Jazz Opening Night: Mixed Results

Posted by Joey Parker on October 29, 2009

Ronnie Brewer

First the good news from last night:

The Yankees lost.
Memo was only out a few minutes after getting plowed through by Nene in the first 24 seconds of the game. This was impressive since he apparently injured both major leg joints on the same play. I’m so jaded by injuries that I didn’t even bat an eye as he was writhing in pain on the floor. Memo showed us his best Willis Reed impression though, by hobbling back and hitting shots to keep us in the game.
Deron looks terrific, as usual. He made a horrible foul on Billups on a last second three, but besides that, he looked dominant.
AK47 looks really good. He was fairly active and he shot well. He missed out on blocking some easy shots though. The hair though…not good.
Most of our bench players looked ready to go. Price, Fess, and Millsap looked fine. Price is a lightning bolt out there! Fess was very composed and didn’t commit any dumb fouls.

Now the bad news:

Boozer. :sigh: His shot made it look like he might have been practicing on a 9-foot rim over the Summer. Everything was short. Even free throws. He needs to realize that if he is shooting bad, he needs to drive in and dunk! (Because his layups were off too.) It kinda-sorta seemed like he was trying harder on defense, but one play really showed that he had a long way to go: He blocked Ty Lawson’s shot, which was a good play, but then Lawson immediately got the ball back and scored as Boozer stood there stuck in the mud under the basket. (Hint to Carlos: you are 6′9″ and Lawson is 5′11″. You CAN block his shot again if you want to.)
Maynor is not quite ready for prime time. To be fair, he got thrown into the game at a time in the 2nd half when the Nuggets were hot and on a run. However, it was pretty obvious that stockier point guards, like Lawson and Billups, are going to be able to punish him down low.
It is very obvious that going without Korver and Miles is going to be tough. Price is great, but it is going to be tough at the swing positions to have such a small rotation out there with Price and Williams and Maynor backing up Brewer.

I thought we played OK overall last night. We let the Nuggets kill us for a little stretch in the 2nd half, but besides that, we played fine. Even though we lost, I TRULY believe that we will finish with a better record than the Nuggets. They are not a deep team at all. If Nene or K-Mart gets hurt, they will drop like a stone.

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Illinois Jazz Fan on October 29, 2009 said:

Boozer:sigh:: Well, he is 0 for 1. Let’s hope he remembers soon that he is playing for a contract.

enuff with boozer, MILLSAP STUNK! on October 29, 2009 said:

millsap was really awful last night, he couldn’t put a body on anyone, at least boozer was rebounding.

Diana Allen on October 29, 2009 said:

I hope you are right Joey!

montgump on October 29, 2009 said:

I thought Fes did a pretty good job filling in for Okur.

mr.jazz on October 29, 2009 said:

first of all millsap wouldnt box anyone out and so they got a lot of easy points . deron owns erveryone. boozer played crap but his rebounding was good. ak47 did great. jazz defense was pretty good until the 2nd half. maynor looked like he was asleep and didnt even want to play. price was good (for some reason i wish he would just jump over lawson and dunk it!!!!!!). overall the jazz did ok. the 4th quarter killed us. and im srry, but sloan needs to put in people that are in our favor so we give them match up problems. thats what i thought of the game.

Dwill and Jazz forever.
thanks

Deb on October 29, 2009 said:

Do you think perhaps maybe this is Carlos Boozer’s sneaky way of getting the Jazz to trade him sooner rather than later?

canadajazz on October 30, 2009 said:

The night started well. Raptors beat the Cavs. Yankees lost big-time.
And the Jazz hung in. For a while.
But then we kind of folded.
The most worrisome part was not Boozer’s lack of offense, or Millsap getting posterized by Anthony.
It’s the backup guard position. What happens when Deron Williams takes a break? Does everything have to screech to a halt? Can we ever find a suitable point guard to spell Williams? Are we experiencing Howard Eisley deja vu?
Hopefully, Eric Maynor will grow and learn and become a capable enough replacement. If not, it’s going to be a long season.

Jared on October 30, 2009 said:

The game just showed us that . . . surprise, we didn’t make any moves, and are still not as good as the Nuggets. It is a joke to say that if Denver’s big men get hurt they will fall like a stone. Guess what, if Lebron gets hurt, the Cavs will fall like a stone. Injuries can kill a season for any team. The things that I got out of the game is that Maynor looked horrible and should definitely be our 3rd option at the point. We desperately need Miles and Korver back. And again surprise, Millsap and Boozer didn’t look comfortable in their roles. Even when we get our shooters back, I don’t think we are better than 5th-6th in the West.

Linda on October 31, 2009 said:

Thought Maynor did much better Friday night.

tman11 on November 01, 2009 said:

Wow I can’t believe maynor is getting dissed on on his very first game as a pro that;s sad. He has never faced any thing like this before, at least Ty lawson going to NCU face better players on a regular basis’s give maynor time he will get it. AK looked great he may not hav blocks shots but he got a hand up and disturbed the shooter and, usually that’s all you need. Booze and MIlsap yeah sign but, they both have something to prove you won’t see that to much from them this season. Bench looked amazing even with out Korver. They will get it together and, have a great year

Shannon in Sacramento on November 02, 2009 said:

It’s very depressing that they lost to the Nuggets, considering they were up almost the entire first three quarters, only to let it slip in the fourth quarter. Why is it that only Williams knows that a professional basketball game goes 48 minutes? Sad. I was overall impressed by Okur hitting some big shots while hurt, and AK looked better defensively than he did last season. His hair though. It’s confusing me! Boozer looked confused most of the time, but I heard that he played a lot better against the Clippers. I

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