Apparently we can say goodbye to Don Wakamatsu, the A's bench coach, as Seattle is set to hire him as manager. These things aren't measurable, but the talk about Wakamatsu is that he's a bright guy and was future management material. It's always nice to have someone like that on the bench next to your manager, so it's too bad the Mariners saw his potential and snapped him up. The AL West is turning into the Billy Beane coaching tree, with Ron Washington in Texas, Wakamatsu in Seattle, and Bob Geren in Oakland. If only the Angels would get on board and hire Mike Gallego, Beane's Borg-like domination of the division would be complete.

Check out this table showing David Pinto's range numbers for center fielders. Rajai Davis completely laps the rest of the pack. The leaders are in the 104 range in their ratio of actual DER (defensive efficiency rating) to projected DER, but Davis is off completely by himself at 107. Everyone knows he's a speedster, but it's interesting to see that he seems to be that rare player who applies his speed to result in high stolen-base percentages and good range afield. If he could get on base with any consistency, he'd be a dangerous player, but my impression is that he's just so punchless that pitchers won't pitch around him, and he doesn't seem to have the Ichiro or Furcal-like slap-and-dash game developed. This shouldn't be taken as a criticism of Davis -- the kind of bat control it takes to play that game is freakish and requires some innate athleticism and hand-eye coordination that Davis may just not have.

Way back last Wednesday, some games happened. The Suns went back to the old school, scoring 113 in beating the Pacers. Amare had 49 of those to go with 11 boards, six assists, five steals, and two blocks. He hit all fifteen of his free throws. That's just a dominant all-around performance. The craziest thing? Shaq scored three points. Who thought we'd get to the point where Shaq would be involved in a win where his team scored 113 and he got outscored by 46 by a teammate.

Detroit moved to 4-0 by sending Toronto to their first loss. The Tayshaun Era began as he scored 27 on 10-13 shooting and grabbed nine boards. Rodney Stuckey filled in admirably at the point, leading the team to committing just five turnovers. Andrea Bargnani shot 5-6 from the bench for Toronto, but maybe Simmons is right about Jermaine O'Neal: eight points and three boards in 29 minutes? That's what you've got?

Philly continued to disappoint by getting blown out in Miami. Dwyane Wade had 29 points, seven boards, six assists, five steals, and three blocks. That's a Shawn Marion night, which is crazy -- since when does Wade hit the boards and block shots? Andre Igoudala only shot 1-7 for Philly. Based on the starting lineups, I'm guessing Wade was guarding him, which should be a mismatch in Iggy's favor. It's possible that Marion was guarding him and they put Wade on Thaddeus Young, but that would seem unlikely, given Young's significant size advantage over Wade, who's not the biggest two-guard in the league.

The Knicks won over Charlotte at MSG with a D'Antoni Special Rotation: only seven guys got real minutes. One of those seven was Nate Robinson, who poured in 24 in 31 minutes off the bench, hitting all five of his threes. This is the nice thing about the Knicks as currently constituted: they do have three, maybe four guys who might go off on any given night: Crawford, Z-Bo, Nate Dogg, and maybe Wilson Chandler. Speaking of Z-Bo, he continued to thrive with 25 and 13. Larry Brown decided to match D'Antoni's rotation: while eleven guys played, five of them played five minutes or less. Four of his starters went 40+ minutes. The six guys who played scored between 13 and 18 points apiece, although the number of shots varied: Jason Richardson required 21 shots to get his 17, while Gerald Wallace only needed eight to get 16 points. The final balance, though, is almost Pistonian.

The undefeated Hawks sent the Hornets to their first loss, in New Orleans. Isn't that sentence by itself enough? Come on, Chris Paul! You want the MVP? Beat the Hawks!

Ben Gordon scored 31, but lost to LeBron and the Cavs, as James had 41, with nine boards, six assists, and four steals. In other words: ho hum. Come on, that's an absurd line. Ben Wallace had fourteen boards, including six offensive, as his rebounding revival seems to continue.

Milwaukee sent Washington to 0-3 by winning in overtime behind Richard Jefferson's 32. Ramon Sessions came off the bench for what I think is the first time but scored 22. Luke Ridnour, the starting point guard, had 20. This implies to me that the Wizards have a little bit of trouble defending point guards.

San Antonio required two overtimes to beat Minnesota 129-125. It's always funny to have two-overtime games, because you get ridiculous lines: 55 points, seven boards, and ten assists for Tony Parker; 30 points and 16 boards for Tim Duncan; 26 points off the bench for Roger Mason; 30 points and fourteen boards for Al Jefferson (although he took 27 shots). And hey, look who's back: Bassy Telfair played 30 minutes off the bench and had ten dimes, leading the Wolves. I'm not sure why, but I root for him, so it's nice to see him have a good game. He did foul out, though.

Shocker of the night: Boston beat the Sonics in Oklahoma. Kevin Durant? 6-15, two rebounds, two assists. Russell Westbrook managed to jack up 13 shots in 19 minutes off the bench, but only hit four of them. Rookie deference? Forget that.

Utah moved to 4-0 by beating Portland. Joel Przybilla shot 3-3 and grabbed 16 boards in a losing effort. Carlos Boozer and Memo Okur combined to shoot 17-27 to continue the Jazz's undefeated run in Deron Williams's absence. (By the way: in now way does this decide the question of whether Williams or Paul is a better point guard. It's Paul in a landslide, but not because of the Jazz's good play without Williams. All that shows is that Williams has better teammates.)

Sacramento picked up its first win, beating Memphis by five. Kevin Martin had 33 points on 18 shots, and Bobby Brown beat up on Memphis off the bench, shooting 4-4 with five assists. OJ Mayo had his first big game for the Grizz, scoring 28 and shooting a whopping 6-10 from three. He managed exactly zero assists. The man can jack up a shot, though. Hamed Haddadi has apparently moved to inactive, which is sensible given that he wasn't getting any run anyway.

Golden State beat Denver by 10, with Carmelo contributing to the Warriors' winning effort by missing 17 shots. Nene had a really nice game: 19 points on eight shots and fifteen rebounds, seven of them offensive. It took a while, but maybe he wasn't a wasted draft pick after all. Anyway, on the winning side, Kelenna Azubuike scored 22 off the bench and Brandan Wright had 18 and 13 while blocking three shots and shooting 7-9. Stephen Jackson missed a lot of shots but he got to the line thirteen times.

The Lakers stayed undefeated and the Clippers stayed winless as L.A. (get it?) won by 18. Kobe missed 13 shots, but got to the line 14 times, Lamar Odom had 15 and 9 with three steals and two blocks off the bench, and Pau Gasol, true to his word that he was going to focus on rebounding this year, grabbed 17 boards. Baron Davis continued to struggle, shooting eleven threes but making only three. The foul story was interesting: the Clippers got called for 32, the Lakers just 17. Home-team bias?

On Thursday, Orlando beat Philly by playing the eight-man rotation despite Dwight Howard getting just 29 minutes. The work was spread around well: the starters all scored between 12 and 20 points and the three front-line men each had eight rebounds. Andre Miller had an odd game, shooting 24 times (missing 17) and having just two assists. Iggy and Elton combined for just 20 shots. Iggy, Elton, and Sam Dalembert each reached double-digits in boards, though.

Portland won by two in overtime against Houston. The bench did nice work for the Blazers, with Travis Outlaw going for 14 and 13 and Rudy Fernandez adding 15 points, including three threes. Yao shot poorly, Tracy needed 23 shots to get 30 points, and Rafer Alston only had four assists in 26 minutes (and those minutes are pretty low, too -- Aaron Brooks actually played more minutes than Skip did).

On Friday, the Knicks sent Washington to 0-4 behind Z-Bo's 22 and 13. Wilson Chandler moved into the starting lineup, pushing David Lee to the bench, although Lee played 27 minutes, more than starter Quentin Richardson. I'm still waiting for The Big Cock to get into a game, but I saw word tonight that he's hurt and may miss the rest of the year, pending an MRI on his back. This is of course terrible news for bloggers.

Charlotte sent New Orleans to its second straight loss to a team the Hornets should beat. Chris Paul did what he could with 20 points, ten assists, and six steals, but he also presumably contributed to Ray Felton shooting 7-9. Peja Stojakovic, another of "my guys", shot 6-12 from three. That's the kind of line that I love seeing from Peja, particularly when it comes in a Hornets loss.

Atlanta stayed undefeated, beating Toronto by 18, led by Mike Bibby's 19 points and 12 assists. Bibby seems to be back! I thought he was done after seeing him last year, where the Hawks got into the playoffs and pushed Boston hard not because of him but in spite of him. But based on his box scores, he's been an integral part of the Hawks' hot start.

Boston won again, beating Milwaukee. They scored 101 points despite no player scoring more than 18 (Paul Pierce). Leon Powe went to the line an absurd nine times, although he did miss five free throws. Powe is, of course, one of the anti-"my guys", a guy I root against, even if that is mean-spirited of me. Something about the way he plays makes me frustrated -- I think a big part of it is his massive celebrations after uncontested dunks. He's learned too much from Kevin Garnett, maybe.

Cleveland won again, edging the Pacers by four. LeBron was LeBron, with 27-9-8 and four blocks. Anderson Varejao shot 8-12 off the bench, although he played starter minutes (30) presumably once it became clear that Ben Wallace was taking the night off: zero points, zero rebounds in nineteen minutes. That's an embarrassment. Danny Granger continues to have come out of (for me) nowhere, scoring 33 and shooting 5-10 from threes.

New Jersey beat Detroit in The Answer's debut. Iverson had 24 points on just 12 shots, but Tayshaun shot just 4-15 and the bench shot 6-20. Devin Harris got to the line an absurd 24 times for the Nets, leading to 38 points, overcoming his own bench's struggles: 3-17 shooting and 12 rebounds in 75 minutes. Twenty-four free throws! How does that even happen? Amusingly, the Nets were actually called for seven more fouls than the Pistons.

Miami sent the struggling Spurs to defeat after Tony Parker went down with an ankle injury the game after he scored 55 points. Roger Mason moved into the starting lineup and scored 18 points, but it couldn't overcome Dwyane Wade's LeBron-like 33-10-9 and Michael Beasley's Marion-like 20-8-3-2-2. I'm still waiting for Shaun Livingston to get into a game for the Heatians.

The Bulls beat Phoenix resoundingly. Joakim Noah had 14 boards off the bench and Ben Gordon led the team in scoring, also as a reserve. Robin Lopez started for the Suns in Shaq's absence and had a nice game: 6-9 shooting, seven boards, and three blocks. The problem is only seven rebounds in 30 minutes. It's not atrocious, but you'd like to see nine to eleven in that number of minutes from your starting center. Both Lopez brothers have been a lot better than I thought they'd be.

Utah stayed 5-0 by beating the Sonics. Kevin Durant shot over 50%! The earth has spun off its axis! AK47 had the game-high in rebounds, with 12, in 32 minutes off the bench. Brevin Knight's eleven assists were also the game high despite coming off the bench for the Jazz. No Sonic had more than three assists, while the Jazz had just five unassisted field goals. That's an absurdly low number, but I'm sure it was beautiful basketball.

Sacramento scored 121 points in beating the Wolves. Kevin Love had a really nice game for the Wolves, shooting 6-7 from the floor and 8-10 from the line while grabbing four offensive boards (but just eight overall).

Denver edged Dallas by three in Chauncey's Nugs debut. Billups shot just 5-17, but Carmelo's 28-8-6 bailed him out, not to mention Jerry Stackhouse's 1-8 and Josh Howard's 4-15. Jason Kidd, oddly enough, came within an assist of a triple-double, going for 22-10-9. He shot 6-12 from three, which is better than he's shot since before my cats were born.

Memphis edged Golden State in Oakland. Hakim Warrick had 19-10 off the bench in 38 minutes, presumably getting that much run because Marc Gasol fouled out in an astonishing 17 minutes. Three Warriors shot double-digit free throws, and Andris Biedrins had a miraculous night, scoring 23 points and grabbing 12 boards while making nine of ten free throws. Biedrins! Missed only one free throw! The world spins back on to its axis!

Finally, Houston sent the Clippers to 0-6. Carl Landry had 20 points off the bench for the Rockets, overcoming Chris Kaman and Baron Davis's matching 23's.

It looks like the final Matt Holliday deal is Holliday coming to the A's alone, with Greg Smith, Huston Street, and Carlos Gonzalez heading to Colorado.

It's an interesting deal, with a mix of selling high, selling low, money concerns, talent, and the possibility of future moves. Let's start with Holliday himself. He's a very talented hitter, a guy with catastrophic power who will hit the ball out of any park, Oakland included, with great frequency. He immediately becomes the A's best hitter, regardless of whether Jason Giambi joins the team and regardless of whether Eric Chavez comes back healthy. Furthermore, for a guy with his size and his offensive profile, he's not a Custian lumberer in the outfield: the defensive metrics I've seen grade him out comfortably above average, and he can apparently handle center field in a pinch. I am excited to have him on the team, excited that someone other than Jack Cust will hit 30 homers next year, excited to have a power righty bat.

Of course, it's Holliday's contract situation that made him available in the first place. He's due something like $12 million this year, and he's apparently thinking about deals in the five-year, $18M per range. This means that for a variety of reasons, the A's will not be resigning him. Yes, with an $80 million payroll, Holliday could fit. But no matter how good the player, committing 20-25% of your payroll to him can be problematic. Furthermore, he'll be 30 at the start of his new deal. Do the A's want to be paying $18M to a 34-year-old left fielder? He might keep hitting like Manny Ramirez through those years, or he might be like almost every player in the history of the game and decline to the point where he's good but not worth $18 million.

As for the guys going out, it's a mixed bag. Greg Smith was absolutely sold high. He had a solid ERA this year, despite his terrible record, but take a look at his peripherals. Too many walks, too many homers, and not enough strikeouts add up to "skyrocketing ERA next year". Maybe that's too harsh. He may not be a bad pitcher in the future, but given the A's depth at his position, isn't a "maybe fourth starter, maybe exploding pinata" something you trade for a year of Matt Holliday in his prime? Even when that guy is dirt cheap for two years and under team control for three after that? Ans: yes.

Huston Street has been on his way out this offseason since last offseason, it seems. Brad Ziegler taking his job and Joey Devine posting preposterous numbers to match Ziegler's only cemented Street's availability, although it also meant the A's would be selling low. Street will still be relatively cheap for the next three years, as he's only become arbitration-eligible this offseason. He's not a great reliever, but he's not a guy who's had just one good year, or half a good season: he's a proven very good reliever, a guy who will save a lot of games. I'll miss him on the team, but he's not a huge loss. Interestingly, the Rockies will look to flip him, so the Mets fans out there should turn their trade proposals to Colorado. Clearly what they're interested in is cheap talent.

Finally, Carlos Gonzalez. One wonders whether Billy Beane acquired Gonzalez, a very un-A's-like player, for this very purpose, sending him somewhere else that values him more highly for something the A's can really use. Gonzalez should be a doubles machine very soon, especially in Colorado, but the question will be whether he makes too many outs to really be very good. In short, is he Garret Anderson? A guy who hits 280/323/433 (as Anderson did in 2006, very similar to his 1997 line)? Now, out of center field instead of left field, and as a good center fielder at that, that's pretty good, but it's not exactly Carlos Beltran, either. Of course, Anderson had peak seasons in he had an OPS+ around 130, but for the most part, he hit within 5% of league average every year. In any case, this extended riff on Garret Anderson is merely to point out that this might be Carlos Gonzalez. That has value in the pre-arb and arbitration years, but it should be noted that Gonzalez didn't hit like that this year in the majors, instead putting up a line of 242/273/361. That walk rate is even lower than Anderson's, and the home-run power isn't there yet, either.

On reflection, I like this trade better than I thought I would, particularly if Jason Giambi winds up joining the team as well, the offense could suddenly be pretty good. Here's a lineup:

Ryan Sweeney, CF
Kurt Suzuki, C
Matt Holliday, LF
Jason Giambi, 1B
Jack Cust, DH
Eric Chavez, 3B
Travis Buck, RF
Mark Ellis, 2B
Bobby Crosby, SS

Not bad, right? The defense takes a hit with Sweeney in center instead of a corner, and with Giambi at first instead of Barton, but that's three 30-homer hitters in the middle of the lineup and Eric Chavez, who also has that kind of power when he's healthy, hitting sixth. Of course, if Chavez is hurt, like we all expect him to be, then swap in Jack Hannahan (and lose surprisingly little on defense) and bat him ninth, moving everyone else up a spot. Hannahan probably isn't a .218 hitter, and his walk rate and isolated power were nearly unchanged from 2007.

Amusingly enough, it's the starting pitching that looks questionable in 2009. That's with or without Greg Smith. The rotation looks like this: Justin Duchscherer, Dana Eveland, and ... uh. Ok, I guess let's say Sean Gallagher, who was terrible but who does strike people out. And Gio Gonzalez, who's Sean Gallagher again, only with even more walks and homers. Let's round it out with Josh Outman, who might actually be pretty good, because it looks like he got really hit-unlucky in his brief A's stint.

This has the potential to be a good rotation: if Gonzalez and Gallagher harness their stuff and quit walking people, if Duchscherer stays healthy, and if Outman is as good as he might be, it's a really good rotation. If none of that happens, it's a bad one. Most likely is something in between. Let's say Duchscherer pitches 150 innings, Dallas Braden puts up a league-average ERA+ in his stead, Gallagher and Gonzalez take steps forward to be adequate starters instead of terrible ones (but also not good ones, as the A's presumably think they can be), and Eveland pitches like he did from August 23rd to September 24th (3.98 ERA -- Baseball-reference.com? Still awesome!). What kind of rotation is that? Not the kind the A's are used to, but maybe the kind that can compete with an Angels team without 14 games of luck, without Mark Teixeira, and without Francisco Rodriguez? Maybe.

The best news I've heard all week: "It seems almost certain that Giambi is headed back to the Athletics, however, particularly after they hired his old strength coach, Bob Alejo, this past week." (From John Perrotto at Baseball Prospectus.)

According to David Pinto's Probabilistic Model of Range, Bobby Crosby was the second-best full-season shortstop in the AL last year at getting to baseballs. (The model, as its name implies, does not attempt to measure arm, nimbleness in turning the deuce, etc.) In the AL, Mike Aviles, Jed Lowrie, Erick Aybar, and Alex Cora ranked above Crosby, but none of them played anywhere near the 145 games that Crosby did. Who was the #1 full-timer? Our old friend Marco Scutaro! Actual Gold Glove winner Michael Young grades out as have almost exactly average range.

Unless the A's have a hidden defensive whiz hiding in the minors, or steal Mike Aviles away from the Royals, they're going to take a defensive hit when Crosby leaves after this year. (And when Ellis leaves two or three years hence. And when Jack Hannahan gets replaced at third base this year. And when Daric Barton .220's his way out of the lineup. It's a remarkable, and remarkably underrated, defensive infield.)

I've gone from mystified to excited to frustrated to worried and everything in between about this Matt Holliday trade. I won't say more until I know for sure who all the players going both directions are. The reaction will, of course, be different if it's Huston Street rather than Greg Smith, or if it's both, or if it really does include Carlos Gonzalez, and so forth.

As long as we're bringing in sluggers, can we get those Giambi-back-to-Oakland rumors going again?

Sunday was a short night, with just two games. New York took its second loss, falling to Milwaukee. Milwaukee won the midwestern way, with six guys over ten points and nobody over 18. Luc Mbah a Moute is showing that maybe he was right to leave UCLA after all, with 11/10 and 4-6 shooting. Ramon Sessions, who I hadn't even heard of before this year, had 18/7/8 and three steals. Joe Alexander even got into the game, but didn't do anything. Milwaukee ... I wonder about them. They could be interesting. Jefferson can score, Redd can shoot, Bogut can rebound and defend the rim, Villanueva is Boozer-lite, and Sessions is apparently a good PG. The problem looks like the bench. Mbah a Moute can be a nice multi-dimensional player, but beyond him, you're looking at Tyronn Lue, Dan Gadzuric, and Charlie Bell. If you can get 40 minutes a night out of your starters all year, you'll be fine, but that can't happen. And if someone gets hurt? Forget about it.

My two fantasy Knicks had awful games, including Jamal Crawford going for exactly one point. Quentin Richardson had a 28/9 and Z-Bo had 15/13. Gallinari didn't get into the game.

Seattle squeaked out a win over Minnesota in a battle of bad teams. The game was played in Oklahoma City for some odd reason. Kevin Durant must have more 7-21 shooting nights than anyone else in the league. Who else gets to take that many shots when he's missing 2/3 of the time? So yeah, 18 points on 21 shots, five boards, and an embarrassing zero assists. But hey, no fouls. Rookie point Russell Westbook had 14 points in 25 minutes off the bench.

Randy Foye had the most brutal night of all, though, with 0-10 shooting and five turnovers for the Wolves. Al Jefferson bailed him out with a 24/13, though. Obviously, the Celtics wouldn't trade their championship for anything, but Jefferson is shaping up to be basically Kevin Garnett all over again in Minnesota. Maybe he'll end up traded to the Knicks in ten years to bail them out of a lengthy period of mediocrity and bring a championship to the team. Danilo will be the Paul Pierce. The shooter in the Ray Allen mode? JJ Redick? Yeah, your 2018 championship winning Knicks, led by the Big Three of Al Jefferson, Danilo Gallinari, and JJ Redick.

And hey, speaking of JJ Redick, he's back to getting DNP's. Like on Monday, when Orlando edged Chicago by three. Dwight Howard had 22/15, including eight offensive boards, and five blocks. As usual, half of Heshard Turkowis was good, and half was not. Rashard had 21/11 while Hedo shot 3-16. (Although to be fair to Hedo, he contributed seven boards and seven assists. This is what's made him such a valuable player. Even when he's not putting the ball in the bucket, he's involved in the offense, creating for other players, and even his size to crash the boards.)

Chicago had a weird mix: Gooden, Rose, Nooch, and Little Kobe all had 14+ points, and all shot 50% or better, but Luol Deng shot 0-8, Gooden fouled out, and the team shot only 18 free throws. This is the classic problem with a team that shoots jump shots like Chicago: guys get a little bit off with their shot (Deng) and nobody gets to the line for easy points. Nocioni had nine free throws (missing four, though), but no one else had more than three. You can make it your style, your offensive philosophy, to shoot midrange jumpers all day, but you'll lose games because of it along the way, even if you do have talented offensive players.

Philly sent Sacto to 0-4 by beating them by 34. This might mean PT for the rooks, except that Marreese Speights already gets run for the Sixers, the same as Jason Thompson does for the Kings. The Sixers put eight guys in double figures and only one player was on the floor more than thirty minutes (Thaddeus Young, who led the team in scoring with 18). Donyell Marshall had the awesomest line: 4-5 shooting, all on threes, in just eight minutes. On the other side, Jason Thompson had yet another impressive game, with 17/6/5 off the bench, with 8-12 shooting. He did have four turnovers, but when you're getting 17/6/5 from a rookie power forward from Rider, you don't nitpick. Especially if you're in a city where you mayor is now Kevin Johnson.

Detroit, playing its first game without Chauncey, moved to 3-0 by beating Charlotte. The M.O. didn't change, as Rip led the team in scoring with 19. (Things will be different when A.I. gets there, so enjoy the spread-the-wealth ball while you can.) Detroit dominated Charlotte's glass: 16 offensive boards compared to just 23 defensive rebounds for the Bobcats. Gerald Wallace had ten of those rebounds by himself, but shot 3-10, nearly matching Jason Richardson's 2-10 effort.

Golden State lost again, this time in Memphis. Marc Gasol makes me cry for the Lakers having traded him. Granted that Golden State plays small ball, the rook playing his fourth NBA game shot 9-11 from the floor and the line for 27 points and grabbed 16 boards. That's just dominance. He did have six turnovers, but again, as with Thompson, you'll take that. This was supposed to be Rudy Gay's team with OJ Mayo a strong second and Marc Gasol learning the game. Suddenly you have to wonder whether this is Marc Gasol's team and the backcourt are just along for the ride.

Golden State missed nearly 2/3 of its shots, but Andris Biedrins had a preposterous 22 rebounds, including nine offensive, while shooting 8/14. The two centers combined for about 1/3 of the total rebounds grabbed in the game. That's crazy.

Cleveland sent Dallas down by 19, in Dallas. That's not impressive for Rick Carlisle's troops. Dirk was held to eight points, Jason Terry shot 1-8, and the team got outrebounded by 17. Lebron went to the line 15 times and Ben Wallace had a "Pistons Ben Wallace" game: 0-4 shooting with 13 rebounds, eight of them offensive.

Utah went to 3-0 and the Clippers dropped to 0-4. Kosta Koufos got into the game for the Jazz, and shot 0-1 in one minute, with no other stats. Nicely done, Kosta. AK47 is worrying me more and more: 15 points, 11 boards, and four steals in 32 minutes off the bench. Paul Millsap had 24 points on just 12 shots. Remember, Utah is 3-0 without Deron Williams. Kyle Korver hasn't really gotten going, Okur hasn't had a great game ... but Kirilenko and Boozer are carrying the team. Let me say it again: Utah scares me a lot.

Baron Davis came off the bench to try to work back from his injury, and missed a lot of shots: he hit just 5-15 from the floor and only 1-4 from the free throw line. He did have nine assists. Marcus Camby also played off the bench, blocking three shots.

Three teams were forced to play on Election Night instead of getting to sit at home and watch CNN. Phoenix won by 28 in New Jersey in the first Lopez-brother matchup ever. They combined for 2-10 shooting and five blocks, but Brook outrebounded Robin 6-1. They also combined for seven fouls in just 39 minutes. They are nothing if not "active", those two.

Anyway, the game also involved other players, such as Ryan Anderson, the Nets rookie, who had 8/7 in 17 minutes, and the Suns six best offensive players (Nash, Amare, Shaq, Barbosa, Hill, and Bell; we could argue whether Diaw belongs there, but he doesn't fit into the stat I'm about to say) shot a combined 34-47, which is really good. Obviously.

Boston snuck past Houston by four in Texas. Ray Allen had 29 points to overcome Tracy McGrady's 26, and the Celtics shut down Yao and Ron-Ron, who shot 7-30 combined. Joey Dorsey may have picked the worst possible team to have taken a shot on him in the second round: he's a short, strong hustle player at the power forward spot. Hmmm ... Luis Scola and Carl Landry? Yeah, whoops. Such are the vagaries of the NBA draft, I guess.

Dallas bounced back from Monday's home loss to beat San Antonio convincingly at the Alamo, sending the Spurs to 0-3 and making everyone wonder if maybe it was Manu all these years and not Tim Duncan who drove the team. Dirk came back with a vengeance, scoring 29, and Jason Terry, added to the starting lineup, scored the same. Jason Kidd had a classic Kidd-near-triple-double, with 9/8/10. George Hill got off the bench for San Antonio, scoring 11 points in 16 minutes. Granted, he was probably playing against JJ Barea, Gerald Green, and James Singleton, but still.

The Lakers finally play again tonight, in a rematch against the Clippers.

The issue of whether Dan Meyer might be able to rebound and show enough to make the A's next year has become moot: he's been claimed on waivers by the Marlins. He was awful in the bigs with the A's and mediocre in the minors after being the prize piece in the Tim Hudson deal years ago, then quickly hurting his shoulder. It's unfortunate that he's entering the AAA journeyman phase of his career, seeing as how he's all of 27 years old. Hopefully he can show a little something in Florida and salvage a major league career.

I friggin' hate the NFL. I was watching Tennessee-Green Bay's overtime game. Tennessee trots Rob Bironas out on 3rd and 2 to try to kick the game winner, and FOX promptly cuts (cutting off Kenny Albert in mid-sentence) to ... three minutes of ads! And a few minutes of pre-game of Dallas-New York. Come on. Spend a buck: take a tiny bit less money from the networks and make them not cut away from the end of early games just to show ads before the late games. Awful.

Cleveland walloped Charlotte in Charlotte's first game on Thursday. The names I'm watching in Charlotte didn't do much: D.J. Augustin had 12 points, two assists, four turnovers, and four fouls in 25 minutes; Adam Morrison had a respectable scoring game (9 points in 23 minutes) but added zero else: one board and one assist; and Alexis Ajinca played three minutes. LeBron did turn the ball over five times, he but he also went for 22/9/9, only shooting the ball 15 times, as Boobie Gibson was on his game, shooting 4/6 from downtown en route to 25 points off the bench. (Somehow he missed four of his five free throws, though, which is atrocious for anyone, but especially for a guard, and especially especially for a guard hitting 67% of his threes on the night.)

Houston's box score looks like a lot of Boston's from last year: one of the big three struggles, but the team still wins because the other two have good games. This time it was Tracy McGrady shooting just 3/10, but Yao had 30/13 on just 15 shots and Ron-Ron went for 29. This overcame a 36-point performance from Dirk and a double-double by Josh Howard.

It's almost old hat, but Chris Paul had a near-triple double in a win over Phoenix, racking up 20/8/10. Like LeBron, he turned the ball over five times as well, but the turnovers weren't fatal in part because the rest of the team combined to only turn the ball over five more times. Stevey Nash had an uncharacteristic seven turnover game, and Robin Lopez picked up three fouls in just two minutes for the Suns, which is pretty hard to do.

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The Knicks took their first loss of the year on Friday, getting blown out (by 29) in Philly. The team's 13 steals to just ten turnovers was pretty much the only highlight. Philly's players played like they can: 24/14 with three blocks by Elton Brand, 20/7/8 for Andre Miller, and eight boards and four blocks for Sam Dalembert. Combine that with shooting off the bench (a combined 14/24 for Sour Lou Williams and Mean Willie Green) and maybe this team really can live up to the hype.

Toronto went to 2-0 in an overtime win over Golden State. Even with Ronny Turiaf and Stephen Jackson fouling out, Marco Belinelli, Marcus Williams, and Anthony Randolph couldn't sniff the floor. Andrea Bargnani shot 8/10 from the bench to help overcome Jermaine O'Neal's 2/10 night. O'Neal did contribute three blocks, so he wasn't useless.

Miami held Sacramento under 20 points for the first three quarters on their way to a 26-point win. Beno Udrih, fresh off a relatively big money extension signed to keep him in Sacramento, shot 1/7 and had five turnovers to just two assists in 22 minutes. Shawn Marion had a classic Matrix game: 13 points, 10 boards, three assists, four steals, and three blocks. Michael Beasley had 17/9: if he can average that for the year, the Heatians are going to be a lot better than some people thought they'd be. (On the other hand, the other half of the world is hyping them like there's no tomorrow because "Dwyane Wade is back and healthy!" They still won't be that good. Have you seen their bench?) Wade, by the way, kept up with Marion with 20 points, eight dimes, four blocks, and four steals his own self.

Luol Deng, Ben Gordon, and Ty Thomas combined for a brutal (SO BRUTAL) 7/37 shooting performance against Boston. We can guess who won this game.

Memphis edged Orlando, sending the Magic to 0-2 despite Hedo's 18/9/7 and Superman's 14/14. Rudy Gay managed to heave up 26 shots despite only winding up with 29 points. That, my friends, is efficiency. Darrell Arthur was 0-6 in 28 minutes as a starter for Memphis. This, remember, was the winning team! Arthur did have ten boards, however.

Denver won in overtime in L.A., against the Clippers. (The overtime game probably helped the Lakers beat them in Denver the next night. Thanks, Clippers!) Nene had 22/11 to go with three blocks before fouling out -- maybe he's back? J.R. Smith decided to rebound for some reason and grabbed ten boards to go with his 17 points. If Denver didn't blow, Smith would probably get mentioned in Sixth Man discussions, although that would be heavily influenced by the fact that he plays starter minutes off the bench (35 on Friday). Al Thornton had a ridiculous 30/11 game for the Clippers, with seven of those eleven coming on the offensive glass. Eric Gordon hit his first NBA field goal.

Portland edged San Antonio 100-99, sending the Spurs to 0-2. Roger Mason's 6/7 shooting off the bench for the Spurs is the only line that really jumps out at me.

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My buddy Miggs and I own Joe Johnson in our fantasy league, and it looks like an inspired pick: 35 points last night en route to a victory over Philly, sending the Hawks to 2-0! Josh Smith had 14/11/3/3/2, which is basically a slightly below-average Josh Smith game. Craziness. Every starter was in double-digits for Philly, but nobody had more than 22 and they only got 10 from their bench. Elton Brand grabbed sixteen boards, though. He is the early league leader in that category and I wouldn't count him out in battling Dwight Howard for the top spot all year. (Joe Johnson, by the way, is leading the league in scoring.)

The Celtics took their first loss, going down by 16 in Indiana. Paul Pierce shot 3/15 and had five of the Celtics fourteen missed free throws. Rajon Rondo was an inexplicable 0-3 from the line. I understand the concept of not being a good field goal shooter in the NBA, because it's hard! Guys are in your face, the game is moving quickly, there's a lot of pressure, you're worried at the same time as you're shooting about rebounding and getting back on defense, and so on. But free throws are easy! Unless you have physical deformities like Shaq, you should be hitting your free throws. Especially if you're a guard. I don't know why teams don't just Hack-a-Rondo: every time he drives, wrap him up. Don't ever let him hit a layup.

Sacramento fell to 0-3 in Orlando despite Kevin Martin's 31points. The Magic had four starters score 20 points, with Jameer Nelson bringing up the rear with just 12. Josh Howard had 29 on just 14 shots to go with 14 boards and five blocks. Rashard Lewis? 26/7/6. Mickael Pietrus? 6/9 shooting. J.J. Redick had another ofer and is now 0/8 on the season. That's pitiful.

Michael Beasley paced Miami with 25, but Charlotte won anyway behind Gerald Wallace: 34/9/3/2/3, and just 16 shots. Emeka Okafor continued to look like Elton Brand Light (but only slightly Light) with 18/13. D.J. Augustin had a funny line off the bench: five assists, four turnovers, and five fouls in just 20 minutes. Adam Morrison shot 1/6, but did dish four dimes.

Detroit went to 2-0, beating Washington despite Nick Young's 23 points on 10 shots off the bench. Detroit outrebounded the Wizards by an absurd 49-24 margin. The Pistons had 16 offensive boards. The Wizards had 19 defensive. When you've got only a 50/50 shot of picking up a rebound on your own defensive glass, you're going to lose the game.

Detroit's box score is full of fun lines: Tayshaun? 1/5 shooting. Amir Johnson? Five fouls in eleven minutes. Chauncey Billups? 2/8 shooting. (Eight dimes, though.) Rasheed had a 7/9 shooting day, including 2/3 from downtown, winding up with 17 points, 12 boards, and six blocked shots. The bench mob came together for the Pistons, shooting 22/34, including 4/4 from Kwame Brown, 4/5 from Jason Maxiell, and 6/9 from Walter Herrmann, who also added seven boards and four assists. Move over Manu Ginobli!

Andris Biedrins shot 8/11 on the way to a Golden State victory over the Nets. Bets on whether six of those eight were dunks? Josh Boone had 17/14 in 27 minutes as a starter for Jersey, including nine offensive boards. He was, however, one of five Nets to pick up five or more fouls, which group includes Brook Lopez, who fouled out in just 19 minutes. It was a surprisingly productive nineteen minutes, though, as Lopez had 10 points, eight boards, two steals, and two blocks. Maybe these Lopez boys can play after all? For some reason, Sean Williams has fallen into the doghouse in Jersey, as he didn't get off the bench for the Nets and has yet to play this year. He's a high-energy guy who can rebound and dunk, and this is a team mostly lacking in size, so you'd think they could use him.

New Orleans went to 3-0, sending Cleveland home with its tail between its legs. LeBron had thirteen assists in the game, but nobody on the Cavs scored more than 18 points. The Hornets did what they do: Chris Paul had 24 points (on just 13 shots) and 15 dimes, David West scored 25, and James Posey hit 4/5 from downtown off the bench to go with six boards and four steals. Posey's contract will look like an albatross in three years, but that's the price the Hornets knew they were going to pay in order to have him on the squad this season and next. So far it's working out.

Rashad McCants shot 6/8 from the bench in Minnesota's loss to Dallas. That's really the only notable line, and I'm sure the game was exactly as scintillating as the box score is.

Chicago beat Memphis by nearly the same score that Dallas beat Minny (96-86 vs. 95-85). The teams combined to shoot in the 40% range, which is awesome. Drew Gooden did grab twenty rebounds, though, becoming the first player to pull that off this season. Ty Thomas had a line full of fives: five blocks, five boards, and 0-5 shooting.

Houston moved to 3-0, sending the Sonics to 0-2 despite Kevin Durant's 26 points. The Rockets shot 36.4% and still won by 12. The NBA: It's Fa .... bleh.

Toronto, surprisingly enough, is now 3-0 after beating the Bucks. Jose Calderon had 25 points and nine assists. Luc Mbah a Moute had a solid game off the bench for Milwaukee, shooting 4/7 with two boards, an assist, a steal, and two blocks in twenty minutes. He's that kind of rangy 6'8" small forward who could be a "box score filler" in the league.

The Clippers fell to 0-3 in Utah as Al Thornton followed up his magnificent night with with a five-point stinker. Eric Gordon shot 1-1 again, this time hitting a three. Carlos Boozer continued to put the Jazz on his back in Deron Williams's absence, putting up 25/10. AK47 did this again: 11/9/4/2/3. I'm very afraid of Utah.

Portland continued its early rough schedule by losing in Phoenix. Amare had 23/13 and Shaq had 16 points on eight shots, helping Phoenix to a 55% shooting night.

Finally, the Lakers moved to 3-0 in Denver despite shooting 38%. They outrebounded the Nuggets 53-38, most of that gap being a 15-3 edge on the offensive glass. L.A. also shot 13 more free throws than Denver, paced by Kobe's 10/12, but including seven for Vlad-Rad and six apiece for Bynum and Ariza. Bynum struggled with fouls, picking up five in just 21 minutes, but he managed eight rebounds anyway. Josh Powell filled in ably, shooting 2/3 and grabbing four boards in seven minutes. If Powell can do that kind of work, this team will once again be eleven or twelve deep, which is absurd. The front nine are all valuable players without question -- the only thing to be asked is "who's #9, Vujacic or Farmar?" Luke Walton can give a few minutes here and there and be solid and Chris Mihm remains my favorite white center in basketball (now that Pau is a power forward). That's nine good players and two useful ones. The question mark was Powell, but he's giving all indication that he can join Mihm and Walton on the "useful" list.

Actually, L.A. even goes deeper, since D.J. Mbenga is #13, inactive but available to be #12 if a big gets hurt (and misses work). I'm not sure Mbenga qualifies as "useful" in the same way that Powell or Walton does, but he's at least a big body who can bang a man on defense and grab a few boards. (#14, by the way, is Sun Yue, who's clearly a stash job -- if he gets a single minute in a Laker uniform this season, (a) I will be shocked; (b) the Lakers will have sustained massive injuries and be on their way to missing the playoffs entirely.)

Read the "First job" question in the interview with Charlie Villanueva below and tell me he didn't just admit to recruiting violations at UConn.

Charlie Villanueva October 31, 2008

I'm not going to do like in the past and force myself to comment on every game, but here are some notes on Wednesday's box scores.

The Twin Towers in Toronto combined for 44 points, 19 boards, 8 assists, and two blocks in 76 minutes. Toronto can win some games with that kind of production.

Elton Brand had a disappointing Philly debut against the aforementioned towers, shooting just 5/14. He'll do better than that normally, and Philly will win some games if he and Sam Dalembert combine for 30 rebounds like they did last night.

Josh Smith? Still a monster: 17 points on 11 shots, 10 boards, four steals, five blocks. Good gracious.

JJ Redick is going to have to shoot better than 0/4 if he's going to crack the Orlando rotation for any length of time and work his way into the league as the new Steve Kerr.

Chris Douglas-Roberts, one of my favorite rookies, and a guy I think a lot of teams will eventually rue passing on, is still looking for his first NBA point after not scoring in 14 minutes against Washington. The Nets won anyway.

Look at the Knicks! 120-115 over the Heat, 29 for Jamal Crawford, 16/11/5 for David Lee, 17 points and nine boards in just 23 minutes for Wilson Chandler. It's a lot of good. The elevated pace of the game resulted in some inflated stats for the Heat, too: nine assists for Dwyane Wade and eight for Mario Chalmers, 23 points for Udonis Haslem, and 13 in 20 minutes for Daequan Cook.

You have to feel bad for Danny Granger, since he's obviously the only scorer on his team: he had 33 points in a loss to Detroit, but no one else on the team scored more than 13.

I love looking at Detroit's box scores -- they're models of spreading the wealth. Ten different guys scored at least five points and no one had more than 19. Nine different guys had at least two rebounds and no one had more than seven. Kwame Brown got stiffed in his Detroit debut, getting only three minutes, while everyone else who got into the game played at least fourteen.

Mikki Moore played 21 minutes and did not grab a rebound. That's absurd. I guess it's Spencer Hawes's fault: 14 in 33 minutes is pretty good for a white guy. Jason Thompson, the rookie from Rider, had a box score line that looks a lot more polished than his game supposedly is: 7/11 shooting, 4/4 from the line and ten boards. All that in 22 minutes. That's impressive stuff for an NBA debut.

Kevin Love also had a nice debut, filling up the box score in 19 minutes from the bench: 12 points, nine boards, two assists, a steal, two blocks. Not bad for a 6'8" chubby white guy.

The Spurs proved Bill Simmons's point that they're an incredibly thin team: Tim Duncan shot 13/21, Tony Parker shot 13/24, and nobody else got more than nine shots. (And that was Matt Bonner!) I can't decide, with Manu out, who the third-best offensive player on this team is. Roger Mason? Mason's a nice player, but he shouldn't be your #3 guy.

Robin Lopez? Shooting 1.000 for his career after a 1/1 debut.

Kevin Durant Year 2 looks a lot like Kevin Durant Year 1: 5/14 for twelve points, three boards, two assists, and four turnovers. If Oden can't stay healthy and Durant can't actually play the game all that well, the second-most ballyhooed draft in history might go down as the biggest 1-2 bust ever. Maybe the lesson is that we shouldn't judge skinny swingmen by one good season against mediocre competition in college.

Darrell Arthur got 27 minutes in his NBA debut and made them count: 11 points and 15 boards. Keep doing that and you'll keep getting minutes. And hey, Marc Gasol, getting a start in his debut, goes for a 12/12 double-double. OJ Mayo? 5/20, and 0/7 from three. Ouch. He's better than that, though, and if he's getting 20 shots a game, he'll put up eye-popping numbers a couple of times this year. Memphis will still lose 50 games, but whatever. (Hamed Haddadi didn't play.)

Carl Landry had an awesome rebounding line: six boards, five offensive. And yet he shot 0-3! He couldn't turn any of those into an easy putback? Joey Dorsey, potentially the new Carl Landry / Luis Scola / Paul Millsap, didn't play.

Andrei Kirilenko isn't starting for the Jazz, but he played 35 effective minutes off the bench: 16 points on nine shots, six boards (three offensive), three assists (best passing SF/PF in the game), one steal, two blocks. If Utah can get that from Kirilenko 75% of the time, they'll go nuts on the league. (Problem: they'll only get that 25% of the time.)

Tyson Chandler makes Chicago feel stupid like nine games out of ten. They couldn't use 13 points, 16 boards, and three blocks from their center? (Granted that probably 6-8 of his points were on alley-oops from the nonpareil Chris Paul.)

Corey Maggette went for 27 on just 11 shots in his Golden State debut. That's unbelievably efficient.

Hack-a-Biedrins should be the new strategy if Golden State manages any close games this year: 4/10 from the free-throw line undermined a 14 and 12 night. (That and fouling out in 29 minutes, that is.)

My boy Ronny had four boards, three assists, and four blocks in 24 minutes. He didn't score, but who cares? Four blocks in 24 minutes is awesome. And I bet none of them were cheap Pau-style blocks, either, but rather thundering swats into the stands following by beatings of that barrel chest of his. I love Ronny.

Don Nelson frustrates me as a box-score watcher: Marcus Williams, Marco Belinelli, Brandon Wright, and Anthony Randolph? DNP. DeMarcus Nelson? (Who?) Thirteen minutes.

Eric Gordon scored two points but didn't hit a field goal. The allegedly beautiful jump shot will go in another day.

Why no Lakers notes? Because their blowout of the Clippers meant a lot of garbage time, which means no notable lines, unless Jordan Farmar's 15/5/5 line is notable. (It might be now, but it won't be much longer. Watch for that to become more and more commonplace as the year goes on.)

The Laker Nation can breathe a sigh of relief -- Andrew Bynum has signed an extension. It's three years with a team option for a fourth. I'm not even going to talk about the money, because who can evaluate it? The guy has had 35 good games in his career, plus a nice two games to start 2008-09. The Lakers had to get the deal done, though, because otherwise he'd be an unrestricted free agent at the end of the year. They couldn't take the risk that he'd be as good this year as he was last year, or better, and thus became a guy that every single team in the league wanted. Locking him up was the only option.

Drayton Moore on the newly acquired Mike Jacobs: "Obviously we like him a lot. He was among the top hitters in all of baseball last year, I think ranking 11th or 12th."

Ok, what? On what possible scale did Jacobs rank 11th or 12th? What stat could Moore be talking about? Jacobs was 129th in batting average, 142nd in on-base percentage, 30th in slugging, 67th in OPS, 22nd in homers, 153rd in hits, 112th in doubles. Advanced stats? His .273 EqA doesn't put him anywhere near the top-30, and his VORP ranked 133rd. In short, Jacobs is a good power hitter, but he makes way too many outs to be regarded as the 11th or 12th-best anything.

I cannot fathom this. The only explanation I can think of is that Moore thought he traded for Brandon Jacobs, who most certainly is a top hitter, if in a different sense.