Pactice! We talkin about practice man ! Practice ?

[coachx]

Yes practice !

I was listening to a Danny Ainge interview yesterday and it really got me thinking. He spoke of how his Celtics practices last year were poor. They were young, lacking depth, and he kept harping on how they lacked toughness in parctice which directly translated to playing soft in real games.

He basically said their practices were a joke and when Pierce went down the rest of the roster could not practice at a high enough intensity to get them ready for real games. He also spoke of how they lacked depth to truely have 5 on 5 scrimmages to match people up vs. players of their own positions to get them ready for real games.

To me this means Big Baby ws drafted to bang vs. Jefferson and toughen him up.

The Hawks team has some people who appear to be practice demons. We started the season last year 4-1. I contribute that to the hard practices Woody put them through in the preseason. There were several articles last year siteing how Woody didn't have to spend as much ime "teaching" as in years past and could put more focus and time on practice.

Sheldon, ZaZa, and Horford are all high energy big effort,bangers who will be going at it in practice. These guys love playing physical and don't shy away from contact, they are actually drawn to contact. They prefer banging in the post vs. throwing up a fade away.Smoove better be ready to bang alot and Marvin too.

The daily practice and traing we often forgot about but this teams has some practice demons. I expect us to give Chicago Bulls like effort next year and just staright up out work some opposing teams with our toughness and front court depth. this should be our new "team identity."

[Lascar78]

If we want tough practices we should re-sign Batista.

If we want to stay healthy we should not.

[pimp]

How about working on some offensive sets?

I tired of Woody's "play good D , and the offensive will take care of itself crap.

This team needs an offensive coordinator in the worst way.

[DJlaysitup]

Yeah...it did take care of itself...to the tuned of last in the league last year

[Lascar78]

Uh ... yeah. Which is why it would have been nice to get the only real distributor in the draft. Our offense has to succeed in spite of woodson, not thanks to him.

[coachx]

Quote:

---

How about working on some offensive sets?

I tired of Woody's "play good D , and the offensive will take care of itself crap.

This team needs an offensive coordinator in the worst way.

---

We have no offensive post guy to run offensive sets through. I hope Horford allows us to open up the other 1/2 of the play book where we run the offense throught a offensive post option. Or maybe Smith's work with Hakeem gives him a jump hook to use.

Without a post scorer we left few options:

1. Pick and Rolls

2. High Post plays

3. JJ (or othr shooter) off screens

4. drive and kicks

5. Isolation plays

6. Play off JJ's double teams

If we could get a post scorer to force some post double teams we could actually run a real offense.

[Lascar78]

Agreed. Which is also why Smith should have been in the post ... oh, about two years ago.

[pimp]

Quote:

---

Uh ... yeah. Which is why it would have been nice to get the only real distributor in the draft. Our offense has to succeed in spite of woodson, not thanks to him.

---

To be honest, it's would be hard to distribute the ball, when everyone is just standing around in one spot.

Teams like the Suns and Jazz, always have motion in their offense.Even when they dumped the ball off to the low post ,they always have guys cuting and making themselves avalible.

If we give the ball to Zaza on the left block, everyone else goes to the right side of the court and just waits to see if Zaza scores or misses.

[pimp]

No having a bigtime post present is no excuse.

the Warriors ,Bulls, Nets and 06 Suns offense do well without post player.

[AnakinJoe]

I think our depth should help when guys don't hustle and need to be benched. And guys who are hungry for playing time (Zaza and Shelden) will likely give Horford all he can handle in practice.

But to the point of many others, if they are practicing 3 half-court plays for JJ and that's it, then what difference does it make? If Steve Nash joined this team tomorrow, we'd still be a half-court team. Most defensive-oriented coaches want to milk the shot clock, limit offensive possessions for the other team. Woody employs the wrong game plan for the team that BK has built. But maybe Horford and Law will boost our half-court offense, since they both should flourish in those sets.

[Lascar78]

Quote:

---

the Warriors ,Bulls, Nets and 06 Suns offense do well without post player.

---

Baron Davis, Kirk Hinrich, Jason Kidd, Steve Nash. That's 3 of the top 5 PG's in assists, and hinrich isn't bad either. You need a PG to get things moving, throw the defense off balance to get guys open.

[Lascar78]

For the record our top assist man was Speedy with 4.4 apg, a pathetic 42nd in the league. Our SG was 44th.

[archie_otu]

Quote:

---

For the record our top assist man was Speedy with 4.4 apg, a pathetic 42nd in the league. Our SG was 44th.

---

I agree...we're the worst passing team in the league...which is why we were last in the league in ppg last season.