Chris Parker/Cleveland Scene answers your questions

[Chris Parker]

It's amazing to me that more reporters don't craft their questions as carefully as you do, as when you mentioned in the Marion thread why you didn't ask Blatt why Marion's not playing. You recognized that the answer would be awkward, so there was no point in asking the question.

I'm an attorney, which makes me pretty anal when it comes to the exact wording of questions. But damn, it is important, especially when you only get a couple of questions, like you guys get after games. You'd think reporters would think them through more carefully, considering whether they're insulting and/or something the coach just can't answer honestly, etc..

I think too many reporters use that period as an opportunity to argue, which seems like a complete waste of time to me.

Anyway, nice to see Fedor taking his craft more seriously. The other guy I notice is Roda. I think he's pretty "meh" as a talk show guy, but I've always thought his questions post-game and in interviews he's done on his shows were good. He seems to "get" that the questioning process isn't about the guy asking the questions, but rather the guy answering them.

Don't underestimate how hard it is in the moment. There are so many things going through your mind. For me I want to create context so I can narrow their answer - sort of herd them into saying something useful, but About Three Clauses In...

I had one of those yesterday with LeBron. I was wandering a meadow hoping I would reach the end of the question. I wanted to ask - if he had looked at the tape of the 4th and the Iso and whether he had taken anything from it. and he sasid like the amazing fucking superhor he is enrout to a huge vicotry = you got to play the first quarter first. How about thet. He said, it won't even matter. I should probably cross post this in the Lebron thing -- because in the way I see it now, he was pointing in the stands. If that really happened, there had to be a few people like "why is he holding his bat like that? What ths fuck is he doing? Well Holy Shit."

That was my emotional response to LeBron leading that team into that Little Bighorn caliber massacre.

GOAT

 

[Chris Parker]

Yes, also we lost game 1 to Chicago at home. But great article as always!

that's so funny. I haven't slept yet. Came home on an 8:30 am flight. Was writing the last bit as I waited to be the last couple people to board 15 minutes before the plane leaves. you can often snake an aisle seat and they never check, plus who wants to be on a plane any longer than absolutely necessary. I'd walk from the runway if the windows popped open. Anyway, was writing to the last moment. Got on the plane and still not even remembering all of the what 2000 or so words. and in my brain there's this little thing. "There was a home loss." I have no idea what it is connected to. Some fever dream as I try to lean into the seat rest ahead and catch something resembling sleep in the 90 minute spirit airlines cattle car.

at least now I know what that home loss thing was about

 

[Chris Parker]

Still reading. Awesome so far. But you had a couple of mistakes that you might want to fix - Bud is the CoY and not the runner-up, and you also spelled his first name "Miek".

for some reason I thought Kerr won. I guess I confused it because the GM won

 

[Chris Parker]

@Chris Parker I'd love for you to tweet out when you are about to be on the air, even if it's a regularly scheduled deal like Mondays at 10:45am. I'm usually sitting at work and if I see a tweet about someone I enjoy listening to going on the air, I usually make it a point to give it a listen. Heck I listen to just about anything I can that's Cavaliers related during the playoffs.

Consider it done. You really shouldn't have to ask, but I'm still trying to get my shit tight like anyone else. Gonna make a point. Gotta remember I only started doing twitter with any frequency in the last 3-4 months. Still kinda getting the hang of it. On the plus side I understand it better than my smartphone. (I work from home, when I'm out, I"m at a show, not watching a show through a viewfinder. Or I'm eating. Well, now I'm checking my twitter. I've succumb. I still don't even have my voice recognition hooked up and I"ve had it like 18 months? two years? Not even sure. I'm all about some technologies, and when I lived in NYC I loved my cell, but I kinda long a bit for the days when nobody could reach you whenever they wanted and things had a bit more back and forth as opposed to backandforth.

 

[ibLurkin]

It's been up a couple hours, but I was en route back from Atlanta. My latest column is up

http://www.clevescene.com/scene-and...cassee-while-paving-the-way-to-the-nba-finals

Done reading - rock solid.

Play breakdown, stats, defensive scheme coverage (A great feature. Most wouldn't notice defensive moves), trend analysis and not one mention of other squabbly media guys.
To date, I think this is one of your best pieces. I'd definitely list it as top-shelf sports coverage.

Oh and by the way, props for the playoff forecast you did a while ago. Not a 100%, but damn impressive.

 

[buzzdog]

Chris, you need to post your articles here for a quick check by your proof readers before you submit them.

 

[ssopata]

BDP is one of my all time favorite. Grew up on old school and KRS-1.

Maybe Love can be our Scott LaRock, lol

Who then plays the role of D-Nice?

 

[Lee]

BDP is one of my all time favorite. Grew up on old school and KRS-1.

Who then plays the role of D-Nice?

Just call me D-Nice.

 

[Chris Parker]

I know for my own part I thought it would be gr8 to be someone confident enough to wear a large watch around my neck just in case people need to know what time it was.... boy--eez

 

[enigmatic]

Thanks to you I'm now blasting "Public Enemy Number 1" and "You Gonna Get Yours" for the first time in years thru my house and scaring my wife, cats, and neighbors this beautiful morning..

I know for my own part I thought it would be gr8 to be someone confident enough to wear a large watch around my neck just in case people need to know what time it was.... boy--eez

 

[natedagg]

It's been up a couple hours, but I was en route back from Atlanta. My latest column is up

http://www.clevescene.com/scene-and...cassee-while-paving-the-way-to-the-nba-finals

I never noticed that JJ was playing well (enough) on defense. Nice catch.

"As LeBron drives, Shumpert, hardly visible besides shoes" : The young man went all Predator on the Hawks and became invisible. This cracks me up.

But seriously Chris, has you ever scene/heard the dejection of a coach like Bud at the post-game presser? Was it most like:
A. An interview with a single mom after she has filed a police report after coming home to find her house robbed.
B. A man who just failed at giving mouth to mouth to his now deceased dog.
C. Someone who just got Clockwork Oranged or Requiemed.

So the Hawks ended up 11/35 on UNcontested shots and 17% on non-rim ones?!? Man that's brutal. We've all had nights like that though, like just yesterday, I couldn't BUY a bucket on my daughter's fisher price hoop, particularly from the baseline... But seriously, that specific data point seems like it would be very mean-regressy.

I said it in the Hawks thread, but we still can play better too, which is a good thing. That said, the 3rd quarter run was just a big, high-stakes, high-intensity blow to the Hawks. I thought some of their shooters were "on" early in the game, but after that punch they took, they couldn't make an open shot. It reminded me a bit of the Bulls game 6 where Chicago is kinda sorta taking shots that were out of rhythm but not exactly tough ones, and the ball just kept rolling out, and with every roll out, the pressure builds, until ultimately, the clock is on 0, your team has lost and you are exhausted, and you find yourself at the podium with an alcoholic daze in your eye and the strange desire to suck your thumb to stop everyone from hearing your cracking voice and the garbled responses coming out of your mouth as you go through the motions with your mind somewhere else.

The answer was D, all of the above.

 

[Pick6]

Chris,

Not sure if this has been addressed before as this is a normal occurence, but would you be able to address on Blatt's downright refusal to play Mozgov in the 4th and beyond? Even with TT out with foul trouble he put Lebron at the 5 tonight.

 

[Chris Parker]

Chris,

Not sure if this has been addressed before as this is a normal occurence, but would you be able to address on Blatt's downright refusal to play Mozgov in the 4th and beyond? Even with TT out with foul trouble he put Lebron at the 5 tonight.

I'm pretty sure I know the answer, and I've mentioned it once or twice. The feeling is this -- you can lose by guys hitting lots of high percentage shots or a few low percentage shots. You're betting that the other guys can't execute effectively enough consistently enough to get and make all those, say shots at the rim. They got 37 GODDAMN shots at the rim and made better than 3/4ths of them. (talking gm2) but they can't buy a three to save their life. That's because Blatt doesn't want them to even start to get hot on 3s. It only takes a couple of them. You make 3 low-percentage shots it's almost the same as executing a drive and finishing 5 times or converting that and a mix of probably well contested mid range jumpers. Cavs are quick enough there aren't that many wide open shots. (My note for tonight Cavs had 60 open shots out of 97. ridiculous. They didn't make them, but honestly they haven't been hitting open shots all series, they've been making an ungodly number of contested shots (see, Earl, LBJ & TMo)

so with taht as preface - the fact is that Thompson is very good at challenging 3 shooters. I can still picture T-Mo fouling Korver on and +1 where he was just inside the 3 line. A 4 pt play is going ot give a team life.

this is something I have been thinking about. Both Blatt's schemes & LBJ's will like physical style are about grinding a team down. saying you're going to have to earn and work for everything. and then when we go the other way we're just going to over power you by making you move and cover the entire perimeter while helping on Lebron as much as you can.

You want to know what it reminds me of? (I might use this tomorrow in the column...)
this guy...

 

[D-westfan]

How many open shots have the hawks had out of curiosity?

 

[Chris Parker]

I'll be on the Defend Cleveland show on WRUW 91.1 in about 5 minutes.

http://www.wruw.org/