Suns Continue Lakers' Woes

by Dan @ Bright Side Of The Sun on Apr 14, 2007 10:05 AM MDT in Phoenix Suns News

Here's a new strategy to guarding Kobe: put Shawn Marion and Raja Bell on him and let him shoot away. I was over at some friends' house watching the game and the mantra whenever Kobe got the ball was, "You Know He's Going To Shoot It". And shoot it he did!

Kobe shot 7-26 and only scored 17 points. How in the WORLD does he expect to win against any team when he keeps shooting like that? The night before he scored 50 points and the Lakers still lost. He took 26 shots against the Suns and 33 against the Clippers. He made 17 of the 33 against the Clippers but he also took 3 times more shots than anyone else on the team.

Well, enough about a guy not even on our team. The Suns played pretty well, I think. Steve Nash, Shawn Marion and Amare Stoudemire all had double-doubles. Steve had another MVP performance with 26 points and 14 rebounds. Raja Bell was way off last night but he did his job by stopping Kobe. Leandro Barbosa also had a really off night scoring only 8 points on 3-10 shooting.

James Jones was a disappointment again. He shot 0-6 (0-5 from the three-point line). He was missing early and just kept going after that. But I was glad to see Steve encouraging him even as he was missing the shots.

My favorite part of the night? When Amare banked in two shots in a row. The first one definitely looked like an accident and afterward we saw several of his teammates speaking to him as he was laughing. I would imagine they were telling him it doesn't count if he doesn't call it.

Oh, one more thing I forgot to mention, with how Amare was talking about the Lakers the other day, I would have thought he might show up a little more than he did. Sure, he had a double-double. But he shot 4-16. Amare HAS to do better than that if the Suns want to beat the Lakers in a 7 game series.

What did you think of the game?

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Good game

I was at the game and I had positive vibes. When I read the articles in the morning paper, I could not believe how it was being reported (we are back to how the journalists twist the facts). One would have thought the Suns played horribly and were on the brink of elimination from playoff contention. These writers (Coro and Bickley) made me so sick that I rushed off a letter to the editor.

On the game now: I saw many positives, despite some problems. I am going to list the positives and negatives without separating them.

1.James JOnes 0 for 6 shooting allowed the Lakers to take a lead in the first quarter. Why is he still starting? If the Suns need defense, put KT in. When Jones cannot score, he becomes a liability.

2.Barbosa had a surprisingly low scoring night, but even then he nailed a couple of 3 pointers at key moments.

3.Raja started off poorly (shooting wise) but he still scored 18 points, and his defense on Kobe was unbelievable.

4.Diaw- Still not back to last year's form but a pretty solid effort. He really hustled and made some great saves and some nice shots. If he can do this consistently, the Suns will be in a good shape.

5.Steve Nash- What more can I say about him that has not already been said? He does whatever the team needs at a given point in time. When his team mates were struggling with shooting, Nash was making unbelievable shots. I hope those journalists who had already picked Dirk for MVP were watching.

6.Amare missed a lot of 'should have made' shots. He seemed to do better in the second half. I am not seeing the speed/power/explosiveness in him anymore. Is he tired from playing too much?

7.The Matrix was great; made some nice shots and great defense.

8.KT was great defensively, and he made those mid range jumpers (he usually does). I was most impressed with some of the defensive plays he made.

Overall a pretty solid win, regardless of what the whining journalists are saying.

by Vash01 @ Bright Side Of The Sun on Apr 14, 2007 11:11 AM MDT reply actions

OT but...

did anyone read espn's article about marion, "the invisible man". its generated a lot of negative comments..which I don't necessarily disagree with. Especially with his hesistation to the question of being the superstar on a bad team vs being on the suns. I hope these "chemistry issues" will be addressed...eyes on the prize!

by alta on Apr 14, 2007 12:50 PM MDT reply actions

Owww... that hurt to read.

Thanks for the heads up on the article, here's a link for anyone that can't find it:

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?page=espnmag/marion

It's obvious that Marion wouldn't mind a bit more credit for all his hard work but it's hard to tell if that writer is making it into a bigger issue than it is by turning a few comments into this huge article for ESPN Magazine.

I mean, you read that article and you picture Marion sitting at home alone all day, complaining about his teammates and daydreaming of being traded. I just can't imagine him wanting to give up a potential title to go off and be Joe Johnson all over again... not that he could be that dominant anyways without somebody like Nash. Just my opinion.

by Trvs on Apr 14, 2007 2:01 PM MDT up reply actions

marion

Hey, great article, thanks for the word. I just went to the defensive player of the nba web page, looks like ben wallace has won it alot.

Link to some info on defensive player of the yr award

Pretty sad reading. I was thinking Joe Johnson all over again also. Of course, Joe wanted to be near family, or didn't like Phoenix..who knows... but the Suns sure tried to keep him... he wanted out. If we still had Joe, there's no question we'd be a great team, but there's always team chemistry to think about.

I think the Steve MVP wins has actually hurt the suns in some ways. Here's Matrix, on a team with someone getting all this attention,
I'm sure that makes him wonder where his appreciation is at. A lot to analyze, too complicated to simply say. I sure hope Matrix gets the defensive player of the year award, he deserves it!

It's kind of funny, I'm pretty sure by the way steve nash acts, that he could have the 2 mvp wins
disappear, as long as they win the championship and he wouldn't care. He's the definition of unselfishness.

One nice thing about the espn article, a comment after it said what I've always guessed, that Marion is a class act toward others. If I could carve out an answer, (Everyone knows STAT is just beginning his greatness and a lot of great things to come) but I'd love to see the Suns win it all and have Marion get the mvp of the finals. Sounds like he needs it.

by jasonsuns1 on Apr 14, 2007 4:26 PM MDT up reply actions

Writer pessimism

I usually defend Paul Coro. I think he does a pretty good job in a thankless and not-very-fun job. But it kind of ticked me off a little bit that when the Suns came into Phoenix really late after the Denver blizzard and then lost to Washington, they didn't get any credit for being tired. Everyone, and I believe Coro was one of the "everyone", said the Suns should have won the game anyway. Yet, what does the view from press row on his article say today?

"The Lakers came in energetic because they needed a win but may have been ripe for an early knockout after arriving in Phoenix at 2:30 a.m."

So the Lakers get an excuse but the Suns don't? Oh well, 3 more games until the playoffs and then we can talk about real games.

by Dan @ Bright Side Of The Sun on Apr 14, 2007 4:36 PM MDT reply actions