This is very true, if T-Mac consistantly plays defense, not only when he wants to. Kenny had Vernon, who was consistantly good defender, and he also had the nba's all time leading shot blocker to clean up any messes...yao is far from the "eraser" as dream was. Paxon and Kerr both played next to Jordan, who was a great defender. i think that had more to do with inconsistancies in his playing time with the aqusition of gary payton. Agreed, but my statement was in response to everyone's joy over ginobili's signing. if the past is any indication, we wont be too joyous the next time we face him. neither of these guys will be called on to garner a huge offensive role...their MO will be to spot-up and hit open jumpers. as i said in a previous post Barry is a slightly better shooter, but fisher is a much better defender.
Where did this idiotic notion that T-Mac is a poor defender stem from? The guy has a career block shots average higher than Kelvin Cato and has the tools to be the best perimeter defender in basketball.
Alexvanderpool, 1) Barry is no worse than Steve Francis on defense. Bary averaged 5.8 assists to 2.4 TO's, that's a 2.41 ratio. Steve Francis averaged 6.2 assists to 3.7 TO's, for a 1.67 ratio. HUMONGOUS difference. One thing you cannot deny: Brent Barry is a better passer than Steve Francis. Higher assists per minute, lower TO's per minute, better asst/to ratio per minute. Francis gets less than half an assist more than Barry in 10 more minutes. Brent Barry is the better PG in terms of PG duties. If you can show me otherwise, please, go ahead. 2) T-Mac is not a bad defender, and is more likely to become defensively dominant than to become a defensive pushover. Chances are, he'll be better than Mobley. In Toronto, he was the defensive stopper, coming off the bench to deefnd the best perimeter player so that Vince Carter could carry the load offensively. He averaged at least one block per game in each of his first 5 seasons in the league. Three with Toronto, and two with Orlando. The highest blocks/per game in the league this year was Vince Carter and 0.89. T-Mac came in at 6, with 3 SF's ahead of him: Trenton Hassell, Darius Miles, and Josh Howard. All primarily defensive players. Still, he's among the league leaders at his positions. I don't think there's a single SG in the league who has a higher blocks/game average for his career. T-mac's career shotblocking average is 1.2, which is more than most C's in the league. In fact, of the 30 people that blocked more than 1.2 shots per game last year, ALL ARE PF's AND C'S! He is 4th in the league among SG's in defensive rebounds per game. Right below Paul Pierce, Jason Richardson, and our very own Jimmy Jackson. He has always been decent at steals. Most importantly? he hasn't even been playing defense the last few years. How many players can play defense without a human eraser, as well as pour in 30 points a night? No one but Micheal Jordan himself. But he had Pippen to take on the defensive assignments, and always had a good shotblocking rpesence behind him. Don't forget that these are numbers from his worst year. 3) Barry is by far a better shooter than Fisher and Hudson. He is one of the best shooters in the entire league, and doesn't need the ball in his hands to be effective all the time. Barry's defense may not be as good, but both Fisher and Hudson are streaky, and their height may limit them when it comes to getting the ball into the post. Barry is a constant threat, and whether he's making them or not, the defense will respect his shot. It's not fair to say Barry is just slightly better than Fisher. Fisher is a GOOD, but not great, threat because he has a big man. Barry is a damn good shooter regardless of the players on the team.
The difference here is that Francis is a shoot-first-pass-later PG. Barry is more inclined to pass the ball first and shoot when needed. We don't need a PG to drive and dish like Kidd. This is going to be inside-out for the most part, so you mainly just need a PG who can hold onto the ball and make the passes to Yao or even to TMac. While Kenny Smith was not flashy, he did just that; he got the ball to Hakeem. I would bet that, however, most of Kenny's assists were passes to Horry. We don't need a PG to put up 20/10. We just need him to hold onto the dang ball and make good passes.
Fisher is the better defender. Hudson is NOT. Why does everyone think Hudson is such a good defender? He's okay, but not a WHOLE lot better than Barry aside from quickness. I don't think anyone is realizing that Fisher will come with a large price tag also. He is not a "cheaper" option making him more attractive. At the same price, I'd take Barry and hope he fits. I refuse to pay Fisher that much money--Barry at least has the talent to justify it. I think you're making the argument for the wrong player. Ginobili showed little, if any, improvement last year from the year before. He's 26, but he may have already hit his ceiling. He is a game-changer for sure, and I love the guy...but he is ridiculously erratic and makes stupid plays too often. The latter will go with maturity, but erratic play will plague him and make him a career-6th man.
Just to add to the Tmac as a defender, about 2 years ago I saw him take Kobe out of his game more than any other playing I have seen guard him his Kobe started reaching his prime. If Tmac is on good team, like he will be with us, he could be a defensive strength, no question. That said we don't always have to burn him out as Chicago did with Jordan, as JJ can handle a lot of the dirty work like Harper and Pippen did you can save Tmac defense for more critical momenets. I really don't see a big difference on team defense whether Thud, Barry, or Fisher or Lue or say Damon Jones is in there. If anything Lue is the best match-up on speed guys neither Fish nor Barry can handle. A much more important key to our defense is not which other PG we add, but which more defensive oriented 4/5 we can add.
