Shams: Patrick Williams to sign 5/90 deal

[TheGOATRises007]

Pat is such a mechanical player. It really doesn’t seem like he eats, drinks and sleeps basketball. Pretty sure he leaves the game at work.

Personally I was kind of bummed when I read how Pat was shocked at the intensity of Demar’s 5am workouts… that Demar pulled him into- woke and picked him up. A guy at the end of his prime is dragging a 21yo expiring RFA #4 pick (looking for 9-figure extension) for a summer workout? Wtf?

My theory is Pat had a pandemic “i can do this” moment, where something clicked, the day to day wasn’t there so he worked on a lot of things in his game. Blessed with a 6’8 NBA ready body and athleticism, he rocketed up that board. I got duped into thinking we got the right guy. But we got E.Curry 2.0. He is an extremely unremarkable NBA player.

When everything’s just right and he’s putting up 3Ps and defending, he is a very solid roleplayer. I don't know - maybe he'll realize at some point in his contract that 9.9 PPG ain't it. BTW his PER is a career low right now, and he's roughly averaging the same minutes (and stat line) since his rookie season exactly 4 years ago. Literally zero improvement in the numbers.

Pat is definitely one of those guys in the league who plays basketball because of money purposes.

He doesn't love the sport. Zero improvement since your rookie season is damning.

[GoBlue72391]

I'm still very curious to see where Pat ends up as a player when he is 26/27 years old.

We're practically begging for him to just be a competent player on offense. If we could score consistently like Cam Johnson at say 14-16 PPG at very good to elite efficiency then he's certainly worth his contract. The most frustrating thing is the missed bunnies at the rim and mind boggling turnovers on simple basketball moves.

It's also interesting to note that Pat is 23 years old. Someone like Cam Johnson was 23 in his rookie season.

By the time Pat is 26/27 I think he'll be a mostly forgotten nondescript 9th or 10th man as the illusion of potential and his draft pedigree will have faded by then. Hopefully I'm wrong.

[GoBlue72391]

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He also has a 3-and-a-half-minute missed dunk compilation from the 2022-23 season, showing that this missed dunk problem is not a new thing in case anyone is misremembering:

Watch on YouTube

[MrSparkle]

Read on Twitter

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He also has a 3-and-a-half-minute missed dunk compilation from the 2022-23 season, showing that this missed dunk problem is not a new thing in case anyone is misremembering:

Watch on YouTube

The last one is just short of a $90M Powerball.

[DuckIII]

He actually didn’t have a bad game. But I’m giving him “normal Bulls fan” treatment today and downgrading it to bad just on the embarrassment factor alone.

I don't know:
3/10, 8 points
5 boards (2 offensive)
2 assists
0 steals / blocks
3 turnovers

I don't know that it takes a pessimistic view to call that a bad game.

I didn’t call anyone a pessimist. It’s just that it ignores half of the game. Unlike nearly every single player on our roster, Pat can have a “not bad” game while having an iffy offensive game.

[dougthonus]

He actually didn’t have a bad game. But I’m giving him “normal Bulls fan” treatment today and downgrading it to bad just on the embarrassment factor alone.

I don't know:
3/10, 8 points
5 boards (2 offensive)
2 assists
0 steals / blocks
3 turnovers

I don't know that it takes a pessimistic view to call that a bad game.

I didn’t call anyone a pessimist.

I didn't want to use the phrase "normal Bulls fans" because I felt it was unnecessarily categorial and potentially insulting to some, so picked a different phrase. Did you mean something different, because it seemed like you were driving at "unfairly negative" from how I interpreted your words.

It’s just that it ignores half of the game. Unlike nearly every single player on our roster, Pat can have a “not bad” game while having an iffy offensive game.

Completely fair that this may be true, and Pat is certainly one of the more likely players for it to be true about.

However, I would say it was worse than an "iffy" offensive game. He scored 8 on 13 possessions.

Defensively, it did not appear to be anything special to me, but to be fair I was multi-tasking and so maybe I've got it wrong, I really have to watch pretty closely to properly evaluate defense otherwise it's just too easy to pick up on blown plays or turnovers but hard to notice the nuances. He generated no turnovers that I remember, and had a few bad blown plays (though Cade is a tough cover so I am not going to beat him up too much over it).

[dumbell78]

I'm not even mad at the guy but it does look like FO drafted Marvin Williams.

[PaKii94]

His explosiveness is overrated. Lauri missed dunks cause he bulked up too much. I don't think that's the case for PWill but it'd probably help his explosiveness to trim down. BUT idk if he has the agility/ball handling ability to play the 3

[DASMACKDOWN]

His explosiveness is overrated. Lauri missed dunks cause he bulked up too much. I don't think that's the case for PWill but it'd probably help his explosiveness to trim down. BUT idk if he has the agility/ball handling ability to play the 3

There is some truth to that. I don't think he is the athlete that jumps out the gym. He certainly isn't a fast twitch guy. But this season in particular he is more lead footed.

I do catch the Lauri comparisons in terms of lift, bulk and strength. They wanted Lauri to be a center essentially. Lauri his rookie season was doing agile dunks through the legs in pregame. Same for Pat. But over time, Lauri got a little too heavy and it slowed him down and lost explosiveness. Which he documented in a long interview with KC Johnson.

Pat has always been more power. He is strong as an Ox. But that's in his lower body which is why I think its affecting his agility. I think came into this season weighing 235 pounds. He came into the league at 215.

[GoBlue72391]

Last night I was watching highlights from Pat's rookie year and he was noticeably thinner and looked more in shape.

In the highlights he had a driving dunk in traffic where he got well above the rim. I haven't seen that kind of athleticism from him in years and forgot he was ever that explosive. He's considerably less athletic and explosive now. I'm not saying he was an elite athlete back then, but it was certainly better than it is now.

Something happened after the end of his rookie year that sapped his athleticism. The loss of athleticism isn't new to this season, it hasn't been seen since his rookie year, so this is an issue that dates back at least 3 years.

The Bulls org needs to compare his current vert to the vert he had at the time he was drafted. I don't think it's been made public, but they definitely have that data internally.

[FriedRise]

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[panthermark]

I'm assuming he added weight to play PF. In doing so, he lost some explosiveness. Problem is that he does not have the skillset to play a lot of SF on offense outside of standing in the corner shooting threes, or cutting to the rim. He does not have the quickness or handles to blow by other SF's, nor would he have the size to over power them. Of course the bigger problem would be the lack of aggression at any position.

[GoBlue72391]

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I must have PTSD, because anytime I read stuff like this I automatically assume it's gonna turn into a 6-8 week injury.

What's the update on Lonzo? What was his initial recovery time for his most recent injury?

[kodo]

That's crazy he's still having problems with that foot, he went out January 25th. It's coming close to a year now.
Unless it's an unrelated new foot problem, not sure which would be worse.
30 mpg for Buzelis. Let's start him off vs Giannis.

[jacoby1us]

Has PW played a full season yet? At least 70-75 games, I wouldn't dare expect players today to play a full season but I am not sure if he has met that threshold due to injury almost every season.

[DASMACKDOWN]

Has PW played a full season yet? At least 70-75 games, I wouldn't dare expect players today to play a full season but I am not sure if he has met that threshold due to injury almost every season.

Yes played all 82 2 years ago.

Hes only had 2 injuries but both have been serious. This foot issue obviously is because he has no lift.

[FriedRise]

30 mpg for Buzelis. Let's start him off vs Giannis.

You know Billy will just start Ayo and distribute the rest of Pat's minutes to Dalen Terry and Julian Phillips. Though maybe Matas will get more than 2 minutes tonight.

[sco]

That's crazy he's still having problems with that foot, he went out January 25th. It's coming close to a year now.
Unless it's an unrelated new foot problem, not sure which would be worse.
30 mpg for Buzelis. Let's start him off vs Giannis.

I read somewhere that it's the other foot. Can anyone confirm?

[sco]

I'd like to see Smith start in Williams' absense. Could be interesting.

[CROBulls]

Pat is definitely one of those guys in the league who plays basketball because of money purposes.

He doesn't love the sport. Zero improvement since your rookie season is damning.

Its amazing how people can notice things like this. People usually dont trust anymore eye test, but today due inflated stats and high scoring games with zero defense, eye test is everything in my opinion. And yes, Pat is definitely one of guys who plays basketball for money as a job. But if team wants to be succesful you basically need to have zero of those kind of players on roster. Yes, money is good, but you still play it because you love competing.

And Pat never once on the floor, in his five year NBA career, played basically one quarter of insipired motivated basketball. Never once expressed frustration or anger for missed assignement, for bad shot, for stupid foul, missed dunk. Does his 8-17 job and goes home and rest his head. Good players hate to lose and hate themselves. If they had bad games they would after game and went practice. You dont hear or see story like that for Pat.

And this guys are getting now 20M guaranteed. I love that people are basically robbing Jerry Reinsdorf during daylight walk, but still we have idiots in front office. And Pat isnt in fault here for some idiot give him free money.