Jermaine Taylor = JJ Redick of the Houston Rockets. Superb college career, but just can't seem to get the hang of the NBA yet.
On potential, he has it. Great first step, can get to the rim, just needs time.... What I see happening is that he will go the role that AB took his rookie campaign....start with the team, get sent to the D-League (when T-Mac returns) perform so well in the D-League that the Rox have to bring you back to the team... Potentially, who knows...in 2 or 3 years our frontcourt could be AB JT Air Bud
LOL. JT has played 31 preseason freaking minutes for his entire NBA career, but just can't seem to get the hang of it yet. Patience my young grasshopper.
Taylor can't dribble with his left hand -- can't drive left -- and is therefore very predictable and easy to guard, hence his SL troubles. We are fortunate Morey (he deserves praise for this) bought the rights to Chase Budinger as well. Taylor will be a star in the D-League but will never be good enough to secure a minimal NBA pension.
LOL. And you can tell all of this after a few SL games and 31 minutes of preseason games. Wow, the rockets should hire you and get rid of their current scouts with your incredible ability to actually make a call on how a young players future will play out. Im impressed.
We haven’t seen much of anything out of Jermaine yet, but I am still holding out hope. I went to the Rockets open practice on Saturday and the kid was impressive. The problem with Jermaine is that he is a scorer and really only a scorer which makes him a boom or bust type prospect. Either he will play great and be a big time contributor or he will be a guy that forces too many shots as a role player and will find himself without a job.
Very astute observation... I've been harsh on Bud... but he is doing well. We should ask the same for Taylor. We all improve (some of us), as we get older when we do something continously. Let's wait on Taylor.
If this were solely my assessment, you would be correct in your derisive answer. However, pre-draft analyses (draftnet and draftexpress) both cited his principal weakness -- not being able to dribble or drive left. He has shown no improvement from what I saw.
Too bad, so far he has not shown much potential to be a good player, but a hope is still there, Morey normally gets a right draft, you got believe it.
And Landry didn't have much of a jumpshot when he first got to the league and he's so undersized at 6' 8" means he's absolutely going to be a bust... oh..... wait.... NVM.
I'm not rooting against Taylor. I hope he devotes a season in Europe or the NDBL learning how to dribble with his left hand. He is capable of learning, but so far I have not read anything or seen anything that indicates he is working on the problem. Without solving that weakness, he goes the way of many, many other NBA hopefuls.
Do all NBA players dribble with the left? I never paid attention that closely. Does Carl Landry, Ariza, Yao, Battier, and all the other Rockets dribble with their left? I'll have to watch that next time.
Best case-scenario I see Jermaine as a 6th man type player, someone who comes off the bench to provide an offensive spark. It will be years before/if he gets there. This year I see him refining his game in the D-league, it seems the Rockets upper management is pumped about having their own D-league team and with some spots open I could see Jermaine starting and being very successful with that route.
Jason Williams, Bob Sura, Steve Nash, Dirk Nowitski, Chris Andersen, Kevin Love, Mike Dunleavy, Brad Miller, Chris Kaman, Steve Blake, Kirk Hinrich, David Lee, Mike Miller, Matt Harpring, Nick Collison... You're right, they're all the same.
I'd say all of them fit the description given though: He's like a poor man's black Steve Novak with more quickness and less shooting ability! I'd say all of those players have more quickness than Steve Novak, the only one that MAY not be as quick as Novak would be Kaman. Novak is one of the best shooters in the NBA, Nash and Dirk may put up a good fight though. Yeah, I'd say a vast majority of white players in the NBA fit the description of having more quickness and less shooting ability than Novak. Pugs
