« Reply #19 on: November 25, 2015, 06:57:28 PM »
I don't blame two losses by a .500 team on one player getting injured who arguably was the team's worst starter.
We'll win some and lose some this year. We had 5 losses before Smart's injury. I'm sure it requires adjustment and we'll lose his defense, but in theory the offense should be better without him.
Smart's our best long-term asset and a great defensive guard, but he was really struggling offensively.
It's not specifically about wins and losses, it's about how they happened (horrendous defense). That is the Smart effect.
I think Stevens needs to go back to Turner-Bradley starting, the IT-Turner. Use Hunter religiously.
Marcus Smart wasn't going to prevent Paul Millisap from dropping 25 and 9 on us... Hawks are a good team... I don't blame a blowout loss to last year's top Eastern Conference team on one role player. I also don't think Marcus SMart is the reason Brook Lopez dropped 23 and 10 on us... though I suppose he would have slowed Jarett Jack a bit.
I think our defense had some epic performances the likes of which I had never really seen before. Some poor defensive performances were inevitable with or without Smart. We weren't going to maintain that.
I'm sure losing Smart changes the gameplan a bit, but I'm not blaming two losses to talented teams on him being gone.
As I wrote above, we need to be careful attributing these two losses to Smart, but I do think his presence has an effect on the team defense in a huge way. It's not just about his man, its about the intensity that he brings onto the floor every night and how that affects the rest of the team. Would Millsap have gone for 25 and 9 with Smart on the floor? Maybe. But Smart's impact on defense goes beyond his own man-on-man defense.
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