The pre-season impression thread

A few things I've noticed from the Rockets-Sixers game:

1) Yao Ming looks bigger both vertically and horizontally. People say he grew an inch since his rookie year so he's around 7'6" WITHOUT shoes. He seemed a lot stronger to. He was backing his way in more and with much more ease (Granted, the Sixers' C's aren't much to talk about). Seemed kind of rusty finishing the shots though but that'll come back.

2) Luther Head is good. This kid's got a fast fast trigger. He reminds of Mike James. He drove like a maniac too. 13 pts, 3 asts, 3 rebs, 2 stls in 13 minutes

3) Kyle Korver is a good passer. He made some nice, nice alley-oop passes.

4) Lonny Baxter looks tough. I see him getting some minutes when the team needs a hustler who will bang his body for a rebound.

What I saw in the Pistons-Bulls game:

-Mo Evans Can Play- He had 13pts and 5 boards. He has awsome ups too.

-Darko is GOOD- 7pts 5rebs 4blks 3asts. Not bad, he showed a 14ft jumper and dunked it hard twice.

-Carlos Delfino can play D- He was a ball hawk, he had like 4 steals and he held down.

The Pistons are in Mid-Season Form- They had 27 assists on 34 FGs which is amazing for the 1st preseason game. Sheed is 20lbs less coming in to camp this year, Ben is ready, Chauncey is shooting great, Tay has found a driving to the basket floater that loooked real good and Rip is not tired.

For the Bulls- Othella Harrington cant be your goto post player, Hinrich is godd as normal, Deng's shot is improved, Tim Thomas can score but he still plays NO D. And Tyson Cahndler will lead the League in offensive boards.

-Darko is GOOD- 7pts 5rebs 4blks 3asts. Not bad, he showed a 14ft jumper and dunked it hard twice.

Still not worth a 5th round pick

You'll be jealous we have him when he dunks all over Kwame & Mihm, haha!

-Darko is GOOD- 7pts 5rebs 4blks 3asts. Not bad, he showed a 14ft jumper and dunked it hard twice.

.

How long did Darko play?

man I would kill for some decent basketball coverage

Milicic played 24mins

Milicic played 24mins

Stat wise, looks like a pretty solid outing... And shows a lot of versatility too.Hope he can keep it up.

I predict a 7 points, 4 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 block season for Milicic. Of course, later in his career he'll become a 30/15/6/4 man.

I predict a 7 points, 4 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 block season for Milicic. Of course, later in his career he'll become a 30/15/6/4 man.

Yea, when he gets signed by the Las Vegas Hornets... (Yes, I'm implying Hornets will suck so bad they'll move their franchise soon...The owner is such a cheapass anyhow..it's bound to happen.)

30/15/6/4 seem really high.....but it wouldnt shock me if he eventually becomes a 23/11/4/2 guy though. I think in 2yrs he'll replace Rasheed in the starting lineup.

He's a FA after next season, i imagine Dumars will match any offer.

Pacers-Nets analysis.

Jimmy "Snap" Hunter had an excellent game. He led all pacers scorers with 17 points on 5-10 shooting. However, he still isn't deserving of the Pacers 15th spot. Samaki Walker actually brings an asset to the teams one weak spot- front court depth. In order to sign Snap, we'd have to cut Eddie Gill, who we'd still have to pay, and Snap wouldn't even see the court. Our backcourt is too deep for a point guard to be the last roster spot. Right now David Harrison, Jeff Foster and Jermaine O'Neal are all hurt. Yes, they are all minor pre-season injuries, but you never know, its always good to have some insurance for those things. Samaki should get the 15th spot.

Jonathon Bender was the star of the game, as weird as that may sound. He had 13 points in 17 minutes. Yay!!! JB will finally contribute this year! Right? Sorry, but I'm not sold. This is a guy who has crapped out on us 6 years in a row since he's been drafted, I'm not going to let one preseason game get my hopes up. Talk to me 2 weeks in to the regular season, and I may have a different outlook. As of right now, he's a 3rd string power forward, who will probably be on the IL soon into the season.

Stephen Jackson looked great. He only played 8 minutes, but when he was out there he played excellent defense on Vince Carter, and gave him fits. Ironically, when Ron switched over to Vince is when VC got his scoring. Jack is clearly a competitor, he was playing harder then anyone else on the court when he was out there.

Jamaal Tinsley looks to be in great shape. His box score stats of 0 points and 5 assists is kind of misleading. He actually played quite a bit of the game away from point guard, Snap, Ron, and Saras handled most of the PG minutes, so he was out of position. I think he's ready for the season to begin, Rick knows that, thus, his lack of production last night.

Sarunas looked good for a guy who was playing his first game with all brand new teammates. Obviously, when you are playing with people you don't know at all, it takes a little getting used to, so there were no Saras highlight reel plays in this one. However, his jumpshot looked pretty sweet. The defense is a major question mark, but... that's not what he's here for.

That brings me to Artest. He played some minutes at point guard, and it didn't really work out. His defense was less then stellar too, but I'm not really worried. Ron has been playing a lot of basketball all summer, so the other guys were out there totally fresh from a summer off. Ron will be more then ready to be Ron again once the season rolls around in a few weeks.

All in all, while missing Jermaine, David Harrison, Jeff Foster, and Danny Granger, a 105-103 loss doesn't look too bad.

Im so fucking god damn pissed off! I fucking ordered nba tv so I could watch my god damn sixers game, it was working for about 10 minutes, then just as the sixers-rockets game was about to start, my tv screen just goes black! Im like "WTF" and thinking I would get the signal back in a couple seconds, but it never fucking happened, my nba tv wasnt working for that night when the game was on. TALK ABOUT SOME BAD LUCK?!

Im so fucking god damn pissed off! I fucking ordered nba tv so I could watch my god damn sixers game, it was working for about 10 minutes, then just as the sixers-rockets game was about to start, my tv screen just goes black! Im like "WTF" and thinking I would get the signal back in a couple seconds, but it never fucking happened, my nba tv wasnt working for that night when the game was on. TALK ABOUT SOME BAD LUCK?!

You live in Pennsylvania right? It should be on FSN or somthing...I have NBATV the game was pretty good.

I thought it would be on csn or something like that, but only for this game it was on nba tv, o well, I requested it on mixmakers.net, so I should get it anyway.

I'm angry , The nets won ONE preseason games and the fans here are boasting like they won a damn championship .The fans here are saying that Krystics "alley-oop" to VC. God I'm angry , Sarunas in the Pacers did look good though .

I'm angry , The nets won ONE preseason games and the fans here are boasting like they won a damn championship .The fans here are saying that Krystics "alley-oop" to VC. God I'm angry , Sarunas in the Pacers did look good though .

Hahaha people are bragging???

Our starting Center, Lead scorer, Backup center and 1st round draft pick didn't play.

The nets fans over here just brag about every win . I understand that they can brag about their team 2-3 years ago , but now , I mean seriously . Nenad Krystic did look good though .Pacers are looking good so far , even though 4 players didnt even play .

picture of the night

darko>>> sweetney

Haha yeah go Nets!

Darko needs to lessen the fouls IMO... 4 personals.. other than that, he can play hard all night and dominate.

The Bulls need a big man...

Kobe was alright with 28, 5, 5 in 27 minutes... Walton may start and Mihm needs to learn to be more consistent...

Kings rookie Francisco Garcia missed his first NBA shot by 2 feet, but made a hustling defensive play on the other end...

In two days, two games have been won by lay-ups... one by Miami and one by Jersey...

And Luke Jackson had better get game time this year! He can shoot...

The Bobcats and Hawks rosters are huge...

With 4:43 left in the 3rd, Andrew Bogut has 9, 9 and 3 in 25 minutes on 4 for 8 shooting...

Kobe was alright with 28, 5, 5 in 27 minutes

I wouldn't say he played alright. He played great putting up those numbers while playing 27 minutes.

0 3point shot attempts also.

So the Timberwolves lost their pre-season opener 92-89 at Target Center. I did not go and it wasn't on TV, so all I got was the highlights on the local news and the box score.

Garnett didn't play because of his sore knee, but it's not really a problem. Casey just doesn't want Garnett to get hurt in a pre-season game.

The good news is Ndudi Ebi didn't play either, a coach's decision. Hopefully, that means Casey doesn't want to play Ebi and maybe we'll cut him. I hate him to death.

Trenton Hassell looked solid going 4-6, scoring a total of 10 points while (I assume) holding Redd to 13 points.

Wally Szczerbiak added 11 points and rookie Rashad McCants had a game-high 18 points in 23 minutes. I have high expectations for McCants this season, if he can stay healthy. Which is a rather big if.

I was hoping Casey would play Chalmers more than just 4 minutes but I guess that's how it goes. Overall, I think a lot of good things probably happened. It was Casey's "first offical" game as a Head Coach. So far everything seems to be going good. My expectations are increasing by the day for this team.

Man when Ebi got minutes, he did great for the Wolves. I would pick him up. He was in the same draft class as LeBron James and I expected alot from him. Hopefully he can get traded and get his minutes.