Jalen Green will be the Rockets' Numero Uno

We do not have to endgame debate it right now for sure.....but one example.

We mostly agree that Durant is a better player, more formidable overall scorer than Russ WB but in his time Durant more than sometimes took less shots than Westbrook while he was in OKC.....

You wonder why, it takes a greater IQ to take less shots and I do not think Green has that kind of IQ......you have so many options and why take the most or 2nd most shots every game when winning contest really matters?

• It is not just inefficiency and shooting, dude just needs a lot of shots to get himself going and more than often he cannot even do that shooting the most shots.
• I did not say nobody would trade for him, I said his value is not really that great as people value him here......he is still more valuable to the Rockets than to most teams that are not bad.
• His efficiency would determine if other teams would view him as a 6th man or a starting player......and his value goes down if teams identify him as a 6th player on their team.....and they would not give up that much for a 6th man.
• He is easily game planned against and taken out of the game.....most playoff teams would do that.
• Who comes in a streak and has hot shooting.....a 6th Man type of Microwave scorer

 

Just look around the league, everyone is scoring at a high clip.....

High volume scoring is not needed as much as it was in the past, you can get that with balanced scoring nowadays.......

The game has shifted to being a team game with superstars at top.

Of course you can get a decent trade with him as a filler but him as the central piece I am not convinced now.

I do think he is going to be a decent trade piece sooner than later but I also think trade partners have gotten smarter. That is essentially why I think he is not that easy of a trade target ....not just because I question him as a player.

I think those teams are waiting him to be extended by the Rockets rather than him going into RFA.....and then strike if his contract is team friendly.

The caring part, I lost that part long ago, I have seen too many players, it is just a waste of time.

This is the endless and lengthy part of AAU and Gleague mentality players vs skilled and ready players being drafted.

 

There are plenty of players he doesn’t dish out compliments to. There are players he says are great (Sengun for example). Why would they be doing this covert James Bond type **** for Jalen only? Lol

Best strategy: go watch Udoka’s comments about everyone this past season and see for yourself if this guy is talking up assets.

 

Where?

DD

 

Here is the thing though, Ime answers the questions asked to him by the media. He is asked more questions about Green than most of the other players. So because he is not going to throw his own player under the bus, he says more good things about Green than the others.

 

Why in the feezy would you trade Jalen after seeing him find his scoring touch towards the end of last season? He will only get better. How long did it take the great Kobe Bean to become what he was?? Patience Hoppergrass.

 

What a hot take......

 

Someone told him that Green was the highest draft pick in a long time and since Yao MIng.....and he did not develop much under Silas.

Head coaches are not development coaches, players should come to know that...... kudos to Ime that he played one this past season.

Udoka is Pop and Jalen Green is Wemby for him except that Green is no Wemby.

 

What can I say? I spit hot fire.

 

He’s got a shot, but I’m doubting.

 

Ok you can go back and look at all the times he brought Green up unprompted by the media. In fact he did it several times in his last few interviews at the end of the season.

Dude surely you’ve been watching. This idea that Udoka is being nice made sense before the trade deadline. Udoka has repeatedly described Jalen as “getting it”. Wished he had gotten it sooner. He’s not talking about no streak man. He could have complimented him and said “is just on fire right now”. It’s very very clear.

You’re literally saying you’d rather believe Ime Udoka of all people is kissing ass and boosting trade value - than to believe Jalen improved his decision making during a spurt and at the end of the season was just starting to figure out how to beat these new aggressive double teams like a star scorer would.

I’ve said this before. At the end of the season his head coach, development coach and both PG’s praised his resilience, work ethic and patience. His defense improved tremendously within one season. His understanding of when to pass the ball improved dramatically. He improved as a rebounder. His overall effort was much improved. This is a 22 year old. Think about how likely such a player is to improve.

Really if he could reduce his 3PA and improve his mechanics slightly and we can get him shooting 3% better from 3PT range we have an amazing young player. Gradually adding strength will improve his defense and finishing too. Are you surprised the coaching staff is confident they can do this? Is it worth improving the shooting and decision making gradually to get a high-stamina lightning quick ultra athletic unselfish SG?

It’s not that surprising they believe in themselves to do this. It requires a lot of gymnastics to come to the conclusion the entire coaching staff and roster are in a conspiracy to say great things about Jalen even when not promoted to. Read the signs man.

 

Charlotte

 

I am not saying that at all, figuratively or literally. I am saying he will always say the positive parts about a player and leave out most of what he doesn't just like any coach should. No conspiracy. F*** that, I don't believe a word of that shiit. He is not being nice to boost his trade value, he is merely conveying his hopes in the form of praise, that Green will become the guy that Ime thinks he is capable of being. He is trying to be supportive and positive.

But all that said, none of us have heard or probably ever know his full feelings about Green or any of his players. That is just the way things are and probably will always be.

 

Well then you’re basically saying Udoka spins everything positively.

If you had to rank the 30 NBA head coaches, Udoka would rank one of the lowest in terms of just focusing on the positives. That’s just not him. We all know that.

Again, you have to believe Udoka is the opposite of who he is in order to believe in this stuff. The truth is Green had 2 bad years (equally thanks to our garbage development culture) and in his third season improved almost everything. His offense improved late which creates questions about whether it was just a hot streak.

What evidence do we have about whether it’s a streak or permanent? Look at the final quarter stats of the season as a whole and pair that with what the head coach, development coach and both PG’s say about him unprompted. You can say nice things but you don’t have to say these particular things. Apply whatever biases you think they have and adjust for it. Consider what the broader NBA respected media analysts think. We’re ignoring the GM. You’ll get a good idea of the truth.

People have been calling Jalen a hard worker for 6 years now going back to high school. Again, you should not be surprised the coaching staff believes this is an easy project. They’re a great development team and Jalen shows extreme patience and coachability. They like each other. It’s a great sign.

 

if Jalen is still ass or incredibly inconsistent by the 15 game mark, 20 game mark at most, Stone needs to move fast and get a trade done

he needs to come out the gate firing on all cylinders from opening tip of game 1

 

This is interesting - matches my eye test pretty well as well in Jalen being the 3rd - 4th most valuable contributor this season, and FVV being our best player overall. Long way to go before he's #1 if ever in any contending team, although my impression so far is he's not converging to being number 1 in any serious team. Note that missing games impact the rank of a player, Sengun maybe could have ranked higher both due to missing games and our lack of shooting slightly impacting his assist numbers, but FVV's and his place in top 10% broadly speaking makes sense to me.

Rockets ordering first, then all players:

 

It matches the eye test not only for Rockets but also for most of the league. And it puts Jalen almost in the top third of the league. Not at all a superstar, but not the complete bum / worst player in the league / worse than any draftable SG right now / whatever idiotic stuff the usual suspects spew hundreds of times per day.

He's a good, not great, player with plenty of room to improve and some hope that he can given his age and occasional bursts. Not a hot take, but that is the reality.

 

The eye test was Fred was running 89% of the action pre-injury with Alpe mostly......post-injury he was running 75% still......

A long way.....a long way....

 

What is an action?

The actions FVV mainly ran were primary pnr ball handler possessions. If he wasn't the primary ball handler in a pnr possession he was a stand still spot up shooter. Those were basically his two roles outside of bringing the ball up the court.


In terms of pnr primary ball handler possessions per game for the entire season, FVV averaged 8 possessions per game and Green 8 possessions per game.

The third most possessions for primary pnr ball handler was Holiday at 2 per game. So in terms of running the offense from the guard position it was FVV and Green.

The rest of the possessions were Sengun post ups or DHO actions and sporadic iso possessions between Sengun, Green, Dylan, Cam, Jabari and Fred.