George Hill was 2-9 and his +/- was -22? Was he just really struggling against Nash or somethign?

Yep....Nash was blowing right by him. I imagine we wont see much of Hill on Nash for the rest of the series.

well it's not like Tony Parker is much better on defense....do the Spurs have anyone that they could put on Nash, while not creating a huge mismatch by putting TP/Hill on the Suns' 2?

I mean.. Nash IS one of the best offensive players in the modern era. His shooting stats are the best of the decade and he matches that with equally impressive assist numbers.

Nash had 11 of the Sun's first 14 points and 8 of them were layups. He just killed Hill. No doubt that Nash is one of the all-time greats and everytime I watch him I wonder what goes through Cuban's mind when he sees him!!

On another note, Nash needs to accept his impending baldness, ala Ginobli, and cut that rag top off his head, which he messes with constantly, trying to keep the receeding hairline hidden.

actually when TP is on nash he slows him down quite a bit... Parker is far too quick for nash

Problem is Nash looks worse with the crew cut.

I think Steve Nash is one of the more underrated players in the league. He is the best PG in the league, but everybody always argues Chris Paul or Deron Williams. I think in the back of people's minds, it is just hard to accept the fact that an old, skinny, white guy who looks more like a skater than a basketball player is the best PG in the league. Sure, he's no defensive juggernaut, but with all the hand checking rules these days, most PG's aren't.

He may not have deserved back-to-back MVP's, but that is really the only knock on the guy's career. He is truly an amazing player to watch.

[This message has been edited by MassAggie97 (edited 5/4/2010 11:14a).]

Nash is the best offensive PG I've ever seen, no doubt. He also does more with less overwhelming athletism than anyone in the history of the league. However, he is terrible on defense. You can't say he's the best PG when he can't stop 170lb Tony Parker from going right over him for layups.

To the OP, Hill did have a bad game. He started the game getting worked by Nash and then ended it by missing a few open 3s that really would have made this game interesting.

Parker isn't great on defense, but he did a noticeably better job on Nash than Hill did. Nash abused Hill, and then Duncan or McDyess was constantly having to come off his man to help on Nash. Nash got way too many easy layups against Hill in the first quarter.

The Spurs then tried to put Hill on Richardson, and it was equally as bad. Richardson is too strong for Hill. I don't think Hill will have a major impact on this series, he just doesn't matchup well with the Suns lineup. It was great having Hill matched up against a slow and old PG like Kidd.

Parker isn't the best defender but he does know how to play Nash. Also, Parker makes Nash work a lot harder on the other end.

I'm pretty sure Hill spent most of his time guarding Terry, not Kidd. He's great against guys who want to shoot because he's got those long arms. It looked to me like Nash really caught him off guard with his early aggressiveness. I expect Hill to get better at guarding Nash as the series goes. In the past, Pop used to use Bowen on Nash.. it's a proven strategy. You stop him from getting open jumpers and then you chase him through the lane with the bigger player. The key is to get good help from the bigs, that wasn't happening early in the game. Notice that Nash didn't do nearly as much damage later and it wasn't just because of Parker.

Sounds like Hill got discouraged/disoriented early on and lost his confidence overall. I wouldn't count him out for the series, yet. Nash can be a perplexing player to defend, you have to have a short memory when guarding him and then make him work as hard as possible on the other end of the court.

quote:

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Problem is Nash looks worse with the crew cut.

I think Steve Nash is one of the more underrated players in the league. He is the best PG in the league, but everybody always argues Chris Paul or Deron Williams. I think in the back of people's minds, it is just hard to accept the fact that an old, skinny, white guy who looks more like a skater than a basketball player is the best PG in the league. Sure, he's no defensive juggernaut, but with all the hand checking rules these days, most PG's aren't.

He may not have deserved back-to-back MVP's, but that is really the only knock on the guy's career. He is truly an amazing player to watch.

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I honestly think everyone knows how good Steve Nash is. I agree with everything you said except for him being underrated.

I guess we will just disagree on whether he is underrated. I think Steve Nash is STILL the best PG in the league. Almost everyone else put Paul and Williams ahead of him.

Maybe I'm wrong about what everyone else thinks, but every "best PG" discussion I've heard in the last couple of years centered on Paul and Williams.

Well it depends on your criteria. I feel defense can't be totally left out of the discussion. Its no coincidence that Nash has NEVER been on a good defensive team.