Game Thread #17: vs Pistons

Breakdown:

• Parker vs Iverson - I'm calling this a draw. Iverson is really struggling fitting into the Pistons offense and Tony played like dog poo against the Rockets. Both could go off. Both could be semi-lousy.
• The FinDog vs Hamilton - Hamilton. Easy call for me there. FinDog hasn't had his shot going. Rip looks ridiculous. I have to give the edge to anybody that looks that ridiculous who isn't named Drew Gooden.
• Fab vs Kwame - No winner. Fab hasn't been very impressive this year. Kwame has never been impressive. Giving one team an advantage here is like complimenting SiMA on his writing. Everybody knows it done out of pity.
• Tim vs Rasheed - Slight edge to Tim. Rasheed gives Tim some trouble with his length and strength, but as long as Rasheed isn't on from 3-ball land he's a not much of a factor on offense.
• Capt Spud vs Tayshaun - Tayshaun plays good defense AND has some offense. Bruce has been known to play some good defense but hasn't even been playing lately. Prince wins easy.

Keys To The Game:

• Suckitude - Can we just not suck like we did against the Rockets? Is that too much to ask? We hadn't played that bad since the game Tony got hurt.
• Defense - A main part of that suckitude was defensive intensity. We'll need to have intensity AND play well defensively.
• Manu - Manu is averaging more turnovers than assists. Additionally, his turnovers ALWAYS seem to lead to easy points for the other team. He really needs to stop forcing things and take better care of the ball. If he doesn't...
  

Some other reading:

there isn't a Pistons SBNation blog and I don't know of Pistons blog. So, no extra reading at the opponent site. I'll give you two other things instead.

1). Silver Dancer Jenn has a blog on the Spurs site about her NBA Jam Van tour of Italy. I found the part about the curling irons and flat irons to be particularly riveting. Do you think Jenn uses a Chi Flat Iron? How many of you guys even know what a flat iron is?

2). I think Ian Mahinmi got hurt again in his first game in Austin. He only played 14 minutes and hasn't played in either of the two games since. This sucks. The Toros are off to a 1-2 start. Their main players are our past two 2nd round picks not named Gist: Marcus Williams and Malik Hairston. Speaking of Gist, he had his best game of the season Sunday in another loss. He had 18 points and 5 rebounds.

Other things of possible interest:

The George Hill - Like most everybody else not named Matt Bonner, George had an atrocious game against the Rockets. It was a matter of time before he came back down to earth. Let's see how he rebounds.