Ah, well... I don't know who this Kelly GUY is... only recently have I been reading HIS articles. My mistake... but you have to admit... the name really throws you off... Kelly isn't really a popular male name.
With all due respect to Kelly, I disagree that Artest is the shot creator we need. Yes, we need a shot creator badly. But Artest isn't the one who will solve the need. We THOUGHT Artest would be good at this last summer. Now we all know how he did when he became the shot creator of the team. It is arguable that he hurt the team more than he helped when he took on the role of shot creator. Ariza is no shot creator either. But as durvasa pointed out, Ariza at least addresses the other weakness of our offense -- fast break.
Man you guys are killin me with this.... Having the most talent on a team does not always equal Championship... In 2003-2004 The lakers had the so-called big 4 (Kobe, Shaq, Malone and Peyton) in the off-season everyone wanted to express mail them the trophy; we all know how that went. I see Ron hurting the team more than helping the team; let the soap opera known as the "Lakers Turn" began.
I really agree with the Kelly Dwyer article - he brought up some solid points. I agree that Artest won't help the Lakers that much and if Ariza is our only move, we'll suffer as well.
Can't say I really agree with the overall point of the article. Houston was better off paying Artest than Ariza, because Ariza can't create the offense? Artest couldn't either! Artest gave us a measly 3 apg. I was hoping for the Ron Artest that could be a bulldog in the paint, but he spent much of his time imitating the McGrady-All-Outside offensive philosophy. No one creates shots for others when they refuse to take the ball closer than 20 feet and are inclined to jack up deep fadeaways over multiple defenders rather than swing the ball. Artest hijacked the offense more than he facilitated it, and it was going to get worse if he had no one to defer to. Agreed, Ariza isn't the answer. But Ron wasn't going to be a good (or aceptable) one either. As it stands, we're trading in Ron (wanted $11M) and Wafer (wanted $3-$5M) for Jermaine Taylor (< $1M), Chase Budinger (< $1M) and Ariza ($5.6M). It's obviously a downgrade in talent. It's probably an upgrade in overall team play. We're keeping our payroll under control and flexible for a trade down the line. Maybe we ultimately sit out this off-season and are a sad sack in '09-10. It happens. I'd rather we be in a position to rebound than to bandaid and handcuff ourselves to pointless 0.520 ball for years. No one wants to lose for any stretch of time. But over-anxious "grab anything that's available" GM work never works (Cuban's first few years at the helm). You have to be patient and seize the true opportunities when they come, and they come when they feel like it.
And more importantly, Ariza doesn't think of himself as a shot creator. Ron-Ron obviously does, despite all evidence to the contrary.
ron is nothing like dennis rodman, they are both defenders and thats really where the comparison ends. for all his hoopla off the court rodman was one of the smartest players on the court who knew what his role was and did his role to the best of his abilities. Ron competes just as hard as dennis did but thinks he is 5 times the player he actually is
Kelly is right unless you factor in that we are wanting the ball to be in Brooks' hands as a playmaker and we are wanting guys to run with him, instead of walking it up and handing it to Artest to create low percentage offense.
Folks Artest will be good in L.A, Ariza will Suck in Houston the first year(maybe) But it Doesn't matter because its a team game and The Rockets will be a good team Go Clutch!!!
Odd because Kelly generally was mega-ticked with Artest's abysmal shot selection. I recall him reaming artest in just about every "behind the box score" feature on the BDL blog that discussed the rocket's offense. And justly so, IMO.
The problem I have with this "Ariza doesn't fit" argument is that you cannot make any conclusions whatsoever regarding the nature of our offense since about 60% of our firepower from last year will not be present this year, and that was regardless of whether or not we re-signed Artest. We were a slow-paced team last year. We might be a faster team than the Lakers this year, ESPECIALLY if they are going to have Artest doing any dribbling of the ball. Adelman will have the job now of reshaping our offense around the remaining. The bright side of that reality is that almost every piece on this team is now someone he has signed off on in his tenure. (I think Battier might be the one exception.) Basically that means that this team should finally after all these years be closest to resembling the kind that Adelman prefers to throw out there, with balanced scoring and easy buckets. In such a system, who is to say that play-making ability will be at a deficit, or that it will be more of a need even than open shot-making? For that matter, I'd be more ready to knock Ariza on his jump shot than his dribble drive.
That team made finals, and didn't win it much due to Malone's injury. Sure talented team doesn't win championship automatically, but having talent rarely hurt.
