Bobcats v. Magic: a Giant Failure

Vladimir Radmanovic's 4th quarter heroics not enough to save Bobcats from another humiliating defeat.

Were it not for Ray Felton's enormous outing -- 6-10 from the field, 18 points, 4 assists, a block and a steal -- this game would have been over at half time where the Bobcats were down by 16.

Ray, in his perverse delight, decided to make things interesting by extending a 3rd quarter run into a push for the lead. But Raymond's burden was too much for him to cast aside, this time -- with his teammates throwing themselves into the arms of temerity and caution instead of blindly following their fearless leader Ray.

Boxscore gems and other notes:

1. Gerald Wallace, in his all his past heroics, missed two break away dunks -- one with no one contesting. This, alone, is nothing to be ashamed of. Even the greatest of dunkers and mesosphere hammerers fall asleep at the wheel on occasion. Going up against a couple of 7-footers in the post isn't exactly conducive to dropping sledgehammers on fools.

2. Vladimir Radmanovic proves himself to the fans --

That he's shit.

After the impressive 3rd quarter comeback by the Bobcats, Radmanovic proves himself to be a team chemistry killer with a botched layup, a cheap foul on Marcin Gortat, and a bizarre technical foul -- earned by him throwing the ball in anger for his own apparent pathetic play.

3. Benihanas is the new P.F. Changs.

I'll be honest. I don't know what the hell a Benihanas is, but James Harden, Sean May, and some dude from the Suns' Front Office really like that shit.

On a final note, Jared Dudley's kicking ass and taking names -- playing Modern Warfare Welfare 2:

Just got done with modern welfare game... That game is crazy.

Bobcats Lose; Joakim Noah Has Last Laugh

Bulls' Fans Remain Smug, Confident in Meaningless Win

Bobcats lose a nail biter as Bulls win by three late in the 4th. It's pretty telling how pathetic the Bobcats are as a team when they can't close out on the road -- going 0-3 this season on away games.

The Bobcats' loss was accentuated by the overwhelming e-support for the Bulls -- and the antagonistic forces at work attempting to disparage our beloved team. Twitter was aflutter with a flow of comments surrounding last night's unsurprising victory for the Bulls:

"My Bulls beat the Bobcats yesterday O so lovely!!! =)" - Nicki0927

"OMG Joakim Noah.. wtf?" - embizzle

"FUCK U BOBCATS!!! GO BULLS!!!!!!!!!!!!" - kathleenriot95

"bobcats aint nobody bull are nice tho!" - Beezy Da Beast

Boxscore gems and other notes:

1. Gerald Wallace's rebounding numbers are coming back to earth:

“When you can’t make a layup, you’ve got to find some way to help the team,” said Wallace, who came into the game shooting just 30.9 percent.

It's important to note that Crash should have never, ever, been in the mix throughout this season for the rebounding title. It's comforting seeing that he is capable of simply putting up pedestrian starting center numbers on off nights. Welcome back, G-force.

2. Joakim Noah and John Salmons playing together for large stretches of minutes bodes poorly for teams playing against the Bulls.

For whatever reason, as a tandem, Salmons and Noah in the lineup creates a strong positive correlation to more free throw attempts. I'm not watching any Bulls games, but perhaps they simply operate as an effective pick and roll tandem -- or maybe Noah doesn't crowd the lane as much as I think he does, allowing Salmons open space to drive.

Whatever the reason, the Bobcats had 8 fewer free throw attempts -- a clear deciding factor in this game's negative result.

3. DJ Augustin, once again, played like shit.

This honestly shouldn't surprise me. He's still healing up from the mystery ankle sprain. But pumping out Kevin Durant +/- numbers really should be something worrying considering he's supposed to be getting better as a sophomore player.

To finish up, Nazr Mohammed, team sage, imparts these words of advice that the Bobcats should so aptly follow:

"Work hard on your job, you can make a living. Work hard on yourself, you can make a fortune!!"

It's funny because Sean May quoted him before I did -- right after his stripper friend suggested that he should hang out at a strip club to ease his Salt Lake City boredom. Keep up the hard "work", Sean.

Preview: Bobcats at Bulls

-- Expect a loss.

The Bobcats are averaging 69 points a game on the road so far this season. That's only two games, but, fuck, 69 points is abysmal. Time to pray for Raja to have another career shooting night. Former Bobcat Sean May has the right idea:

if u kneel b4 God u ca stand b4 anyone

Augustin is day to day from an ankle sprain -- a sprain so minor that I hadn't even heard about it until today.

The good news is that the Bulls are down a player with Tyrus Thomas sidelined for 4-6 weeks from a fractured forearm. Apparently he broke it while doing a set of pull ups:

'He was doing some type of pull-up or something and kind of injured his arm,'' Del Negro said. ''It's just unfortunate.''

This is remarkably similar to Francisco Garcia's arm injury earlier this season -- where the exercise ball he was lifting weights on burst, leading to him shattering his wrist.

Without Tyrus Thomas, the Bulls will likely play Taj Gibson significantly more minutes -- a probable starter.

What this means is Gerald Wallace will probably have another absurd rebounding outing. Expect double-digit boards and lots of trips to the foul line for Crash.

Raja Bell, Gerald Wallace Wow Home Crowd with Outlier Spectacle Against Hawks

Flip Murray Plays in his First Game of the Season as 'Cats Blow out the Hawks.

I say "outlier" because there's no way in hell Raja Bell goes 9 for 12 on any regular basis -- especially with his injured left wrist. Gerald Wallace, similarly, is playing way above his head by averaging 14.8 rebounds per game through these first five games. That is not to say that I would be shocked to see Gerald Wallace increasing his rebounding rate this year. There's a few reasons for why I could see a trend in him increasing his rebounding rate:

1. Gerald Wallace is playing significantly more minutes.

He's been averaging 41.6 minutes per game (though, one of those games was an overtime game) so far through these first five games. That's a huge contrast to his career average of 28 minutes per game. However, last year, Wallace averaged 7.8 rebounds per game on 37.6 minutes per game -- simplified to 1 rebound every 4.8 minutes in 2008-2009 versus 1 rebound every 2.81 minutes in 2009-2010 (through 5 games). That means he's rebounding 1.71 times as effectively this year. A 10% increase in minutes should not increase production by nearly 100%. Those are true fantasy numbers that should fall whenever Wallace decides to return to this visible plane of existence where mere mortals reside. Demigod status is only fleeting.

2. The Bobcats are shooting poorly through these first five games at a mere 38.4% -- increasing offensive rebounding opportunities for Wallace.

The Bobcats are averaging 13.4 offensive rebounds per game so far this season. That's an average increase of 2.6 offensive rebounds per game since last year -- where 10.8 a game was the mean. A lot of that has to do with the Bobcats shooting much more poorly since last year's 45.5% per game. That difference in 7.1% since last year creates more rebounding opportunities for Wallace. Wallace, himself, has doubled his offensive rebounding output since last year -- 1.6 offensive boards per game versus 3.2 offensive rebounds per game.

3. The Bobcats are playing better defense this year under Larry Brown and, as a result, are forcing their opponents into worse shots.

The improved defense has led to a drop in opponent field goal percentage from last year to this year -- 45.4% (2008-2009) to 42.7% (2009-2010). If their opponents continue to shoot poorly, and the front court outside of Wallace continues to play like grade-school children, expect Wallace's defensive rebounding numbers to continue being absurd.

However, regardless of this enormous 5-game sample Gerald Wallace has displayed, rebounding rate generally doesn't vary that much year to year. Most players remain consistently bad or good at rebounding. Somethingawful.com forums poster mphill summarizes this phenomenon pretty well:

Rebound rate typically doesn't improve that much, even for a rookie. Look at Dwight, who entered the league as a twig of a 19 year old and bulked up very quickly. His TRB% went up 3% his second season. Okafor's went down .2%. Shaq's went down 2% and stayed very near that mark for his entire 20 year career.

Boxscore gems and other notes:

Flip Murray made his debut tonight and pretty much did what everyone expected of him -- shoot a bunch of 3s and watch as DJ Augustin gets blocked on nearly half of his shots because Augustin's fucking short (4 Blocks Against tonight).

And finally, I'll end tonight's post with a Cartier Martin zen moment:

Sittin at home watching "House". Who watches this stuff?

Bobcats v. Nets: a Battle for Mediocrity

Spoiler: Bobcats win after closing out with a 24-0 run to take the lead and game.

It was looking pretty grim for a bit. Thought I'd see a new low (in points) tonight. Were the Charlotte Bobcats regressing to a pre-shot clock era? 1947 Providence Steamrollers sightings -- who went on to earn a 6-42 record. Maybe there was a Fort Wayne Pistons v. Minneapolis Lakers sighting, even.

But that was before the advent of the shot clock. Wasn't too long ago during the lock out years when a true crown prince of mediocrity rose to the occasion.

Miami Heat at Chicago Bulls: April 10, 1999

Thank God Tim Floyd isn't our coach. Then again, maybe we'd get a scoring talent like O.J. Mayo begging to join our team. Toni Kukoc would also be a welcome addition (I'd take him any day over Vladimir Radmanovic and his 0-7 outing). Hell, I'd take Kornel David. Shit, Kornel's only 38, bring him on. He can't be any worse than Stevie Graham.

Maybe, then, we wouldn't have to pine for behemoth, Dennis Rodman-like stat lines from Gerald Wallace night in and night out just to save our pathetic 1-out playoff position hopes.

Boxscore gems and other notes:

1. Vladimir Radmanovic with a stellar night.

First quarter.
Vladimir Radmanovic bad pass
Vladimir Radmanovic shooting foul
Vladimir Radmanovic misses 24-foot three point jumper
Vladimir Radmanovic misses two point shot (layup)
Vladimir Radmanovic misses 24-foot three point jumper
Vladimir Radmanovic misses 10-foot jumper
Second.
Vladimir Radmanovic misses 24-foot three point jumper
Vladimir Radmanovic misses two point shot (layup blocked by Bobby Simmons)
Vladimir Radmanovic bad pass
Vladimir Radmanovic personal foul
Third.
Vladimir Radmanovic loose ball foul
Vladimir Radmanovic misses 17-foot jumper

I think Larry Brown caught on to his ineptitude -- or maybe he realized his flaws as a player and begged someone, anyone, not to put him in.

2. Gerald Wallace responds to the sluggish start (10 points in the first quarter) by enlisting as a Fantasy Basketball warrior. It's too bad I drafted Troy Murphy over him -- 24 points, 20 rebounds, 4 steals and a block.

3. Larry Brown called a time out in the 4th quarter when Chris Douglas-Roberts tripped over and injured himself (leading to Wallace's fourth steal). Apparently Lawrence Frank is short-sighted enough to blow through all of his team's timeouts with 9 minutes remaining in the 4th quarter. This was the second injury during the game for the Nets as Yi Jianlian, similarly, blew his knee out earlier in the night.

4. Some dude on ESPN's conversation/comments section claims the game was fixed 'cause teams don't ever go on 24-0 runs. I'm tempted to agree with him, but, then again, this is the fucking Nets without Devin Harris -- leaving Brook Lopez as the only player on the team with an ounce of ability to create their own shot.