Two years ago, Joe Alexander was the 8th pick of the NBA Draft by the Milwaukee Bucks, taken ahead of Brook Lopez, Anthony Randolph, D.J. Augustin, Jason Thompson, Roy Hibbert and JaVale McGee. Today he was waived by his third NBA team. How do you fall that fast?
Adam Morrison and Joe Alexander have got to be the worst White lottery picks player in the recent history. By the way didn't the Bucks drafted Alexander not based on his talents but because he can speak Mandarin so they can keep Yi happy back then?
havent been following him much since he entered the league... From what i remember about his playign style, i guess he's sort of a tweener, like a taller Budinger with less range, at the PF spot.....could it be he needs to go to the "right" team?
Short term thinking based on aesthetic elements, both of those players. They probably saw the explosive leaping out of Alexander and thought they had themselves a mini-Blake Griffin they can mold.
Where is baller4life315 now? I told him he was smoking weed for thinking this guy would be a serviceable player in the NBA. He freaked out on me.
Man I remember getting hyped up on Joe mainly because if memory serves me correct CCR was pretty high on him. Seeing as how CCR is a baller in his own right, I got caught up in the dunk on everyone hype. Could be totally wrong here, but just my memory.
"Fall?" From my standpoint, Joe Alexander never fell because I didn't think he had much potential to start with. Let this be a lesson to everyone (GMs included): Fairly athletic (or even very athletic) swing players who don't have much game usually don't amount to much in the NBA. From Darius Miles to Stromile Swift to Gerald Green to Joe Alexander and a boatload of other so-called "talented" guys "with potential". The main exceptions are foreign players who had a late introduction to basketball. If guys that have been playing basketball since they were knee-high have the lethal combination of poor handles and poor shooting form (which often also means poor work-ethic and poor b-ball IQ), kiss them goodbye when they arrive to the NBA. The NBA is awesome at blowing up the facade of untalented phonies. It makes me laugh when their fans blame NBA coaches or "not being in the right situation" for a player's failure. It's called being exposed. Ask the Emperor.
You make it sound like he was waived three times! But that's just not true. Milwaukee TRADED him to Chicago. Then Chicago DIDN'T RE-SIGN him. Now, after signing with New Orleans, they WAIVED him. See? It's hardly as bad as you make it out to be.
I guess he shouldnt have spent that much time dunking on his teammates in practice....can't say the kid doesnt have hops though, pretty dynamic in that department....Wasnt he a military kid? I think i remember reading he was a hard working basketball junkie...i guess when you can score that easily there's no reason to work on actually improving though.. <object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/GdAYyqSOuPc?fs=1&hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/GdAYyqSOuPc?fs=1&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object>
Good memory. I make no bones about my original assessment that this guy would develop into a useful NBA player. I saw a kid with a good head on his shoulders, tons of room for improvement (hadn't played but a few years), a drive to get better, and overwhelming raw athletic ability for a guy his size. I think it's obvious at this point that he will never live up to the expectations of a #8 pick, but I still feel that in the right system he could be a serviceable big man. He's only 23, his athleticism is impressive, and you can't teach height. Maybe pairing him with an elite set up man like Nash or Paul would provide the spark he needs to avoid going by the wayside so soon.
The sad thing is, he did have a chance with Paul. Too bad he couldn't work his way into the rotation.
Not the end of his career, he's got money now, just needs to swallow his pride play overseas or somewhere work on his game and make a comeback. But prob won't happen....