my thoughts exactly although i think he looks to pass more than dragic does. one of his games is up on youtube and there was a series of two plays that really support this comparison. here's the link to the whole game. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuS-qOFMbCc watch starting from 1:00:12 to 1:00:45 for the two plays was talking about. PRETTY IMPRESSIVE he backs up sergio rodriguez aka spanish chocolate. whats up with that?
Just to clarify that he shares position with Sergio Rodriguez, and his coach is alternating the starting role with both, however Llull is playing 25 minutes per game against the 18 of Rodriguez in the ACB, and 22 vs 20 in the Euroleague, starting in 9 of the 14 matches played until now. It can be said that even sharing responsibilities, Llull can be considered as "the first" PG of the team. As for his season, I talked a while ago about the changes from the 2010-2011 season. He has come to play the 80-90% of his minutes at the PG position. He plays 4-5 minutes less per game than last year, and obviously has passed from a scoring guard role to the classic distributor role of the PG. The outcome of all this is that Llull has dropped a 30% his number of shots attempted, compared to last season. His 3 point shooting percentage has dropped from 40% to 30%, yet his FG% has improved thanks to having fewer scoring responsabilities, and also to be shooting against shorter players than him. Logically his assists number has risen and is now the 2nd best assistant in the ACB, averaging over 7 assists per 40 minutes in the ACB -6 in Euroleague-. Consider that those are not bad numbers at european basketball, be aware that Rubio for instance averaged about 7 in Barcelona, -probably a little bit more in Joventut-. Defensively he's being much more useful for his team since the point guard position. As an undersized SG he had some troubles to defend around the basket and to contest shots of taller players than him. Llull has a very aggressive defensive style, he shows a lot of activity on this side and puts a lot of pressure on the ball really getting to bother the rival PG in the positional offense. The interesting part is that he has the legs to maintain this style and this same effectiveness at NBA level. There are not too many players in the world who count with those legs, he often overdefends the ball and rivals beat him, but his potential as a defender is definitely very high. He needs to be smarter however at 1on1 and get experience defending top PGs to become the effective defender he can be. The most positive point of this season for him is that he's getting experience as the first PG of a highly competitive team like Real Madrid. In previous years when he played this position he had players like Raul Lopez or Prigioni ahead of him, but this year he is the main responsible and because of this he's getting much more experience at the decision making and how to run a team. His mistakes refer still to reading the game / some plays, as he's often accused of only playing at a unique speed (the maximum), when sometimes is not the best for his team and also takes him to commit turnovers. Regardless, his average of TO's is not too high (about 2 per game, less than his teammate Sergio Rodriguez, who is considered a more classic PG) considering his playing style. Llull is now facing the most important part of the season and I've got the feeling that once adapted to his new role, he will improve his level. Don't misunderstand this, Llull is having a good season. His team is well positioned in all competitions and his coach is very happy with him so far. Llull remains to be a singular european player with an elite first step unmatched in European basketball. There is no PG in Europe with that physical level, he's an animal on the court and I call him the european Russell Westbrook -only in this regard-. He's a player capable of getting a defensive rebound and cross the court in 1'5 seconds; it is no secret that if Real Madrid is one of the most dangerous teams in Europe at transition offense, the two Sergios have much of blame at it. He can create and advantage for his team easily since the p&r, he can dismantle defenses with ease thanks to his first step and thats the main quality that makes him NBA material. Llull remains to be a player with evident NBA potential and has expressed several times his desire to play in the US. What it is unclear is whether he will march this summer or the next one, but be sure about one thing: he will be an NBA player at the 2013-14 season. On his role at the NBA, I have stated many times a comparison with Goran Dragic. From my point of view Goran is a player with more technical talent than Sergio, but Llull is even a more physical and aggressive player than Goran. And in any case, still young and with actual room for improvement.
That's based on what? Sergio Llull has more accolades and achievements in competitive basketball than Hasheem Thabeet. What's under Thabeet's belt?
Based on the fact that we currently need more size. We have 3 pgs on the team already. The 2 that play are starting caliber, so he wouldn't even play. Also, as crappy as Thabeet was in the preseason, he was still able to average 2 blocks a game. We need his size now. Maybe not in a week or so,due to the trade deadline. If he gets traded.
We don't need size, we need competence. We have Patterson, Dalembert, Hill and Scola. Even Chandler is exceptionally tall for his position. We aren't getting out rebounded, we are 9th in the league in rebounds. The fact that Morey signed Adrien tells you how much confidence he has in Thabeet. I would take Lull over Thabeet any day, one guy plays competitive basketball, the other warms competitive basketball benches.
Sergio would warm the bench right next to Thabeet if he were here now. What good is all the accolades and potential when you are a bench ornament. They would be wasting Llull's time bringing him over. All this so called size we have and we keep getting our asses handed to us from teams with real size.
How do you know that he would warm the bench? You're calling Llull garbage when he hasn't even played in the NBA yet, even though Llull has already proven on international levels that he is a very good PG (a starter on Real Madrid). You're all over Thabeet when all he has under his belt is being picked second in 2009 and being 7 ft. And how does losing games to talented frontcourt mean we are lacking size? Like I already said, we aren't losing because we lack size, we are losing because we lack talent. The fact that we're not getting out rebounded means we are not lacking size. Your logic makes no sense.
Dragic will most likely be gone. Same with CLee. There would be space for him next year. He will be on a 2nd rd pick rookie contract as well. Plus he's 6'4 which is about the height of a combo guard in the nba. Morey paid 2mil (which is quite a bit for a 2nd rder) to get this guy from the Nuggets in 09, so he must have saw something he really liked in him.
I hope he fails. If he fails, that will be 5 mill out of the drain with him and Jermine Taylor and Les will finally relize Morey needs to get his fat ass out of town.
His game looks similar to Dragic's, up tempo, fast legs. Except he's got better court vision, handles, patience, and looks to pass first. Maybe I should've said similar to Rubio's game. Can't wait to see the guy play.
I don't see the "better court vision, patience, looks to pass first" stuff. From all reports he is very aggressive and has a scoring mentality (for a point guard). Important to remember he is 24 so he's not a super young. I can see Morey cutting a deal to bring Llull over in the offseason to replace Dragic and get ~20 minutes per game for the Rockets.
