Today's Bawful will feature the power of statistical analysis. And this is the Internet, so you can't always do the same schtick over and over, unless your schtick is consistency, something like that. Or I felt like drinking rather than Photoshopping the Suns sucking, even though I was supposed to be doing this post to cover for Bawful so he could get drun-I mean, I was generously offered the opportunity to guest post. Anyways, lets get this stat party started.

Google, stat of the night: 58,100. Just as we made Basketbawful the top Google search result for "potato suck race", I wanted to add more to the legend that is this blog. Until I actually tried a query of "sweet suckteen", and you probably don't need me to tell you, but the 58K+ results are Not At All Safe For Work.

The Detroit Pistons, stats of the night: 12, 13, 20, 36. Sure a blowout loss by a "fighting for an Eastern playoff spot" team with their key players still missing to the "perennially crowned to go to the finals for the West" team may be understandable. But wow. A 12-point 1st and a 13-point 3rd, and a 20-0 Lakers run led to a 92-77 loss. And what is '36'? Was it Kobe's point total for the game? (No, Kobe had only 30 points, along with 8 boards and 7 assists). It's the COMBINED points scored by all 5 'Stions's starters. Includes a non-revenge game by starting center Kwame Brown (4 pts, 8 reb).

Tayshaun Prince, stat of the night: -37. The "poor man's Shawn Marion" somehow managed a whooping +/- of -37 in a 15-point loss! How is this even possible? This has to be some sort of record for the season.

Walter Sharpe, stat of the night: 3. A fabulous debut, Sharpe contributed to Detroit's woes with a +3 suck differential. However, 3 actually refers to the distance in inches missed right of the ENTIRE basket, where the first free throw attempt of his career fell tonight.

The Miami Heat, stats of the night: 100, 6, 5, 30:46. Dwayne Wade recorded his 100th block of the season early in the game, a notable milestone since no other NBA player 6'4" or shorter had ever done it prior. With the officiating double trouble of #12 V. Palmer and #43 D. Crawford, I set the non-call foul blocks over-under at +6. Sadly, or completely logically, 6 actually refers to Miami's new standing in the East, as the Bulls rocked them 106-87. A bawful total of 5 Heat bench players went scoreless during not just a few trillion minutes, but for 30:46 total of playing time.

Los Bulls, stats of the night: 7, 3, 1. Not much I could mention here that won't be on By The Horns, other than the forced awkwardness of "Latin Night" that makes me cringe like shoving los cuernos de toro en mi cabeza. However, they benefit from the bawful of others, as Detroit's aforementioned loss pushes them to the 7 seed, otherwise known as "not crab food". They held The Drain to 3 rebounds (contrast: Ben Gordon had 4). And one Derrick Rose, unintentional sex machine quote machine: "I got hit a few times, but you rub that stuff off and I will have time to recover.” I need a cigarette just swooning over his rookie talent.

Joakim Noah's free throw shooting, stat of the night: 87º. TNT gave us a nice close-up view as he shot two flagrant 1 freebies, courtesy of a Magloire/Wade double team garbage time smother. No need to mention how much contact was made by each Heat player, or who the flagrant was charged on. Anyhoo, he made them both, despite a recent observation of his shooting form, which involves spinning the ball axially like a top, which by my observations was approximately 87 degrees off from where the axis should be. This easily explains his 63.7% FT shooting this season (66.7% career), yet he's still far behind Shaq's shotput and Shawn Marion's flip-flick wrist as the worst looking shots in the NBA. UPDATE!: Reader Axel Foley points out an egregious omission by me: Chuck Hayes as a strong 2nd place candidate, who makes Charles Barkley's golf swing look smooth.

Phoenix's Zone Defense, stat of the night: -20. So it's a good thing to start a game strong, maybe establish your defense like the Suns setting the tone at the beginning of this game. And of course, any Suns fan seeing defensive effort will take what they're given. But against a team that's 1st in the league in offensive rebounds (12.9) and 7th in 3pt% (37.9%), why would you play a scheme that so easily gives these away? The Suns's arrogant lack of adjustment was justified, since they were about -20% more effective at stopping the screen anyways, leading to a -20 point differential.

Matt Barnes, stat of the night: 1. The "poor man's Tayshaun Prince" submitted another 1-for-8 FG performance, littering his past 7 games with inconsistency. Perhaps if we played him some inspirational music, like "Eye of the Tiger", he could have an eye-opening revalation and see the situation more clearly. I'm wondering if a cyclops could help the team at this point, regardless of depth perception issues.

Play by Play bonus: End of the 3rd Quarter (some text may have been adjusted by the author):

:28.9 PHO - J. Richardson defensive rebound
:12 PHO - Confused players still passing the ball around
:09 PHO - J. Richardson receives pass, facepalms incompetent bench players, attempts to create shot off the dribble
:06.5 PHO - Offensive foul on J. Richardson
:01.7 POR - R. Fernandez makes a 6-foot FULL SPEED ABSURD fade away jumper in the lane. Assist: S. Rodriguez
:00.4 PHO - J. Richardson lobs ball lazily to midcourt for G. Dragic, morale of the Suns clearly broken
:00.4 POR - R. Fernandez steals the ball from J. Richardson
:00.1 POR - R. Fernandez makes a 25-foot three-pointer from the right wing
:00.0 End of 3rd Quarter
:00.0 PHO - Forced to stick their hands into the steaming pile of crap to retrieve their gameplan for another quarter

Shaq vs Pryzbilla, stat of the night: 2. Apparently, tonight revealed the 2nd drama altercation involving Shaq stuffing a basketball in the Vanilla Godzilla's face (sorry, this poor video is the only one I could find of the first incident, even though they repeatedly showed it on TNT last night). Sir Charles mentions that "Vanilla Gorilla" would be scary if he played on a good team. Double iceburn.

Horrible incompetent officiating, stat of the night: ∞. #28 T. Nunez Jr., #17 J. Crawford, #36 D. Jones. Any sportswriter that's not completely tired of pointing out the NBA's officiating problem must have the stamina of a rhino.

TNT, stat of the night: 5. The number of hilariously awkward jail jokes and Photoshops made by the studio on the night. I've never seen Sir Charles so speechless, that's good late night television.

University of Arizona, inflated stats of the night: 100%, 100%, 25.5, 21.3. Alumns Jerryd Bayless and Channing Frye got to showcase their skills against their home state's pro team, both shooting perfect from the field with 25.5 pts/48min and 21.3 pts/48min, respectively, and Frye clocking a 21.3 blocks/48min rate as well. Such an outburst in performance must portend well for tomorrow's Madness with possibly the most hated Cinderella team in the history of the tournament.

Stretching for Portland jokes, stat of the night: 3. It's been 3 years since someone compiled the NBA Live 06 Ha Seung Jin remix, so because Portland looked so damn good dismantling the Suns, and we're all sick of Oden health and age jokes, let us re-live this most awesome video of The Blazers's favorite Korean baller (I only brought this up because I was really hoping someone did this same thing only with NBA2K9 and Zach Randolph):


Kobe Bryant, stat of the night: .250. Potentially the percentage chance that a Bryant household maid was abused for the night, but alas it represents Mamba's updated game-winning shot percentage, compared to the league average .298. Other fun numbers include his league-leading 42 misses in 56 tries, far more than Vince Carter (35) and JJ/LeBron (33), and league-leading 5 turnovers. And then he ate a baby seal.

Lacktion report, stat of the night: 1. Chris was feeling some sweet lacktations...

Lakers-Pistons: Shannon Brown has reached the Tao of Finance with a two trillion! Meanwhile, Detroit's Walter Sharpe edged off or away from the rim three times -- once from downtown, twice from the charity stripe -- for a suck differential of +3 in 2:35.

Heat-Bulls: This critical battle between two borderline playoff teams featured extensive challenges of lacktivity from both squads. For Miami, James Jones missed two shots (once from behind the arc) and fouled three times for a +5 in 8:00 flat, while Chris Quinn (1.5 trilion) and All-Lacktion selection Yakhouba Diawara (1.3 trillion) have protected themselves from the economic crisis. And Jamaal Magloire's three rebounds and steal in 10:24 were countered with a brick, a giveway, and three fouls for a Madsen-level 4:3 Voskuhl.

The Notorious VDN actually had another opportunity to unleash human victory cigars tonight, having Linton Johnson snag a +1 via brick in 1:31.

Suns-Blazers: Sure, Joel Pryzbilla made a shot and even had an assist and steal in his 28:01 as Portland's starting big man. But with no further shot attempts and only one rebound, he ended up with a 4:3 Madsen-level Voskuhl via three fouls and a giveaway!

About the author: AnacondaHL is the Chief Internet Media Relations and Security Officer for Basketbawful and a grizzled Internet veteran who watches in despair as his favorite team, the Phoenix Suns, drop their chances lower and lower to make the '09 playoffs. When not wasting time at his Clark Kent job to read BasketBawful, he can be found playing the Internet computer game du jour, Googling questionably NSFW phrases, wondering why the Diamonbacks have seven team colors, and browsing other obscure things on the Internet. He hopes someday to learn four languages, discover a completely un-theorized particle of quantum physics (and would obviously name it after myself, not something stupid like Y(4140)), name the largest number in the world after himself, have an intelligent conversation about anime with someone, and to eat a crab grown in Akron.

Labels: fan submissions, Ha Seung Jin, Phoenix Suns, sweet suckteen