The Javale McGee Appreciation Thread

[TGW]

^^^LOL I had a good laugh at that. John Wall, from a maturity standpoint, is lightyears ahead of Javale.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

Maturity on the court means can he defend well or does he give up on some plays? Maturity means is it good for him to be yelling at Javale McGee in practice about defense when Wall is arguably the worst defender on the team.

Also, if you watch the video on the previous page, that's a different side of McGee. Not Pierre. I saw McGee play in front of troops in October. I have seen what he did in various pro leagues and with NBA stars in the Phillippines.

I don't leave a guy with a label that coaches like Flip Saunders help him earn in the first place.

If you really want to talk about Wall's maturity, look at his technicals, look at his body language. I think he is a GREAT KID and a VERY HARD WORKER. That said, the young man is 21. McGee is 23. Neither one of knows his own smell as far as I am concerned, but IMO neither is light years ahead of the other.

McGee worked hard over the summer and his game shows it. I don't pump John Wall up any higher than he deserves on the merits of his game. That said, if he was MATURE, the items in that link wouldn't show up the way they do, TGW.

Maturity can mean physical maturity--not simply emotional or mental maturity. Wall also has just one season under his belt and McGee has three. I don't go with the conventional wisdom when I see evidence to the contrary.

MY OPINION is that McGee's antics are what people focus on. Does Birdman Chris Anderson come off as immature? Does that guy play any harder than Javale McGee at either end of the court? Did Wall work hard on defense all the time, or did he get beat a bunch?

Wall was in his first year and is younger. My point is no way in heck is he light years ahead of McGee IMO.

[tontoz]

When talking about Wall you really have to break the season down into pre and post Feb 1. Pre Feb 1 Wall sucked in the half court and sucked even worse on D. After Feb 1 he became much better in the half court and on defense. He really looked like two different players.

I have to assume, especially given his recent interview, that his struggles with injuries were worse in january than in february on.

McGee also looked like two different players at times. Towards the end of the year he actually showed a pretty effective post game and occassionally had huge rebounding games. He also did a better job staying down on pump fakes.

[no D in Hibachi]

Javale is the second best Washington basketball player. Second most important and I don't even think this is a question. He made pretty big strides last year and expect greater improvement this year. I expect him to average 15/10/2.5 while becoming a force defensively. If he improves like I think he will it won't matter if the Wiz pay him 10mill per year. He'd be worth it and 10-12 per year for a top 10 center, which he can become, is a pretty good deal. If he doesn't make the improvements I expect than he can try to get his 10+ per year from someone else.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FJHNwWOFY4&feature=g-all[/youtube]

LMAO, one of Javale's highlights from training camp.

I have no problem with Wall telling McGee to run.

Looked like he was dog tired. I thought it was a big deal reading about it first. Seems like it is just a team leader pushing a teammate.

McGee means a lot to the team and it seems like Wall realizes that Javale needs to have the energy to stay with it all the time.

[Illuminaire]

McGee is going to give half of us an aneurism this year.

Box score production wise, he's already worth a 5/40 deal. A little improvement on the boards and with stupid stuff, and he's easily worth 10-12 million a year. Centers who do what he can - and does - are actually really hard to find.

The problem is, NBA contracts don't let us take anything back for the constant headaches, missed rotations, and attempts to dribble the full length of the court through traffic.

[Zonkerbl]

Question: Weren't a lot of people advocating drafting Roy Hibbert? Would he be an upgrade over Javale, if we were to let Javale walk and signed Hibbert instead?

[Illuminaire]

This was debated pretty heavily last year. The short answer is, they are very similar in present production but Javale clearly has more room to improve. Also, McGee is two years younger.

I think you got with McGee unless he completely hits a wall and fails to improve this year.

[Ruzious]

This was debated pretty heavily last year. The short answer is, they are very similar in present production but Javale clearly has more room to improve. Also, McGee is two years younger.

I think you got with McGee unless he completely hits a wall and fails to improve this year.

I don't know about that - I think Hib still has untapped potential - and playing with a quality PG could really help him. People say he's a poor athlete, but since he lost the weight, I think there's a lot of upside with him. I think it's a coin toss between them.

[Zonkerbl]

Can you win a championship with Hibbert?

[Illuminaire]

Hibbert may have untapped potential, but it's very difficult to argue that he has MORE than McGee... who is younger, more athletic, and still figuring out fundamental aspects of the game.

RE: zonker, I don't think we have enough to know that yet. He's close to good enough, possibly there... but obviously, he's the kind of center who would need to be the 3rd best player on his team, ala the Mavericks/Chandler.

[Ruzious]

Hibbert may have untapped potential, but it's very difficult to argue that he has MORE than McGee... who is younger, more athletic, and still figuring out fundamental aspects of the game.

By the same token, it's impossible to miss that Hibbert is a whole helluvalot more likely to come close to reaching his potential. Remember, Hibbert was a very late bloomer himself.

[Nivek]

Back to the statcube thing a minute. Really, the whole on/off thing. I just want to caution against the conclusion the writer (Schuman?) seemed to reach. The on/off numbers don't really say McGee was the team's most effective player last season. They say that the difference between McGee and teammates at his position was bigger than the difference between any other player on the team and the teammates at that position.

In other words: McGee's on/off numbers benefited from being backed up by schlubs like Hilton Armstrong and Seraphin, etc.

McGee also benefited from Flip's strategy of benching him when McGee got tired or started f-ing up. Wall, for example, played so much that he was on the floor no matter what was happening, no matter how he was playing.

I've said it before, and it's worth mentioning again: It's really important when using stats to make sure we understand what the numbers are actually saying. In this case, they're not saying McGee is "effective" in the sense that Dwight Howard is effective. The numbers are saying McGee was better than the guys who played at his position when he was sitting.

All that said: I think McGee has all-world potential. There's no physical reason (aside from stamina) that he could not become a Howard-esque force in the league. With him, it's all about how hard he's willing to work.

[Illuminaire]

Hibbert may have untapped potential, but it's very difficult to argue that he has MORE than McGee... who is younger, more athletic, and still figuring out fundamental aspects of the game.

By the same token, it's impossible to miss that Hibbert is a whole helluvalot more likely to come close to reaching his potential. Remember, Hibbert was a very late bloomer himself.

That may be true, but it's also not what was being originally argued.

[Illuminaire]

Regardless Ruz, we can probably both agree that this will be a telling year for both players. If McGee can't put it together for a contract year, he's not likely to amount to more than a mediocre starter/super sub for his career. If Hibbert is going to make any additional leaps, they're probably going to happen now as well.

[nate33]

I just wanted to copy a couple of things from the Game 5 game thread so it doesn't get lost:

McGee is quietly averaging 14 points, 11 boards, 2.4 blocks and 1.2 steals in just 29 minutes a game. Per 36, that's 17 points, 13 boards, 3 blocks and 1.5 steals. He's also shooting 54%. The man is going to get paid.

Also, he is going to have some serious trade value by the Trade Deadline if he keeps this up.

Keep McGee. Extend him ASAP.

The guy is going to get better the next 2-3 seasons. This is not a fluke.

I'd give JaVale what Deandre Jordan got. 5 years and in the neighborhood of $40 million.

Deandre actually got $43 million over four years and I'd call that the floor for what Javale's looking at. Marc Gasol got 4 years @ $57.70 million.

In my opinion, the worst plan would be to go into free agency with the plan being "Hope Javale gets lowballed" and then not be willing to match what he's 95% likely to get. He is just not going to get lowballed, so it's most likely a catastrophic hedge that blows up on us.

We actually can still extend him through the end of this month, but it's hard to say whether it would be a better idea to do that or just match what he's going to get without some inside info on what he's asking for now.

So maybe it's time to have this discussion. Let's assume McGee plays the entire season roughly like he has been so far. Let's say he averages roughly 14, 10 and 2.5 in 30 minutes a game with occasional dominance and the usual number of bonehead mistakes on D. How much is he worth?

We have a month to extend him. Should we extend him now? If so, what would the biggest extension offer you would put on the table right now? The ceiling would be Marc Gasol's max offer contract of 4 years $57.7M. There's no point in offering him that much or more because we can always match someone else's max offer this summer using his RFA rights.

[DaRealHibachi]

Just came to say that McGee has impressed me yet again... Remains to be seen if he can keep it up for a long(er) stretch; if so, extend him before the month is over... If not, we might just need to accept that he is what he is and trade him before the deadline...

4/45-50 seems about right...

[verbal8]

We have a month to extend him. Should we extend him now? If so, what would the biggest extension offer you would put on the table right now? The ceiling would be Marc Gasol's max offer contract of 4 years $57.7M. There's no point in offering him that much or more because we can always match someone else's max offer this summer using his RFA rights.

What about starting him with a max deal and having it decline the maximum amount and a partial guarantee the final year. I think the contract size would be similar to DeAndre Jordan. It would benefit the Wizards because in a couple years there would be a few million extra in cap space. It benefits McGee because he gets paid even if something horrible happened this season.

[theboomking]

It is early in the season, but JaVale is averaging 14pts, 11 reb, and 2.4 blk in 30 minutes. Other than Wall, he looks like the only other NBA player on the roster. I think you have to lock him up, perhaps in a front loaded contract.

McGee isn't a winning player yet, but he has shown improvement every year, and is only 23. I think the odds are that Javale would remain a tradeable commodity even on a larger contract.

[Zonkerbl]

Sign McGee. He's doing fine.

Although... it seems like every time we sign someone before the reach free agency it always backfires on us. Except maybe Caron Butler.