The combo of Flynn, Smith, Batum/Babbitt, Aldridge and Hickson was on fire. They had all the gears and tempo going. Then Coach Canales brings in Felton and Pryzbilla. The defense and rebounding drops significantly and we start turning the ball over and committing many careless fouls. So Utah makes their run and Coach Canales keeps those two in the game. In fact, Flynn doesn't see a minute until 30 seconds left in the 3rd. And to top it off, he brings in Thabeet. Thabeet?!?! Yeah like that's gonna help! HAHAHAHA If you want to tank, then give Felton the ball. He is a human tank machine. Careless turnovers, never getting the ball to the man in rhythm. Stats last night was a total of 8 assists to 4 turn overs. But his 4 turn overs were timely turn overs. two of them were made in the final minutes of the game and the other two were during Utah's run to cut the 14 point lead down. Our playoff chances are over, but I still don't condone tanking. We play to win every night and let the chips fall. If Canales got some memo that we can't make the playoffs, then I have a low opinion on our management. Setting a losing culture will only hurt the team next season. We need to want to win and do what it takes to win. Tossing in Thabeet or playing Felton when he's obviously ruining the tempo was frustrating.
Playing Thabeet a couple spot minutes was a nice subtle touch. With such a close game, that substitution turned out to be really important. Of course, when you have a superstar tanker like Felton, losing is always within reach.
Felton is the starting PG. Kind of hard not to play him. But yeah, Kaleb may have gotten the memo, and all it takes is a couple of minutes here and there of doling out playing time. I am in the crowd that wants the 10th, not 13th, worst record (No way we catch the tanking GSW). However, I can see the logic in trying to win the home games to keep the paying customers happy, and losing all the road games, when the fans are paying (literally) less attention. It should have roughly the same result. My question is: Does anyone know why Crawford didn't play at all? That was extremely unexpected. Is anyone talking about it? What did I miss?
