Steph, Steven, & PJ Tucker: My NBA Journal

The Thunder opened their home season last night in Oklahoma City with a respectable 115-103 loss to the Philadelphia Sixers. The bench management by Coach D was much better than it was in the two blowout losses to Utah and Houston.

This was actually a fairly watchable game which had some ebb and flow to it. There was never the feel the Thunder would win, but for what in essense was an NBA tanking exhibition game it by far was the best effort by the Thunder this season.

If I had Coach D’s roster as it now stands… Coach D pretty much did what I would do to keep the games as competitve as possible.

What Coach D basically did was issue Isiah Roby a healthy scratch, limit Poku’s defensive liabilities to the team to six minutes, give Kenny Hustle twenty minutes, actually utilize Mike Muscala’s saavy veteran presence, put the ball in Shai’s hands more, keep Giddy engaged, and turn Lu Dort’s defensive hustle loose to energize his team.

I would never ever allow Roby and Poku to be on the floor at the same time as a gesture of repect for Kenrich, Lu, Mike Muscala, and Shai…who are my four best players. If nothing else I’m not going to insult the integrity of the game to these four guys. They’ve earned their NBA minutes.

So here’s the thing…I can’t get on my blog and bitch at Coach D because he did pretty much what I would have done given the hand dealt.

The one thing I would have done differently is to have given Theo Maledon’s minutes to Aaron Wiggins who was a scratch. If I’m building my team from the ground up I want big guards who aren’t a liability on the defensive end.

Giddy is a big guard. Lu is a physical guard. Shai has enough length. Ty Jerome is 6’5″. Tre Mann as well seems to be fine so far playing at this level…keep feeding him minutes. Aaron Wiggins is going to be one of my key wing players at some point. Let’s start getting him into the games…Coach D. If you need to scratch a guard from game to game then scratch Ty Jerome and Maledon on an alternating basis.

Okay…enough of that. This isn’t a coaching issue in Oklahoma City–it’s a Sam Presti issue in Oklahoma City…as to how to nuance this tank and not lose your fanbase in the process.

Next game up with Steph and the Warriors in town. This is easy for me since I’ve now decided on three teams teams I’m going to adopt this NBA season since we don’t have legit NBA hoops in OKC.

I’m adopting Golden State and Memphis in the West. In the East, I’m going to adopt the Miami Heat….who you should know acquired both PJ Tucker and Kyle Lowery this off season, plus have gotten Tyler Herro back on the right path. To me…the PJ Tucker move was like last year when I saw Jrue Holiday sent to the Milwaukee Bucks. PJ Tucker on that Miami roster is something we have to keep an eye on as this season moves along.

So Steph Curry do me a favor…light the living f–k out of the Thunder on Tuesday night and give the OKC fans a glimpse of what a generational NBA player looks like in the flesh. Seth was just the warmup last night. Nice kid, but he’s not Steph Curry from Davidson.

Steven Adams is lighting it up in Memphis so far with Ja Morant. I mean Ja and Steven on the pick and roll were made for one another. Keep it up, mate. We miss you.

And in closing…Austin Reaves the former OU guard who I followed while he was in Norman is doing some really good things for the Lakers right now. Austin is a 6’5″ guard who can play at this level. Keep it up, Austin.

Don’t dwell on the Oklahoma City Thunder would be my advice to Thunder fans. Follow the rest of the league, adopt a team or two, enjoy the NBA, and before you know it these remaining 79 games will be in the rear view mirror.

Have a nice Monday.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *