Filling in for Scott who has had a death in the family. We wish him and his family the best in these trying times.

It’s the “nice effort but no dice” edition.

Banks – DNP-XBOX

Bargnani – -10 on the offensive glass and your starting center has two rebounds, therein lies a major problem. Add to it a shot-chart that any center at any level of play would be ashamed of, and you wonder if having Rasho out there for half his 32 minutes instead would’ve made a bigger impact. Going up against his peers from the graduating class of 2006 wasn’t strong enough motivation as he got out-classed by Aldridge in the first half. Lest they call me unfair, I state that he had two good defensive possessions in the fourth and knocked down two jumpers, happy? Now what?

Belinelli – Aren’t you glad Colangelo picked up his extension for next year? Whew.

Bosh – After laying a defensive egg in Golden State, the franchise’s effort was supreme and so was his jumper. Had an efficient 28/7 on 14 shots and made pretty much every interior rotation. The only knock on his game is letting Camby get the better of him in the first half on a few offensive boards and taking an ill-advised jumper in the fourth when on the previous possession he had easily drawn a foul for two FTs. If we’re measuring him on his individual performance tonight, it was great, if we’re measuring him on his ability to inspire his teammates, get in the face of the under-performers and light a fire where there is none, he failed. It all depends on what your expectations are of the best player on your team.

Calderon – Replaced an ineffective Jack in the late first and continued his fine form of Oakland. Andre Miller notched a few assists at his expense but overall didn’t get burned as much as one feared. After all, after what Curry did to him and Jack anything, would be considered acceptable. Did so well in the second that Triano had him out there to start the third which paid dividends as hen notched 5 of his 7 assists in the frame. Got benched in the late third and didn’t return till 4:52 left in the game as Triano went with Jack for the same stupid reason he had gone for Calderon in Sacramento. Explain please.

DeRozan – 5-7 for 12 points, good energy, hard cuts and effort on defense. Not sure what else you expect from a rookie who doesn’t have a single play called for him. Could his defense get better? Yes. Could everybody’s? Absolutely.

Evans – Rode in on a white horse and produced this: 4 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 -11 0. Very Kaponoish.

Jack – Risk averse tonight which isn’t something I expect from him. Needs to keep the game simple and work with his options instead of always taking it upon himself to kickstart things. Tonight was a night where his vision on offense would’ve been more valuable than his grit, but he chose to be the bull in the china shop instead of a waiter at the restaurant.

Johnson – Sign me up for the fan club. Is that a little polish I noticed in his offensive game? The intestinal fortitude in his jumphook is impressive and so is his persistence on the glass and rolling to the rim. He plays within 8 feet of the rim which is what one expects from a big man. 13 points, 6 rebs (5 off) and sheer hustle for 22 minutes. I don’t understand the lineups with him and Bargnani on the floor unless his task is to clean up the latter’s misses (which he did twice).

Nesterovic – Moved to Toronto to get away from the Slovenian community. His wife loves it.

O’Bryant – Put down 20 quid on the Blazers right before tip-off.

Turkoglu- 14/5/5 and a nice round of boos from the still-insulted-but-sooo-happy-he-changed-his-mind Portland fans. When Triano said we needed more from our best players, surely he was expecting Turkoglu to break say the 20 point mark tonight, no? He’s only done that 7 times all season and we needed a big fourth quarter from him to ease the pressure off of Bosh. Instead he was held scoreless in the fourth and committed a game-high 4 turnovers.

Weems – Played solid D on Roy in the fourth and helped out on the glass when nobody else wanted to with 6. That’s about all you can expect from a guy who wasn’t even in the top ten in training camp. Keep working on that J, maybe add a spin move to the repertoire and you got yourself a career in the L.

Wright – Tweaked something, didn’t play. Went 0-6 nonetheless.

Driving The Bus:  Chris Bosh

Under The Bus:  Reggie Evans

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