Agreed-- the D is going to struggle and I think everyone went into the season acknowledging that. (Of course, losing Jeffries is a big blow here.) What has been surprisingly poor so far, and what we can realistically expect to substantially improve as the season goes on, is the offense.

- Crawford is simply in one of his slumps where his J isn't falling. I don't think it has much to do with a different style of play-- even under LB last year when his game was more reined in, JC went looong stretches giving us almost nothing on offense. We will look a lot better when Crawford breaks out of his slump.

- Frye has been awful. Part of that is Frye's fault but a large portion of the blame goes to Isiah for using Frye only as a jump shooter. It is up to Isiah to integrate Frye more effectively into the offense-- get him some post-ups, run some pick and rolls, whatever.

- And of course Marbury hasn't looked good. I think it's too early to tell why-- maybe he's getting older, slower and less explosive, maybe part of it has to do with an inherent incompatibility with Francis, maybe he really is just not dedicating himself enough to the game. Time will tell.

Posted by franco12:

I am disappointed by a lack of energy out of that group- the only time this team is any good is when Nate is on the floor- he's 5'1" of fire and its really sad that as a team, we have to rely on a midget to be in games.

I'm not gonna lie - I LOL'ed at that.