at New Orleans Hornets Wednesday December 16 8:00 pm

I just read about Hamilton Injured again and doubtful for tonight's game??


Anyone PLEASEEEE tell me I'm wrong.

POll...Do we want Rip to play tongiht?

I'm OK with Rip sitting out but I'm worried that he might get depressed again.

I'm psyched for this game because I just arrived back home in Sacramento after a month on the road and I have my League Pass back! What a luxury it seems like to be able to watch the game and be in chat at the same time. I didn't hear until I read this thread that Rip may be injured again. I really hope that isn't true. I've enjoyed watching Jerebko get lots of minutes but Rip's been out a long time how disappointing for him if he's already hurt again. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that he's okay for this game. See everyone in chat!

While I'm not officially TIRED of Rip, I am TIRED of watching us start the game by running 2-Chest 13 times straight, when Rip plays.

Games not over...and I know you can't blame an entire game on one player...but I'm enticed to blame this game almost entirely on Ben Wallace. He played horrible defense..and let guys rebound over him all game. Let's hope he was just tired on this road trip...because if this continues we are going to have a hard time winning.

Interesting SJAndre, that you say that Ben was the cause of this loss. I mean he didn't have a single rebound in the first half but did finish the game with 7 brds and 3 steals.

However, I blame this loss the whole defensive front as for the second game in a row we let a little guard penetrate and find a big man to punish us.....yep David West punished us more so than Scola did last nite to the tune of 32 pts and 12 boards. Chris Paul had just 2 pts in the first half and 8 dimes I believe, but finished with 16 & 12.

For those of you who joined us late, the Pistons had 16 point lead 53-37 with just over 2 mins left in the first half. That IMO that is when the momentum started to shift as the Hornets outscored us 8-2 in those last 2 minutes and the Pistons had only a 10 pt half time lead..when a possible 16 to 20 pt halftime lead could have led to a probable Piston victory

The first half was a thing of beauty as the Pistons made threes when needed and amassed 16 assists. Charlie was hot, Chucky was hot, Stuckey was hot, Daye was hot and Bynum was dishing...and turning it over..especially in the closing minutes...

In the second half it all unraveled as no threes fell and we started that one on one bull and we could not grab the key rebound and our bigs could not stop them...in fact neither could are littles....

The offense was out of sync in the second half as we were outscored 53-32 and missed 10 of our last 11 shots. Ben hit a reversed layup with just over 2 minutes left in the game to tie the score at 83, but we missed our next five shots with only a couple FTs by Bynum and last second bucket by Ben to make some bookies happy..we were outscored 19-6 over the last 7 minutes as the tired legs caught up with us....wondering since Rip was dressed if he should have come in for a couple of mins

Stuckey was 11-24...may have taken more shots than necessary but won't blame him here. Although Bynum nine assists, he still kind of ruined the rhythm IMO

Dammit Kobe just hit the winning bucket over the bucks in OT ~ lucky sonsa b

Good one, CJ

Last two games highlight how poor the Piston front line can be by NBA standards. Scola and Landry last night, bullied and outquicked our bigs. Tonight, West had his way. You can't play good defense when your bigs cannot compete night in and night out. Ben looked 35, Maxiel looked overmatched, Wilcox looked glued to the floor. Need I go on.

When are the key guys coming back although that won't solve the big problem.

I know its a rebuilding year, but we got to still compete. Joe will have to make a decision in the next 2 weeks if he should try to deal Rip and Max for a pg and a wide body..... nope I don't know who is available at this time but we did look exposed out there tonight defensively..

I know, Dre. But that young agile big is hard to come by just like that. We may have to be content with what we have for now. If the key guys get back, there will be enough firepower to put the Pistons past a bunch of the "pack." CV is doing his job. Joe brought him in as an offensive force. He is not suppose to be the defensive force down low.

What bothers me is our bigs are neither big nor quick. And they are not very skilled. Landry and Scola are not great players and West is more like above average. I don't see West as an all star.

Briefly. Defense lost this one. We only did well in the first half due to a lot of sloppy play by the Hornets. In the 2nd half, they quit turning it over, and kept hitting shots at a high percentage.

Kwame did not play, leaving Atkins and CV the two worst defenders out there. I thought Kuester blew this one primarily by leaving CV in way too long even though it was obvious they were attacking him very successfully over and over.

Stuckey scored a lot, but note his play is a bit ragged of late. The schedule is heating back up. Its nothing to do with anything else. If he is overplayed, his play deteriorates. Played fresh, and he does great.

Bynum had a lot of assists, got to the rack once well, but is not by any means playing healthy.

Rip is out with a minor hamstring problem, the direct result of Kuester not being able to follow his plan of starting Rip out slowly. (In other words, he still does not understand that a lot of the injury problem is of his creation. He is a rookie coach, who is basically refusing to learn that he has to control the minutes of his players - by intelligent planning and actually following his own play. His plans seem to be ok, just not the execution of them.

OK, so not briefly.

No Gordon. I guess they did not dress Summers, which is kind of crazy IMO, just to dress an injured Rip who should be resting his hammy, not to mention his ankle is still not 100% either.

JJ looked very, very good on his ability to catch and shoot near the basket on any situation, including full tilt fast break ops.

Daye hit a couple of threes, and played a ton. One bright spot from this game.

Atkins did score several baskets early, but note we were just playing even early. Defense has got to be played too, and Atkins was not playing it.

CV shot great. N.O. adjusted by making sure he was never open. Good D on their part. Q never adjusted by trying sitting the guy for a spell - hoping maybe they would take some of their concentration off him.

I know Rip did not play tonight, but it seemed his return, and the jump shooting tendencies of the team that go with that, were still too present in this game.

Despite supposedly being short guards, we still used a lot of sets where we had two point guards in the game at the same time. We could have dressed Summers, played him at backup small forward - and started Daye at shooting guard and only played him there.

Wilcox played, and did just fine. But the team could not manage to get the ball to him if he posted up, and apparently someone must of told him to just give it up. NOT a sign of good coaching. Wilcox can score in the post, and we should have taken advantage of that.

Couldn't watch the entire game, I only saw the last 5 minutes of the last qtr.

Nothing to say that does not have been said before.

Hopes JErebko find his game again.. becouse I've seen him playing better than tonight's game. I know he can bring a better game.

Hope we can beat OKC on Friday.

We need to win that game or we'll come back home too dissapointed to face Lakers Sunday in the Palace.

I missed this one... can someone say why Kwame & Rip were DNPs?