Very valid, but absolutely not the only factor. Jalen is attacking the paint and rim far more often than everyone there but Amen, generally handling the ball a lot more.
Yes but buddy Ime Udoka is not an idiot, he's not brainwashed into believing that he has to start a crappy player. In 3 years of his career, when has he otherwise started a crappy player over a better player? Is he really that guy who's going to start someone because of their status rather than their performances? Just try to be a bit balanced. Reed, Cam, Amen and Tari are not ready to handle the ball as much as Jalen. They would certainly be more efficient on a lower volume but all of those guys would struggle starting at SG for us for one reason or another - and allegedly there's no other way for us to play other than for our SG to take 9 3PA per game. That's what I've been told at least. Jalen and Amen are the closest to being able to handle the playmaking but for the starting SG on an offensively-challenged playoff-bound team, they both still have serious weaknesses. Both of them will be great. Jalen's handle gets props all the time from other team's in-game announcers. It's not a weakness of his. Jalen is playing like ass in general, we don't disagree there. He has been disappointing as a playmaker this season, I was hoping for a bump in assists by now. He can easily be around 5 per game. He holds onto the ball too long too. My personal recommendation is to surround him with better shooters and high-tempo players so that we can benefit from his skills. He can just generate points that way and demolish second units. If that doesn't work then best thing is to move him to the bench. I can tell you without any fortune-telling powers: if what you need from the SG position is being efficient on as many 3's as Damian Lillard is taking, Jalen Green is definitely not your guy. You have to give a guy a job he can succeed at. These are ridiculous expectations of Jalen who came into this season a 33% shooter on less volume for his career. I don't think anyone on the roster except maybe Reed can sniff that level of volume and efficiency from 3PT land. So weird we're the only team in the NBA that can't live without that it seems.
I don't think Brooks is a better player, but there's an added complication where the starter is also on fire from 3PT range and guarding an elite offensive player every minute he's on the floor. Brooks is the ONLY starter shooting better from 3 than last season. IMO both Amen and Tari will have better seasons than Brooks but yes, Udoka is coming up on that decision. I think Brooks will cool down eventually (I hope not) and then it will be a pretty obvious decision. Not the same as starting Green for 100+ games of poor offensive efficiency just because he was drafted 3rd or got a new contract. I think in fact the contract secures us enough to move him to the bench if we needed to where we can work on him without worrying about losing him.
You don't think an owner who is notoriously cheap and a gm who just paid 100 million dollars for a SG is influencing the fact that he must be started. if we bench him he basically has 0 trade value. I think it also helps that we have been winning in spite of him. If we were losing more I bet he would have actually been benched. It's pretty clear no one is watching the Rockets outside of Houston. Because every game he gets ripped at least one time and then gets sent to the bench. Everyone still thinks he's good because House of Highlights will post a sick dunk or some play he made for the only contribution he basically had in the game. See this is where we disagree the most. He is a low IQ Bball player. I don't see how he gets more assists. He throws terrible passes or is always late on his decision making. You say we can benefit from his skills but what is his actual skill. I've been trying to figure it out all season. Because from what I see, he is. Below Average in all of the following: Shooting Playmaking Dribbling Defense. Finishing His defense and finishing have improved this year but still wouldn't call it a strength in his game.
Even if brooks is a better 3 pt shooter (and he’s mostly been regressing back to normal), his overall efficiency is terrible, identical to jalen. Amen is better at literally every other aspect of offensive basketball and better defensively at everything except guarding centers. Compare their advanced stats, it’s not close. Udoka unequivocally starts a far inferior player for reasons other than basketball. That cannot be disputed imo
yes but it’s not a trash player. I know you hate brooks but he’s not as bad as Jalen green’s dip when green is shooting 39% from the field and 30% on 3’s.
Hey the advanced metrics say jalen is better this season lol. I think dillon’s lack or rebounding and passing tank his metrics though (which is fair i suppose). Also though, we don’t have a natural replacement for jalen and we do have a clear one for dillon. Reed clearly isn’t ready and amen clearly is
No one drives to the basket more than FVV. And Alperen drives nearly as much as Jalen too. https://www.nba.com/stats/players/drives?TeamID=1610612745&dir=D&sort=DRIVES Currently, JG is not great at making efficient plays for himself, and he is even worse at making his teammates better with the pass. I do think he has some decent passing talent that he has yet to figure out.
I agree with this, unless the team has a sharpshooter his creation skills has some value that is kind of unique.That's barely high praise, we are just a really bad shooting team. What he does otherwise is pretty much not only distributable to other folks in the roster, they do a better job at it. And a sharpshooter would nullify and probably exceed any added value from his creation skills since he's not a good finisher anyway. I think you had a post where you were saying if you want a high volume sharpshooter he's not your guy or has never been a good shooter etc, went back a bunch and used search and couldn't find it, apologies if it was someone else. Having him as a lead ball handler or a guy who runs the offense or a combo guard whatever you want to call it also looks pretty bad right now whenever we try it. So what's the superstar or #1 level outcome you see here? Genuinely curious. It's possible that you don't think that's a super probable outcome for him anymore btw because you also said he might need to come off the bench in some posts if things don't pan out - I hate the overall premise of this thread which makes us talk past each other a lot of times.
Yes but we know we’re in an anomaly, Jalen is at his worst and FVV is having an out of the ordinary hot streak in 2PT land. We’re not talking about making efficient plays for himself, we were simply talking about whether 2.5 turnovers is high for what he does. It’s not, it’s actually above average. On passing he seems to have regressed but also everyone is getting more assists recently, maybe there’s a trend there.
Amen needs to start. I have been adamant about that since the start of the season. Both Brooks and Jalen started out really well. Brooks has been bad 3 out of the last 4 games, but I still don't blame Ime for not sitting him while we are winning. The real argument is who should be benched when we start losing a few. Amen can start for Jalen or Brooks. Which one or is it? I'd rather it be both Amen and Tari.
Frankly Jalen, Brooks and Jabari >> one of these guys needs to be replaced by Amen or Tari who have flat out outplayed all 3. Amen is shooting 30% on his 3's and passable from mid range - you were adamant he would need to start, but we were also adamant that if he made this kind of progress on his jumper he could skyrocket. Amen and Tari have earned the starting spots. This team's future is knocking and Udoka is going to have to make some difficult decisions soon. Jabari, Brooks and Green have not been playing well enough to start over the terror twins. This roster is so crazy talented man.
Dillon Brooks should be in exactly zero replacement conversations this season, unless you are pulling in KD. Absolutely armchair GM BS. Udoka would slap y’all across the gat damn face.
Benching Jabari instead of Brooks is a non-starter for me. Jabari has adjusted the arc on his shot and is shooting very well. His rebounding is absolutely essential and he is also expanding his help defense. He has been outstanding at offensive rebounding. He is still very young and confidence is still an issue. He disappears a bit on offense too often, but I rarely see him not contribute at some aspect of the game. You don't bench that kind of potential for a stop gap, inconsistent vet. The other aspect is Jabari's contract. We have to find out what we want to spend to keep him. We know what Dillon costs. We also know what he has been his entire career which is a good defensive player with a below average offensive game that rebounds poorly. I'm not sacrificing Jabari's development for that.
If JG was leading this team in +- I think there would be quite a different narrative about him. What DB brings is not easily quantifiable, similar to Ariza/Battier/Tucker. He is balling out this year.
+- isn’t something i would pay much mind to till you get a large sample. Last season he was in the negative but this season it’s been off the charts. His BPM and all those metrics are poor like usual. If Jalen was playing like he has been but had monster +- i would have the exact same opinion of him, as would anyone who understands how it works over small samples
