Lion Face/Lemon Face 11.14.09: Friday the 13th Edition

The team in purple wins a great game for their fourth straight. No, not those guys in purple. Yes, the other team in purple. Chris Paul hurt ankles his ankle on the court. The Hawks and Celtics squared off with different results than what you would think would happen.

And there were plenty of point guard happenings – both good and bad. So how do you recap a nine-game night in the NBA?

Aw hell, you know the drill by now. We’re making faces! Matt and Ben, show the people what they want!

Lion Face: Greg Oden’s Defense and Rebounding
Holy Wes Unseld, this guy can defend the paint. I mean, he’s really, really, really, really, really good at it. He changes shots all the time and wipes away second chance points before they even can materialize, thanks to his rebounding. This guy is nearly as good now as Ben Wallace was when he was still alive, only he has the potential to actually matter on the offensive end of the floor. He’s a guy you can anchor a young team with simply off of his defensive presence. You just have to hope he can keep his hands to himself and not unnecessarily plague his team with his own foul trouble. Against the lowly Hornets, he had a pretty typical game: 8 points, 12 rebounds, 3 blocks, 4 fouls, 29 minutes. His three blocks were on layup attempts by guards.

Lemon Face: Greg Oden’s Offense
Holy DeSagana Diop, you can’t rely on this guy to score at all. He missed his first six shots in the game against New Orleans and other than a mid-range jumper, they were all around the basket. His footwork is inconsistent at best and his touch is pretty hit or miss (literally). I still think he has the potential on offense to be very good. He’ll never remind anybody of Hakeem Olajuwon and maybe not even Hakim Warrick. But his offensive rebounding is a deadly weapon and he’s not exactly Zan Tabak out there, either. For now, let’s just hope LaMarcus Aldridge decides to grow a pair and score in the post when the Blazers need him.

Lion Face: Dwight Howard
26 points. 14 rebounds. 5 blocks. Helped hold Brook Lopez to 1 of 12 from the field. Isn’t Dwight Howard’s greatness so mundane? I mean, what’s next? More dunking? He’s going to keep improving his post game and make it impossible to dislike his game outside of his free throw shooting? Yaaaaaaaawwwwwwn.

Lemon Face: Stephen Curry’s PT
He played two minutes and 35 seconds in a blowout win against a bad team in which he fit perfectly into the flow of the game. He’s being forced to play point guard next to Monta Ellis and has been doing a decent job of it with 4.8 assists per game to go against 2.0 turnovers per contest. And yet he plays two minutes and 35 seconds against the Knicks. Marcus Landry played more than double his minutes on the floor. He didn’t even get out on the floor more than Darko Milicic or Jared Jeffries and they aren’t even basketball players. Oh well, at least Anthony Randolph got more playing time than…

Seriously, Nellie – what the eff?

Lion Face: Rafer Alston’s Trip-Dub
Sure, the Nets are the only winless team in the NBA and are riding a nine-game losing streak like Luke Perry rides a bull in the movie Eight Seconds. But Skip To My Lou recorded a triple-double (17 points, 10 assists, 10 rebounds) against his former Magic teammates on Friday night and reminded everyone that when he wants to be, he’s still a hell of an NBA player who puts up numbers without positively affecting the outcome of the game for his team. It would be like celebrating John McClane if he battled every Eastern European terrorist in a high-rise building without actually saving the day. Yippie-kay-ay, M’er F’er!

Lemon Face: Chris Paul’s Ankle
This is not fair. It’s simply not fair. Do you realize that Chris Paul went into this game with 26.1 points, 9.3 assists, 2.2 turnovers and 62.2% from the field? His True Shooting percentage was 73.6%! 73.6!!!! That’s not even a real integer in basketball. And if it is, I feel like it’s something that Chris Paul manufactured in order to impress us – like the pick-and-roll alley-oop or Tyson Chandler’s acceptance. And now, he’ll be out for one to two weeks with a sprained left ankle. Who knows if he’ll return to his old self when he does come back because most likely, the injury will have needed more time to heal (they always do, much like broken hearts and your bleeding ears after being forced to listen to a Kelly Clarkson song).

Lion Face: Eric Maynor, The Pride of VCU
He received his first start in the NBA because of a Deron Williams family issue (best of luck, D) and he made the most of it by channeling the tour de force we saw at Virginia Commonwealth in tournament form. He finished the night with 13 points, 11 assists and just two turnovers in 36 minutes. He helped set up his teammates, played stellar defense in helping to prove that Lou Williams is not a point guard, and led his team to a 22-point victory over the 76ers on the road. I will bang his drum for his entire career. He’s one of those Brevin Knight-Eric Snow-type of pros who will never really blow you away with his talent but will always seem to be disruptive against the opposing team. Big ups to you, Eric Maynor.

Lemon Face: T’Wolves Crapiness
You’re sucking the life out of my will to live. This team is an abortion on offense and not capable of really competing with anybody. Due to injury, they’ve asked me to throw my support behind Ryan Hollins and Sasha Pavlovic. I find myself having conversations with myself about the legitimacy of Nathan Jawai and trying to convince my own psyche that his jersey is cut funny and that’s why he has rack on him that would make Hugh Heffner want to pay it to live in his mansion and have Viagra-sex with him every night before Murder She Wrote. I don’t know how many more Corey Brewer jump shots I can take either. I watch Brandon Jennings and Tyreke Evans and then try to ponder why people are so high on Jonny Flynn. I mean, he’s not the point guard of the future. The point guard of the future is eating tapas and serenading U.S. tourists in Barcelona. But hey, at least the shooting specialist they drafted out of North Carolina is making one-third of his shots and less than 30% of his threes this year. Shoot me.  

Lion Face: Jason Thompson And The Kings
Don’t look now but Jason Thompson has played like an All-Star through the first nine games of the season. Over his past five games, he’s averaging 20 points, 11 rebounds, and nine free throw attempts per game (making 86%). His defense has been great, he’s second in the league in offensive rebounding, and he’s helped lead this Sacramento Kings team to four straight wins (first time since spring of 2008) and 5-4 record. The Kings aren’t playing like the 17-win, redheaded stepchild of yesterseason. They’re looking like a team that is nearly impossible to beat at home and currently applying for “I hope we don’t have to face them while we’re fighting for our playoff lives this March and April” status. Against the Rockets on Friday, JT had 27 points, 11 rebounds, and nine offensive rebounds.

Lemon Face: Aaron Brooks
10 points and five assists in 26 minutes are not terrible numbers. But he played terribly against the Kings on Friday. Opposing guard, Beno Udrih, more than doubled his point production and he made just 4/13 shots in this game. His quickness was taken away by the savvy play (yes, even Beno can be savvy) by Udrih and he was overmatched for almost the entire course of this game. Re-read that; Beno Udrih overmatched him for almost the entire course of this game. That is lemon face worthy.

Lion Face: Atlanta Hawks
Watching their game tonight, I’m reminded of this quote from Teddy KGB in Rounders: “Very aggressive. A new day. And. You. Von’t. Be. Pushed. A-round.” I feel like the Hawks are always supposed to be making the next leap with a “statement” game like a win in Boston during the regular season. And now I’m supposed to throw on my Kevin Willis jersey, fire up the Mike Fratello perm and be psyched for Hawks basketball. And maybe it is one of those statement games. Personally, I feel like it’s a bunch of crap. I don’t think they’re ready and as constructed, I don’t think they’ll ever be ready. But to go into Boston, beat them on the boards by 18, force them into 1/15 shooting from three and only allow 86 points is still damn impressive.

Lemon Face: Clippers Final 36 Minutes

Lion Face: Ty Lawson
Tywon. Ronell.

Mr. Lawson if you’re nasty.