let Lavine be putting up those stats as 2nd fiddle next to Embiid which is something he can easily do we’d be viewing him in a much different light
I don't know man, but this board's been b****ing about the Rockets being a poor developmental organization through multiple decades, multiple coaches, at least a couple of GM's, several assistant coaches, and possibly 2 ownerships. JB Bickerstaff was ridiculed here, so maybe he wasn't the problem? I think people may have mocked Nurse while he was with the organization (Vipers), too, after he left saying they didn't want him and wanted somebody proven. Or something like that. Same with Chris Finch. So far Finch is doing a decent job with that TWolves defense and has them playing pretty good basketball. We'll see how long that lasts. Maybe some of the issue with KPJ is the offense is changing and these guys have to think on the fly a bit more than last year with them getting away from having to run sets (or trying not to run them, anyway). Maybe he has to regress a bit as he learns to adapt? One thing I do like about this offense is that it isn't on any one player to be "the guy". You always see all of them contributing to the scoreboard.
I feel like we had good development in the Adleman and early McHale era Scola, Landry, Brooks, Lowry, Dragic, Budinger, Patterson, Morris, Parsons, Asik, Jones, D-Mo, Beverley all made big strides in Houston, sometime around 2014 after we just seemed to start missing on all of our picks/projects save for a player or two. Probably mostly due to the quality and flat-out absence of many picks. It would have been nice to hang on to Melton I think that dude is going to be a rock-solid player.
I’m just looking at the situations Green, Mobley, and Barnes are in, and the difference is staggering, yet people act like it doesn’t matter Mobley is playing well, but a lot of his buckets are assisted, it’s just a fact (78% of his buckets are assisted to be exact)…if Mobley was averaging 7 or 8 points, this thread would not be this active…we have zero playmaking…KPJr is the worst starting PG in the NBA averaging the same amount of turnovers as assists…Mobley has 1 guard averaging 8 assists, and another averaging 7…Cavs move the ball far more than the Rockets Barnes has Nick Nurse and his system, and the Raptors are proven when it comes to development with Siakam, OG, Van Vleet, Norman Powell, etc Rockets have zero playmaking, zero structure…it’s just go out there and chuck KPJr looks clueless, and this is the same KPJr who would’ve been “top 3 in this draft class easy,” so people should be alarmed…nothing is run for Jalen Green to get him more buckets he doesn’t need to create himself…Silas’ “system” looks terrible at this point, I wouldn’t even mind John Wall coming back and playing…main reason I was cool with him just chilling on the bench with courtside seats was to give KPJr more usage and shots to see what he’s got, but we need someone who can run some semblance of an offense, and although Wall certainly isn’t great, with the way KPJr looks, he might as well be CP3 in comparison
it’s the same stuff he did last year and generally the year before too though he’s gotten a tiny bit incrementally better at efficiency… plus as increasingly gotten healthier. He’s a really really really good player. there’s a question on overall impact… but that type of stuff is impossible to tell in most cases. His teams around him have been horrible. it’s still early this year but even his Drtg has gone from mid 110s to 104 so far this year. He did t all of a sudden became amazing at defense. So much of this stuff is team, coaching and system dependent. the things that become hard to gauge are “levels” of greatness. Like Love or Bosh were number one guys with in some cases incredible numbers who became number three guys on championship teams. AD is a number two. Kyrie is a 2/3. Some of that is obvious now in retrospect. But beforehand it’s harder to tell. Is Jayson Tatum a #1 on a championship team? I honestly don’t know. We’ve been conditioned to think he is… but what makes him so more than LaVine right now? none of that really matters right now. Mobley has generally played great. His defense is what one should be most excited about. But if at worst he is a big that is super efficient offensively off others and hits the occasional three that’s still great. Barnes has just been flat out great. I think you can put him on any team and he’s do great. He’s Tate bit taller, a better dribbler and passer and apparently shooter. Green has to turn into LaVine to even be talking about 1st or 2/3 on a championship team … and be better at defense. But LaVine is a great comp… he also started EXTREMELY young.
Great stuff I've never seen Mobley as ever developing into a true #1 on a championship squad My comp has always been a KG/AD hybrid Both guys spent years putting up MVP stats for 1st-Rd fodder as 'the man' Both were traded to teams with a go-to scorer at wing and won rings in their first seasons next to such a player This is the same path I see for Mobley If Green becomes the type of alpha that can lead a team to a ship, then we made the right pick I don't see it I hope I'm wrong as a Rockets fan
I agree with you on the players around these guys being important. Toronto is probably an awesome situation for Barnes, but his biggest asset is he's got an NBA body to go along with that talent. From what I've seen of Mobley, he doesn't have to be the focus of the offense, and he's already shown to be solid on defense, so he gets a lot of stuff within the flow. Jalen obviously doesn't have the benefit of much of anything, but to say there's no structure, meh. Everything I've heard about the 5-out is that it takes a while for people unfamiliar with basketball to learn how to run it. It's going to probably be especially difficult for Jalen since he's a twig out there and he's been "THE guy" his entire career and now he's in an offense where he's not the guy and also has to learn the NBA while he's learning the new offense. I think as long as his shot comes around and is more consistent, he'll be ok. He doesn't look to be a Stromile Swift type. BTW, you can see how guys like Gordon and Nwaba who have been in the league attack defenses, while KPJ and Green either attack and are confused afterwards or are hesitant to attack. Also, wrt "the system", Silas already said he's letting the guys screw up and isn't putting metrics like "you must do this" or "you have to be here at this point in the season" on them. He'd rather just show them what to do, have them make mistakes and have those mistakes become learning moments. If, as fans, we can't deal with that, welp... tough for us. lol. It doesn't bother me, tbh... I think I said it in another thread that I expected at least another 2 years of pain, unless we had some miracle. I do admit I was hoping KPJ would be better than he has, but hopefully he's still adapting/learning.
aside from plenty of minutes and chuck opportunities, I really don’t see anything that is conducive to development here a #2 overall pick isn’t likely to be in a good situation, but Mobley and Barnes just have it way better than Green does atm Green trying to create so much for himself and taking stepback threes ain’t it right now
In the game against Boston, Jalen Green had 5 spot up attempts from 3, and hit 4 of them…also had 2 assisted dunks in transition…more assisted looks and getting to the line on a somewhat consistent basis is what he needs for now IMO, but when the team is just freestyling on offense and KPJr is your starting PG…
We going to ignore the fact that he scored 2 points last night or does small sample size only apply to Jalen?
Yeah some people don't understand that a rookie and especially a rookie guard, no matter how talented, is going to struggle more times than not when they have to take the ball and make something happen 85% of the time. For as naturally gifted on offense as he is just saying go make something happen isn't conducive for success in rookies
Ha. No, my friend, i certainly don't feel stupid. Clearly, Simmons is an inflated asset. But you Keep hiding behind worthless stats I stand by my position that Simmons is an inflated asset. You seem to think that building around Simmons, an offensively limited, unmotivated individual, is the way to a championship. You think Simmons is a good value; but the league's GMs disagrees. Yet... You seem to think you're smart. . Ofcourse I dont value ur "rational." Additionally... you ignored my other point that Green is on the same trajectory as other great SG/SF including Kobe, Harden, and McGrady.
I agree that LaVine is straight balling now. Last year, too. But prior to that he just didn’t give crap on D. Defense as a prerequisite for winning is a team concept, I agree. But it’s hard to take a guy a seriously if he’s just not giving any effort on D. The other strange thing is he’s a really late bloomer, and that hurts perception. You’re asking whether Tatum is a #1, and wе still don’t know, I agree. But at least Boston who drafted him thinks and is betting that he is. Lavine was supposed to be #3 in Minny behind KAT and Wiggins, but they gave up on him completely and had to package him with Larry Markanen in a trade. Most #1s you know from pretty early on… In fact all of them either were #1 with the team that drafted them or they left on their own. I can’t think of a team giving-up on a player and he goes on to become a #1 on a championship team somewhere else… Maybe Chauncey, if you want to count him… So these things make me skeptical about LaVine being "that guy", but it’s true that he’s straight out balling now. Jalen Green comes with a lot more hype and expectations than LaVine had in his first 3 years in the league, so that confuses me a bit.
Lol, u do know Lavine was traded for Jimmy Butler right? Who they actually should’ve traded is Wiggins, but he was their #1 overall pick and a hyped prospect so that wasn’t gonna happen. Even tho Wiggins averaged 21 in his second season and 24 in his 3rd, guess who the considerably better player is between Wiggins and Lavine? What is this guy talking about?
#2 overall picks taken since 2000 Stromile Swift, Tyson Chandler, Jay Williams, Darko, Emeka Okafor, Marvin Williams, KD, Beasley, Thabeet, Evan Turner, Derrick Williams, MKG, Oladipo, Jabari Parker, D-Lo, Ingram, Lonzo, Bagley, Ja Morant, James Wiseman How many of those players are better or will be better than Zach Lavine? it’s been posted on here before…from 2001-2018, only 41% of players taken in the top 5 have even made 1 All-Star team and/or All-NBA
Theres tons of examples of number ones that 5 games into their career you definitely don’t know…. Much less after their rookie season. Steph, Kawhi, Harden (I’d consider him a number one even though if he eventually wins it will be as a number 2), Giannis, Kobe, DWade, Dirk just off the top of my head. I’d agree that most number ones aren’t voluntarily moved by the team … but we are no longer sure number ones will be number ones 5 games or 10 games or one year or even two (or in some cases 3) years into a career. As this relates to LaVine it seems more likely he’s a number 2 than number one but again…. One never knows and at this point he’s as much a number one as Tatum RIGHT NOW. so much of it is situation and circumstance. Tatum got drafted into an already good Celtics team (because of their trade with the Nets they got those picks), with a great coach (imo) and culture. LaVine got drafted by the Timberwolves. Steph joined a Warriors organization that was meh, but had put together a playoff run somewhat recently and was in the middle of culture changing of which he was a part of. THis is why my thread on the coaching experiment is so so important, to me. It’s a ok and even encouraged to lose as a fan cause I want more top talent. But I need to see culture, system, development, etc for everyone’s long term benefit.
Green could be a great one but he's not on that trajectory. Yet. Needs more patience. And a lot more strength. And consistency.
He is on that trajectory. he’s a rookie in his second week. he was one of the youngest to ever score 30. stop being obtuse. he’s not a finished product but he’ll be great one day, I’m certain.
