Just got back from the game. First, the Thunder are not good, other than Green, Durant (who looks like he will never be more than a scorer at best) and Westbrook, the team is generally untalented. Swift, Petro and Sene = 21 feet of crap. They need real bigs in the worst way.
Observations on the Sixers, especially things I have not noticed on TV. Iggy is bringing the ball up a lot in half court sets, maybe a quarter of the time, and is the best initiator of their break with his dribble. His power dribble on the break and court vision were very impressive, plus he had some nice drives to the basket in the half-court. He sees the court at least as well as Miller does. His jumper almost has too much arc on it. He might be able to control it a little better if he flattened it out just a little. Still, he shot better tonight than he has most of the season.
I know Sam had a good game tonight, but there were still three or four cringe worthy times where the ball wnet into his hand and you just knew something awkward and bad would happen, and it did. His 15 footer was falling better tonight and he had some nice tap-ins. He sets the most useless screens imaginable.
Lou looked terrible. He was missing FT's, completely ignoring his team mates and absolutely blew three outlet passes to start a break that ended up as easy steals for OKC instead of easy baskets for us. Any time he gets any space between himself and a defender he shoots, otherwise he drives. His defense was so-so.
Thad has an incredible nose for the ball and the basket and the touch on all of his shots is feathery smooth. He can put points on the board in a hurry. He is a glider athletically as opposed to Iggy's more explosive athleticism. And no, they don't run plays for him.
Green looked solid, he left some shots short, but so did a lot of players (4th game in 5 nights) tonight. He plays more within himself tha Lou does.
Speights has all of the tools offensively and is a better athlete than I ever imagined when we drafted him. He has the second best touch on his shot to Thad and it is pretty close between the two of them. He just needs to learn some go to moves and get more experience on defense. He will be starting by next year, book it. Also he should come i the game when Brand sits to keep the offense balanced. There is usually a 3-5 minute span of time when reggie and Sam are the only bigs in the game. This is not good, every time this happened the Thunder made a run and our offense clogged up. Speights should come in with or before Reggie.
Reggie was Reggie, which was a good thing in itself. You can tell he makes the opposition uncomfortable by his raw energy.
Brand is a player who is not dominant in any one area, but seems to be very good in most. He is an extremely efficient and proficient shotblocker who keeps the blocked ball in play. He plays the interior passing lanes very well. He deferred to Sammy on the boards some tonight as he defended the perimeter a little more (not really his thing, see Green, Jeff in the boxscore), but he definitely does not slow down the break when he runs.
This may sound like I am picking on him, but it's actually a compliment - Brand's offensive game is a mixture of a more athletic Armon Gilliam down low, with Chris Webber on the mid-range jump shot and a neat little power drive built in to his repertoire. Like Gilliam he does not jump over people, but down low, when he is not open to dunk the ball, he has a number of fakes, half hooks, push shots and other tricks and body contortions he uses around the rim to get his shot off or initiate contact for a foul. Speights will eventually have a more prototypical low-post game as his height will allow him to get off a variety of jump hooks, turn-around jumpers and drop shots that might get blocked if Brand shot them straight up. Brand really has a neat bag of tricks in his varied offensive game and a nice touch from the perimeter, plus real muscle on the boards and defensively. Sadly none of our guards has a shooting touch to compare with Brand, Speights and Thad.
We also have the best garbage time three point shooting team in teh league with Rush, Ivey and Marshall. Marshall is definitely power forward sized these days and could not keep up with any decent small forward. In a pinch you could get 10 minutes a game from him at PF without killing your team.
