Someone said that Cuttino Mobley would be better as a 6th man. I'm wondering how that could possibly be, even after this season. Can someone explain to me why he would be better off playing a bench role.
Cuttino is an AVERAGE all-around player. He's a very good SCORER... Which sounds like 6th man material to me... He is a bad to average defensive player. Does not create many shots for others. Doesn't really rebound, or do anything else for that matter. If Mobley was as good as some of you think, in the company of a Michael Finley, then wouldn't our record without Francis be better than 2-24 or whatever it was? Fact is, that Mobley doesn't do the little things that help us win. He can only score. He would be valuable off the bench to provide a spark. Ideally, we'd have a Doug Christie-like SG who would provide the little things, and would complement Mobley very well.
Ideally we would have Dream in his prime swatting all the guys that get past Cat and Franchise. More reasticly we need someone that can score and defend in the paint. Look how successful we were last year when Dream was putting up 15/8. Our guards are the best guard tandem in the league. Our front court just sucks. We no sf's that can score on a consistent basis. Our best defender is a 19 year kid that gets pushed around in the paint. Our PF's either plays no D nor rebounds or is too short to play the position in the West. And our starting center is Kelvin Cato. Lets not fix something that isn't broken.
You put Finley in Mobley's place during the Francis-less period and it wouldn't be all that different. Finley's not even the best player on his team, not even second. I do think this team underachieved during that stretch, but that's not all Cat's fault. Cat gets a lot of heat for his defense when it isn't as bad as many make it out to be. If it takes D to be a starter then why is Steve starting? Oh yeah Cat led the team in steals, so that's one little thing that helps us win.
I think you're just being a little too greedy Kidrock. Sure, I'd like a whole starting five who was good at every aspect of the game, but its not going to happen. And the fact is that Mobley is the second best player on this team. Don't we have at least three other starting positions we need to fill, rather than fill a position that is currently filled by our second best player? Cuttino is at least better than half of the other shooting guards in the league, so if Mobley should be on the bench, then so should at least fourteen other starting shooting guards around the NBA.
Cat is a great 2 guard with all star talent as a starter. But the one thing that Cat can do that so many other players can not do is come into a game that has an established pace and completely change the tempo and make an immediate impact. Cat has the ability to sit on the bench for 10 minutes and then come in cold and start hitting shots as soon as he hits the floor while so many other players require enough time to try and get a feel for what is happening before making an impact. By the time some bench players have had time too adjust to the tempo of the game it is time for the starter to return, we would not have that problem with Cat. Cat is a good starter and would also be a good 6th man if Rudy ever chooses to use him that way.
Cat would start for any other team in the league period, and the thought of him coming off the bench for our sh!tty team who obviously needs him is a ridiculous idea to say the least. Have fun wasting your time to dream up every possible scenario to put Mobley on the bench because IT IS NEVER GOING TO FU#KING HAPPEN!!!
Are you kidding me? KidRock8- If Mobley was as good as some of you think, in the company of a Michael Finley, then wouldn't our record without Francis be better than 2-24 or whatever it was? If we had Nowitzki, Lafrentz, VanExel, and Cuttino, I can guarantee you that 2-24 record would be above .500
Cuttino Mobley revived 1 vote for the ALL NBA TEAM, Steve Francis recived 5 I belive. That means some people rank him as a top 6 guard in the NBA Cuttino could easily have made the All star game this year if we had a winning record. Next year he likely will be close to getting a spot. any player that ends the season as the leagues top 15 scorers is not a bench player. not in any dream that kid rock may have. I agree that Cat may be the 6 man next year or maybe the year after that, but that will be as the first player coming off the bench at the ALL-STAR GAME. you know the other day I was talking to Peter Vesceys wife at the deli. she is a huge pacers fan, so we were talking about that series, and I guess she was talking about how huge those guys are and such. well after a few minutes of sharing stories on tall players, and some stories I shared with her about college, and mentioned cuttino. She immediately lit up and exclaimed how he was an amazing player. she said how that kid is gonna be a star. very nice thing to hear about a 2nd rounder "over acheiver" from a Pacers fan from NY who deffinately knows her basketball(maybe more than her husband ) Cuttino is the man, and is certainly the Co-leader of this team 40+ minutes every night, never tired peace
This is why I think we should go for Bruce Bowen or someone the same. All defense frontcourt to complement an all offense backcourt. Imagine this Mutombo Ben Wallace Ron Artest Mobley Francis Bring 2 scorers off the bench. Artest can score some. Mutombo some. Wallace very little. But if we had, for example, Croshere and Griff on the bench, then we'd be a very good team.
It's not about if Mobley would be better off as a 6th man it's about if the team would be better off with Mobley as a 6th man. No team in this league will ever win a title with Mobley as it's leading scorer. He's a selfish player which is fine for a sixth man but it's not fine for a guy who plays 40 minutes a game and has the basketball IQ of a bowl of oatmeal. Steve Francis is a more talented player than Mobley and should be the starting scoring guard on this team. Francis is so much more explosive than Mobley and despite what the Mobley bandwagon would tell you, he would clearly be a better scorer than Mobley at the two spot. He shoots a better % when not plagued with the migraines, he gets to the free throw line more often, he can and is willing to create for teammates, and he would get the superstar calls that Mobley will never get. I don't think it's any stretch to say that Francis is a legit 25 pts/game scoring threat from the two guard spot without having the responsibilities of the point. In addition, the drive by's that Francis is a victim of at the point would not happen as often at the two because the scoring guards in this league aren't as quick as the point guards. The problem with all of this is that we don't have a quality point guard who can be a floor leader. Neither Francis nor Mobley are very intelligent players on the court and I dispute whether they are even "leaders" on this team. This is why Andre Miller's name pops up a lot on these boards. Having a quality point like Miller or even Jason Williams from Duke would enable us to unshackle Francis' offensive game and let him just go out and score while keeping Mobley in a three guard rotation off the bench to provide instant "iso offense". Now there are those who talk about the Mobley/Francis friendship as the basis for everything we do. Francis will be unhappy with this, Mobley will be unhappy with that, and so on but at some point you can't let your players run your team, especially when they haven't done anything in this league. If Francis and Mobley aren't open to something that coaching/management believes would improve the team then we already have bigger problems than if the team is better off with Mobley coming off the bench.
If we had Finley, instead of Mobley during the stretch that Francis was out, there is no way we would have been as bad as 2 wins. I can't believe a Finley comparison has been made with Mobley. I didn't base Mobley sitting on the bench solely on defense. Francis is a horrible defender, but he does just about everything else you can expect from a PG. Therefore, he has no business coming off the bench. Can someone tell me what else Mobley brings to the table, other than scoring? And I guess being Francis' bosom buddy. If Mobley did a better job of getting his teammates involved offensively, I probably wouldn't have bothered to start this thread.
But Mobley would be the best player or the 2nd best player on the Mavs? I guess since Kobe is the 2nd best Laker, that means he's only on par with Cat? Awesome logic.
Timing, What is a Mobley bandwagon? Is that sorta like a Francis bandwagon? At least you are no longer riding that Francis-is-a-point-guard bandwagon. Hey, if you can work out a trade for a real point guard, convince Francis to play SG, get him some defenders (because his going to be taken to school at SG worse than PG), and ship off Mobley for his REAL VALUE as a star, I'm down for that. But I have serious problems with letting YOU do that trade of Mobley, because you clearly think less of him than all those coaches, scouts and players who study film of him and design defenses to figure out how to stop that explosiveness off the dribble. When you see guys like John Stockton yelling at Kirilenko for misplaying a zone on Cuttino by standing a mere one foot too far away from his assigned spot and allowing Cat to beat his man and Kirilenko to take it right through the center of the lane to the rim, you know the smartest players in this league like Stockton know what Cat's explosiveness is capable of. Dude, hate him if you must, but at least realize his awesome trade value and how bringing him off the bench for 25 minutes like a Vinnie Johnson is a completely stupid idea from a GM standpoint. Pick Francis over Mobley as your SG; that's fine, but get some serious return value from that. I think you hate Cat so much that you want to bury him on the bench to punish him. You don't even want to get trade value for him.
Of course opposing defenses will study film on Mobley. If 50% of the plays are run for him... I'm sure that 28 NBA teams studied film on Ron Mercer, when he played for the awful Bulls. What's your point? That every team uses video to scout their opponents tendency's?
