CAT TIME

Greetings Cougar Nation. Hope you’re having a happy hump day.

Yesterday, we had a couple of comments related to my main man, Kyle Weaver.

So, given that I’ve had the opportunity of watching him over the past couple of weeks, I thought I’d give an update.

But before we get to Mr. Weaver’s play, it’s important to frame the backdrop of where Kyle is currently spending his playing days.

In case you forgot, Kyle now plays in Clay Bennett’s wonderworld.

And you know what that means. Yep, its January, and the big boys are feedin’ on the Red River.

So, giddie up Francesca, how bout you and me go fishin’ for some Blue Cat?

Yowza. What fun times in Okey land.

Anyhow, as you all know by now, Kyle has been starting for the last two weeks. On Sunday, I watched him play the Sacramento Kings. Last night, I watched him play the Fakers. Sunday, he scored a career high 9 points with all of his points coming in the first half. Yesterday, he scored 11 with 7 of those coming in the first quarter while matched up against Kobe Bryant.

Weaver had a bunch of nifty plays in both games including swatting a Kobe jumper in the fourth last night (Durant loved it) as well as forcing Kobe into a traveling call.

When Kyle first became a starter the Thunder had him drifting on the weakside elbow basically doing nothing except for enjoying a great view of Kevin Durant’s development into brilliance. More recently, though, they are getting him the ball in the open court and setting him up on the baseline. This allows Kyle to slash and do the dipsy-do-dunkeroo stuff that we saw during his career as a Coug. The result: career highs in the last two games.

Over that time, teams have been sagging off of Weaver and challenging him to hit the long range J (see Marcus Capers). Thankfully for Kyle, the Thunder want him to take that shot. So, Kyle was 1 for 5 last night from three point land but he’s getting to develop his shot on the fly which is good.

As Sedihawk and I discussed yesterday, when you think back to the development of GP and Kyle’s clone, Nate McMillan

you come to re-remember that those dudes also couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn when they entered the league.

So, Kyle seems like he’s carving himself a nice nitch. The key to his development is to get better at shooting his J. The other key for him is to have his teammates–most notably Westbrook–provide some semblance of team defense since Kyle is getting killed right now on back screens. If and when that happens, Kyle may find himself enjoying a nice 7 or 8 year career as a major player in the league.

Have a good week.