Nobody's posting about this, so I guess I will... I almost went to this game (I didn't but I'll be at the Clipper's game) -- but I didn't watch the whole thing on TV, I missed quite a bit (including the last half of the 4th quarter). But I saw Lampe in the first half and he looked pretty good, his picks are uglier than Amare's but he's not getting called for an illegal pick, so "if it works..."! He only ended up with 4 points, but I'm glad he's getting more minutes and will hopefully play more as a team, he seems to stand around on offense and when he gets the ball he just shoots it... he's not playing in any kind of team concept, I hope he gets past that -- learn from Zarko, he's made some great passes and passed up shots cause a teammate had a better one. Dice picked up another 13 rebounds, perhaps I'm more for him coming back than I used to be. We are weak on the boards (Amare and Marion, and it's not like Marion is ripping them away from people, he's just outjumping them) -- so Dice and somebody like Dampier or Camby would give us 4 good rebounders and a pretty good defensive front court. Barbosa had 17 points, but his 4 steals is impressive, he's got those long arms, he should grab 2-3 steals a night, I just wish he'd get more than 2 assists, the other night he had 8, and he's been having around 5... but Phoenix is a pretty good passing team, it's not his fault if he passes it to Shawn and Shawn passes to JJ who passes to Amare -- so like in Denver nobody will have major assists because they play the team game. I'm pretty excited about next year... I didn't realize the Suns would end the season this way, but it's really encouraging -- almost to the point you don't want to add Vujanic, Camby, Dampier, Kobe, or whoever they've been rumored to get, because it may hurt team chemistry. But that's what a coach is for, speaking of which I'm not sure what the Suns are doing with the coaching situation, as far as I know D'Antoni is still an interim-coach. Does this mean we might get one of the coaches who were fired? Perhaps Riley? Or whoever he replaces (Nelson)? Or stay with D'Antoni? I just hope it's a coach the players like but respect, and has an offensive-minded system (but not so offensive you've got no defense like Dallas).
D'Antoni is not an interim coach. he was named head coach after Johnson got fired. The colangelos said they would have had a press conference (suns.com) to say he'd be back next year except they didn't need to since he is already under contract for it.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting panfolk:</div><div class="quote_post">D'Antoni is not an interim coach.</div> Ok, thanks for clearing that up, I wasn't sure of his status... I guess I don't HATE him, I just think there are a number of coaches out there who Phoenix can grab who have proven themself. But I guess I can't compain about the current team, they play hard, the offense is clicking, and they don't struggle nightly on defense -- that's about all you can ask for from a coaching standpoint.
I kinda wonder if he's gonna play a lot of small ball next year. Dice woulod be great as a backup to AMare, not at Center. Will he reign Lampe in? Will Zarko and Amare bring the turnovers down (another reason I want Z to stay through the offseason)? Will the Suns beat zone defense? There are a few questions...
