I hope you're right. I watched some of the replay of the Russia vs AUS game last night. Shved looked pretty good offensively again, but he doesnt do much or try hard on defense. I didnt see the talking incident.

Kirilenko is very good. The dude just knows how to play the game - very smart and good at everything. The more I watch him, the happier I am we missed out on Batum.

Love Rewards Krzyzewski For Going Big

....Love was the biggest beneficiary, seeing his minutes increase from 12.0 per game in the exhibitions to 16.5 per game in pool play. And he paid Krzyzewski back for the increased minutes. Not only has Love shot 24-for-36 in London, but the U.S. outscored its opponents 268-147 with Love on the floor. And that plus-121 was the team’s highest mark in pool play.

Even the "great" Krzyzewski didn't see how good Love is at first. Love doesn't look like much when he plays, but he is really good at basketball.

He's 3rd best player on the team and he was being treated like a scrub. It's a little better now, but if they play a close game and Love gets like 5 minutes I hope they lose.

3rd best player on the team? Hmmm, I'm a big Love fan but I'm not sure his defense is as good as almost anyone else on the team. I do think his game translates well internationally due to his set 3point shot (obv his ability to score in general and rebounds translates anywhere).

How would you rank the top players on team USA in terms of value to the team?

Without giving too much thought I'd go:
Lebron
CP3
Durant (not a defensive stud but the type of defense he does play can cause havoc with those long arms)
Chandler

Westbrook (I think his defensive activity is really valuable given the way the team's identity - creating steals)
Kobe (meh, not that he's trying very hard yet or more valuable generally than Love, but, he still is such a good all around player and has lots of International experience - taking over when necessary and what to do when tested)
Love

Something like that maybe. I guess from actually looking at the roster his D may be better than Melo's and maybe Harden or Deron (no feeling on whether Deron is good at D or not) but everyone else is probably better at D.

Anyway, I think Love maybe as the 7th guy works really well for this team. Obv he should be getting solid minutes - it seems at first during camp he maybe wasn't trying too hard so maybe that's why coach K didn't plan to have him playing a bunch.

Westbrook is too inconsistent imo. Kobe isnt as good as he used to be. Paul is great, but #2? Chandler is way better at D than Love, but Love is better/way more versitile at offense and somewhat better at rebounding.

I'd put Durant as a close 2nd behind James, with those two a notch above everyone else. Love should be in the next group imo.

So given the makeup of this team, you'd play Love more than Chandler? And more than Chris Paul?

I think CP3 is almost the perfect PG for a team like this. He is elite smart decision maker, can hit the 3 very well, and obv is a great passer. He cares pretty much zero about "getting his" (unlike Deron or Westbrook - the other PGs). He doesn't have to create offense for himself at all with this team but can if he ever wants. That's why I put him 2nd on that list.

I could be argued to put Westbrook lower for sure. But, I mean, this team is built to create turnovers on D and fast break/shoot the 3 on offense. There are a bunch of other guys who can shoot the 3 besides love, but I'm not sure anyone is better than pressuring the ball and just causing havok than Westbrook (well, Lebron, but other than him). Love has good outlet passing, but it comes in to play much less than causing turnovers I think. So, Westbrook's elite skill is more valuable to the team than Love's elite skill to help with those goals. And Westbrook is better at defense than Love generally by a decent margin.

And while Kobe obv is a lot worse than his peak...I mean, at least I remember him putting the team on his back in '08 when **** got real. I assume a bunch of other players are ready to do that, but no way of knowing how Love will react yet. He has zero playoff touches and didn't play a ton at the Worlds 2 years ago.

3rd or 4th best player IMO I should have said. I think he and CP3 are pretty close.

Tim Allen of Canis dead of apparent suicide

http://www.canishoopus.com/2012/8/8/...en-passed-away

So sad

No clue who that is. Is he the main Canis blogger?

Apparently, I really don't read Canis.
http://blogs.citypages.com/blotter/2...cide_at_29.php

Stop n Pop is the head guy. Tim was one of the main three writers/editors along with SnP & Oceanary. Tim was always positive and level headed, and appeared to have a lot going for himself, so this was a huge shock to me.

very sad

Yeah, seems really weird from the couple of articles I read and seeing his Twitter. Glad I don't identify anything with that name.

Definitely a bummer.

One more reason to be glad Batum isn't a Timberwolf

Whoa. Serious w t f on that play. I guesss....he was trying to punch the bball, but ummm, man, I dno, not sure how you go into that play not intentionally trying to neuter someone.

He admitted it was intentional haha.

i mean he may have good reason for frustration but at least assault him somewhere other than the nuts. that is just lame, cowardly, and dangerous.

Wow. Maybe he thought the dude was Paul Allen?

As of now, Kevin Love’s per 40 minute Olympic averages: 29.3 points and 16.9 rebounds, 80 percent shooting on 2s, 42 percent on 3s.

Its going to be a great season!

lol 80% on 2s.

He probably would shoot even better if he had a 2012 EDM Twolves supermegamix to listen to before games.

I haven't seen one game because I don't get the channel that carries the games, but guys in the modern dynasty draft were ripping on Love's defense yesterday.

Based on the Olympics or in the first round of that mock draft?

I scanned some of that thread and it just seemed that a ton of people were saying Love is horrifically awful at D without anything to back it up whatsoever. So, I mean, not really sure how that information is useful. A bunch of people think he sucks at defense but aren't interested in seeing if that's true.

I do believe he made a tangible step last year from the year before (eye test though so meh) and likely will take another couple of steps. I really don't think he'll end up being great at D but he may become an average help defender and potentially above average man-to-man defender consistently. Maybe my thinking is really skewed b/c so many Wolves were so atrocious at D Love seemed "fine".

Also, I was listening to the Haralabos podcast on Grantland.com and the guy hosting was like "Shved and Rubio playing defense together? *laughlaughlaugh*" - Haralabos saying "umm, actually Rubio is good at defense, very good for a rookie" and the host just continuing to laugh for some weird reason.

Not weird someone would watch a couple games in the Olympics and think Shved will suck on D, but pretty weird to have been able to watch dozens of Rubio games and think that he sucks on D.

Yeah Rubio way outperformed my expectations for his defense last year. He was legitimately good. Love really did look bad on defense against Australia imo and I'm certainly not someone (read: Zeestein) who just likes to troll the hell out of him. I also agree in particular it's his help d that he needs to work on, but he can improve and hopefully play average defense before long. When you consider his rebounding abilities, average defense would go a long way. I think AK47 will cover up this weakness pretty well though, another way that Andrei is such a good fit.

Yeah, AK47 basically fixes everything on a team apparently. His nickname should really be Duct Tape or something like that.

Btw, guess how Rubio could get even better at defense?

A: By listening to a sweet EDM playlist of Timberwolves inspired tracks!

When he got drafted it got brought up that he is horrible on defense, but during yesterday's game a lot of posters were mentioning it. Someone even posted, paraphrasing "can we drop Love 5 spots just because of today's game?"