Every year I bring you summer league coverage, unfortunately the RMR is cancelled and I couldn't make Vegas but I do have a friend who is down there and I got her passes. She's a Mavs fan and I know how well you guys love those, but she did do a pretty good job covering day 1. I talked to Blondie and she said it was okay that I posted this. enjoy.
http://nbahoopsonline.com/Articles/Summerleague/2010/LV1.html
My first game of the Summer League was between the Mavericks and the Nuggets. I love the Mavericks so it was exciting to see them tip off first and for me to get my Dallas Mavericks fix that I have longed for for so long. Unfortunately for me the first summer league game was a lot like the last regular season game.
Colby Karl, George Karl’s son, is really good and got the Nuggets off to a very nice start. Shan Edwards was also very good and went crazy on the Mavericks scoring about 12 points in the first quarter. The Mavs were able to make it closer at like 14-11 but Denver really got out running and blew the game open.
Denver had control of this game after about the 5 minute mark of the 1st quarter. The Mavs did cut the lead to 13 a few times but that was it and you never had the feeling that they were ever going to get into this game. Denver won by 18 points.
Edwards cooled off after his nice start but played better well. He has a nack for getting to the rim and getting fouled but does not look like a NBA player.
Ty Lawson for the Nuggets really seemed bored. He acted as if he was not happy to be there and the coaches had to get on him after the game for talking to some tramps behind the bench. He did do a good job when he was on the court though, nothing more than normal though.
Colby Karl has a nice stroke to his shot. I watched his nail like 8 threes in a row during warm ups. He was probably Denver’s best player and definitely looked to understand that this was a job audition for him where as many players did not.
I was excited to see JR Giddens play but he was terrible. He took bad shots, missed passes and got beat off the dribble. He did however play better in the second half.
Omar Samaha was another name I was excited to see who let me down. He can rebound but that big body which helped him dominate in college is small by NBA standards. He plays defense with his hands to much too.
Dominique Jones at least lived up to his billing. He played very well for the Mavs and has great athleticism.. Great at getting to the hoop and drawing fouls, but does take some bad shots.
The second game of the day was between Phoenix and Houston. This game started out a lot better than the previous one but it too ended up in a blow out. The teams changed leads every few seconds for the first three quarters before the Rockets pulled away.
I was surprised by how fluid the offenses of both teams looked during the game. Usually in summer league both teams suck during the first part of the games and there is a lot of turnovers, there was a lot of turnovers here too but not like normal.
Houston pulled away in the 4th with another very nice quarter while Phoenix just played terribly.
Jermaine Taylor was fantastic. He looked like an All-star out there and totally dominated this game. Everything the Suns tried to do to stop him failed miserably. He has a very nice short range jumper and a powerful body which allows him to post up.
Patrick Patterson also played very well. He has a good NBA body and can score with his back to the basket. But he needs to learn how to box out and put fourth the extra effort to get a long rebound.
Gani Lawl did a good job for the Suns. He kind of reminded me of a very young Ben Wallace in that he was great defensive capabilities but vanishes on offense. He passed up a lot of shots and could have had 20-25 points easily He is an okay free throw shooter for a big man and got to the line a lot.
Earl Clark was decent but just didn’t do anything too striking. I think he may not be ready for this level of basketball yet and may need to spend most of next year in the D-league.
Ryan Toolson is a jerk. Some kids asked him for his autograph and he told them no in a very condensending way, yet Jordan Hill who was a lottery pick last year and a true NBA player had no problem giving these kids an autograph.
The final game I attended, I missed the last game, was between the Lakers and Pistons and was the best game of the bunch. The Lakers got up by 10 points very early and kept it that way through most of the game. But the Pistons battled back and got 5 points in a 3 second span because the Pistons suck at free throws and the Lakers sucked at boxing out.
Paul Millsap of the Jazz sat next to me for a few minutes, he was a nice guy and kind of short for a power forward. His brother is on the Pistons team but did not play.
Austin Daye played really well. He was very active and able to fake other players into committing fouls or going for a head fake.
DeJuan Summers played good too. He still needs to work on his shot selection but was able to get to the line a lot.
Devin Ebanks looked to be a steal for the Lakers. He’s very good at controlling a game and making it come to him. I liked his shot selection and he has a nice jump shot too.
Ibraham Jaaber is a name I was not familiar with but he had a very good game. Not a very good shooter and missed several lay ups but he has great court vision and is a solid defender.
Derrick Caracter had a good game on the offensive end but has no clue how to play defense. He had like 10 fouls in the game and about 7 of them where pure stupid. He does do a good job at boxing out to grab boards and has some nice moves in the paint.
Written by:
Jessica Styen
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