MJS first day of camp story (Potsie out)

[LUKE23]

http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/sports/62625747.html

Off to a running start
By Charles F. Gardner of the Journal Sentinel
Sept. 29, 2009 12:42 p.m.

St. Francis - Andrew Bogut and Michael Redd were on the floor, participating in contact drills as the Bucks opened training camp on Tuesday morning.

Forwards Hakim Warrick and Ersan Ilyasova were impressive in rebounding drills, and point guard Brandon Jennings got his first taste of a true NBA practice.

It was a session that generally satisfied coach Scott Skiles, beginning his second season as Bucks coach.

"It was pretty typical of a first practice," Skiles said. "As time went on, guys wound down a little bit and started missing shots they would normally make, things like that.

"But guys played hard. We had good focus, and we're off to a good start."

The Bucks went for 2 1/2 hours in their first session, and Bogut and Redd took part in the entire practice. Both are coming off serious injuries, Bogut a stress fracture in his back and Redd an anterior cruciate ligament tear in his left knee. The two key Bucks players have spent all summer rehabilitating their injuries and preparing for the coming season.

"I thought both guys were good, moved around well," Skiles said. "You don't know exactly how rehab is going to go and those kind of things. We knew as the summer was going on that the guys were being very diligent about what they were supposed to be doing. All the signs were pointing in that direction, and we'll hope it continues."

Bogut said he was pleased with how he got through the workout.

"I got through the whole day, so far," Bogut said. "It definitely gives you some confidence, having a full-contact session for 2 1/2 hours and getting through it OK."

The only player unable to practice was forward Joe Alexander, who sat out with a hamstring injury. Skiles said the 2008 first-round pick would be re-evaluated in several days.

"It is (a concern)," Skiles said. "Because it did happen last year, and now he's missed some time again. The first couple weeks of exhibition season are when you're trying to get your foundation in and things you're going to refer back to at some point during the season.

"It's tough for anybody to miss, but it's really tough for a young player."

[paulpressey25]

Good to see that Bogut and Redd can run around. That is huge.

Alexander hopefully won't have any Geoff Jenkins injury problems.

[Swan Vox]

The only player unable to practice was forward Joe Alexander, who sat out with a hamstring injury. Skiles said the 2008 first-round pick would be re-evaluated in several days.

"It is (a concern)," Skiles said. "Because it did happen last year, and now he's missed some time again. The first couple weeks of exhibition season are when you're trying to get your foundation in and things you're going to refer back to at some point during the season.

"It's tough for anybody to miss, but it's really tough for a young player."

Going back to last year?!!! WTF. Is this the first we've heard of this? Didn't JA play in summer league? I don't understand...someone please explain this injury to me. If there's anyone that needs to be at practice its JA.

[steger_3434]

They'll re-evaluate Potsie after a few days? So I take it he's out at least until the reval? I know the injury isn't his fault, but c'mon. This kids career is going to go down as one of the Bucks all-time biggest busts at this rate. Have an awful awful first year SL. Look like you don't belong on an NBA court your rookie year. Start out our second SL looking awful before showing up, then getting injured before camp even starts.

[trwi7]

The only player unable to practice was forward Joe Alexander, who sat out with a hamstring injury. Skiles said the 2008 first-round pick would be re-evaluated in several days.

"It is (a concern)," Skiles said. "Because it did happen last year, and now he's missed some time again. The first couple weeks of exhibition season are when you're trying to get your foundation in and things you're going to refer back to at some point during the season.

"It's tough for anybody to miss, but it's really tough for a young player."

Going back to last year?!!! WTF. Is this the first we've heard of this? Didn't JA play in summer league? I don't understand...someone please explain this injury to me. If there's anyone that needs to be at practice its JA.

He was out for a while last year (abdominal strain or something) that caused him to miss a bunch of practices and a few preseason games.

[LUKE23]

I don't see JA getting many minutes this year, even if healthy. But it would be nice for him to get as much practice time as possible. But I think he's the third SF and possibly fourth PF right now.

[Swan Vox]

I don't see JA getting many minutes this year, even if healthy. But it would be nice for him to get as much practice time as possible. But I think he's the third SF and possibly fourth PF right now.

Yeah, rationally I understand he's pretty far down on the depth chart, but there is still a large part of me that bubbles up with anger about the possibility of a wasted lottery pick. As much as I like LRMAM, I would LOVE for Alexander to at least show something. Hearing that he's already nursing an injury is giving me Justin Harrell anxiety.

[Cold Crush 24]

Just what he needs. The guy looks lost on the court. He needs to be out there figuring out how to play the NBA game. I dont care if he isnt going to get a ton of PT. He should atleast be in practice learning what he needs to do in garbage time. If we arent going to play him we should ship him to the Mad Ants.

[LUKE23]

http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/sports/62634937.html

First practice in the books
By Tom Enlund of the Journal Sentinel
Sept. 29, 2009 1:17 p.m.

St. Francis – The Bucks hit the practice floor for their first training-camp workout Tuesday morning and there was plenty of activity, an emphasis on defense, along with an attention to detail.

Coach Scott Skiles was pleased afterward and so were the players.

“We did a lot of stuff that we drill every day,” said center Andrew Bogut. “Our close-outs, our defensive schemes, and then we scrimmaged a bit. We’ll scrimmage more later in the week but now we’re laying the foundation down and coach is putting his principles in and it was good.”

Bogut and guard Michael Redd, both coming off major injuries, both participated in the entire 2 ½-hour workout.

It’d didn’t take the Bucks long to start working on defense as early in the practice Skiles had the players broken up into three groups working with the various assistant coaches on different defensive coverages. That led into some four-on-four, half-court work on correct defensive stances and proper positioning on the court. The coaches corrected the players if they were even a foot or so away from where they were supposed to be on the court defensively.

“Little things, the little things,” assistant coach Kelvin Sampson reminded the players in his group. “Finish the drill strong.”

During the drills, the scoreboard clock was set to how much time Skiles wanted to spend on each drill and that time was counted down. After taking over the team last season, Skiles removed the time-of-the-day clocks from the gym so the players wouldn’t be pre-occupied with how much time was left in practice.

Later on, the Bucks split into four teams and spent quite a bit of time engaging in a lively half-court competition in which the teams were awarded points – depending on the version of the game – for a defensive stop, a rebound, or a rebound and advancement of the ball to half-court.

“We’ll score by stops in most of our drills,” said Skiles.

The losers ran full-court sprints with the assistant coaches acting as line monitors, making the sure the players didn’t cheat and ran the full sprint to the baseline before going back in the other direction.

They finished up with some five-on-five full-court scrimmaging.

Skiles ran the players through their paces and several were bent over with hands on knees in the later stages of the workout.

“That was a hard practice,” said Skiles. “No matter how much you’re playing in September or working on your body or whatever, the first few days are always a little bit of a shock. I thought the guys got through it well. At this point of the year you want to take them to a point of fatigue and take them over that a little bit and see what happens. I thought they were in good shape.”

[paulpressey25]

Huge...just huge to read about Bogut and Redd taking part in the entire practice, including 5 on 5 scrimmages.

[EastSideBucksFan]

Huge...just huge to read about Bogut and Redd taking part in the entire practice, including 5 on 5 scrimmages.

(Lets out deep breath)


That is really encouraging to read. To see them going full force in the first practice alleviates plenty of concerns. Sounds like they were just resting Bogut as long as they could until camp.

[GrandAdmiralDan]

I'll just put my observations here rather than starting a separate thread...

Sorry I didn't get them to you sooner, but I had to get back to my office after the practice, and then I had to do lunch.

Anyway...

I've seen videos of various Bucks practices over the last few seasons (a few during Stotts tenure, and one during LK's tenure) and have talked in depth with people who have attended training camp and practices, but I have not actually attended personally before. The last time I was at the actual court was back in my youth to actually play basketball (last time was in 8th grade). It seemed much bigger back then

I thought this was an excellent practice, and an excellent first day of training camp, overall.

Coach Skiles continues to impress. LK's training camp was also very impressive, as were his practices initially, but unfortunately all the good that was done there was pretty much lost with each game the Bucks played as LK demonstrated he did not know how to manage a GAME or coach during one. And then you had Stotts who didn't at all inspire confidence during his practices. Skiles practice lived up to what I have heard about them. And we all know he can actually coach in games too, which makes a huge difference to the players in these practiced, believe me. I do still maintain that you could fill a 12 man roster (filling all necessary positions) with the worst players currently in the NBA, and Skiles would manage to squeeze 30 wins out of that bunch. Since we actually do have some legitimate NBA talent (regardless of how disappointed I've been with Hammond's tenure so far), this bodes well for the prospect of the Bucks actually having a decent season. Possibly.

As for this practice, it was very no-nonsense. Skiles lived up to his reputation many times, but he picked his spots very effectively. ANd it's not like he was Bobby Knight or anything. I didn't think he was at all too harsh at any single point. He corrected things that needed to be corrected, and all the players seemed to respect that. Skiles wasn't trying to embarrass or humiliate anyone. And he made a point of specifically praising players when it was warranted. His most effusive praise came in the very first moments of the start of practice, when Skiles was going over the first drill (a defensive drill, no shocker there). The drill was closing out defensively on someone who just received a pass. He asked Mbah A Moute to help him demonstrate for everyone else, and he pointed out that Mbah A Moute had to be one of the top 15 or 10 players in the league at closing out defensively in this situation. He then immediately revised his remarks to say, "actually, probably top 5"
I totally agree, and Mbah A Moute of course provided a great example with Skiles of what this drill was all about. All the actual Bucks players performed quite well during this drill, which is a good sign. I don't care much about the four camp-fodder players that were brought in to be warm bodies for the duration of training camp (Dominic James, Hubbard, Tyndale, Gaines) but Dominic James did well on this drill too, if anyone cares. The other 3 were somewhat iffy, but they aren't really NBA caliber players and won't be making this team, so no big deal.

It was disappointing to see Joe Alexander just aimlessly standing on the sidelines instead of practicing. Nobody I spoke to after the practice had started seemed to know why he wasn't practicing. When it was over I found out that he had tweaked something but I was told he'd be fine. Before even hearing that tiny bit of info, it did seem a bit curious. I must say that he really didn't seem very engaged with what was going on. Maybe he was, and outward appearances were just deceiving, but I'm relaying my impression. I never got to scrimmage on my high school varsity team unless 3 other players were injured/sick and only really got to do any practice work with the team during drills when we'd break off into 3 or more groups, so I was frequently in the position that Joe Alexander was in, and while I tried to stay engaged, I definitely wasn't all the time and Alexander was doing subtle things that reminded me of things I used to do in that situation when I couldn't keep my mind from wandering. One example was staring off into space and swinging his arms from front to back over and over again. I recognized that instantly. Maybe some others here who have played know what I'm talking about here
On a completely superficial basis, Joe Alexander might want to consider cutting his hair. He's looking like he is straight out of Hyrule these days. I was tempted to ask him to show me his triforce tattoo. Ridnour of course would fit right in there too, but at least he is keeping that mop trimmed

As much as I had wished to see Alexander play to try an gauge his progress, that was actually pretty far down on my list of things I was interested in seeing. My main interests were seeing Bogut and Redd in person to see how they've progressed with their injuries and how ready they looked. Bogut especially. As much as I would like to see Redd and the Bucks part company, that is going to be infinitely easier if the guy is actually healthy, so Redd's health is a pretty big deal to me too. I was naturally interested in seeing Jennings. But I might have been more interested in seeing Ersan than Jennings, actually. I was also interested in seeing the other newcomers, especially Delfino, followed by Warrick. Additionally, I wanted to get a look at Meeks, followed by Ukic. No, I didn't forget Kurt Thomas. That just didn't interest me. I like Kurt Thomas just fine, but I've seen plenty of Kurt Thomas already. Nothing really new to see there.

Bogut and Redd both seemed unencumbered by any injury. This was quite a relief. They seemed to be going at it just as hard as everyone else. Based on what I saw, I am no longer concerned about either of them being ready for the start of the season. They're ready now. Bogut looked especially great on one of the defensive drills that emphasized defending the post entry pass and then rotating (as the sole defender against 4 offensive players) to try and keep up with ball swings. Redd wasn't really vocal during the practice, not that this came as much of a surprise. Bogut was. If there is a leader on this team, it is Bogut without question. Not that he is the embodiment of a leader, but in the world of blind men, the one-eyed man is king. And I don't mean that as an insult to Bogut, I just don't want to be overly effusive with praise that isn't quite yet warranted. He definitely has been demonstrating more leadership lately, and today he continued on that path. For some of the drills, the Bucks were split into 4 groups, and there were points awarded for various things during the drills. After each drill, the group that had the most "points" got to sit out while the other 3 groups had to run a couple full court sprints. One of the catches to these sprints were that one of the assistant coaches acted as a line judge and if he saw one of the players start back down the court the other way without going all the way and touching the line, he blew his whistle. On the very first sprint, Bogut's group was one of the 3 groups running. On the first time up, Ersan got whistled, meaning everyone had to start over. I thought Skiles might say something, but he didn't. However, Bogut let Ersan have it, and then he made it clear to every other player that he wouldn't tolerate any half-assed practicing. Among a few other expletive laced things he yelled, he sternly yelled something along the lines of "Don't f***ing cheat the f***ing drills!"
There were no further laziness/cheating issues the rest of practice. I don't know if they can maintain this type of discipline over the course of a season (hopefully they can) but it was a great tone to set in the first practice.

I thought the drills were pretty impressive and intense for the first day of training camp.
One of the drills was 4 defenders vs 5 offensive players (4 Bucks and 1 assistant coach). The assistant coach would take a mid range jumper, with the intention of missing. If an offensive player got the rebound, that was 2 points for his team if he could immediately score off the offensive rebound. If you couldn't score, it was a do-over with no points being awarded. If a defensive player got the rebound, his team had to get the ball over half court in order to get 1 point, but an additional caveat was that while you could pass the ball during this effort, you could not pass the ball OVER half court, you had to take it over half court on the dribble. If the ball was turned-over during this process, the original offensive team got 2 points. The point here of course was to put emphasis on the overall rebounding process, both offensive rebounding and defensive rebounding. For offensive rebounding, putting emphasis on put-backs, and for defensive rebounding, putting emphasis on pushing the ball up court to get into your offense.

I certainly was not as impressed with Warrick as the MJS seemed to be. He demonstrated atrocious ball handling skills, and part of that was poor decision making too, as he shouldn't have been attempting to dribble in many of those situations. He did rebound reasonably well throughout the course of the practice, and he had a couple decent post moves. But he is definitely not the sharpest tool in the shed. He screwed up a couple times, most blatantly on one of the drills in which he took off in the complete wrong direction, towards the wrong hoop. Skiles made EVERYONE stop, and then he docked Warrick's team 2 points

The player Skiles had to correct most often was Dominic James. James also shot the ball too much. If this continues, Skiles just might punch him But at this point, James presence at training camp has been a negative. He needs to at least be a neutral presence, if not a positive one.

Ersan was definitely the most impressive today, IMO. Plenty of what you've seen from Ersan from clips of his good overseas play is what was on display today. Both sides of the floor.

Ukic was very solid. He didn't do anything particularly well, either scoring-wise or creating-wise. He barely did any of either. But he was there, he seemed sure of himself, and he wasn't making mistakes. I would also point out that you could say the same things about Bell the times he was running the point today, and Bell is definitely a better shooter than Roko, so it still seems totally unnecessary to have Roko on this roster.

Jennings looked far more comfortable on defense than on offense. He seemed a little nervous on offense. His jump shot really needs work, and he needs to do a better job on shot selection. He was fairly passive, and didn't create much. However, he did put up a couple of nice runners at one point, and another point he finally had a stretch where he was more aggressive offensively, which resulted in him hitting 3 of 4 midrange jumpers in the span of 6 or 7 possessions. Definitely nothing from Jennings today that got me excited or wowed me, but also nothing that made me concerned (such as was the experience with Joe Alexander last year).

I like what I saw from Delfino (still don't like what led to him being on the team, but that's another story). Nothing spectacular, but he was solid.

Bell seemed to be in significantly better shape (physically, and basketball wise) this year as opposed to last year's training camp and preseason, and OBVIOUSLY as compared to the year before last. Good job, flintstone. Glad you decided to come correct this year, for old time's sake

Gadzuric was pretty bad, but Elson was HORRENDOUS. Absolutely terrible. He must have traveled at least 8 or 9 times (not all of them were called), among many other displays of poor play. I'm not even doing justice to how atrocious Elson was. As of right now, I can't see either of them supplanting Kurt Thomas at 2nd string center. I would expect one of Elson/Gadzuric to be on the inactive list, and the other one to DNP-CD on a nightly basis as the 3rd string center behind Bogut and Thomas. I don't care if Thomas is less of a "true" center than Elson or Gadzuric. Thomas is without a doubt the better option. But holy hell, I cannot believe how terrible Elson looked.

A side note:
For the .01% of you who thought Walter Sharpe was going to suit up for the Bucks at some point this season... it's not going to happen


As I said, overall, this was an excellent practice and a great start to training camp. If they can build on this, they will most definitely exceed the expectations of quite a number of people.

[steger_3434]

Great great great writeup Gad. The point that stuck out to me most in your novel was that BJ didn't create during the first practice. This really has me worried. I was excited as all hell when we drafted him, but after SL when I didn't see him drive and dish one single time I got worried. The "optimists" on the board said the only reason he didn't drive is that it's SL and the coaching staff wanted him to work on other aspects of his game and didn't want him to get hurt. Now we see/hear that the first day of camp he wasn't creating either. If Jennings is a PG that just moves the ball around the perimeter we're in for a rude awaking.

[GrandAdmiralDan]

I knew I forgot something:

At one point during the practice, a classic bit of slapstick comedy, when Gadzuric inexplicably lost control of what he was doing during a dead ball, and head-butted the front of Hakim Warrick's face.

[emunney]

Thanks for that, GAD.

[GrandAdmiralDan]

Great great great writeup Gad. The point that stuck out to me most in your novel was that BJ didn't create during the first practice. This really has me worried. I was excited as all hell when we drafted him, but after SL when I didn't see him drive and dish one single time I got worried. The "optimists" on the board said the only reason he didn't drive is that it's SL and the coaching staff wanted him to work on other aspects of his game and didn't want him to get hurt. Now we see/hear that the first day of camp he wasn't creating either. If Jennings is a PG that just moves the ball around the perimeter we're in for a rude awaking.

To be fair to Jennings, I will say that some of this was due to the drills they were doing today. Some of the drills weren't at all designed for the PG to create. In some of the drills, the offense was supposed to move the ball around in a specific sequence. So I've got to give Jennings a pass for THOSE drills. However, there were drills that he could have shown more in, but didn't.
I wouldn't worry about Jennings... YET.

[REDDzone]

You da man, grand admiral.

[rilamann]

Thanks for sharing GAD great post,hell of a lot better than any camp report we will get from the JS.

Great to hear that Bogut appears to be healthy & ready to go (& Redd too if he's going to be on our roster).I also like to hear that Bogut is taking the enicitive(sp) to be our on court leader,we need one of those.

[trwi7]

Great great great writeup Gad. The point that stuck out to me most in your novel was that BJ didn't create during the first practice. This really has me worried. I was excited as all hell when we drafted him, but after SL when I didn't see him drive and dish one single time I got worried. The "optimists" on the board said the only reason he didn't drive is that it's SL and the coaching staff wanted him to work on other aspects of his game and didn't want him to get hurt. Now we see/hear that the first day of camp he wasn't creating either. If Jennings is a PG that just moves the ball around the perimeter we're in for a rude awaking.

To be fair to Jennings, I will say that some of this was due to the drills they were doing today. Some of the drills weren't at all designed for the PG to create. In some of the drills, the offense was supposed to move the ball around in a specific sequence. So I've got to give Jennings a pass for THOSE drills. However, there were drills that he could have shown more in, but didn't.
I wouldn't worry about Jennings... YET.

So what you're saying is Brandon Jennings might not be great from the start?!?!

[steger_3434]

I hope I didn't imply that I thought Jennings should be great from the beginning. I know it's going to take time for him to amount to the star I hope he is. With that said, you don't have to be great to drive into the lane to create. He's supposedly already one of the fastest players in the NBA with a good handle. If he can't at least get into the lane or try to get into the lane he's going to have an awful rookie year. I"m talking JAish awful.