Comments on: Oklahoma City Thunder: Big lineup under-used? http://blog.newsok.com/berrytramel/2012/06/20/oklahoma-city-thunder-big-lineup-under-used/ Thoughts from The Oklahoman Sports Columnist Berry Tramel | NewsOK.com Mon, 22 Apr 2013 20:41:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5 By: John http://blog.newsok.com/berrytramel/2012/06/20/oklahoma-city-thunder-big-lineup-under-used/comment-page-1/#comment-127995 John Thu, 21 Jun 2012 15:08:57 +0000 http://blog.newsok.com/berrytramel/?p=9571#comment-127995 Scotty and Hardin will have a lot to answer for if this ends in five games tonite. But the question is WHO’S gonna pull down OFFENSIVE REBOUNDS!? Really. No offensive rebounds, no 3-point attempts unless you’re feelin’ lucky. And they haven’t been lucky for three games!

]]> By: John http://blog.newsok.com/berrytramel/2012/06/20/oklahoma-city-thunder-big-lineup-under-used/comment-page-1/#comment-127956 John Thu, 21 Jun 2012 00:45:24 +0000 http://blog.newsok.com/berrytramel/?p=9571#comment-127956 I agree that the big men (particularly Perkins) need to be on the court more, but not necessarily for the reasons you provide. In game 1, the Thunder had 22 assists. Since then, they haven’t gotten more than 14 any of the past 3 games. Despite only playing 18 minutes yesterday, Perkins was on the scoring end of 2 of the Thunder’s 13 assists.

Here’s a breakdown that better illustrates my point, using the combined numbers for Ibaka, Perkins, and Collison.
Game 1: 11 FG, 0 FT, 22 PTS
Game 2: 3 FG, 5 FT, 11 PTS
Game 3: 6 FG, 5 FT, 17 PTS
Game 4: 7 FG, 0 FT, 14 PTS

The Thunder MUST be getting a minimum of 10 assisted buckets (20 points) from a combination of Perkins, Collison, and Ibaka, and should be aiming for 13-15 assisted buckets from those three big men.

As a final thought, the Heat have average (or worse) post defenders, and even limited scorers like Collison and Perkins can get easy buckets in the low post. Look back on Miami’s past series with Indiana and Boston, and recall how easily guys like Hibbert and Hansbrough for the Pacers and Bass and Garnett for the Celtics were getting assisted buckets.

This team needs to be more efficient on offense in order to get past the Heat, and the easiest way to do that is to get more layups and dunks from the big guys.

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