Wow. When Speights went down with the MCL sprain on November 14th, word out of the Sixers camp was 6-8 weeks before his return, this morning he was
listed as probable for tonight's game. 6-8 weeks has apparently been trimmed to four weeks and change.
Iguodala is also listed as probable, presumably because he's still dealing with the rib contusion that forced him from the game for a stretch on Monday night.
Good for Speights for putting the work in to get back on the floor quickly. Am I psyched the team has seemingly rushed their 22-year-old big man back on the floor to risk further injury in a lost season playing for a useless coach? Of course I am. "Better safe than sorry" is so boring.
Come on Brian, Eddie Jordan is trying to save his job, what else could be more important ot the future of the sixers?
As much as I'd love to lay this one at Jordan's feet, I don't think he has the power to make this call, and I don't think he's the only one running the "my job is on the line" math through his head on a daily basis.
You beat me to the post.
All I can say is WTF?
But if he's ready to go I'm psyched. I hope the Beast is back.
And Elton Brand inches every closer to DNP-CD's.
You know, I'm dying for someone to ask Stefanski, "So is Elton Brand completely washed up, or is Eddie Jordan just incapable of incorporating him into his system?" It's one or the other, and I'd really like to know what he thinks.
Then be prepared to see high-speed tap dancing like Gregory Hines on Fast-Forward or outright duck & cover, unless its a live interview.
Playing Speights now is dumb. Unless he's been practicing for the past week. It's bad right now, but not bad enough to jeopardize the kid's entire sophomore season.
Dum-da-dum-dumb!
glad i didn't drop him from my fantasy team
So which is a better NBA line-up?
1.
Jrue/AI/Iguodala/Young/Sam
2.
Lou/Green/Kapono/Speights/Brand
... I could see Jordan using this as 2st team/2nd team at some point. Strange how the Sixers and be so deep and yet be so bad.
With all this depth, you would think the possibility would exist to a] move a bad contract b] acquire a young star for a few of our young core
On that note ,who do you guys think is our "big three" in our coaches AND G.M.!s eyes.
What depth?
When your depth is a combination of crap players and/or crap contracts who can you trade for what.
The sixers tradeable assets are mostly the guys no one wants to trade (though if someone wanted lou williams i wouldn't be adverse to the sixers trading him)
This is after watching the phillies give up cliff lee for spare parts to save 9 mil, sigh
You've got 3 or 4 legitimate starters in the group of 10, maybe. Iguodala, Thad, Brand and maybe Dalembert. Those four guys could probably start for more than half the teams in the league. Iverson, Lou, Jrue, Speights maybe 1/3 of the teams, maybe less. Green and Kapono are barely rotational guys on most other teams. There's potential there, but I don't think it's an especially deep roster. It is an especially athletic roster, that's actually built to defend and run extremely well. But we've covered that.
But which of those 5 men squads is "better"
I'd take the first unit. Sam's long enough to handle Brand on the blocks. Speights is mostly a perimeter player right now. Jrue would shut Lou down. Iverson is more talented than Green and neither defends. It would come down to Iguodala being able to score at will on Kapono.
If Speights plays well in the few minutes that he gets in the first half tonight, EB will not sniff the floor in the 2nd half.
I'm not expecting him to see meaningful minutes no matter how much Speights plays. Unless Sammy gets in foul trouble, which is likely depending on how they use Slaq.
He'd probably go to Primoz instead of Brand, because he really knows how to spread the floor and get after it. He's also a better volleyball player.
If Speights is healthy and playing a lot (which is totally up in the air), could we see a crunch-time line-up of AI, Willie, AI9, Thad, and Speights? Even if that doesn't happen tonight, it may be possible for the next few games. Speights gives Jordan the excuse to say he went with one big guy down the stretch.
You were very close. EB instead of Speights, though.