Hey...Danny Fortson IS there PF. He will be top 5 rebounder if he remains a starter. He is looking like an absolutely legitimate 15-10 workhorse. I'm with Cowens here...Fortson should start and Jameison has more abilities to take on other roles. I mean if SAR and Othella can share the court, Jameison and Fortson can too. He'll be just fine as long as Cowens knows how to use his talents in create ways. Jameison can still play the low post on offense with Fortson out of the way weakside, no doubt about that. I also do not read Antwan having any desire to leave the team from those quotes.
I totally agree on Fortson. Until I got a chance to see him on League Pass this year I had no idea what kind of player he is. That guy is a man among boys in the paint. I saw him plow through LaFrenz time after time in that Denver game. I could easily see Danny average 13+ rebounds this year, and that kind of productivity merits a starting spot! I don't think Jamison's going to be a career franchise player... ------------------
SAR and Othella is different. SAR is an SF, and operates face up, as he has a smooth jumper, and nice penetrating abilities. SAR doesn't have the strength to bang as a PF full time. Jamison is a PF. His jumper lacks a lot, and he needs to be able to operate to be successful. This is a very strange situation for Golden State (I questioned why they even wanted to sign Fortson). hp-Would you be talking about playing Fortson and Jamison PF/C, or with a center in there and Jamison posting as an SF? If you mean Jamison as an SF, if Foyle or Dampier are in there, I don't see how that can work. Neither Foyle nor Dampier are very effective outside 2 feet, and same can probably be said for Fortson. Of the 4, Jamison has the best shot, but Jamison at SF causes even more problems, because they usually don't have a 3 point shooter on the floor (with Hughes and Blaylock in the backcourt). What complicates things even more is the fact that Fortson isn't just playing 15-10: He's playing 17-17.5 with a 59% FG% in 32 MPG! (granted just 2 games) Jamison is on my fantasy team, and his numbers (12.5-3, 30 MPG, 41% FG%, 3.5 TO per game) are certainly lackluster. I always thought this was Jamison's team, along with Hughes. Why is he getting only 30 MPG? I haven't seen the games, so maybe it's not fair for me to comment, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a meltdown in Golden State. Blaylock's already gone off on Dampier, Fortson's game is begging for more PT, and shot oppurtunities, which can't make Jamison, or possibly Hughes, who might lose a few shots, very happy. Golden State desperately needs to either revamp their combinations of players, or design some radical plays, because they have 4 big men who should get around 30 MPG each, and only 2 slots to truly play them in (assuming Jamison as an SF experiment failed). Do you bring Jamison or Fortson off the bench? Do you go small with Fortson at center, in the tree sized west? (note: I'd like this thread geared towards the Golden State issues. No dreamcasting here!) ------------------ The Serious Police are watching. Follow the rules or be assimilated. Shandon is underrated.
NIKE, go ahead and bench Fortson. What do you want me to say? Jamison and Fortson and a center can play the frontline together. I believe SF is the most unnecessary position in the game. If I have to build a team with only 4 prototype players and one tweener, I will draft two PFs, a center and two guards in a hearbeat, before I'd replace one of those star PFs with a mediocre (yet prototype) SF. This is where the coach must invent a system to fit his stars. And make no mistake, Fortson at 15-10 is a star. The guy is a monster on the boards. He is a hungry monster. Jamison and Fortson can play together as long as Cowens is creative.
Well, I guess it's my duty to check in here. Jamison has been somewhat shafted by a combination of circumstances, some of which you guys have noted: (1) Fortson playing so well at PF. (2) Jamison, though he's still in a learning process, being a better perimeter player than Fortson or Dampier. So right now, Jamison's punishment for being a better all-around player is having the things he's done best taken away from him. Which wouldn't be so bad if he could make the transition quietly, but instead (3) Team PR, media coverage, and Jamison's own 20/10 play from last year have built up an expectation that he should put up All-Star numbers. Not only did fans expect it, Jamison expected it. Not to mention, there's always the lingering Vince Carter comparisons to be dealt with. And complicating the whole thing is (4) Cowens hasn't figured out what to do with Jamison from an X's-and-O's standpoint. Perhaps because they spent so much preseason time working on the running game, or perhaps because Cowens and his staff are something less than creative geniuses offensively -- or maybe both -- the W's halfcourt offense hasn't shown much ball movement or ability to switch to secondary options (like Jamison cutting to the hoop). So we've been left watching the primary options: -- Throw the ball to Dampier (or, on rare occasions, Fortson) in the low post. -- Mookie running a pick-and-roll. -- Hughes running a pick-and-roll. Believe it or not, Dampier really has been the first option (though he usually passes the ball back out). I've always defended the guy as underrated, but even I'm stunned to seeing him get 2 or 3 times as many touches as Jamison. Which leads me back to Cowens' offensive game plan. If the W's were some kind of awesome scoring juggernaut and Jamison was the only one who wasn't thriving, then I could see a reason to move him. But the fact is, they're barely shooting 40%, and a lot of folks aren't thriving. Judging from the first two games, it'd be easy to think PJ Carlesimo was still coaching the team. Well, except that neither PJ nor St. Jean had trouble finding ways to get Jamison scoring opportunities last year (although he did have a bad first month). Before Jamison hurt his knee last year, he'd scored 20+ points in 14 out of his last 15 games. So, I know the guy can score. What I don't know is whether Dave Cowens can design an offense that lets him do it. As heyp notes, if you really wanted to give Jamison room to operate, it would be easy to put both Dampier and Fortson up past the 3-point line on the weak side. But Cowens doesn't seem to want that. Instead, he's making Jamison play a pure SF role "cold turkey" -- that is, without doing ANY of the things he's best at (finishing on the fast break, getting the ball while cutting to the basket, or putbacks of offensive rebounds). The hopeful answer is that over time, Cowens will design better plays, and the halfcourt execution will improve so that Antawn starts finding the seams in the defense (and the other players start finding him near the hoop). But in the meantime, NIKE, I'd get Jamison off my fantasy team for awhile. ------------------ [This message has been edited by Swopa (edited November 04, 2000).]
heyparty-I agree with your assessment of the SF position as the most unneccessary. Aside from the recent center drought in the late 90s, "true" SFs were the hardest to find in the present day type of game. On our own Rockets for example, we had Horry, who has evolved into a PF who played SF because of lack of strength, and Elie, who at 6'5'' is rather small for an SF. But, the problem for the Warriors is, and it looks like it always will be, outside shooting. They lack even one real dangerous outside shot in their talented starting 5. Jason Coll....err, a big man with an outside shot to about 15-20 could do wonders for their offense. Swopa-How does Jamison look defensively at SF? Going from defending the low post to stopping a Lamar Odom from trying to fly by you are two different things. I was close to picking up Fortson too...I still have Jermaine O'Neal and Mo Tay to dispose of at PF for me so I should be able to make it through for the while. With your impressions of Dampier, I picked him up round 11 over Potapenko, who's now riding pine, while Damp is on the bench for me as the #5 ranking center to date (I have Ewing.) I also picked up Hughes for giggles to back Kobe Bryant and Allen Iverson, 3 Warriors on my team. I'd be curious to watch Jamison today. Usually, slumping superstar/coach meetings will have a big impact on a player's next game, whether it be positive or negative. Even more interesting with a big team like San Antonio. So, basically, Golden State needs to redesign their offense and playbook to fit their personnel (to include Jamison in a better fit, and to a lesser extent, Hughes who was acquired midseason). Swopa-Last few questions: Has Jamison gotten any real PF time (Fortson out, or at center)? Would Golden State consider bringing Jamison off the bench in more of a PF role, or would that be out of the question? ------------------ The Serious Police are watching. Follow the rules or be assimilated. Shandon is underrated.
I'll be going to the Spurs game tonight (my brother and I are splitting season tickets, and I've got the first 4 home games), NIKE, so I'll give you a firsthand update. You're exactly right that it's mostly a matter of making the pieces fit. This team has gone through HUGE turnover -- guys like Jamison and Vonteego Cummings are young players dealing with their third coach (and third playbook) in a year. Tonight will be only Hughes' third game with Jamison or Fortson, and his ninth with Dampier. So if they all look a little unfamiliar with each other out on the court, there's a good reason. Fortson is lucky, because what he does, he can do regardless of who his coach or teammates are. So he's looked great, while everybody else is still on the learning curve. Regarding Jamison's minutes, he played PF for nearly all of the 4th quarter in the comeback win over Phoenix, with Fortson on the bench until the last 2-3 minutes. (Jamison got in early foul trouble, so he only played 4 minutes in the first half, then the entire second half.) Due to the hype factor I mentioned in my earlier post, I don't think there's any way they could get away with benching Jamison. And what would be the point? It's more important for GS to develop Jamison's abilities for the long term than to scratch out a few more wins this year. Jamison's defense at SF (like Hughes' at SG) is shaky, but he's got the athleticism to learn it over time. His outside shooting and ballhandling have already improved substantially. Incidentally, to address another issue that's been brought up, Fortson wouldn't work out at C. In the Phoenix game, Cowens tried that for about a minute and a half -- after two easy Suns layups (that Dampier or Foyle would have challenged, but Fortson was too slow to react to), the experiment was over. ------------------ [This message has been edited by Swopa (edited November 04, 2000).]
I was thinking Golden State should swap with Orlando for Mike Miller. Each team gets what it needs. Even if Grant Hill sits for awhile, Bo Outlaw can start at SF. That team needs a power forward in the worst way. ------------------
Golden state doesnt look TOO stupid now. twan jamison averaged almost 20 ppg and 8 rpg last year to carters 25 and 6. Twan is listed as 6'9 but is 6'7 more accurate? if he is 6'9 then i would trade fortson because jamison is a franchise player.
http://www.contracostatimes.com/sports/basketball/warriors/stories/warriors_20001104.htm *Please, let's not put this in the Rockets forum unless there's reason to believe talks have been rekindled from our 3 reliable sources (Doc Rocket/Pops/Clutch). We don't need a 300 post thread, then 12 more other threads dealing with speculation.* ------------------ The Serious Police are watching. Follow the rules or be assimilated. Shandon is underrated.
I knew Jamison would be unhappy. He doesnt like the position he is in. People think he is a SF, I have said this before that he is not a sf. Jamison can play sf, but he is alot more effective as a pf. He is a great player, golden state has to figure out how to treat the franchise player well. ------------------ "You look a team that's been to the mountaintop like the Houston Rockets, I'm going to put pressure on myself to be the best possible player that I can be. With the pieces they already have in place and myself, we can do some amazing things next season." Maurice Taylor
Well, GS may not look stupid, but I sure do (you didn't take my advice about dropping Jamison from your fantasy team, did you, NIKE?) And NIKE looks awfully prescient with his remark that "Usually, slumping superstar/coach meetings will have a big impact on a player's next game" -- Jamison exploded tonight for 32 points on 14-for-21 shooting (including 2-for-3 on three-pointers ... who said he couldn't shoot from outside?), with 8 rebounds and 3 assists. Unfortunately, the Warriors lost in an avalanche of Spurs 3-pointers and the twilight-zone scoring of Malik Rose(?!), who put in 26 points in 23 minutes. But Jamison looked better than he ever has offensively, scoring inside, outside, and on the break. Two things that helped make a difference: (1) Jamison got a couple of early fast-break baskets, the first an emphatic dunk (as if to say, "Finally!!"). (2) Fortson came out fairly early in the 1st quarter, with Jamison staying in to play PF for several minutes and scoring on a handful of post-up opportunities. From there, his confidence was up and carried him through most of the remainder of the game. Give Jamison some toughness points, too -- it looked like he jammed his shooting wrist in the 4th quarter, and he was in obvious pain and shielding the hand as he lagged running back on defense. A rebound turned into a Warriors fast break, and Jamison again jogged slightly behind the play, lingering at the 3-point line (as I was saying to my friend, "Antawn's hurt! They've got to call time out!") Seeing him unguarded, Vonteego Cummings whipped a pass to Jamison, who not only caught the ball cleanly but sank a three. Now, if only Cowens would have a talk with Larry Hughes . . . ------------------
Swopa-Fortunately no. I had picked my starters 2 days ago, so I couldn't do anything about it if I wanted to. Unfortunately, Jim Jackson and Nick Van Exel busted out the whooping stick on me, and the prelim totals say I lost by 37. (I won't mention my head coach blunder by accidentally forgetting to start someone in my 3rd flex position, and if I had started anyone on my bench (J. O'Neal, Mark Jackson, Larry Hughes, Erick Dampier, Mo Taylor) other than Mo Taylor, who would've still left me 1 point down, I would've won. But off my sob fantasy basketball stories, the Warriors will be a roller coaster team, and while I don't think they're a playoff contender, if I'm going into the last week of the season fighting for a playoff spot, they'd be a dangerous team to have to play. They'll go through bumps in the road, but the talent and potential are obviously there. ------------------ The Serious Police are watching. Follow the rules or be assimilated. Shandon is underrated.
