Bad news for Darko, Hill wants to continue starting Battie(Denton blog)

[lazyberbs 0]

And besides that, the talking heads were trying to give Tony free passes on his inability to hold a couple of boards and passes, saying that is just coming back from a broken hand and it still hurt. They also mentioned that Darko has been playing with a bad back recently, before the game he missed.

 

I really have to disagree with the poster who accuses DMC of not keeping his hands up. He is constantly jumping out to cover players who have gotten loose from Magic defenders, leaping with his hand up. He always has his hands up on defense.

 

Even tonight with the bad back, he was much quicker than Tony. The only reason I would have started Battie ahead of him tonight would have been if I wanted the team to run and it is easier to run with a broken finger than a bad back. But I would have made it clear that that was the reason; that Darko was still the starter.

 

It did work in one way, though. It just added to the huge disparity in bench scoring.

 

Another one of those intangibles, have you guys noticed Darko pushing his man back as much as six feet to clear room for the little guys to drive past him on the way to the basket? Now if we could get some of them to drop the ball off to Darko for a slam when his man has to go after the slasher. Did anyone else notice the nice pass from Dwight to Darko for the bucket?

 

Dwight and Darko should be playing guards so we could get some assists.

[EnFuego 1]

Now that the new and improved Brian Hill has lost a game, lets get back to basics. The quote from Denton

 

"The Magic played so well in Wednesday's 101-90 defeat of Utah that Hill doesn't want to change a thing. That's why Battie will continue to start ahead of Milicic"

 

I'll presume Denton states that because Hill said it.

 

Quote from jack daniel 999

 

B.Hill said in pre game show ...

 

That he believes you don't lose starting job due to injury.

 

I didn't see the show but I'll take jack's word for it.

 

This seeming contradiction strikes me as follows.

 

Brian is stubborn to the bone. He has played Batie as a starter for 50 games so of course he is sure Battie is the better starter. To change now is to admit to a mistake and Brian is not good at that. So whatever reason he needs to give, Darko's back on the bench.

 

The progress of this franchise is predicated on this man's ego. Typically, teams tolerate a a jerk like him because they are proven winners (Larry Brown comes to mind). Just like unweisbrod, we hire the people with the attitude and ego of a champion, but without the rings.

 

Obviously, I favor Darko starting. We have still to have Dwight and Darlo start a game where Tony comes out of the bench. The ideal situation for many who post here.

 

You can say what you want about things that don't show up in the box score. The things that do show up in the box score matter more.

 

Stats as starters

 

Batie 51 Games 6.0 PPG 5.1 RPG 0.5 BPG

 

Darko 16 Games 9.8 PPG 7.1 RPG and 2.13 BPG

 

The reason they put these things in the box score is because they matter. Darko is inconsistent while Tony is extremely consistent. Consistently showing he would be a very valuable bench player.