Did Memphis make a good decision in keeping Gay? Player Comparison Screencap/Large Spoiler Stats. http://www.basketball-reference.com...&sum=0&p1=mayooj01&y1=2013&p2=gayru01&y2=2013
I'll pick Gay. He's a better fit for Memphis than OJ is. The Grizzlies already has Tony Allen playing the SG so they need Gay as their SF. Right now, the Grizzs have probably one of the best frontcourt in the NBA with Gasol, Z-Bo, and Gay...
Gay's output's totally not worth his contract though. You do realize he's making more money than LBJ, but he's getting outproduced by Mayo who's only making 6M, right? I'm not even sure why you think he's good fit, both Gasol and ZBO are low post guys but Gay's shooting at a terrible 35% from the 3.
Now that the season is progressing further, it's starting to become really, really obvious why Memphis let Mayo go. He's a one man fast break. For the other team. He is averaging 8.5 turnovers per game through his last two games. In comparison, Rudy Gay does pretty much nothing wrong. He is a good shooter, good defender, great finisher, is unlikely to turn the ball over when handling it. He is the superior of the two players.
Cuban failed to lock him up. Mayo has a player option for next season that he will undoubtedly decline so that he can test his value in free agency. That's all we're seeing so far this season, is Contract Year OJ Mayo, as he plays to try to get the first serious contract offer of his career.
Waa?!? So two games in a row represents a player's game? The dude averages 3 TOs a game over 23 games...that's hardly turnover prone like you're alluding to. To put his TOs into perspective here are the averages of some better known players in the league... Kobe Bryant 3.8 LBJ 2.7 Kevin Durant 3.3 Westbrook 3.3 Rudy Gay 2.5 (who does nothing wrong) Mayo had 14 games out of 23 where he only had 2 or less TOs in the game this season. I can pick bad two games in a row from Rudy Gay's past and make some BS assessment on it...it wouldn't be anymore true to his ability than your assessment about Mayo is. Hell, after reading the OPs stat sheet it appears Mayo is a much better offensive player than Gay, no contest. Much better shooter in every way, hell he's almost 20% better 3Pt shooter than Gay and is 7% points better overall. That's an offensive ass kicking.
Teams have scouting info on Mayo and he is falling back down to earf: OJ Mayo's last 3 games: 24 points, just 3 assists and 9 turnovers in 52 minutes! 10 points, 3 assists, 6 turnovers, 30 minutes He'll torch a team that refuses to guard him, like the Rockets, every now and then, but I'm seeing a downward trend. I'm seeing a league that realizes that if you put a hand in OJ Mayo's face, he is bound to follow up by doing something stupid with the basketball. Like making it yours.
I'm also chuckling at this notion that a career 38% three point shooter is now "so much better" at shooting than a career 35% three point shooter because the former is at a completely unsustainable 51% through a fraction of one NBA season. It's like people have no idea what a hot shooting streak looks like. Well, *this* is what it looks like.
One misconception I've been seeing about Mayo is that he has good "value" on his contract. I whole-heartedly disagree, unless you're talking about JUST this season. Realize that in the long term, Mayo's value is about to shoot WAY WAY up. So yeah, as a one year pick up it's fine (not like the Mavs need the other cap space right now anyways), but as of next year that won't be the case. That being said, Gay's contract is borderline absurd.
Through 23 games this season he is, it's a fact. How do you think he'll finish the season? Do you think he'll have better or worse numbers than Gay?
I want to see how Mayo is doing after 40 games, not 20. Hot starts don't prove anything. If he continues the production and efficiency after Dirk returns, we've got a real debate on our hands. The last couple of years he's been on thin ice in Memphis with a diminished role, so it wouldn't surprise me if he continues the pace all season with Dallas as the #2 gun to Dirk. Mavs didn't want to sign Mayo long-term because they want to pursue a max player or two next summer.
His numbers will be worse than Rudy Gay's. Two reasons: 1. Rudy Gay isn't in a contract year, and is doing what Rudy Gay always does. He tries to win basketball games. His numbers are right in line with season projections. Gay's projections are 22 PPG, 46% shooting, and he's now at 19.2 PPG, 42% shooting. With a very slight uptick in his shooting, his numbers are right in line with expectations. We'll see that uptick through the next 3/4s of a season. All else being the same, averages are meaningful. He'll end up at about his averages. -MEANWHILE- 2. OJ Mayo is outperforming projections, for the time being. He was projected at 16.3 PPG, 42.5% shooting. So projected at worse production than Rudy Gay, not better. Instead, he's at 20.4 PPG and 48.4%. There are two reasons for this. A. Dirk has been injured and so Mayo has been forced to carry more of the scoring load than expected at the start of the season, and B. The three ball has been falling for him at an impossible rate, and the misses that normally come with shooting it greatly affect shooting percentages. When I say "impossible rate" I don't necessarily mean that Mayo is somehow so good that he is doing the impossible by shooting 20% higher than his career three point shooting average. I mean that it is literally impossible for him to maintain that pace, and that he absolutely should regress back down to expectations for the remaining 3/4s of the season. My suggestion: Bookmark this thread. Come back to it at the end of the season. You will find that Mayo's numbers will have taken a huge dip, fallen back down to expectations, and all these comparisons to players like James Harden and Rudy Gay will seem laughable in retrospect. Yes, there was seriously a thread a week ago claiming that Mayo was better than Harden. Well, that thread was stupid, and now I'm not even sure if Mayo is better than Rudy Gay, let alone James Harden. So go ahead. Bump away, 4-5 months from now. I'm a big boy. I'll be the first to admit it if the math was wrong on Mayo and he really is having a superhuman season. But I seriously doubt it. Statistically, it just looks like a shooting streak to me. I've seen this many times before. We all have.
Translation: Harden really was worth what we gave him. No, really he was. :Morey is a genius too, for good measure.