Ok, not much to talk about these days so lets just revisit this subject for fun. I recall when Walker was on the move from Boston. There was a lot of discussion around here that Walker would be a disaster for this team. You still think that now? Instead of Walker, we ended up with Swift. Who would you rather have now Swift or Walker? I was in the pro-Walker camp at the time. Initially I thought he was simply a ball hog that jacked up crazy shots. But upon closer examiniation, he assists and rebound stats were surprising. I felt he would have complimented Yao and TMac just great. During the finals, it is true his shooting % isn't stellar but there is no doubt that he helped that team win particularly in Game 6. His shot wasn't falling but he found other ways. I have no idea if we seriously made a run at Walker, but after this past season of injuries to TMac and Yao, we absolutely could have used his scoring ability ...not to mention some of his intangibles ...you know, what Swift doesn't have ANY of.
I would only accept a veteran player with the MLE. That doesn't add much to the debate, but we have had planty of veteran players come in and under-perform. I guess I'm a bit skepticle. I'll pass on Walker. On the Heat, he had a pretty fine surrounding cast.
i hadn't watched walker a ton until the playoffs. he is a very nice complementary player to have. if he would just stop jacking up shots he would be an excellent player to have on offense. he does a lot of nice things like rebounding, passing, and finishing. but good god that outside shot is uglier than barkley's used to be.
Miami would not have won that series without Walker. We likely would have still made the playoffs last season if we had Walker ...or at least we would have been in contention for the playoffs. How does that make Walker a bad idea?
He keeps jacking up bad shots. It drives me crazy watching him play. It would make me go insane if he played on the Rockets.
While Miami might not have won the series but for Walker's contributions, if they had lost the series, one of the prime places to look at to place blame would have been Walker. Miami won the series really because Riley is such a strong personality that he was able to get Walker to bend his game enough for them to win. If you remember the first couple of games, Walker spent way too much time dribbling the ball around the perimeter and trying to be D.Wade, that is to say a scorer and playmaker. He is not a playmaker and they were sinking because he was destroying possessions for them jacking up bad shots and throwing the ball away after he controlled the ball for way too long. Walker is a player that a coach simply has to stay on top of to keep his game in check, otherwise, he can destroy a team with his on court stupidity. With our injuries last year, Walker would not have helped us. He would have resorted back to his tactics of dribble dribble dribble shoot shoot shoot and then when JVG coached him to be a better player, he would have grown frustrated because we were losing and wanted out. Walker will only be productive on a playoff team in a 6th man type role, and even then the team and the coach is going to have to knock heads with him just like Miami did during this season. On top of that, he is one of those players that constantly whines to the officials about every single call that goes against him and every single play that he feels like he is fouled with no call, instead of just going to the other end and doing his job. I hate players that do that constantly. Besides that he is getting paid $7 million. Pass.
Walker would be bad. He takes horrible shots, he once led the league in 3pt attempts with... OVER 7 per game! Ya he has learned a lot but he still thinks he is better than he is. Im in the minority and hated Mike James as a starting PG in Houston, Walker is the same kind of story.
yeah, antoine had a solid game 6, but he was still 0-6 from the 3 line and had numerous other bricks. if it took walker going to the clinching game of the finals just to finally play hard and rebound, then theres no way i'd rather have him.
We should have gotten Donyell Marshall. One of the top SHOOTING PFs inthe league. Can grab some boards too.
yada yada yada. You can't rewrite history to fit your argument. The fact is, Miami won that series and Walker played a key role. He isn't the "perfect" player but the dude played big when it counted. Sometimes you need to hit singles ...not homeruns. Walker isn't "perfect" but he would have made the team better. If you always wait for homeruns, you lose a lot of games. No. You think a 20ppg guy is of no help. Interesting. When TMac and/or Yao were hurt, he would have put up 20 ppg. When they are not hurt, he'd be the 3rd option scoring 12-15ppg. That is cheaper than Juwan and he is light years better. And that is <2mil more than Stro and he is light years better then Stro too. $ for $, he would be a big upgrade over what we have now. I'd rather spend 7mil on a productive player than $15 mil on two mostly useless guys. But I'll respect your opinion if you feel we are better off since we didn't get him.
I can't imagine two more different PF's than JHoward and Toine. I love people's purely emotional responses to players. It's similar to all this anti-JJ Redick talk. If you have a good basketball player, you go with it and coach around the weaknesses. Nobody is perfect but you look for guys that know how to contribute and win games.
Stay away from Walker. That guy sucks soo much, what does he do besides jack up 3s and occasionally go to the basket, only to be a horrible FT shooter?
Walker's one of those players that CAN be a solid rotation player/starter. He's always been a good rebounder and a fairly effective passer. However, his seemingly unselfish performance in this year's finals is hardly representative of his normal style of play. Despite his self-proclaimed "maturity," Walker still hasn't kicked the habit of jacking up long range shots. He's an above-average shooter, but his shot selection has always been very poor. If he ever manages to get that shot-jacking mentality out of his head, he definitely has all the physical tools to be a decent starter..even at his age. Unfortunately, his age is the very thing that makes it difficult to correct his poor shot selection. At 30, he's more or less set in his ways. Old habits die hard, so I doubt his playing style will change.
I can't find it now, but wasn't there an article posted not too long ago which tried to quantify how many wins a player was "worth". IIRC Walker was one of the worst players, grading out negatively. He is one of the two or three least efficient big scorers in the NBA. He takes and misses a ton of threes and doesn't get to the line often. If you keep jacking up enough shots, every once in a while you are bound to have stretches where you look good. Even if he was OK in the finals, he is still a horible player.
