What Has Happened?

[BeebCats]

Here are our wins this year:

1 point win vs a struggling Indiana team that is missing Danny Granger and has Roy Hibbert playing nowhere near like last year
4 point win vs Dallas that was missing Dirk and others
16 point win vs awful Washington (good win)
2 point win vs Minnesota who was missing Kevin Love, Rubio, and others
4 point win vs Milwaukee (good win)
1 point win vs Toronto where we got bailed out on the last no call and they had one of their classic meltdowns
2 point win vs awful Washington

I'm surprised people got so hyped off our early success - we won so many close games that could've gone either way, we could've EASILY been 1-11 instead of 7-5. And now we're in a stretch playing good teams (Spurs, Knicks, ATL, OKC, etc) and losing... like we were supposed to be winning these? This is normal. As mentioned earlier, back to reality.

I also can't believe people are blaming this on any player, let alone Hendo. He's not even getting enough minutes to win or lose the game for us, and when he is in, I'm personally a lot more comfortable with having a 2nd player being able to get a shot up other than Kemba.

Enjoy the wins we get, but remember what everybody (or at least most people) were predicting before the season? Another awful year -- not as bad as last year, but definitely toward the bottom of the league. Let's not let our expectations creep up because of a couple lucky/close wins against bad/injured teams.

[Adam42R]

Agree about the substitutions, but also think Dunlap is getting a feel for what works and doesn't with his team. It's been only 20 games, and he needs to see how some mesh together and don't. Hendo was arguably our franchise player when this season started, so I think Dunlap definitely needs to see what happens when he's in and out. My biggest beef is the Diop experiment and the lack of bigs when we are cruising in the 4th. At the end of the day, we knew we would be a bottom-5 team this year regardless of the start to the year.... we were spoiled with our start. I think we are going to see some showcasing over the next few weeks of our moveable parts and the rookie honeymoon will end and they will need to step up and learn. Bottom line about this team is that we are way more entertaining to watch this year and aren't getting smoked by 40 once a week. It sucks that we aren't putting W's in the column, but our core is growing together and learning much faster than I anticipated (See Kemba and Bismack).

I think this (bolded) statement is a bit incongruent: There's the small-ball experiment in the 4th quarter of games and there was playing Diop last night. On the former, I agree with you. On the latter, Diop was simply the best thing we seemed to have going for us in the front court last night. As improbable as it seemed, he easily had more rebounds per minute than seemingly the rest of the team combined and I thought we played far better D when he was in last night. That's not to say that he'll bring that nightly or even once a month but he did last night. And Haywood was bringing nothing to the table in the meantime - it seemed like he had so many shots from 2' that didn't draw iron or net incl. the jump hook that seemingly never got above his shoulder. He was a mess.

[TheBeagle]

What the hell do you mean what happened? We are talking about a team that won 7 games last year including 2 losing streaks of over 15 games. We added Ben Gordon, Ramon Session and amnestied Brendan Hayward. What did you expect?

Yes. That's why when some of our more tightly-wound BCP brethren were chomping their nails to the cuticles worrying about draft position, those of us with perspective were enjoying the hell out of the early season success fully aware that stretches like this were coming. I'm still worried that some here really thought we would make the playoffs...

In terms of Dunlap's sub patterns that fanofafan and others have brought up, that is starting to irk me as well. Look at last night vs GSW: we have really good energy off the bat with MKG and Kemba supplying most of the juice, then around the 7 or 6 minute mark, Dunlap takes them both out and GSW goes off and puts up 38 and it's basically game, set, match. And this isn't the first time he's done such. And then, to nobody with common sense's suprise, when MKG and Kemba play the entire 4th, the energy level is ramped up, as is the defense, and we get it down to single digits. I don't get it.

[TheBeagle]

I think this (bolded) statement is a bit incongruent: There's the small-ball experiment in the 4th quarter of games and there was playing Diop last night. On the former, I agree with you. On the latter, Diop was simply the best thing we seemed to have going for us in the front court last night. As improbable as it seemed, he easily had more rebounds per minute than seemingly the rest of the team combined and I thought we played far better D when he was in last night. That's not to say that he'll bring that nightly or even once a month but he did last night. And Haywood was bringing nothing to the table in the meantime - it seemed like he had so many shots from 2' that didn't draw iron or net incl. the jump hook that seemingly never got above his shoulder. He was a mess.

I agree. Diop is playing better than Haywood over the last couple games, plain and simple. He's a better defender, equal rebounder, inferior offense but his energy (believe it or not) is just that much better than Haywood and I think he deserves the nod over him right now.

[Bogg]

It also doesn't hurt if Diop shows that he can give you ten competent minutes a night, as it's time for Charlotte to be looking to complete a major trade at the deadline.

[ncstamey]

I agree that our expectations should be low, but to me it seems like we are getting out-coached (or maybe in Dunlap's situation over-coaching ourselves). Like TheBeagle just said, taking MKG and Kemba out so quickly and then getting hammered whilst they sit on the bench is telling to just about everyone in the arena EXCEPT Dunlap they are the spark plugs we need to stay in the game.

I also agree that it seems as though Taylor gets to work through mistakes more than MKG. I think Taylor deserves his min on the floor but in my eyes there is no comparison that MKG is the superior player.... so LET HIM PLAY.

I like Dunlap and think he is doing a good job with the players, but his in-game strategics leave a lot to be desired.

[Bogg]

I agree that our expectations should be low, but to me it seems like we are getting out-coached (or maybe in Dunlap's situation over-coaching ourselves). Like TheBeagle just said, taking MKG and Kemba out so quickly and then getting hammered whilst they sit on the bench is telling to just about everyone in the arena EXCEPT Dunlap they are the spark plugs we need to stay in the game.

In Dunlap's defense, the two of them led the team in minutes with 34 each last night. They have to spend some time on the bench, or they'll get so winded they aren't able to do the things that make them special in the first place, and the team doesn't have the talent to not struggle when they're out (or even when they're in, at certain times). Now, if you think that they should stagger their minutes so that one or the other is always on the floor, I can't really argue too much with that.

[dnbman]

[StitchJones]

So there are multiple reasons we are on this losing streak.

#1 Our defense has gone to hell. particularly on the pick and roll and just purely the ability to stop the man in front of you from getting to the basket. We are getting absolutely killed on drive and kicks to open shooters.


#2 The play of our big men other than biz has really regressed. Haywood has been horrendous during this losing streak. His defense is gone, along with his rebounding, and he seems to miss every single close shot attempt he makes. Mullens still plays way too much on the perimeter and plays soft in the post on offense and defense. Let's not even talk about Diop, we knew he was just a body when the year started. Bismack has been the only saving grace. He has obviously improved as far as catching and finishing, and he's getting more aggressive in the post. His defense is still good and he at least tries on the pick and roll.

#3 We have no go to scorer, so Dunlap switches rotations around during the game to try and find the hot hand, whether that is Kemba, Gordon, or like in the last game, MKG on the post. Because of this minutes, rotations and rolls switch from game to game. I don't fault Dunlap for this in the least, this team does not have a reliable 20+ per game scorer, so he has to find offense from the rotation on a game by game basis. When this roster improves and you have 2 20ppg scorers, you can then have more defined rolls and rotations. until then it' going to be a case of finding the hot hand night after night, and adjusting the lineup based on that.

#4 The schedule has gotten harder and teams are a little more prepared for us. This should have been expected, and because we don't have a dominant player yet, it's just going to be very hard to enforce our will on teams.

[QC Thundercats]

I see two potential reasons for Dunlap's substitution patterns.

First, as a rookie head coach who is getting to know his roster over a couple months, I think he is still learning his team and figuring out who is best at what, with who, and in certain situations. Its almost like he's a gourmet chef trying out new recipes - the first few batches probably won't come out right, some may be absolutely horrible, and he might accidentally stumble across something brilliant. But until he finds that perfect combination of ingredients, there will be a lot of inconsistency in how the food comes out.

He's got to experiment with all his ingredients first before finding out what works best.

Second, we have to remember that for this team, while winning is important, it is not the priority this year. Jordan and Cho have put player development first above winning at all costs. If that was the case, Diop wouldn't see the floor, the three guard lineup would not close games, and Mullens would not shoot all those 3s. But Dunlap has to balance his teaching moments during the game - when to pull someone in so as not to overwhelm, how to put certain players in particular game situations to see how the player evaluates it and can learn from it, and when to leave players alone so that they are forced to figure things out without a crutch.

All this development while at the same time not burning the legs out of all the young players who aren't used to such a long, intense schedule. Dunlap is a very sharp coach, who sees everything and probably obsessively overanalyzes to a fault. I have no doubt he will tighten things up as the year develops, and once the team gets into playoff contention in a year or two, we'll really start to see his imprint on the team.

Until then, lets not have a knee jerk reaction over a losing streak, or a winning one for that matter. Its all a long process who's fruits we won't get to enjoy for many months.