Would you trade Donatas Motiejunas for Goran Dragic?

BTW - we should have kept Dragic in the first place, and we would not even be having this conversation.

Player option? Over a PLAYER OPTION? Really, and we gave one to Dwight.

Morey has been good, but there are many decisions he has made that are questionable if you are trying to win.

DD

 

Well you're right, we wouldn't be having this conversation because we wouldn't have Dwight Howard and might not have Harden. It would be a totally different conversation, probably a really sad conversation.

 

Personally I wouldn't give a rats ass if my Center doesn't get any steals at all. That's what wings and guards are for. And blocks are nice and good highlights but tell nothing about the actual defence in the post and rim protection. Esp the most important part of defence = team defence.
Case in point Drummond. Anyone who thinks he is a good defender because of his blocks and rebounds should look better.

 

The story goes that the decision was not DM the GM's but rather his boss; in no small part as he was enamored with a different PG.

But you know all that.

Now, Dragic to LAL? Makes sense if, indeed, the Lakes are aggressively pursuing him and the Suns believe it would get 1 #6-#7 pick from LAL this year instead of a lower pick next year.

Where else does GD make sense if he leaves PHX? Knixies? Nah, they're throwing this season's towel in. Not many realistic choices...

So, do the Suns retain their main man? Trade Thomas (to Boston)? Just move a wing or two, bye-bye Gerald Green. To?

Do the Suns even believe they can hold off OKC with this roster?

 

Agree. Would still like to have Aaron Brooks back.

 

Dragic would be good fit for the triangle imo so I can see them trying to get him with a max. They and LA don't have many choices. They want to get a top name THIS summer so they can attract any FA next summer. Plus the Knicks dont' even have their pick next year (and probably the LAL also) so they have no incentive for tanking for two years in a row.
Knicks however have no assets so their only chance is FA.
Lakers can pay and trade for him with their current assets.
There are other interested teams in a pg that I am not sure however that they have the cap space to pay him the max. Maybe the Kings. Or Charlotte and Detroit. I know Detroit will have 30 mil cap space.

 

I'm not relying on on just stats. You don't remember how T-Jones played. He got his points from facing up and beating guys with his quickness, facing up and shooting little hooks around the basket, in the pick and roll where he has the highest percentage on the team, alley oops, transition baskets, some jumpers, and yes, some put-backs.

The only thing Jones didn't do was post up. But he had a nice little face up spin move hook shot game. It was basically like a post up but he'd use his quickness to gain position near the rim.

 

If you look closely at this list, you will notice that the first allstar caliber player is Chris Paul, who is 34th. The first allstar big guy is Al Jefferson, who is 42nd.

These high post up shooting percentages are stats that role players get while defenses are worried about something else.

 

That's why we need another creator, that doesn't mean we HAVE TO trade away Dmo. Dmo is one of the guys who actually help Harden, how about we try to keep those.

 

Straw man again. I don't measure defense by blocks and steals. Look into it. Millsap is a good defender, always has been. Heck just look at how high he is in drapm this year.

Quite a few pgs can average 20ppg on .600 ts%? And make 3rd team all nba? No, just no.

 

Would u trade a treasure yard dog for a junk yard dog? No ! because u need and can have both to WIN.

 

Watch these highlights from the beginning of the year and tell me again that Jones is only a "garbage man". Sure, he doesn't post up, but he faces up and gets to the rim in the same spots a post player would get to. He just gets there through face ups instead of post ups:

http://youtu.be/jL2ogxrsiKE

 

Also if you look at this list you will see that the attempts of Paul or other guards are extremely lower than someone's like DMO. That's why the stats of guards are dismissable I just couldn't filter this list to include only lets say over 50 attempts.
I mean..who in their mind would judge a POINT GUARD on their post up game?

So I have absolutely no clue what you want to say .
Al Jefferson is less efficient than DMO in the post and he is the one who posts up the more in the league and it's his basic top skill. His defence and passing sucks.

 

Ok now I don't want to give up Dmo or Tjones. They can have Nick Johnson, Capella ,Dorsey,or Canaan. They can take their pick. We drafted Tjones/Dmo and developed him, Its would hurt to lose them.

 

I didn't mean it as a straw man, I was assuming that was what you were trying to say given that Millsap's defense is considerably inferior to DMo's almost everywhere on the court. I was just trying to make sense of your comment.

The way I see it, what matters more, counting stats like blocks and steals (or a plus-minus based metric) or the actual shooting percentages against players? If guys aren't scoring at a high percentage against one player and he has few steals and blocks and his drapm is low isn't that still better than a player that other players are shooting a high percentage against with a lot of steals, a lot of blocks, and a high drapm?

Isn't the goal of defense to stop players from scoring? If that's the case, I can't see many more important metrics than the opponent FG%

My eye test says that Millsap is a poor defender and the numbers say that players on average shoot for higher percentages against him than they do against the average defender. I could be wrong, but I think that's a pretty solid case even though the plus-minus stats suggest otherwise.

 

If you change the filters on those stats, you'll find that David Lee, long acknowledged as a terrible defender, is putting up the same numbers. Also, for such a great rim protector, Dmo doesn't contest many shots.

 

There is a difference between a big man that gets his points through face-ups and a big man that can get his points in the post. Over their career, Amare Stoudemire averages more ppg than Tim Duncan (20ppg vs 19.7 ppg). But the effect Duncan has on the offensive end is far greater than Amare, because of all the attention Duncan requires while in the post.

A post up big man that requires double teams will make his teammates better. A face up big man will get his points, but he isn’t gonna make anyone around him better. I was as pro-Jones as anyone last season, but his post-season against Aldridge really opened my eyes. His game is just too limited

 

Your eye test also told you Jones is just a garbage man when that clearly isn't the case.

 

getting to the rim makes teammates better. It doesn't matter how you do it.

 

Well the point is Millsap has always been a regarded as a good defender whether you're an eye test guy or an advanced stats guy. This idea that Millsap sucks on D is something pretty novel.

Anyways my point wasn't that he is better or worse than Dmo, just that there a lot of good PFs too. Its not a shallow nba position like C.