Paul Pierce slipped to 8 also RV6. So did caron butler in the yao draft. Amare despite being beast in all the workout and ripped gooden a new a-whole, the grizz scouts recommended him gooden over him. If the only assumption u can come up with is he might be like stro swift even though they play different positions, the that's piss poor scouting. U keep bringing up the league wasn't trending toward 3 star method, by why does the league have to trend that way? The purpose is to field thebest team regardless of what anyone else is doing. Nowhere was it eveident that battier or rafer was capable of being a legit 3 scorer. The only reason why rafer took that role despite being a terrible scorer is because no one else wanted it.
Well first of all I do both, as I am guessing Hollinger does. Why would I be a Battier fan if I only looked at the numbers? And I am guessing that the difference between going to a team and being the man vs playing third fiddle would be huge. Gay would of had no place in the offense, he would of been on the bench just like Snyder and Spanouliss. In Mepmphis he got loads of time and was able to learn while on the court. Heres a nice quote from an article written on the issue: "They made the playoffs three straight years with Battier and are now on their way to three straight 60-loss seasons without him. Is that all Shane's fault? Probably not. But if anyone's judgment should be questioned here, it's probably not Morey's." I didnt state any stats, I just referenced Hollinger's piece trying to emphasize how terribly overated Gay is. Do I have a statistical analysis ready for the defensive impact for each team in the past few years....no I don't. The reason I don't is people on the internet ignore anything that doesnt support thier opinions. Head did get some time, that is true, but he also never developed, never got better, and is a below average NBA player. PER only tells some of the story, and its clear that it struggles to read defensive impact. Brewer instead of Battier would at best of been a wash and we would not of been able to dump swift in the process. Again Battier was the right choice, because Gay is very overated.
Pierce went 10th,which was so low that I was amazed. I felt he was the best overall player in the draft.Caron went 10 too,if I recall correctly. Some people felt his knees were a problem,others were concerned that he didn't have range on his shot. He has turned to be a solid player. I didn't know how good he would turn as a pro,but I felt he should have gone higher in the draft.
Yea Pierce fell tremendously in his draft. It was almost highway robbery (in fact indeeeed highway robbery) that Pierce fell to no.10 to Boston.. other drafts he similar falls for swingmen like Pierce as well...in 2004 it was a shock that Andre Iguodala fell to number 9 to Philadelphia when the guys picked ahead of him were the likes of Rafael Arujao Josh Childress etc etc... but the knees issue I reckon is extremely overrated....there seems to be always someone or maybe more than a few players who fall big time in drafts to even the 2nd round because they have "supposed" knee weaknesses.....Paul Millsap..Caron Butler....the most recent and glazing example being Dejuan Blair... Whatever it may be, Rudy Gay was one of the top prospects with superstar potental that fell into our laps at no.8...Toronto was even considering him greatly for their no.1 pick but they had to go with the best big man route in the end...How Morey could love guys like Budinger and not rate guys like Rudy Gay I wouldn't know.........
The part in bold tells me all I needed to know about your basketball knowledge. So luther head can avg 20mins a game and 10pts and yet you're going to tell me Gay or Brewer wouldn't play and had no place? So what about filling the lane when rafer is pushing the ball off a rebound? What about slashing to the basket when the defense collapse on yao and tracy and is basically leaving everyone else butt naked? What about a guy just making athletic plays because the entire focus is on tracy and Yao. If u don't think he could score 15 ppg and shoot higher than what he does now playing with tracy and yao, then you are ignorant, not stupid. That's why is respect scola because he gets the easiest 13 pts probably in his life just by playing off tracy and yao. When you have a guy like tracy that gets chuck hayes 4 layups a game and a guy like yao that draw attention in the post, the game is easy and when a team like utah isn't worried about a guy like shane doing anything off the dribble or bringing in harpring that is posting a guy like luther head, again, you're ignorant, not stupid.
I used stro because he was part of the deal and an ex-rocket, therefore fans would be familiar with him and his issues. The only comparison i was making between stro and gay was that they had the skills to be special, but not the mentality. The league doesn't have to trend that way, i brough it up because that's what fans complain about now that it is the trend. The reasons it wasn't the trend back then (and the reason why teams werent going in that direction to field the best team possible) are 3: 1)The league had not been as talented in the past as it is now. The amount of superstars hasn't grown too much, but the "upper middle class" of players has grown dramatically. Basically the semi-stars to barely a star class. In the late 90s you were considered a pretty talented team if you just had 2 stars and role players. Since then it's grown a lot. 2) More and more big names are demanding trades and/or taking lower salaries more than ever in the quest for a ring. This means it's easier and more likely to to have a lot of talent on one team. 3) The few super-talented teams that were able to be assembled prior to that had not been very succesful when it comes to winning it all. A prime example is that Phoenix team that was stacked, i think it was around 2000. They did pretty much what the current suns do, they won a lot during the season, but that's it. So for those reason most teams didn't pursue that type of team, which is why it had not been a trend. When i said shane and rafer were capable third scorers, i meant within the context of my post, in which i described the third scorer at the time as a 12-15 ppg guy. I don't see why that range would be difficult to reach for those two guys.
Im going to request you lay off the personal attacks. I had a long post laying into you, but I deleted it because I know its not your normal habit. Again, I think your opinions on this issue are not very good, but I refuse to name call and I would expect the same from you. The Rockets brought Bonzi in to be the third scorer, they recognized then that they needed one. Roy was the right choice to pursue as a scorer, Gay was not, which is why they chose to address another need over Gay. Even in Hindsight, you can tell they did thier homework, because Roy will end up being an all star in this era, while Gay will not. I believe you yourself said that if you are a top ten pick and you don't become a multiple all star then you are a flop. Well there you have it, Roy is, Gay isn't.
Except that there's basically zero indication the Rockets wouldn't have traded away Roy for Battier, just like they traded away Gay.
Other than the fact that they targeted Roy as part of a trade or their pick. I've never read anything about them pursuing Battier on draft day, from what i remember, West had been turning down offers for Shane and wasn't open to trading him during that time and he was the one who went to the Rockets offering Shane. So it's not like houston went into the draft with Shane at #1 on their list looking to find a deal for him like you have tried to imply. You have to take into consideration the fact that houston at the time was looking for immediate help. all the guys they brought in had established games. With Shane you knew what he'd bring. With Bonzi the same. They talked about Roy being a guy who'd contribute immediately, which is a big reason why they wanted him. Gay, although full of potential, wasn't someone many expected to "get it" right away, regardless of whether he'd eventually fulfill that potential. that being said, Shane would have never been on the table to begin with because West had Morrison and Gay as 1 and 2 on his list. Perhaps he had Roy at 3, but since Roy and Gay went very close in the draft, I doubt West would have used his time at the moment dealing with houston instead of whoever would have drafted Gay. and who knows if West was even open to trading shane for Roy, we don't know how much he thought of Roy at the time.
larsv8, if u draft the bpa, u don't need bonzi. If u want to be safe about the newly drafted rookie,then cool. The 92 rockets needed immediate help to and they drafted a center and turned him into a sf and in 93 they drafted cassell.They had a top 5 player in the league and still drafted the talent. RV6, what gave u any clue shane could avg 12-15 ppg consistently when he couldn't do it in memphis? Alston is a career 34% shooter. I brought tthis before that prior to getting artest, the rocketsdidnt have 1 guy in their rotation with a scoring avg of 15ppg other than yao and tracy. In that same rotation, they didn't have a guy to avg 15ppg for a season ever. If u go to the 06 team, the only guy to do that aside from tracy and yao was howard.
I think you need to keep in mind i'm looking at this from the front office's perspective around 06 when these guys were brought in, you're still looking back at it from this moment, knowing what did or didnt happen, which seems to be the trend... Shane actually averaged 14 his first year. I'll assume you mean he couldn't do it from year to year. Based on the numbers, you'd be right, he didn't. But could he? Even you have to admit he'd be capable of that range. And I know Alston shot horribly, i was big on Alston's need to be limited his last few years here, but would it be crazy for him to average that range too? Not at all, didn't he average around 12 a game? So we're talking an extra bucket or two here, not doubling their averages. Now of course we know Rafer fell in love with too many jumpers and not enough drives and Shane with not enough shooting and occasional cuts. I'd say the coaching deserved some blame as well for not coming down on both or for reinforcing it, whichever it was.
Another ****ty performance by Battier tonight. He can't even shoot a 3 anymore. He has zero trade value right now. Great.
