khandor’s sports blog

Paul Silas is off to a solid start as the new old head coach for the Bobcats.

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Silas says Bobcats will play up-tempo style game

Paul Silas’ first practice as the new interim coach of the Charlotte Bobcats Thursday had one noteworthy twist.

Instead of practicing with a 24-second shot clock, the Bobcats worked with a 14-second shot clock.

It’s all part of Silas’ plan to play up-tempo basketball—a stark contrast to the style of his predecessor, Larry Brown, who was fired on Wednesday.

“I want to bring some energy to this ball club,” Silas said after being introduced as the fourth head coach in franchise history. “I want us to get up and down and let it all hang out. If they don’t want to get up and down, they can come sit down by me.”

The Bobcats currently rank 29th in the NBA in scoring, averaging 91.7 points a game. Only Milwaukee is averaging fewer points. The Bobcats have averaged just 80.2 points during their current four-game losing streak and have not scored 100 since beating Denver 100-98 on Dec. 7.

“We’ve got shooters,” Silas said. “We’ve got defenders. We’ve got shot blockers. We’ve got all the ingredients that you need. The guys just have to get out and play and believe in themselves and believe that I believe in them. I’ve found that if you have a confident player, it’s unbelievable what he can do.”

Guard Stephen Jackson(notes) welcomed the commitment to playing up tempo.

“It’s rejuvenating,” Jackson said. “The styles are like night and day. Hopefully this will bring some life to us and give us some confidence and get us playing well again. Up-tempo, we’ve got a great group of young guys and this fits their style. Hopefully we can do a good job at it and enjoy it because it’s definitely fun.”

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With a roster that looks like this:

it’s the right decision for Charlotte to shift to an up-tempo game that can increase the Minutes Played for talented but, thus far, under-utilized youngsters like Tyrus Thomas, Domenic McGuire, DJ Augustin, Derrick Brown and Gerald Henderson.

The collection of players on the Bobcats’ roster at-present is not good enough to contend for a Top 4 spot in the Eastern Conference this season.

Used in the best possible way, however, by their head coach:

[for example]
 

there is more than enough NBA-level talent on this year’s team to remain in the hunt for the No. 8 seed in the playoffs well into the spring, if not for the entire campaign.

FINAL SCORE: RAPTORS 98, Wizards 100
Complete Game Info

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The Wizards’ [15th place, 19-61/.238] immediate future is so much brighter, in comparison with the Raptors’ [14th place, 30-49/.380], that it’s not even funny.

STARTERS
Arenas vs Calderon
Young vs Parker [past his prime]
Butler vs Marion [past his prime]
Jamison vs Bosh [playing out of position]
Haywood vs Bargnani [not a dominating Center]

KEY SUBS
Crittenton vs Ukic [not yet ready for the NBA]
Stevenson vs Kapono [an albatross]
McGuire vs Graham
Songaila vs Humphries
Blatche vs O’Bryant [not an NBA-level player]

EXTRAS
James vs Banks [not an NBA-level player; an albatross]
Dixon vs Douby [not an NBA-level player]
McGee vs Jawai [not an NBA-level player]
Pecherov vs Voskuhl [not an NBA-level player]
Thomas vs ?

UPCOMING DRAFT PICK
No. 1-3 [overall] Selection vs No. 8-9 Selection [if not traded again]

Thinking back to where the Raptors’ player roster was in Jan-Feb/06, before Bryan Colangelo [Pres/GM] was hired, and comparing it to the current one:

Raptors Roster 2005-2006

27 – 55 .329 (pythagorean: 31 – 51 .382)

Name G Min Pts PPG FGM FGA FGP FTM FTA FTP 3PM 3PA 3PP REB RPG AST APG STL BLK TO
Chris Bosh 70 2753 1572 22.5 549 1087 .505 474 581 .816 0 13 .000 647 9.2 181 2.6 50 79 157
Mike James 79 2922 1604 20.3 576 1228 .469 283 338 .837 169 382 .442 262 3.3 460 5.8 72 3 206
Morris Peterson 82 3139 1374 16.8 478 1096 .436 241 294 .820 177 448 .395 381 4.6 190 2.3 104 15 126
Charlie Villanueva 81 2364 1053 13.0 435 940 .463 113 160 .706 70 214 .327 521 6.4 88 1.1 60 63 99
Jalen Rose 46 1238 557 12.1 180 446 .404 166 217 .765 31 115 .270 129 2.8 113 2.5 20 10 65
Matt Bonner 78 1711 583 7.5 209 467 .448 63 76 .829 102 243 .420 284 3.6 56 0.7 49 31 32
Joey Graham 80 1579 533 6.7 198 414 .478 108 133 .812 29 87 .333 244 3.1 60 0.8 37 13 92
Jose Calderon 64 1485 349 5.5 132 312 .423 78 92 .848 7 43 .163 141 2.2 288 4.5 42 4 101
Andre Barrett 17 261 78 4.6 35 97 .361 6 9 .667 2 13 .154 22 1.3 50 2.9 10 0 14
Antonio Davis 8 191 35 4.4 14 31 .452 7 20 .350 0 0 .000 36 4.5 7 0.9 3 1 8
Pape Sow 42 591 147 3.5 53 123 .431 41 57 .719 0 0 .000 146 3.5 8 0.2 21 19 30
Eric Williams 28 356 91 3.3 29 75 .387 28 38 .737 5 18 .278 50 1.8 15 0.5 7 2 15
Darrick Martin 40 340 102 2.6 34 97 .351 18 24 .750 16 40 .400 20 0.5 57 1.4 17 0 15
Rafael Araujo 53 618 125 2.4 55 152 .362 15 28 .536 0 2 .000 145 2.7 21 0.4 25 6 42
Loren Woods 27 324 62 2.3 28 59 .475 6 14 .429 0 1 .000 110 4.1 4 0.1 9 23 16
Aaron Williams 14 99 25 1.8 10 19 .526 5 6 .833 0 0 .000 15 1.1 1 0.1 4 3 5
Alvin Williams 1 10 1 1.0 0 3 .000 1 2 .500 0 2 .000 3 3.0 0 0.0 0 0 0
2006 No. 1 [overall], 1st Round Draft Pick
2006 No. 5 [overall], 2nd Round Draft Pick

is enough to put tears in the eyes of someone who really knows how to go about building a championship calibre NBA franchise, given the assets at their disposal 3 seasons ago.

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Where exactly each of these teams go from here will be determined by their respective General Managers, one of whom is already a 2-time NBA Executive Of the Year Award winner … the other of whom has yet to be recognized by his peers in this way [i.e. Ernie Grunfeld].

If the actual wager was …

Which one’s team is going to finish with more WINS during the 2009-2010 season AND go further in the NBA Playoffs?

on whom would YOU be willing to bet a sizable portion of YOUR own hard-earned money?