[2016-2017] Donatas Motiejunas as a New Orleans Pelican

He was averaging 15 pts and 8. something rebs during the win streak, I didn't bother looking it up when I posted and didn't his averagea plummeted....


Still WAY better than DMo though LOL

 

Ok....

DD

 

The guys at TheRinger.com had a few things to say about DMO.

https://theringer.com/russell-westbrooks-one-man-show-suddenly-has-reinforcements-292f4311d6c3

Donatas Motiejunas Made a $36 Million Mistake
Cousins’s foul trouble opened up playing time for Motiejunas, who played 23 minutes on Sunday after getting a DNP-CD the night before in Dallas. No player on the New Orleans roster has been more affected by the trade than Motiejunas, who has seen his playing time dwindle in the past three games. At 7-foot and 222 pounds, Motiejunas has an intriguing inside-out offensive game, but he was never the most mobile player, even before a back injury that kept him out almost all of last season. Oklahoma City attacked him ruthlessly whenever he was in the game. This was my favorite of all his poor defensive plays:

The Pelicans defense has been shredded whenever Motiejunas has been on the floor this season: their defensive rating is 10 points higher when he is in (112.7) than when he is out (102.5). While he might have been able to play as a power forward a generation ago, the only way to hide him now is to play him at center, but there are no longer any available minutes at the position with Cousins and Davis on the roster. New Orleans is punting four roster spots with redundant big men — Motiejunas, Omer Asik, Alexis Ajinca, and rookie Cheick Diallo — who don’t make sense next to the team’s best two players, and it has hamstrung their ability to add talent.

Motiejunas signed a one-year deal with the Pelicans after a months-long standoff with the Rockets. He was a restricted free agent who refused to sign the qualifying offer Houston had extended to him, and he wouldn’t report for a physical when the Rockets matched the four-year, $36 million contract he signed with the Nets in December. The idea was for him to rebuild his value with New Orleans, but that’s not going to happen if he’s rotting away on the bench while Alvin Gentry goes small around Cousins and Davis. He will likely have to sign another one-year deal this offseason, and his history of back injuries means he may never get another lucrative long-term contract. He could end up joining Lance Stephenson, another player who had a brief stint with New Orleans this season, as an example of a guy who should have swallowed his pride and taken the better deal in front of him.

 

DMo had a decent stretch in the 4th against OKC while Cousins was on the bench. He got a steal, scored in the post, and drew two free throws. Helped keep the game close. It was nice to see him look like his old self for a bit. Then he missed both free throws and gave up an offensive rebound and disappeared from there. He doesn't play positional defense anymore, either.

 

^^^^

LOL. Positional defense and boxing out are two of his strong traits. In that play he had position and boxed out......only to box out his own player

 

This needs a response from @DaDakota and @Bobbythegreat !

 

Honestly, he's just not that good... even worse when he's not physically right (which he probably never will be).

I'm not sure there's a single thing he does well... even his back to the basket post-game can effectively be neutralized if any team actually bothered to game-plan against it (thanks to his high turnover rate, slow-twitch fibers, and overall clumsiness as he's always seems to be falling down).

 

It's like you could replace "DMo" with "TJones" in that paragraph and it would still apply. Inconsistency and disappearing noted in that paragraph defines journeymen role players who slowly fall out of the rotation as they get further and further away from our draft date hopes, dreams and potential.

btw: notice no one in the media describes Marcus Morris and Patrick Patterson that way.

In DMo's case, it's probably due to him playing at less that 100% of his 2015 self, despite him saying he's fine in the media. This is what he said to Joel Blank last week...."I'm fine. You see me out on the court, right? In the NBA at the highest level of basketball, right?" Yeah, we do....unfortunately you couldn't also quote productive stats to Joel, soooo..... Getting some play intermixed with DNPs doesn't mean you are just as mobile, quick and durable as before, yet keep saying you're perfectly fine, because you're trying to withhold the complete truth for financial gain -- which is fully within your rights.

 

Dmo is a role player, he needs a team that fits how he plays, obviously New Orleans is NOT it.....hell Houston was it...which is preplexing to me....

Oh well, still like his game no matter what the haters say about him.



DD

 

Sam Bowie hid knee pain from Portland's doctors pre-draft and into his career. There's no test they could administer that could tell them if he felt any pain, all of that relies on the patient being forthcoming. He knew if he told the truth it would affect his career and earnings, so he lied. I know I'd do the same thing with a lifetime's worth of earnings on the line.

There's no way to know whether DMo is hiding anything like that. Only he would know. Ask Dwight if he was in pain after herniated disk surgery rehab the answer would likely be no. The surgery repaired his back, but he lost a lot of athleticism in the process. The same could be true for DMo, except unlike Dwight some doctors clearly thought his back was still a long-term concern.

 

Yule - C

 

He sucks

 

I ALMOST caught myself feeling bad for DMo last night as I watched him look pathetic and helpless against Enes Kanter and Steven Adams, but then I remembered how he and his dumbass agent tried to break Restricted Free Agency. Sorry DMo, you're not special. You play by the same rules as every other free agent. See Tristan Thompson if you need an example.

He was never any match for guys like these as far as rebounding goes even pre-injury, but this was a whole other level of ineptness. He looked helpless. I still remember Rudy Gobert and DeAndre Jordan annihilating him when he was playing center for us his one good season. This was prior to him getting hurt and I honestly have always wondered if him playing center against bigger stronger guys like that is what screwed his back up. Now he is a shell of his former self and anybody that gives him a contract worth a lot of money without those buyouts will regret it. There is no way in the world a player as young and skilled as he is would agree to a contract that has ZERO guaranteed years in it. I've never seen a veteran sign anything like that. Something just doesn't pass the smell test. He isn't right physically.

 

Dmo looks to be following Parsons road to success.

1) Convince everyone your healthy
2) Over drinks, convince one team to sign you to a big contract.
3) Then go on vacation

 

The fact that Dmo hasn't fired his agent makes me wonder if BJ actually advised him to report for the physical when the Rockets matched. Either way, Dmo is a colossal idiot. In fact, he's a 36 million dollar idiot.

 

You guys crack me up with this "positional defense" stuff. Lol, he's NOT a good defensive player. It's ok to say it.

 

Tough but a lot of truth in it.

 

Since when are teams supposed to break their backs to fit in role players? Every single argument you say defending DMo can apply to Brewer as well, but I don't see you defending Brewer to high heavens like you DMo.

That's why it's so funny to hear you throw shade at Dwight because you keep coddling an infinitely worse player like DMo. You have two different standards, Dwight averages a double double and leads the team to Rox best finish since Hakeem and he's a cancer and loser. DMo scores 4 pts on 36% fg 0% 3 pt fg and you like how he plays.

 

Royce White is the only player in recent Rockets history that i can think of that did more to hurt himself than Dmo.