Scarily Mo Johnson-esque. Had a couple of tough looks rim out, but the problem is that he’s taking tough looks — and lots of them — in the first place. Offense should not be this hard for a team this good.
Flirted with a triple-double; an A+ for his non-shooting impact and an D- for his shooting impact, so let’s split the difference. Really felt his impact in the second half. as he drew two offensive fouls, blocked two shots at the rim, and hit a nice tip-in. But he can’t be your most effective starter.
He’s not pre-injury levels yet, but he’s slowly but surely scraping there. Still not quick enough to defend the pick-and-roll effectively — if he ever was — and he’s shooting too much, but they’re shots that will go down in time.
At one moment in the first half, Andray Blatche went into full point-center mode, found Joe Johnson open for a three, Johnson missed, he dove for the rebound, was called for a foul, flung his headband to the bench, and was called for a technical foul. It was the most Andray Blatche moment in Andray Blatche history.
Other than that, some good moments for Blatche tonight, including some behind-the-back goodness, steals, and blocked shots. But there are so many plays when the lane is an ocean with him on the floor.
We haven’t talked much about Bogans in the grades lately, mostly because there’s not much to say: he shoots corner 3’s, plays decent defense on whichever wing player he’s switched on, and that’s pretty much it. But in the spirit of giving him credit, he was the only Nets player hitting from beyond the arc tonight (despite a sad, late airball) and got involved in enough possessions to say he didn’t have a terrible game. If only role players playing their roles was enough in the NBA.
Got a lot of minutes, but they weren’t terribly loud. Did have one block on Ekpe Udoh at the rim that was all kinds of awesome, so that salvages him slightly.
Taylor’s first game as the second-string point guard went surprisingly well: the rookie played a little out of control, but splashed shots from varying areas on the floor, including a nice three-pointer that cut the Bucks lead to 4 in the fourth quarter. Attacked the basket and showed off some nice hops. You hope not to see too many minutes for him long-term, but if tonight was an encouraging performance.
Missed a lot of shots, had some issues distributing the ball, and didn’t look like a starting-quality point guard. So he filled in for Deron Williams quite well.
