That's directed to me. OK. I understand your point. Griffin's fg% is quite low. That was because he took a lot of 3s. (BTW, his 3p% is very good.) Offensively, he was used primarily as a spot up shooter. That probably explains why he didn't have high assist number. If the "rumor" is correct, that he has bulked up and has improved on his inside game, his fg% will be a lot better than that.
I think it is stil MoT's starting job to lose since he lost it due to injury. As far as spreading out minutes that will be a tough job if we keep all three w/o any trades. After last season and all the injuries I would rather keep them all and worry about distributing minutes than have less talented players to distribute minutes to. If I had to pick between having too many big men/too few little or just the opposite, I would stick with the former.
Even if Rice is healthy, he will not play more than 25 minutes per. They know that the injuries he had the past 2-3 years are wear type injuries and will not risk his effectiveness. Look for him to start the 1st, play 6-8 minutes, sit most of the second, play the final 5 minutes and then do the same in the 2nd half....this is Rudy ball and his operandi. Look for Boki to play around 15 minutes depending on his effectiveness....I am afraid there are not going to be a lot of minutes for Thomas or Taylor depending on Griffin's effectiveness. I say Taylor, because we do not know his effectiveness any more. This injury was a rough one. This is going to be a really interesting season, because someone will have to go at the 4.
Too much talent, too little minutes. The Rockets really need to look to make a trade here. MoT or KT?
lets rank them stat by stat: scoring: 1. moT 2. kt 3. griff rebounding: 1. griff 2. kt 3. moT blocking: 1. griff 2. kt 3. moT griff wins two out of three. he should start. moT finnishes last in two out of three. and those two are what we need most. kt is even across the board. i say griff starts, kt come off the bench, and we trade moT.
Another thing that skews those numbers is how "hot" the player is. Mo T only played in 11 games over 35 min because he was usually a non factor and Rudy wanted KT. Late in the year he played some good games where he was hot and they went to him alot. So those games where he played 35+ mins were some of his best games. At this point it is a good problem to have. But the future of the PF is ALL Griffin. By mid-season Griffin should be getting more PT than Mo T or KT.
man, nice contribution Trader_Jorge. thx for the stats. I don't really now what to make of them other than, Eddie rox, Maurice is a great shooter who gets in foul trouble and had Kenny backing him up, and Kenny had no one backing him up, considering Walt and Rice went down forcing Eddie to play some 3. Nice rebound numbers by Kenny, though.
Smoothie the question I have is how many games did we win with KT and griff starting? And how many games did we win with Taylor? And I know that Steve was hurt, but he was in some of those games...Im just asking
The question really is...how many games did we lose with Taylor injured, and really only KT to man PF since Eddie had to play small forward, since Glenn and Walt were down. We just cannot sustain that many injuries. Mo, Steve, Walt and Rice. You cannot make some argument that we "win more with Mo" when really the point is that we "lose more with no Mo, Steve, Walt and Rice." We won in 2001 because the entire team started clicking...especially Hakeem!!! especially Hakeem. Everything made it easier for Mo to show his stuff, and he did. Mo is a keeper, imo. But let's not go crazy and claim "how many games did we lose without Taylor, or we could ask the same thing about Glenn Rice and Walt being down." That argument is thin. Very thin.
Well at least something I have is thin Then lets change my argument to this. How many games did KT and Griff win us last year? Im just basically saying Im not sold on KT being the saviour of our team, And Im really not sold that Griff could start for this team after 20 games. KT is great one on one, but he is under-sized. He still out rebounds Big Mo though. but still he isnt very good defensivly, except that little Karl Malone strip he does. I just wonder if he would be more helpful to Houston in a trade? And if you are worried about Yao Ming's size and youth, you should be terrorfied of Fast Eddie Griffin, not only is he Under-sized he has no one on one move at all. I like him as much as the next guy, but I think he is about as far away as Yao, They develope at about the same rate of speed imo! We have to remember he can block shots and he is clutch, that dude has "ice-water" for blood.
undersized and not physically mature are 2 different things. Ben Wallace is undersized. Kenny Thomas is undersized. Yao Ming and Eddie Griffin are not fully developed physically. According to reports, Eddie has put on 17 pounds over the past year. Some reports have Ming gaining around 40 pounds over the last couple years (early listings of ~240-260 vs. current 296+). As for no one on one moves, he's working at that, and he can hit an outside shot. Do we really want everything to be about one on one moves anyway? There isn't room for PT for Collier, Cato, Ming, Griffin, Taylor, and Thomas...however I suspect Collier might as well quit now, and that it will be CATO forced to fight for his minutes, not MoT/KT. I suspect Taylor/Griffin to man a large portion of the backup minutes to Yao if Cato doesn't prove worthy of the minutes.
I do agree they both will grow, I should have clarfied that, but I didnt. Leme say I do believe they will be a heck of a force to contend with....But it will take time for them to develop!
He missed and rushed a lot of shots too. It wasn't just three point shooting like you said. I think we could've used about 2 or 3 ferocious dunks per game from him. He's capable
He shot .392 from two point range, the lowest on the team. And 33% from three isn't even average, much less good. The numbers we are throwing around don't say anything we didn't already know. Eddie is a better shot block, Mo is a weak rebounder, Eddie can't shoot yet. I say start MoT because he gives us at least a semblance of a low post game, which no one else does. Hopefully Eddie will eventually, but I'm not sure it will be this soon. Bring Eddie off the bench first, then Kenny. I think Eddie is better suited at this time to defend second unit guys where his lack of strength won't hurt him. Eventually, Eddie will be good enough defensively and rebounding to start even if he gave us nothing offensively, but I'm guessing that will be a while yet.
