Chinese Preseason Game

Caught the game last night (October 20 @ 12:30AM) and I had a few thoughts.

It’s difficult to gage how good the team is going to be this year because it’s preseason, and Rashard Lewis (along with Trevor Ariza and Keyon Dooling) hasn’t been playing because of injury. In place of a starting lineup that would look like this: C – Dwight Howard, F – Rashard Lewis, F – Hedo Turkoglu, G – Keith Bogans, G – Jameer Nelson… we have Howard, Bogans, Nelson, Turkoglu, and Pat Garrity, which leads me to my first concern with the team.

• I’ll not tear into anyone at this point, before the season starts, but if Garrity sees significant minutes this season then we are in trouble. Yes, he is excellent from a catch and shoot position but he is a liability on defense, can’t rebound or box out at all, and if he has to put the ball on the floor then he’s lost. I thought we drafted JJ Redick to shoot and not rebound or play defense? It’s only preseason and the stats from last night would indicate that Garrity played well, and he did as long as you don’t look at how easily Drew Gooden was getting to the offensive glass. How thankful was Garrity when they Donyell Marshall (who is a slightly more athletic version of Garrity at this point in his career) entered the game? Well Marshall isn’t the Power Forward he’ll be facing every night, so Garrity should be victimized on the regular… if he gets regular minutes. Brian Hill was right to keep Garrity on the bench.
• Stan Van Gundy has given the entire team the green light according to everything I’ve read and this philosophy was on display last night. Adonal Foyle attempted 8 shots and 3 of them were terrible decisions. All of Carlos Arroyo’s shots (3) were terrible and 1 of them was taken after he dribbled the ball for 15+ seconds. Garrity was matched up with Damon Jones and took him to the post… which seemed like a good idea but Garrity shot a fade away. A fade away! Against a man 6 inches shorter! These were all bad shots and bad decisions, but I understand the philosophy that Van Gundy is working with, and that the philosophy should increase confidence in players. Does it have to get so ugly though?
• When the offense was working it was pretty. There was a lot of running, and pushing the ball, and a lot of movement. Dwight was getting the ball in good spots. There were too many turnovers, some of them awful, mental mistakes, but this team is going to be climbing out of that hole forever. I don’t think this team will ever be in the top half of the league in turnovers.
• JJ Redick was shooting the ball well and so was Keith Bogans. I can see a great rotation with JJ coming in and facing 2nd team guards and lighting them up. Redick’s first shot was right in Shannon Brown’s face, and it was beautiful. Bogans is hitting the open shot but on his two drives to the basket he didn’t look comfortable. The catch a shoot guys (Bogans, Redick, Garrity, Turkoglu) looked good in the offense.
• Hedo, Hedo, Hedo… why must you take terrible, off-the-dribble jumpers instead of taking the open shot? What’s the point of this? Turkoglu is 6′ 10″ and doesn’t rebound (though he did lead the team this game), and he bails players out all the time by taking Kobe-esque fall-aways instead of making the simple decision. And 7 TURNOVERS! Come on, man! Why, Hedo, can’t you be as good as you are on the video game?
• Carlos Arroyo played well by most accounts, and I’m sure the message boards in Orlando are abuzz about how he should start, but I don’t think he should. This game he over penetrated a number of times and his 2 turnovers were bad passes (including a bad no-look-pass to… a fan). He can be a great backup with shooters on the wings because they will create space for him and he can be more of the focus, which is how he thrives with the Puerto Rican National Team, but if he were starting he’s be the 5th option and he doesn’t play well in that situation.
• On the Cleveland side there was one player that I thought was good, better than expected, and I wish he played for us. Dwayne Jones, a second year forward/center from Saint Josephs, was a rebounding machine in this game. He had 9 boards in 24 minutes, but more importantly, he was in the mix for many, many, more. Every time a ball bounced into a crowd he was getting a hand on the ball. That’s a great skill to have and Cleveland should play the hell out of that guy if they don’t sign Varejao. I didn’t pay much attention to the other aspects of his game, but his intensity on the boards couldn’t be ignored.

I can’t wait for the season to start and to see the team grow together with Rashard in the mix. It was a nice little taste I got last night. I think Van Gundy is going to be the best thing that happened to the Magic in a long time.