Have you ever watched a movie that simply didn’t do anything for you? I’m not talking about a movie that you hated or a movie that was really bad. I just mean a movie that was very boring from start to finish and left your life, psyche, and sense of entertainment completely unaffected?
I felt that way when I watched the movie Vantage Point. It wasn’t bad. It wasn’t good. It wasn’t exciting. It wasn’t suspenseful. It was merely Dennis Quaid running around a city in Spain trying to figure out who shot the president, who set off an explosion and why Matthew Fox was such a douche bag. I didn’t really leave the theater disappointed either. It was simply two hours of my life I would never get back but I don’t know that I really would have replaced them with anything substantial.
That’s kind of how this game between the Sixers and Kings.
I don’t know if it’s a sign of the dog days of the NBA season coming in January but this game was just hard to watch, wasn’t it?
It’s hard to even come up with something to say about it. It was a very bland, uninteresting game. There wasn’t a big run that the 76ers really went on. The Kings went on a huge run early and looked like they were going to blow a bad Philly team out of the water. But then the offensive onslaught stopped. Well, it didn’t exactly stop. The Kings shot fairly well throughout the entire game. The problem was the 76ers started making their shots.
In fact if you throw out the 76ers first quarter dry spell of 7/22 shooting, they shot 60% over the course of the rest of the game. A good percentage of those were quality shots. They made nine of their 16 three-point attempts with the main culprit being Rodney Carney – yes, THAT Rodney Carney. The Kings kept leaving him open on the perimeter – most likely because the scouting report probably says, “IT’S F^$%ING RODNEY CARNEY” – and he made them pay. He made four of his five attempts from deep. Even Allen Iverson and Lou Williams each hit a couple of threes (combined 4/6). It was just one of those nights.
The Kings didn’t play bad defense but they didn’t play inspired defense, either. Well, maybe that IS bad defense. In the first quarter there was a spark with this team when Donté Greene and Beno Udrih weren’t turning the ball over. They took the ball from Philly and made the most of those opportunities with 10 points off of five turnovers. But after that, it looked like a bad high school team going through the defensive motions in practice.
Once the Sixers evened up the game going into halftime and came out in the third quarter by not letting the Kings go on a huge run to turn the tide of the game, the writing was pretty much on the wall. It was a lot like the final half of the Kings home loss to the Bulls. It wasn’t a blowout and the Kings were always within striking distance but you never had a confident feeling they would come back and take control of this game.
And that’s all you can really say about this game. Chalk it up to tired legs and seemingly disinterested participants.
Game Notes
– Remember when the Kings were allegedly entertaining the idea of acquiring Samuel Dalembert? After watching this game, aren’t you glad nothing came of that? He’s terrible. He’s a defensive specialist who can’t play solid defense. He has hands that Johan Petro would laugh at. And you’d rather try to kick in shots from halfcourt than give him the ball in a scoring opportunity.
– Where do Omri Casspi and Donté Greene disappear to when they have it going? It seems like when Donté and Omri start out on fire, there’s very little chance of seeing them in the second quarter. Tonight, the honor went to Omri. He had a very good scoring night with 21 points on 14 shots. Sure he missed those two close shots but he scored very efficiently for a team that struggled to get good shots.
– When your team is clearly lacking energy, why don’t we see more of Jon Brockman? He played eight minutes tonight and it didn’t seem like he was given a chance to inject life into this team.
– Allen Iverson isn’t the old 40-point threat we’re used to seeing but he scored VERY easily against the Kings tonight. He still has enough left in his tank to positively affect games.
– When you have Thaddeus Young guarding Jason Thompson inside, why don’t you feed him like the gluttony victim in Seven? He should have been allowed to punish him all night. The fact he only had 14 shot attempts is wrong. Poor recognition of a mismatch there.
– That’s all. Don’t re-watch this game if you want to. And don’t watch Vantage Point. It’s just a waste of a couple hours.
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