Hayward's Hot Hand

[countrybama24]

Article on Yahoo. I mostly liked the quotes from other coaches. The only thing that could prevent him for being in a few all-star games is his aggressiveness and usage, in my opinion. Just another young Jazz player flying under the mainstream radar. He reminds me of Collison in a way, just always finding ways to be productive without the flash.

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/haywards-h ... ymuV68vLYF

''Hayward is starting to really feel his oats as far as playing with confidence and feeling comfortable,'' San Antonio coach Gregg Popovich said April 9 when the Spurs visited Salt Lake City. ''He's really a great player, moving without the basketball, constant motion, aggressive all the time, thinking the game.''
That night, the 6-foot-8 Hayward scored 16 points and added six rebounds and two blocks in the Jazz win. Two days later, he scored 29 in Houston.
In the last five games he has averaged 20.2 points, 4.4. assists, 3.4 rebounds, 1.2 steals and is shooting 64 percent (14 of 22) from 3-point range.
Suns coach Alvin Gentry has called Hayward ''one of the bright young stars in the league.''
''He's the whole package,'' Gentry added. ''He can put it down. He can shoot it from the perimeter. He is a slasher-and-cutter, and on top of all of that, he is a really good defender.''
He also has a physical style that can irritate opponents, perhaps because they don't see past the boyish looks.
Consider his own little block party in Boston on March 28, when he rejected two shots in the span of five seconds by Keyon Dooling and Avery Bradley.
By then, Golden State Warriors coach Mark Jackson already was a believer.
''You can make the case that he's the most valuable player for them against us,'' Jackson said.

[Lava Rock Kid]

He is bound to have a hot hand, He is single you know.

[Spottieottie]

Hayward so far is 2/2 in starting slow and getting extremely hot as the season gets further in. This is a much better trend then vice versa... now if he could keep the momentum all the way to the playoffs, he could be such a killer post-season player. I am drooling thinking about it.

[The59Sound]

Gordon Hayward makes it great to be a Jazz fan. I hope he's a lifer, because he's going to do some special things in this league. The longer he plays, the more surreal it will become that he was booed on draft night.

[HolyToledo]

I was surprised he was booed on draft night. I thought he would be a good player (not as good as he is and will be). It may have been a product of expecting to get a superstar from the long awaited NY Knick pick only to be disappointed that he didnt fit the mode of a Kobe and Lebron-black and athletic. KOC did a great job of picking him and the Jazz fans got their superstar.

[Ming Kong!]

Definitely favorite player lately. SO happy we did rolled the dice on him. Where are the doubters now?

[Litany]

In before obligatory "not hating," "keeping it real," "he's Mike Miller," "he needs to stop thinking he's Manu" post by reapaman.

[erudite23]

Let's talk when he has a usage above 20.

But, still, its becoming obvious that he will be a better player than even my most optimistic project ever thought he could be.


I have never hated a Jazz pick worse than I did at the time he was chosen. Being wrong never felt....so right. Haha.

[d-will8]

Whether or not Hayward has the ability to be a "superstar" or even a multiple time all-star, I feel like it's pretty clear at this point that he can at least have a Tayshaun Prince/Luol Deng type impact. Considering how dissatisfied I was when we drafted him, I can definitely live with that. At the very least, he's going to be an awesome complementary player, especially since he's a better passer and shooter than Prince or Deng.

[StocktonShorts]

Definitely favorite player lately. SO happy we did rolled the dice on him. Where are the doubters now?

We're in the corner booth sharing a crow casserole.

[Wolverine]

He is bound to have a hot hand, He is single you know.

I thought being married lead to a hot hand?

[reapaman]

In before obligatory "not hating," "keeping it real," "he's Mike Miller," "he needs to stop thinking he's Manu" post by reapaman.

Well I won't dissapoint you

And he did stop thinking he was manu and started to look for his jumpshot first then let the rest of his game come too him. First half of the season typically his first move was to penetrate or pass the ball, his primary job is not to be a playmaker. He's a shooter that he needs to shoot to get hot and when he gets hot then he can distribute and drive too the basket all he wants.

And by the way many of you people said he was gonna be a bust, all I said is that he wasn't manu or reggie miller and Deng for that matter. He was and is Mike Miller who was a 15 pt 3 ast and 4 rb guy his second year and no coincidence that Haywards numbers are pretty similar. Nothing wrong with Mike Miller; many of you guys just remeber old mike miller as a spot up shooter and not young mike miller who was distributing, slashing, and killing people. Even with that said, I'll still take Paul George over hayward in a heartbeat.

[Reckless]

He did this last april too. when he figures out how to do this year round he'll be a all star

[countrybama24]

Gordon is already drawing more fouls than miller ever did in his career. Hell score as many, if not more points than mike on less shots, and be a better distributor. On top of that, hes a better defender. Stats may look the same, but Gordon is way better and will improve next year more than mike in his third year because he's younger, and the jazz bring their rookies along slowly. How much do you wanna bet Gordon's career numbers end up better than millers in points, assists, blocks, steals, and free throw attempts?

[ColdBlue]

I certainly had doubts about Hayward after we drafted him, but it didn't take long to realize that he was legit. The guy can flat out play the game.

[reapaman]

Gordon is already drawing more fouls than miller ever did in his career. Hell score as many, if not more points than mike on less shots, and be a better distributor. On top of that, hes a better defender. Stats may look the same, but Gordon is way better and will improve next year more than mike in his third year because he's younger, and the jazz bring their rookies along slowly. How much do you wanna bet Gordon's career numbers end up better than millers in points, assists, blocks, steals, and free throw attempts?

Define "better" because I said hayward could be "better" but slightly. And I don't get the younger thing because Miller was only a month older than hayward his second year. Miller was also the 2nd most important player on the team that year and had usage of 20.9 where hayward is 3rd or even 4th depending on how Harris plays and has a usage of 17.9. Miller drew more defensive attention and was more responsible for whether or not his team won and still played well all season so they are in different situations. Hayward will be more than fine but lets put this all in the correct perspective before we say he will be way better than Miller. We still gotta see Hayward do well all year and see how he performs with more defensive attention and responsibilities.

[countrybama24]

Ok so we're in agreement, he'll have (slightly) better stats across the board and play significantly better defense (and be a better ball handler / distributor) than a former rookie of the year and 6th man of the year. Great.

Hayward's lower usage rate proves his stats are depressed right now, put him in a bigger role a la miller and those go up.

[d-will8]

Offensively, Miller's probably not a bad comparison. I think Hayward will be better than Miller offensively, but not necessarily by a huge margin. His defense really separates him from Miller and puts him more in the Prince/Deng region, though. According to 82games.com, Hayward's opponents' average PER is 9.6. That's pretty damn good. For reference's sake, Iguodala allows an opponent PER of 8.8, while Deng allows one of 10.7. From what I can tell, Miller generally allows one between 16 and 17. It's also worth noting that George, who's probably known as a better defender than Hayward given that he's known as an athlete and did a decent job guarding Rose in the playoffs, allows one of 15.2.

Going beyond this one stat, you'd have to be nuts to argue that Hayward's not a significantly better defender than Miller's ever been. I feel like Hayward has the potential to be an elite defender and Mike Miller with elite defense is a pretty damn good player. I can certainly see the argument for George over Hayward, but I'm not sure I agree with it at this point. Hayward can ball. If you still don't see that, I don't know what to tell you.

[Ming Kong!]

Definitely favorite player lately. SO happy we did rolled the dice on him. Where are the doubters now?

We're in the corner booth sharing a crow casserole.

Well I never watched him in college as I really don't like college basketball, probably just spoiled by NBA talents. I had a friend tell me that he was going to be very good though and to me it was clear that there was something to this kid since he led a small school to the championship game, and almost won. These boards though were highly against the choice though, the GB said we just picked him because he was white. Well, right now there are only 3 players that seem pretty clearly ahead of him from the 2010 draft, Cousins, Monroe and Wall, and I could see him climbing the list too.

[reapaman]

Lets make this clear first, Hayward likely won't be as good of a shooter or rebounder as Miller. I also disagree with the significantly better at defense thing, the eye test says differently. He could possibly be slightly better than Miller defensively but he hasn't shown it imo and he's not even in the conversation with deng, iggy, or george. Hayward does a nice job in help defense, disrupting the lanes, and things like that but when it comes to just just straight on ball and man to man defense (which is what really counts); he's not that strong. My reference would be how someone like rudy gay drove to the basket at will verses hayward the last couple times they faced off while he relied on mostly jumpers when I saw him go against iggy and deng because it was much harder to drive on them.

BTW Monta freaking ellis who defends no one has an opponent PER lower than Paul George and Iman Shumpert for that matter. So I wouldn't hold that as a good reference. PER sucks as a stat. D-Rating is a much better stat and Miller in his second year was 108, Hayward is 109, George is at 99. Even with that said Iggy was not as known for defense his 2nd year and was at 108 and now he's at 97 d-rating. So Hayward could make dramatic improvements, but that remains to be seen.

Yes Hayward can ball and has a chance to be better overall than Mike Miller who was a former rookie and sixth man of the year but that is still a long ways away from the sure fire hall of famer that Manu is.