DeJuan Blair

ManuGino · Post #21 » by **ManuGino** » Mon May 21, 2012 4:00 am

Diaw > Blair

It's that simple.

Neal with it. (Had to do it justinandimcool)

Post #22 » by **Nolan** » Mon May 21, 2012 4:13 am

He just hasn't really been a good fit for us this year. We need him to play center, but he's not a center.

He's a good player and he'll be effective for some other team if we choose to move him.

yellowsub264 · Post #23 » by **yellowsub264** » Mon May 21, 2012 4:24 am

I think its just the matchups in this series. He could get some minutes against OKC against Collison, but the Spurs front court is clicking without him

bullsnewdynasty · Post #24 » by **bullsnewdynasty** » Mon May 21, 2012 4:26 am

He is a very good player and easily worth a 2nd round pick.

Basileus777 · Post #25 » by **Basileus777** » Mon May 21, 2012 4:35 am

I'm not sure what people expect from Blair. He's terrible defensively and needs to play center and be near the basket to do anything on offense. The Spurs have more skilled big men who can space the floor and finish inside more effectively, so he has no real role on the team anymore. Blair needs to develop his jump shot and improve on defense if he wants to be a good rotation player.

IBProfane · Post #26 » by **IBProfane** » Mon May 21, 2012 7:32 am

Funny that the 3-4 Spurs fans on this thread all say that he's terrible. Meanwhile he posted 9.5 ppg on 53% shooting, 5.5 rpg (2.4 offensive), 0.9 spg in just 21.3 minutes per. Oh yeah, and he makes less than $1m per year. I've watched DeJuan Blair play at least 30-40 times since he's been in the league and he's not terrible at all. He's might not be a good defender, but he's light years better than Carlos Boozer or even Amare Stoudamire. His main problem is he doesn't have any length, and is limited athletically. I guarantee you there are about 29 teams in the league that would give the Spurs a 2nd round pick for DeJuan Blair. Boris Diaw isn't substantially better than him. Diaw is a better defender, passer and decision maker, Blair is a better rebounder and scorer. You're crazy if you think otherwise.

giberish · Post #27 » by **giberish** » Mon May 21, 2012 7:45 am

Diaw is better on both offense and especially defense (Diaw is generally underrated, even fat and apathetic he was the clear best player on Charlotte. They were somewhat competitive with him and historically bad after he left).

Bonner is at least as good on defense and spreads the floor - a big win on offense giving more room in the lane for everyone else by taking a big man to the 3-point line.

Splitter (and of course Duncan) are quality defensive centers - a role Blair can't fill.

Blair is good enough to be a rotation player in the league, though his limitations (only works around the basket on offense but can't provide the interior defense expected of a center) keep him to a 4th big man type role, except SA has 4 better bigs so he's a 5th big.

CoachPop · Post #28 » by **CoachPop** » Mon May 21, 2012 7:48 am

IBProfane wrote:Funny that the 3-4 Spurs fans on this thread all say that he's terrible. Meanwhile he posted 9.5 ppg on 53% shooting, 5.5 rpg (2.4 offensive), 0.9 spg in just 21.3 minutes per. Oh yeah, and he makes less than $1m per year. I've watched DeJuan Blair play at least 30-40 times since he's been in the league and he's not terrible at all. He's might not be a good defender, but he's light years better than Carlos Boozer or even Amare Stoudamire. His main problem is he doesn't have any length, and is limited athletically. I guarantee you there are about 29 teams in the league that would give the Spurs a 2nd round pick for DeJuan Blair. Boris Diaw isn't substantially better than him. Diaw is a better defender, passer and decision maker, Blair is a better rebounder and scorer. You're crazy if you think otherwise.

If you want to look up stats, the only one that matters is his defensive rating. I'll save you the trouble of looking it up. Blair has the worst defensive ranking of any starter in the league. Now, the guys you mentioned as points of comparison, they're miles better than Blair on offense. So while they defensive deficiencies might cancel out 50% of the offensive contributions, Blair's cancels out 150% of his. For every 1 good thing he does on offense (ie his cuts to the basket on pick and rolls, 'cause that's all he's got), he does 1.5 bad things on defense and the boards.

Basically, Splitter is better at the one thing Blair is good at, running the pick and role, and he's 1000x better at everything else. And Diaw? He's got more BBIQ in his pinky than Blair could ever imagine possessing.

Anyways, Blair for late first round pick or bust! I say late first round, because I do think he has talent, and could be useful on another team. Just not this team, with its high standards and all.

SVictor · Post #29 » by **SVictor** » Mon May 21, 2012 8:03 am

IBProfane wrote:Funny that the 3-4 Spurs fans on this thread all say that he's terrible. Meanwhile he posted 9.5 ppg on 53% shooting, 5.5 rpg (2.4 offensive), 0.9 spg in just 21.3 minutes per. Oh yeah, and he makes less than $1m per year. I've watched DeJuan Blair play at least 30-40 times since he's been in the league and he's not terrible at all. He's might not be a good defender, but he's light years better than Carlos Boozer or even Amare Stoudamire. His main problem is he doesn't have any length, and is limited athletically. I guarantee you there are about 29 teams in the league that would give the Spurs a 2nd round pick for DeJuan Blair. Boris Diaw isn't substantially better than him. Diaw is a better defender, passer and decision maker, Blair is a better rebounder and scorer. You're crazy if you think otherwise.

He is a seriviceable and cheap forward that plays center. We simply had other needs.

If Spurs were to make a serious run to the title, they couldn't afford to start DeJuan at the center. Imagine that we faced Indiana in the Finals, and he had to deal with Hibbert + West? I would have paid for Joel Anthony :lol:

UDRIH14 · Post #30 » by **UDRIH14** » Mon May 21, 2012 9:09 am

i prefer the fatty diaw over dancing bear circus shots

AnaheimRoyale · Post #31 » by **AnaheimRoyale** » Mon May 21, 2012 9:21 am

Blair can be a valuable player somewhere, but I don't think it'll be the Spurs, for several reasons. Firstly, Blair doesn't mesh well with our current players, he's just too small and unathletic to guard bigger guys, and lacks skills that would let him compensate (like being a good shooter, or being able to run down the court quickly, or great passing skills). Yeh, he has a big wing span, but the guy rarely jumps, because he doesn't want to risk injury. That last point highlights an important aspect to Blair; the man is a pro, in every sense of the word. He understands this is a business, so he'll behave and say all the right things in the media, but he knows it's up to him to put himself first, and in the position to make the most money he can. He's not going to do that on the Spurs, because of the aforementioned problems, and also because Blair tries to do too much on O and not enough on D, in order to showcase himself. Popp didn't call him out last year for lack of professionalism for no reason.

The guy would make mid-level money on the free agent market, but the Spurs are sure to pick up his super cheap team option of $1mill, forcing him into the same situation next year (but with Splitter and Diaw taking more of his minutes). It's not fun to be Dajuan Blair right now. He's hopefully just going to keep being a pro, and wait out his contract expiring in 2013, at which point the Spurs might actually need him, or will just sign guys like Milsap or A.Jefferson or Ibaka or Harden who are more suited to the role anyhow.

Blair isn't untalented, and has brought good things to the Spurs, he just doesn't fit great here anymore, much like the Spurs knew Scola wouldn't fit. They hated to trade him for nothing, but they had no choice, nobody else would offer value, and the time to wait was over. It was a 2nd rounder or nothing. Let's hope the Spurs get better value for Blair.

rockmanslim · Post #32 » by **rockmanslim** » Mon May 21, 2012 9:30 am

CoachPop wrote:If you want to look up stats, the only one that matters is his defensive rating. I'll save you the trouble of looking it up.

Where are these defensive ratings? I don't have a dog in this fight, just want to know for future reference to look up D ratings for players in general.

PippenAintEasy · Post #33 » by **PippenAintEasy** » Mon May 21, 2012 9:59 am

I remember I was absolutely pissed at the Bulls for taking Taj Gibson over Blair.

Blair does have explosive games from time to time, and can put up some gaudy rebound numbers. But Taj Gibsons defense completely destroys Blair's.

Jimmy Recard · Post #34 » by **Jimmy Recard** » Mon May 21, 2012 10:01 am

Blair and James Anderson will probably be dealt in the off-season. Anderson, in particular, i thought would be much better than what he is.

manou · Post #35 » by **manou** » Mon May 21, 2012 10:14 am

Unlike many other spurs fans, I like Blair. He has value, you don't have several 20-20 games as a rookie by accident.
Thing is, he plays on energy. His first year, he was mad at being a second round draftee. Thus he played with enormous energy, saying "you mad" at all the other teams. But he's settled greatly this season (last one too). Too bad, he clearly can help teams. For my spurs, I don't know, but he has value on the market.

manou · Post #36 » by **manou** » Mon May 21, 2012 10:26 am

IBProfane wrote:Boris Diaw isn't substantially better than him.

Yes, he is. He's better at everything except rebounding.
His bball IQ is so much better... he facilitates the offense, everything goes smoothly with him. Diaw is a monster upgrade for our team.

Diaw+Jax >>>>>> Jefferson+Blair, best mid-season acquisitions ever for my team.

The Aztec · Post #37 » by **The Aztec** » Mon May 21, 2012 10:31 am

rockmanslim wrote:
CoachPop wrote:If you want to look up stats, the only one that matters is his defensive rating. I'll save you the trouble of looking it up.

Where are these defensive ratings? I don't have a dog in this fight, just want to know for future reference to look up D ratings for players in general.

I read that Blair is statistically the worst defender in the NBA, when opponents go up against him their efficiency rating is on par with that of an allstar or superstar. I've been trying to find the thread on another site but no luck.

The Spurs need to try to get a 1st round pick for him, try to draft an athletic 4 that can defend. Teams around the league actually think very highly of him, he was a starter most of the season had nice stats and he's a cheap big man. I think the Spurs may be able to get a pick as low as 20 for him, maybe even a bit lower if there is a team that just sucks at drafting and would rather have an NBA player.

SVictor · Post #38 » by **SVictor** » Mon May 21, 2012 10:38 am

manou wrote:
Diaw+Jax >>>>>> Jefferson+Blair, best mid-season acquisitions ever for my team.

This.

Post #39 » by **kingkirk** » Mon May 21, 2012 10:43 am

Every big playing ahead of him is playing better and he doesnt offer anything different to what they do.

Diaw has the guard skills and range. Splitter offers the size, length and defense whilst Bonner provides the dead eye shooting from deep.

The of course you have TD.

StClairBandit · Post #40 » by **StClairBandit** » Mon May 21, 2012 10:46 am

DeJuan is a good player but with the emergence of Tiago Splitter and the addition of Boris he's basically the odd man out on the team. The both of them are blatantly better players within the Spurs system at least and are miles better on defense. I would not be surprised if he gets minutes against the Thunder though. I remember watching him pretty much win a game for the Spurs against them in the regular season.