. He shot pretty well last night.
I would also say that Westbrook’s number might be a bit deceptive, as he seemed to be only taking shots when no other option existed. Sure, he missed a few open jump shots, but that is really not what the Thunder need him for.
Also, I had never noticed until last night just how quick Kirtic’s release is. He popped one from the right side of the free throw line that made me belch an involuntary and audible “whoa”…. of course nobody new what the heck I was “whoaing” about, but that’s ok.
I’m much more worried about our interior defense than in our perimeter defense. Our perimeter defense was the best of the season in March and April, after we got Thabo in late February. But we didn’t do much to shore up interior defense except…..Etan Thomas.