As you guys probably guessed from all of the reports we have been putting out, NetsAreScorching was credentialed for last Thursday’s practice, and I just wanted to share with you some stuff I noticed while watching.
- The first thing that I noticed was who was working with big man guru (in my opinion), assistant coach Roy Rogers. Brook was there of course, but the other person was Sean Williams. In fact, Sean was one of the last people off of the practice court on Thursday. Sean Williams has caught a lot of flack from Nets fans (myself included), but it is starting to look like he is embracing this final chance of his. I am starting to think he could be this team’s spark of the bench this year, providing high energy minutes when the team looks out of whack (sort of like what happened during the Knicks’ game in the Garden).
- The other two guys that were left on the court with Sean were Devin Harris and Courtney Lee. It is becoming clear that these two are really starting to create a bond, probably due to the fact that they are following similar career paths. The two were joking around while finishing up shooting drills (Courtney Lee’s stroke looks so smooth up close), and they closed practice with a half-court shooting contest (Courtney won). A bond like this between your PG and SG is very important because they rely on each other to provide scoring opportunities. If they know where each other is going to be on the court, it just becomes easier to set each other up.
- Lawrence Frank is a really nice and engaging person. I know I haven’t really been too fond of his coaching decisions, but I am starting to understand why the media and his team loves him. When we were all gathered around for his post-practice interview, he was all smiles and cracking jokes. When I asked him a question, he didn’t shoot me a snide “who is this kid” look, but he looked me in the eyes and answered my question.
- That being said, I still have to disagree with a few things he said during the conference. As of Thursday, Frank didn’t sit down and discuss roles with his players one-on-one. He did that on Sunday, “On Sunday guys got to know who’s going to be playing and who’s not.” That isn’t a smart move in my opinion. I would have hoped that this would have been done before the final preseason game, because it would help simulate more situations they will be facing during the season. With that being said though, it can be hard to do that with all of the injuries the Nets experienced this offseason.
- He also kind of dismissed the Knicks killing the Nets from the three point line. “They have good shooters,” Frank said. I mean he did say the Nets could have defended the three better, “We also contributed to it…We struggled not getting into the ball…we got sucked in on penetration.” Those are all things I agree with, but it still irks me because the Knicks weren’t good from 3 at all against anyone else but the Nets (38% from 3 vs. the Nets – 29% vs. everyone else).
