Game 5: Quarter 4 "Ain't No Holla Back Girl"

Gwen Stefani with special guest Akon is playing at the E Center tonight. I wanted to go really bad. Damn playoffs. Last time she was in town I was out at sea. WATER MOCCASINS!!

Game 5 Menu through 3 quarters:

A Shane Battier dome on a nice Albertson's roll
Couple of handfuls of chips
Good and Plenty (Ming Yao size)
Star Crunch
One half of a Dr. Peppper
One Diet Mt. Dew


JVG hails from Rochester, NY. I wonder if Ming Yao has been to Nick Tahou's for the Garbage Plate

Beavis just said Luther Head...ha ha he ha ha he

Jazz not running plays for Milsap, still getting shots.

Sig don't do technologies very good. Please put your mouse and click on the super cool rectangle at the top. That is Nick Tahoe's garbage plate. It is pretty sweet.

Hottie alert sitting next to the scorer's table, Rockets side, behind JVG.

So at halftime I went to gas station to up the calorie count. I was admiring this dude's station wagon. It is funny how these things sneak up on you. I also looked down, had hot dog juice on my shirt and didn't give a frog.

Did we ever get a report back on how much Ming Yao's Luther Head weighs?

Some people have told me I look like Scott Layden.

Others have told me I look like Frank Layden

That play is why this site exists.

Rockets up 3, feels like 10

WHEN DID THIS GAME TURN?? THAT'S RIGHT, WHEN JERRY STOPPPED CALLING PLAYS FOR KIRILENKO.

Oh no, Fisher is off the bench. Fisher shot attempt projection with 6 left...4 shots.

HA, Fisher looked like Tater after reading a Liemd post.

This is the 26th year anniversary of my good friend's 18th surprise birthday party thrown by his mom. She had Mr. Potato Head out for us to play.

Note: Mr. Potato Head is no relation to Luther Head.

Jerry falling back to the Fish guarding TMAC approach. Jerry is no Mr. Potato Head.

Fisher shot count: 1

That exchange looked like an Arena Football game, culminating in Derek Clements knocking the ball away from the intended receiver.

Raja Bell made the NBA First Team All Defense. Apparently Steve Luhm is not the only NBA journalist who does not watch games.

Jerry puts Matt in, remembering now that you can't finish games with Fisher.

Jazz showing some serious sackage. See what happens when you remove leadership from the equation?

Capt Blake is a sissy.

Nice play from JVG out of the time out. I think they ran that at McQuaid.

Mother of God, that was one tremendous pass by AK.

Blogging style still running up against some resistance by management.

Harp short arms a jumper in the clutch, makes note to self..."lift more weights"

Fisher in AK out.

Fisher offensive foul. Yep, that is our coach.

Bench shot of Fisher, looks like he got a whiff of one of Ronnie Brewer's bench farts.

Just received an emergency email from bordelais7, the man who has funded this free site. There appears to be a meeting at 7:00am local to seriously consider changing the name of this site.

Larry H. Miller now thumbing through league directory for Sam Mitchell's cell number.

Jazz lose.

Quick 4th quarter recap: Jazz playing well, flowing well. Fisher in for GG. TMAC hits two shots, Fish throws up a brick, Jazz go down 7. Harp enters, hits two jumpers, AK makes a block and than threads a needle to booze for a layup. Jazz cut it to one. Rich Kotite swaps offense for defense and puts Patton in who immediatley runs a tank into the Siegfried line. Jazz lose.

Should have went to see Gwen Stefani.

Oh, I forgot,

WATER MOCCASINS!!

Jazz LiveBlog and Something Something Harry Potter

-Stupid fellow bloggers. Someone forgot to start the third quarter.

-Hey, I started just in time to see AK's made basket of the first round!

-I need a conclusion for this 20-page paper I'm writing, if you have suggestions, put them in the comments. Subject doesn't matter.

-Oooooh, AK hit a jumper. I'm in a state of shock. I'm serious, I look like Jerry Sloan right now.

-*grabs drool towel*

-T-Mac gives the ref the Evil Eye. Looks very similar to the Eye That Is Pointed Up and To the Left at a 37-Degree Angle.

-Some lonely Rockets' fan has to have an AlstonSucks page out there.

-AK just hit another jumper. Stop hitting jumpers, AK, or they won't trade you. I'm serious. And as I type, Fisher almost steals the ball. Oh, wait, the Jazz already had the ball.

Fisher with a turnover.

-It's too bad the Jazz don't have an SG on the bench who could hit a three for a rally-killer instead of dribbling the ball off his foot or hand-checking the other player five feet from the three-point stripe or running into three-man coverage or resembling Levar Burton.

-McGrady said he prefers having Kirilenko on him. Sloan responds by putting Fisher on him.

I'm sure T-Mac is really really upset right now.

-Boozer, used to shooting over a 7-footer, launches a 10-footer 2 feet past the hoop. Derek Fisher immediately starts arguing he practiced with a 7-footer last summer.

-T-Mac walks over to Sloan, says, "I really really hate having Harpring guard me. Please don't throw me in the briar patch."

-It's a bad sign when you're looking over comments on a rough draft and two sentences are underlined with the word "YIKES!" written out to the side.

-Harpring doubles down on Yao, Yao passes out to Battier, Harpring moves to full-on sprint shuffle to recover. Two seconds later, Harp is still three feet from Yao and Battier hits an open three-pointer.

-If I'm not mistaken, one of the announcers just missed his "sneeze" button.

-In case you're interested, a certain bordelais7 was intended to write this blog, but got distracted by a soccer game. Yes, soccer.

How far the Jazz have fallen.

-Long conversation on bench points from the TNT analysts. Bolerjack feels a disturbance in the Force.

-Someone should probably tell the Rockets they don't really need to foul Fisher. Ever. He's his own personal hard foul.

-Collins, feeling sorry for the Rockets' unwise fouling of Harpring, decides to foul T-Mac on a three-pointer he hits. Harpring, unbelievably upset, collects the ball, steps back, and attempts a little jumpshot, which he misses.

Ladies and gentlemen, how about your Jazz?

-Fisher to Harpring for an airball.

See previous comment.

-Well, sorry for the low quality. It was short notice, and I'm tired. Prepare for an infusion of oddity with Capt. Sig.

Live Blog and the Chamber of Secrets

TNT showing the 25th in the series of Geico "caveman commercials." I've decided those commercials could be used as a universal IQ test. If you laugh, you're sent back to the remedial grades.

Tracy McGrady has been diagnosed with a "hip pointer." He's back in the game now. Basically I just heard the announcers say "McGrady faked it."

Fun Fact: Ecdysiastic is the latin word for pole dancing.

Fisher just pivoted with the ball for roughly 15 seconds before passing the ball. That was productive. Lord knows moving your left foot back and forth might make your defender fall over. Oh wait, Harpring is on our team.

Fratello reports that Jerry Sloan told him "Harpring knows how to get his points in our offense." Graciously cuts off the rest of the quote: "by sacrificing his teammates shots, playing selfishly, and always calling for the ball regardless of defensive coverage."

TNT runs a playoff promo featuring 50% images of D-Wade and Shaq. OOPS!

Giricek hits another 3. Jerry Sloan plants his head firmly in the sand.

Mehmet Okur's 3 point percentage in this series is Shawn Bradley-esque.

Harpring passed. Isn't that precious!

Harpring slips on invisible banana peel.

Close-up on McGrady's "I'm in pain!" face. Funny how losing two games in a row leads to injury for T-Mac. Of course ESPN will still trumpet him as one of the greatest playoff performers ever despite his playoff series record still being 0-for-career.

12 combined turnovers already. Fratello is still describing the teams as playing "crisp fundamental basketball."

Fisher hits a three-pointer. TNT commentators talking about how great he is. This confirms my theory that Mike Fratello has been in cryogenic storage since 1999.

How many suits do you think Craig Sager owns? Do you think he tries to top his previous high in bad taste with every new purchase? What are the odds it's all an elaborate joke and he just has one blue suit and the producers blue-screen horrific colors and patterns on him without his knowledge every game? These are the things I need the New York Times to cover.

TNT shows a "Hertz around the league" graphic. I'm very disappointed this isn't an injury update.

Current injury report: Tracy McGrady - wounded pride.

Juwan Howard suddenly outperforming all expectations that were set from the last several games. Documented receipts from Floyd Landis' pharmacist ordered shredded by Jeff Van Gundy.

Mehmet Okur hits a dagger three. Celebrates by planning first shower this month.

Tracy McGrady already has 9 assists. Funny how it's easier to get those when your teammates start hitting shots.

Kirilenko takes a shot. I think it missed but Masha just thinks it needs an interpreter.

McGrady misses poorly. Fratello defends it by saying "that was not a shot!" I couldn't agree more.

Craig Sager's tie just got him indicted at the Hague.

I'd tell you what Tracy McGrady's arm tattoo says, but I decided it would take less time to read "War and Peace"

Passing the torch on to Bordy for the 3rd quarter. Madame Kicky is ready to gnaw my arm off if I don't go buy food right now.

Live Blog and the Sorcerer's Stone

Prior to this game the TNT studio crew are busy talking about a far more interesting series: Cleveland v. Washington. This despite the fact that Barkley talked about that he doesn't like series that end in sweeps

Jeff Van Gundy just gave commentary about something involving coaching. I'd tell you what he said but I was too fascinated by his appearance. He looked like a recovering methadone addict on a 48 hour crack binge.

Boozer's acne level is at Purplish red.

Mike Fratello comments that Harpring has been playing "above his head" in this series. Not hard to do when your head is normally at floor level from falling over so much.

Battier misses a three. Hot Dog juice spills everywhere.

Tracy McGrady drives right past Derek Fisher to get to the rim, but gets an MLA after getting a contact high from Fisher the last couple game and absorbing his MLA-Superpowers.

Boozer tries to shoot through Yao's arms. Shocked to discover the Chinaman isn't intangible or building a railroad through the American West.

Fisher hacks Yao Ming and raises his hand to signal he fouled him. You know, in case the officials confuse him for that other black guy from Utah.

Kirilenko grabbing several early rebounds. Harpring scrambling madly for his Russian voodoo doll.

Fisher attempts to charge through three Rockets. Falls over instead. On the positive side that allows him to blow his coverage on the other end and let McGrady score an easy three.

Fisher picks up a charging foul and spills Hot Dog Juice all over the floor in the process.

Just showed a Toyota commercial where a Tacoma survives a mauling by a monster truck. Too Bad. I was rooting for the monster truck. Anything that looks like a dinosaur and eats metal vaguely reminds me of mom.

Madame Kicky is bitching to one of her friends about the evils of diet pills. My favorite blast: "We'll see if it works....when you're dead!"

New Favorite when the phone call was ending: "Goodbye...perhaps forever!"

Kirilenko gts a crazy block against Yao. The struggle for the ball was reminiscient of Mongolia stuck between the Russians and the Chinese.

Gordan Giricek hits an open three. Imagine if that guy was our starting shooting guard!

Fratello praising the value of the deflections statistic. Matt Harpring leads the league in dribbling off his foot in traffic, but no mention is made if that counts towards deflections or not.

Mutombo makes the "Harpring deflection" out of bounds. Fratello's giving him a hustle point.

I love that Deron Williams has some variation of his name tattooed on each arm. You know...in case he forgets.

TNT showing highlights from game 3 and 4 and have somehow made the film look old even though it was only a few days ago. I was half expecting George Mikan to throw down a dunk in that grainy footage.

McGrady drives to the hoop at will. Someday he may figure out that no one can stop him when he does that.

TNT switches to some bizarre camera angle that can only be described as "viewpoint of a drunk guy in Section 321."

Holy crap, this game is actually looking like both teams may score 90+ points.

Tracy McGrady's back is sore. John Amaechi unavailable for comment.

Harpring dribbles off his knee brace and commits a turnover. In fairness, the brace is roughly the size of a large baby. Good thing we have the brace signed for 3 more seasons after this one.

Blog en Direct Quatre: Pourquoi?

So I get to blog the fourth quarter in a game where the Jazz lead by a zillion, and Fisher is being hailed as the saviour of the Jazz by ESPN. What have I done to deserve this?

Gordan passes the ball to himself. Based on my rudimentary lip-reading skills, Giricek needs no help with his English profanity.

Prompted by the Jumbotron and the organ, and perhaps mesmerized by the LED ring, the crowd chants "de-fense! de-fense!" Giricek pauses in confusion, as if making a mental note to ask his translator after the game "what IS that word?"

Brewer must feel a bit like Brady Quinn on the bench, right around the 12th or 13th pick. Wondering with every timeout if NOW is his turn.

Deron takes the inbound pass, looks over to Sloan for directions. Does a double-take to verify. Proceeds down the court and passes to AK. Double-take explained.

Back in chat, bordy is surely being mocked for having to live-suffer through a dreadfully boring 4th quarter.

Nothing gets me excited for game 5 and the NBA like a NASCAR commercial. Kind of like inviting a bunch of kids to a birthday party and sending them home with a Wall Street Journal as a party favor.

I still don't understand why the Jazz have a six-foot-tall Ewok as a mascot.

Harpring launches a shot, which he quickly realizes will never get to the hoop. He follows the shot and spanks the ball. Pwned.

You'd have to be an idiot to still be watching the game from the Eastern Time Zone at this point. Go to bed, tater.

ESPN acknowledges the fact that the game is now meaningless, switches quickly to Masha Cleavage Update.

#9 in the game. Confused, ESPN checks their rosters.

#9 misses a shot. Commentators talking NFL draft. Bordy thinking Masha.

Dee Brown with 126 attempted assists per 48 minutes.

I can't think of a sentence or a comment that will adequately wrap up this live-debacle, so....HOT DOG JUICE!

Live Blog III: The Last Crusade

Battier misses a three. Both teams scramble for the ball like they're playing Hungry Hungry Hippos.

Fisher MLA. Realizing that missing lay-ups is considered veteran leadership by Jerry.

Announcers blame the MLA on Fisher's bum shoulder. Fisher's agent slips Tim Legler an unmarked envelope full of benjamins.

Deron shoots a fall-away over Skip to My Lou. And-1 league defensive drills tape orders cancelled nation-wide.

Just a second. I need to go buy some RGX bodyspray. This girl in a slip wants to smell me.

ESPN takes a break from the game to show girls in white shirts running through a fountain outside. This would be way hotter if they weren't 9.

Van Gundy whispers something into McGrady's ear. McGrady whispers something into Yao's ear. Ten minutes later Alston is calling the play "Pick and Roll Purple Monkey Dishwasher"

AK has been attending the Matt Harpring school for passing. Reportedly the billing address for his tuition payment was in Houston.

Boozer Acne level upgraded to Orange.

Tim Legler talks about Okur as having a "great body." Orders flowers and chocolates to be sent to the locker room after the game.

Kirilenko runs to the rim on a 3 on 1 fast break Deron looks right at him and throws a no-look to Okur...which he misses. AK refuses to run back and surrenders a McGrady 3. Vegas sets the odds at 10 to 1 that he's pulled in favor of Harpring within 4 minutes.

Yao Ming gets winded after running for 7 minutes of game time. Apparently he's been burning money and huffing the fumes at home.

Collins grabs a deflection for a steal. This is the most productive he's been since Stanford.

Do you ever wonder if Jason Collins and Jarron trade teams every once in awhile?

Boozer is now shooting every shot like he's shooting over Yao. His free throw attempts are flying higher than Lamar Odom.

And Harp is checking in for AK. Stunning.

Harp rubs AK's head as he walks in. Calls him Opie and grins.

Luther Head gets fouled by Deron. Dee Brown looks on from the bench enviously. Roger Powell sleeps softly at home. James Augustine trying to convince hookers he was once a legitimate NCAA player.

3 second defensive violation called against Houston. 3 seconds more defense than Rafer Alston's played all game.

Fisher falls on floor and turns the ball over. Legler says that's why he got three championships in LA.

Legler says that Fisher has been "key to the development of Deron Williams." I don't even have a joke that can top that one.

Fisher shoots an airball. Legler manages not to comment on his hustle.

ESPN has a close-up shot on the one non-white fan in the ESA. NBA Cares about diversity.

Utah has managed to get out to a 21 point lead. Sloan frantically trying to come with a reason not to play Brewer in garbage time.

Fisher takes advantage of a bad Skip to My Lou pass, pumps his fist after a Giricek three like the fate of the earth depends on it.

Uh-oh there's a 21 point lead going into the fourth. My repertoire of jokes doesn't have a ton of options involving the jazz playing well. Time to pass the baton.

Game Four Live-Blog, Part Two: Attack of the Clones

-Unforced Error sucks.

-Fisher's current Points Per Shot: 1.0. AK's current Points Per Shot: Undefined.

-Junior Jazz kids rewarded by meeting Carlos Boozer and Andrei Kirilenko. AK defeated four times in a row in games of Knockout.

-"‹sjf› fisher to the locker room!!!" Sometimes I worry that we get excited about the wrong things. And not this time.

Remember when SJF acted like he was going to post on this blog?

-Deron points where he wants Harp to screen, Harp automatically slips the screen and moves to the basket, Deron looks at him in puzzlement. Harp then falls down.

[see title of blog for details]

-NBA on ESPN's Taco Bell Update. That's generally not a topic for polite conversation.

-AK back in. Immediately not guarded. And really, he's not being guarded. T-Mac was just standing under the basket, arms at his side. Touche, Jerry.

-T-Mac glares at the ref. Man five feet to the left of ref looks around, points at self, mouths "me?"

-Commercial with montage of common people counting down from 3 and "shooting" various objects at the buzzer. In the Fisher household, the countdown starts at 11.

-NBA Cares commercial, featuring Yao staring blankly at a group of interracial children while holding a closed picture book. That reminds me of how my parents cared for me.

-AK fouled, gets set to miss two FTs. Giricek waiting to check in for him immediately afterwards.

-I like how the Jazz keep running the play that's designed for Harpring to stand under the basket and post up. Oh wait, they're not running that play? Are you sure?

-Sloan finally gets his stoppage in play, puts in Giri for AK. Chews out AK for missing two free throws. AK argues he hit them both to no avail.

-Blog quietly amongst yourselves for a few minutes, I need to check the baseball scores for the day.

-Brian McCann's in a bit of a slump.

-Harpring just pirouetted around Yao with both arms outstretched at full extension. Quite graceful.

-Fisher back in. Can faintly hear seven people clapping when his name is announced. Two of them are his mother.

-Boozer with his Finishing Move.

-What does T-Mac have tattooed on his right arm? I'd like to think it's his favorite paper from 8th Grade creative writing with Ms. Townshend.

-Announcer: "Derek Fisher must have magnets on his hands." That explains the shot.

Ha.

-Jazz up 50-45 at halftime. Rockets shooting 3.5% better from the field. Let the ref-blaming begin in Houston.

-Unless I'm mistaken, that NBA Playoffs commercial had Anthony tucking in his shirt, saying, "This is how you get ready for the playoffs," followed by a white man gently spanking him on the ass.

I thought Bordy was the only one that got ready for the playoffs that way.

-For a second there, I thought that was Jayson Williams doing the halftime commentary. Nice double take when I heard him say: "You can't be afraid to take the shot."

-I enjoy the fact that Justin Morneau has a commercial now. This would be the equivalent of giving Harpring a national shoe commercial. Except Morneau is good.

-Earlier today:

Sasha Pavlovic commits hard foul. Announcer: "Pavlovic with a hard foul there, he played under Jerry Sloan, you know he learned to play hard." Yes, that's why they exposed him in the draft instead of Jarron.

Sloan hates foreign people.

-Turning things over to Kicky for the third quarter. Enjoy.

Game Four LiveBlog, Part One: The Phantom Menace

Playoff record: 1-2
Thinly-veiled digs from Sloan at AK since CryGate: ~7
Positive contributions from AK in the series: 2
Positive contributions from Fisher in the series:
Years the Rockets/Jazz Series Will Set the NBA Back: 27.4
Functional Motor Nerves in Jerry Sloan's Mouth: 3
Functional Motor Nerves in Harpring's Legs: 3
Boozer Acne Level: 4.2

It's go time.

-ESPN just showed the one guy in Utah that still wears an AK-47 jersey. Those should be 75% off in the Jazz store in a year.

-Oh great, Tim Legler is the color man. "I recommend they stand around the 3-point line, don't play defense, and generally act really really white."

Fisher: "Sweet!"

-Yao has the same facial hair configuration of all Computer Science students I know. I bet he has a Lvl. 60 Night Elf Druid.

-I wonder if the Jazz assign a guy for each game that sits on the baseline and yells "three seconds!" every time Yao catches the ball in the post. If so, he's certainly doing his job. Probably sits next to the guys that start yelling "RED!" when the shot clock hits 12.

-Just so you know, they're not guarding AK.

-Nice transition from the broadcasters. "Unforced error." "There's Fisher." I think we have a new nickname.

-Fisher would have gotten around that screen better than AK. And then he only would have had to jump five feet in the air to challenge the shot.

-9-6, Jazz, 8:06 to go in the quarter. AK stumbles a little heading to the bench, bursts into tears.

-T-Mac becomes the first person to describe his emotion when being picked by the Raptors as a "feeling of relief." Most people describe it as "Toronto who?"

-Oh, good scott, Fisher trips trying to go one-on-three which is described by the announcers as "splitting two defenders." I can't wait 'til he gets a charge and it's described as "splitting one defender."

-Deron has posted up on offense more often than AK.

-Who is not being guarded, by the way.

-Boozer gets called for an offensive foul. In total disgust, one male fan three rows back stands up, assumes an angry posture, and limp-wristedly waves a dark blue pom-pom at the ref. You go, girl.

-Fisher might be hurt. Crowd applauds as he stands up, but then subsides quickly when they realize he's not heading back to the bench.

-AK called for cheap foul. Pleads case to ref. Cries. Isn't guarded.

-Harp just participated in Houston's offensive set. Made the pass to the perimeter. Actually one of his better passes.

-Giricek and Harpring both in. Harpring on T-Mac, Giricek on Battier. Sloan nods in approval. His jaw stays in the same position.

-Fisher is now 0-2 with 4 FTA. Currently preparing statement for tonight's interviews where he commends himself for getting to the line. Final line prediction: 2-11 FGA, 7/8 FTA.

-Why do players switch positions after the first FTA? "Dude, I totally wasn't feeling it on the right side."

-They just called "travelling" fully 3 seconds after the infraction occurred. It's like Harpring's defense on three-pointers.

-Is anyone surprised Fisher tried to shoot that ball at the end of the quarter? Does the concept of passing just disappear when there are less than 30 seconds in a quarter? It's absolutely infuriating.

No funny in this post. Fisher sucks.

On This Day, We All Cry With Kirilenko

Harpringsucks.com welcomes special guest writer "ddd" of retiresloan.com fame for this contribution. Check out his site for sequels in this series and for other inspirational thoughts.

In evaluating a basketball player’s effectiveness, there is one key element sports journalists get wrong more than anything else. A cultural obsession with statistics makes analysts lose sight of what’s most important. All they have to do is answer this question: How does the team play when player X is on the court?

Do they tend to stay focused? Do they make silly mistakes? Or, even more simply, does their team score more points than the opposing team when player X is on the court? When Andrei Kirilenko is on the court for the Jazz, the answers are: Yes. No. Yes.

The Jazz’s mysterious 8-12 limp to the finish coincided with Sloan’s mid-March preference to finish games with Harpring at the expense of AK. After the midway point of the third quarter, Andrei would disappear never to be seen again.[i] The result? A team previously known for composure down the stretch was instantly transformed into a team that collapsed in the fourth quarter. Coincidence? Hardly.[ii]

When I first heard of the HarpringSucks blog, my thoughts were probably pretty similar to most Jazz fans. “Wait, Matt’s okay. What are they talking about?” I never really had a lot of affection for Harpring, but I thought of him as a good sixth man who plays hard, scores in bunches, and gives the team some toughness that offsets his complete inability to stay in front of his man on defense.

Earlier this year, some Scottish filmmakers released a documentary about French soccer legend Zinedine Zidane where 17 cameras track him for an entire match against Villa Real. It’s amazing what you notice once you are trained in on Zidane, and Zidane alone. The ball appears to be simply an extended appendage of his body. His skill is like nothing the world’s most popular sport has ever seen. Nobody takes the ball from Zidane, unless Zidane is ready to give up the ball. Nobody.

Harpring is the exact opposite. I dare you to play the role of the Scottish filmmaker and focus on Matt for an entire game. What you will see is a turnover machine. He can’t pass the ball. I mean at all. When was the last time Harpring threw a pass where you said, “Wow, I can’t believe he saw that.” Whereas, with AK almost every game he throws at least one pass where you say to yourself, “I can’t believe he saw, much less threw, that pass.” The only passes Harpring makes that inspire awe are those that go directly into the hands of the other team.

Broadcasters love to mention the media guide garbage about Harpring’s family background in football. “How tough is Matt Harpring? I mean he goes about two-thirty, but that doesn’t even tell ya…Wow…I mean, he and Fish are solid.” Bolerjack will repeat some variation of this at least three times a game.

Not once, have I heard anyone make the most obvious comparison available—Harpring is a perpetual fumbler. The ball squirts out of his hands more than any one not-named Greg Ostertag. Except, Sloan rarely had Ostertag on the court when the game was on the line. Not the case with Matt.

Harpring also routinely has many turnovers that will never appear in the stat sheet. The guy commits at least two to three stupid completely unnecessary fouls each game. Most of these occur, but are not limited to, the offensive end. Harpring is like one of the metal centurion cylons out of Battlestar Gallatica, except instead of a complicated base ship to give him orders, he has tractor-loving puritan Sloan.

The Matt Harpring cylon is programmed to run specific routes on the court. If someone gets in its way, it does not abort the mission, but continues with the route. Toughness. TOUGHNESS will prevail over all! This is the only form of analysis provided to the Harp-bot.

Inevitably at some point in every game, Harpring will be trying to post up, screen, or move through the lane and he will thrust his hip or shoulder into an opposing player causing them to fly to the hardwood. Guess what? There aren’t first-downs in this game, you can’t do that. The ref immediately blows his whistle. Harpring will then turn, making a face of complete incredulity like an eight-year-old who was told he could not ride the roller coaster because he didn’t meet the 45 inch height requirement. “Sorry son, I just can’t let you out there. This is for your own good.” If Sloan were the brilliant coach every one treats him to be, this is precisely what he’d say to Harpring.

Instead, he is Jerry’s favorite student. "Little Jerry," they call him. How cute. How appropriate. How disgusting. I will now hang myself from the kitsch Energy Solutions signage. It’s Electrifying!
________________________________________

[i] On April 7, Andrei was injured and missed all but the final two games of the regular season. However, at that point Sloan had already made his preference for Harpring clearly known.

[ii] Many people will point out that AK was injured midway through the 12-1. However, AK’s minutes were not redistributed primarily to Harpring, but Millsap. Paul's presence also results in favorable answers to the key effectiveness questions.

Game 2, 4th Quarter: "Man Overboard"

“A monkey can throw pots in the water. You have to know what you are looking at.”

And so it begins, Capt Sig at the helm of the 4^th quarter blog. Navigating the entire internets to safe dockage in Houston. The Peter Principle in living breathing color.

In pre-blogging warm-ups I stretched, loosenedd up my fingers by typing a quick essay on the numerous uses of socks, and read a chapter from Fisherman’s Weekly.

Checking the boards in Vegas, odds are 10-1 Mr. Softy returns in the game.

Masha crosses off another day in the "Leaving Utah Family Countdown Calender"

Amanda Harpring crosses off another day in the "AK Leaving Utah Countdown Calender"

The Jazz begin the 4th with Williams, GG, Memo, Harpringsucks and Mansap....and zero hope.

ANDREI IN!

WTF!

Steve Wynn commits suicide.

AK trying to stretch the defense.

Battier's head looks like a pack of hot dogs.

It appears that Capt Sig just experienced the shortest relevancy in blogger history. The game is now over. Lets play fill dead blog time:

Random Trivia: Jeff Van Gundy is in the Nazareth College Golden Flyer Athletic Hall of Fame:

http://www.naz.edu/dept/athletics/halloffame/bios/all-bios.htm#vangundy

(Hair optional)

KJZZ showing a WNBA commercial.............................too easy.

I just realized I am blogging in bullet statements.

It appears my blogging style is meeting some resistance on chat. Good chance the Northwestern has turned into the Exxon Valdez.

My mates are turning on me, I feel like Barney in that episode where Andy and he try to join the exclusive men's club in Raleigh. They let Andy in but not Barney.

I think Battier is leaking hot dog juice from his dome after that Boozer dunk attempt.

That might have been Boozer's first help defensive block attempt all year.

Good sequence there. A Frog Fisher turnover, followed by Frog getting tripped up on a lilly pad trying to fight through a screen, capped off by a harpringsucks WOOT.

BUCKLE UP

Serious comment: That is about the 3rd time that Okur has passed up a 3 to pass to Fisher. That is probably not a good sign.

It appeared that Battier upgraded to an Italian Sausage in that Williams assault.

Thank God a Commercial. Time for some social commentary. (Sig believes a well-rounded captain is a good captain).

Why do people with BMI’s larger than Jargon Collins’s jersey number insist on wearing fewer clothes than anybody else in the summer? Fat feet and sandals should trigger some Federal legislation.

Thurl keeping the vest alive as a fashion statement.

Booner: "You have to be a tough guy to play in this league". AK cues Robert John's "Sad Eyes" on his IPOD.

The stage is set for some Harpring trickery....err "bafoonery".

What would you say Ming Yao's head weighs?

Boozer silencing all critics. Amazing performance. The Capt tips his hat.

LOCKER CLEAN OUT CONTEST! I MUST ENTER TATERMOOG.

Boler: "Carlos with back to back double doubles"

Harp with an MLA and a mulligan.

Harp with an assist, securing the Subway Sub of the Game. Ak searches for Olivia Newton-John on his IPOD.

"Me Ming Yao, Me Shoot'em Good Free Throws"

AK just asked Hoffa if he would put in a good word for him in Toronto.

The record with Harp finishing games just notched another L. Rinse Lather Repeat.

Serious comment: McGrady is getting any look he wants and has now for two games. With Frog Fisher guarding him, I am reminded of a shooting drill where the ball boy closes out and pretends to play defense. I don’t when, but he is going to score 45 in a game before this series is over. Maybe two games.

Locker cleanout day projection: May 1

JOC shopping AK projected start date: May 2

Game 2, Quarter 3: "See Quarter 1"

Third leg in a four-man relay. I'm used to this position. Ran the third leg on school relay teams. That's where they stick the slowest guy. I'll try to avoid any "baton" analogies, especially with Kicky behind me and Capt. Pearl in front of me.

Bordy Playoff "It's Electric!" Voltage Check: I think I've got just enough juice to provide backup power to a solar-powered calculator.

For those who have never live-blogged before, you might not appreciate just how exhausting it can be. Trying to be witty for a half hour straight is not all that simple, even for Wit Personified. Fortunately, all I have to do is report the facts, as the Jazz provide enough laughs to feed an army of humor-starved fans, simply by showing up and letting Sloan work his magic. Even when it's the same jokes over and over. And over. *sigh*

I'll be following the game on TNT, but might stick with KJZZ for the first couple of minutes so that I can catch Boler ejaculate a "double-double!" as he scrambles for stats ranking Boozer among the best double-doublers in the 2007 playoffs. Meanwhile, as Craig is giggling over Carlos' statistical dominance ("Is that an impressive feat, ten things in two items?"), Boozer will let Rafer drive by for a half-heartedly-contested layup.

By my estimation, AK will play about 40 more minutes in a Jazz uniform. Only 20 of which will actually count, as the other 20 will be spent in the Jazz' offensive half.

Ty Corbin asked about half-time adjustments. He supresses a smirk as he thinks to himself "Jazz? Adjustments?", and proceeds to pile on the BS. He'll do great things in the Jazz organization.

And here we go...

AK with 4 fouls already. Sloan leaves him in so that he can wow us with his offense. AK airballs a 3. I can hear Jerry giggling on the sideline.

Kirilenko fires back by refusing to play real defense, and he hops around harmlessly in front of a Yao shot. Like a cute little bunny rabbit that knows it's about to be shot.

Boler initiates the "double-double" watch. "Twenty-three and nine!" Meanwhile, something happens on the court, an official blows a whistle, and I have no clue what happened since I'm sitting here re-reading and re-admiring my work.

Little bunny foo-foo gets shot in the head. The only question is whether or not the shooter will stick him back in for two minutes in a show of humiliation.

I've never been a big believer in conspiracy theories, but the fact that officials are making semi-phantom calls against Fisher in an attempt to get him into foul trouble make me wonder if they're planning ahead to try to keep this game close.

Jazz down by 2. A concerned coaching staff decides to go with plan "A".

"Double-double!" *switches channel*

Fish getting worked. Bam! All over the floor. Onlookers laugh and applaud. Cilantro added on top for aesthetics and...oh wait. This is Emeril. *switches channel again*

Harp with the double-double (points, falls)

Guess Millsap already got his playoff "experience" on Saturday. Should serve him well in seasons to come.

Embarrassing moment: "‹tatermoog› Oh, crap, I forgot there was a game on. I'm watching Scrubs."

Hint: the embarrassing part isn't the fact that he forgot there was a game on.

Harpring with an MLA, ends the quarter sprawled on the floor. How fitting.

Jazz down 6. Handing the baton off to the anchor...Buckle up!

Live Blog II: The Wrath of Khan

Time to start the second quarter.

Boozer is on fire and shooting at a Kobe like rate. The thought of him continuing to shoot 15 footers over Yao Ming though is making me feel slightly sick. Although that may be because I just accidentally chewed a cayenne pepper while eating General Tso's chicken (tastes surprisingly like defeat).

Matt Harpring just ran by the scorer's table with his trademark meticulously groomed hair. Mike Fratello is fondling his hairpiece self-conciously.

Yao gets a foul called on him and acts like a tank just ran over his dad in Tiananmen Square.

I just spent 20 seconds trying to figure out how to spell Tiananmen.

Skip to my Lou hits a 3, high-fives the professor, and calls a press conference to promote his video.

TNT shows a "total playoff wins" graphic with Sloan featured near the top. They graciously decide not to show a "total crushing playoff losses due to bad coaching" graphic.

Do you think Boozer looks at Juwan Howard and sees what he's going to look like in 15 years after he gets all his tattoos removed and grows a beard?

Boozer hits both free throws, the devil licks his lip and savors some of his soul.

Memo waves a cape and shouts "ole'!" while Yao gets an easy bucket.

Harp shoots and the ball goes off the front of the rim. Harp gives the equipment manager the stink-eye.

Yao inexplicably throws the ball straight up around Memo's arm. Memo is thrilled he now has the power to telekinetically block shots.

Kirilenko checks back into the game after signing an endorsement deal with Johnson and Johnson's "no more tears" line of shampoo and using the offical Utah Jazz Kleenex on the sidelines.

TNT, unimpressed with the basketball on the floor, decides to show a shot of the fountain outside. I feel strangely at peace.

Okur misses a shot. Shrugs it off and remembers what his wife looks like.

McGrady stares at the camera after getting fouled by AK's aura.

I'm convinced McGrady's lazy eye can see the future.

Okur blocks another shot by Yao Ming. He must have inhaled some of Marcus Camby's essence before the game.

Jeff Van Gundy lowers his head and shakes it after Yao picks up his third foul. I'd tell you what happened next but the glare off of Van Gundy's dome temporarily blinded me.

Harpring makes an uncontested lay-up.

Harpring makes an actually kind of impressive basket against McGrady. McGrady immediately feigns an injury on the side-line to protect his pride.

Fratello comments that Harpring is "the best" at playing physically. Harp responds by committing an egregious foul at the other end.

Charles Barkley just did a commercial for T-Mobile. It's unclear how many times they had to re-do the take because Charles ate his phone.

I just looked into McGrady's lazy eye and saw how I die. Spooky!

Battier hits a clutch three from the corner, speeding along his transformation into his generation's Bruce Bowen.

Derek Fisher throws the ball off the side of the backboard. Congratulates himself for gradually improving his accuracy.

Harpring falls over a full 2 seconds after the whistle is blown. Sloan praises him for showing veteran leadership.

Craig Sager wears a marigold jacket as part of the NBA Cares program. My self-esteem is going up while I think about how well I dress by comparison.

Carlos just winked into the camera while saying "Charles I'm stepping up for you baby." I think I just had a joygasm.

Game 2 Live Blog..."I'm Postponing Jack Bauer for This" Version

Apologies to DDD for bumping his post down. This is like U2 opening for After the Fire.

It's 7:30 and I am watching Boozer, Sloan, and Harpring tell me that the Jazz have to just make shots. So that is the solution? I guess Fisher is not playing.

Now, we have Thurl and Pace telling us how to shoot over Yao Ming. Shoot me now.

Time to switch to the Orlando/Detroit game. Wow. Dwight Howard is a bad free throw shooter and who can blame him? There are three hotties right behind the basket.

So...KJZZ or TNT? Which do I go with? Well, Boler of course! Where else can I find out that "Harpring comes from a football family" or "how tough is Fisher?"

Game predictions...Sloan will take Crygate to heart and give Andrei 18 minutes tonight. Harpring will show his anger at losing 6th Man of the Year to Barbosa by falling an extra couple of times. I am going to have three pages before tip off. I will wait now.

If I ever paint my face, I hope someone is there to kick my ass.

The Jazz are screwed. Bob Delaney is reffing.

12:00 - The Jazz win the tip and nobody is guarding Andrei.

44 seconds later, Fisher is 0-1.

10:45 WOW...Memo played defense!

10:15 Boozer is taking Memo's place as the outside shooter. 4-0 Jazz.

9:35 Fisher on McGrady. I guess the stove isn't that hot. Touch it again. Fisher one foul. Please, give him another.

9:22 AK knocks a pass out of bounds. Sloan talleys one touch. Seven seconds later, a rebound. That's two touches.

8:45 AK gets another but runs over Raja Be..I mean Shane Battier.

8:25 Memo played defense again and stole the ball! Even more incredible, Fisher passed it. Boozer scores again.

7:45 Boozer is smoking! 10-2 Jazz.

7:25 Memo tries tipping it into Houston's basket.

6:40 Rafer trying to help the Jazz but Chuck Hayes will have none of it. 12-6 Jazz.

6:18 An AK post up! Nothing to see here. Move along.

5:46 It is Boozer vs. Hayes. Incredible shot after a faol by Yao.

Time out...KFC commercial. Why does Kentucky Fried Chicken use "Sweet Home Alabama" as their jingle?

They are coming out of the timeout and Andrei is still on the floor. My prediction is coming true!

5:38 and Fisher is taking Harpring's duties for falling down.

5:00 and Boler is talking about saddling and riding Boozer. I know that surprises nobody.

4:30 and another block from Memo. That probably doubles his season output.

3:50 Battier strips AK. AK pops Yao. Fair trade.

3:38 Sloan gets the bench in. Harpring, Giricek, and Collins on the floor.

3:27 McGrady fouls Harpring. Harpring doesn't fall.

3:10 Boone is describing a foul. I think it is English, but I am not sure.

3:10 Kirk Snyder! The Jazz have a chance!!

3:00 Harpring shuffles his way to a travel.

2:48 McGrady heating up. Glad I don't have the 4th quarter duty tonight.

2:12 Almost a Harpring fall going for a loose ball. Time out, Jazz 19-15.

A Moment in Time....Olajuwon pops Whopper.

1:37 Fisher just scored! A free throw. Only one shot so far. So far.

1:08 Snyder scores. 30 seconds later, he gives back.

:3.2 Fisher goes one on one with a Houston defender. He wanted Alston, but he got Head.** He scores! Jazz end the quarter with a 26-17 lead. Sloan's Master Plan is working.

**- obligatory

Now....I turn this over to SirKickyAss.

Rinse, Lather, Repeat

No satire, no cute pop-culture references, no usual harpringsucks.com inside jokes.

OK, ignore the last one.


How long will Jerry Sloan stay with an approach that includes:

1.) Playing Frog Fisher the most minutes at SG.
2.) Playing Frog Fisher in poor match-up situations
3.) Playing Frog Fisher to end games.
4.) Playing Harpringsucks more minutes than AK.
5.) Playing Harpringsucks to end games.
6.) Playing Harpringsucks and Fisher together to end games.

??????

The truly entertaining part is that all of the above "tactical decisions" either practiced in isolation or in aggregate are not void of historical outcomes.

* The SG Breakout Tour occurred in January
* The MIA occurred on March 13
* Frog Fisher's play in March and April


More recently:

* John Salmons
* Brandon Roy
* Rashard Lewis
* the backcourt stumble defense
* Numerous Harpring passing TO's down the stretch run of the season.


The saga began after the Jazz 6 game winning streak in which Kirilenko was in full regeneration mode. The kickoff event was the MIA against Miami. 8-12 since. 0-1 in the playoffs.

Out of those 8 wins, 3 occurred when Portland, Houston, and Dallas played the JV squads at the end of the season and 2 occurred during two good games by AK (Minny, and GSW) in which he played 36 and 38 mins respectively.

The remaining 3 wins were:

Memphis: Blowout
Washington: Boozer 41pts, Ak, Harpringsucks, & Frog Fisher all sucked
Houston: The only game which provides a shred of Pro-Sloan credibility as Harp made an easy layup.

I wonder when the "adjustments" will be made?


Rinse, Lather, Repeat

BlogLive IV: Derek Fisher and the Chamber of Suck

-Buckle up!

-Deron Williams just gave the stinkeye to Paul Millsap after getting stripped. I can't even figure out why that happened.

-Harpring, eager to get in the stinkeye action, does one of his patented flyby shoulder checks on Yao. I'm incredulous it was called a foul, too, Matt.

-Harpring has an obvious offensive foul called, which he responds to with the Mick Jagger hands-on-hips strut. Very sexy.

-AK Interview on the Bench: "Just tweaked ankle a little bit. Had problems with health, but better now, feeling good, and...WATER MOCCASINS!"

-Some lady in the crowd is giving the film-noir death wail with every single made basket by the Rockets. I'd say it's annoying, but, well, I've watched the Jazz for 75+ games. I'm immune to annoying.

-Harpring has been the most effective player in the fourth quarter. In related news, the Jazz are losing 71-65.

-Fisher has not played in the last few minutes. Either Jerry is benching him for his horrible third quarter play, or he's resting him for the stretch run. What do YOU, the audience, think?

*waits*

-Classic Harp. Dances, waves his arms, gives stinkeye, catches ball, dances, turns into double team, airballs, falls down, stands up, scowls, shuffles back upcourt.

-Those of you with "stretch run," congratulations.

-Tracy McGrady has flash of insight, realizes he's being guarded by a midget. Shoots, hits. Jazz switch Harpring to McGrady. Again, Tracy McGrady has flash of insight, realizes he's being guarded by mental midget. Fakes him out, shoots three, is fouled. Ballgame.

-Executive Decision did horribly at the box office, by the way.

-Harp rejected by Chuck Hayes. Rejected by a guy that couldn't even dominate at the college level. By a guy that was the Jarron Collins of the University of Kentucky Wildcats. He's given back every trace of this being a "good game" that he had.

Website title affirmed.

-Hooray, the Impala commercial that combines "Sweet Home Alabama" with some generic rap song, thereby alienating two potential customer bases. Might as well have Imus and Sharpton swapping keys at the end.

-Which players will Sloan blame in the postgame?
A.)Harpring
B.)Fisher
C.)AK
D.)Boozer
E.)Memo

Remember, if you're not sure, C is almost always the best guess.

-It's important to get to the playoffs so the young guys can get experience. Right, Brewer/Miles/Hoffa/Dee? I can't really complain, since 3 out of those 4 suck.

(Jim Grey: "SUCK!")

-Oh, gads, here is where Fisher gives Sloan a positive taste in his mouth. And I could change that sentence to be less grotesque, but I don't think I should.

-This is a good point to plug one of my favorite sites, www.retiresloan.com. A fine site with a fine name.

-AK currently being paid something akin to $5-million per playoff minute.

-Why call a timeout here? I have this sensation Jerry is scribbling a play out furiously and then just writing "8" in the corner.

Boozer: "Coach, we're down 8 with a few seconds to go."
Sloan: "That's why there's an 8, dumbass."

-Deron missed the 8-pointer.

-Jazz down 0-1. But, in the positives:

• Blowing a 9-point halftime lead is probably not even in the Top Ten Collapses for the Jazz this season.
• Fisher shot over 50%, and it's not at all likely that percentage will dip down to his usual 40% over the course of the playoffs.
• AK only had half the opportunities to fail that he did in the regular season with 3 FGA.
• Boozer's acne, if connected the right way, spelled "woot."
• Deron only missed a triple-double by 1 assist and 1 rebound, which would have turned the game into a dreaded Pyrrhic Victory.
• Sloan's gameplan seems sound.
• The Jazz held the Rockets to 39.1% shooting, and they only held the Jazz to 35.6%.
• The rookies got some good experience watching wily veterans Matt Harpring and Derek Fisher play.

In the end, I think we can put this in the "moral victory" category.

Have a lovely night, kids.

Live Blog Part III: The Correction

-In the Clint Eastwood movie, this is the part where the hero who has been beaten up and ground underfoot rests for a few minutes, comes back, and completely obliterates the people who beat him up in the first place. In this case, better hope Clint Eastwood gets unexpectedly offed, like Steven Seagal in Executive Decision.

-Ah, my favorite Utah Jazz play, where every player touches the ball once and passes it back out to Deron until 8 second are left on the shot clock. Communism in action. "But it works in theory."

-Clint Eastwood is stirring.

-Walton: "We're going to have to get the report from Jim Grey about what Van Gundy said at halftime." Grey: "Van Gundy said the team 'sucked.'" Walton: "Anything else?" Grey: "...suck."

-Jazz just baldwined a fastbreak.

-As soon as something happens in this quarter, I'll let you know.

-T-Mac: "I'm the only playmaker on the team." Rafer Alston opens his mouth to disagree, then realizes even he can't argue.

-AK is hurt. There's a surprise. They probably need to go for the extended warranty on his next surgery instead of all the crappy 45-day quick-fixes.

-Wait, he's back. They gave him one of Harp's spare knees. They also gave him one of Harpring's spare jump shots.

-Announcer: "AK is shooting only 6 times per game, why is that?" Walton: "He's lost focus."

*sigh*

Announcer: "Bill, my co-worker has been with the company for 10 years but is still getting paid less than new workers that aren't nearly as good. Why is that?" Walton: "He's lost focus."

It doesn't make sense in that case, either.

-Harpring comes in, immediately makes an impact by showing off his broadway "jazz hands" after receiving the ball for an easy layup. Hoffa applauds the pageantry.

-Eastwood just picked off one of the little weak ones.

-Oh. My. Goodness. I think Derek Fisher just showed the Jazz how you turn it up a notch for the playoffs. It takes serious juevos to botch a 4-on-.5 fast break. And he not only did it, he did it like a seasoned veteran and leader.

This website is mis-titled.

-Know how the villains always miss the hero in westerns, even at point-blank? That's what that was like. I'm still in shock.

-Fisher just made the worst play of the playoffs so far, and Deron gets benched so Fisher can run the offense. Get back on that horse, Fish. Come on, we all know this team is about giving everyone a second chance.

-Fisher with the great 2-for-1 brick after getting an offensive foul a few plays back. Sadly, I think he HAS turned it on for the playoffs. He's better than usual. This is equivalent to watching the Cubs invite Steve Bartman onto the field to play shortstop.

-Clint Eastwood's back.

LiveBlog de Playoffs: Second Quarter and Halftime

-To be honest, I have no idea why ESPN shoved this game to the end of the day and didn't give it one of the prime time spots. Had to be some kind of timezone problem.

-This game has all the flow of The Real Roxanne.

-Why did Harpring just fall down? Give me your best answer in the comments. There is no good reason he should fall down as often as he does. He's like a fainting goat.

-Harpring touches Millsap as he lays the ball in, Millsap falls down for no reason. The demon has been passed on.

-Deron Williams just hurt one of his shooting hands. *rimshot*

-ESPN showing the Rocket's Kid Dance Team, as large a collection of kids with low self-esteem as you'll find outside the Baldwin household.

-Harpring Football Reference from Bill Walton. "He's a football player, he's exactly the kind of guy you want on your team." Yes, Bill. If you have a football team.

-Can an interesting live-blog be written from a completely uninteresting game?

Answer: no.

-Announcer: "Boozer to Harpring, he [Boozer] was wide open!" *clank* Welcome to the Utah Jazz, Mr. Announcer.

-Yao Ming has this pseudo-friendly gritted-teeth facial expression going on right now. I think he's trying to be intimidating but doesn't know how. He should learn how to do The Scowl.

-Holy crap, that whole last post was in rhyme. I should try some more if I have the time. Harpring sucks.

-Walton: "Deron Williams continues to shine as the brightest comet in this game." He's due for a unicorn reference.

-AK tries to catch an easy Deron pass with his genitals. I know his hands have been bad, but...

-I appreciate LHM giving the media a chance to use the word "sucks" when describing the Jazz. They're throwing it around like Jarron Collins with a loose ball. It's like the kid that learns that "damn" doesn't get him in as much trouble as he thought it would, so he damned well starts describing every damned thing with the damned word.

-Sloan didn't like the genital-catch, replaces AK with a man with no genitals. Well...person.

-"Derek Fisher playing inspired basketball." "Leadership...it's what it's all about."

Derek Fisher has 6 points.

-Derek Fisher just turned it ON for the playoffs. What a rush. Hit that iso play after waving off the teammates with 8 seconds to go. We should just keep going back to that.

Regardless, Jazz up 42-33. This game should be in the books with the Jazz's ability to close games. And Jim Gray seizes another opportunity to say "suck" on national television.

-There are two ways to look at a game where your team is up 9 and the other team is shooting 29.4%. One is to say, "hey, nice going, guys!" The other is to say, "Oh crap, this isn't going to hold up." I won't tell you how to think. But I'm going to finish this half-empty bottle of IBC while I'm waiting for the third quarter.

Playoffs Live-Blog: Intro and First Quarter

Here we are at the playoffs. So many storylines, so little time:

• Will Jerry tighten up his rotation for the playoffs and only play the necessary 11 players?
• Will Harpring's lockdown defense he learned in his youth against AI resurface?
• Will Carlos Boozer continue his consistent inconsistency or simply collapse in a pile of pulled hammies and acne?
• Will Okur be hung over?
• Will AK play more than 30 minutes? In a four-game series?
• Will Fisher turn into Playoffs Fisher and raise his FG% a full three points?

We will soon find out. As soon as the Jazz game is on. Which should be soon.

So...um...

-Jazz players are merely laughing at T-Mac's "it's on me" assertion. Not because it's arrogant, because it's an assertion of personal responsibility.

-Back in the days of old, I'd fear an Overtime game between the Pistons and Magic because it would cut into the few times I got to see the Jazz play. Now I realize all I will miss is AK's first half minutes. All six of'em.

-Houston up 2-0, 10:15 remaining. I haven't seen any of the game yet, but I'll guess Derek Fisher has missed a shot already.

-Checked a boxscore, he's 0-2.

-We've got a live feed, now. I already miss the boxscore.

-Announcer: "How long will Jerry Sloan wait until he takes a timeout?" Jerry Sloan, listening: "Oh, crap, I keep forgetting I can call those. 20 second!"8-0, Rockets.

-Fantastic block from AK on Yao. I'm waiting to see Harpring jump off the bench.

-Utah on track for 40 points in the game. That seems a bit high, but give it a few minutes. Fisher hasn't gotten too involved yet.

-Timeout. Utah shooting 27.3%, Houston shooting 33.3%. It's like the Derek Fisher Shooting Drills invitational.

-Fisher fouled by Rafer Alston. Another baby black hole is born.

-Fisher 2-4 in the first quarter. He's worth every penny of that contract, baby. Turns it ON in the playoffs. Sure, they might be on Houston's court right now entirely due to his inability to hit a basket in the last twenty games of the season, but he's going to give the team AT LEAST 4 more points over the course of the next four games than he would have in four similar regular season games.

-That last comment brought to you by the number 4.

-Tonight's game brought to you by Deja Vu. Singularly apropos thus far.

-The Jazz just ran a play for Jarron Collins, which ended with a banked jumpshot from the top of the key. Jerry Sloan scribbles out Millsap on his depth chart, writes in "Collins."

Just kidding, Millsap's not on his depth chart.

-Giricek defends McGrady for a full seven seconds before someone realizes he's having an epileptic seizure.

-Wow, that 2-for-1 offense worked really well. 35 seconds for a shot, run to the corner, double-pump, and airball a three against double coverage. But on the bright side, the Jazz will have a shot with five seconds to go. Oh, wait, Houston rebounded their own miss and hit a last-second shot.

But it's the thought that counts.

-Houston up 20-18 after one quarter. So far, this has been the kind of fantastic play that one can expect from a game that features Matt Harpring, Derek Fisher, Rafer Alston, and Chuck Hayes.

SL Media in Playoffs Mode

Matt Harpring, Playoffs Warrior:

"Once the ball gets thrown up, it becomes basketball again," forward Matt Harpring said. "You know, these guys have played in a lot of games, and we've played in a lot of tough games. So I just don't think that's going to be that big of an issue."
He should know.
In Harpring's first playoff game as a rookie for Orlando, he was assigned to guard Philadelphia's Allen Iverson. That worked out so well the Sixers later traded for Harpring, helping cement his reputation as a tough player perfectly built for the crucible of the playoffs.
But will the Jazz have anybody shine the same way?

That first game against Orlando, Iverson scored 30 points with 5 rebounds and 7 assists.

In fact, AI in the Magic/Sixers series:

FG%: 44.4
PPG: 28.25
RPG: 3.75
APG: 6
SPG: 4 (including 10 in Game Three)

AI in the 1998/1999 season:

FG%: 41.2
PPG: 22.0
RPG: 4.9
APG: 4.6
SPG: 2.3

So AI scored 6.25 more points per game on substantially better shooting while also passing and stealing the ball at a higher rate. To be fair, Harpring cut back on his rebounding.

It's rather sad when SLMedia is actually rewriting history to make their favorite players look better. Judging from the stats, I would think Orlando traded Harp to Philly to try and get someone that could guard.

Official Harpringsucks.com NBA-wide season awards

With the conclusion of the regular season this week, columnists across the internet have been attempting to fill their quota of required column space by doing the easy "filler column." The column where they announce their picks for the post-season awards, put a nice picture of their picks in a sidebar, write two sentences of analysis and kick off for the day and light their cigars with $1,000,000 bills. Like Hot Rod Hundley to his beloved mistress Jack Daniels, the temptation to fill up page space with this stuff is irresistable.

There's just one problem: these columnists so extensively research each other's opinions that their collective wordsmithing is even more of a collaborative writing project than Charles Barkley's first "autobiography" where he claimed he was "misquoted." These writers spend so much time searching for the answer that meets critical consensus that they're missing the dark horse candidates who should truly be winning these awards. Thankfully, your trusty Harpringsucks.com writing staff is here to fill this black void in your soul with a few selected awards.

Rookie of the Year: Patrick O'Bryant, Idaho Stampede

The internet columnists would have you believe that Brandon Roy is the no-brainer pick for Rookie of the Year. That's simply not true. While Roy certainly had a solid season as a rookie averaging 16.8 points his other averages are less impressive at 4 assists per game and 4.4 rebounds for the Trailblazers. In contrast, O'Bryant averaged a double-double for the Stampede (12 points, 10 rebounds) in under 30 minutes a game. On top of that he provided stifling defense for Idaho with 2.88 blocks.

Those who buy into the mainstream columnists could immediately interrupt with "but O'Bryant wasn't THAT good! The Idaho Stampede were in the NBDL!" Let me remind you, Mr. Hollinger, that the Trailblazers didn't make the playoffs either and the Stampede won one more game than the Blazers (33), despite only playing a 50 game season. Endorsing Roy for rookie of the year is sort of like endorsing Zach Randolph for MVP: great stats but simply stacking up the numbers on a bad team. O'Bryant, on the other hand, is a proven winner and an NBDL all-star.

Honorable mention: Saer Sene

Sixth Man of the Year: Derek Fisher, Utah Jazz

After trading Andre Owens, Keith McLeod, Devin Brown, complimentary movie tickets, $15 in quarters, a signed Matt Harpring 8X10 glossy, and the always definite "future considerations" to Golden State for Derek Fisher the Jazz were poised to have one of the most solid reserve back-courts in the league. With Deron Williams heading into his second season after a rookie year full of fits and starts, everyone knew that the young point guard would have some rough patches in the season ahead. Thankfully the Jazz had bought themselves an insurance policy with some veteran leadership off the bench. Only one thing could ruin this plan: starting the 6'1" Fisher at shooting guard despite his career long shooting slump. Thank God no coach would be that foolish.

Honorable Mention: Renaldo Balkman

Coach of the Year: Sam Mitchell, Toronto Raptors

On this topic we must say that ESPN's intelligencia has it right. The current odds-on favorite for Coach of the Year has stumbled upon a novel gameplan: No gameplan! Toronto raptors fans have frequently marvelled at Mitchell's ability to simply pitch a ball on the floor and hand T.J. Ford the reigns to do as he pleases. Sam Mitchell is such a good coach that his team certainly hasn't been circulating rumors regarding their plans to fire him ALL season. And he would certainly never win a poll among players for "worst coach" less than a year ago.

(Please ignore the article at http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Basketball/NBA/Toronto/2006/03/09/1479992-sun.html . It's full of lies and slander propogated by Vince Carter and Damon Stoudamire acolytes.)

One can only imagine how poorly this team would have done under one of the more accomplished available coaches like Ron Jeremy look-a-like Stan Van Gundy, the incredibly moustachioed Rick Adelman, or Ronco hair oil spokesperson Mike Fratello.

Honorable Mention: Eric Musselman

Most Valuable Player: Charlie Villanueva, Milwaukee Bucks

This season has witnessed an incredible number of teams quite obviously tanking in order to get one of the top two selections in the draft. This culminated in the last few weeks of the season with many top players on teams in contention for the worst record in the league coming up mysteriously lame with indefinable injuries. Paul Pierce was shelved indefinitely with no real discussion of what was wrong with him. Michael Redd and Andrew Bogut both disappeared with little plausible explanation. Memphis outright bought out one of its better players (Eddie Jones) rather than risk him improving their record any more.

What these gambits all had in common though is that they occurred late enough in the season that they were easily counter-acted in a race to the bottom by competing teams shelving their top players as well. As a result, they did little to change the tanking team's relative position.

One man, however, had the foresight to start going down with implausible injuries back in November before tanking became the thing all the cool stars were doing. That man was Charlie Villanueva. A mere two weeks into the season, Charlie V knew his strong start was putting the possibility of drafting Greg Oden or Kevin Durant far outside of Milwaukee's reach. Therefore he missed, in succession: 3 weeks with a sprained left elbow, 1 game with right shoulder tendinitis, another 3 weeks with an undefined "right shoulder injury," another week with another undefined "ankle injury", and then finally packed it in for the last month of the season with right shoulder tendinitis again. In sum, he was able to miss over half the season.

His impact was not felt only in the time he was off the floor, however. Charlie managed to also make sure that about once a month he was either returning to his team or leaving them, thoroughly preventing his teammates from either getting used to his presence or getting used to playing without him. This injury pattern prevented the Bucks from achieving any level of consistent play with or without him and gave Milwaukee a great chance at landing one of the top two picks in the draft. Mr. Villanueva, we salute you!

Honorable Mention: Pau Gasol

IJSPD Flow Chart: Expanded Playoff Edition!

Click to enlarge.

Getting to the Basket a Positive Good?

Let's take a look at today's Jazz Naotes [sic]:

Fisher searching for shooting touch

Ah, this will be Fisher apologizing for his horrible performance in the last 13 games, wherein he's shooting 30.6% with 9.5 FGA/Gm.

Deron Williams jokes with Derek Fisher about passing the ball to him, and Fisher — smile ear-to-ear wide — plays along.
"He's just bitter," Fisher, the Jazz's starting shooting guard, says of Williams, the Jazz's starting point guard who this season is averaging more assists per game (9.4) than everyone else in the NBA except two-time league MVP Steve Nash.
"He's just bitter because he's second in the league in assists and not first," Fisher adds with a sincere laugh, "and he feels like it's my fault, because if I hit a couple more shots then he would have been first."

Here's how I guess that "joke" went:

Deron: "This guy ****ing sucks, he doesn't pass, he can't shoot, and he keeps driving 1-on-4 and getting blocked."
Fisher: "He's just bitter."
SLMedia: "Hahahahaha!"

Nothing like a person making fun of doing his job horribly. Right now, Fisher's in the Sitcom Zone. He has become so inept and so inexplicably liked that he's Urkeled the SLMedia into fawning submission.

My favorite part, of course, is Fisher's replying with a "sincere laugh." What does that even mean?

All kidding aside, Fisher — who won three title rings with the Los Angeles Lakers and is known for being a sharpshooter when games are on the line — realizes he is struggling with his shot.

He's "known for being a sharpshooter when games are on the line"? Yet again, perception has out-distanced reality, and--in this case--is lapping it. In recent weeks, there have been quite a few games on the line. And in recent weeks, Fisher is shooting 30.6%.

Before making just 1-of-4 against Portland on Monday, the veteran guard hit just 2-of-9, 2-of-10, 3-of-13 and 4-of-11 in four of his five prior games.
"It's probably a small mechanical thing that I'm continuing to try to work through — trying to keep my focus on the rim, trying to stay with my shot," Fisher said.

That's a pretty small sample. Here's an expanded one:

Apr. 16: 1-4
Apr. 14: 2-9
Apr. 13: 3-7
Apr. 11: 2-10
Apr. 9: 3-13
Apr. 7: 4-11
Apr. 6: 5-15
Apr. 4: 3-8
Apr. 1: 2-7
Mar. 30: 5-11
Mar. 28: 3-8
Mar. 26: 2-10
Mar. 24: 3-11

That's a small mechanical problem the way lacking an engine is a small mechanical problem for a car.

Here's a better suggestion for the root of his problems:

Derek Fisher, Career FG%: 39.7

If the guy's a sharpshooter when games are on the line, he must have been in many, many blowouts. In reality, his recent struggles are just part and parcel of being a crappy shooter. Occasionally, when he gets hot, he'll hit 44% for a stretch. But in general, he'll be hovering in the low 40s and high 30s, the Jazz equivalent of Montana.

"But I'm attacking the basket better than I ever have and getting to the free-throw line," he added after making 11-of-12 from the line against the Trail Blazers, "so I'm really just trying to stay focused and in the moment."

Hey, gotta give him credit. In that same 13-game stretch, he's shooting 4.6 FTA/GM, higher than 2.2 career average. But, then again, attacking the basket is usually a lot better when that attack doesn't result in the ball getting spiked to midcourt by Earl Watson. One of my favorite stats is Points Per Shot, which generally shows how well offensive attempts are translating to points. Fisher's PPS over the last 13 games:

1.0.

1.0! He is scoring 1 Point per FGA. By comparison, on the season:

Notorious Offensive Liability, AK: 1.40
MLA King, Harp: 1.36.
Soft European, Giri: 1.24.
Rafer Alston: 1.19
Adam Morrison: .97

OK, Adam Morrison really sucks, but you get the idea. Even when Fisher is "attacking the basket better than [he] ever [has]," he's being less productive than the average production of his teammates. Incredible.

Even with only one regular-season game, tonight's vs. Houston, remaining before the Jazz open a playoff series against the Rockets this coming weekend, Fisher is confident he can iron out the wrinkles before postseason play gets under way.
"I guarantee you there won't be many people that'll leave me open come the playoffs," he said. "There is no question that I'm gonna be able to knock shots down if my teammates continue to hit me when I'm open. I'll get the job done — that's no problem."

What we have here is a guy that's not only admitting he only turns it on for playoffs, he's bragging about it. But, a few points:
-I guarantee you there will be people leaving Fisher open in the playoffs
-I guarantee you that he will knock down shots if his teammates continue to hit him when he's open, just at around a 40% clip
-he won't get the job done, that's a problem

And if there is one thing that is no problem for Fisher, especially lately, it's taking shots.

Heaven help me, but I can't tell if this is supposed to be a dig or admiration.

"I've been frustrated and disappointed with myself throughout the season at times because I feel like knocking down a few more shots would have helped us win a few more games," he said. "But, at the same time, the reason I was brought here was ... not just shooting the ball, not just one aspect of the game.

Not just shooting the ball? If the Jazz brought Fisher in AT ALL to shoot the ball, then they need to purchase a simple calculator and learn how to divide total FGM by FGA. But you gotta give Fisher credit. As frustrated and disappointed as he's been at his inability to help the team succeed, he plays through it. Like when he shot 3-11 in 18 minutes versus the Grizzlies. Or 5-15 versus Sacramento in a 4-point loss.

"It was being a leader on and off the court, helping guys understand how to be professional. I feel like I've lived up to those expectations," added Fisher, who took several shots Monday that were directed at Jazz owner Larry H. Miller because of disparaging remarks that Miller earlier had made about the club. "Now we're getting into that part of the season where people really feel like I can help this team, and I'm relishing the opportunity to be a part of it."

Ah, and we finish with the classic "Juxtapose-Comment-with-Contradictory-Context-
that-May-or-May-Not-Be-Intentional."

And yes, we are getting into that part of the season where Fisher can help the team: the off-season. Any time Fisher is not on the court in a Utah uniform is a win/win situation.

SLMedia, God bless'em.

Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc

Well, the Jazz won last night, but the Harpring start was a pretty big failure. He hit 5/14 shots (and that was only after going 2/3 after the game was pretty well in the bag), played his usual abysmal defense, and generally was Matt Harpring. Glad to see that the Jazz can go ahead and get past the experiment before the playoffs.

Oh, wait, Harpring was awesome.

DALLAS - Matt Harpring did not manage another season scoring-high when the Jazz beat the Dallas Mavericks 104-89 at the American Airlines Center on Friday night.
But he did make a big difference.

Already analyzing Harpring's game in terms of the last. "Wow, he scored 31 points, he's going to be great when he starts!" I fully expect his next 3/11 shooting night to be greeted with, "He didn't pull down 19 rebounds like he did against Orlando in 2003, but he might have been just as effective regardless."

Harpring entered the starting lineup for the first time all season to help the Jazz combat All-Star Josh Howard and avoid another sluggish start, and it worked. Though Harpring made just five of 14 shots on his way to 14 points, he held Howard to 12 points and fueled a fast start that the Jazz never relinquished.

Oh, so his importance was in setting the tone, eh?

First quarter:

(11:30): Harpring gets the ball in the post, tries to go up for a layup surrounded by three players, feebly passing it back when he realizes even he can't figure out a way to get a shot up. Scowls.

(10:50): Howard gets the rebound off a Fisher MLA. Howard gets the rebound at the free throw line. Harpring looks at him in puzzlement as he decides to run the ball downcourt. Harpring shuffles quietly behind him. He drives to the rim and is fouled shooting the ball. Harpring scowls at the help defense. Howard, however, is intimidated by Harpring's presence during the free throws and misses both.

(10:13): Harp makes a nice layup off a cut to the basket. Ah, HERE is the tone-setting.

(9:53): No, wait. Harpring takes the ball downcourt (!) and Boozer screens the defenders under the basket. Harpring, seeing his opportunity, drives and misses a point-blank MLA. But the thought sure set the tone.

(9:39): Josh Howard gets the ball at the three-point line. Harpring stares at him intensely, ready to defend. Howard blows by with next to no effort for an easy layup. Harpring stares at him intensely, ready to defend.

(9:10): Harpring, still thinking about the last play, watches Howard with a look of contemplation as he blows by again, only to short-arm an open layup. Harpring feels there was something he was supposed to do on that play, he just can't think of what.

(8:03): Harpring goes out to help on a screen and somehow ends up on the standing five feet beyond the three-point line with no opponent near him. Howard gets the ball and drives to the basket, hitting another chippy with minimal defense. At this point, Howard has had two free throws, two easy baskets, and a blown open layup in four minutes.

(5:36): A bit of space between Harp updates, but he that's because he didn't do anything in that time. For some odd reason, Sloan switches Fisher to Howard and Harpring to George. George quickly realizes his opportunity and knocks down an open jumper as Harpring flies by, making a Defense Gesture.

(4:00): Harp suddenly realizes he hasn't shot the ball in a while and shoots an ugly three with 16 seconds on the shot clock. He clanks it off the rim and into said shot clock.

So, eight minutes into the game and Harp is 1/3, Josh Howard is 2/4 (a missed open jumper on Fisher accounts for the fourth) with 2FTA, and the Jazz lead 16-10. The only real visible difference between this game and the last to the casual fan is the inclusion of Harpring in the starting lineup. Unfortunately, beat writers shouldn't be casual fans.

"Matt a lot of times sets the tone by coming in and working hard on offense and being physical," teammate Derek Fisher said. "And we seemed to start the game that way and played the way, for the most part, the entire game."
Harpring said he was surprised that coach Jerry Sloan asked him at the pregame shootaround to start. "We played hard," he said. "No question about that."

First, to be nitpicky, that second paragraph doesn't make sense. The quote they used from Harpring doesn't work with the previous contextualizing sentence. Unless that's now his answer to frickin' everything.

Second, that is not the reason the Jazz won. Here are some valid reasons the Jazz won the game:

• If you take Harpring out of the equation, the Jazz shot a blistering 56.1%.
  
• Dallas didn't play Jason Terry (Jazz-killer), Jerry Stackhouse (Jazz-player-killer), and Erick Dampier (probably just a killer).
• Avery Johnson wasn't exactly treating the game as a playoff matchup. Jose Juan Barea (who?) played 24 minutes and shot 15 times.
• The Mavs missed 13 out of 18 3FGA, and trust me, it wasn't from shutdown defense.

NOT BECAUSE THEY FRICKIN' PLAYED HARD.

*sigh*

Salt Lake Media.

[Edit]Holy crap, it gets worse.

Hide your women and children

Over the last 100 years there have been a number of incredibly alarming front page newspaper headlines that have horrified and shocked all who came into contact with them: "Hindenberg Crashes", "JFK Assassinated", "Titanic Sinks", and "Barbaro dies." All of those catastrophes, however, are dwarfed by today's headline in the Salt Lake Tribune which should have been more appropriately titled "Holocaust: Part Deux." The offending headline: "Sloan may start Harpring."

It's official, the sextagenarian should start reading his AARP magazine and start applying for social security, he's officially making decisions that can only be chalked up to senility. Sadly, the Tribune seems to be buying the riduclous stream of pro-Harpring propaganda. Next week's headline is bound to be "Benito Moussilini was merely unloved as a child."

Matt Harpring said he would be surprised if it actually happened.

But with the Jazz mired in a five-game losing streak that threatens to ruin their promising season, coach Jerry Sloan said he and his assistant coaches have "talked about" moving Harpring into the starting lineup for the first time all year when the Jazz play the Dallas Mavericks tonight at the American Airlines Center.

"We'll just have to look and see," Sloan said. "See if that's better for us."

Probably couldn't be much worse.

It's official, the Utah Jazz have decided that they need to join the growing number of teams tanking for the #1 pick in the draft. Unfortunately for them, that strategy doesn't work when you've already secured a winning record.

The only possible rationale for making such a move would be the "Utah needs to win the championship this season, play the veteran major minutes."

Such thinking is impermissably flawed. The reality is the Jazz have essentially a zero probability of winning the championship this season. At best they might win a round in the playoffs and give Dallas a good fight in the second round. No reasonable basketball fan can expect better out of this team. As a result, it's important that we use whatever opportunities we have to develop the talent that will actually be useful in 2-4 years when the championship push can occur. Harpring, a 30 year-old guy with creaky knees, isn't that guy. The people he's taking minutes from (Brewer, Millsap) might be. The reality is with Harpring there's no upside left to explore, he's been declining for 4 straight seasons, and the current version isn't good enough to make a meaningful difference in a championship run.

Furthermore, the Jazz by simply winning the division have exceeded expectations, there's no need to make some sort of last minute push to appease the fan base or critics who were given almost no hope of winning 50 games on opening day. All tiring the guy out by playing him nearly 40 minutes a game will do is make him (even) less effective come playoff time.

The Jazz have lost six of seven games since clinching the NBA's Northwest Division championship two weeks ago, and trail the Houston Rockets by 1 1/2 games in the race for home-court advantage in the first round of the playoffs

Part of the reason is that they often have been overmatched at the small forward position, where rookie Ronnie Brewer has been starting in place of injured Andrei Kirilenko. And with the Jazz about to face two All-Star small forwards - the Mavs' Josh Howard tonight and Phoenix's Shawn Marion on Saturday - at a time when they desperately need a victory, taking a chance on Harpring might be worth the risk to the rhythm of the rotation.

To say Brewer has been overmatched while starting recently is frankly a little silly. In part because he hasn't gotten the chance. In the 3 games he's played the results (and playing time) have been all over the map.

The first game he shot 5-7 from the field, scored 12 points, grabbed 3 rebounds, got an assist and a steal and committed no fouls. All in 18 minutes of playing time. In contrast, Harpring (who's actually been shooting well lately, must be spending extra time in the lay-up line) went 4-6 for 10 points, also had 3 rebounds, 2 assists, 1 steal and 1 block in 30 minutes of playing time. He also accumulated 4 fouls in that time period. What I see is that the veteran leader who's hustling took nearly twice as long to achieve essentially the same production

The second game Brewer was rightly rewarded for a good game the night before and was given 33 minutes of playing time. Brewer went 7-9 from the field for 21 points, grabbed 4 rebounds, and stole the ball once. To be fair, he also had 3 turnovers. Harpring had 28 minutes and hustled extra-hard trying to preserve his spot in the rotation after a clear threat from Brewer the previous game. He responded with 6-10 shooting for 17 points, 8 rebounds, 1 steal, and 6 turnovers.

Despite having consecutive good games for a rookie, Harp must have given Brewer the stink-eye in practice because Sloan immediately pulled him after only 5 minutes in the next game and gave Harpring 37 minutes.

Taking Brewer out in favor of Harpring, even if it was important for the Jazz to win as much as possible right now, isn't abandoning a failed experiment. It's aborting the experiment before it even began.

It appears we may need a new edition of the IJSPD flow chart just for harpring related decisions. As of now, Sloan's perception of Harpring's competition for minutes appears to be completely disconnected with reality. Maybe Brewer needs to work on his "shuffle."

HarpringSucks.com Quiz

Version one.

take the quiz here

Harpring Still Sucks

"We're obviously not getting stops," Harpring said. "And we're not moving the ball on offense. It's a bad combination."

Sometimes the guy just doesn't give himself any credit. Sure, the Jazz have lost three straight to lottery teams, and yes the last two losses have been phenomenal late-game collapses, but should Matt really be this hard on himself and on the team?

Not getting stops: Matt Harpring single-handedly held Rashard Lewis in the back-court for almost the entire remaining five seconds of Saturday's contest. He also successfully denied Lewis entrance inside the three-point arc all game, forcing him to shoot ten three-pointers. On Friday, he helped his teammates stop their assigned players by forcing the Kings to run their offense through Salmons. Also, he stopped Giricek from talking to him on Saturday by simply ignoring him.

Not moving the ball on offense: Sure, we've often criticized Harpring for being a tad selfish. But let's be realistic here. Late in Saturday's game, Harpring passed up a shot from the left wing in order to pass it to an on-fire Fisher on the other side. The ball didn't make it that far, but it's the thought that counts. And what of "The Pass" earlier in the game that hit exactly -- and I mean precisely -- the spot where Boozer had been just two seconds earlier.

The team may not be getting stops and may not be running the offense very well, but let's not blame Harpring, please.

IJSPD Flow Chart

Percentages: Follow-Up

Tough loss last night. I can't help but think that the results may have been different had the team just listened to their coach. Not ONCE did they toss the ball out of bounds with the clock running down, nor did they ever take a shot-clock violation for the overall good of the team. Jerry has really lost his handle on this group.

list of sequences where Jazz had possession with five or less seconds on the shot clock:

- 1st Quarter, 8:26, shot-clock at 1 second: Deron, obviously with more concern for his own stats than for team success, misses a layup which is partially blocked by Roy right before the shot clock expires. Roy ends up with a wide-open layup at the other end six seconds later as the Jazz are completely lost on defense. Sloan glares at Deron with that "the stats back me up!" scowl, but Deron doesn't see it. Sloan motions to Harpring to take over scowling duty for him.

- 1st Quarter, 4:03, shot-clock at 4 seconds: Fisher. Enough said, really. The thing about Sloan's theory is that it really only merits consideration if a certain player is the one taking the shot. Hint: NOT Deron (who shoots incredibly well when the shot-clock is winding down). Fisher misses the jumper, Outlaw gets two free throws 11 seconds later. In reality, this one doesn't count, as Sloan is impressed by the leadership and guts that were demonstrated by Fisher on this play. Being willing to take shots in that type of situation takes a real veteran.

- 1st Quarter, 0:09, shot-clock at 4 seconds: Harpring misses a jump shot, Outlaw misses at the other end. Jazz got lucky.

- 2nd Quarter, 11:38, shot-clock at 2 seconds: Williams feeds the ball to Collins, who hits a jumper. Jarron looks sheepishly back at the bench, insisting that "the ball slipped! I was trying to set up the offense, I promise!" Blazers miss at the other end, but get the rebound and make a shot. Must have been because Collins was out of position 22 seconds after his made shot. Jerry motions at the team statistician to make note.

- 2nd Quarter, 10:42, shot-clock at 0 seconds: Harpring barely gets the shot off, and misses. Blazers turnover on their next possession.

- 2nd Quarter, 9:21, shot-clock at 4 seconds: Williams hits a layup and gets fouled. But 22 seconds later, on the next possession, Outlaw hits a jumper. A-HA!

- 2nd Quarter, 4:16, shot-clock at 0 seconds: Fisher misses a 3. Portland misses on their next attempt.

Halftime. Jazz 0-7 in "Rash Decisions". Not ONCE was the offense set back up. ZERO shot-clock violations. Only 2 shots made and 5 points scored. After a stirring speech from the coach, Kirilenko says that he's ready to come out and have a big 4th quarter.

- 3rd Quarter, 7:36, shot-clock at 4 seconds: Boozer hits a shot. Blazers counter with a missed shot.

- 3rd Quarter, 2:54, shot-clock at 4 seconds: Okur hits a shot. Which is odd, since I don't remember Okur playing yesterday. Roy makes a 3-pointer 21 seconds later. Karma.

-4th Quarter, 11:17, shot-clock at 4 seconds: Okur called for traveling. NOW they've got it figured out. Took them long enough.

- 4th Quarter, 8:29, shot-clock at 3 seconds: Williams hits a 3. Give the kid a break, this is only his second year.

- 4th Quarter, 6:43, shot-clock at 0 seconds: Okur misses a 3. Magloire gets two free throws the other way, 12 seconds later. NOW I remember Okur playing last night.

- 4th Quarter, 3:49, shot-clock at 1 second: Giricek loses the ball. Minor victory. Blazers miss at the other end.

And that's it. In 13 opportunities, the Jazz shot 11 times. Only Okur was savvy enough to take a traveling call, and Giricek put in an effort by handing the ball to the opponent, but overall Jerry must have been furious. I'm sure he had Harpring give the entire team a good stinkeye after the game.

Out of the 11 shots, the Jazz made only 5 of them (45% -- interestingly slighly above their game average) for 12 points. However, off of the six misses, the Blazers scored on 3 of the ensuing possessions (5 points). Coincidentally, the Jazz lost by 5 points!

Draw your own conclusions from this data, but I think the message is clear: Harpring Sucks.