Love's post game comments

[thedoper]

Abe, I'm not going to say it's laughable, but I am surprised you and Doper just don't get how bullshit like that can tear a team apart. The media jackals know Love is putty in their hands because he is an emotional guy, and will eventually break down. His answer "you watched the game...it's pretty obvious" is the worst thing he could have said. I'll bet Flip, Adelman, and the smarter guys on the team were just cringing when they heard that. True champions know how to fend off the media and cover for their teammates with a cliché. "This is a team game, and everyone on our team made mistakes tonight. This isn't about one or two plays". That's what LeBron James would have said. It doesn't make great newspaper copy...it just makes championships.
I wonder if Love ever wonders why a college team with Love, Westbrook, Collison and Mbah a Moute couldn't win a championship. We got a clue tonight.

I think it all depends on the makeup of a team. A team of weak minded stiffs will get ripped apart by relatively tame comments. Championship teams have had people being personally called out in the media before and it is regarded as tough leadership (see Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird). When a team doesn't have a championship makeup then you get the get the interpretation that you are bringing up. What I am saying is that it is more important how people respond after the shit is in the open. And everyone has a responsibility moving forward from here including Love. If people take Love's comments as a personal slight and have trust issues with him, it says more about their insecurities than Love's. If Martin is really distraught about Love's comments, he as a veteran should know how to go to Love and teach him the merits of BS "sportsspeech" to the media.

My bigger worry here is with Adelman. A great coach would see this coming and get in front of a moment like this. He would tell his players to not address media concerns and take the blame for the sake of the team. When your team takes a tough loss what do you have to lose by being out front and center and saying I was asking too much of Martin on that play. I don't think it is in Adelman's make up to recognize that though.

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

"I wonder if Love ever wonders why a college team with Love, Westbrook, Collison and Mbah a Moute couldn't win a championship. We got a clue tonight."

Westbrook barely played. He averaged nine minutes per game I think. The eventual national champion, and my Florida Gators, took them out in the Final Four. Al Horford and Joakim Noah were way too much for him, and even Greg Oden (healthy) in the title game. The reason UCLA lost was because they were the inferior team talent-wise. Florida had already won a ring together and had perfect role players to go with an extremely good college starting five. Best college basketball team of all time that 06/07 team was.

[The Rage Monster [enjin:8010341]]

The individual comments don't bother me as much as his overall attitude. Yes he is our best player but I get the feeling that he thinks he is above the team due to his scoring and rebounding stats and in games like this he is above blame for the loss. As great as he is, the fact is he is only above average at half the game, his defense just doesn't cut it.

I didn't get to see the game but I assume Love and Griffin were on the court together the majority of the game. Griffin went off for 32 points shooting 55%, that's not what I would call winning defense. The thing that really bothers me though is at the end of the game he doesn't step in front of Crawford to try and prevent the easy layup, instead he runs out of the way to defend the always deadly Griffin spotting up for a corner 3.

[khans2k5 [enjin:6608728]]

Martin is a 9 year NBA veteran who has been playing bad all December long. He is supposed to be our second leading scorer and he is dropping 14 points on 39% FG and 30% from 3 in December. He needs a kick in the butt because this team isn't built to win with him playing poorly this long (almost 10 games now). If this was a rookie or a young guy, I could understand the disappointment in Love, but this is a veteran who is not playing well at all right now and he needs to shape up or this team isn't going to win very much. With Ricky and Brewer in the starting lineup, there is no room for Martin to play this poorly and expect us to win any games against anybody decent. He needs to be called out because he can't take off games like he could in OKC with Durant and Westbrook because he needs to be the number 2 guy (#1 perimeter) guy on most if not every night. Given how poorly he plays D, he can't keep playing this bad offensively, otherwise he hurts us just as much as helps us and that isn't enough to win with our current roster makeup. We're a quarter of the way in the season and his on-court body language is already showing like he is ready for a break. He's not shooting or driving to the basket well and he seems to just be lazy and go for cheap fouls all the time instead of getting to the basket and fighting through contact. He's playing a lazy game right now and he needs to know that he is a big part of our success/failure this season and he needs to play hard every night or be prepared to take the heat when he is playing like this.

[thedoper]

Adelman's post game comments: "It was a tough loss for a lot of reasons. That's all I have to say," coach Rick Adelman said. "I don't want to say anything. I don't want to get fined."

Shouldn't we be more up in arms about the coach implying the refs were to blame for the loss? Hardly creating a culture of winning there.

[AbeVigodaLive]

Adelman's post game comments: "It was a tough loss for a lot of reasons. That's all I have to say," coach Rick Adelman said. "I don't want to say anything. I don't want to get fined."

Shouldn't we be more up in arms about the coach implying the refs were to blame for the loss? Hardly creating a culture of winning there.

I think you make a good point Doper.

From little snippets we've heard all season, there's a lot of bitterness in the Wolves organization over scheduling and now uneven officiating.

Yeah, the schedule sucked. But there comes a point where you make the best of it and get over it. As for officiating yesterday, I don't remember anything horrible about it.

Although the Clippers' incessant whining was ridiculous. Just play ball. Just like the Wolves following the lead from its coach or best player... I think the Clippers do too. Paul and Rivers are setting up calls in the 4th quarter in the 1st quarter. If it works, good for them I guess. But, it's pretty annoying to watch.

[Mstermisty [enjin:6864008]]

Love reacted exactly like you hope he would after that game: angry, frustrated, and he called out the team for giving the game away. I honestly think he was as mad at himself as he was K-Mart, because he missed a big free-throw and also missed a couple opportunities to put the game away late in regulation (offensive foul against Blake, etc.).

Yeah K-Mart was the biggest goat in this one, but Love's frustration, in my opinion, was testament to how many different plays they could have made to win the game. If he wouldn't have reacted this way it would have been upsetting to me.

What's more concerning to me is hearing that K-Mart mentioned "not wanting to be fined" when not commenting after the game. If that indeed is in reference to the refs, then he needs to take a long look in the mirror, because he made two very bad, costly plays, and since his hot start he his overall play has been terrible.

[markkbu [enjin:6588958]]

Love reacted exactly like you hope he would after that game: angry, frustrated, and he called out the team for giving the game away. I honestly think he was as mad at himself as he was K-Mart, because he missed a big free-throw and also missed a couple opportunities to put the game away late in regulation (offensive foul against Blake, etc.).

Yeah K-Mart was the biggest goat in this one, but Love's frustration, in my opinion, was testament to how many different plays they could have made to win the game. If he wouldn't have reacted this way it would have been upsetting to me.

What's more concerning to me is hearing that K-Mart mentioned "not wanting to be fined" when not commenting after the game. If that indeed is in reference to the refs, then he needs to take a long look in the mirror, because he made two very bad, costly plays, and since his hot start he his overall play has been terrible.

I think that it would be beneficial if Love would clearly accept responsibility for challenges on the team. It is always easy to find flaw in others' play, it would more difficult (and inspiring) if Love focused on the things that he could do to bring about wins for the Wolves. I haven't really hear him do that much.

He clearly played great last night. Ensuring that it doesn't appear that he is diverting blame is what a leader would do.

[Papalrep]

"Love has every right to be pissed off by what happened last night. I actually think last night solidified Love's role as a leader. 45-19-6 gives you the right to question your teammates performance publically."

OK I watched the clip - I LIKE what he said. He was not philosophical, he was pissed. He called out everyone to "take this a little more seriously". I agree, I think he looked like a leader.

KMart said he was going Christmas shopping. Hey now, that's inspiring. Wimp

[Squishypoo [enjin:6648839]]

Some of you are just as bad as the media lol..I might have to watch the video again, But i did not hear love call out anyone..