This game could be fugly if Billups can't play.

We should vBookie the over/under on Flip Murray turnovers.

ECF preview?

Howard might go 20/20 tonight.


Detroit (12-7) at Orlando (14-6)

Game Info: 7:00 pm EST Fri Dec 8, 2006
TV: WMYD, SUN

By JON PALMIERI, STATS Senior Writer

The Detroit Pistons have been one of the elite teams in the Eastern Conference the past few years. The Orlando Magic could be poised to make that jump this season.

Orlando looks to win its seventh straight at home Friday when it faces Detroit for the first time this season.

The Magic (14-6) had a chance to complete their six-game road trip with five wins, but admitted fatigue may have played a role in a 94-80 loss Wednesday at Indiana.

"We had a great trip. This doesn't change that," Magic center Tony Battie said. "But maybe fatigue played a role tonight. Maybe it caught up to us."

Dwight Howard had 20 points, eight rebounds and three blocks, while Grant Hill scored 16 points for the East-leading Magic, who haven't played a home game since Nov. 25.

"We'll do what we've done all season. We'll bounce back," said guard Jameer Nelson, who shot 3-of-12 from the field. "But we didn't have the energy, the focus that we've had in previous games. We dug a hole and never could seem to get out of it."

Returning home should provide a boost for the Magic, who have won seven of eight at the TD Waterhouse Centre, which could be renamed Amway Arena pending a vote Monday by the Orlando City Council.

Orlando has won 19 of its last 21 home games, dating to last season, and the Magic play seven of their next eight at home.

One of the keys to the Magic's season has been the continued good health of Hill, who has been hampered by injuries throughout much of his 12-year career.

Hill, who has missed only two games this season, is second on the team in scoring (14.9), first in steals (1.3) and is shooting 53.3 percent (98-of-184) from the field.

Detroit (12-7) bounced back from consecutive losses to last-place teams with a 92-82 victory Thursday at Dallas, ending the Mavericks' 22-game home win streak against Eastern Conference teams.

"Everybody was locked into what we were doing," Pistons coach Flip Saunders said. "What we can take from this is we played playoff basketball in a regular-season game. We played our tempo, played good defense, hit the offensive boards and kept the turnovers down."

Tayshaun Prince had 20 points and Rasheed Wallace scored 15 of his 19 on 3-pointers as the Pistons assumed sole possession of first place in the Central Division.

"I was just getting open looks," Wallace said. "It was good ball movement, swinging the ball to the open man. That's all it was."

Wallace's performance had to be particularly satisfying after he was limited to seven points on 3-of-10 from the field Tuesday in an 88-85 loss to Portland.

Wallace has struggled in his last three matchups with Orlando, averaging 13.3 points on 16-of-43 shooting from the field, including 6-of-25 from beyond the arc.

The Magic ended a four-game losing streak to the Pistons with an 89-87 home victory on April 7. Detroit has won 10 of the last 13 meetings.

There are three vBookie wagers open for this game.

Pistons +4.5: http://wtfdetroit.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7752

Over/Under 186: http://wtfdetroit.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7769

Dwight Howard over/under for his total points + rebounds: http://wtfdetroit.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7767

There are three vBookie wagers open for this game.

Pistons +4.5: http://wtfdetroit.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7752

Over/Under 186: http://wtfdetroit.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7769

Dwight Howard over/under for his total points + rebounds: http://wtfdetroit.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7767

We should put a Darko over/under bet up for shits and giggles.

This will be a toughy. Back to back road games.


These are tough games to wager on. I'm saving my Alpacas for now.

These fouls look mickey-mouse, on both sides.

Damn, fell asleep the entire first half. Looks we showed up again tonight.

Imagine what Chauncey could do if he didnt' strain his hammy.
<laughs>

Chauncey with 16 points in the third. Looks like he wants a big payday this summer. We darn well better give it to him if he keeps this up.

BS tech called on Dice.

So he did strain it? I said something in last nights OGT, but then thought I was just seeing things.

If we pass on CBill, then do a complete rebuild. I don't want to do that, but at that point you might as well.

Rasheed has a legitimate bitch on that foul call.

Wow, CBill missed two free throws in a row in crunch time. Nice win though, Im happy. Plus I won on the Howard +/-

We win 87-83, despite Chauncey missing his last two clutch FTs.

I'm glad we won. With the way the refs were fucking things up, we could've easily lost.

Should this be LOL @ the Mavs and OMag or props to the boys? Or a lil of both?

I'm going to go with props to the boys on these two wins. Detroit played some mighty fine defense and won. Go team!

I just finished watching Hills presser where he talked about coming down the lane and getting striped, blocked or whatever. LOL. Flip took a nice one away (and had a sweet turn-around fade-away jumper after missing 2 fts) and CBill knocked one away from Arroyo that should have been 2.

Hopefully our defense can morf into something that the league will quit bitching about.

And hopefully JoeD can pull some miracle at the trade deadline to add some little piece.

Its amazing what 2 wins will do for me.

as great as it is to get a win, um Chauncey played 39 mins while semi-injured? ookay. Sooner or later, Flip has to cut down his minutes a little bit. you'd think.
i'm happy to see that we've actually beaten some good teams though. The earlier streak didn't do that much for me because we were beating garbage teams.

Beating the top 2 teams back to back makes me feel [smilie=blaha.gif]

I wasn't able to watch the game, busy night at work, but regardless, huge pair of road wins for the boys. Regardless of how well or bad the other teams played, any time you can get back to back road wins against the hottest teams in each conference it's huge.

a win is a win. but this was a PERFECT game to play blalock. arroyo? nelson? he matches up perfect with those kids and he could have gotten to the hoop and gotten us some easy buckets or got to the line.

i'm not saying he can be a star for us, but i KNOW the kid can give us something. he may struggle a bit too, of course. but flip's handle isn't as good as his.

flip is VERY shaky handling the ball and while he got hot for a little bit tonight, he was turnover prone. even the times he DIDN'T turn it over, he was bobbling the ball and eating up time off the shot clock.

i wish flip would get a clue and give the kid a chance. all i'm asking for is 8-10 minutes a night! even 5-7 minutes might be a nice change of pace.

this is why we'll perish as a team and be forced to start over from scratch- we never have coaches who understand how to play and develop young talent.

from carlisle, to LB, to flip. i know a lot of coaches are hesitant to play kids. but they're changing their mindset with the way the league is going now. our coaches never do though.

there IS a happy medium- you don't have to blow your chances to win in order to play young kids. you CAN play them some spot minutes AND still maintain a winning team.

give the kids a freaking role on the team already! if they screw up, take them out- no harm done.

it's not like our other guys are playing so great that we can't afford to take them off the floor!

i'm sick of coaches who don't know how to manage minutes for their team. :(

You have to ask yourself if it is an organizational mandate to limit the play of the kids.

3 coaches with different personalities, styles and histories all following the same plan.

You have to ask yourself if it is an organizational mandate to limit the play of the kids.


Answer: NO

no- just 3 coaches who have no clue how to develop talent longterm or how to manage minutes.

other coaches around the league are figuring it out. we got 3 straight coaches who haven't got a clue when it comes to this. sure they can draw up some pretty looking X's & O's. but IMO the nba is becoming less and less about that and more and more about the talent on the floor and how you develop them.

X's & O's are still important but the nba coaches are more managers than actual coaches IMO. they really just need to be a decent X's & O's guy but more of a manager of personalities and player minutes.

Can you really blame the coaches?

This organization has a reputation for canning coaches at the drop of a hat.

It's "win now" around here.

That being said, they still need to develop these guys somehow.

I would think that is why they have the D league...but I dont think they have Blalock or Amir there.

But how do you actually develop several young players at the same time when the "title chase" has been the thing?

After we won the title everyone expected a repeat chase. When we lost G7 and Flip was hired it was stated numerous times that "anything less than a Finals appearance is a failure"

So for 4 straight seasons (during LB's first year he's more likely to teach young guys at practice than play them meaningful minutes) we've been in this "win now" mode.

It's gonna come back to bite us eventually.

I wonder if Amir Johnson and Will Blalock are expiring deals or if the team has options on both?

The D league?

Amir did his time and did well so another trip isn't gonna prove much.

Blalock could use the time but only if they run similar offensive sets. Otherwise it's pointless since he's not learning our system.

Chuck Daly was always able to get the youngsters some minutes.

The starters should be getting the minutes right now to iron things out after Ben's leaving. Let the starters get it together for a couple more weeks, then play the youngsters.

Chuck Daly was always able to get the youngsters some minutes.

The starters should be getting the minutes right now to iron things out after Ben's leaving. Let the starters get it together for a couple more weeks, then play the youngsters.

I have to disagree with you there Tahoe. Daly didn't do a very good job of playing some of his youngsters. Dumars, Salley, and Rodman were all played more out of neccessity. I remember that Lance Blanks was supposed to be decent but never played. Fennis Dembo never played either but kinda sucked. More importantly was Tony Campbell who almost never played until he went to the T-Wolves where he became a pretty darn good NBA player with them and the Lakers. He is a great example of a good player who wasn't any good until he got some pt.

don't forget michael williams. the kid turned out to be a fairly efficient pg(not great) in Minnesota too oddly enough.

But how do you actually develop several young players at the same time when the "title chase" has been the thing?

After we won the title everyone expected a repeat chase. When we lost G7 and Flip was hired it was stated numerous times that "anything less than a Finals appearance is a failure"

So for 4 straight seasons (during LB's first year he's more likely to teach young guys at practice than play them meaningful minutes) we've been in this "win now" mode.

It's gonna come back to bite us eventually.

I wonder if Amir Johnson and Will Blalock are expiring deals or if the team has options on both?

this reminds me of the environment debate. companies resist becoming green because theyre worried about profits. but going green fits every economic model, so its a false debate.

same thing here. we're in 'win now' mode, but developing the young guys and the bench helps you 'win now' (as long as you realize 'now' means april, may, and june, not december, january, and february).

you guys there IS a happy medium. it's not all black and white. you CAN play young guys and still win.

look, i'm not advocating playing blalock and AJ a ton of minutes. maybe not even play them every night. but you CAN play them 10 or 15 minutes here or there. even 5-8 minutes!

give them a ROLE. it has been proven over and over that a guy who has an actual role on a team (other than just bench warmer) is better off. i don't care if it's a very, very small role- at least GIVE HIM A ROLE!

i don't like him personally, but i do admire phil jackson for the way he manages minutes. he's a prime example of a guy who is willing to play young, inexperienced kids in small doses. he has had success with this more than it has hurt him.

you CAN balance the 2- winning and finding some minutes for young guys. i mean, for goodness sake- if we played blalock for 5-8 minutes and he was horrible, of course we pull him before he kills us. we're not going to totally blow an entire game from playing him a few minutes in the 2nd quarter or something.

for goodness sake- he can't be worse than what hunter gives us! play them a few minutes and if they don't bring the energy you need, take them out- it doesn't kill you.

but i am sure that if we put in these kids, they can give us some energy and athleticism and a change of pace that we desperately need. even if it's only for a few minutes, like i said. they won't have success all the time- of course not. our bench doesn't have success all the time NOW so they would be no different.

but it can and should be done. you're not sacrificing wins if you do it right. of course i understand the urgency to win, win, win NOW or else. but i don't buy the argument that playing a youngster for a few spot minutes is going to destroy your ability to win.

if we insert AJ or blalock in for a couple of minutes, are we suddenly going to give up 20 points and go scoreless, making it impossible to win? no- we make bad substitutions NOW. you can insert them in the lineup (with some starters of course and maybe not play them both together) and if things go south, take them out.

no harm done. it's not like the game is suddenly going to get out of hand and we'll have no chance of winning. play them in the earlier portions of the game and let them show what they can bring.

you guys there IS a happy medium. it's not all black and white. you CAN play young guys and still win.

look, i'm not advocating playing blalock and AJ a ton of minutes. maybe not even play them every night. but you CAN play them 10 or 15 minutes here or there. even 5-8 minutes!


There's always a cost and minutes have to come from somewhere. If starters are taking up those minutes in a game it's probably because they're needed for the win. If not, there are other bench players ahead of the kids that need minutes to stay in a rhythm. Murray, Delfino, Davis, Dice, Hunter, etc.

The argument that a team trying to "win now" struggles to find minutes for the bottom of the roster is a legitimate one. Most contenders won't play them unless injuries or crisis force the issue.



i don't like him personally, but i do admire phil jackson for the way he manages minutes. he's a prime example of a guy who is willing to play young, inexperienced kids in small doses. he has had success with this more than it has hurt him.


Phillip has also had the benefit of having the best talents in the league to do the heavy lifting. MJ, Kobe and Shaq give you a huge margin for error where you can throw kids out there without losing games. Hell, they could drag me from behind the computer and throw me on the floor with Kobe against the bobcats and probably get the W.

The pistons have talent but nobody that's so far above the league that they can t-bag the opposition standing up.

again read what i wrote. we don't have a true superstar but it's not like playing a kid for a few minutes is going to immediately make the game get out of hand and we will have no ability to overcome a couple of mistakes.

that's sort of silly to suggest IMO. you don't need a superstar to overcome bad play from a bench player for a few minutes. we get that NOW. i've seen a bunch of times just this year where flip, hunter, or delfino will come in and stink it up.

we take them out and then we still win. it's not like a few minutes played by a reserve is going to decide the game, as you suggest it would if you lack a superstar.

also, there have been games where a bench player has been completely removed from the rotation for one reason or another. it would be just as easy to insert one of the younger kids to get those minutes, instead of dumping all the minutes on our starter or on an aging, mostly useless vet like hunter.

you don't always have to play your starters 40 minutes to get a win. even if you did, it wouldn't kill you to play a younger kid for a couple of minutes that they are NOT in there.

there are creative ways to mix your bench in there more IMO.

Man, these 4+ day layoffs are killers (for fans at least).

Fuck a schedulemaker.

I hate Flips bench usage, but it's not because Amir or Blaylock don't see the floor. I don't expect Flip to use the 11th and 12th men except in a blowout. Yes, other teams develop their young guys, but I bet those young guys also aren't the 11th and 12th players on the depth chart.

What baffles me is the lack of use for the 8th, 9th and 10th guys. Too often Flip had a 7-8 man rotation (with maybe a few minutes for the 9th and 10th guys). Our players were definately worn out. Heck, they complained this year about being worn out (they've played a ton of back to backs). If the starters are rested, than overlooking your bench for a game or two is fine. However, they are playing major minutes in back to back games quite often.

I thought Maxiell did a nice job in the Orlando game.

He really seemed to draw the attention of the Orlando D, so even when he wasn't shooting, he was drawing defenders, which is something that this team sorely lacks.

It would be nice (if he's not going to do it other times) that at least on the back half of back-to-backs if Flip would throw the young guys out there for 8-10 minutes. I could live with that.

I thought Maxiell did a nice job in the Orlando game.

He really seemed to draw the attention of the Orlando D, so even when he wasn't shooting, he was drawing defenders, which is something that this team sorely lacks.

It would be nice (if he's not going to do it other times) that at least on the back half of back-to-backs if Flip would throw the young guys out there for 8-10 minutes. I could live with that.

or the front side if it's an "easier" opponent.

What I'm wondering?

If the East is so fucking weak that the 8th seed only needs to win 40 games why don't we play the kids on back to back nights just for shits and giggles?

I'm not talking the whole game, but given them 10 mins each (I'm talking about Blalock and Amir). If we lose then who gives a fuck?

It's not like Home Court is the ultimate fucking prize come playoff time. We proved that last season.

Man, these 4+ day layoffs are killers (for fans at least).

Fuck a schedulemaker.

yep

we got a 'shout out' thread we need a 'fuck a ?' thread.

I think so.