Andray Blatche - Resurgence Thread ( Merged )

[Silvie Lysandra]

For what it's worth:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... 01&y2=2006

http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... 01&y2=2006

Now, for their careers up to that point, Z-Bo is better, but Blatche isn't far behind in rebounding rate, he scores about as Z-Bo at the same age (it can be inferred that the difference in PER is largely due to lower usage for Dray).

The question is that will Dray get it 5 years earlier than Z-Bo did? Keep in mind that 1 summer of 7DD was greater than anything Z-Bo had did to that point, and Z-Bo was considered even more of a cancer.

[Illuminaire]

2005-6 is Randolph's worst season by far. Every year before and after was significantly better. Why pick that one out to compare to Dray?

Edit: Blatche gets a lot more steals and blocks. Assists and turnovers look surprisingly similar. Zach has a huge edge in rebounding, though - 3% is not a small difference. It's actually effectively 23% more rebounds per missed shot than Blatche gets. (Possible late night math fail noted here )

Zach's TS% is also a good bit higher, mainly because he draws a lot more fouls.

We all know Blatche *could* be a better player than Randolph. To date, though, he hasn't really done so.

[sashae]

[Ruzious]

Whoo, that's it in a nutshell.

[gesa2]

Thank you for this Sashae, thank you. Made my night!

[JonathanJoseph]

I'm very pro-Blatche, but that's hilarious.

[hands11]

Amare has had far more serious injuries than any Blatche has had -- including the injury from when Blatche was shot. Amare has overcome those injuries by working his ass off. Blatche hasn't demonstrated anything resembling Amare's work ethic.

Aboslutely, but there aren't very many players who you can say could be as good/effective/impactful as Amare. It's a short list and Blatche is on it.

That's why I think a disciplinarian coach or player to act as mentor for Blatche is about the most important thing the Wizards could invest in (and I have no doubt that the accumulating cap room will target a grizzled, hardass veteran in the mold of a Garnett). If Blatche fulfills 75% of his promise, then the Wizards already have a championship core in Wall/Blatche. What this season's playoffs are showing us is that youth isn't the handicap it used to be (see: Chicago, Memphis, OKC). OKC started off 3-25 just 2 seasons ago. We could be closer than anyone thinks if Blatche matures.

Again, Blatche is still only 24 and has been a "starter" for less than 100 NBA games. In about 30 of those games, he has been an all-NBA, dominant, "best player on the floor" player. Taking the glass-half-empty view of that reality seems awfully short-sighted to me.

[bulletproof_32]

Wow. I'm listening to a conference call between Uncle Ted and Wizards season ticket holders and some guy just put Blatche on blast. Said he was an 11 year season ticket holder but won't be renewing because he’s had enough of watching Andray Blatche. I think he hates Blatche more than Rico.

Ted responsed that he believes in redemption and supports Blatche. Generally sounded like he really likes what Blatche brings to the team and that he's not going anywhere.

[dandridge 10]

Wow. I'm listening to a conference call between Uncle Ted and Wizards season ticket holders and some guy just put Blatche on blast. Said he was an 11 year season ticket holder but won't be renewing because he’s had enough of watching Andray Blatche. I think he hates Blatche more than Rico.

Ted responsed that he believes in redemption and supports Blatche. Generally sounded like he really likes what Blatche brings to the team and that he's not going anywhere.

Yeah, I listened to the conference call too. Not very encouraging for us Blatche haters...although Ted did seem to acknowledge that other teams probably don't value Blatche very high when Ted said something to the effect of ..."its funny you want to trade Blatche because you don't like him but at the same time you expect other teams to want him."

[RickRoll_inDC]

I think we can all safely say that Blatche is at least relatively talented. He has the skills to play, he's just a bit of a bone head.

I'm with Ted on this one in that he deserves another chance. I keep looking back to two seasons ago when we basically blew up the team and Blatche was the go-to guy. He was playing some great ball then and he's definitely capable of doing it again.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

IMO when "April Fools" Blatche, (I like that because that's the month he plays like he is an all-NBA player), is the sixth man the Wizards will have a terrific team.

Andray is good but not the way Flip wants to use him. He's neither efficient enough at scoring nor consistently productive at rebounding to be among the great players in this league. For the most part, he and McGee together is a soft frontcourt. I have more faith in McGee's physical talent and room for improvement than I do in Blatche stopping the ball. He's a great player OCCASIONALLY. A good bit of the time Blatche plays lethargically and/or selfishly.

I think he's a slightly above average player, who when in shape is a good player. Saunders, however, gives Andray license to dominate the ball as if he were a great player. That is the problem more than Andray IMO. This coach allows and enables Blatche to play bad basketball.

[verbal8]

IMO when "April Fools" Blatche, (I like that because that's the month he plays like he is an all-NBA player), is the sixth man the Wizards will have a terrific team.

I think Blatche is probably at his best as a small ball center. If you consider him a back-up center, he is the 3rd best in the league after Gortat and Haywood.

While he is not as much of a post presence as he could/should be, he can provide spacing for Wall or Crawford to attack the basket. He also may look a little better with a good spot-up shooter in the line-up.

[Ruzious]

IMO when "April Fools" Blatche, (I like that because that's the month he plays like he is an all-NBA player), is the sixth man the Wizards will have a terrific team.

Andray is good but not the way Flip wants to use him. He's neither efficient enough at scoring nor consistently productive at rebounding to be among the great players in this league. For the most part, he and McGee together is a soft frontcourt. I have more faith in McGee's physical talent and room for improvement than I do in Blatche stopping the ball. He's a great player OCCASIONALLY. A good bit of the time Blatche plays lethargically and/or selfishly.

I think he's a slightly above average player, who when in shape is a good player. Saunders, however, gives Andray license to dominate the ball as if he were a great player. That is the problem more than Andray IMO. This coach allows and enables Blatche to play bad basketball.

You're saying Andray is a good player, but because of the way Saunders has used him - he's a bad player.

The obvious question then is - How should he be used - keeping in mind that a player can't really be good if he isn't "the e word" - efficient?

[nate33]

^ Also, it's not like Flip had a realistic option to bring him off the bench. We have to find someone better to be the starter first. To say that Flip used him wrong is misleading.

[fishercob]

While I was popping a woody the other night watching Joakim Noah play, two sequences stood out:

1) The block/steal of Wade, dribbles the length of the floor, dishes and gets it back and laying it in
2)The bounce pass from the high post/ top of the key to Boozer for the dunk

My enthusiasm turned to frustration and anger though b/c I thought about Blatche. Dray has a very similar body type to Noah, though he's clearly not in as good shape. He's got the skill to make both those plays I described and has done so on occasion.

But the major difference between the two guys is the contents of their skulls and their chests. Blatche may even have more offensive skill and the ability to score more, but he's so much worse in every other way -- shot selection, sticky hands, over dribbling, rebounding defense, body language, etc. Those differences are what make Noah a winning player (as in, a vital component to one of the best team's in the league and possibly soon-to-be champion) and Blatche a.... well, not.

[gesa2]

I find myself coming back to this thread just to look at this again.

But Fisher, I agree with you. Blatche won't ever be what he could be. drive and motor are skills too, and he lacks them.

[Nivek]

I keep looking back to two seasons ago when we basically blew up the team and Blatche was the go-to guy. He was playing some great ball then and he's definitely capable of doing it again.

He actually wasn't playing great ball. At least not for more than a few games. He scored a lot because he shot a lot and he played a lot of minutes. He was still inefficient -- far too inefficient to be a go-to guy on a good team.

[MF23]

^
That team couldn't win a game either. If he was "great" he would have lead that team to at least a few wins

[LyricalRico]

^
That team couldn't win a game either. If he was "great" he would have lead that team to at least a few wins

[JonathanJoseph]

^
That team couldn't win a game either. If he was "great" he would have lead that team to at least a few wins

Hold up right there. The Wizards won 5 of their last 9 (a 10%of the season stretch) playing through Blatche with a absurdly barren roster. Mike Miller, Shaun Livngston, Fab Oberto, James Singleton were playing major minutes. The Wiz had a similar stretch this season with othyus jeffers and Larry Owens and Yi (!) playing big minutes. The common denominator was that Blatche was playing hard and playing well. I do not care what the stats say, he was playing all-NBA caliber, winning basketball.

Theres plenty of reason to be skeptical that Blatche can do that consistently, but let's not rewrite history.