Can Monta Ellis play lead guard fulltime in the NBA?

[MightyReds2020]

i don't know why people is still asking this. If you ask Nellie of 2 years back, he already knew Monta's going to be a lead guard and has the tools to be one. he groomed him accordingly, and Monta's pretty much there.

[Chris Cohan]

Bob Fitzgerald says he's not ready.
For now.

[nismolos]

This year? Or last?

I think Jack's unreal clutchness sure helped us... I don't know if you're allowed to "carry" a team in the ass-end of the 4th. Last year, same deal. There wasn't significant amount of time where Jax took over like Tay did... hell, to be honest, I can only think of a handful of players in the league right now who did that.

sorry i'm late. Baron Davis is one of them...more often than Monta. I think the Baron hatred has gone overboard. I agree he had a bad 2nd half of the season but "bad" Baron is still better than 1/2 the starting PG's in the NBA. Monta is a fantastic young guard who has the potential to be an all-star pg... and although I see a high ceiling for Monta as a PG...it will never be as high a ceiling as the dominant PG's in the NBA. Call me a homer, but Baron can be in that superstar list of PG's any given day. Every team needs a superstar and Baron is the closest thing we have to one. When Baron is on top of his game, he is the 2nd best PG in the league after Paul (yes, that is a bold statement and i'm ready to take your heat). Yes, he is a roller-coaster ride and we need consistency. He is very arogant as well. The point i'm trying to make is that I think he CAN be consistent. Our starters played WAY too many minutes...we need a bench. Did we really expect to compete in the playoffs with no bench? I bet if we won 2-3 more games and made the playoffs, we could have given the Lakers a waay bigger scare than Denver did bc Davis would have done the same thing as the 07 playoffs. Can anyone deny he was one of the best players in the 07 playoffs? Does everyone really think he has lost that ability already? He just played a full 82 game season with a S***load of minutes and people are still questioning his stamina. He's getting older but he's not there yet. He's got at least 3 great years left in him.

Give this team a bench, develop our rooks, and we'll really see what Baron can do. I love Monta but I had to post this after watching BBJ's highlights bc it reminded me... I saw a lot of great passes by Monta...definitely all-star potential. But Baron is the one with the natural court-vision that all superstar pg's possess. We need to keep him around a little longer damnit. Maybe if we can actually bring in some guard depth we can start talking about Davis not being here. But we CAN compete now...especially with the Mavs/Suns/and now Spurs on the decline. I do believe Monta is a great "lead" guard... but we are a better team with Baron. Right now at least.

[nismolos]

Baron isn't Paul or Williams, either.

Parker is the obvious name. I ran a long list of young lead guard types Ellis has to be grouped with, including what would be called "pure" point guards and players like Stuckey, Parker, Ellis.

Ellis comes out near the top of the future class. Top 10 for sure, probably top 6/7, top 5 very possible.

Baron is no Paul, but he's better than Williams. Now...who actually performed better for the season as a whole? Williams. But put the low-post players/depth that Williams had around Baron and his assists would have gone up. Baron has more talent and when he actually controls his talent (07 playoffs and first half of the season) he can even be better than Paul on a given night. Ask Dwayne Wade. He respects Davis probably more than any guard in the NBA.

[nismolos]

I assume if Monta doesn't break his neck again this summer he'll be in full PG mode at training camp, like he was supposed to be last summer.

BTW, in practice Nellie used to tell Monta he wasn't allowed to shoot... he should drive to the hole but had to look around, decide what to do, pass it or back it out, not shoot it himself. I thought that was pretty cool.

I remember that too... he did it at the beginning of the 06-07 season I believe.

[Chris Cohan]

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Baron is no Paul, but he's better than Williams. Now...who actually performed better for the season as a whole? Williams. But put the low-post players/depth that Williams had around Baron and his assists would have gone up. Baron has more talent and when he actually controls his talent (07 playoffs and first half of the season) he can even be better than Paul on a given night. Ask Dwayne Wade. He respects Davis probably more than any guard in the NBA.

Where are you getting this stuff from?!
Good to have the Homer Crew back in town for the draft.

[GSW2K4]

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Baron is no Paul, but he's better than Williams. Now...who actually performed better for the season as a whole? Williams. But put the low-post players/depth that Williams had around Baron and his assists would have gone up. Baron has more talent and when he actually controls his talent (07 playoffs and first half of the season) he can even be better than Paul on a given night. Ask Dwayne Wade. He respects Davis probably more than any guard in the NBA.

I see what you're saying here -- I do think Baron hate goes too far sometimes. He is a talented player and has been that superstar who has put the team on his back on occasion... so has Monta... and Jackson for that matter.

But there's the talent vs. ball-dominance vs. dollar value issue at work here as well.

So when you consider who we'd rather depend on in the future, I'd rather depend on Monta because we just can't depend on Baron as his game declines...

Not many would dispute that Baron has talent to be a hall of fame point guard. However, he's among the most ball dominant guards in the league AND shoots the most threes. The problem with that is that it ruins continuity for the team. Add to that his approach to the game -- concern with the entertainment aspects of NBA basketball rather than finer aspects of efficient basketball -- and he's not worth the money he might demand. None of these things has anything to do with the talent around him as much as his own approach to the game.

So when you compare him to Williams... if memory serves me correctly, D. Williams thoroughly outplayed Baron last year in the playoffs when Baron was probably playing some of the best basketball of his career. People might want to attribute that to injury/fatigue, but Williams played more minutes and more games than Baron last season. Fact is, Williams has proven to be the better post-season pg in a very short time.

You have to consider that relative to the competition in the west, we can't afford to have Baron chucking away games. A team built around that chucking is not going to go far... so that decreases his value despite his considerable talent.

[nismolos]

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Where are you getting this stuff from?!
Good to have the Homer Crew back in town for the draft.

I don't have a "source" to list here because i'm not turning in a term paper. But I do clearly recall Dwayne Wade stating that Baron was the hardest player to guard in the NBA. He was even in his fave-5 .

[Chris Cohan]

What in the world are you talking about?