RealGM

so its been half of a season .. what do you think of steve blake ..is he a better fit then farmar?

The biggest knock i have on him is that he's not aggressive enough. I'm sure most people will agree. The dude needs to remember he's a part of the Lakers now, not some new guy who needs to step aside and bow down to the Lakers who have been here longer. He needs to shoot every open shot he gets and everything else will follow.

I like his playmaking ability, always have and it fits here.

Been disappointed also in his defense too, hasn't really been a step up from Fish.

I would still rather have Kirk Hinrich. I wish Sasha was an expiring last season we probably would have landed Hinrich by trading the expiring of Ammo and Sasha. Chicago gave him up for nothing.

The most disappointing thing about Steve Blake is his lack of minutes. I can't imagine how deflating it must be to know that you're playing the 3rd lowest minutes of your career behind one of the worst PG's in the league. Phil needs to be slapped. Hard.

Other than that, I've been impressed with what I've seen. He plays very under control and always tries to make the right play. While he could be more aggressive, that's not what he was brought in for. His outside shooting and ability to run the reserve unit, as well as playing defense (probably the biggest disappointment for me -- thought he'd be better) is what he's here to do. His minutes need to increase though, that's for damn sure.

the problem with blake is that hes a pusher type shooter, almost floats it out of his hands. thats fine and all but in order to be efficient with your shot he needs to be wide open and at a stand still position. BTW he hasnt been making **** lately. whats worse is blake cant even penetrate and score in the lane to save his life, atleast farmer would attack and occasionally dunk on hall-of-fame power forwards.

so far i give blake a c-

semi-sentient wrote:The most disappointing thing about Steve Blake is his lack of minutes. I can't imagine how deflating it must be to know that you're playing the 3rd lowest minutes of your career behind one of the worst PG's in the league. Phil needs to be slapped. Hard.

Other than that, I've been impressed with what I've seen. He plays very under control and always tries to make the right play. While he could be more aggressive, that's not what he was brought in for. His outside shooting and ability to run the reserve unit, as well as playing defense (probably the biggest disappointment for me -- thought he'd be better) is what he's here to do. His minutes need to increase though, that's for damn sure.

exactly how i feel as well.

I can't believe anyone would say his D isn't a step above fisher. Did you watch the mavs game? terry would destroy fisher and blow by instantly. at least with blake once in awhile he'd have to pull back because blake kept his body in front of him.

I agree with Semi.

Blake's playing OK, a bit below than what's expected. But no one also expected Fish (and even Shannon) would get more minutes than him. He never had enough time playing with the starting unit early in the season IMO. You can also blame Brown's improvement.

semi-sentient wrote:The most disappointing thing about Steve Blake is his lack of minutes. I can't imagine how deflating it must be to know that you're playing the 3rd lowest minutes of your career behind one of the worst PG's in the league. Phil needs to be slapped. Hard.

Other than that, I've been impressed with what I've seen. He plays very under control and always tries to make the right play. While he could be more aggressive, that's not what he was brought in for. His outside shooting and ability to run the reserve unit, as well as playing defense (probably the biggest disappointment for me -- thought he'd be better) is what he's here to do. His minutes need to increase though, that's for damn sure.

Well yeah this is definitely true. Put him next to the starters each time he is on the court and his play will be so much better. The thing with that is that there is no chance in hell Fisher would be effective with the second unit. Those guys like to play at a faster tempo and Derek Fisher is the exact opposite of that.

But no man should have to bow down to Luke Walton.

Sadly I don't see how he is doing any better than Farmar. JOrdan had great quickness, athleticism and he was a good change of pace from the starting 5. Sure he is turnover prone and a little hot headed but I'm seeing the same kind of mistakes and bad defense from Blake without the added advantage of making the plays Jordan used to make.

JOrdan was a much more consistent shooter and he wasn't scared of running a pick n roll with the bigs. Blake just seems like a lesser Fisher to me.

Everyone has made some really nice points, seems like we are all on the same page. Nothing else to to add what hasn't already been said. Have a nice evening.

Oddly enough, I was completely against getting Blake in the off-season and wanted to see us keep Farmar so that we could do a mid-season trade (using Sasha) to bring in Hinrich. That would have left us with plenty of money to throw at someone who could give us some scoring off the bench (not that there was much available).

I guess Blake really exceeded my expectations early on, but recently he hasn't been all that hot and I agree that he's not giving us anything that Farmar didn't. I think he's going to have the same problem that Farmar did though, which is primarily that he won't get an opportunity to showcase what he can do while Fisher is still breathing. And since Fisher never gets injured... sigh. Retire already.

PS: Blake currently has the best 3P% and FT% on the team, which is not too shabby. Not that he shoots enough FT's for it to matter or anything, but he gets the benefit of the doubt since it's his first year and he hasn't had a full season of tri under his belt.

Stu Lantz and Joel Myers even say that Blake needs to be more aggressive, but he's always trying to get the guys back into correct offensive rotations. As much as that's good and all, he needs to break away from the offense once in awhile and do his thing. Earlier in the season, I remember that he didn't hesitate to shoot when he had open looks, now, he hesitates at times.

I'd rather have Blake shoot 3's than Brown....

why is it that every year, people on here talk about how phil is the best coach and then he needs to "be slapped" for not playing STEVE BLAKE more? STEVE BLAKE people. yes he is good and yes he can be better than fisher and maybe already is but who cares. its the regular season and phil knows what he is doing. people were talking about how he was "outcoached" by doc rivers in the finals when la lost a few years ago. its so ridiculous, realgm even had an article saying that garbage. la played a full strength boston team that was clearly better...lakers had an adjusting pau gasol (regardless of success in the reg season, he needed to get into real playoff basketball) and no bynum...its not an excuse, but moreso a reason to say, stop questioning phil, he's not senile and whoever says he needs to change anything needs to just stop talking until they size up 11 rings or even ONE to get started

relax people. its steve blake. its not like phil is holding chris paul on the bench in favor of fisher

+1 ChampagnePapa