12/28 - Oh my god the Pistons are 2-28
- Thread starter DeadlySplitter
- Start date
I;m still shaking my head over how good the Pistons looked most of the game, but I'm assuming the third quarter Pistons is what got them the 28 games losing streak in the first place.
KP 35 points on 21 attempts - obv better - 8 rebounds - 1 steal - 1 assist.
He did shoot better, but Tatum kinda killed him on those last two numbers. They're pretty close.. definitely not a "gag job" though by NBCSN. Tatum also played 43 minutes which isn't nothing.
Edit: KP may have deserved it, but it's not like JT didn't have a good to very good all around game.
With some even decent coaching Detroit has talent to win games where they're at least average.
They can do so much with a few passes and some body movement, it’s not going to be good enough to just let Tatum fire away with contested looks in the playoffs. Going on season 3 of 35% Tatum and I don’t see anything right now that leads me to expect he will return to the 37%-40% guy he was the 3 seasons prior.
There would have been some distant cousin of karma with the Pistons going to 3-28 against Boston.
Waive Svi and see if Joe can get it going off the bench in short minutes.
A win is a win is a win.
There has to have been a more recent instance than this, right?
Duran has been out (among others) and he's really important to this team.
But the biggest problem is that they can't shoot -worst 3P% in NBA (among other shooting stats). Hard to win in today's NBA when you can't shoot 3Ps.
DET looked better in 2H of BRK and 1H of BOS because Cade went off (hr scored 57 I think in those 4Qs).
But Jrue started picking him up full court and kept at it; Cade looked gassed by end of 3Q - Jrue apparently has that effect on players he really guards.
I don’t spend every game thread complaining about him.
The team matters because the team they are playing is fucking awful. The expectations should be higher. If you play golf, shooting a 90 is at a great private course is different than shooting 90 at your local goat track
I say this with all due respect, have you ever thought your expectations are too low? I mean, you’re arguing about someone we all want to be a top 5 player, shooting fucking 11-31 against the team with the longest losing streak in nba history. You’re always arguing with anyone who has the cojones to say that Tatum isn’t a basketball god walking with mere mortals. Its getting tiring
I honestly can’t believe this is a conversation. I said his shooting has been shit (because it has, without a shadow of a doubt) and you pretend like I am saying fuck deuce Tatum and Jayson should be waived.
You understand the difference right?
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Detrtoit is baffling. They were looking to take a step up. they gave their coach a tone of money to build towards the playoffs this year or next. Now can you trade the few vet pieces they have and lose 40 in a row?
I mean.. if you want to be relentlessly negative about our best player then that’s on you.. I thought you were a good poster.. I’m not so sure anymore.
edit: I watched the postgame interviews of most of the players for tonites game.. you should too. Tatum, for one, talks almost every game about how much he’s working/doing what he can to try and win a championship.. Joe talked tonite about how much Tatum did everything he could to win tonite.. as did KP and DW.. but you’re right.. it’s me that has his expectations too low.
edit2: I mean.. there are other stats than just fga, fgm, and fg%.. but that’s all that seems to matter. Tonite.. on a night when the C’s, who are fucking 24-6.. came back from down 21 to win.. against an extra motivated team after a long west coast road trip… there was almost zero talk about how impressive that is… instead after every shot Tatum misses it’s as if the world is going to end.. zero positive comments when he hits or assists or steals the ball.. because that’s what he should do.. but god forbid he steps back on a three or misses a shot at the end of the game.
edit3: on a night where he was 2 rebounds away from a triple double with 5 steals.. you’re trying to tell me that all that matters is he missed a bunch. Thank your lucky stars you never had to root for Kobe or Westbrook.
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He's shooting a career high in efg while scoring 27 ppg, that doesn't sound like his shooting has been shit. On a day he shot poorly he still had a phenomenal game, if he shot 11/31 every game then you might have a case, though if he put up today's stat line including the shooting 82 times I'm pretty sure not many people would say he was having a bad year.
He looked bad, though. Visibly frustrated, pressing for shots, not making great decisions. It wasn’t just easy misses.
Anyone who questions Tatum’s desire is really hard for me to understand. The guy wants it almost too badly. It looked to me tonight like he felt he needed to pick up for a missing JB and be THE MAN and would have taken a loss really personally. He has to know his long-range shot is off, but he’s had so many nights where it just clicks in.
His next level comes when he gets that his team is loaded and he basically never has to force anything. Late game, his pass out of the post to White for the three was the dagger, and was the pass he didn’t make a couple late-game efforts in a row. Big smile.
As good as this team is, they’re not near their peak, which is pretty awesome.
StatMuse trolling the Tatum haters:
View: https://twitter.com/statmuse/status/1740571320004325812?s=20
View: https://twitter.com/statmuse/status/1740571320004325812?s=20
Watching the replay now, Tatum was obviously inefficient with his shooting but had a very good game otherwise per the eye test. I get that BBref gamescore isnt the end all and be all of stats (if anyone else has a good game to game relative performance stats Id be all ears), but worth noting per that stat Tatum's game last night was his best game in a few weeks and a tick better than his 30 points on 16 shot performance against the clips last week. KPs game was marginally better by that stat, but close enough that Tatum getting the (meaningless, mind you) player of the game seems reasonable IMO.
On a larger scale, it really does seem to me this team has won half a dozen games or so, last night included, we all think they wouldve lost last year. They have the best record in the league, against a tough schedule, and dont seem close to peaking. These are all good things. They have warts that will come back to bite them come playoff time, I have zero doubt about that. But if healthy, I think we see those warts far less than we have in the last few playoff runs.
On a larger scale, it really does seem to me this team has won half a dozen games or so, last night included, we all think they wouldve lost last year. They have the best record in the league, against a tough schedule, and dont seem close to peaking. These are all good things. They have warts that will come back to bite them come playoff time, I have zero doubt about that. But if healthy, I think we see those warts far less than we have in the last few playoff runs.
Had to rally to shoot 29% from three- at one point near the end of the half, they were 4-24. 7-15 thereafter; and the telling number there is the 15 (in 30 minutes) versus the 24 launches in 24 minutes. Other things were working.
It’s a game thread.
None of what I said was out of line. I posted 7 times in this thread. 3 of them had nothing to do with Tatum. The only thing where I said anything more than “has to be better” was when I said end of game possessions are vomit emojis
My posts about him were pointing out his inefficient night. One of the posts @PedroKsBambino agreed with.
I’m literaly posting the shooting numbers. Thats it. One post I replied to @Deathofthebambino who said that he should drive more and shoot less 3’s because it was making him inefficient. I replied to that agreeing with updated numbers.
Some of these other things I don’t even know what to say. It’s obviously more important that they won the game? I never said all that matters is he missed a bunch.
The only thing I wish I did was post more complementing how well he was rebounding and passing. Thats fair.
I’ve posted other things saying I was at fault or you’re right. I really don’t think I was nearly as negative/mean as you seem to be portraying me as here.
I should have mentioned how well he was doing rebounding and passing for sure but, even then, I really don’t think that saying has to be more efficient is out of line or mean in a game threadi
It's funny, I think those of us that fall into the JB is actually good camp have made this same argument 100+ times over the years. Every turnover is treated like a microcosm of how shitty he is, for post after post, but when he goes on a 10-0 run by himself, the thread becomes crickets.
At the end of the day, I love both of them. I don't necessarily even have an issue with Tatum's step back 3's, except when its clear he's not making them and when there is basically zero rim protection on the other side. If Tatum is settling, because he's got Giannis and Lopez waiting for him at the rim, it's not bad basketball, but when he's got Cade Cunningham trying to guard him on a cleared out floor, and he's already like 1/7 from deep, another step back should bring some negative posts.
Tatum is shooting .434/.296/.811 over his last 15 games. But he's also turning the ball over way less (he had a fucking awful turnover stretch into late November) He's just in a slump, and players like him have to shoot their way out of it. I think he's fallen back on that long looping from the waist upwards motion that he's fallen into a few times in his career. Like even on catch and shoot 3's, he's bringing the ball down, and then back up. I notice it a ton and it seems to be when things are going poorly, instead of catching it chest high and then just shooting. He'll figure it out, and the fact that they are winning these games with Tatum's shot not falling is fucking insane.
Tatum does almost everything else on the court as good or better than everyone else on the team. Him being on the court creates gravity which opens up everyone else, his presence alone makes the team better, even if he has bad shooting nights or makes a few bad decisions. This has always been one of my peeves with Jaylen's haters. When you have the ball in your hands as much as these guys do, they're going to fuck up, they aren't perfect. All we can hope for is incremental improvement when we're talking about guys already residing in the top 20 on Earth.
I will say though, the team clearly missed Brown last night, especially in the 1st quarter, where he usually gets off to hot starts. Jaylen would have put 3-4 of those Pistons defenders on posters and it would have been fun to watch, and it probably would have resulted in far fewer 3's in that first half.
Pure stat-based post re: Tatum: he was at 27 points on 20 shots at one point, early to mid 4th. He only scored 4 points on his last 11 shots.
