Does Stromile Swift have the potential to approach Dennis Rodman in defense and boarding while having some offense as well and w/o the antics off-court and on-court? I realize that like Artest the same intesity that fuels the positive is the fuel for the negative. Playing next to Yao and TMac it seems as though SS may have the athletic ability and intensity to approach Rodman. What do you think?
you realize you are talking about a pf who has been playing the potential card for the past five years and comparing him to argubly the greatest defensive pf ever in the nba (yes thats how much i respected rodman on the court). if swift can approach 1/2 of what rodman was i'd be giddy as a kid on christmas morning
doubt it.....i'd say 'no'. what set rodman apart was his ability to do so much with what appeared to be so little...I think Rodman would have put up his gaudy numbers on any team, not just the good ones. I'm certainly not expecting a Rodman, however...how about 80% of Otis Thorpe?
At this point SS is pretty much a more athletic version of Theo Ratliff. Imposing shot blocker, leaves much to be desired as a rebounder... However, under JVG I think Stro can give 10 pts, 10 boards, and 2.5 blocks as a starter. Thats nowhere near what Rodman did on the glass, but thats all we really need from Stro.
Guys... I like the Stro signing, but come on. I'm optimistically hoping that down the road he'll maybe give us Kenyon Martin-type production. But for next season, I really don't think we should expect much more than maybe 11/7, 12/8... Something along those lines. Just having the added offensive and defensive dimensions that his quickness and athleticism will provide is enough.
10 boards a night is a pretty damn good average. If he can do that, well it would make CD look like more of a genius. I just can't see SS giving us a double double game in and game out. He is good. Not that good.
Rodman was pulling 19 boards a night during his prime. Even in his last 12 games in his NBA career with Dallas, he still got 14 boards a game. I would be happy if Swift can avg. 10 boards next season.
"No" is my answer to the original question. However, I do expect him to be a good fit with the Rockets. I think JVG's instructions to Swift will be something like this: - "Rebound" - "Block shots" - "Dunk the everliving shiit out of the ball at every opportunity" Then he can tell him "if you do those three things, you will get all the playing time you want, the fans will love you, and you might even get a ring or two out of the deal." I don't see any reason why Stro couldn't/wouldn't take that challenge.
Rodman was a legendary man-on-man defender. What about Swift's man-on-man defence in the Western Conference? Defensively, he's only really shone so far as a weakside defender.
http://www.nba.com/playerfile/dennis_rodman/index.html A cursory glance at Rodman's stats yields the folowing: He played 5 yrs before he averaged double digit rebounds [that was when he began starting and playing 36-40 MPG], never averaged better that .83 blocks, and only averaged double digit scoring one year in his career, and averaged only 7+ PPG for a career so he was not a double/double waiting to happen. He was the most imposing rebounder I've ever seen and a defensive all-star for seven years and defensive MVP for 2 years. SS is arguably already better offensively and a better shotblocker, but I have to agree I doubt he will ever be an 18+ rebounder, Rodman did it twice. SS averaged 10/5 last year playing 21+MPG, take that to 40MPG and you would have 20/10. Can he approah that, I don't know. I did watch Rodman a lot, but I have not seen that much of SS playing which is why I asked people that maybe followed him more closely. It is unreasonable to presume that anyone will ever rebound like Rodman again. That is why I put approach in italics/bold face type. 10-12 RPG would be approaching since Rodman only aver 13.7RPG for his career. BTW: I would be thrilled if he was 80% of OT also. OT was a true double/double threat for most of his career, but never averaged 18+ RPG for the year. I was just curious what y'all thought.
The only real thing dirty about his game was the fact that he got into the players heads and annoyed the crap out of them till they made mistakes and that's all he had to do. Every players has a bit of a dirty streak and he really wasn't too drity to me at all...They knew what to do to get under the skin of his opponents and it worked everytime. I don't consider that dirty at all.
I don't normally like to compare current players to former players and say can he be like <blank>....as it is never a fair comparison for either player. Rodman was a beast for about a decade and coming from the 2nd round in the draft to boot. When Stro leads the league in rebounds for a couple of seven years in a row then we can revisit this thread. More importantly then the stats were the intangible things that Rodman did on the floor. The guy was always riding the bike and I mean ALWAYS, constantly guarded the best big on the opposing team and virtually shut them down on a repeated basis. Took Karl Malone completely out of his game two years in a row in the finals, would taunt the crap out of the opposing team and get in their head and in essence take them out of the their game, he was the guy on the team who was the enforcer, the bad boy, the guy who wouldn't take any crap from the other team (or a baseline camera man...lol). And how can you not like a guy who whispered "The mailman doesn't deliver on Sunday..." to Karl Malone as he is getting ready to take a free throw shot at a pivotal time in the game.......LOL I think that Stro will be a big positive to our lineup but as of right now he can't hold Rodman's jock strap...
i think u really cant compare the two...they have totally different games...ss is a good rebounder but usually goes for blocks which gets him out of position sometimes for a rebound....rodman main goal was to get rebounds..ss has a better all around game, does a lot of things good but doesnt really do anything great....
Rodman's R/D was amazing. Ben Wallace approaches that now... Stro? Does he have the toughness? I dunno.
