Everyone misses bunnies. Just a couple of bad calls can be a 5-8 point difference. If Stack did not get those 3 free throws or those 2 bad calls on Dyess and Webber, Sheed gets hacked and a Dallas player gets the same call on the next possetion.

I just got thru watching the DVR of the game and I dont really do a lot of recaps but I feel i must, so here's the must:

1. We played without Chauncey


...nuff said!

Fatigue was the overriding factor in this game. Our two leading scorers, Murray and Dyess, have one thing in common. Flip Suanders has not ridden them into the ground yet. Rip Hamilton does not have a game like that, where he can't even hit free throws, clutch or otherwise. We played a 7 man rotation. What's worse, in neither half did Flip Saunders bring any sub in the game for the 1st or 3rd quarters except Dyess. Just run them into the ground, and of course, turn around and complain about lack of effort.

How does Flip Murray, a guy who is not known for playing defense, a guy out of the rotation for a long stretch of the season, end up with clutch minutes over Delfino at the end of the game. Murray got burnt twice by Terry there to give Dallas control of the game. Murray did not have a bad game, but he certainly did get overplayed. Its great that he scored 18, but defense is part of the game. Another 4 steals from him was great, but not good enough to compensate for his otherwise poor D.

Due to foul trouble, we used Prince at power forward some, even though Maxiell did not get to play except for 30 or so seconds. Two straight games cutting Maxiell out of the rotation. Davis has not played lately; looks like a repeat of last season on that score.

Yes, there were some bad calls against us. It happens. But the game should not have been that close. We are better than Dallas, if only given a chance to play our guys rested. Billups is already out for injury. At this rate, none of our starters are apt to go into the playoffs rested or healthy. We need both, we will get neither. Just because Orlando slaughtered Miami today does not mean we can beat Miami. We don't have any true centers. Only by using a bench can we beat Miami. The media would have you believe our bench is getting more play this year. Who?

Though tired and playing ragged, our starters did give whatever they had. Can't fault effort.

Dyess scored equally inside and out in this one. One player I say is being played perfectly.

Flip Murray was out of control just a bit here and there but made good decisions most of the time. A turnover or two, but he played over 40 minutes so thats to be expected. Good shooting night for him.

A near complete lack of offensive boards thru at least the first 3 quarters by the Pistons. Thats an effort stat. But like I am trying to say, effort, with nothing in the tank to give, falls short.

Webber continues to amaze with his passing, and his team has caught on to the fact they better be ready to receive the ball, cause it coming. Still, Webber even looked tired. He has played some darn heavy minutes. A lot of 20-10 or near 20-10 games for us sure, but a whole lot of minutes for someone coming off a long layoff.

I hope two things. One, the media takes off its blinders and really starts looking at the fact our bench is not developing. Our youth, except for Delfino, is not getting regular minutes. And two, I hope somebody in the Pistons management starts telling Flip no, its not time to step it up, its time to prepare. Prepare for the playoffs. Tonights game did nothing for that. Playing everyone too much who does not need the minutes, and the young guys that do need the minutes, they are sitting on the bench being wasted.

I like the idea of playing the Mavs at their place in the Finals. If we can split the first 2 (this is assuming of course we make it to the Finals with the Mavs), this is a series we could win.

They did not get our best effort tonight.

Nice job on the leecap.

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I like the idea of playing the Mavs too because the Pistons are better inside at all 5 positions.

Just kidn....
aside from that:

1. SHEED...Played the usual game he plays against superstars: LIKE A PUNK. Terrible 3's in the 4th and the ususal MAGGLIO ORDONEZ performance come crunch time..
2. RIP ...was high. 5 Missed free throws? What do these guys do when they come home. He needs to stop DLin with Ameche after those long trips...
3. THE ONE I HATE...no problem with his game today. None. Very proud of him.
4. TAY...a 30 pt effort turned into a 14 pt performance, as usual. Should have dominated this game.
5. WEBBER..looked very tired in agame wwhere a 20-10 game should have been easy for him or Sheed...lost his edge in the 2nd half
6. MCDYESS....excellent ..but should hve scored 25..easy!
7. DELFINO..worse D game I ever seen him play. rotation off the pick and roll was awful.

BASICALLY..8 missed KEY free throws, Sheed not manning up on Mr Diggler, and Avery outcoaching Flip. But I aint impressed by this loss cuz CB and Hunter trumps George and Buckner ANY DAY>>>

Speaking of Dirk Diggler , Boogie Nights is on IFC tonite.......3rd greatest movie of all time:

1. THE GODFATHER
2. APOCALYPSE NOW.............

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I'm kinda surprised everyone is on Sheed, when it was Webber who kept getting caught on Nowiztki and couldn't stop him from either driving or pulling up.

Dirk got hot in Chris and then kept it going against Sheed.

Still, I like our team against theirs. We blew them out in their building, and just lost in the last 2 minutes in ours.

San Antonio is a much tougher opponent IMO.

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To all of my friends, comrades and companions at PF.com

Thank you for another great season!

lookin at the boxscore, we lost cuz their bigs Dirk and Harris outplayed our bigs Sheed and Rip..except Hrris aint no big............

it seemed to me that after the half, Dallas picked up their D intensity just a little bit. That threw us off. We were still executing but we were reacting to them...not making them react to us.

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Don't hang on the board as much as I used to because it seems as if the hoop IQ on this board is at an all time low.

If any of you really watched and understood the game you would have noticed that Sheed really locked into DIrk big time and The big German couldn't do much of anything. Avery then began to run a pick and roll that caused a Sheeb/Webb switch where Dirk took it to webb repeatedly. For crying out loud we lost a game to the best team in the NBA without our starting PG, and our leading scorer shooting as if his lasik surgery was coming back to haunt him, and we still only lost because in the end of close games you need to make shots, they hit 'em, we didn't- end of story. We played solid D, got great production from guys that needed to step up, but we lost cause we missed some shots due to lack of execution down the stretch, which w/out your starting all-star pg is to be expected.

I pretty much encouraged by this week.
1-We can just flat out BEAT phx
2-We beat DALLAS once in Dallas, and they barely beat us with an off shooting Rip, and no Chauncey.
3-We know we can go toe2toe w/SA
I don't know about you guys but I feel we are ready to seriously compete for that 2nd title. This team now knows exactly what type of game they want to play to win, we finally have an identity.

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