Stacey Lovelace Waived by Shock

Stacey Lovelace was waived by the Detroit Shock. I guess whatever was going on with Stacey was bigger than both teams. Lovelace would only play seven games with the Shock...and her player file page at WNBA.com has been pulled....

Not Vultures, but the Noble Order of "Coragyps atratus"

More info regarding the Houston Comets. Links provided by Rebkell posters.

Link one is from Fox 26 in Houston, so there's no guarantee how long it will stay up on the website. I'll quote:

HOUSTON -- WNBA President Donna Orender was in Houston last month meeting with Harris County Judge Ed Emmett and Houston Mayor Bill White to solicit their help in finding a new owner or ownership group for the Houston Comets.

"We are told they are seeking a change of ownership and they would like us to help them find a person, or a group of persons, to take over ownership of the team," said Emmett in an interview with FOX 26 Sports.

Mayor White concurs.

"We will be looking for some new local ownership of that team and that's what she wanted to talk about." White said.

Mayor Bill White of Houston has confirmed that the WNBA is now operating the Houston franchise.

Link two is from the Houston Roundball Review. From the article, the writer says sources have told Kris Gardner that there are two groups in Dallas that want to purchase the Comets and move them to Dallas.

Link three is from the Houston Chronicle. It is the only link with comments, some poignant, some smart, some douchebag.

Here are what the options are for Houston.

1. The WNBA remains in control of Houston. This is not a good idea. As a part-time baseball fan, I remember when Major League Baseball took control of the Montreal Expos for a while. As the General Manager of a WNBA-operated team, you're very restricted. The WNBA will want to keep expenses down and will forbid you from acquiring any costly player whose salary the WNBA'll have to pay. Furthemore, every other GM will call the WNBA and ask, "why should player X be trapped in Houston when I can trade player Y who is "just as good" and I can aquire player X for my own team?"

Houston would become a dumping ground for the WNBA. I'm sure Bill Laimbeer has Donna Orender on speed dial with his hand poised above the button. Meanwhile, the team would move sooner or later and Houston fans would be treated to some awful B-ball from a lame duck franchise.

2. The team finds another owner in Houston. The best option. However, if this owner doesn't have deep pockets - one Rebkell poster wrote "(T)eams can not operate with millionaires as owners. You need multi-millionaires...." - we could have the same problem two or three years down the line.

3. The team finds another owner elsewhere. The team moves. We have the Dallas Comets. Or the Baltimore Comets. Or the San Francisco Comets. Or the Tulsa Comets. Hey, Utah relocated to San Antonio and that seemed to have worked out quite well. Orlando's relocation worked well, too.

4. The team folds and is disbanded. There is another dispersal draft. However, given the weaknesses of the teams in the Eastern Conference, my suggestion would be that either a) the Comets be merged with the Dream, or b) the dispersal be limited to the non-playoff teams.

It's too early in the game to say how things will turn out. Houston was sort of the #1 candidate for the kind of team that would face financial trouble. I knew that Hilton Koch was in trouble in Houston. I remember reporting about some member of the staff who had not been paid. The team blogger sort of disappeared. They were not just running Houston on a shoestring, they were running it on an aglet (you can look it up).

However, given that this blog loves to play with statistics and given that we also like to speculate, let's assume option #4 is in effect. Houston has a dispersal draft. Who should the Atlanta Dream take, given that they have first pick?

Here is the Houston Comets in order of descending Wins Score:

1. Sancho Lyttle - 184.5
2. Michelle Snow - 183.5
3. Tina Thompson - 105
4. Shannon Johnson - 79.5
5. Hamechetou Maiga-Ba - 56.5
6. Roneeka Hodges - 35
7. Mistie Williams - 26.5
8. Erica White - 17.5
9. Tamecka Dixon - 14
10. Latasha Byears - 4
11. Sequoia Holmes - 3.5
12. Mwadi Mabika - 0.5
13. Marcedes Walker - minus 2.5
14. Ashley Shields - minus 8
15. Matee Ajavon - minus 8.5

So it seems that the players to grab are either Sancho Lyttle or Michelle Snow. Myself, I'd take Snow. Snow produces more points and furthermore, she's a Tennessee alum. Although that means more orange jerseys at Philips Arena. Ugh.

Houston Comets Now Without an Owner?

From Rebkell at this link.

Dear Comets fans and supporters,

As you may have heard, the WNBA, Mayor Bill White and I are working diligently to find a new owner or ownership group for the Houston Comets. I wanted to take this moment to express my sincere gratitude at having had the opportunity to be an integral part of this storied franchise and thank you for the continued support that has made the Comets such an integral part of the wonderful Houston community.

As a longtime Comets fan and season-ticket holder, I understand and appreciate the significance of this team to the city of Houston and the WNBA. Since the league’s 1997 tip-off, the Comets have been core to the exponential growth of women’s basketball. By winning the WNBA’s first four titles, the team established itself as one of professional sports’ great modern dynasties and became a point of civic pride for Houston.

The fact that the energy, passion and commitment of Houston’s tremendous fan base no doubt ignited much of this success is something I was keenly aware of prior to purchasing the club. My tenure as owner has only served to enhance my longstanding admiration for the extraordinary atmosphere that takes over the stands at Comets games.

As we work to find an owner that will uphold the Comets’ tradition and guide this organization to great heights once again, please be assured that absolutely nothing about the experience of attending Comets games will change. The team is in the midst of a winning season and will be back home after the Olympic break to deliver more thrilling basketball action. Your support to date has led to an 11-2 home record, the second best such mark in the WNBA. The players will be counting on your energy and passion to help them secure a playoff berth.

Thank you for all the support that you have given the Comets before and during my tenure. My experience owning this team has been a great thrill, and I will continue to sit alongside you in the stands and cheer on our team.

Sincerely,

Hilton Koch

More on this as it develops.

Put a Milo on Her

For those who don't care about baseball, there's a book called Moneyball, written by Michael M. Lewis, which tells the story of how Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane turned to statistical analysis to turn the A's around for pennies on the dollar.

However, some of Beane's decisions had nothing to do with statistics. The book takes the reader inside the Oakland A's draft process. Beane and his staff have to sort through literally hundreds of players, speaking with scouts and making analytical decisions.

But before a single slide rule is touched, we learn about Milo. Milo was a former administrative employee of the Oakland A's who would just say the most horrible things to people and got on everyone's nerves. (He once told a new employee, as a way of greeting, "I was against hiring you.") He gained such a reputation that the name "Milo" was synonymous with someone socially maladjusted.

The Athletics draft board was a large magnetic board with hundreds of names attached. When researching the backgrounds of these players, Beane would find psychological red flags. Some had histories of problems with drugs or the law. Some had "all Fs" in college. Some were "god-squadders", people excessively preoccupied with religion. Some players were revealed to have zero scores in ambition or competitiveness on the primitive psych metrics the A's used.

Whenever Beane heard something that disturbed him, he said, "Put a Milo on him."

At that moment, a magnetic sticker with a picture of ex-Athletics employee Milo was placed next to that player's name on the board. No matter what the player's talent, that player was immediately removed from consideration. For a young player hoping to become a pro, to have a Milo put on you was a potential death sentence from the Athletics. Instead of 30 teams looking to sign you, there would now be 29.

Beane's reasoning was that small, weak franchises could not afford to have the development of players derailed by outside issues. With only so much money to spend, the Athletics had no time to invest in psychological or behavior correction - the choices of the Athletics had to pay off immediately. A club like the Yankees could afford to spend the money or wait for someone to get their head sorted out, but not the A's.

I think the above is true also with poor teams. The "head" of a player is not taken into account when drafting or acquiring players. It's a real risk to spend one's time and energy on a basket case, particularly if you have a sub-.500 record. No coach of a struggling team should be worrying about whether or not a particular player is going to "show up" mentally.

The comment about whether Courtney Paris wanted to play in the WNBA or not was what prompted this post. I don't believe that's the case about Courtney; in fact, everything I've read about Paris suggests that she wants to take her game to greater and greater levels. If this was something she had said, as an imaginary GM it might make me want to pass on her during the draft. (However, there is no proof that she's said such a thing. - Pet)

The Atlanta Dream has a couple of players I'm concerned about. One is Izi Castro Marques. Her meltdown in Madrid was shocking, and it almost cost the Brazilian national team a spot in the Olympics. Of course, we don't know the whole story about the animosity between Paul Bassul and Izi, but Izi should be controlled enough to keep her personal issues off the basketball court.

The other is Betty Lennox. Lennox and Meadors have clashed, and those clashes have made the press. Clearly, they don't see eye to eye, but if there are differing points of view, they shouldn't be reported to the press.

As the newest WNBA franchise, it's important that we make sure that we don't have any future Milos on the Dream. I'm not saying that everyone on the Dream has to have a perfect mental makeup. However, if Coach Meadors is reading this, I have a polite suggestion -- Coach Meadors, when you're evaluating talent for the 2009 Draft, and you hear stories about a senior college player clashing with coaches, or the law, or if you hear that a player's heart might not be in the game at all times, don't try to fix those things yourself.

Put a Milo on her. We'll take the basket cases after we have a WNBA Championship behind us.

2008-09 - The Best Senior Prospects

I've now concluded my analysis of the current Division I women's basketball prospects. All of these women will be seniors during the 2008-09 season. For blog readers which may be math-phobic, you might want to skip down to the very end where the players are actually named.

Why do an analysis?

Good question. The point is basically to try to determine which players deserve a closer look.

Whenever someone who likes statistics creates a ranked list, contention is the outcome. "How dare you claim that Player X is #16 when it's plain that X is better than Player Y who is #6?"

The goal is to look both with the eyes and with the stats. Your eyes can actually fool you as much as statistics can. In order to really know which players are the best, you would have to watch each of the named players for the entire college season. This is impossible for all but maybe a handful of reporters, and even they can only watch so many players in the day. Statistics do two things:

a) they isolate players that have distinguished themselves in some way in the boxscores and,
b) they point to a player's flaws as well as a player's strengths.

The Starting Point

I began with Hollinger’s idea that blocks, steals, rebounds, and three point shooting were important in a prospect. I determined that we should look at NCAA Division I players who were juniors in the 2007-08 season. Only players who were in the Top 100 players in any of the four categories indicated above should be considered. This left me with 108 players to look at, and I was able to locate statistics for 105 of those players. (Florida A & M and St. Mary’s (California), I’m pointing the finger at you.)

Ashley Paris, sister of Courtney Paris, was mentioned in a previous comment, so I added her to my list. As my attention is drawn to other players, I'll add them to my analysis.

Blocks, Forwards, Rebounds

One expects forwards and centers to be able to get rebounds, with guards at a disadvantage. All players should be able to get steals, with guards (being more agile and quick) having the best shot. Three point shooting would be primarily a guard skill.

I decided that the scale for blocks, steals, and rebounds would be linear. It would be based on number of blocks per game, steals per game, and rebounds per game. A good player should be good in all of these defensive skills at the college level. Therefore, these three factors were multiplied together. Ed Weiland has a stat called RSB40, which he uses as a multiplicative factor so I feel that I'm on the right track.

This decision hurts guards – because we don’t expect them to rebound - but the guards get a chance to be rewarded later.

Furthermore, the factor for steals was doubled. Hollinger weighted steals more heavily than any other factor in his analysis, and the numbers that come out at the end match up with “common sense” when I make the same decision.

The problem is that at some point in the analysis, you have to decide what number of blocks, steals, or rebounds per game corresponds to a factor = 1.0. Looking over the top 100 finishers in these categories, I made the following decisions:

1.5 blocks per game = factor of 1.0
2.2 steals per game = factor of 2.0 (remember, the factor for steals is doubled)
8.1 rebounds per game = factor of 1.0.

If you want different results, set different factors. I'm going to stand on these values, which would be pretty impressive if they were per-game.

Three-point Shooting

We ranked players by percentage, not by number of shots made. 0.343 percentage = 1.00 factor. Players were required to make at least an average of two three-pointers a game to sort out those people with high three-point shooting but low numbers of baskets – if they didn’t meet the average qualification, they got a zero factor.

Age

The age of players is definitely important, because older players are closer to their peaks. The youngest player among the candidates had a 11/18/1987 birthday. I began penalizing players who had birthdates before 11/18/1986. A person born a quarter of a year before that date would have 0.25 removed from the final score; a person born on 11/18/85 would have 1.0 removed from the final score. A player closer to their eventual peak should be devalued.

For some players, I was not able to find their ages. Those players were not penalized in the system. There was one player who was born in “January 1987”, I assigned her a birthdate of 1/15/87. She didn't suffer any age penalty according to my current rules.

Wins Efficiency

Certainly, we should reward players who can score, but by how much? There are so many metrics like PER and Efficiency. I don’t agree with “Efficiency” because I believe it overvalues crappy shooting. I therefore used the “Wins Score” metric, but divided it by Games Played – Wins Score is not divided by Games Played – to create a more Efficiency-like metric called “Wins Efficiency”. I divided the final Wins Efficiency results by 10 to award points. A player with a score of 10 in “Wins Efficiency” gets 1.00 point.

WPPR

This is a variation on Hollinger’s Pure Point Rating. The problem with Pure Point Rating is that if you apply the formula to WNBA players, they have terrible values. The reason is because in the NBA, the average team’s amount of turnovers is 2/3 of the amount of its assists. In the WNBA, players turn the ball over more and for an average team, turnovers and assists are equal. I simply removed the 2/3 multiplicative factor from Hollinger’s formula. In the NBA, assist/turnover ratio is misleading as to a player’s true value as a guard; in the WNBA assist/turnover ratio is more accurate.

My variation – WPPR – rewards players who have more assists than turnovers. A good guard will have a high WPPR and all players are rewarded 1/5 of their WPPR if the value is positive. In general, this decision rewards guards and punishes forwards and centers (who have more turnovers than assists), but the best forwards and centers at the college level can avoid turnovers. Still, they’ll have a negative number. If a forward or center has a negative WPPR, 1/10th of the WPPR is removed from the final score.

However, a guard who has a negative WPPR in the women’s game is someone whom one should be wary of. If a guard has a negative WPPR, 1/5th of the WPPR is removed from the final score.

50-50 players

Fifty-fifty players are players who have 50 blocks and 50 steals in a season in the men’s college games turn out to be excellent college players, according to Hollinger. Players are given a special 1.00 factor bonus for meeting this benchmark. Only two players qualify for this benchmark in the 2007-08 season: Demetress Adams of South Carolina and Jessica Bobbitt of Belmont. This is an additive factor, so no one is penalized for not reaching the mark. (Except for maybe Chante Black of Duke, who missed the 50-50 mark by one steal. I decided not to give her the point; your mileage may very.)

Conference Strength

Players were rewarded for playing against good teams and punished for playing against bad teams. The final score is multiplied by a factor equivalent to the strength of their conference. Conference strengths are determined by Jeff Sagarin’s ratings for women’s NCAA basketball. The central mean method was used, with the Big Twelve’s 86.55 rating converted to a 1.00 factor, and partial ratings converted linearly.

Final Factor

Equals:

blocked factor*steals factors (which is x2) * rebounds factor
plus three point factor
plus age factor (negative for older players)
plus Wins Efficiency factor
plus PPR factor
plus 50-50 factor….

all multiplied by conference strength factor.

Known Flaws

Hollinger points to several "red flags" that might disqualify a player. One of the flaws is the flaw of a player not receiving a certain number of rebounds per height. Hollinger states that "a player in the X range of height should receive at least Y rebounds per game". I wasn't able to do create these height categories because I don't have enough information about the range of heights in the NBA (and WNBA) to determine the appropriate cutoff points.

Furthermore, schools play at many different "paces". The word "pace" has a specific meaning in the APBRmetric community. I was not able to obtain this information and was not willing to calculate it for, oh, about 300 schools. Maybe someday, there will be a master women's college database. Until then, the speed at which schools play, the number of possessions per team, etc. is not taken into account.

(* * *)

So who are the leaders after all this number crunching? Lets look at the top twenty overall players:

Top Twenty Overall Players



We have Courtney Paris of Oklahoma as number one, and that's a good start. I'd expect Angel McCoughtry to be number two, but she ends up as #8 on the metric. However, Kristi Toliver at #2 should be no surprise.

I wonder if my formula gives too much credit to guards. Then again, I have approximately 20 centers, 30 forwards and fifty guards on my list so I shouldn't be surprised that guards are overrepresented. I would say the only surprises are Kristi Cirone of Illinois State and Jenna Schone of Miami of Ohio, both from small schools.

Top Ten Centers



I'm very surprised that the quality of centers drops of quickly after Courtney Paris. I don't know if centers get short shrift for having low WPPR or for the fact that most of the centers in women's college basketball don't seem to produce a lot of Wins Efficiency.

Top Twenty Forwards



Forwards also drop off quickly, although not as quickly as centers do. There are four good forwards to be had early in the draft. Most of the good centers come from the big schools.

Top Twenty Guards



Guards are the quality position in the metric. Even down at the twentieth position, there are decent guards. Furthermore, the small schools (Tiera DeLaHoussay at Western Michigan, Shantia Grace at South Florida) provide a large number of great guards. If you want to sneak up on someone in the draft, you can probably get a quality guard from an overlooked school.

I also wondered if guards are the prime position for players to make their presence known in women's basketball. The talent level at the women's college game is thinner than in the men's game, and it's more likely that tall (but not truly athletic) women have been pushed into the post positions in high school.

(* * *)

I'll try to keep this list updated, and to have the senior stats analyzed at the end of the 2009 season. Oddly enough, Hollinger says that good NBA players have a decrease in their statistics between their junior and senior years. So if one of your favorite juniors has a bad year...well, don't lose hope. And if one of your favorite juniors isn't ranked high on my list...well, 2008-09 has the power to change everything.

When Talent Overwhelms Necessity

Generally, there's a consensus as to who the number one pick of a draft in any year should be. Most of the draft touts who write about the NBA, or the NFL, or even the WNBA are pretty much in agreement about who the first handful of picks should be in any given year. There's a general consensus as to who the #1 pick should be, a slightly smaller consensus as to who #2 should be, and everyone's draft list differs beyond that spot.

If it were just as simple as teams choosing the best players available when their turns come up, predicting a draft would be easy. What makes draft predictions so hard is that teams have needs beyond talent. A team might already have talent at one position, but be lacking in another. If a team has two strong forwards, they won't be looking for another forward; rather, they'll be looking at the best of the guards still on the draft board. A team has to fit specific needs when drafting. Necessity is the mother of the draft.

There is, however, an exception. The exception is when one of the remaining players is so head and shoulders in talent above the rest that you should draft that player regardless of position. In the case of the team with the two forwards above, a undrafted forward might be playing at a level above the undrafted guards. In which case you draft the forward, and then decide who is going to get traded for a guard down the line or who can shift positions to make place for the new player.

Making matters more complicated for the Atlanta Dream is that if the magic ping-pong balls bounce the right way, Atlanta will get the first pick in the 2009 WNBA draft. In which case they'll have to answer their ultimate question, "draft for talent or draft for necessity?"

Here's how I see the Atlanta Dream vis-a-vis positions:

guard: not much of a need
center: we might be able to make do with Bales and Feenstra
forward: a clear need.

Therefore, Coach Meadors has to be thinking: "go with the best forward in the draft". I've been doing my preliminary analysis (to be printed tomorrow) and right now, I have the best forward as being Angel McCoughtry out of Louisville. The problem is, McCoughtry is the best forward but not the best player. That player, according to preliminary analysis, is Courtney Paris, a center out of Oklahoma.

So who does Meadors take? Paris, or McCoughtry?

The answer to that question is, "is Paris substantially better than McCoughtry?" Right now, my answer is "yes", Paris is just enough better than McCoughtry for the Dream to take Paris as the #1 pick if they get the chance. That will probably mean that Bales will stay as backup and poor Katie Feenstra will have to pack up her bags and go.

Where, oh where, will poor Kit go? And what kind of a forward could we get for Feenstra? Any takers?

"Dirty Girl! Dirty Dirty Dirty!"

It appears that the Australians are pegging the U. S. Team as "dirty players".

"We're used to playing against teams that are going to beat the crap out of us, because we are so good," said (Australian player Lauren) Jackson.

"People have to stop us somehow and that's the way they're going to stop us. People like Penny and myself and Belinda Snell you just can't let go to the basket because we'll kill people.

"So they're going to really stop us anyway that they can. And generally that's when black eyes and broken bones occur."

However, the U.S. players were unimpressed, choosing not to fan the flames before their opening game against the Czech Republic.

"Okay -- whatever!" shrugged American veteran Lisa Leslie, who will be attempting to win a fourth Olympic gold medal. "We gotta go get gold. Whatever it takes."

That was probably the best way to answer this criticism. I still remember this picture:



Hard to complain that your opponents aren't playing by Marquis of Queensbury rules when you've spent extended amounts of time marching around in army fatigues.

The Slow Down Time of No Basketball

Well, it's hard to drum up talk about the Dream. Everyone, even the players is on vacation. There's no Olympic basketball until about four days from now: I don't count FIBA's Diamond tournament or whatever they call it. I don't even have a basketball schedule for Georgia Tech yet.

So what am I doing? I'm trying to work on a statistical analysis similar to the kind Q does over at Rethinking Basketball. I want to analyze the current-junior-soon-to-be-senior college class in Women's Basketball and try to determine who will be the hot picks in the 2009 WNBA Draft. However, this involves looking up and imputting statistics for over 100 prospects. I'm about 35-40 percent done. After that, I have to assign how much weight to give to each of the numbers.
(Hm, maybe I should send this to Q for his critique afterwards.)

I also had the idea of writing a work of fiction where the 1981-82 Los Angeles Lakers (at their current ages, as middle-aged men) take on the 2007 Phoenix Mercury in a "Battle of the Sexes" like the Billie Jean King-Bobby Riggs match. Unfortunately, it seems to involve too much research. I know where some of the 81-82 Lakers have ended up, but I don't know enough about their personalities or their current health statuses to make it interesting. Another project down the tubes.

When I get new news or new ideas, trust me, I'll let ya know.

The Petrel Memorial Hardwood Court

From the International Herald Tribune:

The WNBA is giving away a basketball court.

Fans in six of the league's cities will have a chance to win a new court for their town through a contest in which they will compete in various timed drills that will test fundamental basketball skills.

The competition, which will promote healthy competition, sportsmanship and team spirit, is set to begin on Tuesday and will run through Aug. 26 in Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Houston, Sacramento and Washington. WNBA players will be on-hand to lead the basketball drills during the competitions.

A great way to get the WNBA's name in the local paper. (Although I suspect the angrydumbjock.com crowd would go "Oh no! Cooties!" if they ever stepped on such hardwood.)

Atlanta Dream 2009: Who Stays, Who Goes?

It's time to start firing up the grill.

With only seven games left in the season and the Dream pretty much mathematically eliminated from the playoffs, everyone turns in different directions. For the players on the Dream, it's about establishing personal marks. For the coaches, it's about evaluating the talent. And for fans, it's thinking about next year and fashioning the 2009 Dream Team in one's mind.

So here's my take on the Dream for next year, including which players by all rights should be a part of next year's team ("KEEP") and which players should think about life with the next WNBA expansion team. ("PASS")

Alison Bales - KEEP. The Alison Bales for Kristen Mann trade was Atlanta's best trade of the year. Both players have gone in opposite directions, with Mann becoming one component out of several in Indiana. Bales is getting more minutes than ever in her second year, is ranked seventh in blocks per game and third in defensive rebounds per 40 minutes. She might not be the player you'd build a franchise around, but Coach Marynell Meadors will have one fewer center to look for next year.

Ivory Latta - KEEP. Betty Lennox might be the playmaker, but Latta is the face of the franchise. It's a no brainer. Granted, Latta has not been a top ten player (except in three point goals and attempts) but this is Latta's first full-time year and her game can only get better. Furthermore, her ebullient personality makes her the Dream's spokesperson on and off the court.

Betty Lennox - KEEP. It's hard to be a leader, and Betty Lennox has learned that this year by enduring a 17 game losing streak. The downsides about Betty are her turnovers and her moodiness. Her comments about her relationship with Coach Meadors are cause for concern, but Lennox has to know that the team will be better next year than it is this year. As for the turnovers, a better Dream team means that Lennox won't see as many double (or triple) teams in 2009.

Katie Feenstra - KEEP. I'm sure a lot of posters at the Atlanta Dream Message Board have now fallen off their chairs - Kit has been a recepient of abuse all year. However, much of it is undeserving. Does she deserve to be starting center? The answer is no; having Bales has almost made us forget about Feenstra's perpetual struggles. Is Kit a better than average player? Yes. Can she play a role in backing up Bales? Yes. Feenstra will never be your starter, but she's too good to throw away. (And please, Coach Meadors, give up that dream of the "Twin Towers" and stop putting Kit and Alison on the floor at the same time.)

Kristin Haynie - KEEP. Haynie's career has been one of hot and cold. She's good for a few points per game, plays decent defense, but she turns the ball over too much to be a starting guard - we already have Lennox in the "turnover" slot. Latta took the starting role away from Haynie and it's not coming back any time soon. However, Lennox and Latta need someone who can back them up during a game. Haynie can give you a decent 14 minutes.

Erika de Souza - KEEP. If we were grading on a report card, we'd have to give De Souza a ladies' "C". She's simply not participated enough due to health issues. However, she's coming into her prime as a player, and the flashes of brilliance while Erika has been healthy reveal a player simply too gifted to toss on the discard pile.

Tamera Young - KEEP. Some rookies are instant stars. Others are long term projects, and it looks like Young is going to be the latter. Her 32.5 percent field goal percentage is ice cold, and that has to change if she's going to have any kind of future in the WNBA. She should consider herself lucky that she's playing on such a bad team; she'd be buried in the background on any decent team. However, she's revealed both endurance and the ability to get the offensive rebound.

Kasha Terry - PASS. Kasha Terry was a free agent acquisition, and now we know why she was left on the discard pile by Indiana. Too many turnovers and personal fouls might doom Terry to be one of those "have-height-will-travel" kind of players. She only shoots 55 percent from the free throw line, limiting Kasha's usefulness to the first three quarters of a game.

Ann Strother - PASS. Why do I suspect that Ann Strother will be wearing someone else's uniform in 2009? Fans have decried Strother's limited use, but I suspect they just like the cute blond player. She shoots 35 percent from the field, 71 percent from the free throw line, and generally averages more personal fouls than assists or steals in a game. Hasn't broken the 10 point mark this year. If there was any time for Strother to have a break-out year, this was it. It didn't happen.

Jennifer Lacy - PASS. Yes, we all like Jennifer Lacy, but Lacy has the power to inexplicably...disappear during games. When Betty Lennox scores one point in 20 minutes, that's a very bad day for Lennox. But when Jennifer Lacy scores one point in 20 minutes, it seems to be par for the course. Lacy is another abysmal free throw shooter (66 percent) and picks up an average of three personal fouls in the two quarters she plays during a game. She might be a leader in the locker room, but "transcendent talent" and "Jennifer Lacy" will never be used in a sentence together while Lacy is in the WNBA.

Iziane Castro Marques - PASS. It's been an awful year for Izi. She's been thrown off the Brazilian Olympic team, and she's lost her shooting touch. With the Storm, she was a great shooter but in Atlanta she's completely lost her confidence. Yes, Coach Marynell Meadors likes Izi a lot, but Meadors liked Kit a lot too -- and you don't see Kit starting many games right now, do you? Yet Izi inexplicably starts. Coach, Izi ain't coming out of the slump and between Betty and Izi, the team only needs one playmaker. Trade Izi.

Chioma Nnamaka - PASS. If you ain't gonna play her, send her someplace else. But if she can't get on with a team as limited as the Dream, we might be seeing Nnamaka's final year in the WNBA.

Marynell Meadors - KEEP. By now, the more rabid fans are heading for the pitchforks and burning torches. But frankly, this is not a very good team. I agree with Josh Bagriansky at Score Atlanta: if I were giving out grades, no one on this team, not even Latta or Lennox deserve an "A". This, sadly enough, is exactly the kind of team that goes 3-24. Meadors gets big points in acquiring Bales; loses points in hanging with Kit and Izi too long.

As they say, "You can't shine manure." And WNBA watchers and Dream fans blame Meadors for not rubbing vigorously enough, it seems. Meadors tried to get us Ann Wauters, but that was a chimeric hope. Yelena Leuchanka never showed up, Erika got hurt, and Meadors just had to make do and try to squeeze lemons into lemonade. Camille Little and Stacey Lovelace performing disappearing acts on the Dream sure didn't help Meadors any. When you're 3-24, no one is your friend.

Let's wait until the offseason, and see what Trader Meadors does in turns of drafting and acquisitions. If there are a lot of mistakes, bad trades, etc., then we can began firing up "Old Sparky" and look for a coach who wants a real challenge. But until that day comes, I'll stick with Meadors.

W and the W

An article in the Austin American-Statesman features CBS Radio's Mark Knoller, who made a detailed record of how George W. Bush has spent his seven-plus years in office. What I found odd is that the WNBA gets a mention.

In June 2008, Knoller left himself a note about the scene at an East Garden reception for the WNBA champ Phoenix Mercury: "The usual comments about their achievement and commitment to community programs. But Bush lingers some 16 minutes after the ceremony, schmoozing and chatting. Unusual. A sign of a lame duck with not much on his plate, perhaps."

Could be. Either that, or he likes women's basketball. It's been long rumored that Bush wants to be commissioner of baseball after he retires from office. But maybe W will be commissioner of the W....

The WNBA En Vacance

One of my favorite blogs is the Pass the Ball blog run by the Washington Mystics.

I've seen lots of player blogs, but they tend to be dehumanized. The player is simply too aware that their words will be read for public consumption, and they tend to be guarded. At Pass the Ball, however, the players aren't required to provide a lot of information (which loosens up the pressure, certainly) and you get a lot of little trivia that really humanizes the players. I like to read minor things like what toothpaste a player uses -- "hey! I use that toothpaste!" -- and it's nice to know what players are doing during the break.

Some blog entries of interest....

Crystal Langhorne

The highlight of this break is coming up this weekend, the last part of my break. Harp, Kristi Toliver, and Jade Perry are taking a nice weekend getaway. We're heading to Atlantic City tomorrow, we're going to do a little shopping, head to the beach, and probably squeeze in some good food there too. Then I might do a little gambling. I don't really like wasting my money so I think I'm only going to put up 20 to use on that. Of course we will go out somewhere that night. Then on Saturday, we're heading to Harp's house in Philly to a big get together her mom is having for her. After that we're going to get a hotel and go out once again. So I'm really excited about this weekend it should be a really good time.

Monique Currie

So I do get a few days to get away and relax and what a better place to go than to Miami! It will be a mini Duke reunion because Alana Beard and Iciss Tillis will be there as well. It’s not such a big deal that Alana is there because I am lucky enough to see her pretty much everyday but when you throw Iciss in the mix, the three of us really know how to have a good time. I’m sure a lot of memories will be made down there. I look forward to telling you all about them! I’m hoping to wake up early in the mornings and run along the beach while the sun is setting… but I doubt very seriously that that will actually happen though. It really does sound good though.

Currie's July 29th blog entry also talks about her failing a test to get her expired license reinstated, and about how she plans to deal with "fresh meat" Crystal Langhorne later on. Langhorne will learn not to diss her fellow bloggers....

Back From Vacation

In sunny Las Vegas. More like "hot and extremely humid Las Vegas". I slept 11 hours when I got home last night.

You would never guess who I met at the airport. Jerry Finkbeiner, the head coach of the women's basketball program at Oral Roberts University. Finkbeiner has been very successful at ORU; he made it to the first round of the NCAA Women's Tournament. Unfortunately, his team was assigned Tennessee in the opening round. You can guess how far ORU advanced.

So what was Finkbeiner doing in Vegas, of all places? Apparently, they were holding some tournament in Las Vegas for under-18 players. (I thought I saw a few of them at the hotels.) Finkbeiner was recruiting. Given ORU's success in women's b-ball, I'm sure the casinos don't want him near the tables -- Finkbeiner has a record of beating the odds against him.

Extremistan

It was Q over at Rethinking Basketball who introduced me to the work of The Arbitarian, who is one of a small but dedicated network of NBA (and by extension, WNBA) stat grinders.

He introduced something called the "playing style spectrum". The formulas are at the link above. They are simple formulas -- nothing more than simple division -- but the explanation is a bit long.

What's the idea? The idea is to assign three numbers to every player....

Scorer index: Determines how much a player specializes in points and field goal attempts
Perimeter index: Determines how much a player specializes in assists and steals
Interior index: Determines how much a player specializes in blocked shots and rebounds

I then applied the score to all players with more than 10 minutes per game playing time in the WNBA. Let's take a look at the players on the Dream. An important note is that a high number for a player does not mean that they are the "best in the WNBA", but rather that a high portion of their individual game rests in one of the three areas above.

Betty Lennox (0.91, 0.45, 0.2)

It's what we think. A high degree of Lennox's value comes from scoring, but the middle number is good - she can also handle the ball.

Ivory Latta (0.78, 0.84, 0.03)

Latta is not just a shooter, but a point guard who can work the perimeter and handle the ball. Her interior game, however, is nonexistent...but we don't expect Ivory to get rebounds.

Tamera Young (0.59, 0.4, 0.59)

Young is the type of player who can do several things well in the time she gets.

Iziane Castro Marques (0.99, 0.46, 0.09)

Izi's game is more heavily related to scoring even than Betty Lennox's is. Like Betty, she's also good at handling the ball and lousy at the boards.

Jennifer Lacy (0.79, 0.21, 0.50)

For someone who is a forward-center, Jennifer seems to concentrate on scoring points more. My guess is that either a) Jennifer has been forced to rely more on shooting due to the need to come back from losses, or b) the presence of other shot blockers has allowed Lacy to be more agressive with scoring. Then again, her numbers might have always been like this.

Katie Feenstra (0.22, 0.01, 0.98)

Not much of a scorer, and as that 0.01 indicates, a lousy ball handler with only 10 assists and 3 steals all year. Her game is a big woman's game. But does that 0.98 mean that her game depends more on blocked shots and rebounds than anyone else on the Atlanta Dream?

Kasha Terry (0.31, 0.16, 0.88)

A bit more of a scorer than Kit is.

Alison Bales (0.05, 0.11, 0.99)

Holy moley. Bales personal game comes almost entirely from her ability to block shots and get rebounds.

Erika DeSouza (0.13, 0.04, 0.97)

Again, another pure shot blocker and rebounder.

(* * *)

So what does this mean? It means we have a lot of players on the Dream that have "extreme" games. Lennox and Castro Marques are extreme scorers. You give them the ball, and they're going to take a shot with it, offense be damned. They like to create their own offenses. How good they are at doing that is a matter of debate, given Castro Marques's streakiness and Lennox's tendency to turn over the ball. If you have a pure scorer, you want someone who can hit what she's aiming at and not turn over the ball.

Let's look at Cappie Pondexter's triple of (0.96, 0.6, 0.06). She's sort of like Betty Lennox and Izi Castro Marques. Cappie is also a "shoot first" kind of player. However, she hits 41 percent of her shots, compared to the 35 percent that Izi hits. She's also only turned the ball over 62 times, compared to Betty Lennox's 100.

Let's also look at Feenstra, Terry, Bales and DeSouza. They rebound. They block shots. But for the most part, that's all they do, particularly Alison Bales. Granted, Bales does it very well - in Wins Score, Bales has the highest value of any player on the Dream, even Ivory Latta or Betty Lennox! However, aside from Terry, Bales, Feenstra and DeSouza are all one-dimensional. On the offensive end, they can set screens or get the offensive rebound, but other teams know that Bales or Feenstra won't be given the ball to score (heck, if Izi or Lennox is on the floor, it's a much better idea to double team the lead shooters). Compare their triples with Lisa Leslie's (0.33, 0.26, 0.82). Leslie's game depends a lot on getting those rebounds and shot blocking, but not to the extent of the big women on the dream. Defenses still have to worry that Leslie will score with the ball.

So why is this post called "Extremistan"? If you look at other teams than the Dream, players don't seem to be clustered up at one end or the other of the spectrum as much as the players on the Dream. The Dream is a bit more predictable in their individual games than players from other teams. That makes it easy to build defenses around what the Dream can do offensively, and vice versa.

So THAT's Who "Headband Girl" Is!!

Well no. Just kidding.

Interesting blog entry on how not to behave at a Dream autograph session.

Excerpt:

I was a total mess, and playing way too much, including telling Katie Feenstra she spelled her name wrong on my t-shirt, trying to get Ivory Latta to not hate the autograph-signing thing she was probably forced to do, telling Kristen Hainey that I told Katie Feenstra she signed her name wrong and then asking when I would be able to get a jersey with her (Hainey, not Feenstra’s) number on it (nice touch, huh? and, OH! I did this WHILE Betty Lenox is signing my jersey on my back- so OBVIOUSLY I was putting my big fat butt right on the table in her face....

2008/27 - Liberty 86, Dream 76

(After this post, it might be some time before an update. As the WNBA goes on vacation, so do my wife and I! Four days in sunny Las Vegas!)

I knew this was going to be a tough game going in. I had the Liberty as the second best team in the WNBA before this game, and I figured we'd probably lose this game by about eight points. We lost by ten, because the wheels fell off the bus in the final quarter. Despite the fact that this was our fifth straight loss, I think we can take some good away from it. We kept up with New York for three quarters -- yeah, New York was playing like crap but so were we, and we could still hang with the best. The problem was that New York had Janel McCarville. We didn't. End of discussion.

My thoughts and observations and explanations:

1) When I got to the arena, I notice that there was a three-point arc of white tape just within the standard three point boundaries. The guys at Philips Arena removed the tape arc before game time. What was that all about? The only thing I could think of was that some high-school or college team was playing. It just becomes one of the Mysteries of Philips Arena.

2) Our National Anthem singer was Talein, an R & B performer. She ornamented her performance to the point where I thought I was listening to the vocal musings of B. G. Murphy, short for "Bleeding Gums".

3) The New York Liberty, it seems, sure enjoy basketball and just hanging around with each other. Tiffany Jackson was joking with the referees before tip-off. Cathrine Kraayeveld and Ashley Battle were doing this kind of "chest bump" -- where two people leap and bump chests in exhaltation -- but were colliding into each other's sides instead. Jackson joined in. They were having a grand old time.

4) Headband Girl is back. She was the one holding up the poster on Friday asking for Kasha Terry's headband. I assume the first try ended in failure. Headband Girl, it seems, is persistent.

5) Noox did not start. Everyone was surprised. We figured it was for one of several reasons. Either the fact that she scored less than a dime in three straight games, or her comments to reporters, or both. Everyone gritted their teeth.

6) Bales looked pretty immobile out there. What a dropoff from her early games. She played 17 minutes, and didn't score a single damn point. Only one blocked shot for Bales the entire game.

7) However, the Dream hung in there. Ivory Latta hit three three point shots. But Janel McCarville was already looking good. She attempted these kinds of baskets that were pretty much impossible shots. She made some of them, including a one-armed I'm-looking-in-the-opposite-direction-of-the-basket-but-shooting-anyway kind of shot. I sort of gasped when I saw that shot. She was a lot more agile than any of our immobile posts, who have arms but don't have speed.

8) Then again, Janel gets no love in Atlanta. Our PA announcer kept calling her "Kraayeveld." I'm sure Cathrine thought, "wow, I'm even better than I thought I was!"

9) Noox put in a couple of buckets at the end. For once, a team did not get a nine-point lead against the Dream in the first quarter. The most New York led by was five points, 22-17. We closed that gap to 22-21 by the end of the first.

10) Both teams shot over 50 percent in the first quarter. That's because both teams were playing crappy defense.

11) Lisa Willis burned us a couple of times in the second quarter. The second time she made this driving jump shot and blew right by three Atlanta defenders like they were bicycles on the interstate. Not a single defender even made an attempt to put a hand on her. Not even a halfway-decent neck chokehold.

12) Atlanta pulled into the lead. Janel made this weird I'm-going-out-of-bounds-but-I-still-think-I-can-make-this-shot layup attempt. I don't think I've ever seen a player as confident as Janel McCarville.

13) We took a three point lead in the second, leading 37-34 at one time. If I had to explain how the Liberty were playing, well in the words of Chief Wiggum, "that's some mighty poor ball handling, Lou". The Liberty, probably afraid they'd dribble the ball off their feet if they dared to take it past the three point arc, kept trying to nail three pointers. It's a good thing for the Liberty that we weren't taking advantage.

14) During an inbounds play, Erika de Souza made this weird leg high-kick that caused the crowd to chuckle, as if she could block the in-bounds with her legs. Maybe it's just an attempt to get some physical therapy in before Beijing.

15) Near the end of the second, the refereeing reached that nadir that only WNBA fans have come to know and love. There was a shitty no-contact foul on Ivory Latta. The replay shows that Latta never even touched Tiffany Jackson. There was a shitty lane violation call on De Souza, and the referees realized their shittiness (hey, it does stink) and made up for it with a make-up call on an out-of-bounds.

But once again, their colons jumped out of their throats and strangled them. There was a ticky-tack foul called on Ann Strother near the buzzer that resulted in the three chimpanzees refereeing to have a Jeopardy!-like meeting of the minds. "Do we say that the buzzer went off, or do we give the Liberty two more free throws?" After much scratching and grooming, the refs gave Johnson two extra free throws. She hit one, which was enough to give the Libs a 44-43 lead coming into halftime.

16) The Dream honored three winners of the Atlanta Dream Tournament of Champions, for young women.

Under 11: Pistols (?sp)
Under 13: Metros
Under 15: Tigerettes

I like seeing this kind of thing. Supposedly next year, the Atlanta Dream T of C will be extended to a large range of age groups, and there will be male teams as well.

17) The Sweet Vibrations Motorcycle Club - a motorcycle club that is about "sisterhood" -- was honored by the Dream for their fundraising efforts. Those women looked pretty tough to me. If they asked me for cash, I'd probably empty my pockets, too.

18) I noticed that neither Jennifer Lacy nor Katie Feenstra had started. We found out what was wrong with Lacy -- according to Jenna Marina of the AJC, Lacy had a meniscus tear. However, why didn't Katie start? It could be that Meadors has finally decided to stop rotating people in and out willy-nilly....

...no, that's not it. Kit is in the doghouse again.

19) I don't even know what was going on in the third quarter.

a) Lennox didn't start that quarter either.
b) Shameka Criston blocked not one, but two inbounds by Tamera Young. She had to laugh about it, and I guess it was funny.
c) The Dream got called for a three second violation.
d) The Dream got called for a shot clock violation.
e) The Liberty treated the ball as if it were coated with axle grease.
f) Kasha Terry missed two free throws.
g) The refs called travelling on B-Money, but made up that bad call with another bad call in favor of the Dream.
h) Ivory Latta ended the quarter by taking forever to set up a shot, almost loses the ball, and then tries to drive in to the basket to make one of those short-range shots she's horrible at making. Result: nothing.

Boy, that third quarter was some of the worst basketball I've seen all year. Correction: it was the worst basketball I've seen all year, even worse than that game where Phoenix scored 105 on us.

20) I finally put a name to that crappy referee: #58, J. Tiven. Mr. Tiven, I'm keeping an eye on you.

21) Tiffany Jackson got hurt. My eye was on the other end of the court, so I don't know what happened to her, but she was down for a full minute or so. They picked her up off the floor, but she was holding one of her legs stiffly. That can't be good.

22) We managed to tie the game 60-60 at the start of the fourth. Then the Libs went on an 8-1 run. The officiating didn't help, although I won't put the blame entirely on the officials. Kasha Terry picked up two straight fouls, one being a dubious late call. Before we knew it, the Liberty were up 71-64 with 3:40 to go...and with the Dream playing as poorly as it did, I knew we wouldn't catch up.

23) Janel McCarville scored 10 points in the fourth, with six rebounds. Shameka Christon scored nine points.

24) The only hope the Dream had was to foul. The Liberty also caught the foul bug, and the last two minutes became a real snooze-fest of endless trips to the line, with the referees deciding to torment the spectators just a bit longer. By the time the clock expired, the Liberty had won, 86-76.

(* * *)

Now, to look at the boxscore.

Shooting percentage: About even. The Liberty and the Dream both shot about 41 percent.
Offensive rebounds: The Dream had a slight edge, 13 to 11.
Turnovers. The Dream had another slight edge, 18 to 20. What killed us was the fact that the Liberty were able to convert Dream turnovers into points. The Dream did not.
Free throw trips. 32-29 in favor of the Liberty. What's worse is the fact that the Dream only hit 69 percetnt of its free throws. The Dream hit 75 percent of its shots, good for four extra points right there.

Flow of game: even until the last quarter where the Dream shot only 23 percent. It was then that the Liberty pulled away.

Shooting efficiency:

Lennox: 18 points on 21 shots. Not great, but a much better game for Lennox than the last three.
Latta: 14 points on 11 shots. Very good.
Castro Marques: 11 points on 14 shots. Izi went 1 for 7 in that last quarter.
DeSouza: 9 points on 13 shots. Hwoever, she had 11 rebounds.
Kasha Terry: Awful. 7 points, 13 shots. The eight rebounds (sorta) made up for it.

Southern Belle Milk Carton of the Game: Alison Bales. 17 minutes played, no shots taken, three rebounds, one blocked shot. Even Kit could have done better than that.

(* * *)

I'll be back after vacation, but I might surprise you with an article -- you never know. And so many questions to ask ourselves....

Will Betty Lennox and Marynell Meadors bury the hatchet?
Will Meadors find an effective low post player?
Will the Dream win another game all season?
Will Headband Girl ever get Kasha Terry's headband?

To find the answers to these and other questions...keep reading!

Prospect?

A pleasant blog entry about a little girl playing her first basketball game.

Coach Marynell Meadors is already rushing over there, contract in hand. By September, we think Sam'll be ready to start. How soon can we get her to Atlanta?

Who's That in Yahoo Search?

From YaHoo! front page, July 26, 2008, 11:46 PM Eastern Time.



Look at #5. Maybe having Lady Magic in wasn't such a bad idea after all.

2008/26 - Mystics 81, Dream 75

"And so this is gametime
And what have you done
Another game wasted
And a new one just begun...."


If there was any team that we could have beat, should have beat, it should have been the Mystics. But it's not going to happen, at least in 2008. Three games, three losses, and the opportunity has disappeared.

Let's look at the upcoming schedule:

Sun 27: vs. New York. I have them as the second best team in the WNBA right now.
(month off)
Fri 29: vs. Connecticut. Which will be tanned, rested, and ready.
Sat 30: @ Indiana. Probably no practice. We'll just have to hope that the Fever don't show up again.
Tue 2: vs. Seattle. A chance at a win, as Betty Lennox would like to shove a win down Brian Agler's throat.
Fri 5: @ New York. I don't think a win is going to happen at MSG.
Mon 8: vs. Indiana. By now, every team is fighting for a playoff spot and licking their chops.
Thu 11: @ Los Angeles. Los Angeles will be fighting hardest of all, to save their season.
Fri 12: @ Seattle. Last game. Our only hope is that Seattle will have secured wherever they end up and rest their starters.

Five out of those eight games would make a strong woman wince. And the Dream are not strong women, or have not been playing like it, anyway.

All right. You want the numbered list, you get the numbered list.

1) I saw Lennox warming up, downing three after three after three. She looked absolutely fantastic. Oh, how appearances can deceive.

2) A bunch of kids took the court before the game -- the AAU Georgia Hawks, which seemed to only have five kids, played the AAU Georgia Force, who had ten kids who rotated an entire five-man team out. The Hawks won 13-10. The kids looked ecstatic playing. Let's get some girls teams out to play during halftime!

3) Definitely great seeing Erika back practicing. Someone held up a sign reading, "Welcome Back, Desouza!"

4) National anthem: Sung by Nike (pronounced NEE-kay.) She didn't do a bad job.

5) Immediately, I got a bad feeling. Lennox takes the ball, tries a three...and misses. Her next shot is an airball. Gonna be another long night at Philips.

6) Atlanta called a full time out. Didn't help. Once again, Atlanta digs itself in a first quarter hole, this time 11-2. Meadors rotates in Kristin Haynie, Alison Bales, and Tamera Young. We begin to warm up, and Washington goes over the limit in fouls with four and a half minutes remaining.

7) Meadors has the Twin Towers in. For the last time, this is not Riley and Wauters!! Put Kit in or Alison in, but not both!

8) Izi really kept us in the game, when we didn't deserve to be. She was hitting her foul shots. She scored four of her 10 first quarter points on charity stripe trips. Washington kept sending up to the free throw line. It was the only way we could score points.

9) Erika finally made her debut with 6.9 seconds left in the first quarter. During those 6.9 seconds, she steals the ball from Taj McWilliams-Franklin's lob pass, and takes a last second shot that almost went in and brought us within one.

10) Then, we began to fight Washington for control of the game. Lennox makes a basket in the second quarter to put us in the lead for the first time, 33-32. Strother hits a three and we take a two point lead, 36-34.

11) Washington was in foul trouble again and you could actually feel the Mystics back up. The only kinds of shots they wanted to hit were three pointers -- they didn't want to tangle with our tall girls at the posts and they made themselves happy shooting from range. Coco Miller -- the untalented Miller -- failed at two straight three pointers.

12) Two women in the stands held up a poster: "#35 Kasha Terry - Can I Have Your Headband?" I hope that Kasha came out after the game and gave those girls the headband, which they'll probably keep in a reliquary somewhere.

13) We were within an eyelash of taking a tie into halftime, when #@$#$% Laurie Koehn took a buzzer-beating three point shot to give the Mystics a 45-42 halftime lead, despite that they were outshooting us 47 percent to 35 percent. Those giveaway free throws really kept us in the game.

14) I saw a couple of fans waving a Swedish flag in the audience. This means either,

a) we're going to sign Johanna Bjorklund,
b) they got the flag at IKEA, or
c) those fans were realllllly lost.

CLARIFICATION: The fans were giving support to Chioma Nnamaka, who was born in Uppsala, Sweden. An anonymous commenter pointed this out. Boy, I'm embarrassed.

15) Then, the Mystics went on a 15-2 run. The Mystics superpowers were so great that they made the clock stick and the game had to stop while they reset it. Taj McWilliams-Frankin just killed us. She scored 11 points in the quarter and got five rebounds. Washington just blew by our big women like they were standing still. Washington led 70-59 at the end of the third quarter.

16) We rolled into some good luck in the fourth quarter. We were down 75-65. Then Latta hit a bucket. Then she hit a 23 foot long jumper. Then Izi hit one. THen Latta threw another one from behind the arc. We closed the score to 76-75.

It was 3:47 to go in the fourth. Showtime!

17) Here's what we showed them in "Showtime":

a) Latta loses the ball.
b) Latta throws a bad pass. Currie steals.
c) Latta loses the ball...again.

After that, we were El Shafto. All we could do is foul the Mystics and hope they had somehow forgotten to shoot.

They hadn't.

18) We had four turnovers in the final four minutes. Tamera Young had come in for Lennox in the fourth quarter. Her contributions were a turnover and a personal foul. Young had six personal fouls, fouling out with 10 seconds left. I think they sent her out for autographs, and young kids should have been forced to stay behind a six foot protective wall.

19) At least we applied some defensive pressure. We forced Nikki Blue into an over and back turnover, far too late for it to do us any good.

20) As one of the fans was leaving the game, I heard her mumble, "that was wack." That about sums it up.

(* * *)

Okay, now let's look at the bloody boxscore:

Shooting percentage: 42.1 percent Mystics, 39 percent Dream. Misleading, because the Mystics shot close to 50 percent over the first three quarters.
Offensive rebounds EVen with Erika back, the Mystics outhustled us 15-11.
Turnovers: The Mystics won that part of the game as well, 16-20.
Free throw visits: WE won that one, 20-17 and shot 95 percent from the charity stripe. It was one of the only things keeping us in the game.

Let's take a look at player efficiency:

Izi: 23 points in 22 scoring attempts. This was one of her better nights, where she didn't have to throw the ball up fifty times to score 10 points.
Latta: When she finally warmed up, she shot very well indeed.
Bales: Not so well. 7 points, 8 attempts.
Haynie, Young, DeSouza, Strother: Nothing to be ashamed of anywhere.
Terry: One of the two milkcartons of the game. Minutes played: 22. Points scored: 4. I think Terry's mom -- who sits behind the Atlanta bench - must have a gun pointed at Coach Meadors's back.

...but the winner of the Southern Belle Milk Carton of the Game is:



Betty Lennox. Six shots. Two points. Four turnovers. They should have just let Ann Strother play eight more minutes.

Come back soon, B-Money. The Dream need you.

FREE B-MONEY!

Another great article by Josh Bagriansky of Score Atlanta, this time highlighting the deteriorating relationship between Betty Lennox and Marynell Meadors.

Jeez. I don't know what's going on. Camille Little got out, then Stacey Lovelace, and now it looks like Betty Lennox is in the coach's doghouse. "Will the last player to leave Atlanta please turn out the lights?"

They're talking about it on Rebkell and the Atlanta Dream Message Board. Question: do you think Kelly Miller would come to the Dream if we sent B-Money to Phoenix? I'm sure that Betty would enjoy getting to play the Seattle Storm more than twice a year.

FREE B-MONEY! Just remember that Atlanta Dream fans love you, Betty.