With such a face-filled night of basketball, there’s really no need for me to attempt to come up with a clever intro that somehow gets me to seamlessly incorporate the Matt Damon-Ben Affleck clip we always run here.
So let’s get down to business right away.
How bout it, gents?
Lion Face: Do What Toney Douglas Do
What is it that Toney Douglas do, you ask? Whatever the hell he wants, apparently. Toney Douglas was one of those late first round sleepers that I loved before the draft. It all started when I was able to attend his pre-draft workout with the Sacramento Kings. He was matched up against guys like Stephen Curry and Tyreke Evans. Did he dominate? No. But did he get dominated? Not from what I saw. He held his own defensively. He wasn’t afraid offensively. It was just an impressive display of confidence for a guy that should be overmatched. Ever since then, I’ve been a fan and dedicated to the love that Posting and Toasting loves to give him. Against the Sixers, he got the start and made the most of it. He seemingly did more in one game than Chris Duhon has done all year. He picked Willie Greene at halfcourt for a layup and the foul. He finished the night with 20 points, seven assists and three steals. He should be starting for the Knicks the rest of the year. That is unless they want to tank.
Lemon Face: Andre Iguodala’s Shooting
Andre Iguodala was letting it fly against the Knicks. Maybe Tracy McGrady going 4/5 from three-point range inspired him. I’m not quite sure. Or maybe he thought that he should validate Rodney Carney’s comments about it being impossible for players to tank. But one thing is certain of this night: Andre Iguodala couldn’t get his shot to fall. He was 0/7 from three and he was 1/11 from outside of the key overall. I’m no mathematician but that’s a very low percentage of shots made. He was only 4/11 inside the paint and finished 5/22 for 14 points. Valiant effort but he should have realized David Lee was the big man inside and attacked him more.
Lion Face: Andre Iguodala’s Effort
But you can’t completely kill Iggy for the poor shooting. He did make an effort and crash the glass when his shot wasn’t falling. He finished with 17 rebounds overall and grabbed five offensive rebounds. Also, his defense was pretty decent in the game. It wasn’t otherworldly like we expect from him but other than some T-Mac threes he defended well. Just wasn’t enough to overcome his poor shooting.
Lemon Face: Deeeeeetroit Basketbaaaaaaaall?
I don’t even know what to say about the Pistons now. They’re just bad and headed nowhere. You like to hope that Rodney Stuckey is headed somewhere for them but if they get the number one pick, wouldn’t they just take John Wall and punt Rodney Stuckey for another piece to the puzzle? They have Ben Gordon signed to all that money but failed to realize that he won’t make them better unless they’re already in the playoffs. Hoping you get something from their big men is the basketball equivalent of playing Russian roulette. Someone is going to get hurt and everyone is going to feel horrible about it. Two years ago, the Boston-Detroit matchup meant something special. Now it just meant a cure-all for what was ailing Boston. My condolences, Mo-town.
Lion Face: Samuel Dalembert
Was it against the Knicks and the defensive saloon door, David Lee? Absolutely. But Sammy still came up big and did a fine job of controlling the interior. He had 11 points, 18 rebounds and three blocks. He had a nice drop step dunk against David Lee that resulted in a three-point opportunity. He had nine offensive rebounds in the game. It’s not exactly reinventing the wheel or anything like that but it was still a very solid game from a consistently inconsistent interior player.
Lemon Face: Rajon Rondo
I know that Will Bynum is a stick of dynamite on the court but Rajon Rondo didn’t play a good game at all. He should dominate Bynum because he’s just as quick and yet a lot longer and better. Instead, he scored just three points on 1/5 shooting. Yes he had six assists and four steals in 29 minutes of action but he shouldn’t be putting up such mediocre stats against such a mediocre team. A win is a win is a win but Rajon is better than that.
Lion Face: Celtics Bench
61 points on 25/37 shooting for the Boston bench. Everybody scored in the game. Three guys off the bench finished in double figures and two other guys finished with at least eight points. I think the Celtics would take half of that production for the playoffs this year. It would be nice to see the Celtics bench step up like this when it matters because we’ll all benefit from the elevated play in the second season.
Lemon Face: Defense
In the Houston-Denver shootout, there were 94 made baskets, 16 threes, 44 made free throws and only 18 turnovers (with just 12 points off of turnovers) for the two squads. It resulted in 248 points. The Rockets had a 38-point first quarter. The Nuggets had a 38-point third quarter. And I had a lot of fun watching these two teams exchange haymakers like Balboa-Creed. In fact, it was JUST LIKE Apollo Creed and Rocky going at it. There were a lot of shots to the face without either boxer putting their hands up to block.
Lion Face: Carmelo Anthony
Carmelo Anthony is a very good basketball player. And he’s a transcendent scorer in pretty much every way. He never overwhelms you with his scoring and yet it’s still suffocating at the same time. It’s very sneaky the way the barrage hits you. You realize he’s scoring a lot and yet you’re not overly impressed until you realize a couple minutes later, “Holy crap! Melo is scoring A LOT!†Against the Rockets, he took the theme of the no defense game and ran with it. He peppered the Rockets with jumpers from all over the floor. He also scored inside with 20 seconds left to tie the game. He also got a good look at the end of the game from three that would have won it but he misfired on the shot. Carmelo’s offense seems to be waiting for you to fall asleep. Once you do, it’s standing there over you with a pillow, hoping to take the life from you.
Lemon Face: Jerry Sloan
I don’t know if I should blame Deron Williams for this too but ultimately, it falls on Jerry Sloan to protect his players. At the end of the third quarter, the Jazz were up 30 and they still had Deron Williams in the game. Well, he hurt his leg near the end of the period when he shouldn’t have even been on the court. With two other point guards on the roster and a shooting guard who is capable of handling the dribbling, there’s no excuse for Deron to be out there for no reason. The Jazz are lucky the injury wasn’t serious and he’ll be able to continue fighting off the Thunder for homecourt advantage in the first round.
Lion Face: Brooks and Martin
Yes, it sounds like either a country music duo or some type of bourbon but Brooks and Martin is becoming one of the most fun backcourts in the league. Against the Rockets, they combined for 60 points on just 33 shots. Kevin Martin moved perfectly without the ball and his cutting through the lane seemed to open things up for everybody. And Brooks was just electric all night. Brooks also had nine assists to go with his 31 points and eventual game-winning jumper with 2.9 seconds left. And don’t forget that these guys did this against a damn good defensive backcourt of Billups and Afflalo.
Lemon Face Lion Face: Johan Petro
I’m so confused right now. Johan Petro caught passes. He made jumpers. He made free throws. Rebounds didn’t bounce off of his hands. This is not a world I’m prepared to live in. Let’s just move on.
Lion Face: Darren Collison
Obviously, Collison hasn’t had enough opportunities to challenge for the Rookie of the Year consideration. He just hasn’t been doing more than Evans and Curry and he hasn’t been playing at this high level for nearly as long (not his fault; he had a pretty good player in front of him). In the month of February, he won Rookie of the Month in the West because of his 21-8-3.9 averages. The problem was he also averaged 4.8 turnovers per game. Well this month, I think he’s been even better. He’s averaging 16.1 points, 11.4 assists and he’s cut the turnovers to 3.7 per game. Against the Clippers, he threw up an 18-point, 14-assist performance. Yes he still had four turnovers but he played the entire game and stood toe-to-toe with a motivated Baron Davis. Most importantly, Hornets got the win on the road. Kid is legit and deserves to be on the All-Rookie 1st team (I’m not sure if they go by position but the All-Rookie 1st team should definitely be all guards this year).
Lemon Face: Al Thornton
Somebody had to represent this Wizards team for their horrendous performance Monday night and he went 1/9 for four points and four rebounds in 25 minutes of play. Seems justifiable if you ask me.
Lion Face: Baron Davis
Baron Davis had 18 points on 14 shots, which is really nice for a guy who has shot so horribly all season long. But even more impressive is the 17:1 assist to turnover performance he put out there against the Hornets. Darren Collison is not a bad defensive point guard. But he couldn’t slow down the strength and creativity of Baron. Fear the Beard when he’s giving a damn.
Lemon Face: Chris Kaman
Emeka Okafor is a really good defensive big man but 3/15 from the field and just three rebounds is inexcusable.
Lion Face: Pau Gasol
Is there anyone in this league that can guard him when he’s making that left-handed half-hook over his right shoulder? Chuck Hayes couldn’t stop it and neither could Dwight Howard. When he has that going, he’s pretty much unguardable so when he’s doing that against the Warriors, you know the Dubs are in trouble. His 26 points on 13 shots were a steadying force against the rag-tag Warriors. The Warriors tried to trick the Lakers into playing their game. They made them run and for the most part, it worked. But every once in a while when the Lakers were losing their way, they’d get wise and dump it into Pau. He’d calmly score and set things right in the basketball universe. In fact, the Lakers were completely stupid for not getting this man 20 shots.
Lemon Face: Andrew Bynum… hear me out on this
This is going to seem like I’m picking on Andrew Bynum because I always find a way to pick on Andrew Bynum. And yes, ultimately a 19-point, 14-rebound performance is pretty good. But he was kind of terrible against the Warriors. He should be destroying people inside against the Warriors like that creature in Cloverfield. Instead, he turned the ball over eight times (!) and managed to transplant his hands with one from Kwame Brown and the other from Johan Petro of three years ago. You can never truly rely on him catching a quick pass. Although, I do like that he went 7/8 from the line.
Lion Face: Chris Hunter
Not sure who Chris Hunter is? Don’t worry about it; you’ll have plenty of time to learn his name. In a day in age in which guys like the Collins brothers, Jerome James and Steve Hunter get paid to be tall, Chris Hunter has worked his tail off to get from the D-League to a regular spot on an NBA team. Is he taking advantage of the various Warriors’ injuries in the frontcourt in order to get this hard work to pay off? Absolutely. But he’s still putting in the work and getting results. Against the Lakers big front line, he managed to put in 22 points and seven of the Warriors’ 25 rebounds. He made all six of his free throws and kept his bigger opposition honest with scoring inside and outside. I love when guys like this get rewarded for working hard, rather than just being tall.
Lemon Face: Monta Ellis
WOW, this guy killed his team tonight. You might remember me trying to open up the dark side of his impressive stats earlier in the season. Well, against the Lakers Monta just continued to jack up shot after shot despite the fact that Steph Curry, Corey Maggette and basically anyone not named Monta Ellis was having a relatively easy time scoring against the Lakers. Yes, Monta had 11 assists and five steals. But he went to the free throw line just two times and made just five of his 23 shots. It’s not that he was missing shots. It’s that he was MISSING shots! And the final play of the game kind of summed up his night perfectly. After Curry missed the wide-open, game-tying three Monta grabbed the rebound. He looked for Curry to kick it out to but Curry was standing out of bounds. Kobe was retreating to guard CJ Watson in the right corner so Monta high-tailed it out to the top of the three-point arc. He turned, fired and had his desperation attempt bounce around a few times before falling off the side of the rim. It was a valiant effort but considering he had Anthony Morrow all by himself (Celine Dion style), he once again made a horrible decision.
One last thing, too many people are going to make a big deal over Ellis “smiling†after missing the three. It was sort of a smile-grimace in which he knew he had a chance to tie the game and instead he missed the shot. He wasn’t happy with missing the three. He was upset. But with the shot he took and the bounces it had before it fell outside of the cylinder, that face really isn’t the end of competition as some will make it out to be.
Lion Face: Kobe Bryant
The nine turnovers were bad. He was so careless with the ball and just didn’t take care of it. That’s not something you expect from Mamba. Maybe this guy but not Mamba:
However, Kobe did still score an efficient 29 points – 9/18 shooting, 2/4 from three (one of them was a BIG three) and 9/11 from the free throw line (one big miss that nearly cost them the win). Kobe always seems to be in control, even when he’s dribbling and passing the ball all over the place. He got caught up a little too much in the pissing match with Monta and Steph but overall, he always had this game in hand. The Lakers took his confidence and calm and made the plays when they had to. Did they have to rely on a fortunate bounce against a team they should destroy? Yes. But that’s the Lakers team we need to get used. They play to their competition. Lucky for them, their competition will be good in the playoffs.
Lemon Face: Shannon Brown
Remember months ago when Lakers fans were lauding Shannon Brown as one of the top reserve guards in the league? He was a guy that “changed the game†and “played good defense†against better guards. He deserved to be in the dunk contest too. Well, he’s actually not very good. He certainly can’t shoot. And his defense is pretty bad. He’s the exact body type and level of athleticism you’d want guarding Curry or Monta or Watson. And yet they all scored quite easily against him.
Lion Face: Stephen Curry
There’s no denying this kid’s talent. I still don’t think he can be the Rookie of the Year because he’s been good since the beginning of January and Tyreke Evans has been doing it consistently since the fifth game of the year. But there’s no shame in being the runner-up to only the fourth rookie in NBA history to put up 20-5-5. Curry plays perfectly into the style of the Warriors. Get up the court, get to the basket and when given daylight you should throw up a shot from beyond that little arc on the court. Curry’s not just a shooter, either. He can get to the rim, get crafty around the basket and also find his teammates in the position most advantageous for them to score. Can Curry steal the Rookie of the Year award? I’ve been saying no for months but at this point, he’s getting a lot more national exposure than Tyreke can get. He’s playing big on national TV, which is an opportunity Tyreke isn’t afforded. Maybe with a strong final month, he can trick enough voters to remember his name come ballot time.
With games like 29 points and nine assists against the best team in the league coming through the ESPN broadcast truck, it’s not so far-fetched anymore to think he can rob Evans of the award.
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