TONY ALLEN on Kobe.....!

[Oldschoolkid]

Tony Allen is the guy who can do it. He is taller, more agile and more athletic than any other person at that position. He ALSO proved he can do it in the regular season.........At least rotate him in for 5 minutes at a time...Tony is so tall, they will have a hard time covering him, which will ruin LA's defense on Paul P, and or Ray A....Tony is 6'7".......Come on Doc, play the man.....Eddie house over Sam any day....Sam has his uses though...he is still a crafty, rugged veteran, but Eddie is the shot-man!!! They know they HAVE to cover Eddie. KG needs to see out of the double team the way Bird used too, make them pay for the double, but the free guy needs to move to the ball and help out also!!!! One more thing, Mark Jackson and the other announcers, except Jeff Van gundy are lakers fans all the way.......what happened to unbiased announcers....they used to call them professionals.....

[celticmaestro]

to tell you the god's honest truth, there's few things i'd rather see in game 4.

my only concern is: "is tony allen ready?"

i'd like to think so, eddie house proved he was ready when called upon, but tony's had injuries. i'd love to see him in there, but can't see it happening.

[MBz]

TA is barely 6'4 first off and I don't want to see him touch the floor. 

[Oldschoolkid]

okay, right 6'4".......all I am saying is TRY it......it worked before. No noe else is doing that great of a job on him...!

You guys falsly accuse TA of being the turnover king while you watch the other Celts do it just as much......I am not saying he is the point guard, he is a swing man, in this case it is about DEFENSE...remember that....! Ray Allen, well, first it is a waste for him to guard Kobe, too much work for our scoring production unit!!! Second....he might not be able to get up as high as he needs to...on a dime..! In for a rotation on Kobe, 5 minutes here and there, make kobe work.......and stop this micro-analysis of TA's game, he played darn good all year, and he should be in there becasue he can help us out, and for that reason only so don't misquote me. No noe plays for what they did, only what they can DO!!!

[connerhenry43]

the c's have guarded kobe fine. last night was rough, but even so, they still did a decent job on him. unless insane foul trouble or an injury happens, no need to see TA in this series.

[crownsy]

**** tony is 6'3 mabey 6'4 at best.

also, while he might be able to slow kobe down on defense, how are we accounting for him being mabey the worst offensive SG in celtics history again?

between him being cold, and being a horrid shooter/dribbler anyway, for every good play he is capable of were treated to such great TA hits as;

"I can't belive i dribbled the ball of my foot on a fast break again!"

"oh look, stripped yet again on my way to the paint!"

"Why can't i hit the rim with a jumpshot consitantly?"

"why do i often appear lost on offense?"

"Why do i fall for every pump fake from a good shooter?"

and, my personal favroite, and why your seeing zero trust in him these playoffs;

"why did i needlesly foul joe johnson on 2 three point attempts in two seprate games?"

also if your going to falsley accuse us of saying tony is a turnover machine, how bout some stats that prove  it isn't true?

oh wait, the stats say tony is easily the most TO prone player per possesion on the team...guess that won't be working out.

and gauding kobe is slowing ray down offensivly? huh? ray's shooting great, and in the first 2 games helped hold kobe to a terrable shooting precentage.

even last night, to no ones suprise, 12 of kobe's points came from the line. the "breath near him" and its a foul system was in full effect. i dread to think how fast tony would have picked up 3 fouls.

[celticmaestro]

and, my personal favroite, and why your seeing zero trust in him these playoffs;

"why did i needlesly foul joe johnson on 2 three point attempts in two seprate games?"

tp, that was funny.

if only we could say the same things about tony this season as last season. last season there would be no hesitation. shame.

[Roy Hobbs]

okay, right 6'4".......all I am saying is TRY it......it worked before. No noe else is doing that great of a job on him...!

You guys falsly accuse TA of being the turnover king while you watch the other Celts do it just as much......I am not saying he is the point guard, he is a swing man, in this case it is about DEFENSE...remember that....! Ray Allen, well, first it is a waste for him to guard Kobe, too much work for our scoring production unit!!! Second....he might not be able to get up as high as he needs to...on a dime..! In for a rotation on Kobe, 5 minutes here and there, make kobe work.......and stop this micro-analysis of TA's game, he played darn good all year, and he should be in there becasue he can help us out, and for that reason only so don't misquote me. No noe plays for what they did, only what they can DO!!!

As I posted elsewhere:

Well...

1) TA is the turnover king.  He averaged more turnovers per minute than any player on the team.

2) The team hasn't been effective with Tony in there in limited playoff time.  He has a negative +/- rating, meaning the team has been outscored with him in the game.

3) His defense has been terrible thus far in the post-season.  That's probably not all his fault, since he's extraordinarily rusty, but he has the larger PER differential on the team, and has an Opponent's PER of 26.0.  This isn't indicative of Tony's true ability, but again, he's too rusty to contribute much at this point.

I hear what you're saying, but I think at this point, it's too late.

[wdleehi]

Ray and Pierce have done as well as anyone against Kobe one on one.  (posey is a step slow)


The biggest issue is leaving kobe one on one inside the three point line at critical times.


And PJ being slow last night with the defensive rotation/help.

[Oldschoolkid]

As i said before, Tony did the job before and he can do it again, yee of little faith, also known as the exact same guy who jumped on my post about Leon Powe, promoting his playing time. I guess some guys here have a lot of talking experience but little playing experience, so i don't fault you for that, nothing we can do there! Also, if you held every C's player to the same standard, you would come up with the same results, mistakes, some costly, some not, you just overlook the guys you like, and jump on the one...you don't. Until you are again proven wrong. there are a lot of reasonable people here who have seen TA play and be effective, so stop the heresay. you don't like him, fine, that is your opinion, but do not take a run at me, this isn't the forum for that....I have seen a lot of C's make big mistakes and ones that look like they were sleeping, lazy passes, air balls, passes to no one, we don't record them. TA has played some great games, and has guarded kobe well before. It is also not the best thing to do to put one of your best offensive players on their best offensive players, great D wears a man out, and when guarding kobe, you need to be 100%, another reason to TA, if his offense is as you say, then he can better concentrate on D, deny Kobe the ball, ect.....so lighten up and keep it general.

[evrock]

the problem wasn't that Tony didn't play and guard Kobe.  the problem is that they let Kobe go STRAIGHT UP against Ray down the stretch!  Where was the trap or double-team!?!??

[Who]

Lakers defense has trouble once they allow penetration. Putting TA on the court next to the Big Three kills any chance of the Lakers being able to help on his drive, and probably gives him an open lane to start with. Tony could do important things offensively against this Lakers squad.

[CDawg834]

When it comes to turnover Tony, I think the stat to look at is not just the # of turnovers, but the A/TO ratio, comparing number of assists to number of turnovers.  Anyone handling the ball should have a higher number of turnovers, but should also have more assists to counter that.  During the season, TA was the only 1, 2, or 3 to have more turnovers than assists, which is unacceptable for a guard.  I left out the 4s and 5s as league-wide they have more TOs because they don't handle the ball. 

PP34 has a lot of turnovers, but he has more assists to help counter that, it shows the offense is going through him and is pretty effective.  But when TA has more turnovers than assists as a guard, it shows the offense is falling apart when he touches the ball.

To me, his inability to function in a team offense counteracts any defensive usefulness he has.

And stats and analysis aside, I HATE Tony and hope he never plays another game in New England unless it is for the Vermont Frost Heaves!

[Andy Jick]

i'd put tony in just to try it, but it would be a first-half experiment (when the damage could be less minimal).  if he played beside rondo and they decided to actually RUN it might be worth a shot.  this team needs a few easy baskets in transition, and tony could foul kobe and we're no worse for it.

but i really don't want him in there.

actually, i think lebron's been tougher this playoffs than kobe has thus far...

[CDawg834]

Game 4 of the Finals isn't really a good time to be experimenting.

And how many more posts do I need to get Sam Cassell out from under my name?!?!?!?