Now do you regret trading for Griffin? Jefferson is a beast and he is one of the reasons why New Jersey is playing well... his FG percentage is 2nd in the LEAGUE just behind Shaq... which is unheard of for a G/F. Yah he plays with Jason Kidd, but some of the games I've watched.. he creates on his own, he is deceptively quick and likes to take it hard to the rack which gets him either an easy DUNK or he gets fouled. I mean c'mon they traded Van Horn just so he can play more minutes. They also say this year he was snubbed for an all-star slot. While on the other hand, Griffin is shooting a measley 38% and he continues to get blocked everytime he shoots near the basket. He doesn't like taking it strong. His delivery is soo slow, and he hardly gets up on his jumpshot. Now his position is being taken over by a hobbled MoT. And people here say he was snubbed for the sophmore rookie challenge game.. What is wrong here?
If Griffin doesn't show me something before season's end.. I am off the train..get rid of him..while we can still get something decent in return!
At this point, I'd take Jefferson, honestly. We could have traded those other two picks and selected a little point guard. However, the "patience please" argument has some merit. Not tons of merit though. Kemp, for example, was a young'un, and in his first year he averaged 6.5 pts, 4.3 rebs. But even in his second year... 15.0 and 8.4 ... Eddie's stayed at 8 and 6 so far, roughly.
PF postion is the weakest link in ths Rox team right now I think. Even if we have richardson, we still need a good PF. I dont know if Richardson can do mcuh better than Cat or Posey in the Rox system. Maybe he can, who knows. I only wish we could get Brand or even Horry.
I think Griffin will be better than Jefferson when he reaches the age Jefferson is now, which happens to coincide with the time when the Rox should be making title runs.
Raise your hands if you thought Jefferson would be a monster? How excited was this message board to get Griffin? Yet now people are acting like they knew Jefferson would dominate. Also of note the Rockets didn't trade Jefferson, Collins and Armstrong for Griffin, they traded their draft picks, and as part of the deal they drafted whoever New Jersey wanted, which one of them was Jefferson who everybody said would be a nice roleplayer with decent upside. I don't know a person on the planet who thought Jefferson would explode like this and Griffin would struggle. So the question right now is, what would your rather have, Griffin and Posey or Jefferson since the Rockets would have never traded for Posey if they had Jefferson. I would take Griffin and Posey, Griffin has huge upside and is young, and Posey is a very good player. Jefferson is nice, he's playing very well, but I'll take Posey and Griffin.
The one thing I am worried about with Griffin is that he might never become a good shooter. Even in his one year in college, he had a very low fg %, which is unusual. I think Francis shot above .500 in college, being a relatively small guard. Griffin is a tall guy, and yet, he had a low fg % against players who are much shorter than in the NBA on average. That kind of worries me.
If Griffin doesn't show some serious improvement by the end of next season then he's sure not looking like he'll accomplish much here. He's also been kind of lost though in this guards vs team play battle we have going on so I'm inclined to be a little patient until we see him in the low post more often.
Good point regarding Posey. That was a good trade. Has anybody tried to have a look at Philly's win/loss record with Kenny Thomas playing major minutes/not playing? I have no stats, but I followed it and it seemed like they lost a lot more when he was in. Plus, he was redundant on the Rockets' team. I wish him the best, but I have my doubts. Othella Harrington and Shandon Anderson have not exactly been setting the world on fire after they left the Rockets.
I know, I know, easy to say, since I wasn't even posting then, but I was screaming "no, guys, NO! Not for a project!" I'd had the pleasure to see Jefferson play live in college.
Bob Kemp is probably laughing his ass off right now. He gave props to the Rockets for picking Jefferson as a great fit and then totally ripped the trade when it was announced.
I would rather have Murphy right now. Griff still has time to develop, but he has a lot of work to do. Jefferson? I'd rather have a solid pf and Posey.
I didn't know if he would be a monster but I thought he fit the Rockets' needs better than Glen Rice or Griffin at the time. It's still a little early to evaluate - but I think with the current coach Griffin won't mature until after eight years, like Hakeem...
I've said this since day 1 whe Rudy had him shooting 3's to avoid contact. He's our version of a young Donyell Marshall. The thing that helped Marshall is that he was a terrible shooter because of his shot selection. He went to Utah, played with some veterans and learned what is a good shot and what is not. Now he's a better shooter and scorer because of it. I hope it doesn't take for Griffin to play somewhere else to become a better shooter, but right now, he really look like a lost soul on offense.
Okay, I just checked that draft again and I guess I would have prefered to have Richard Jefferson, Jamaal Tinsley (or Tony Parker) and Gilbert Arenas (we could have had all three with our three picks)...but...hindsight is 20/20...
I'm usually an Eddie apologist (is he old enough to drink legally yet?) but there is no denying the passion Jefferson brings to the court every night. I do have two related questions though. 1) Would Jefferson's rookie play have been so good that the Rockets record would have made them 7th, 8th or 9th in the draft order this year and thus no Yao? 2) Jefferson feeds off of Kidds (and K-Marts) passionate play...would his fire diminish as a Rocket (in light of how we have been playing lately)? To me, the picture is bigger than Jefferson vs EG only. Not to mention two other guaranteed contracts that came along with Jefferson.
I for one was one of those people who was excited to get Eddie Griffin but not for 3 picks.. While he was in Arizona, I knew Jefferson was going to be good, but I didn't know he would do it this fast. Also note that the Rockets would have not done the trade if they knew Jefferson was going to drop to the 13th pick in the draft. At the time they could have used those picks on a PF and a PG. So let me ask you this who would you rather have... Griffin, Posey and Moochie's long contract or Jefferson, Troy Murphy, and Tony Parker?
Or to make the question more fair would you rather have Posey/Griffin or Jefferson/KT. If we could do a strait up trade I would take Jefferson and KT over Posey and Griffin right now. But I still would have a hard time doing it. Looking back I thought Griffin was going to be a hauss and we pulled a fast one on New Jersey. I hope Griffin can turn it around but it looks like he lacks the intensity or toughness to become an all-star.
