The latest from long time BobcatsPlanet member TheBeagle on his March Madness / Charlotte Bobcats weekend.

A crazy, bewildering, fun whirlwind weekend wraps up. My love of the NCAA tournament and Tar Heel basketball is not something I conceal, so the fact that this past weekend played out like it did would be incredible in and of itself, but add in to that the fact that my dad’s old Army buddy (whose name I won’t drop here, out of modesty and privacy) who is longstanding icon of the Philadelphia sportswriting and talk-radio scene was in town to cover the regionals in Charlotte. I can’t even begin to explain the stories this guy has to tell, the people he’s spoken with, the person he was talking to in the living room Friday night (!!!!) on his cell……just a trip!! (I think I now have more dirt on the AI-Larry Brown feud than any professed NBA analyst that’s ever been employed at ESPN.)

Just a quickie: his forte is college basketball (covered every Final 4 since ’92, but a handful before that), but even in Philly he was surprisingly well-versed in our Bobcats. Covering Penn State basketball, he told me he was able to talk to JRich individually a handful of times when Michigan St played Penn St, and he said he is as genuine and good-natured as he comes off on-camera. Like us, he thought it was a great draft day trade for us when it went down. He’s a gamer who’s purpose is to continue to improve and help his teams win games. Like everyone else, he loves Jared, and told me he was the steal of the draft. Matt Carroll is the man; he went to high school 5 minutes from where the guy lives, and he knew the family very well. He was closer to his brother, Pat, since he went to St. Joe’s, but was very high on Matt and you could tell he was proud how hard the hometown Philly native worked to make it to where he is now. He was shocked at how little development Emeka has shown since UConn days, but he really thinks it has to do with such poor coaching since he’s been here…but there’s no coaching that can improve stone hands. He’s still high on Raymond and says everyone should calm down (the family friend telling me this is not a native Philadelphian, obviously, which explains his even keel and patience with athletes) and realize how much better of a PG he really is compared to the majority of PGs out there. He absolutely loves Gerald and thinks he’s one of the most freakish athletes in the league, and that he his actually a lot more well known around the country than I thought, which is a good thing; he deserves national recognition.

Well, due to sleep deprivation, he had to head off to sleep before the Sonics game was over, wishing them luck. At the time they were down by 1, and through persistence, they pulled it out and we won 2 in a row!

Saturday, through some miracle or another, he’s able to get me and my dad seats in Sec. 103 for the game, while he’s sitting on first row media table directly across for the Louisville bench. After some drama, and lots and lots of standing (no one sat down in the second half in the lower bowl that I know of), the Heels pull it out, and we get a really good view of the celebration and ritual net-cutting….that never gets old, even if it’s not the final net-cutting. Anyhow, we hang around, and the friend comes out and gives us his pressbook with all kinds of awesomeness in it (if you’re into sports collectible stuff that you can’t just go out and buy), and tells me I’m two for two that night. I smile and ask him what he means, and he tells me the ‘Cats just won their 3rd straight!!!

Me and dad didn’t get home ’til 2am (which isn’t all that late to me, but due to the craziness of the last few days, and lack of enough sleep) and we were worn slap-out, but damned if that wasn’t the best weekend I’ve had in recent memory.

I finished watching the Blazers game a couple hours ago, and I was amazed at the team I saw out there in the 4th. Sure, Roy was out, but the Blazers were gunning hard for this game, trying to get a win, and we took their best shot, and with stellar defense, and Raymond, chanelling Hansbrough and March’s past, put us on his back and we finish with an unexpected 3-1 road trip.

Wow, such a shame the players didn’t have the coach they needed, cause I know this is a playoff team. We’re every bit as good as Atlanta, and not far off from Toronto, Philly and Washington to boot. Oh well, some answers are starting to become clearer, and maybe with a change here and there, and a ping pong bounce here and there, next year will be what this year was supposed to have been!

Portland is coming to Charlotte on Monday November 19th, for a showdown with the Bobcats.  They bring a 4-6 record into the game, as well as a 3 game losing streak…which follows a 4 game winning streak…which itself followed another 3 game losing skid.  Hey, at least they are consistent (for a few games at a time).  The question is, which team are they?  The world-beaters who have already knocked off New Orleans, Dallas, and Detroit?  Or the high-lotto team who has already been blown out by those same Hornets, Denver, and Washington (plus a loss to expected cellar-dweller Philly)?

 Prior to the start of the season, everyone would have said the second.  Portland had traded away Zach Randolph, for no other reason than so he could not corrupt the young (or not) Greg Oden…only to see Greg undergo micro-fracture surgery and be forced to miss the season.  People looked at the team and said they were too young to contend, but to look out for them going forward.  But, they put together a nice winning streak, and people wondered if the future got here early.  Now, those questions are being aside again, because of the recent losses.  As a Bobcats fan, I want to know what to expect for the game:  Are the Bobcats going to have a walk-over, on their way back to 2 games above the mediocre mark, or will they slide back to .500 basketball?

The numbers seem to indicate the former.  In 3 of Portland's 4 wins,  they shot 50% or better from the floor – including against the strong defensive squads of Dallas and Detroit.  How did they manage such hot shooting nights?  Hitting more jumpers than normal.  Overall, 30.7% of made field goals in the league this year are layups or dunks.  In those 3 games, layups and dunks accounts for only 24.1% of Portland's total made baskets, so they were doing unusally well from further from the cup – and that is a trend that is unlikely to continue.  

On defense, Portland gives up more points per possession (ppp) than all but 6 teams in the league, at 1.05 ppp.  A  big factor in this high rate is the fact that Portland hardly ever takes the ball away from their opponents.  They create turnovers on only 13.5% of their opponents' possessions, a mark only Memphis exceeds (in a bad way).  They also do a poor job on the defensive boards, grabbing 69.5% of available defensive rebounds (8th worst in the NBA).  Giving your opponents more initial shots (few turnovers) and more second shots (few defensive rebounds) is not a formula for success.

For comparison, the Bobcats surrender 1.01 ppp, force turnovers on 15.5% of their opponents' possessions, and grab 69.1% of available defensive rebounds.  While the first two numbers are solid, the third is far from it – and made all the more unusual by the fact that the Bobcats are the best offensive rebounding team in the NBA (or second best, according to ESPN).  They pull down 33.2% of their own missed shots, nearly 8% better than Portland's mark.  How they can be so effective on one end and not the other is a bit strange, but not the focus of this post – all that matters is that the Bobcats look ready to expose a weakness of their opponent.

After looking at the numbers behind Portland's wins, I feel better.  In fact, I will make a couple of predictions – the Bobcats win tonight, as long as they hold the Blazers under 50% from the floor.  And second, the Trailblazers are going to start giving up more points if they keep letting the opposition keep the ball so much (hopefully the Bobcats will start on that tonight).

(Most of these numbers can be seen at the Queen City Hoops Stats Page – and the ones that can't yet are going to be added soon). 

Okay, okay, I take it all back what I said a few games ago about not wanting Vince Carter. I would take Vince Carter. Hell, I’d take Jimmy Carter at this point, if I thought it could help. I’d do anything to avoid having to endure another game like last night’s debacle in Portland. Once again without Woods and Prior—I mean, Okafor and May—the Bobcats were blown away by 37 points, their second-worst deficit ever (and that’s saying something; in terms of severity, it’s comparable to DMX’s second worst run-in with the cops ever). For a large portion of the second half we were down by over 40—40!—man, I want to drink my 40’s, not trail by them.

Every Rose Arena has its thorn, and for the Bobcats it was LeMarcus Aldridge, who scored 30 points on 12-19 shooting (and sat most of the 4th). Of course, it’s hard to miss when every other shot is an unopposed alley-oop. I already compared our defense to a bowling alley last night, so where do I go from there? The Maginot Line? Arena football? Saddam Hussein’s lawyers? I’m taking requests. Martell Webster (20 points) also steamrolled over the Bobcats’ crumbling infrastructure early and often, and the only remaining suspense after the first quarter was when commentator Matt Devlin would realize that Webster’s first name wasn’t “Martin.” (answer: with ten minutes to go in the second quarter, but give Matt credit: he then jokingly asked if Martell “was Daniel’s brother,” and it’s that sort of brilliant humor that lets me laugh through my tears.) Meanwhile, Zach Randolph (20 points) picked his teeth with Primoz Brezec and Ryan Hollins, and I think it’s safe to say at this point that Brandon Roy (14 points, 9 assists, 8 rebounds) has the inside track on Adam Morrison for Rookie of the Year.

Then, to put the icing on the turd, we learned that Okafor is headed back to Charlotte to get an MRI on his calf and may be gone 6 weeks?!? What in the world!? I never thought of the calf as a very sophisticated part of the human anatomy. What is it with this team and seemingly innocuous injuries that end up knocking out players for weeks? Sean May has a sore knee and he’s out indefinitely, Brevin Knight pulls his groin and they end up cutting out his stomach…Jesus, at this point, I’ll just be happy if they find out Emeka doesn’t have cancer.

I guess we’ll all be getting a good look at Hollins then. He had 6 points through the first half, but he didn’t get any more after that, and unfortunately his fouls caught up and eventually tied with his scoring. And where was Derek Anderson? With all those young guys on the Blazers, they should have been ripe for some of Anderson’s veteran bamboozling. Instead: 0 points in 7 minutes? It was the worst “DA” performance since Mike Nifong.

Forget it, this hurts too much. I’d rather think about something less depressing right now, like Darfur. I just hope I can contain my excitement until the Bobcats next game on Sunday in Seattle. Will we be able to stay within 40? Will we at least hold the Sonics to under 30 points for one of the quarters? Will Okafor need to have his leg amputated? Tune in to find out…

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