Wizenheimer wrote:Roy The Natural wrote:I'm ready to move CJ. It's time to do it. I think he brings some stuff, but he's just not really the guy for this team. I think he could pull in Aaron Gordon, maybe it needs a smidge of incentive, but I think something along these lines should be done. Yes Portland will lose some offense from him, but I tire of his game.
He seems pretty much at his averages other than 3 point shooting, but it feels like outside the Bucks game, his averages are just completely ineffectively being achieved. He's not hitting shots when he needs to, and his play at the rim has been abysmal. I know it's early in the season, and he probably will improve as the year goes on in some areas, but I just don't really like him in the starting unit on this team, and I don't want him isoing with the bench. He gets 20 points half the time, and you sit there wondering where those points even came from.
he's a 6'3 SG who takes a lot of shots
two big problems is that he has the ball in his hands a lot (most dribbles/possession in the league last year) but he doesn't include teammates in his ball-dominance
look at his assist/36 numbers over the last 4 seasons:
2015-16 - 4.4
2016-17 - 3.7
2017-18 - 3.3
2018-19 - 2.7
that's a bad trend-line for somebody who's been averaging over 18 FGA's a game and is so ball-dominant. It rarely helps the team. Just like against the Pelicans in the playoffs: he had great numbers in the series but it didn't carry the team anywhere. If Dame has great numbers, he's carrying the Blazers to wins. CJ. not so much
and of course, there's CJ's lousy defense
but we all know that Olshey will never trade CJ; CJ's untouchable
I agree. I do think he's capable of being a lesser Kyrie Irving type player as a lead guard and netting about 5 assists a game. I also still believe that he'd look a lot better with a team without a scoring point guard. But, outside of the Bucks game this year, I've just haven't noticed him doing "winning" things on the basketball court. As you said, he can have great games, and they don't seem to have a major impact on the team winning or losing.
Part of this, in my view, is because the team gives up a lot by starting him at the 2. Even when his guy isn't going off, it's creating defensive mismatches that cause cascading defensive failures. He's not the reason we lost tonight, but he's just not the right fit on this team, and I'd feel more comfortable upgrading parts of the team that need offensive versatility and having his backups fill in, then I am continuing to trot out the current lineup.... regardless of current play.
For example, the darling trade of Aaron Gordon for CJ... in this case let's just say it's straight up.
Lillard
Layman
Gordon
Aminu
Nurkic
You could possibly replace Layman with Stauskas or Curry if either begins to separate themselves feels like a more balanced lineup with more possibilities. There are games that they will probably lose that CJ could help them win, and there are games they'll probably win that CJ wouldn't have helped in. The thing here is, the current Blazer's roster is finally not so devoid of shooting that losing CJ for the sake of balance is catastrophic..... well, and CJ isn't really hitting from deep at the rate that he needs to as well.
I like that starting lineup a lot more than our current one to be honest. Switching 2 through 4 is possible, every player 1 through 4 is more than capable of knocking down an open 3. If Harkless comes back and plays like he did down the stretch last year, you could probably plug him in at the 2 and have all that extreme length that everyone always loves on these boards.
