Interested to hear what other people think about this stuff.. Goona scattershoot a bit after slogging through the Yahoo highlight reels of most of the guys who are our potential picks. I acknowledge that these are highlights, and cannot possibly give the whole picture - however, they can give SOME, and it is that SOME I am commenting on here. I honestly never really watch college basketball, and have not seen these guys in anything other than clips. So I am sure I will be off on some of these guys, but that's ok. In order.. Adam Morrison: AM seems very stiff, not fluid at all. He is slow. That said, he can shoot it from anywhere, and while his shot is not a thing of beauty, he shoots it from above and behind his head, at the top of his jump, which looks to me like it makes for a pretty much unblockable shot. And the ball goes in the net. Depending on where he ends up, he could be a great success, or spend his career jacking up lots of shots for perrennial losers. Tyrus Thomas: If you squint, you could be watching a highlight reel of Swift. I knew people had compared the two guys, but it is uncanny. TT even looks like SS a bit. The question is, will he bring it every second, like Amare, or will he be a flake like Stro? There was nothing about his highlights which made me think this guys would add anything to the Rox that we don't already have in Stro. Pass. Rudy Gay: Not sure where all the 'athletic freak' descriptions come from. He's long and skinny, and clearly has some talent, but seemed kind of awkward. Not as impressed as I was expecting to be. LaMarcus Aldridge: I wonder a bit when the best a highlight project can come up with it garbage baskets. He could probably develop into a good player, but was there anything outstanding about his game? Surely there is, but it sure as heck was not in these clips. Still, a guy with his size and agility, never a bad thing. (Bargnani was not included in the clips - comment reserved) Brandon Roy: Roy is a good player, but what really stands out is his smarts. We have lamented the fact that so many players have questionable Basketball IQ's, well this guy has skill, and knowledge, and ability. If it weren't for his knees being scarier than Freddy Krueger, he would probably be #1 overall. It's a shame that a guy at his age and skill level has already had two serious knee injuries. What are the odds it'll never happen again? I would take him in a heartbeat, but every single day I would be expecting to hear the worst on the news: Roy has blwon out his knee, will miss the season. Marcus Williams: MW is a telented PG, no doubt. He moves well, sees the floor pretty well, and seemed to do a decent job setting up teammates, or finding them with a quick accurate pass. However, I don't like his shot. I can't describe it exactly, maybe it's too flat, or something like that. But it appears that he has learned to shoot at the front edge of the rim, so that the ball hits the net on the front side instead of the rear side. That scares me, because guys who shoot like that, when they get tired, they become bricklayers. Too easy for the shot to be off, there is no margin for error like there is when a guy shoots at the middle or back half of the net. A quibble, yes, but it could be the difference between him being a career 30% or a career 40% shooter. Randy Foye: Foye, on the other hand, is not as pure a pg as MW, BUT, I think he would be a much better fit in Houston than MW would be. His shot appears to be better, and he seems to be a little more active in the paint and around the basket. Looked to me to be more focused, dialed-in. Between MW and Foye, I would take Foye. Patrick O'Bryant: Whee. The second coming of Brad Sellers. Please God let someone decide this stiff is worth a top7 pick. Shelden Williams: I hate to say it, but Shelden reminded me of Karl Malone a little bit. Definitely a man among boys, at least in the college game. Real question is whether he can develop beyond his raw offense. If he can, he will probably be a multi-time All-Star. If not, then he will be more of a Boozer than anything else. Probably will be a good NBA player for a long time, but just like Thomas and Aldridge, I wonder if he fits what the Rox need at the 4: a range shooter with some defensive ability. Probably not. Not necessarily a bad thing, just not what we need most. Ronnie Brewer: I have been on record for weeks saying Brewer is our man, and nothing here changed my opinion. It was telling that Brewer was the first player who had defense specifically included in his highlights. He looks to be a real monster on the defensive perimeter. Love love LOVE it. He can take it to the basket with either hand, which I thought was a good sign. And while I was kind of laughing at that ugly-ass shot he has, hey, the ball goes in the hole, so who are we to complain? I think RB would instantly become one of the most popular Rockets. Cedric Simmons: Like Brewer, CS's defense was actually highlighted in this clip. He's a big guy, an athlete. Certainly someone we wouldn't mind having on the team, but I still believe that simply a big athlete at the 4, while not a bad thing, does not address our most pressing needs. However, he could easily be just as good as any of the other top 4's in the draft. Rodney Carney: Emphasize, these are highlight reels, so they provide no answer to the question of whether he can keep his head and heart in a game at all times. That said, I like his game in the clips. He's quick, active, he can shoot pretty well, and get to the basket with ease. But no defense was shown, so I would have to say that it did not show as much as the Brewer clip did, overall. But if he can keep his motor running all the time, he would not be a bad pickup. I get the vibe that, with him spending time at TMac's house so much, he may wind up in Rockets Red. Not my first choice, but it could work out just fine. J.J. Redick: Redick has the kind of shot that very few others in these clips have. His shot POPS the net - you all know what I mean. Some guys just have such a pure sweet shot that they make the net *splash* when the ball always seems to hit it in just that exact right spot. He's certainly not a stiff, and he's bigger than Wesley. Depending on where he goes, he could end up making himiself into a better version of Manu. I would be happy enough to see him on the Rockets. Some others... Ager: Read reports of him dominating workouts. If so, I did not see it in these clips. Nothing particularly impressive here, so he must have turned it up a notch for the workouts. Rondo: Odd player. Totally-right-handed. That may work for a while, but opposing coaches would figure out pretty quickly how to neutralize him, if that is all he can do. Gansey: Has Bryce Drew writtn all over him. Novak and Pitsnogle: Big white guys who can shoot. Nothing wrong with that, we did well when we had Air Bull and Scotty the Body. A guy who was not in the videos, but is probably going to be a great steal in the 2nd round, is Bobby Jones. Could be a great perimeter defender if we lose out on Brewer somehow.
You lost me at... WTF? For the most part, I can agree on the other players, although I think you slighted Mike Gansey a bit.
Yeah, Redick = Manu? I've never heard anyone even try to fly that comparison. I'd like to hear some justification for that. And the highlights don't show that Gansey led his team in rebounding and averaged 5 or more boards every year of his college career. Gansey is more like Wesley's offensive game + Sura's rebounding instincts. And regarding Carney, I'm confident that he's going to be an elite level transition player in the league. He's got blazing straight ahead speed and seems to really get motivated by running the court. Whether he'll be anything more than a spot up shooter in the halfcourt game is pretty much up in the air though. I probably wouldn't pick him over the top 6 players (Roy, Gay, Thomas, Aldridge, Morrison, Bargnani) or Brewer, but taken on his own merits, Carney would be a good addition to the team.
Rudy gay is a 6'8" wing player with a 40" vertical and a 7'3" wingspan. Total athletic freak. Where his awkwardness comes in is that he's not a great ballhandler, but supposedly he's been working extremely hard on it.
I agree, Brewer is the guy to pick and Reddick if Brewer is taken by the time we make our pick. I also have to agree that Gay is not that great, he reminds me of a smaller version of P.J. Brown.
A lot of people here are underestimating Gay. I live on the East Coast so I see a lot of UCONN games and Gay really impresses me. He's not going to be an MVP candidate but he should make the all-star team for many years to come. One of the things I most like about Gay is his teamwork, he is NOT a me-first player and for some reason that is considered a weakness. Another thing I have to say, for the people who question his work ethic, is that he is a very hard worker and you could clearly see it in his improvement from 2 years ago to last year. Gay will NEVER singlehandedly lead a team into the playoffs like T-Mac did in Orlando or Kobe last year, but he will be a valuable member of the team. He will probably put up similar stats to KG except less rebounds of course.
Are you serious? Rudy Gay is about every bit as athletic as Tmac. Only difference is Tmac is a much better ball handler.
I can't really agree with a lot of your assesments simply because I've seen all of those guys play full games, most of them multiple times. I'll just comment on the top 6 and Brewer Morrison - I agree, although I think his competitiveness is important to remember when trying to decide if he'll be a winner in the NBA. Tyrus Thomas - His jump shot, although ugly, is improving by the day. In hi one year in College, he improved seemeingly every game, and showed the desire to elevate his game. I don't like the way he and his agents have handled the workout process, but I think a raw Kenyon Martin is a better than Swift simply because I think he'll become more than just a dunker. He's a wild card though, that's for sure. Rudy Gay - Umm, he's a legit 6'8" with T-Mac hops and a Wingspan only about 3 inches short than Yao's...ball handling is one of those things that can be improved, and if that happens and he shoots from the arc like he did freshman year, he'll be a star. Aldridge - he's got some good-looking post moves, and a deadly hook shot. He's got nice touch and good range, runs the floor like a dear, and can keep up with the quicker PF's/C's in the league. With that said, defense isn't great and he sometimes plays passive, especially when he gets pushed around, so he might need time to bulk up. But the skills and size are there. Sheldon Williams - At WORST he's a Dale Davis type of enforcer, and I think he'll end up being the best big man in this draft (not counting the Euros). Roy - No idea how he'll translate to the NBA. Always seemed like a SG version of SHane Battier to me Brewer: He's not an elite player like everyone here is making him out to be, but he will D up and he is athletic. But I don't get how you can nit-pick at other people's shooting forms and then laugh off Brewer's...he seems like one of those guys that has to shoot a lot and handle the ball a lot to get into a rythm, and that's not going to bode well for him on this team. It'll be like when Scottie Pippen was turned into a spot-up shooter when he came to Houston. Brewer will be a good player, but not for the ROckets I feel.
That Rudy Gay highlight film is truly stupifying, his agent should be very proud; but it's starting to look like the same guy is editing the highlights for every player...dunk dunk dunk. I don't think that is going to happen in the NBA. Someone is going to take your head off. I swear they have used the same dunk more than once in this short video too, the 360 jam and the under the boards inbound tip. Also I think there was just one defensive play in the whole thing. These are fun but I don't think they have anything to do with projecting NBA players.
Well like I said, I based all that strictly on those highlights. Maybe it's more of a judgement on who was putting together the reels than anything else.. and I did say I was probably going to be off a lot because of it.. just a stab at doing some armchair evaluating. Well it'll be an interesting draft, at least.
