New five presents defensive challenge

Detroit coach Michael Curry might have found the answer he was seeking in overhauling the Pistons’ starting lineup.

Now that Rodney Stuckey has been added as the starting point guard, former point Allen Iverson can go back to working off the ball, where he won’t have to worry about getting other players involved.

Without Billups the Pistons have lacked leadership. Iverson is just trying to fit in and not trying to start telling a bunch of players that have already won a ring what to do.

In his second year, Stuckey isn’t going to carry the cache that Billups had when it comes to getting the team’s attention, but there were some signs during Wednesday’s win over the Wizards that he was starting to endear himself as a leader.

After Rasheed Wallace picked up a technical foul for arguing a call, Stuckey was the first player over to check on Wallace, appearing to remind him that they needed him. Wallace looked at Stuckey and gave him a nod that said it was all right. The aging hot-tempered veteran didn’t just blow off the kid.

The main question about adding Stuckey to the starting lineup with Iverson, Rip Hamilton and Tayshaun Prince and Wallace is the defense, especially the size of that group with Prince playing as a power forward.

Detroit could run into a problem against teams with good small forwards, which happen to be Boston and Cleveland. Detroit has counted on Prince to play Boston’s Paul Pierce and Cleveland’s Lebron James. Now Hamilton, who isn’t the defender Prince is, will have to pick up those players. Hamilton, who is three inches shorter than Prince and just as frail looking, won’t be able to guard the power forward spot, even against an offensively challenged Ben Wallace.

The Celtics are a different beast altogether because of the Pierce-Garnett combination. Hamilton will certainly have to guard Pierce and could get overpowered. Detroit will have to use their offense to help their defense, which means running Pierce off of constant screens. Also Ray Allen is probably going to have some trouble staying in front of Iverson or Stuckey.

Detroit is going to have to make team adjust to them, but also Prince will need this season to get used to guarding players that prefer to play with their backs to the basket. He didn’t see that as much at small forward, but other teams now are going to look at his frame and want to post him up.

Tonight Prince should get a good measure of what he can do at the power forward spot against a physical Utah Jazz power forward in Paul Millsap. That will be the matchup to watch to tell how the Pistons are going to work in this new alignment.

Stuckey and Deron Williams is a great matchup at the point guard spot, but in the Eastern Conference, Stuckey won’t have to worry about seeing that kind of point guard play among the contenders.

The more important thing is how well Prince — and Hamilton as well — will be able to defend their new spots.

Warriors have taken steps back

The Warriors clearly have taken a step back since getting to the second round of the playoffs two seasons ago.

At first it looked like at least statistically that they were able to make up for the points and rebounds they lost with the departures of Baron Davis and Matt Barnes. But with Monta Ellis and Al Harrington out and the front office in disarray, the Warriors appear to be in a rebuilding mode around center Andris Biedrins. Steven Jackson is also a nice player as a complimentary man, but aside from Ellis there are no sacred cows on this roster.

They are in such a position right now that Don Nelson is actually forced to play younger players like C.J. Watson. He’s always been a man that prefers the veteran talent and it’s a wonder how he’s been able to stick around in this league with a philosophy staunchly opposed to playing rookies. Not only that, he’s never put together a team properly built for the postseason.

The Warriors two years ago happened to matchup well against a Mavericks team that also wasn’t built to win in the playoffs. Neither wanted to play a half court game.

Corey Maggette was supposed to be the main piece acquired to replace Davis’ production, but he’s been slowed by injury this season and hardly dominated in the 23 minutes he played in a loss to the Pistons on Thursday.

Biedrins with 17 points and 19 rebounds looked to be the real deal, but he also ran into a team in Detroit that has struggled at times with its post defense this season. In Tuesday’s 100-92 win over Sacramento, Kings reserve forward/center Spencer Hawes made several nice moves and was the most effective post player for either team when he was in the game.

MyDyess’ absence is hurting the Pistons, especially with Amir Johnson’s apparent lack of understanding of the game. Johnson didn’t even start last night against the Warriors and Biedrins had his way against the slower Kwame Brown from the start.

C.J. Watson appeared that he’s going to be a quality player for the Warriors and perhaps if there’s any bright spot to Ellis being injured (and suspended) it’s that Watson is getting a chance to learn how to be an effective player. Lord knows Nelson is only playing the second-year pro because he absolutely has to. That, more than anything, should tell people this team isn’t going anywhere this year. If the team was in contention, Nelson would probably have been content signing a Sam Cassell or similar player to play the point.

Half-court eventually answer for Suns

Going into last night’s game against the Houston Rockets, Phoenix Suns guard Steve Nash sounded like a kid whining about taking his vitamins.

Nash’s is having trouble making the necessary adjustments to Terry Porter’s style, saying to the Arizona Republic that the offense lacks “creativity” and “flow.” Ideas valued in Nash’s basketball philosophy.

But more than winning?

Nash might want to concentrate on not getting wiped away every time he gets screened and let Porter have control of this team. The Phoenix Suns now have a calculated attack.

Phoenix is going to have to get used to the fact that learning to play playoff basketball is sometimes a tedious task. For years the Spurs have been derided for their matter-of-fact, uninteresting style of play. But when the playoffs come around the Spurs are a tough team to beat because they start playing that slow knockdown, drag-out style in the preseason and don’t change all year.

You’re going to see things like an easy bucket in transition getting passed up in favor of setting up the offense for a high-percentage shot.

Running and gunning is one thing, but in the end the team that wins is the team that does the most with their accumulated possessions. Why not slow down and think about getting the highest percentage opportunity each time you have the ball? That’s the way teams win championships in this league.

Also, if there’s one thing the other top teams have over Phoenix, it’s overall team athleticism and a good half court offense can neutralize the athletic advantage of a good defense.

Posting up Shaq with Steve Nash on the wing feeding him the ball is about as good an attack as any team has in the league. The defender guarding Steve Nash really can’t sag off of him to help out the man guarding Shaq. Nash is prone to shooting over 50-percent from the field and with those two on the same side of the floor, coaches know exactly where the two players guarding them are. Neither can afford to leave their man. A third defender would be needed to help double-team Shaq and then the Suns are playing three-on-two on the other side. That is why you play half court basketball. It's getting fast break numbers without running.

Every good team in the league has a combination like Shaq and Nash, a combination that forces three defenders to guard two players. Rasheed and Iverson is one. Garnett and Allen is another. Duncan and any one of the Spurs’ perimeter players can force a double team.

Be patient, Phoenix. The wins totals aren’t going to be what they were, but the team is going to be rougher and tougher and more ready to stand up to the big dogs in the Western Conference.

Iverson also changes Detroit's defense

The Detroit Pistons’ 100-92 win over the Sacramento Kings last night was closer than what one would reasonably expect from an Eastern Conference finalist going against a Western Conference also-ran that was missing two of its best players.

It’s still quite clear the Pistons have a lot of work to do with Iverson, but the adjustment is not only on the offensive side. The defense also has an adjustment to make.

Detroit has never had the type of guards that team’s would look to post-up the way they’re going to look to post-up Iverson.

Kings guard John Salmons took Iverson down low several times and it nearly won the Kings the game. Pistons first-year coach Michael Curry had a lot on his plate before Joe Dumars traded Chauncey Billups for Iverson, but now he has a lot more. Maybe all this new responsibility took hold last night and Curry was distracted by it as Salmons kept posting up Iverson and making plays for his team. Lets not forget, last night’s game was Curry’s seventh as an NBA head coach. He still has some things to learn, especially on the game-management end.

Detroit gained the advantage once Sacramento started breaking down in its half court sets.

The change in feel defensively may have led to Spencer Hawes playing as well as he did in the limited minutes he had. He always seemed to be working in space. He was hitting open mid-range jumpers and once, working one-on-one against Rasheed Wallace down low, he made Wallace bite on an up-and-under fake and then finished with a two-handed slam.

The only thing that seemed to keep him from dominating the game was that he was in foul trouble. But while he was in there he showed he was both big and quick. He looked a lot like Kevin Love did at UCLA last year — and this was against a Detroit front line that has no slouches.

The Kings lost by eight points without two of their big guns in Kevin Martin and Francisco Garcia. Had they played, perhaps the Pistons would have never been able to lull the Kings into the half court style as much as they did and maybe that would have been enough to get a win.

Either way, the Kings didn’t seem as sorry as they might at first glance appear to be.

But was it Detroit’s defense that made them look that way?

The Celtics shredded it in their 88-76 win over Detroit Sunday and Devin Harris looked like a franchise player two nights before in a 106-93 win over the Pistons in New Jersey.

Mavs should keep Kidd past this year

It isn’t a pro sports team in Dallas without a little controversy.

But I don’t want to bore you with a diatribe on Josh Howard’s ignorance.

He was just being ghetto.

The more intriguing aspect to the Maveriks' upcoming season is what they are going to do about Jason Kidd. They haven’t committed to paying him beyond this season.

They were bounced in the first round of the playoffs last year, but that didn’t have as much to do with him as it did with the emergence of the New Orleans Hornets and the fact that players and the front office had grown tired of Avery Johnson, and he of them.

They didn’t even practice before their final playoff game. A saving grace for the only coach to take Dallas to the NBA Finals was that former coach Don Nelson also had problems with Mavs owner Mark Cuban. Makes you wonder how it's going to end with Carlisle in Dallas. Carlisle has won everywhere he’s been. He started Detriot on their turnaround and he won over 60 games one season with the Indiana Pacers.

But during those years, he was portrayed as a man that was a bit cold, a hard-nosed general that didn’t give orders politely.

Some people would have a problem with that — ghetto people like Josh Howard.

A coach is only as good as his relationship with the superstars and Howard is a superstar for the Mavericks.

So is Dirk Nowitski.

So is Jason Kidd.

The Mavericks need to stick with Kidd, for better or worse. Who else would they be able to get to play point guard?

Any team that has a good one isn’t going to get rid of him. A wise move would be for the Mavericks to keep Kidd around in order to give them time to develop another point guard. What better coach for a young point guard could there be than Jason Kidd, an all-star, Olympian and future Hall of Famer.

They want to talk in Dallas about how Kidd wasn’t aggressive enough offensively last year, like that would be grounds for a divorce. Well, anybody who lends even a casual eye to the NBA knows that you don’t play Kidd for his offensive talent. You play him for his ability to get the ball to people who know how to shoot.

There are few players that the Mavericks could trade Kidd for and it would actually be an upgrade to the team. They probably should have never brought him to Dallas again in the first place, but now that they have, it would be stupid to cut him loose for a point that might not have as much promise as Devin Harris did.

Lakers have team player in Kobe

Kobe cares.

He could have sat out until Christmas, nursing an injured pinkie that required surgery, but instead he’ll be out there practicing and playing with his team. He’ll be out there being the leader they need him to be.

He could have said to the Lakers look man, I’ve had a long summer—traveled to China, played in the Olympics and before that led this team to the NBA finals. I’m tired, dog tired. Let me rest for a little while. When the season gets serious, I’ll be there.

The Lakers would have let him do it. They would have had too. Who wants to tell Kobe Bryant he can’t have surgery now because he waited too long? Who wants to be that person to say sorry dude, you shouldn’t have played in the Olympics? No one’s going to say that, which is why Kobe cares.

He could have taken that road. He could have taken the time off. He could have opted for the surgery. Everyone could see how the pinkie affected him during the playoffs last season. He winced every time someone slapped at the ball. Kobe Bryant played hurt last season—and led his team to the brink of a championship.

He didn’t take them all the way. He still couldn’t do it without Shaq, but Kobe has already one-upped Shaq in the team player department. There’s a big difference between Shaq and Kobe and now we’re starting to see the difference.

Both will be remembered fondly in a Lakers uniform, but Kobe will be remembered with more admiration than Shaq. At first that didn’t seem possible. Kobe seemed like the selfish one, the arrogant one. Shaq appeared to be the humble one. The team player. The jovial one. But when Shaq needed toe surgery before the 2002-03 season, he chose to have it. No one questioned that he needed it, but they questioned why he waited. Why wait this long when you could have done it right after last season, they said?

But the big fella needed some extra time off. Some believed he wanted it — like how Ron Artest wanted to take a month off before Christmas to promote his record label. Shaq wanted the same thing. He just had a better method with which to seek that time and now it’s become an annual thing. He sits out most of November and December and isn’t taking it seriously until February. The Suns are going to find that out this year. The Heat quickly learned about it. That year, it was the same thing. The only counterpoint to it is that on the court it didn’t seem to matter. The Lakers won their third consecutive championship that year, but off the court the chemistry faltered. It all came to a head next season. The season Phil Jackson published as The Last Season.

By not having surgery, Kobe’s telling his team he’ll be there. Yea, I’m Kobe Bryant, he said, but I’m not too good to play games in November and December. This is a special team, he said, and we’ll need chemistry to win. We’ll need to play together. You can pass me the ball and I’ll pass you the ball. We’ll need to like each other. Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers, we’re one.

Kobe cares.

He cares so much that people are actually going to forget that little incident in Colorado a few years ago — or at least it’s not going to be the first thing they think about when they see him. Well, the men there anyway.

Kobe Bryant is going to play team ball, he’s going to do all the good things people think he should.

We’ll see if it will pay off. We’ll see if Kobe will have will have to make reservations to tell Shaq how his ass tastes.

Rivers gets a bigger payday

When you coach an NBA team, what a difference adding a pair of future Hall of Famers makes.

Doc Rivers always knew basketball, but after guiding the Celtics to just 24 wins in his third season, it looked like Paul Piece needed to be traded so that the rebuilding could begin. And if Pierce left town, there was no rule in place that said Rivers wouldn’t be far behind him.
They called him Doc, the fans said, but he didn’t know as much as we all thought he did. Let’s just call him Glenn from now on.

But then the trades happened -- Ray Allen from Seattle, Kevin Garnett from Minnesota. Sitting near a remote lake in Montana, Phil Jackson backed away from his pipe and smiled. Welcome to my world Doc. There are winners and there are losers and you, my friend, just became a winner. The future Hall of Famers arrived, and the Celtics couldn’t lose.

It turned out the fans weren’t duped, Rivers wasn’t just another former player that was good in front of the camera, but not in front of the chalkboard. They were worried after a 2006-2007 season that had very little promise. That year, it was acceptable to be shopping Paul Pierce. Might as well let’em go, they said. Someone was probably willing to pay a pretty draft pick and some prospects for a big body with an all-around game. Might as well not waste you time in Boston, Mr. Pierce. It’s not fair to you and it’s not fair to us. It could be a long time before we’re a winner again.

But what a difference adding a pair of future Hall of Famers can make.

For the first time in years, the Celtics were actually hard to beat. Pierce became a threat again. They put the Doc back in Doc again. The Celtics were atop the Eastern Conference again. The rainbow we all saw ended in Boston again.

Maybe Mr. Rivers can coach, they said.

Trade Pierce? You’re crazy.

Danny Ainge, with the help of an old friend named Kevin McHale, made the Celtics viable again. The future Hall of Famers were kings of a league where old guys aren’t supposed to matter.

Ainge could have said this was a one time thing. A betting man would say it probably was. Let him coach the next year to see if they could do it again and then, if they did, reconsider after that.

But Ainge said Doc you’re a good coach. I don’t care what happens in the next four years. The Big Three could all retire. You’re the guy we want taking this team into the future. You can coach. Now I have to get you players. Everyone knows that now. I won’t hide behind you anymore.

Here, Mr. Rivers, is your 5.5 million dollar check. We’ll give you one in each of the next four years. Hopefully you’ll spend it as wisely as we think we did.

The Celtics won’t win next year. There’s no doubt about it. They were lucky to escape the Atlanta Hawks and the Cleveland Cavaliers this year. The only team they looked clearly better than was the Pistons.

But the Pistons have developing youngsters, as do the Hawks. Lebron James is still getting better and he has a bona fide sidekick now in Mo Williams. The Sixers owned the free agent market and they now have their own big three -- a version that is younger, quicker and stronger. They’re also coached by a former NBA point guard, who knows a thing or two about winning championships.

How important is that?

Just ask Danny Ainge.

If you can’t get a straight answer from him, ask Rivers.

He might not know how important it is, but he can tell you how much it’s worth.