Good Grizz, Bad Grizz.

Your Memphis Grizzlies really showed how great, and terrible, they can be this weekend. Luckily, I slept through the bad part. Sorry, I was hungover and needed a nap. So, let's just focus on the positives.

The Grizz took it to the Portland Trailblazers on Friday. I don't know who those guys were, but they looked great. They passed. They shot well. The rebounded very well (which at this point is expected). They helped each other out on D. It was awesome to watch and it lead to a 30 point lead in the first half. The Blazers challenged in the fourth, but were never able to get closer than 8 as the Grizz answered every time the Blazers got the lead to single digits. Biggest win of the year for the Grizz and probably the best game I've see them play in a few years. Biggest thing to take from the game was the fact that Jamal Tinsley finished the game. He may not be the starter; but he is the finisher and, contrary to what Allen Iverson thinks, that's what is important. We'll be watching this develop over the next couple weeks.

Yesterday the Grizz rolled into L.A. to take on the Clipjoints. Our boys came out looking great again. It was unbelievable. It made me remember the days when the Grizz used to make the playoffs. We were up by twenty in the third. All was good, but I was sleepy. I had been out rather late with Turtle the night before. We had quite a few beverages. I am getting better at flip cup. Yada yada yada, I fell asleep. I woke up and were down eight with two minutes left. I don't know what happened. Apparently, we stopped scoring, because I think they scored about six points while I was asleep and the Clips scored about thirty. I'll take the heat for this one, guys. My bad. I wasn't ready to play and it showed.

That being said, I'm looking forward to the Grizz heading into an always rowdy arena in Salt Lake City tonight. I look for Jamal Tinsley to get major minutes in order to match up with my favorite point guard in the league, Deron Williams. Look for the Grizz to pound it in to Marc Gasol early in order to get Okur in foul trouble. Okur is very important to the Jazz because he gives them unbelievable spacing on the offensive end, which allows Boozer and Williams to do their thing. If we can get Okur out of the game, it would go a long way to getting a Grizz W.

Speaking of spacing, there was an article in the paper talking about the lack of three point shooting from the Grizz. I talked about this earlier when I talked about how the Grizz are not settling. The article seems to imply that the Grizz not shooting three's (least attempts and makes in the league) is a negative thing. I can see the need for spacing, but I see this as a positive. The only guy on the team that should shoot threes is OJ Mayo. Rudy Gay can shoot some when he's feeling it, but I'd rather have him shoot from mid-range. Tinsley and Conley can hit some threes if they are wide open with set shots, but that should come off of drives or post ups.

My point is, one of the keys to basketball is knowing what you can do and doing only that. I don't want Marc Gasol shooting threes and dribbling up the court. He can't do that, and he shouldn't do that. Overall, the Grizz cannot shoot from three point range. Therefore, they shouldn't. The past few years they haven't been able to shoot from three, but they've attempted to. That's much worse. This team is a power team with all three of their front court starters being able to post anyone up and score. They should milk that. If we can get OJ some open threes, great. If not, force it in the post, get to the line and wear teams down. That's what we do well. Do it until someone stops it.

This is not to say I don't understand the need for spacing. I do. Spacing is the most important thing on offense. The point I would make about that is that while the Grizz don't have many three point shooters, everyone of the starters is very efficient from mid range. Rudy has slowly become deadly from midrange and Marc and Zach both shoot it very well for big men. They don't space it out to the three point line, but they do make them out to 18 feet. That is enough spacing... hopefully.

Util tomorrow, go Grizz!!!