Game Day: Suns (5-3) @ Kings (5-5), Monday 11/8/21

[djy2j]

Kaminsky with THE MOVES!!

Cannot believe he attempted that and was able to execute that w o traveling. New year. New Frank

[LazarusLong]

Frank does the Dream Shake ...

[djy2j]

Nader -14 and CamJ -15 for the night. Just brutal out there letting the Kings back in it

[JeremyG]

The Kings didn’t believe they could win until we brought the starters back in. Dumb move.

[djy2j]

Real poor officiating per usual tonight

[Furlanfufi]

We're trying really hard to throw the game away

[Furlanfufi]

wtf booker

[Flagrant Fowl]

Missed most of the second half with exception of the last 30 seconds. Seems like they came out with a purpose and then got too comfortable.

Great to see Cam Payne fill it up again.

[Gladiator]

What a clusterf;:k at the end - Paul turnover,Booker 2! missed free throws. Only caught the end so assume they played well earlier but that was very unimpressive.
Take the win and never talk of it again.

[LazarusLong]

Weakness: second unit forwards. That's Nader and Johnson.
Nader has been beaten around here like a piñata, but Cam has played like a nervous rookie ...

[BlaCkAdDa]

Real poor officiating per usual tonight

Got the important one right (on review!)

[Mori Chu]

Phew, well, at least we held on to win. Refs gave the Kings a lot of calls. Mitchell played great defense in the 4th. Shame we had to burn out our starters bringing them back in for the end. Our bench forwards have been really bad lately, as others have commented.

[specialsauce]

Cam J seems to have plateaued, which is a bit disappointing. Thought he had a promising career trajectory but starting to think he is what he is.

We desperately tried to give this game away.

We really could use another 3/4 off the bench. Ahem Torrey Craig.

[Nodack]

Scary ending. Bench couldn’t hold it and Monty had to bring back the starters. Starters sat too long and came in cold. I agree, never speak of this again.

[Flagrant Fowl]

It's hard to not be disappointed in Cam Johnson's lack of progression. It might just be a slump, but that seems unlikely because he's not playing poorly due to trying new things. OTOH, having a guy who's skillset and role is solidified can benefit rounding out a rotation and prevent overpaying them on a long term deal.

I unfortunately think he has the most trade value among players who could be dealt, but I think his value is still higher than a guy like Thaddeus Young.

[Superbone]

That’s the defense we needed to get back to. Impressive 3rd quarter from everyone

And the 4th quarter was equally disappointing but I’ll take the win and get out of town.

[carey]

Where’s the news thread for this week?

[pickle]

I am not disappointed in Cam Johnson... He's just not hitting his shots, but he's doing everything else right now, getting to his spots on offense, getting open, and playing good positional defense and disrupting the passing lanes. Once his shots start falling again he'll be back to about 12 ppg, maybe slightly higher. I'm still very thrilled to have him on the team. At least the team had the good sense to pick up his option...

[ShelC]

[Flagrant Fowl]

I went back and watched the second half.

Booker is incredible. He's already my favorite player in the league, but that was mostly due to him being on the Suns. Some of the stuff he's done recently has me readjusting how good I thought he could be. His 3 point numbers aren't up a ton, but he seems to be hitting the easy looks that seemed to be a problem last year.

The block at the rim a couple of nights ago was awesome, and drawing a charge against Harrison Barnes was pretty much the game winning play in this one. This play in particular got me irrationally excited. It was very Kobeish.

https://www.nba.com/stats/events/?GameE ... )&sct=plot

I think pickle's take on Cam Johnson is fair. I could be panicking a bit. One thing I've always liked about Cam Johnson is that he's most often turned on mentally. I can't recall seeing him make a lazy play. I suppose he suffers a bit from being labeled as a shooter, so it's easy to be critical when his shot isn't falling. The truth is he's still engaged and playing hard.

Nader, on the other hand, I'd rather not see him again. He had a pretty big impact on the Kings getting momentum in the 4th. However, I don't think the bench "lost" the lead, per se. The Kings were playing their starters against Mikal and 4 bench players, and there was some weird officiating going on with the Kings in the bonus at 9:10 left in the 4th. The odd thing about that stretch early in the 4th for the Suns was that I would think it'd be the time to run some plays for Mikal, but it was just spread PnR with Cam Payne and Frank.

I think this was a good win. The Suns got to a crazy level in the third quarter that showed how well they can play. Clearly they were focused on it after the previous game against these Kings. Don't be fooled by the final score.