I've seen people talk about how he should start over Wes, but the main reason he isn't is because Ryan Bowen would have to come in. Now who wants that? I believe for Bogans to start for us, it would have to be next season and it depends on who we chase off-season. I think if we want him to start and give Head the back-up spot in the process, we would have to sign a SF this offseason. Matt Harpring sounds like a legit choice and I would have no problems with that. Also, it all depends if we re-sign Wesley this off-season... I'm not sure if I want to sign him again, if we do... hopefully he doesn't start. And he doesn't do a good job coming off the bench either. It would also limit Head's production. Our line-up next season could look like this: PG: Alston/ Spanoulis with half of the MLE/ 1st Draft pick SG: Bogans/ Head SF: McGrady/ Harpring with the other half/ Ryan Bowen PF: Howard/ Swift/ Hayes C: Ming/ Mutombo/ 2nd Draft pick Question: Will Harpring take half of the MLE? Also, after writing this post, I'm not sure if this is how small the changes will be... I wonder if we're going to dump players like Alston/Head/Howard/Swift and go in a different direction. I question if we will re-sign Wesley after this season... I mean, we didn't trade him and that could just mean that we planned on going for a final run for the playoffs. Or could it mean that we didn't want to burn bridges with him and plan on signing him again cheap? What do you think we will do with Wesley?
Why does everybody want Matt Harpring? I liked him for the Rockets a few years ago when we had Francis and Mobley but our team is so slow footed now! Why take on another slow footed injury prone guy? I know he can shoot, but we need more quickness and athleticism.
Well alright, not necessarily Matt Harpring, but any productive Small Forward in the off-season is what I mean if we want Bogans to start. I believe we have a good mix at the SG spot... Bogans has the power and the inside game, while Head can come off the bench and be a sharp shooter. I truly believe Head is going to develop into a deadly 3 point threat.
i think it can work out right. wesley can be his backup. when he subs for mcgrady, have wesley take his spot. i think he'll be better than wesley come guarding ginobili on sunday.
I don't mean to be harsh, but there is absolutely no way Bogans will be our startin SG next year. His career stats are stinky and he will never be a starting SG in the NBA. You realize we got him for Lonny Baxter, right? From the mighty Bobcats. He's OK as a hard nosed energy guy off the bench but that's it. If all we have next year at SG is Bogans & Head I'll join the JVG & CD must go bandwagon. I want to keep Bogans next year as a backup SG/SF. Wesley won't be back next season. Put that in the bank. He'll be 36 in November. Stick a fork in him when we lose our last game.
Wesley is starting, because he deserves to start with our current roster. I hope he is on the team in some capacity next year. I don't think he has missed a game, and has played through injuries, hussles, is a great shooter, and an underrated defender.
Problem is Wesley has never been a bench player and has never done that great off of it. And it could likely take Luther Head's minutes, and we need youth/speed/shooting from this guy. Also, let me compare our team to the Spurs (by no means are we on their level) Starting 5: Alston and Tony Parker (play-making, scoring if need be) McGrady and Ginobili (scoring, slashing) Bogans and Bowen (defense, intangibles, occasional 3's) Yao and Duncan (Inside scoring) Juwan and Nazr (intangibles) Bench: Finley and Head/Wesley (outside scoring) Stromile/Brunson and Horry (change of pace) To be fair, Bowen was a scrub for the early part of his career. Both of their career stats are also comparable as well as their career highs.
I love wesley and bogans, but I have to agree for the most part with this post. Bogans shouldnt be our starter and assuming we sign a legit starting shooting guard and Bogans is the backup... Wesley most likely wont be back. Bogans is great as a backup and in fact so is Wesley, but the money require to get a starting 2, bring over spaniolus (if we do) or sign a backup point would leave little if any money left for Wesley or a legit backup 3. As to who the starting 2 would be, I've no clue whos out there this summer, anyone got a list of available shooting guards... FA to be etc?
I am just not sold on the SG free-agent crop this off-season. Only player with nice numbers is Bonzi, but that is subtracting from addition (if that makes sense). The guy is a cancer and I believe Tracy doesn't like this guy (they were about to fight once). The rest of the SG's don't stand out as players that can contribute to a championship team. Others, we simply can't afford.
Question: Do we have Keith Bogans' bird rights to extend him? I hope we don't have to dip in the MLE to re-sign the guy.
It's quite the stretch to compare Bogans, or anyone for that matter, to Bruce Bowen. Bruce Bowen's career is very unique. But we can dream of Bogans becoming that caliber of player for us. We used the LLE on DA last season. Does that mean we can't use it again this year on Bogans? Maybe he would take the veteran minimum. He isn't going to be a hot commodity and maybe he likes it here and wants to stay. Our starting SG for next year is wide open. You have to look at trades in addition to UFAs and RFAs. At this very early point, I'm thinking one of our two new starters next year (at PF & SG) will come by trade, the other by MLE. I dread the long summer of anticipation with our roster and Tracy's back.
Yeah, only 1 LLE per 2 years, sadly. Not sure how we can get two new starters by trade, I'm not confident in our trade assets. Will be extremely hard to get rid of Howard, my guess is we trade him for a player the same age as him but a shorter contract. Don't want to get rid of Head, we need to stick with players for once. We will probably keep Swift and see how he does in the off-season, my guess is earliest of him being traded is next season's trade dead-line if he still isn't working for us. So if you look at all that, don't know what we can get via trades.
If Bogans continues to be aggressive with the dribble drives, I believe he will be a great complement to TMac. He can take the harder defensive matchup and we need the opposite of what Bowen gives San Antonio. We've got TMac to shoot bombs. We need Bogans to force the action to the basket like he did against the Pacers. It would be great if Bogans would spend all summer shooting a couple thousand jumpers a day and come back with the good jump shot as well as the dribble drive. Then we need to pick one more taller, athletic swingman to pick up minutes behind TMac, a guy that can put some points on the board. Maybe somebody like Jones from Charlotte. I have always liked Harpring but I believe with his latest injuries, he's just too slow to be very effective anymore. The league is getting quicker so we've got to get quicker. Wouldn't it be great if we could pick up Jones or an eqivalent player in a S&T using part or all of the $4.2 million trade exception we got from New Orleans. Or maybe use the $4.2 TE on a player like Melvin Ely. I think we are going to have a lot of options this offseason. We've got some developing talent in Head. I really think Spanoulis could be our starting PG in a year after he comes over and gets used to the league. We've got to get more defense out of our PG spot. Don't know if he's got the ability to play D, most Euros don't. But our PG defense has to improve. We have to be able to contain dribble penetration better than we have with Rafer and whoever else backing him up.
Bogans is fine as a backup SG. But if Bogans is the best we can do for starting SG, how are you going to consider us a championship team!? Bogans is a downgraded version of Bowen, if Bogans can stay with the team and maybe become more consistent, then I like his defense as a starter because he'll be like what Bowen does in SA. BTW I've watched a couple of games with Bogans, he's pretty agressive, and he's pretty "hustle-player" I guess, but, he's not exactly Mr. Lock Up D. At least not yet...
Rockets have Bogans bird rights as well as Fitch's. Melvin Ely, Richie Frahm, Trevor Ariza, Qyntel Woods and Fred Jones seem like good pick ups. DJ Mbenga is interesting. No real starters though. Wesley will be back unless Rocks make a trade.
The only thing holding Bogans from the starting lineup is his perimeter shooting. He's not lockdown but he is a good defender. And he's a gritty rebounder, aggressive driver, and runs the floor well. If only he can start canning those open 3's, he'd be perfect. His form looks pretty good. He doesn't have a hitch, it comes out pretty smoothly, and it seems like he gets good rotation on the ball. It's just not falling for some reason.
There's really no telling where our season is going. We're obviously going to make a push for the playoffs but there's no telling what the outcome will be. That being said along with the draft lottery, there's really no way to predict where we will end up picking in the draft. Furthermore, March Madness is only beginning so plenty of the names we've been seeing all year long are going to rise and fall. Basically, you have no idea what hand you're getting dealt with the draft. It's one thing to prefer to draft at a certain position or two, but you can't PLAN on taking a player at any given position especially given the fact that we have needs/holes at practically every position.
Because it's a trend here. Someone mentions and we're riding it for a stretch. It's funny how now that Wes had some bad games threads like this appear and when he will be knocking down shots again.. Well I just pictured myself GARM couple of months ago with a lot of Yao threads, but of the other kind than nowadays.
