The Brandon Knight is a tough son of a ***** thread

[DetroitPistons]

I like BK7 a lot, but maybe he is better suited as a Jason Terry/Jamal Crawford type that is a scorer off the bench. I love the fact that he plays D and cares about the team.

Knight has proven time and time again that he is much worse playing off the ball. He is a PG.

If the team is gonna go anywhere they need a creator to pass and make plays, Knight doesn't do either that well.

That's because he's been shoved over to SG where he becomes a ghost. When he's on the ball he is a better playmaker although he obviously still has to improve. We don't need a ball dominant PG for this team. If Knight can be a 6ast PG with great defense and efficient 3pt shooting then I will be very happy.

[Jodi]

I like BK7 a lot, but maybe he is better suited as a Jason Terry/Jamal Crawford type that is a scorer off the bench. I love the fact that he plays D and cares about the team.

Who do you think our starting 1 and 2 should be?..

[JD43320]

Nobody on the current roster.

[Goldtop]

I agree. Knight is just too inconsistent to bank on him being a longterm starter. The #1 thing you need to see from a player to consider them part of your main core longterm is consistency. He's great one night, then non-existant the next. Better to be avg every night than up/down like that. At least you'd know what you're getting from him every night.

He still has time to develop consistency and prove him can be a starter, but as of now, if we are to keep him longterm, he's looking more like a 6th man type guy than a starter. That's not a bad thing though because he are going to need a 6th man eventually too. As long as we can find some kind of role for him it won't be a wasted pick. And I think he definitely has a role as a defensive stopper type energy guy off the bench, who can also stretch the defense with the 3-ball and score a little off the dribble. Essentially play the Mike James role.

I have little doubt we can find a better SG in FA or the draft this summer. The PG situation is more iffy. I don't think you can be successful with a PG who's as inconsistent as Knight. I don't know if Calderon is the answer either. Yes he's consistent, but hard to ignore the record we have with him starting. So that just may end up being the one position we have to wait to find our longterm answer.

We didn't find our longterm PF in the Goin to Work team until the last piece. You can't always get every piece right away.

[Stones48223]

I like BK7 a lot, but maybe he is better suited as a Jason Terry/Jamal Crawford type that is a scorer off the bench. I love the fact that he plays D and cares about the team.

Who do you think our starting 1 and 2 should be?..

Would like to pry Rondo outta Boston for pick and Knight or draft Burke at the 1. Tyreke Evans or Mayo at the 2.

[Blkbrd671]

lol, this discussion is pointless, i think its safe to say that POS Jose is not going to be our starting pg, which is a relief. There's no FA PG that i want starting on this team, i highly doubt a PG worth trading for is being made available. Looks like we are running with knight or drafting burke. Criticize all you want, Knight can run the point, just needs to improve. Being that's he's barely 20, i say he's doing a pretty good job.

[Brapman]

The guard situation is totally up in the air.

1. Knight is 21 years old - obviously an extremely talented player. He's coming off a truncated rookie season becasuse of the strike - one in which the team had absolultely NO offensive players. He improved quite a bit in the offseason - but he's suffered in season two from a ton of injuries to his legs/feet. We really don't know yet whether he can/will make a Billups like leap as a guy who can play PG. If he plays SG, we have to have guys at PG who are bigger PG types than Calderon/Bynum because there will be a lot of matchups against that guard pairing that will maim us.

2. Stuckey's best position, by far is PG. No question about that. When he's playing well, he's a monster at that position, and there are very few PG's in the league who can match up with him because he's too strong for them. He cannot play SG on a team that needs him to be a spot up distance shooter.

3. English: has shown me absolutely nothing.

4. Calderon is a great pure PG on offense and a great shooter - possibly the perfect offensive player on a team with Monroe and Drummond, but a defensive sieve. If we resign him, we have to load up with other defensive monsters to aid Drummond and to protect against Calderon's weakness.

5. Bynum is one of the worst defensive guards I've ever seen, but one of league's most dynamic offensive 1 on 1 guards, and a guy who blends with Drummond because he is great at exactly one pass (the lob) even though he's a pretty bad pure PG otherwise. He's a great penetrating guard, but a guy who I think brings the rest of the offense to a standstill.

6. Middleton is a guy who I think can play minutes at SG. He's got fine handle, great offensive skills, plays good D, and all around looks like a player the Pistons should want to grow with.

IMO, it's the guard situation that needs to be sorted out. If I were Joe, my offseason priority is to make decisions about who are guards will be over the next few seasons. Here's the plan I'm settling in on now:

a) Install Stuckey as our PG. Stuckey will be on an expiring contract and extremely tradeable at the deadline. It's his best position, so lets ride with him there.

b) Keep Knight as our SG. He's going to be stronger next season, and he's a matchup nightmare. Other teams will have to play chicken with us: their bigger SG trying to defend Knight. Knight trying to defend those bigger SG's. Which coach blinks first. But we're covered to a certain extent by Drummond, and with bigger PG's.

c) Draft Smart, if we get lucky in the lottery, or MCW if we don't, or McLemore, or Oladipo. A three guard rotation of any of those guys plus Knight and Stuckey could be ideal. If we draft the PG, we can bring him along slowly, but we'll have drafted a guy with the size we need to pair with Knight.

d) Play Middleton some minutes at SG - he'd be the team's 4th guard or possibly the 5th guard depending on who we sign as a FA.

e) Don't resign Calderon. I like Jose, but if we're committed to Knight, I think the team needs to move on since Jose doesn't mesh defensively with Brandon. We'll be a team playing whack-a-mole on D forever, so we should go in a different direction.

We will clearly be trying out guard combinations for much of the next couple of seasons - but Stuckey's expiring contract will remain a valuable trade asset - more valuable as next season roles along, plus we'll hopefully be increasing his trade value from the low point it is today. We can also always move Knight since it's clear that this kid has a huge heart, and can and will be part of a rotation on a great team in the future. My plan will dramatically improve the team's defensive ability. It's super desireable to make sure we have PG's and SG's who can prevent/limit as much penetration into the paint as possible, and who are athletic and long enough to both 3 pt shooters.

If this is our focus this offseason, we can allocate some of our salary cap space to improving our defensive presence at the back power positions. I'd just leave Singler and Middleton alone for now.

I like this plan a hellof a lot better than any plan that has us drafting a lousy defensive fit or a selfish scorer (Shabazz) at SF.

[menten]

4. Calderon is a great pure PG on offense and a great shooter - possibly the perfect offensive player on a team with Monroe and Drummond

are you kidding me? he's a crappy pure PG and assy playmaker. his idea of running an offense is dribbling the ball for 20 seconds like a retart and then passing it to whoever is open. knight at least knows what ball movement is

b) Keep Knight as our SG.

[Brapman]

To each his own, I guess, but statistically, Calderon is and has been one of the very best PG's in BB for quite a few years. His assist to turnover ratio is fantastic, and he's just about the best 3 pt shooter in the league. If he could defend, he'd be considered a superstar.

I get the argument for not wanting him back: he's bad on defense and he's a bit too old to project that he'll be around when the Pistons are contenders again in a few seasons. However, not recognizing him as a great offensive PG isn't supportable statistically, or IMO just from the old eyeball test.

[joseph mamah]

JC is between average and above average.

[menten]

However, not recognizing him as a great offensive PG isn't supportable statistically, or IMO just from the old eyeball test.

it dont need stats to see he's ass. i just watch the games and i can tell you, the dude is a net negative on both ends
he can be servicable as an off the bench spot up shooter, who isnt allowed to dribble

edit: lol even the stats say the team plays worse with him on the floor: http://www.82games.com/1213/1213DET.HTM

[rmfc]

Play Knight at PG or trade him. There is absolutely no need to see what he can do at SG.

[MrBigShot]

Play Knight at PG or trade him. There is absolutely no need to see what he can do at SG.

[Rekindled]

Generally speaking, I'd be one of those who would have faith in BK7 as the PG for the Pistons. I'm sure he'll work on his passing over and over again and I think he's a willing passer at heart. But man oh man sometimes it just seems as if passing the ball at the right time is like a foreign language that he just can't speak or learn to save his life, especially on the pick and roll. Sometimes his passes just look so bad and unnatural.

[Pharaoh]

Not to be one of those type of people but:

Anyone who thinks Calderon is "ass" doesn't know the game of basketball

You can complain about his D but to say he can't run an offense and claim he's a net negative on BOTH ends of the floor is just BS

[Blkbrd671]

To each his own, I guess, but statistically, Calderon is and has been one of the very best PG's in BB for quite a few years. His assist to turnover ratio is fantastic, and he's just about the best 3 pt shooter in the league. If he could defend, he'd be considered a superstar.

I get the argument for not wanting him back: he's bad on defense and he's a bit too old to project that he'll be around when the Pistons are contenders again in a few seasons. However, not recognizing him as a great offensive PG isn't supportable statistically, or IMO just from the old eyeball test.

Here's the thing that cracks me up about JC. Statistically he's very efficient and the team supposedly overall is a better team, however i have yet to see JC translate his stats into wins and/or have his Offensive bball IQ outweigh his piece of sh* defense. Its pointless to be better statistically but still lose the game. i wouldn't mind JC so much except that it looks/seems as if the team doesn't respond to him.

[MrBigShot]

Has more to do with the fact that our team sucks and Drummond was injured for a good part of the time he was starting. Jose is a solid PG. Not great, but solid. Not going to win much with him at PG though....getting old, and just not physically able to play defense on athletic PGs.