Game 76: Denver Nuggets (50-24) @ Utah Jazz (38-36)

[Inigo Montoya]

I'm not saying he's simply not starter material

i kinda do... at this point of his career at least.

I don't think he's a rotation player on a good team

he was one last season - the clippers were pretty good.

He's worse than most other bench players in the league, who we'll assume are also playing against other bench players.

i don't think that he is. i think a lot of it has to do with his role, how he is asked to play (which is not how i think he should play), how he is used, and who he is playing with. he's also ranked #131 out of all 465 players in TS%, so he is actually better than most bench players in the league as far as that stat is concerned...

also, there is a total of 30 SG starters in the league. a TS% of .553 - would rank him 24th among all SGs (as you stated), not just starters. how many SGs are there in the league? according the link you provided, there are 86, so he is actually better than 5 other starters and 61 players overall at the SG position as far as TS% is concerned. why wouldn't his TS% improve if he had a more defined role, used correctly and played against lesser competition? 24th out of 86 is actually pretty good considering he's playing against better competition, he's undersized, misused and plays too many minutes with a bad PG. his stats are pretty similar to korver's btw, who does have 3 inches on him, plays in a weaker conference, and has a defined role. he has a TS% of .634, which just goes to show you what a difference the level of competition makes, as well as a defined role and a good PG.

I don't think he's a rotation player on a good team

well, we are not a good team. and we are unlikely to be a good team next year. so if you want to tank, wouldn't you be in favor of keeping him?

[StocktonShorts]

I don't think he's a rotation player on a good team

he was one last season - the clippers were pretty good.

It's funny you say that, because the Clippers replaced Mo Williams and Randy Foye's minutes with Jamal Crawford, Eric Bledsoe and Willie Green and they're a much better team.

Last year Mo played 1472 minutes for them (28.3/game) and Randy played 1682 (25.9/game). Chauncey played 607 (30.4/game) and Bledsoe played 464 (11.6/game). The Clippers finished 40-26.

This year Jamal Crawford has played 2063 minutes, Bledsoe 1452, Willie Green 1109 and Billups 382. The Clippers are at 50-26. Essentially they've taken all of Mo and Randy's minutes and given them to Crawford, Bledsoe and Green, without changing much else on the roster and they're a much better team.

The way I see it, our genius front office took another playoff team's castoffs and made them our starting back court.

[Inigo Montoya]

It's funny you say that, because the Clippers replaced Mo Williams and Randy Foye's minutes with Jamal Crawford, Eric Bledsoe and Chauncey Billups and they're a much better team.

This year Jamal Crawford has played 2063 minutes, Bledsoe 1452, Willie Green 1109 and Billups 382. The Clippers are at 50-26. Essentially they've taken all of Mo and Randy's minutes and given them to Crawford, Bledsoe and Green, without changing much else on the roster and they're a much better team.

so...you're saying that the clippers replaced 2 players with 3-4 players, and that crawford, billups and bledsoe are better than mo and foye? not really earth-shattering, is it? kinda obvious. not to mention that Jamal Crawford, Willie Green, Eric Bledsoe and Chauncey Billups are all bench players, and not starters. we took two bench players on a decent team (clippers of last year) and made them starters. is it surprising we are not doing well? as you said - not really. but the FO didn't make foye a starter - that was corbin. so i don't blame the FO for that.

it brings us back to the discussion of how players are used and how the FO likely thought they will be used. bringing mo to play last year's offense is not a bad move. but corbin changed the offense. that's also not the FO fault.

[StocktonShorts]

^^ I blame the FO for Mo. They clearly brought him in to be the starting PG.

I blame Corbin for Foye.

[Inigo Montoya]

ok, but do you think he was brought here under the assumption that the jazz will play the same style as last year? because if that's the case, it is not such a bad move.

harris had to play off the ball a lot and shoot a lot from the outside, both were not his strength (*cough* corbin *cough*). but mo actually would fit that style pretty well. but corbin chose to change the style this year and rely more on the PG to push the tempo - something that mo is not good at (because of his bad decision making, score first mentality, bad passing and his not so great handle) but harris actually is. mo's injury (among other things) caused the jazz to revert to the post heavy offense of last year but that wasn't the intention and not what corbin had in mind when he changed the system and and chose to rely more on mo.

so i think overall, there was some sort of communication issue of some sort, or whatever else you want to choose to describe it as. but i'm not sure the FO would have traded for mo if they knew what kind of offense corbin would choose to implement. i think they brought mo because they thought the jazz would play like last year.