AZ BLAZER wrote:Many posters here are speculating on the severity of Greg's knee injury, and then also trying to speculate that he will be "eased in" to the Portland lineup. In several published reports, KP has said that the MF was performed on a very small, non-weight bearing part of the knee. In contrast, Amare, Kidd, Martin and Randolph all had big tears in weight bearing areas. They were all brought back too early and suffered further damage/setbacks.
While I agree with the thrust of your post, the bolded portion is incorrect; Amare had a small tear (roughly a centimeter, IIRC) on a non-weight-bearing portion of his knee, much like Oden's. He was inconsistent with his initial rehab efforts and was rushed back, though, that's why he had such an ordeal.
Randolph rehabbed just fine but he's never been especially athletic, so it's hardly noticeable.
Anyway, the rest of your post is solid but that one bit was wrong.
Oden should be a very valuable and intriguing addition to the lineup next year.
DrunkOnMystery wrote:-= original quote snipped =-
62.8% is a good free throw shooter?
And for the record, if you had bothered to read my post, you'd know that I wasn't claiming Oden would be a bad freethrow shooter. I was saying that a claim that he shoots 80% in practice is completely meaningless. It's been claimed that Dwight Howard often makes 30+ in a row in practice. That doesn't change the fact that he's a terrible free throw shooter.
He shot just under 80% from the line in his final year in HS and then spent a large portion of his freshman season at Ohio State shooting free throws left-handed, which dipped his FT% rather noticeably. He's not going to shoot 80% at the NBA level, at least not in his first couple of years, that's clear.
And he might shoot 60-65% as a rook, because that happens a lot but it would be a mistake to think he's as bad at the line as is Howard, because Oden is not. He's a good FT shooter. Not an astonishing free throw shooter, but Duncan-like at least (career 68.4%) or even Karl Malone-esque (career 74.2%, shot over 79% in three consecutive seasons near the end of his career).
Oden's scoring will be in double-digits but where it falls between 10 or 11 points per game and 14-16 ppg will depend on how much Nate McMillan involves Oden in the offense... and that's something that will change from opening day to the All-Star break to the stretch run. We'll have to keep an eye on it but I would say something like 12-14 ppg is pretty reasonable to expect.
For one thing, he'll probably be grabbing 2.5 to 3.0 offensive boards a game and getting a bucket or two that way; for another, he'll probably be shooting 55-60% from the floor because he's not going to take a lot of shots more than 7 or 8 feet from the basket (that said, even Dwight shot 52 and 53 percent in his first two years, so we'll see).
Portland will look to him for dump passes for dunks and for alleys and for a few simple isolations; even if he shoots the 52/53% Dwight shot as a rookie and sophmore, I suspect he'll pick up an extra half-point or a point on his scoring average from his superior free throw shooting, so I'm pretty comfortable with about 13 ppg out of Oden, even if his FG efficiency isn't quite as good as Howard's is at present.
Remember though, some of Dwight's FG% increase came when it became basically impossible to deny him position and Oden's an inch taller and actually about 10 or 15 pounds heavier than Dwight is right now (though I think he said the Blazers want him to lose 5 or 10 pounds just to keep pressure off the knee). In any case, that means he's going to possess the physical wherewithal to get consistently get very deep position on basically anyone in the league aside from Dwight himself and Shaq. That'll help him early on, even if his post moves aren't as refined as they might otherwise be.
Rebounding-wise, I think 10, 10.5 rpg is a pretty good starting point. I don't think he'll play more than 33 mpg and that will hurt his ability to really stuff the stat sheet in that regard but double-digits on the glass is still pretty special and will be a great help to the Blazers.
Shot-blocking isn't what it used to be but Oden isn't a typical center, he's got more shot-blocking prowess than Dwight, IMO. Still, there will be an adjustment period, so I think 2.0, 2.2 bpg is pretty fair and reasonable, maybe even 1.8.
So yeah, something like 13/10/2.0 is about what I expect out of him as a rookie.
Portland can trash all those plans if they start running more of the offense through him than expected and playing him longer minutes, of course... and that might well happen enough in the second half to skew his stats above the projections presented here. It's a really tough call.
conleyorbust wrote:Amare is different. Amare isn't a low post player, he isn't nearly as heavy as Oden, he faces up, blows by, and explodes to finish. Oden gets position with his strength, catches the ball (has great hands), and turns and either dunks or tosses up a little hook. Much easier offensive game not as much volume but the knee injury won't impede Oden in the same way.
Amare is only about 245, just to support conley here. He's not a guy with imposing physical power but he happens to have good body control, excellent explosiveness and is extremely aggressive. It leads to a lot of offensive fouls but he also rams it in your teeth a lot and draws tons of free throws.
Amare's game is primarily founded upon transition offense and the high sidescreen with Nash. He's an excellent mid-range shooter and rolls hard to the rim off of the good screens he sets, then jumps and crams it or finishes either way. He moves very well without the ball and with Shaq, he's even more dangerous because he gets the play where he catches it at the foul line and dive-drives hard to the rim a lot. That play is why he started averaging like 30 ppg once Shaq started playing, he was basically in single coverage when moving towards the rim with the Diesel on the floor because teams were so worried about Shaq's 60% finishing ability.
Amare does have some low-post game; he has a turnaround jumper, a baseline spin, a drop-step and he can hop-step into the lane for a jump hook but he's much more comfortable facing the rim and using his quickness, even in the low post.
Oden is an entirely different animal, even putting aside that he's 2 inches taller and a good 45 pounds heavier.
