so you are saying that HEad deserved to get drafted in the 1st round and CHuck derserved to go undrafted .. and I dont know why y'all like Luther, he cant do anything.. he shot the ball well at the beginning, but he sucked since.. I thought that was the rookie wall, but I found out that it's not the rookie wall ,that's actually the way he plays .and the 1st 5 games of the season was just a HOT STREAK... I hear a lot of talking that he should work hard to be a PG , but he has no PG basics to build on.. his handles suck, he cant shoot worth a crap, he cant pass , he is USELESS.. Head was lucky to get drafted and was lucky enough to play well in the first 5 games of the season so we keep him... that's true luck and he has absolutely no skills..
I don't even know why I'm replying. I bet it will be like going up against tinman, only without the whimsy. First off you said point blank that we should have drafted Hayes or Langford instead of Head. If you had said we should have gotten Simien, David Lee, or Ryan Gomes instead, that could actually be argued. But to waste a draft pick on a guy who we picked up off the street as free agent is totally moronic. And give me a break about Langford. That guy isn't in the league and probably will never make it. Check the facts. Luther has improved his shooting in the past two months. His FG% is in the mid 40s which is excellent for a guard, and his 3pt % is back up to the high 30s to low 40s. He's shown good finishing skills around the rim all year, and he's finally developing an in-between floater that's falling lately. He's even got a mid-range pull-up, so he's got all the tools in terms of shooting. No doubt he's got to work on his handle, strength, and positioning on defense, but he does have the foundation to build on. I find it funny that you say that, "I am sure they can work on Chuck's release and he will get better" but that Head is useless. Hayes gets a free pass on his weaknesses, while Head gets bashed for his. Double standard much? I await your nonsensical, poorly formatted, circular arguments with great anticipation. Cheers.
well, fisrt, you might be right that I didn't make it clear about Hayes and Langford at the beginning.. it was just a bad-structured sentence.. second, I would appreciate it if u show some kind of respect when u reply because people have different opinions and u gotta respect that .. it would be better if we had a positive argument instead of firing at each other because we have different opinions.. I know that it's non-sense to draft Chuck or Langford in the 1st round pick because they went undrafted.. but that's not what I said we should've done, all I said is Chuck deserves to be a first round pick because he is a great player, he just didn't have the luck... now, talking about Head's and Hayes' fundamentally wrong shots .. I said we can work on Hayes because he plays the 4, he doesn't need to be a good shooter, but Head is an undersized 2 ( the 2 is also known as SHOOTING guard).. so he needs to be a good shooter first, then we work on him.. Hayes has other strong abilities (rebounding and other stuff) that makes him worth working on his FT shooting... and that's the reason why Hayes deserves a free pass .. on the other hand, Head has no significant strong points except for his below average shooting (which we need to work on if u wanna keep him).. he does a lot of T-O's and he is not a good handler or passer... that's why i dont like Luther... I await your sensical, well formatted, good arguments with great anticipation. Cheers
Love the stats, props to the thread starter. Does anybody know, anecdotally or statistically, how Hayes is on defense? Perhaps Rodman's greatest asset was his one-on-one defense, which doesn't show up in the stats above; so I'm skeptical of comparing the two players. Rodman gave Worthy serious fits when the Pistons played the Lakers in the Finals, and this was when Worthy was in his prime.
His defense is very good, especially for a rookie. He'll miss a rotation now and then (not nearly as bad as Swift on this, though), but for a first year player who joined the team in the middle of the season and has only played sporadically it's hard to really fault him for the few times that happens. Even though he's short, he's an excellent post defender because he has quick hands and he keeps his arms up high. He's much better lateral quickness than Juwan and Stromile as well, so he's much better at defending face up offensive players. If you want to look at his impact on the team defensively, this shows we're 9.9 points/100poss (or about 9.1 points/48min)better on defense with Hayes on the court versus him off the court. That's an incredible improvement, but it's unclear to what extent that might be due to facing lesser quality opponents in his minutes.
I'm not sure what's the point. You say he's a below average shooter, and I say he is a good shooter that went into a slump in the middle part of the season. You say he doesn't have any strong abilities when I say that he's got the quick hands and feet to be a good defender (with improvements in his strength and positioning) and the finishing ability to be a quality scorer (with improvements on his handle). If we're disagreeing on that then we're not going to see eye to eye on this subject.
quick hands and feet to be a good defender?? huh?? .. an undersized 2 will never be a good defender because 2's these days are really good (kobe, Ray, J-Rich...)... and quality scorer ?? yeah, that's why he gets blocked almost everytime he drives to the basket..
Who needs Morey the Stats GM when we have resident clutch fans like durvasa and Tango on board? Les could save all the money on hiring the MIT-MBA and spend it on retaining Chuck Hayes. The guy has earned his permanent spot on this team. I hope he's not going to anther team, which would be a travesty.
Chuch Hayes will be a solid backup for years to come and gives 100% every night and knows his role....great player to have on the team
Yes Luther is undersized at the two, but just because he's not going to be a stopper doesn't mean he can't be a good defender. And it's not as if he'll only get matched up with SGs. Whether he develops a better handle or not, we're going to have a lot of lineups with Tracy playing the point on offense with luther playing the two on offense while guarding pgs on defense. And if he does improve his dribble, then there's no reason why he can't be a full-time PG. And luther gets blocked almost every time he drives? Are you even watching these games. Luther is excellent at finishing on the baseline, reversing and protecting his shot with the rim. Your boy Hayes on the other hand bricks a lot of open layups and gets blocked plenty. But I guess that's all right since he's a PF. And another thing. Maybe I would have more consideration for your opinion, if you weren't saying that one of our players sucked, or were useless. Your hyperbolic negativity makes you sound like a jerk. I'm done with you. Goodbye.
Great post(s). Chuck's rebound rate is 20.6, and that would rank him second in the NBA (behind Dwight Howard) if he played enough minutes to qualify. Also, Hayes' turnover rate (the percentage of possessions he takes part in that end up in turnovers) is 8.2 -- which is good for any player, ESPECIALLY a power forward. Consider that last year, Danny Fortson's was up around 21, while Tyson Chandler is around 22 this year. Usually rebounding role players rack up turnovers by setting illegal screens, picking up loose ball fouls, or getting stripped while going up with a follow shot after securing an offensive rebound. Guys like Chandler, Dampier and Reggie Evans are usually turnover machines -- whereas Chuck's turnover rate is even less then someone like Kevin Garnett (9.5). This bodes very well for a jump to 30 or so minutes per game.
There is no reason to tear either Luther or Chuck down to validate opinions. Both have tons of upside and I think will continue to improve ... Luther to be more of a one and chuck with his hitch and shooting range. Chuck has for the most part has always finished well around the basket and Luther has improved a lot in that area since the beginning of the season. He hardly gets blocked or is unable to finish now.
Luther is much more talented than you give credit to Rocketsmac. Luther has some pretty nifty passes here and there. He's a fair 3 point shooter. Probably our only spot up 3 point shooter. He's got incredibly quick hands and comes up with plenty of steals. He reverses nicely at the rim. He's got a decent floater and kid will get better. Hayes isn't a slouch, but the way you make it sound like Head deserves to be the last one picked while playing a pick up game at the Y.
From the times I've been able to watch Chuck,defends the best against players who are slower than him, as really the only way he can afford to give up 4 inches in height is to use his quick hands to go for the strip, and his basketball awareness to get superior positioning. He's basically David Wesley at the power forward, or Karl Malone on Yao Ming in the 2004 playoffs. When he's forced to face someone quicker or with a strong jumpshot, he's powerless to attempt the blocked shot and picks up fouls quickly. I truly believe that Van Gundy has put Chuck in a position to suceed far more than any other player on the roster due to injuries. Our backcourt rotations were a mess this year, and when our two best perimeter defenders are 6-3 Luther Head and 6-1 David Wesley, there will always be matchup problems. With our frontcourt depth, Van Gundy was able to find good opportunities for Chuck to flourish. I understand that this sounds critical of Chuck, but really, I'm as big a proponent of giving him more minutes as all of you. We need to see how he's able to deal with unfavorable matchups, as well as seeing whether his lack of a jumpshot hurts our offense too much. Most of us who were fans of the Stromile Swift acquisition looked at his impressive PER and per 48 min stats and wondering why he didn't get more minutes; now we know that Stro gets minutes when he's playing well, and gets pulled when he isn't. Imagine if Luther had had the same luxury of playing only in favorable matchups; instead of being assigned to Kobe Bryant and Ray Allen, he'd be playing against Smush Parker and Luke Ridnour, getting Bob Sura to slide over to the 2 on defense, or getting Tracy to help out during when the opponent began to heat up, or Derek Anderson/Keith Bogans. Instead of having to initiate the offense off the pick and roll, when his scouting report declares shooting off the dribble as a weakness, he could camp out on the three point line like at Illinois. We never asked Jon Barry to be our #1 stopper on defense and our point guard on offense; why should we expect the 24th pick in the draft to come in and be able to do these things? I believe that this season has shown we have the role players necessary to compete (I won't say contend just yet), but we don't have the necessary starters to allow our role-players to play their roles. Keith Bogans and Rafer Alston are both playing career highs in minutes per game, while the two year project Luther Head is averaging the third most minutes per game out of all the rookies. These guys are capable of playing well when they're within their element, yet are sadly outclassed when forced to take on more responsibilites than their talent merits. Add in two rookies, a recovered Bob Sura and Spanoulis, and maybe our role players can go back to playing to their strengths.
I have no problem with you defending Luther Head, but when it turns into a slam on Chuck Hayes, I have to step in. Yes, Hayes gets his fair share of shots blocked at the rim, but to single him out doesn't sit well with me. Using the numbers at 82games.com, I calculated the fg% on inside shots (shots/dunks in the paint, not including tip ins). Here's a comparison of Hayes, Swift, Howard, Yao, and (why not) Luther. Code: FG% Blocked% ---- -------- Yao Ming 66.3% 10.5% Chuck Hayes 61.5% 15.8% Stromile Swift 60.2% 8.8% Juwan Howard 55.4% 13.9% Luther Head 54.7% 19.0% Hayes gets blocked quite a lot, but he still finishes close to the basket at a better rate than anyone on the team except Yao. Give him a break.
its not just Hayes lack of height that hurts him, but also his lack of a vertical to compensate, that was the real difference between him and Barkley. If Hayes could dunk and rebound above the rim, his height wouldn't be nearly the problem. I think Hayes suffers more from the Van Gundy rookie fear. Hayes to me will be at best a back up 4.
You can talk all you want about aesthetics and potential and size issues -- but the bottom line is that, for every 40 minutes Chuck plays, he scores 11 points. Luther Head, of the myriad scoring skills, scores 12 points for every 40 minutes. The difference isn't as big as you think.
