We need a PF who can shoot the 3s off the bench more than a back-up point guard for Houston(Harden is the starting PG) like Dragic. Yeah he can start but how many shots would he get? He merely can be a 14/6 guy aside Harden imo. That's not that much different from Bev's outcomes. In the past decade, many team had won Champions partly because they got a 4-spot role player who can play 3D or at least shoot the long-2s very very good. Lakers: Horry Piston: R.Wallace Spurs: Horry Heat: A.Walker/Posey Lakers: Odom/Gasol Celtics: Garnett/Posey Mavs: Dirk Heat: Bosh/LeBron/Lewis Spurs: Diaw/Borner Who is gonna stretch the floor and play some solid D for H-H in the 4-spot at the most critical moment of the playoff game in the Rockets? ANS: I see NO one.
I'm somewhere in between. I respect the fact that Dragic would be an offensive upgrade, but I want to see what this group can do. We have time to see how this group will develop. I might be inclined to go either way at this point.
He isn't formally but that does not stop him from playing like one. He gets the help from his teammates.
I still rather has Morey made a trade for Ersan Ilyasova than getting Dragic cuz Dragic would be a FA this coming summer and we can't keep him.
Nothing to offer him, and I'm not sure about great Dragic would look next to Harden. Eric Bledsoe has a similar skill set to Harden and it's difficult for the two to co-exist. Not a good fit.
I know stats can be deceiving, but Beverely has a 2.0 VORP the past two seasons where Dragic only has one season significantly better than that (1.7 this season). In a qualitative sense you'd be surrendering Beverely's tenacious defense in the first unit. This is a starting five that could include Smith too soon. You have three pretty good scoters there and a pretty good outside shooter in Ariza when isn't logged down in minutes. You don't need more offense in the starting five. If you could get Dragic for nothing then you'd be better overall, but you aren't getting him for nothing, so I'm very hesitant.
The reason we are talking about Dragic is because it is reasonable to think that Phoenix might want to trade him. They have too many good Pg's but not enough good frontcourt players, especially not any with legitimate size. My feeling is that they will want to trade Isaiah Thomas first, but if they couldn't find a good deal for him then that's when they would look to trade Dragic (assuming they fall out of the playoff race). I don't see anyway that they trade Bledsoe.
We need a back up guard and not a starter. To take the ball out of Harden's hands is ridiculous to even contemplate. Dragic wants the max and to pay him that when we have Harden already is a bad idea. I understand why so many are all over Dragic's nutsack as he played here once but we have maybe the best ball handler in the world now. It may be a better idea to get a real good role playing combo guard. To lock the cap for Dragic when we have to have a great front court to go deep in the playoffs means we are losers every year until a max contract opens again.
Goran on the season is 16 ppg on 13 shot attempts. 32 minutes He never gets 13 FGA with Smith on the team and without Smith he still won't get to 16.
Also forget to mention: below average assist rate: 4 apg Average rebound rate for PG: 3 rpg He does not block shots like Lowry and average steal rate for a guard: 1 spg and 2 Turnovers per game (still sometimes out of control)
To get Dragic we have to trade the NO pick, Papanikolaou and Beverly. If not Papanikolaou, maybe Motiejunas, Beverly and the NO pick.
Dragic would look spectacular next to Harden. Defenses are trapping harden in the elbows big time closing off the lane. They are getting better at forcing him to pass out and that will be especially true in the playoffs. If we don't have a 2nd threat it will be hard for us to win a 7 games series with Harden as the only playmaker on this team. Great teams have two playmakers for this reason. You need two to effectively beat a zone type defense at the NBA level. Even SA had multiple guys who could penetrate and be triple threat players. Miami had Lebron and Wade. When Dallas won it had playmakers all over the place. Did Celtics had multiple playmakers in Pierce and Rondo. You have to go back to the Kobe-Shaq Lakers which was a different era of basketball prior to teams using zone defenses. You can't depend on Harden to do all the work from a facilitation standpoint. And when he goes to the bench, we are pretty bad offensively.
