Amen is future superstar but we need elite pg for amen and sengun's progress. Spurs Got fox and Paul for wemby, we Got reed for now
He's at worst the 3rd best player on the team right now...and his actual basketball skills are still quite lacking relative to his impact. Almost all of the success he's having is due to supernatural physical tools and great effort. Even defensively he makes mistakes I don't think he's gonna make in a few years. Amen the finished product may be one of the 5 best players in the NBA. A project isn't finished, not necessarily bad.
According to google's AI, "In the NBA, calling a player a "project" means they have raw talent and potential but need significant development and work on their skills before they can be considered a reliable contributor at the professional level". I've don't recall ever hearing a reliable contributor called a project before your post much less someone of Amen's skill level.
It's seeming more and more like Ime sees Amen as "the guy", as much as we have one at all on this roster. He's been playing him insane minutes the past two and a half months. If that's the case, I believe we're going to have to re-think certain elements of our young core if we want to have a top offensive team, not just a top defensive team. The first obvious question is the fit between him and Sengun. One or both of them has be able to shoot open threes above the break. We have some time to let them both work on improving their shots, but it should be a major development priority for both guys. I think if we don't get at least one of them to the point where they force their man to come out to the three point line, they simply can't play together long-term IMO. Not a decision I'd make right away, but definitely something to keep an eye on over the next couple of seasons. Maybe they'll both figure out how to hit those shots and it will work out fine, but if not, and if Amen ends up being the "main guy" moreso than Sengun--at some point down the road, we might have to make the tough decision to trade Alpi. We'll see. The next thing that stands out to me is Jalen. To his credit, I think he does force his man to come out to the three point line, and he does have a lot of gravity. However, he still doesn't capitalize often enough. I think this offense would look a lot vastly better if you substituted, say, Tyler Herro for Jalen--we already have plenty of offensive gravity with Amen & Alpi, what we need is somebody who consistently punishes defenses for packing the paint and just uses that gravity to put a ton of points on the board for us. And then there are Tari and Jabari. These two are probably the next most obvious opportunities to upgrade our shooting and get somebody who can put points on the board. I'm actually still bullish on Jabari's shooting and I think there's a good chance he can be a 38+ percent three point shooter on high volume in the future. Tari, though--I don't know. I love what Tari brings individually, but I don't think he's ever going to be ideal guy to play next to Amen. In terms of outside shooting, he's really just a wide open corner three guy and that's about it. Maybe it's fine if the majority of his minutes are off the bench. I haven't mentioned PG because I think right now FVV is actually a fine fit there--I think his true talent level is still 37+ percent on very high volume, which gets the job done. Although we could use a good backup like Jose Alvarado, and FVV isn't the solution forever, and will need to be replaced at some point due to his age.
I mostly agree with this. I am more optimistic about the Sengun fit assuming Sengun at least rediscover some of his touch inside the paint. However the rest of the team need to have some legit high level shooters. Either through development, like Reed actually delivering on his pre-draft shooting hype, or making changes to the roster. But I think Sengun and Amen are currently who the Rockets need to most consider going forward as their core.
Amen is the future, and he is a very unique player. The only person that really fits in perfectly with him right now is Jabari. Everything else is a little bit harder to see. You could make the argument that keeping Fred around for two or three years on a good deal also works. Amen can be an offensive machine, but he has to have elite spacing. so three out of the four players around him must be elite shooters.
An elite 3P sniper would be even more helpful to Amen's growth + Rockets success. Rockets have needed this type of player year in and year out. Both Alp + JG also benefit with this type of player.
Same was said about maximizing both Alp + Jalen. Yet Stone continues to sit on hands/head in sand instead of acquiring these players.
He tried with Reed Sheppard. Aaron Holiday, FVV, Jabari Smith, Dillon Brooks, Cam Whitmore these players can all shoot the 3. Literally 6 three point shooters added to help the team's bad shooting but you think he hasnt done anything lol. I guess if you are operating in bad faith facts don't matter.
Hmmmm... That would mean Ime saw Green as the guy last season and sees Green as more of the guy than Sengun? Since he plays him the most minutes. I don't know if there's a correlation honestly. Honestly it's always seemed like he just gives minutes to defense over offense. He plays defensive non-shooters more than shooting non-defenders always. I think I even remember Jalen saying Ime told them you just won't play if you don't play defense. Never said that about offense as far as I recall.
The only person who fits with him is a guy who plays the same position, can't pass, and is mostly just a stationary target off the ball with middling effectiveness as a shooter Yeah - sure ok man. Counting down the days for when somebody posts that the Rockets need a 6-7 3&D type to pair with Jabari.
