My time is limited at the moment. Meanwhile, the Pistons are out there making fools of themselves losing to the Bobcats, and Coach Michael Curry is suddenly starting to appear like he is losing the battle to get the Iverson mess under control. And the Pistons now have to play again with no rest on a back to back road game at Indiana! So this is an emergency fast break post that I will be explaining in detail (very, very great detail as you regular readers know) in the coming days and weeks. RULES FOR MAKING SURE IVERSON DOES NOT HURT YOUR TEAM 1. If you don't realize that Iverson plays both guard positions at once regardless of his designated position you will lose out. 2. If you make a summary judgment in advance that Iverson can not be an effective point guard you will lose out. 3. If you are afraid to limit Iverson's minutes or afraid to make him come off the bench if you have to do that, you will lose out. There are other rules you need to discover and follow to reduce the damage from the Larry Brown caused Iverson combo guard mess but those three are the most important to start with. Now here is the correct starting lineup for the Detroit Pistons: PG Rodney Stuckey SG Richard Hamilton SF Tayshaun Prince PF Amir Johnson C Rasheed Wallace You bring in Iverson for Hamilton at 8-9 minutes into the game. You want either Stuckey, Iverson, or even Bynum in the game at all times when Hamilton is in the game, since Hamilton can not run the point worth a damn. If you are going to run Prince at the point, for god's sakes, don't ever do it with Hamilton and AI in the game at the same time. In that scheme you have a G-F (Prince)at the point, you have a combo guard designated at SG (Iverson) who doesn't trust or feel comfortable with the designated PG, and you have another SG (Hamilton) who needs a pure PG to excel. You have created total and complete chaos and you have ruined both the offense and the defense at the same time! In fact, the three player combination of Prince/Iverson/Hamilton is not even among the top 50 three-player combinations for the Pistons. Generally, Prince at the point is a very bad idea except for a few plays here and there to confuse the defense. It sounds more complicated than it is, but I admit it's kind of complicated, and, once again, I don't have time at the moment to explain further. Much more later.
I still have faith that the Pistons will win their playoff series even if they do not have home court advantage, whereas the Nuggets will lose their playoff series even if they do have home court advantage. I think that when this one surprise after another season is all said and done (laugh out loud at what they said on the Mavericks forum tonight about the "Birdman" and about the call that made Mark Cuban ballistic) I will be very, very satisfied because the Pistons will find the way to win their playoff series while the Nuggets will be unable to win theirs.
Don't you think you should have Iverson start, and let Hamilton come off the bench with the second unit, since the only thing rip can do is shoot jumpers? Iverson is a much more dynamic offensive player and should get the bulk of the minutes. Bringing hamilton off the bench would be a huge boost to our second unit. Stuckey and AI are developing chemistry together and are so dangerous when they are both driving to the basket at will. I don't even think Hamilton is as good of a defensive player as AI either, and thats not saying much.
You got your wish, Curry has decided that AI starts. Among other reasons, the last reason for AI not starting that I grew to like was that it would make the Pistons' 2nd unit one of the most and probably the most deadly 2nd unit in the game. Since Iverson plays both guard positions at once and usually takes care of both of them well at the same time, you could have 3 forwards and a center in the game at the same time. Four quality Pistons defensive players and Iverson would have been a much better version of the Sixers and a much more successful version. The important things Curry must accomplish, regardless of what he knows or doesn't know about how complicated it is to make sure Iverson's game does not actually do more harm than good, are: 1. End what they are calling in Detroit "small ball". It is a disaster for the Pistons, due to rebounding and defending going down the tubes. Please, end it and don't bring it back. 2. Cut way back or eliminate Prince running the point; this would work even less well in the playoffs than it has in the regular. This is too crafty to work in the real world. Prince has a lot more important things to do than run point. 3. Keep the not working Prince/Iverson/Hamilton combination down, which mostly means, since Prince must play mega minutes, keep the Iverson/Hamilton combination down. Hamilton needs a traditional or boring or standard point guard to work with and everyone agrees that Iverson is not that. 4. Keep the Stuckey/Iverson combination down too, for a very important indirect reason. Without Hamilton making some jump shots, the Pistons do not have enough offense for the playoffs. You can not run every play to the hoop, especially in the playoffs; you have to have some players knocking down jumpers. But Hamilton plays poorly with Iverson and much better with Stuckey. Hamilton is disturbed by someone playing both guard positions at once, and I can't say that I blame him; I've been reporting on how that can screw up an offense for many moons. Now since Stuckey can only play so many minutes, you have to divide his minutes between Stuckey/Iverson and Stuckey/Hamilton. If you start Stuckey/Iverson and go a lot of minutes that way, you don't have enough Stuckey minutes left for Stuckey/Hamilton. 5. No one is arguing that Iverson's minutes should be limited. As mentioned already, I would really want to see Curry make sure that Iverson gets his 35 minutes a game and have that filled out to a greater extent with Iverson and the bigger, quality defensive, but offensively less dynamic group of Pistons, especially McDyess, Maxiell, Kwame Brown. You know and I know that Hamilton can't do much of anything with those players. Hamilton can't do much of anything with anyone except Stuckey. 6. Here is the bottom line number one objective for Curry in terms of minutes: Since Hamilton should be close to 30 minutes and Iverson 35-40, you will have to have up to 20 minutes of Iverson/Hamilton regardless of who starts. I would divide and conquer; I would make sure Stuckey is in for about 10 of those and be left with the situation Hamilton can't work with for just 10 minutes or so. Since Stuckey plays 30 his breakdown would be ideally 10 minutes of Stuckey/Iverson/Hamilton, and 10 minutes of Stuckey/Hamilton, and just 10 minutes of Stuckey/Iverson. SUMMARY Iverson/Hamilton with No Stuckey 10 Iverson/Hamilton/Stuckey 10 Stuckey/Hamilton with No Iverson 10 Stuckey/Iverson with No Hamilton 10 Iverson/ No Stuckey and No Hamilton 5-10 It's like a damn rubrick's cube! Just remember the number 10 Curry, the key to solving the puzzle is the number 10! Curry and the Pistons fail if the Stuckey/Iverson minutes are much above 10, because if so, there is no way to make sure Hamilton contributes. And then you also have the old Nuggets and Sixers Iverson problem. I call that problem the two point guard problem, and both your offense and defense are damaged to some extent by it. You are too small defensively. Offensively, you either have one guard of limited value that the defense can ignore, if you have what should really be a reserve point guard in there with Iverson. This was the Denver situation. Or, and this would be the potential Detroit problem, you are wasting the overall game potential of two starting, playmaking guards by having them in there at the same time. So I'll be monitoring the Stuckey/Iverson minutes especially, because you can't solve this unless they are limited. You want to know the truth? The truth is the Nuggets' Iverson puzzle was easy compared to this one, yet Karl could not even begin to solve it, whereas Curry is at least aware that he has a puzzle to solve and he is doing his darndest to solve it. So solve this puzzle and keep the Larry Brown caused damage down Mr. Curry and you will win your playoff series and not be fired, lol. But if everything gets blamed on Iverson you won't be fired even if you lose. By starting Iverson instead of Hamilton, it is more difficult to get much of the above achieved, but it is still possible. I guess Curry just likes to solve complicated problems. That would put him several steps ahead of George Karl, who seemingly has blown off every complicated problem he ever encountered.
"You want to know the truth? The truth is the Nuggets' Iverson puzzle was easy compared to this one, yet Karl could not even begin to solve it, whereas Curry is at least aware that he has a puzzle to solve and he is doing his darndest to solve it." the next dumbest coach in the league next to george karl is michael curry.... easy... he better be out by the end of the season when sheed and ai leave so they dont waste the 120 mil they spend on a new player(s)
