Skybox wrote:p0peye wrote:Ah, the eternal dilemma of positions is so tantalizing. AG is a star at SF, but a roleplayer at PF.
This is the thing with AB too…
what we want him to be doesn’t make it so…takes a lot more “mental gymnastics “ to be convinced he’s a PG than just Matisse Thybulle. This is BASED ON WHAT WEVE SEEN (not imagined)…if he’s got NBA PG skills & instincts, then either Mose hasn’t unlocked them or he’s still a victim of “rookie yips”. Calling his rookie year as an NBA #6 pick, PG prospect as anything but underwhelming is homerism. Doesn’t mean he’s a bust (yet) but anything he shows this year, other than defense, is new…I hope he does. He’s clearly a passionate, athletic kid, who (supposedly) has game management skills that NBA execs have bet on but he has not yet displayed…I really hope he (1) gets enough on-ball time to tell the truth, and (2) the truth is that he’s an NBA PG of exceptional size and defensive ability. Either way, he needs to show SOMETHING this season, or even the mental gymnastics won’t be enough to continue the mental picture we all want.
Matisse Thybulle or NAW are nice players too…but not what we’re looking for/needing more of.
Like Knightro, i'm fed up with this. I'll just say what i said in past.
Evan Turner.
MCW
Ben Simmons
Livingston
Lonzo Ball ( to some exstend)
Elite college players, all failed as "tall PG" in nba because at college you can bully people with your size alone and all opponents around you are either slower or less athletic or shorter ( especially if you are Ben Simmons who with 6'10 size got 40 inch vertical to go along ). Or all of it at once.
Problem is, you get into nba, you are no longer faster than majority of opponents, you are not stronger than majority of opponents, you aren't taller than most of the opponents.
To me it always boils down to that one Kobe qoute
For example, jumping ability. My vertical was a 40, wasn’t a 46 or 45. My hands are big but they are not massive. You got to figure out ways to strengthen them so your hands are strong enough to be able to palm a ball and do the things that you need to do. In a matter of quickness, I was quick but not insanely quick. I was fast but not ridiculously fast. So I had to rely on skill a lot more but I enjoyed it through.
And that's where they just flat out fail. They aren't that skilled nor understand angles to benefit tham. Somebody who is 6'2 and somehow got to nba draft ( and especially in lottery) in order to get there had to learn ALL the tricks in the book. From Brunson, Iverson, Lillard, Paul, Thomas, Vleet, Kemba , Kyrie, Lowry. We all played with that one nasty little prick that is so short yet he just knows when to hit you on a hip to bounce off you or knows how to shake off pressure with little dribble. He had to learn how to shoot from impossible angles because if he didn't, he would never get to nba in first place. Those are warms. Ultra talented, ultra crafty players. They got to NBA because of their work ethic and their skillset is direct result of them learning how to play with size disadvantage.
Tall PGs had it easier path to nba. They would make right passes over defense, they would take contact from not many good defensive bigs at college and finish around rim, they would not rely on jumpshots because , let's face it, there was never need it.
Or when NBA changed, around Lonzo's time taking 3s from kind a always same angle was enough to mask fact guy had broken shooting motion that would for sure be impossible to use in nba, especially in traffic , especially from mid range .
So they go into nba and you soon figure almost non of them can run traditional pick&roll because their shooting in motion is bizzare. It's jarring how incapable they are. They almost always are robotic and repeat same motion in pick&roll , expecting defense will be fooled each and every time by same trick. Once teams start to go under and you still can't stop and pop from 15 feet, well there will be trouble.
Again , back to Lonzo, his rookie year he couldn't even create as passer because he couldn't ingage defense into defending him.
Years later he got bit better but he was still nowhere near as good as scouts & fans thought he will be. He was still guy that couldn't run basic pick&roll, because he shot 31% from mid range, teams straight up refused to cover his pick&roll ( and boy, his percentile at it is just disaster ).
MCW / Livingston / Turner were even worst because they couldn't shoot to save their lifes. Simmons , once compared with Lebron, is 28 years old and probably closer to retirement than serious career.
Size in basketball matters. But there is no funcional benefit of being taller than opponent if there is no space to bully him ,you can't shoot over him as you suck at it, and you are just tall, lumbering on paper "ballhandler" who has average nba size ,average dribbling, average vision , or even if your vision is good, you can't get by anybody because people defend you by sag off.
That 19 years old kid from Spurs draft showed more "true point guarding" than Cole, Suggs, Black showed since they joined nba in one preseason game. It's just so obvious guy is schooled from that "little prick bag of Magic for basketball". Gets Mo flying, than slides under him, than leans on him to avoid block, than scores layup over 2 lumbering bigs while not even jumping. So dirty, beautiful. And ways he knows what he will do with ball, before he recives the pass. You just can't teach that.
Black at PG is based on pretty much nothing but blind hope that somebody who was "ballhandler by default" at college , with average vision, avearge passing can learn how to become PG in nba. I would not bet my money on it. I'm oke with giving him a shot, but i expect it will end in similar fashion as Point-Guard-Cole and Point - Guard- Suggs attemps ended.
Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans. -John Lennon
, within striking distance of an evolving Cole (Simons, Herro, Tyus, CJ). I'm not talking about Cole evolving into prime CJ, for instance, just the explosive heady guy off the bench that 2024 CJ could be for this squad.
