While watching the ending quarter of game four between the Memphis Grizzlies and the Oklahoma 
Thunder something was clearly off with Durant. Durant seemed to be distracted, frustrated, and even upset. His body language told us everything we needed to know, his shoulders were slumped, his hands on his hips, and no joy or excitement in his eyes. During a 9 minute stretch in game 4 Durant did not take a shot, clearly changes need to be made for tonight's game and needs to start with the Thunder playing through Durant. Even one of the females watching the game with my friends and I notice something was not right. After watching a couple minutes of overtime she asked a simple question that was in all of our minds. "Why is that guy not passing the ball?" while she pointed at Russell Westbrook. Later she followed up with "can he please pass the ball there are people open." Every guy in the room couldn't help but chuckle, but she was right, Russell Westbrook seemed to be ignoring many of his teammates and most noticeably Kevin Durant. I remember watching Durant play for the Longhorns, and never once did DJ Augustin need to be reminded he was playing with greatness and he needed to get Durant the ball.
Thunder something was clearly off with Durant. Durant seemed to be distracted, frustrated, and even upset. His body language told us everything we needed to know, his shoulders were slumped, his hands on his hips, and no joy or excitement in his eyes. During a 9 minute stretch in game 4 Durant did not take a shot, clearly changes need to be made for tonight's game and needs to start with the Thunder playing through Durant. Even one of the females watching the game with my friends and I notice something was not right. After watching a couple minutes of overtime she asked a simple question that was in all of our minds. "Why is that guy not passing the ball?" while she pointed at Russell Westbrook. Later she followed up with "can he please pass the ball there are people open." Every guy in the room couldn't help but chuckle, but she was right, Russell Westbrook seemed to be ignoring many of his teammates and most noticeably Kevin Durant. I remember watching Durant play for the Longhorns, and never once did DJ Augustin need to be reminded he was playing with greatness and he needed to get Durant the ball.
If the Thunder plan on facing Dallas Mavericks in the Western Conference finals this on going rift between the top two players on the Thunder needs to end now. Russell and Kevin need to have the same joy playing together they played with at the start of the year and in the summer with team USA. Russell seems to go out of his way to ignore Durant, almost choosing to try to be the lone wolf hero. Even though he had a 40 point burst in game four he looked awfully stupid doing it. And in the end it still took some heroic offense from the Durantula for the Thunder to finally put away the pesky Grizzlies. Lucky for Oklahoma Conley and Mayo fouled out, which Mayo's foul should have been avoided and a clear coaching mistake. Without their guard play Memphis' front line looked worn out.
Westbrook shot 13 more shots than their main shooter. I am sorry, Tony Allen is a good defender, but not close to being good enough from keeping the ball from the hands of the leagues top scorer. Hopefully the chemistry between Durant and Westbrook returns, because it was missing the other night, and all you need to know is Westbrook played point for 51 minutes and only recorded 5 assists. Tonight Durant needs to get over 25 shots, and Westbrook gets his mates involved raking up over 10 dimes, because if not the Thunder will find themselves in a hole that only less than 20% of teams find a way to climb out of. The Thunder need a new attitude to go with Durant's new shoes he will be wearing, which were designed by one of his twitter followers!
1 comments:
excellent post mr. li, i'm pretty sure the shoes will solve all of the problems as well
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