Motivation 101
Photo. Jeffery SalterWe have a feeling that the Kings might get destroyed by the Jazz tonight, and it’s not just because Sacramento stinks. Following an exhibition game this year between the two teams in New Mexico, the Jazz found copies of the Kings’ pre-game scouting report:
The Kings left multiple copies of the report in the press room after their exhibition victory over the Jazz in Albuquerque, N.M. It was published by The Tribune and others and Jazz coach Jerry Sloan has cited it to his players “a time or two.”
The scouting report criticized several Jazz players for their defense, especially Carlos Boozer, of whom it was written: “Coast[s] on defense – Go at him & Make him defend.” Mehmet Okur, Gordan Giricek and Jarron Collins also were not treated kindly.
But Sloan said he wouldn’t try to motivate his players with making the Kings eat their words. “I’m not into high school stuff,” Sloan said.
He added that the millions players make should be motivation enough. It shouldn’t come from a piece of paper mistakenly left behind by another team.
“That’s a sad commentary on our business, if that’s what it takes,” Sloan said.
Definitely not earth-shattering stuff – anyone who’s watched a Jazz game knows that Giricek and Okur probably couldn’t lock down half of the Dime office. But Boozer? He might not be a great defender either, but we kind of assume that he’ll kill the Sacramento front line tonight, even without any extra motivation.
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November 12th, 2007 at 1:19 pm
Philipp says:
Man, I thought you guys were over the xenophobia! Just calling out Okur and Giricek and defending Boozer, while not even mentioning Collins… We get it: Okur and Giricek are Europeans, so they are soft and bad defenders. Its nice when the world is simple like that… I still remember when you mentioned that one time when Okur didnt get up to defend one shot in the last minute for three consecutive articles on dime-online!
November 12th, 2007 at 2:23 pm
Bron42 says:
why are you arguing like okur and giricek ARENT soft? lol when have either one even been considered average defenders let alone good? so its not like anyone is takin shots at them by sayin their bad defenders. Its your basic high school scouting report.
November 12th, 2007 at 2:31 pm
Dime Magazine says:
Philipp –
Collins doesn’t even really play, so he’s not worth talking about. We’re not hating on the other two for not being from the U.S. It’s like Bron says here, anyone will tell you those two don’t guard anyone.
November 12th, 2007 at 3:42 pm
Amar says:
Bron and Dime — ask Yao Ming about Okurs defense . . . didn’t he get blocked by that soft euro who doesn’t play defense like 12 times in 7 games and had the ball stolen by him in single coverage 20 times?
November 12th, 2007 at 11:44 pm
Joseph says:
Yeah problem with that Amar is Okur used all his energy on defense. I watched that entire series and Okur did jack on offense until game seven because he was so worried about Yao on defense. It worked though between Okur hounding him on D and Boozer taking hit at him every. single. time. on offense. He was even practicing shooting over Collins holding up a broom before the series. Boozer has heart.
November 13th, 2007 at 12:37 am
buckets says:
plus..yao dont really got a beast mentality himself all the time
November 13th, 2007 at 4:37 am
Ak47 says:
What about Okur’s defense on TD last may?