You guys just got Joey Graham

[SnakefromHell]

^With exception of Billups and J.R., the other guys are not three pt shooters. Yes they can nail those shots, but it's not within their repertoire. Afflalo hits threes yes, but it's only one season where he shows he can hit 40%, Melo is not consistent with his threes, Lawson is not consistent from college three, let alone NBA three.

T-Mac can hit threes, but doesn't mean he's a specialist. Like Melo, he's a scorer, not a shooter.

Great teams have 3 or more three pt specialists. Although Billups and J.R. are more than 3 pt shooters, they are consistent with it, we can consider them specialists. Therefore, we only have two specialists now, and we need at least another one. Because what happens is a lot of nights Billups and J.R. go cold at the same time, and all of a sudden noone can hit the long shot. Melo was 1-for-15 in Game 2 and 3 of Lakers series.

If two shooters go cold, we still have a 3rd one to go to. The more, the better... these guys (White, Graham) don't add to that. Screw FO, they really use money as the basis of signings not the better fit.

---

But it doesn't mean I disagree with you that we need rebounding... I think it's the biggest need and then shooting, instead we used the two remaining spots for two Sonny Weemses who don't bring either to the table.

[J Smitty]

I disagree wholeheartedly. Especially for the fact that we're talking about a guy who is going to be the 11th man at best. Having a sharpshooter is irrelevant if the guy isn't even going to be in the rotation. The important thing is to have the guys who play 30 minutes to be able to hit the three at a good percentage, and that's what Billups, JR, and Melo all do. Can't ask for much more than that.

I also love this - "Great teams have 3 or more three pt specialists." Where do you get this from, what evidence do you have to support it? Did you decide to throw out the number three because you said we "only have two 3pt specialists?" Who are the Lakers' 3pt specialists? Sure, having deadly shooters on the floor is nice, but it is far from necessary. And at the same time, guys who are 3pt specialists, like you say, are that because they tend to suck at everything else. Take Voshon Lenard for instance. He was a guy who was probably our last '3pt specialist' that actually played regularly, and while he would make his share of shots, he was also so much of a liability on defense that it essentially negated his shooting.

The point is, having a guy who can shoot but provides nothing else is far from important. IMO, it's actually rather pointless. I'll take a guy like Afflalo, who may not be a deadly shooter, but is in the 37-40% range and is a good defender and all around player as well....long before I'd take a guy like Wally or Kapono or Korver.



As far as White and Graham go....White is a fairly good shooter(37% in the d-league, 86% from the line), and Graham is a good rebounder for his position. Again, not that it really matters, since neither will ever see the floor for any significant period of time(and if they ever do, we'd be **** already anyway).

[SnakefromHell]

3PT % -

New Orleans series -
Billups - 65.5%
J.R. - 42.4%
Melo - 46.2%

Dallas series -
Billups - 43.8%
J.R. - 38.5%
Melo - 44.4%

L.A. series -
Billups - 33.3%
J.R. - 29.8%
Melo - 25.0%


In other words, a big factor of our success was our ability to knock down the long ball. Did it just so happen in Lakers series, all these three have a slump? Our inability to knock down those shots hurt us... and this is why we still need more shooters.

I'll buy it and say they just so happened to have a slump in Lakers series, and not only one player, but it so happens that all three had slump at the same time. But this is why we can't take chances of the same situation happening again. When these three can't hit shots, in games that matter, we find ourselves scrambling to find another shooter.

If it were not for Kleiza (47.4% in Lakers series), I don't think it'd go 6 games like it did... we'd have been lucky to win 1 game. Kleiza literally saved us with his three pt shooting in Game 2. When we were about to get in a deep hole, he bailed us out and kept us in it until we won it.

Even when he wasn't signed with Olympiakos yet, Kenyon said we still needed a shooter, and now he's gone, we need it more than ever.

Because if three of our players who play lots of minutes and who we count to knock down those long shots can have a slump at the same time for a playoffs series, then we have to address that problem.

[el loco]

For the life of me, I'll never understand why this team is allergic to adding shooters.

Are you forgetting we picked up Jon Barry back in 03???

And a nice signing it was. We once had Dale Ellis

[MattBoner]

Odds of him making the team are slim to none. White will most likely beat him out, and even if he doesn't, Szczerbiak will probably get signed midway through camp.

He's not THAT bad

[JRMelo15]

Odds of him making the team are slim to none. White will most likely beat him out, and even if he doesn't, Szczerbiak will probably get signed midway through camp.

He's not THAT bad

Doesn't matter that much, neither White or Graham (granted they make the team) are going to see a lot of meaningful minutes in the season.

[corona]

balkman > graham/white

melo
billups
smith
nene
kmart
birdman
carter
balkman
affalo/lawson (one or the other will not be approved by karl for regular PT)

it's not like karl's gonna extend beyond 9 men on a regular basis. fortunately that means we aren't gonna see much of joey graham.

[J Smitty]

Afflalo will no doubt get steady playing time. If Dahntay Jones did, there is no way in hell AA doesn't. He works harder than Jones did, and is 10x more talented. He is a prototypical Karl player, so he'll get his minutes. Which probably isn't a bad thing either.

If anything it'll be between Balkman and Lawson for minutes. And since Karl loves to roll out two PGs a lot of times, there might actually be some burn available for little Ty. If Balk ever gets used he'll be in there as a four, not on the wings....so I don't think those two's PT will be dependent on each other anyway.

[Powder Blue]

Afflalo will no doubt get steady playing time. If Dahntay Jones did, there is no way in hell AA doesn't. He works harder than Jones did, and is 10x more talented. He is a prototypical Karl player, so he'll get his minutes. Which probably isn't a bad thing either.

If anything it'll be between Balkman and Lawson for minutes. And since Karl loves to roll out two PGs a lot of times, there might actually be some burn available for little Ty. If Balk ever gets used he'll be in there as a four, not on the wings....so I don't think those two's PT will be dependent on each other anyway.

LK averaged 22 mpg and DJ had 18mpg. As Smitty said AA will probably snag at least 20 mpg and JR may bump up a little from his 27 mgp last year. That'll leave about 15-20 minutes for Balk and Ty

[MHZ]

George Karl will play AA plenty. He was gushing over him like a smitten schoolboy.

"He's been tremendous," Nuggets coach George Karl said. "As soon as summer league was over, he was maybe the first guy back in town. He's been in the gym many, many hours already. The coaching staff loves him. Hopefully, the fans will love him too."

http://www.denverpost.com/sports/ci_13440759