Why is everyone against upgrading at PG (in the near future)?

"If" we get Rondo or CP3, will they be able to make plays over Harden? This is the question.

 

I'm not against upgrading at PG in the future; I'm against downgrading in the very recent past.

 

All stats have their way's they can be spun any way to suite the argument, yes I agree. They are not the end all to any argument.

If you are going on the eye test, then sure I agree they could try to use Harden off the ball more to at least try to throw off the defense, which clearly is focused on stopping the Harden P&R 99% of the game.

Still, that doesn't mean it isn't affective, or that Lin running the same play instead of Harden would make the the offense any more efficient. If anything the data supports the opposite. Any way you spin it, the Rockets are better with the ball in Hardens hands.

But yes, enough with the Harden love. Lets move on.

 

Russell Westbrook was able to with Durant and Harden on the court Jeremy Lin just sucks right now that is exactly what it is. If Lin improves he will play better.

 

You done loss your mind! Lin can barely beat his man off the dribble most times.

 

The best perimeter playmaker will be given the keys to the offense, as is typical in the NBA.

 

All stats can be spun yes but AST% is just very faulty I wasn't sure if you knew that. I see a lot of people citing AST% on twitter & I am always like bro check CP3's AST%

Sure I am cool to move on. I am sick right now & was watching plays from the Raptors game to help formulate my thoughts but I am having trouble focusing lol. Anyway I still stand by initial statement that I don't think that Harden is a better floor general than Lin. Torocan cited passing stats from 82 games.com. But in my opinion there is a lot more to being a good PG than passing stats. I said this on a previos thread & I think it begs repeating.

There is a lot more to being a good floor general than just passing. It isn't just making the pass but how you pass it, where you pass it & when you pass it. Do you hit guys in there sweet spots (in a position than they can be successful), do you feed guys enough so that they stay active on the court. For example big men are more active on the defensive end if they are getting touches offensively. Do you lead them into there shots (in transition/ off the lob) as opposed to passing them the ball & having them (gather them selves) & lead themselves into there shots. Do you control the pace of the game. Do guys stay active & move because they know that you will pass to them?

There are things that I have seen Lin do this season (& it isn't just a personal bias I have seen commentators highlight it as well) in terms of how he passes the ball that points to his ability to quarterback an offense really well. Does that mean that Harden can't do those things & the Rockets can't be successful hell no. But I just feel that Lin just has a better feel for those things right now. To be frank what I think is irrelevant lol I am not the coach.

I think for the most part we do agree with one another that there does need to be a bit more balance in playmaking & frankly that is all that matters. As long as the team wins & players are having some semblance of success I am cool. Anyway thanks for the conversation it was very illuminating. Sorry for keeping you waiting for me to post my thoughts.

 

[/QUOTE]However, you are missing the point. The Point is NOBODY is attacking Lin here. Its just that believe it or not, he's not Michael Jordan just yet, and has to work on his game a little bit. Nothing wrong with that. So do 99% of NBA players right now.

Everyone that roots for the Rockets should be rooting for Lin to succeed here. There is no reason NOT to root for him. Lets just put aside the Harden Vs. Lin debate for now though please. Its tiresome.[/QUOTE]


No one was making this a Lin vs Harden except for you. You're the one who keeps bringing it up. Also you're using stat from last year and this year's situation is totally different. You have your opinion and others have theirs.

 

Does this latest quote from Morey answer OP's question and end this trade discussion?

From SI:
Whether the team would still have gone after Lin if they'd first acquired Harden: "Yeah, I think so. Part of Lin is we had lost [Goran] Dragic and [Kyle] Lowry. We felt Lin was someone who had played at the All-Star level before, albeit for a short window. That gives you some odds that he could be that good. Even though now we have James, a guy we can absolutely build around, we need to keep adding bets to get that second really top-end player and, again, they're not really given away, so you got to hope one of your draft picks makes it or one of your signings. And Jeremy's played at a super-high level before, so there's a chance he could play at it again."

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/20...ts-jeremy-lin-james-harden-daryl-morey/1.html

 

I don't think you know what Assist percentage is keeping track of. It means almost 50% of the field goals made by Harden where assisted or created by another player, meaning a Thunder player got an assist for the basket that Harden made. While Jeremy had only a quarter of his baskets made assisted by another Knicks player.

 

A better stat to judge playmaking by is Assist Rate (AR). In case you were wondering

Lin 2012 - 36.47%
Harden 2012 - 24.67%

Furthermore, the quality of assists for Lin were higher too.

Lin - 3.4 Assist at Rim - 1.4 Assist for 3pt
Harden - 1.3 Assist at Rim - 1.3 Assist for 3pt

 

And the New iPad

 

I think the main reason there is a lot of talk about upgrading at power forward is because most people agree a strong inside out game is needed for a team to go far. We have the out. We lack the inside. Being as there are almost no centers in the league with a polished offensive game at the moment, power forward is the obvious area to target.

Also, what Carl Herrera said.

 

I'm a Lin fan and I'm not against the idea of upgrading.

I am against the idea of passing judgement prematurely though, which is what a lot of people are doing.

Give him a year so you can see what you got, rather than making the same mistake again and watch him flourish somewhere else. Based on his performance with the Knicks and watching every single game he played, it's hard to say it was a fluke. With him coming off an injury and his shot appearing to come back over the past couple of games, I'd say it's worth still giving him the benefit of the doubt.

If this team is trying to get far into the playoffs this year, then you could certainly trade for a better PG by the deadline and be better off this year. But I don't think that is the case, despite what the players are saying and if this team is truly trying to build for the future, it would be far premature to judge or cut ties with Lin so early.

That would be a seriously short sighted, knee-jerk reaction.

 

I'm sorry for being late to this thread, Roxxy, or I might have jumped in. I had almost exactly the same argument in another thread, so I have numbers handy.

I think everyone agrees that the best assists are at the rim.

The percentage of Harden's assists that were at the rim: 41.8.

Lin's corresponding percentage: 50.5.

Now one stat is not proof of anything, but it does lend support to the notion that Lin is a better playmaker than Harden, with better floor vision.

Agreed about Lin doing some amazing things this year.

 

Per basketball reference-

Pomeroy Assist Rate

100 * AST / (((MP / (Tm MP / 5)) * Tm FG) - FG)

This is the official AST% of Basketball-Reference. The metric (developed by Ken Pomeroy) estimates the percentage of teammate baskets a player assisted on while he was on on the court. The big issue here is that teammates can also miss baskets and do other things while on the court besides making buckets, while this just looks at assists relative to teammate made baskets:

I agree its not a perfect stat, but that wasn't the point I was trying to make. Anyway you spin the data, its hard for anyone to spin it where Lin is the more accomplished playmaker although so many people on here seem to want to convince themselves this just because they want the Rockets to run their sets through Lin more than Harden because of their loyalties to him.

I personally think that his fans want some kind of justification to vote him in the all-star game. They are freaking out right now that its going to be a controversy when he either almost makes the cut, or makes the cut when there are far more deserving players that dont make the all-star cut.

Whether Lin fans want to admit that or not, I believe that's an underlining factor in the defensiveness of his fans on here who could care less about the well being of the team and just want to see Lin put up stats.

Harden is going to the man for this team for a long time so the LOF fans are going to have to get used to it. He's not going anywhere, and the team is not going to take the ball out of their best player's hands just to get Lin stats. So lets just move on and root for the guy to improve in the aspects of his game that will help the Rockets go to the next level.

 

Speak for yourself. 9% seems like a drastic difference but its not with this stat. To me having watching both players for 2 years, having a higher assist percentage rate at the rim to me means he's not getting his own shot at the rim or getting to the foul line enough. It means he's more passive when he makes a move to the bucket.

See, you can make whatever kind of analysis you want to out of that stat.

Anyways, I think its been well established here that assist percentage is a pretty useless stat. I only brought it up to prove that you can spin stats any way you want to. You want to spin stats, I can go crazy with Harden's stats. He's a Quantitative Method Major's dream player. Roxxy said himself/herself(sorry Im not sure and dont want to guess) that its a useless stat as no stat should be the end all be all.

 

I don't think Lin's fans want the offense to run through him. No one has said that; you're the one assuming this. I think what we would like to see is more variation in the offense, which means changing things up a bit and maybe letting Lin handle the ball a little more and initiating the offense, since that is one of his strengths, and what a point guard is supposed to do. What we want is to maximize the strengths of everyone on the roster. Right now Harden is the primary playmaker, and although he is doing a good job in that role, it is not perfect. I don't think it would hurt to try to make the offense even more efficient by changing things up a bit.

 

Lin is a better playmaker than Harden. A lot of people are convinced that the team would do better if he were allowed to be our full-time PG, that's it. I doubt many knowledgeable Lin fans are deluded enough to think he belongs in the All-Star game this year. He may get some votes from excited newbies, but that's to be expected. The experienced fans, however, know better.

 

So if you have 5 seconds left on the shot clock, and have to get a play off to win the game, you are willing to say that Jeremy Lin is the better player to get a good shot off?

You realize you are talking about taking the ball out of the hands of the most efficient pick & roll player in the league, and a player who has proven that in that situation he ranks up in the same class as Lebron, Kobe, Melo, Wade, and Durant as noted by the folks at synergy sports, John Hollinger, and many others who have the data to back that up?

I do realize that Lin has that "Tebow effect" where you can say that "he's just a winner" and has proved it before with his time in NY when he went on one of the more historic runs in NBA history, but I find it hard that any NBA coach would be as willing to gamble on late game situations when you have a guy who has proven himself as one of the most elite scorers in the league for a couple seasons now. IMO, its pretty ballsy to say that Lin is a better playmaker, but feel free to keep convincing yourself of that.