...he got star player treatment but he isn't a star but GS did that because our team spacing was bad and because Houston has few reliable shooters. They didn't need to double Sengun because Draymond was able to guard him and there wasn't a need to rush out to the open man because who cares if Fred VanVleet is taking a shot because he is barely shooting league average on WIDE OPEN 3s...or who cares if Tari Eason is taking it - we will live with giving him open shots...same with Brooks, the rest of the roster no one even bothered to close out on. So they ran Jalen off the 3pt line hard, then collapsed in the paint forcing Jalen to either take a bad mid range shot, take a contested shot in the paint, or find the open man which is not his strong suit. I would say he made the right read about half the time and most of those reads didn't amount to anything because you don't need to over pursue on the shooters we have. Houston doesn't have many players who can reliably make shots so they knew that as long as Draymond was covering Sengun and the rest of the guys were preventing Jalen from getting shots to get him in rhythm, then no one else on the roster would step up....and that's what happened in losses.
...the issue was less the G league itself and more that unlike college basketball, there wasn't a financial machine to support so in the pandemic, the G league didn't have much of a season aside from a truncated schedule and some scrimmages for a few weeks with half staffed teams where the college kids that year still played in televised games with sponsors paying good money.
Don't think there is a bad contract considering his age. Other teams WILL think they can fix him. Like I do not think Green is at that point where he's a toxic contract, that's Beal, that's Dame, Green is a healthy young 23 year old player that could get better or other teams will think he will play better with what they are doing and will see value in his potential. It really is never hard to trade sub 25 year old players in this league.
When I look at the remaining backcourts left in the NBA and I look at the 2nd best guard, they are either just flat out a better player than Jalen or they bring something specific like shooting, passing, defense.... I can't think of any of them that have performed worse than Jalen in this postseason. And there are some 3rd guards off the bench that have played better. What I'm saying is that I don't know if you can actually contend with Jalen even as the 2nd best guard in the backcourt. In a couple of the games Fred played like a top level superstar and Jalen still didn't show up or bring much value. We lost game 4 by 3 points and all of the rest of the starters played at least "good". Even the backups were ok. Look at this box score: Led the team in turnovers, only 1 assist, no steals or blocks, shot terribly from everywhere, 1 more rebound than midget Fred. And while his defense has improved we all know it's not good enough to be the sole reason he's out there. This right here is the stuff that can, did and will cost us series. 2nd best guards cannot play like this if you are serious about wanting to win at a high level. Fred was literally playing like a star and Jalen STILL couldn't feed off of that or have a positive impact on a game we lost by only 3 pts. Find a good deal and trade him.
He's not a toxic contract but hes becoming a toxic presence. He's almost at "nepotism" level. Minutes he only "earns" because there isnt a single other player on the roster that qualifies as a passable shooting guard. Even next year Reed and Holiday are undersized for the SG position. Cam is a wing. So he's "given" a starting spot while everyone else has to earn it. Amen and Sengun have earned their spots. They've come off the bench and now start. Jalen has never once come off the bench. It's going to cause issues with other players. Not even gonna get into the commercials and 45 year old baby momma.
He’s right though. He’s got a long long way to go before he reaches bearded bum ass loser level. Not a bad impersonation for first try though.
I'm willing to give him the 1st 10 games after Stone's lil analysis ... Anything under 10 points and he gotta go
Yes and he couldn't help it. The only thing I disagree with with what you've said is that "he packed his bags." If anything he never unpacked his bag. He lacks the bbiq to change his game to find the seams where he can make an impact. He seems like a nice kid, just not cut out to be a starter in the league. Especially on a playoff teams. He doesn't have the bbiq/eiq to see the big picture and find his way forward.
Why is this a thing? What the f*** was Stone supposed to say? "Jalen was unwashed ass for 6 of 7 games. That 40 year-old baby mama has him whipped. Now, 29 other GM's, let's deal!"
Well, Stone was just saying what he should say to protect his value and to not completely ruin the kid's self-esteem. It's funny I still remember how Mathloom try to use Ime's post game interview sentence to support his arguments. What else you expect Ime to say? Jalen was completely useless? He doesn't have the heart? Really ridiculous logic... Yes, one playoff series doesn't define a player. But, four years are enough time for most people to realize who is the deadweight and who is not worth investing further.
Let green play until mid-season trade deadline to rebuild his trade value. If he doesn't make a tremendous leap year 5, the front office has to do due diligence and pivot. Cause if ime refuses to get rid of fvv, we need to upgrade from green. Our offense would still be sht due to below average offense schemes and playmaking but it's highly unlikely green will improve any further playing with fvv of all people.
Dude is who he is and as a Cali boy mostly does his damage in March....but he improved in months of January, February. He has now 4 years under his belt and I bet most of the NBA teams have a thick scouting report on him and know exactly what they want to pay for him if he ever hit Free Agency.
Well panic trading right now would b stupid. Plus trading for the likes of booker and Durant would waste the tank effort and put our chance to win it all on the clock. Pg is the position that needs to b addressed the most. I wished we traded for Halliburton. We went from pg heaven (harden, cp3 and even wb) to fvv, wall and kpj.
To-do list for Jalen this offseason...is significant but also something that a determined player would set to accomplish. I think cultivating mass is probably somewhere on the list. Dude needs some Fight Milk. The 3% improved this year, .354 on 8.1 attempts per game is pretty good considering the volume but of course any improvement there is obviously accepted. FG% I'd like to see it mid-40s instead of low 40s. FT% same mid-80s instead of low-80s. I mean, a whole rebound and assist to each season average would get him into a pretty average guard territory too but contextually, we're a good rebounding team and a poor shooting one so there's a bit of give on those categories. It's really down to getting stronger and being more of a bucket. This may sound a little weird too but like, be an *******. Be competitive. Be cool off the court. On the court you gettin these elbows. We ain't friends on the court, my friend is Spalding. Be Russell Westbrook.
Re-watching Stone's answer to the "Jalen data" question is pretty telling. I....uhhh...that that...uhhh.... Funny how he called data flawed and then proceeds to say "his data" says otherwise. Basically contradicted his own statement about not paying attention to flawed data.
