Vuc

[PennytoShaq]

No this is all great. The main reason is that you are so upset that you are going through all my posts in an angry rage and this is the best you can find - especially the bold part. I stand by that statement - We needed to let Gordon play SF so he could see what his true position was he was and he was quoted as wanting to do just that. I have said that from the beginning and stand by it to this day. I appreciate you spending all that time going back through my posts just to show evidence of how petty you actually are. "To close my coffin" - Son, you are so bent on being the "winner" that you can't even see how ridiculous you look.

Again - study the draft better next year before writing novels on who every team should draft and telling us your self-assured assessment that is not even correct half the time in poorly written paragraphs that are painful to read.
Stop being petty.
And thank you for spending all that time searching my posts and finding nothing that significant at all - high five.

[SOUL]

My FA this year would be : Tony Allen ( no BS guy ,great to have in lockeroom ), Patrick Patterson, by some stats one of best PFs in the game, by far best backup PF in nba and maybe Patty Mills or Yogi Farrell,depending can Magic trade away Augustin. This isn't year to do anything crazy in FA and as you can say i'm not even suggesting trading Payton ASAP. I'm still willing to give him a chance to see did he improve, if not ,like everybody else minus Isaac,he will be trade bait .

The thing is when you actually elaborate on things, we seem to align on a lot of opinions more than differ.. but the way you go about it until pressed about it makes it hard to know exactly how you feel towards certain situations and players. Like I know you're not high on Payton or Vucevic for that matter but the way you come off a lot of the time reads like you want them to be playing overseas rather than come off the bench... or like you might think they are decent players that would have success on decent teams but not contenders but it reads like you wouldn't even give them playing time on a 9-73 team.

I think that's where you get into these back and forths with people. A little more elaboration and a lot of this back and forth could be avoided. Acknowledging a point that is hard to refute and then countering that point with something maybe people haven't thought about would be taken way better than some of the other methods being used to tear players apart. What bothers me in this thread is I'm posting clear evidence of Vucevic not being a efficient offensive player and that's still being argued and pointed towards other people when he literally posted better stats when those people were on the team 2 years earlier and even poorer shooters. It might have a small amount of impact on Vuc, but it's basically giving Vuc a pass 7 years in to ask him to actually shoot more threes or get to the line or go to the rim strong.

But I definitely agree on a similar FA route.

[fendilim]

Vuc is not a bad offensive player.

Yes he is.

I think people are talking about his past/what he is able to do on offense as opposed to him trending downwards.

Yes, numbers are trending downward, because of the deficiencies of AG and EP.

[PennytoShaq]

Tony Allen, a guy who can not shoot at all. I love Tony Allen, but it makes no sense how Pepe can rail on and on about how everyone needs to be a 3 point shooter and we have no offense, and then he drops that nugget. The irony is that his shooting #s last years were even worse than Jeff Green's.

Amazing.

[SOUL]

Vuc is not a bad offensive player.

Yes he is.

I think people are talking about his past/what he is able to do on offense as opposed to him trending downwards.

Yes, numbers are trending downward, because of the deficiencies of AG and EP.

There is zero evidence or correlation between those two things. That insinuates that Vucevic once lived in the paint (he was in there more, but he was always a mid-range shooting big) and that he has been bad ever since they started playing with EP and AG compared to anything before that. Vucevic's best year is when Gordon and Payton were both rookies. Rookie years are when players usually shoot their worst efficiency wise.

In fact, the best he played last season was with Gordon and Payton during the last 1/3 of the year when Ibaka left, somebody who operated literally in the same exact spaces (+ the three point line) as Vucevic.

In the 20 post ASG games he averaged 16.5/11.3/2.7 with 45/36/79 numbers in 21 minutes a game together with those guys.

Prior to that he averaged 47/28/61 and 13.1/10.1/2.8 .. numbers way down.

This is where people's reluctance to admit Ibaka leaving actually helped the team (because it was post ASG) backfires.

Is it really that hard to say "Yeah, Vucevic struggled last year and needs to tweak his offense to provide more impact in the league."

[JF5]

Yes he is.

I think people are talking about his past/what he is able to do on offense as opposed to him trending downwards.

Yes, numbers are trending downward, because of the deficiencies of AG and EP.

There is zero evidence or correlation between those two things. That insinuates that Vucevic once lived in the paint (he was in there more, but he was always a mid-range shooting big) and that he has been bad ever since they started playing with EP and AG compared to anything before that. Vucevic's best year is when Gordon and Payton were both rookies. Rookie years are when players usually shoot their worst efficiency wise.

In fact, the best he played last season was with Gordon and Payton during the last 1/3 of the year when Ibaka left, somebody who operated literally in the same exact spaces (+ the three point line) as Vucevic.

In the 20 post ASG games he averaged 16.5/11.3/2.7 with 45/36/79 numbers in 21 minutes a game together with those guys.

Prior to that he averaged 47/28/61 and 13.1/10.1/2.8 .. numbers way down.

This is where people's reluctance to admit Ibaka leaving actually helped the team (because it was post ASG) backfires.

Is it really that hard to say "Yeah, Vucevic struggled last year and needs to tweak his offense to provide more impact in the league."

People do recognize Ibaka leaving helped the team. But its obvious PRIOR TO HIM BEING TRADED that the poor spacing hurt not just Vucevic but everyone else as most were playing out of their roles and weren't playing to their strengths. I think he's referencing that portion of the season where that non-shooting/poor scoring line-up was trotted out.

Once Terrence Ross was brought in and the team adapted to more of a quicker pace/larger space of offense and players were placed back into their proper roles having everyone play to their strengths everyone looked a lot better. Just more of a question if its legitimate (as this team has played well in the latter stages of the last several seasons when the majority of the league has mailed in).

Vucevic like everyone else had a poor season, but he'll bounce back with better shooting probably as the team will probably have similar fluid offense that they had at the end of this past season where everyone played well.

[shadrock]

Say what you want about Vuc but right now he is our best player and him being pissed is warranted. I am not the biggest Vuc fan but even I acknowledge we treated him like crap last year. Trading for Ibaka and ask him to please and work with him since we wanted him to stay, sending him to the bench, starting Biz over him, bringing him back to the SL, etc.

It was not a good year for Vuc but I don't blame it all on him. Vogel misused him, Hennigan put a sh*tty team around him that can't hit the water if they were in the ocean, and then we point the fingers at him for his shortcomings.

Despite all that he is still our longest tenured player and was the first to show promise after we traded dwight. I agree that it may be time to move on and get value for him since we will most likely rebuild and he deserves to go somewhere to win. Even with all the crap we have given him, he still remains loyal. Yeah, he shows his frustrations but I like that in a player. At least he is not requesting for trades or creating drama like dwight.

Before giving up on Vuc, there are 3-4 players on this team I would ship out and get the hell out of orlando before trading Vuc.

I don't think Vucevic is our best player at all. I would probably give that to Gordon.

Vucevic is a bad defender and inefficient on offense. We are worse on both ends when he plays in my opinion

If Vuc is a bad defender then who in the team isnt? Gordon sucked defensively in the paint. He was worse then Ibaka and his rebounding weren't even as good as Vuc, Ibaka, or even Biz. If you're going to criticize Vuc postD, then point out Gordons. He sucked defensively as a PF this season. Guarding SF on defense is another story. There he did his job well. Which is why we will move on with the Isaac/AG duo that can switch heavily on offense/defense. Defense, AG moves to the 3, offense, Isaac is our 4.

Saying that we were worse on both ends with him and better with Biz at the C just tells me you didnt watch enough games and have it out for Vuc. Biz was freaking awful on both ends. He is an energy player but you dont pay that skill 17mil/per. He has no offensive talents. The guy cant even catch the ball and we are a better offensive team with him than Vuc? You lose the right to be taken seriously with that argument.

Yes, we are a better team on offense with Biz on the floor than Vuc. Here is why in dot point format to make is easy to understand:

- He does not waste any shots.
- He does not shoot low percentage midrange jumpshots.
- He sets the best screens in the league (makes teammates better).
- He is a constant lob threat (makes teammates better).
- He is great on the offensive rebounds.
- He does not pout and whinge and cry when things dont go his way, thus frustrating the entire team.
- He is willing to come off the bench.

To summ up, give Vuc's shots to AG, Elf, Isaac, whoever, and we are a better team immediately. Vuc may score more points but they are not good points and not the shots we want to be taking. Biz does his work off the ball and makes the game easier for AG, Elf, etc with his screens and his rolling to the hoop. Not to mention, his defense creates transition opportunities.

The days of big men who cant defend are done. We need to move on.

EDIT: Also just saw that this is reflected in the offensive rating for the team with Biz on the floor, which is 112, as compared to Vuc on the floor, which is 110. Id argue that number will only grow with more reps.

[MagicStarwipe]

My impersonation of a pepe post:

Paytonhugger tried to tell me Elfrid was greatest PG since Magic Johnson and when he was on string of stat padding triple doubles stalked me every day calling me an idiot when in fact I forgot more about the game than John Wooden ever knew. You all tried to tell me AG would overtake LeBron as greatest SF in the game and lead us to the 2017 championship and I tried to tell you all that he's never played SF before and we might lose some games. Duh! You morons. I told you in 2009 that we would sign Jeff Green this season and he would average 9.2 PPG on 39% shooting in 22.2 MPG yet not one other person other than me threw a hissy fit when we signed him. All of you, every last one of you said he would win sixth man of the year. Once again proving my superior knowledge over you dumb dumbs. Now you poo poo heads want to be immature and personal attack me. Why am I so hard done by on this board?

[drsd]

On a horrible team Vučević has a PER over 19. Imagine his stat line with valued assets around him (and without Ibaka crowding his game).

Vučević is an excellent center.

Yes, numbers are trending downward, because of the deficiencies of Ibaka.

Fixed.

My point: Ibaka was not a compliment of Vučević. Not at all.

People do recognize Ibaka leaving helped the team. But its obvious PRIOR TO HIM BEING TRADED that the poor spacing hurt not just Vucevic but everyone else as most were playing out of their roles and weren't playing to their strengths..

THis one!

Isaac at SF is likely to add to Vučević's game. My concern now is whether Gordon is a compliment at PF and the direction the Magic will take at SG.

[fendilim]

Yes he is.

I think people are talking about his past/what he is able to do on offense as opposed to him trending downwards.

Yes, numbers are trending downward, because of the deficiencies of AG and EP.

There is zero evidence or correlation between those two things. That insinuates that Vucevic once lived in the paint (he was in there more, but he was always a mid-range shooting big) and that he has been bad ever since they started playing with EP and AG compared to anything before that. Vucevic's best year is when Gordon and Payton were both rookies. Rookie years are when players usually shoot their worst efficiency wise.

In fact, the best he played last season was with Gordon and Payton during the last 1/3 of the year when Ibaka left, somebody who operated literally in the same exact spaces (+ the three point line) as Vucevic.

In the 20 post ASG games he averaged 16.5/11.3/2.7 with 45/36/79 numbers in 21 minutes a game together with those guys.

Prior to that he averaged 47/28/61 and 13.1/10.1/2.8 .. numbers way down.

This is where people's reluctance to admit Ibaka leaving actually helped the team (because it was post ASG) backfires.

Is it really that hard to say "Yeah, Vucevic struggled last year and needs to tweak his offense to provide more impact in the league."

True, best years were during ep and ag rookie year. But how many minutes did he play with both on the court?

It started trending downwards under Skiles who had to utilize more pick and pop to open up the lane for Ep and Ag. Then this year Vuc also had to shoot more perimeter shots because of the poor spacing.

[basketballRob]

The funny thing is Greg Monroe has been better than Vuc and the Bucks can't give him away.

[pepe1991]

No this is all great. The main reason is that you are so upset that you are going through all my posts in an angry rage and this is the best you can find - especially the bold part. I stand by that statement - We needed to let Gordon play SF so he could see what his true position was he was and he was quoted as wanting to do just that. I have said that from the beginning and stand by it to this day. I appreciate you spending all that time going back through my posts just to show evidence of how petty you actually are. "To close my coffin" - Son, you are so bent on being the "winner" that you can't even see how ridiculous you look.

Again - study the draft better next year before writing novels on who every team should draft and telling us your self-assured assessment that is not even correct half the time in poorly written paragraphs that are painful to read.
Stop being petty.
And thank you for spending all that time searching my posts and finding nothing that significant at all - high five.

yet still all experts view Isaac as future PF ,but you said it he is SF...to drift later into "with potential to play small ball 5" after Skin brought that .

I don't range, in general talking about basketball doesn't get me mad, i just pointed out all BS you were spitting year ago, to act like you are some basketball mastermind this year.

[Bensational]

Why are we discussing how well other players compliment Vuc's game? He's not good enough to warrant finding guys that compliment him - we've tried that already for the past 5 years. We got him his unicorn, and he didn't fit. The problem is with Vuc.

We should be asking how well Vuc compliments other players. Right now we know that he's a challenge to find a complimentary PF or PG to go with him because none of the options we've tried with him have had any success.

What's the justifiable plan for keeping him around? What's the ideal situation for him? Who are his ideal complimentary players, and can we get them, and does he win us games if we get them for him?

I'll wager the answer is that he doesn't win us enough games to make it worth it. He's a role player, and you don't build around role players.

[pepe1991]

Tony Allen, a guy who can not shoot at all. I love Tony Allen, but it makes no sense how Pepe can rail on and on about how everyone needs to be a 3 point shooter and we have no offense, and then he drops that nugget. The irony is that his shooting #s last years were even worse than Jeff Green's.

Amazing.

TOny Allen is almost 36 years old. You bring guy like that to be example for young kids how to value possessions on defense and play hard each and every possession of their career, and how your career can be great despite clear disadvantages. When you bring vets, you don't expect them to be go to guys who will try to overshadow younger guys ( something that Smith, Green, Augustin and others tried ) , you bring guys who will play their role and be more valuable off than on the court with that young kids.

But to understand how valuable he would be you should think a little bit , i didn't expect somebody like you to understand it.

[pepe1991]

My impersonation of a pepe post:

Paytonhugger tried to tell me Elfrid was greatest PG since Magic Johnson and when he was on string of stat padding triple doubles stalked me every day calling me an idiot when in fact I forgot more about the game than John Wooden ever knew. You all tried to tell me AG would overtake LeBron as greatest SF in the game and lead us to the 2017 championship and I tried to tell you all that he's never played SF before and we might lose some games. Duh! You morons. I told you in 2009 that we would sign Jeff Green this season and he would average 9.2 PPG on 39% shooting in 22.2 MPG yet not one other person other than me threw a hissy fit when we signed him. All of you, every last one of you said he would win sixth man of the year. Once again proving my superior knowledge over you dumb dumbs. Now you poo poo heads want to be immature and personal attack me. Why am I so hard done by on this board?

If you want to argue, bring it to inbox .
I don't think i have "superior knowledge" over anybody but same people who last month act like they know everything about basketball were acting the same way last year -spitting some of dumbest BS you could read on internet. You were comparing BIyombo to Deandre Jordan . It's not my words, but yours.

Jeff Green has 47% eFG% for career. You can make strong argument that he had one good season, for Boston.

[fendilim]

Why are we discussing how well other players compliment Vuc's game? He's not good enough to warrant finding guys that compliment him - we've tried that already for the past 5 years. We got him his unicorn, and he didn't fit. The problem is with Vuc.

We should be asking how well Vuc compliments other players. Right now we know that he's a challenge to find a complimentary PF or PG to go with him because none of the options we've tried with him have had any success.

What's the justifiable plan for keeping him around? What's the ideal situation for him? Who are his ideal complimentary players, and can we get them, and does he win us games if we get them for him?

I'll wager the answer is that he doesn't win us enough games to make it worth it. He's a role player, and you don't build around role players.

Vuc ability to make the perimeter shot is a good compliment for someone like payton.

[pepe1991]

My FA this year would be : Tony Allen ( no BS guy ,great to have in lockeroom ), Patrick Patterson, by some stats one of best PFs in the game, by far best backup PF in nba and maybe Patty Mills or Yogi Farrell,depending can Magic trade away Augustin. This isn't year to do anything crazy in FA and as you can say i'm not even suggesting trading Payton ASAP. I'm still willing to give him a chance to see did he improve, if not ,like everybody else minus Isaac,he will be trade bait .

The thing is when you actually elaborate on things, we seem to align on a lot of opinions more than differ.. but the way you go about it until pressed about it makes it hard to know exactly how you feel towards certain situations and players. Like I know you're not high on Payton or Vucevic for that matter but the way you come off a lot of the time reads like you want them to be playing overseas rather than come off the bench... or like you might think they are decent players that would have success on decent teams but not contenders but it reads like you wouldn't even give them playing time on a 9-73 team.

I think that's where you get into these back and forths with people. A little more elaboration and a lot of this back and forth could be avoided. Acknowledging a point that is hard to refute and then countering that point with something maybe people haven't thought about would be taken way better than some of the other methods being used to tear players apart. What bothers me in this thread is I'm posting clear evidence of Vucevic not being a efficient offensive player and that's still being argued and pointed towards other people when he literally posted better stats when those people were on the team 2 years earlier and even poorer shooters. It might have a small amount of impact on Vuc, but it's basically giving Vuc a pass 7 years in to ask him to actually shoot more threes or get to the line or go to the rim strong.

But I definitely agree on a similar FA route.

I just get annoyed when i waste 25 min to collect stats ,data, qouted by experts and somebody like Pennytoshaq gives reply like " Tony Snell is good defender " ,yea, real expert opinion, no proofs, nothing, just guy presenting his opinion as fact I reply to him how 99,3% of all his 3s ( who were 70% of all his FGA) were assisted and he changes subject calling me angry hater or something like that. At the end of a day this is forum, people say dumb **** ( me included ) , never own anything and just trow random opinions presented as facts.

When it comes to Vučević, i never thought he was great, he never worked well with any PF ( Gordon, Green,Hezonja,Ilaysova, Big Baby, Ibaka, Smith, Nicholson.. .?) and his offense was never effective. That being said, Magic never had effective offense and guys who can carry bigger volumen on offense anyway so it was him taking most shots by default.
But casual nba fans have box score bias. That's why Westbrook is MVP, that's why guys like Francis, Marbury were stars. That's why people love T mac despite fact that guy was one of biggest loosers in nba history for superstar level of talent. Casual fans are obsessed with PPG ,RPG and APG ,nothing else matters, so, naturally, Vučević and his 19-11 from few years ago will always look better than Gordon and his 12-5.

[Bensational]

The funny thing is Greg Monroe has been better than Vuc and the Bucks can't give him away.

This is one of the things I'll find most interesting about the upcoming season and what happens to Vuc. Hammond had Monroe in Milwaukee and he ended up as a bench guy that they struggled to move (but, who was a pretty key piece in their team with the presence he gave them off the bench). Weltman had Valanciunas who ended up relegated to a 20mpg guy in the playoffs this year. Vuc is a big much more in their mould, and it seems like their preferences have evolved to liking small ball stretch 5's like Thon and Ibaka.

[Bensational]

Why are we discussing how well other players compliment Vuc's game? He's not good enough to warrant finding guys that compliment him - we've tried that already for the past 5 years. We got him his unicorn, and he didn't fit. The problem is with Vuc.

We should be asking how well Vuc compliments other players. Right now we know that he's a challenge to find a complimentary PF or PG to go with him because none of the options we've tried with him have had any success.

What's the justifiable plan for keeping him around? What's the ideal situation for him? Who are his ideal complimentary players, and can we get them, and does he win us games if we get them for him?

I'll wager the answer is that he doesn't win us enough games to make it worth it. He's a role player, and you don't build around role players.

Vuc ability to make the perimeter shot is a good compliment for someone like payton.

Vuc can make a perimeter shot, but it's not a key part of his game by any stretch. He is predominantly a mid-range/long 2 guy. If he took all his mid/long jumpers out to the 3pt line and was able to hit between 35-40% then he'd be much more useful. I think he could do it, too, he just doesn't seem to back his 3pt shot enough in games.

Ibaka was actually good for/with Elf, and would've been great as a stretch 5. If you look at games where Elf scored over 20ppg last year, the team was 10-6 with wins against good teams like Atlanta, Oklahoma, Washington, Chicago and Milwaukee. Ibaka often had big games in those wins, too.

[MrTwister]

Vucevic spoke recently in one podcast about his past few seasons and trade rumors and generally situation in Orlando.

Despite whole ego and entitlement talk, Magic management actually praised him for embracing different roles and rolling with coaching staff ideas.He said though, that he expressed his displeasure with that situation (benching, changing roles, playing further away from the basket, shooting 3's) but shifted his focus on being best bench player he can be, and Martins noticed that and told him that on exit interview.He also said, that during trade deadline, when his name was circulating in trade rumors, Martins pulled him aside and told him that they value him and that he is not going anywhere.He is longest tenured player there and they want some kind of continuity in franchise which changed so much past couple of years.

About playing different positions, he said that he had to play further away from the basket(he said he feels most comfortable as C and closer to the basket) because of the new free agents they got last summer and it was an adjustment.He also said that early in the season there was lots of negative energy from some vets(didnt say which) after losing some games and that kinda affected young guys on the roster.Mentioned that there was a moment when they thought they can turn it around when they won like 5 in a row on the road but later they lost some and just went back to old ways

He said that Skiles was strict but everyone had sense what they can do and what they cant.Called him like some old ex-yu coaches strict, but fair.He said he benched him for entire half one game, next morning he called him in his office to explain him what was wrong, why it happened and why it shouldn't happen anymore.Didn't spoke about Vogel much, said he experimented a lot, trying to get a feel of some players etc.

If I remember something more i will add up.