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I must say, I was never an advocate of Dalembert's game. Through years of goaltends, foul trouble, and unworthy compensation, it hasn't been easy to show the big guy some love. Lately, he's been the opposite. He's been playing to his strengths, but at the same time understanding his limitations. On top of averaging career highs in PPG, RPG, and BPG he's been able to focus mentally and has displayed a newfound court awareness I've never seen prior to this season. He still has his vices, albeit reduced, but numbers like this - 11.4ppg, 10.1rpg, 2.6bpg are much closer to what we all had envisioned for Sam when he signed longterm. The Canadian Sensation has arrived.

The point that I was making in another thread is that you have to be patient with young players. You have to be especially patient with bigs. They need more time to develop because they never had to rely fundamentals. You don't need to be fundamentally sound when you're bigger than everyone.

I know dbonder doesn't agree, but Sam has become an impact player in this league and still has plenty of room to improve.

Especially patient with players that did not grow up playing the game.

Sam's biggest improvement this year is managing to stay out of foul trouble on most nights. All of the other improved numbers stem from him being able to stay on the floor.

Can somebody double check if this year is Sammy's contract year? Btw, being a Daly fan for these years all I can say is where is Ricky Pryor when you need him the most?

dalembert has been awesome this season. i can't watch the sixers here in north carolina, but if i could, he would be one of the only reasons i would.

Where are all the "dump daly" posters now. He has looked awesome. I may have to change my name to DalyTheBeast

crazylyf wrote:Can somebody double check if this year is Sammy's contract year? Btw, being a Daly fan for these years all I can say is where is Ricky Pryor when you need him the most?

Where did he go? Was he banned permanetly?

I hate to throw some cold water on here, SD has improved a chunk. But realistically with his physical gifts he should be putting up 18-12-3.

He has come a long way but has farther to go. Our expectations were so low that he looks like an All-Star in comparison. SD's biggest weakness IMHO is the bonehead plays he makes. They have come down this year, but optimally you'd like to see him bring it down from 5 to 2. At this point you can't use the excuse of him picking up the game late any more. He has been in the NBA 6 years.

On most nights Sam just doesn't get the touches to score that many points....18 PPG for same is totally unrealistic. He could probably average 12-13 boards a night a maybe he will with his recent play.

Sam is the only other center in the Eastern Conference, besides Howard, to be averaging a double double.

SD's biggest weakness IMHO is the bonehead plays he makes

I may be wrong on this (maybe someone else heard it) but I'm pretty sure I heard the Rockets announcers say that 4 of the last 5 Centers that Yao has faced had fouled out against him. If that's true, it says a whole lot about Sam's ability to cut down on fouls this season.

STChaser

wow444 wrote:I hate to throw some cold water on here, SD has improved a chunk. But realistically with his physical gifts he should be putting up 18-12-3.

He has come a long way but has farther to go. Our expectations were so low that he looks like an All-Star in comparison. SD's biggest weakness IMHO is the bonehead plays he makes. They have come down this year, but optimally you'd like to see him bring it down from 5 to 2. At this point you can't use the excuse of him picking up the game late any more. He has been in the NBA 6 years.

I can see the 12 and 3, but Sam should never be expected to put up 18ppg.

Numbers like 12/12/3 are Marcus Camby-like numbers.

I would take that in a HEARTBEAT.

Throw some Ds

I used to kill Dalembert because he wasn't very good and deserved it.

But I give him all the credit in the world, he worked hard with Moses and drastically improved his game. He has been very good since the 2nd half of last season.

If Sam is the only other center to average a double-double in the East, he should at least get looked at for the allstar team. If he keeps playing at this pace he has a chance at least. The only thing I worry about is if he makes the allstar team he might start to think hes better then he is.

ankle420breaker wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



I can see the 12 and 3, but Sam should never be expected to put up 18ppg.

Why not? You guys have sort of made my point about our expectations. All it would take would be a hook shot from either hand and then an up and under off of that. He'd get more touches and more foul shots and 18 ppg. He has the ability, he just needs to put in the work. Keeping the ball above his shoulders on the O boards would help a little also

Iguodala is only averaging 19 PPG. Tim Duncan only averages 18.6...There are only 5 centers in the league that average at least 18 PPG and they are all the main offensive weapon on their respective teams.

Ya, I dont think Sam should average 18 or would want him to. i think he could top out at 15, maybe 16 and thats pushing it. If we have a PF next year who can score that will help him score more easy baskets which could get him to 14-16 but 18 in my opinion would be alil too much.

PrimeTime21 wrote:Iguodala is only averaging 19 PPG. Tim Duncan only averages 18.6...There are only 5 centers in the league that average at least 18 PPG and they are all the main offensive weapon on their respective teams.

Duncan isn't the greatest example, since he would be averaging over 25 per game if he was on just about any other team in the league. It just so happens that SA is the deepest team in the league, and he can save a bit of his energy for the playoffs, hence the drop in production.

wow444 wrote:Why not? You guys have sort of made my point about our expectations. All it would take would be a hook shot from either hand and then an up and under off of that. He'd get more touches and more foul shots and 18 ppg. He has the ability, he just needs to put in the work. Keeping the ball above his shoulders on the O boards would help a little also.

Exactly. You obviously can't expect him to score 18 a game with the offensive skills he has right now. But he's getting 11 with absolutely zero post moves. Seven more points on a team starving for post play wouldn't be inconceivable, if he could develop a few reliable moves.

To play devil's advocate a little more, Sam's per minute numbers are basically the same this year as they have been for his career. Had he played the same amount of minutes per game over his career, he'd be averaging one point, a quarter of a rebound and less than half a block more this season.

Anyways, I acknowledge that he has certainly improved, but some of you are taking this a little far. He's no All-Star, that's for sure.

I think the biggest improvement has been his consistency and his abilty to stay on the floor more often, while avoiding foul trouble. He's averaging 0.5 less fouls per game (when drawing his career averages out to this season's 33 mpg), and while that may seem small, an extra foul every second game can often mean the difference between sitting an extra 5-10 minutes because of foul trouble.