I agree with you. Curry is immature as a coach. Joe should have never put him in charge. The little things you do as a coach (and in life) are very important. Some needs to pass this on to Curry. I dont feel that Curry will develop into a decent coach. The type of player he was will hinder him becoming a decent coach. I think he feels that he was better than he was.
I fell asleep during this one as well and figured that we got bown out by 70 points. ...What you and I fail to realize though is that this Piston team is [sarcasm]awesome[/sarcasm] in the 4th quarter and has been all year.
Watching the game I think Stuckey is hurt but playing because of the other injuries. I saw him grimace a few times after making plays. I don't have the game taped but if someone does (LOL), when rewatching the game take a look at him and see if he doesn't seem like he has a lower back pain. He seemed to be stretching and rubbing it in pain quite few times last night. It may be effecting his explosiveness.
I think Stuckey is probably pretty dinged up by this point in the season. And dragging from so many games and minutes. But, I suspect the bigger part of his difficulties on the court comes from having been scouted by the other teams. Everyone has figured out his schtick. They all know he's a reluctent jump shooter and are ready for him to drive. Time for him to move to the next level if he wants any more 40 point games. I nodded off last night after three quarters, but missing the fourth doesn't seem to have mattered. I tried early on to watch Max and see why he doesn't get the defensive boards, and it's not too hard to see. When the shot goes up, if he's not directly under the basket, he doesn't block out his man and instead releases down the floor. He missed at least two easy boards last night doing that. And when he's under the rim, he still doesn't really fight for position, but instead relies on jumping over guys, which even with his hops isn't that easy from a standing start.
Maybe its time for Ms. D to hire Zeke as Stuckey's personal coach to teach him the fundamentals of the point guard position ..but then again, I see him more as a future 2 and if a real PG is out there, maybe we should be looking in that direction......but only after we satisfy the holes we have up front.
That would be great. Not only would it really help Stuckey but it would be a chance for Zeke to start redeeming himself after the NY debacle.
Is it to late to get Mr Illitch to hire Al Kaline to coach Brandon Inge on the art of not striking out??
Supposedly, Brandon completely re-worked his swing in the off-season. I'm not sure how it will translate to games, though. It's hard to do something a certain way your whole life and then suddenly change it up. It's like telling Darko to stop blocking shots.
Yep, it's hard to get the Pistons to stop taking jumpshots even when the middle is wide open.. when you do it your whole life even a great coach like Michael Curry can't motivate or change you.
I don't see Stuckey as anything more than a Willie Green type as a 2. He needs to play the 1 if he's going to be anything more than run of the mill. PG is a tough position to learn. Look how someone like Rondo struggled last year and he has run the point his whole life.
Seeing how Stuckey's jump shot is the weakest part of his game, moving him to "shooting" guard seems like the wrong way to go.
If we're talking overall game, defense is by far his weakest. And it's mostly mental errors with him (ball watching on this team is contagious)... the physical tools are there for him to be a good defender. I like Stuckey's mid range jumper that he can create off the dribble, but clearly his outside shot still has some work to do. I can live with that though... I don't want my players taking 21 foot two point jumpers, ie the worst shot in basketball. His point guard skills are really lacking though, and it's evident by Rip basically playing both positions on the floor now. I really want this guy to succeed (he seems like such a nice and humble kid) so I'm not quite ready to give up on him just yet.
Ok, besides the overall defense, mental errors, and ball watching, jump shooting is definitely his biggest weakness. (what a good scouting report that would be!)
NBA Player Shooting Detail stats Its sort of funny looking at that graph and seeing that Stuckey is just behind Rip in 2 point jump shot %. (.425 vs. .426). I really wish that chart had league averages included, but that seems to be above average this year (look at Prince way down there at .366... yikes!). I don't think his jumper is all that bad...he's fundamentally very sound on his jumper. When he goes cold, I simply find it to be a confidence issue and it's pretty apparent with all of the perimeter shots that he is passing up lately. Anyway, his mid-range shot near the paint off the dribble is pretty good IMO. The perimeter shot needs improving, but I really don't want him taking a lot of those anyway. He needs to keep the defense off balance by not being so damn predictable all the time, though.
Stuck is given a lot of wide open J's because they are giving them to him and trying to block his drives. He's basically shooting 45% free throws out there. Rip is double teamed and most of our opponent's gameplan focuses on stopping him. But Stuckey can hit the shot and does go through some pretty nice stretches. It's just amazing to me how much more effective he is when he starts hitting it. It opens everything else up for him. One thing I've noticed, but can't prove, is that when Stuckey is challenged, his misses are almost always off the back of the rim.
