Looks like Kanter is taking the offseason seriously.....

[xstockholmsyndromex]

https://twitter.com/Enes_Kanter/status/ ... to/1/large


Dude looks to be in MUCH better shape.

[nguyenbalong]

It bothers me seeing his arms bigger than his legs.

[StocktonShorts]

It bothers me seeing his arms bigger than his legs.

And his cleavage better than his instructor's.

[BarneyGumble]

This pic gave me a hard on no homo, basketball related wood here.....

[carrottop12]

At the very least, this shows that he's a good worker, which really is a huge concearn with young big men who have just been bigger than everyone else they've played against. If he's putting that kind of work into his game, we'll be in good shape!

[retiredcoach]

by BarneyGumble on Wed Aug 29, 2012 10:05 am
This pic gave me a hard on no homo, basketball related wood here.....

Okay, Barney, here are some "wood" rasps to take care of the problem.

[erudite23]

Wow. That is one ripped dude. He really does have an amazing body for this game. I'm not sure how this compares to the shape he was in last season, but as he continues to mature and work, I think he'll be in the 270-280 range. If he retains the mobility we saw last season, he'll be a force to be reckoned with. I think he's a cinch to be a monster rebounder and post defender. If he develops his back to the basket game and that jumper, he has a chance to be a star.

[QuantumMacgyver]

Big deal. HIstory proves that no matter what he does it'll take 5+ years before he develops any true reliable offensive skills. Until then he is nothing more than a rebounder and defender.

[countrybama24]

Big deal. No matter what he does it'll take 5+ years before he develops any true reliable offensive skills. Until then he is nothing more than a rebounder and defender.

5+??? You're insane, it'll be 2-3 until he is a good offensive player and by year 5 he'll reach his peak. Teams kill for a big, strong mobile big man with offensive skill. And having an elite rebounder and solid defender at the 5 alone is incredibly valuable.

Think about the "training" he's had. Prep school and UK practices (calipari is an awful coach imo, simply a good recruiter) offered him nothing, then no training camp. Compare that to Al Horford or other college big men who got years under much better coaches (not to mention actual game time), or Hibbert who took all 4 years at georgetown to develop. You'll be eating crow in the middle of year 3 at the latest.

[QuantumMacgyver]

Big deal. No matter what he does it'll take 5+ years before he develops any true reliable offensive skills. Until then he is nothing more than a rebounder and defender.

5+??? You're insane, it'll be 2-3 until he is a good offensive player and by year 5 he'll reach his peak. Teams kill for a big, strong mobile big man with offensive skill. And having an elite rebounder and solid defender at the 5 alone is incredibly valuable.

Think about the "training" he's had. Prep school and UK practices (calipari is an awful coach imo, simply a good recruiter) offered him nothing, then no training camp. Compare that to Al Horford or other college big men who got years under much better coaches (not to mention actual game time), or Hibbert who took all 4 years at georgetown to develop. You'll be eating crow in the middle of year 3 at the latest.

I absolutely could not agree more. Check out my sig.

[erudite23]

Big deal. No matter what he does it'll take 5+ years before he develops any true reliable offensive skills. Until then he is nothing more than a rebounder and defender.

5+??? You're insane, it'll be 2-3 until he is a good offensive player and by year 5 he'll reach his peak. Teams kill for a big, strong mobile big man with offensive skill. And having an elite rebounder and solid defender at the 5 alone is incredibly valuable.

Think about the "training" he's had. Prep school and UK practices (calipari is an awful coach imo, simply a good recruiter) offered him nothing, then no training camp. Compare that to Al Horford or other college big men who got years under much better coaches (not to mention actual game time), or Hibbert who took all 4 years at georgetown to develop. You'll be eating crow in the middle of year 3 at the latest.

Haha. It pays to think for a sec before you respond.

[QuantumMacgyver]

Big deal. No matter what he does it'll take 5+ years before he develops any true reliable offensive skills. Until then he is nothing more than a rebounder and defender.

5+??? You're insane, it'll be 2-3 until he is a good offensive player and by year 5 he'll reach his peak. Teams kill for a big, strong mobile big man with offensive skill. And having an elite rebounder and solid defender at the 5 alone is incredibly valuable.

Think about the "training" he's had. Prep school and UK practices (calipari is an awful coach imo, simply a good recruiter) offered him nothing, then no training camp. Compare that to Al Horford or other college big men who got years under much better coaches (not to mention actual game time), or Hibbert who took all 4 years at georgetown to develop. You'll be eating crow in the middle of year 3 at the latest.

Haha. It pays to think for a sec before you respond.

In his defense, my sig wasn't up yet. I posted and then thought "I should let everyone know where my idiotic statement is coming from", so this very thing could be avoided. By the time I added my sig he had commented. The fault lies entirely with me.

[erudite23]

Also, if you look at the history of the NBA over the last 12 years, since the 2001 draft when high schoolers really started to come into the league en mass, and look simply at the TS% of all big men over that time, you see that few have outperformed Kanter at his age. I've compiled some numbers below for 19 and 20 year old big men, ranked according to True Shooting % with a reference of their usage rates to the side to get a feel for the volume at which they are scoring as well. Here's how it looks:

Player - TS% - Usage Rate
1. Dwight Howard 57.1% / 16.7%
2. Tyson Chandler 54.3% / 16.6%
3. Derrick Favors 54.2% / 17.1%
4. Eddy Curry 54.0% / 20.7%
5. Enes Kanter 53.9% / 17.3%
(Kevin Garnett 52.2% / 17.6%)
6. Chris Bosh 51.3% / 18.3%
7. Spencer Hawes 48.6% / 19.2%
8. Bismack Biyombo 48.0 / 13.1%
8. Eddie Griffin 45.6% / 18.4%
10. Kwame Brown 45.0% / 18.6%
11. Kris Humphries 41.9% / 20.2%


If we move up to 20 year olds here's how it looks:
Player - TS% - USG%
1. DeAndre Jordan 58.5% / 13.9%
2. Greg Monroe 57.5% / 15.4%
3. Brook Lopez 56.8% / 20.3%
4. Serge Ibaka 56.2% / 16.2%
5. Al Jefferson 55.4% / 21.2%
6. Nene Hilario 54.5% / 18.7%
7. Kevin Love 53.8% / 21.0%
8. Ryan Anderson 53.2% / 18.6%
9. Amare Stoudemire 53.0% / 21.5%
10. Johan Petro 53.0% / 13.7%
11. DeMarcus Cousins 48.4% / 27.2%
12. Tristan Thompson 46.9% / 19.2%
13. Darrell Arthur 45.6% / 16.3%

What does this list tell us? First, it shows that Kanter performed exactly as you would expect an elite young big man to perform. He was not on a team that allowed him to use a lot of possessions, so he posted great efficiency in fairly limited--but not extremely so--usage. He is right in the same range as the very best 19 year old rookie bigs of the last dozen years, with the lone exception of Dwight Howard who towers above everyone else.

Secondly, it shows the difference between 19 year olds and 20 year olds, as the 2nd list does not include any more impressive names than the first list, but it skews higher overall, suggesting that the extra year of development makes a significant difference in the performance of a player. Even as a 20 year old, Kanter would have acquitted himself very well.

So, despite all the minutiae, despite all the concerns over being blocked too much, not being explosive enough, not having a left hand and not being black, he compares very well with other players who have been in his position (and incidentally enough, so does Derrick Favors). This is no guarantee that he develops from here, but I do think its a good sifting indicator. The true busts--like Kwame, Griffin and (to a lesser degree) Hawes--all stick out like sore thumbs.....with the one exception of Eddy Curry, who was clearly talented enough to play, but failed for far different reasons. It's a small sample size, but it gives you a picture of what you're comparing to.

[QuantumMacgyver]

Thanks Erudite. Interesting stuff!

[reapaman]

You know whats hilarious. Erudite used a true shooting % argument a couple months ago in referenced to Jefferson and after I pointed out to you that guys like Deandre Jordan and Tyson chandler have multiple seasons of significantly higher TS% than kevin love, aldridge, prime KG, Prime duncan ect... you even admitted it was a huge failure. So why are you using it again? Usage rate aint helping either your cause in this case either (although its a good stat when used in other ways). True shooting on the other hand should never be used ever, period. I mean you named 24 people and the #1 highest TS % was D. Jordan, did you realize that? He shouldn't even be in the same league offensively as a majority of those guys even at that age.

Some people don't realize that having a lesser role and playing against 2nd team units should actually benefit you numbers percentage wise. Your more likely to shoot better playing against backups and having teams focus on other more than you. Kanter had tons of open shots and easy oppurtunties to score and based on the stats from hoop data I post 100 times, it proves his shooting was bad. The only thing he did well was put backs and dunks. And whenever he tried to do his go to moves back in the youth league or other international events which was basically try to shoot over people, he usually got blocked. Am I the only one that said he got blocked alot when he did that? far from it. Was he getting blocked dunking and put backing? Not much . I said that before the draft he would get blocked alot trying to shoot over people in the nba and thats what happened last season. I'm not making stuff up, I actually think about these things. Plus that was against alot of second unit teams, I can only imagine how much he will get blocked playing major minutes versus first team units.

As for his shot, like I said I can see if he was getting doubled team alot or constantly be forced into bad positions but he wasn't. He was lefted open alot. In that situation you should shoot better than what he did if your a good shooter. He is clearly not. I mean even if his shooting numbers from each jump shooting spot goes up by 5% which is a huge improvement for anyone, his numbers will still be very bad. And like I said every player I can think of that didn't already have an acceptable jumper or post moves coming into the NBA ala rose, james, dwight, josh smith, rondo, ect.. either still don't have a reliable jumper or took 5 + years to develop one no matter how hard they tried (well from an outsiders point of veiw since we can never be sure how truely hard they worked at it). So my question is, why will Kanter be any different?

[QuantumMacgyver]

Reapaman, everything point you made about Kanter's percentages are solid. However, they also counteract your main argument. I agree that these stats have flaws, as does every single stat imaginable. That being said, every point you make as to why Kanter's percentages are misleading also apply to nearly every other player listed above. Most of them were in situations very similar to Kanter's where they were not the first option on the floor and therefore got easier shots. The point being that these players are a great pool of comparison because they are similar in age, and MOST of them were in very similar situations. No stat is universally true. These stats simply have a certain weight to them as far as stats go.

I don't imagine many people will disagree that Kanter is going to have a difficult time in regard to getting his shots blocked. However, I feel most people have faith that he will find ways around, that a la the Up-and-UnderTaker, etc. Bottom line is Kanter has an elite skill set and a great work ethic. Two things that every player needs to succeed.

[MeestR]

i just think this is a little refreshing seeing as how most our big men have troubles with extra chins, extra twinkies, extra idiocy, or extra short arms. nice seeing this center actually trying to improve.

[jazzgasm]

At the very least, this shows that he's a good worker, which really is a huge concearn with young big men who have just been bigger than everyone else they've played against. If he's putting that kind of work into his game, we'll be in good shape!

+ 1

[erudite23]

You know whats hilarious. Erudite used a true shooting % argument a couple months ago in referenced to Jefferson and after I pointed out to you that guys like Deandre Jordan and Tyson chandler have multiple seasons of significantly higher TS% than kevin love, aldridge, prime KG, Prime duncan ect... you even admitted it was a huge failure. So why are you using it again? Usage rate aint helping either your cause in this case either (although its a good stat when used in other ways). True shooting on the other hand should never be used ever, period. I mean you named 24 people and the #1 highest TS % was D. Jordan, did you realize that? He shouldn't even be in the same league offensively as a majority of those guys even at that age.

Ugh. I'm a glutton for punishment.

Do you even understand TS%? I'm not sure where you think I said that, but I certainly did not say any such thing. TS is a great metric because it gives you a thumbnail of how efficiently a player scores taking FTs, two pointers and three pointers into account. Everything is considered, and it becomes a rough measurement of how efficient a player is in converting the shots he takes.

Usage measures how much you shoot.

And, finally, TOs measure how much you give the ball away, which taken in context of how much you shoot and how efficiently you make those shots, is a very meaningful number.


Throw those three together, and you have a good approximation of the overall offensive capabilities of a player. For example, DeAndre Jordan's phenomenal TS% as a rookie is a great number. However, when taken into consideration with the fact that he had one of the two or three lowest usage rates on the list, it is far less impressive, because it tells you that he was mostly just finishing gimme shots. Meanwhile, Amare's mediocre TS% for a 20 year old is easier to swallow, because he was creating far more shots than many of the other players on that list. Its a dual spectrum. Enes, meanwhile, has a usage that is about average for the players on these lists.

Some people don't realize that having a lesser role and playing against 2nd team units should actually benefit you numbers percentage wise. Your more likely to shoot better playing against backups and having teams focus on other more than you. Kanter had tons of open shots and easy oppurtunties to score and based on the stats from hoop data I post 100 times, it proves his shooting was bad. The only thing he did well was put backs and dunks. And whenever he tried to do his go to moves back in the youth league or other international events which was basically try to shoot over people, he usually got blocked. Am I the only one that said he got blocked alot when he did that? far from it. Was he getting blocked dunking and put backing? Not much . I said that before the draft he would get blocked alot trying to shoot over people in the nba and thats what happened last season. I'm not making stuff up, I actually think about these things. Plus that was against alot of second unit teams, I can only imagine how much he will get blocked playing major minutes versus first team units.

All of that comes out in the wash. I don't care if Kanter gets blocked 40% of the time if he's making all of his other shots. I really don't. I care about how many go in, I'm not concerned about the story of the ones he misses. And the numbers are conclusive. He shot the ball efficiently as a rookie. Now, his raw FG% of 49.6% is only decent. However, when you couple it with the fact that he got to the line at a very high rate and made a solid percentage (for a rookie big) there, then you have a significant improvement in efficiency over a big who may have shot better from the field, but did not garnish many trips to the line.

None of any of this means anything. We're comparing him to other 19 year old bigs. Players who played similarly limited minutes on other teams, who's limited usage was the same as his....you're grasping. Anything and everything you say also applies to the other players on the list. And just in case you need to be reminded, I can show you some video footage of Kanter schooling the 2nd best center in the league.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQ0wMlRaJRg

As for his shot, like I said I can see if he was getting doubled team alot or constantly be forced into bad positions but he wasn't. He was lefted open alot. In that situation you should shoot better than what he did if your a good shooter. He is clearly not. I mean even if his shooting numbers from each jump shooting spot goes up by 5% which is a huge improvement for anyone, his numbers will still be very bad. And like I said every player I can think of that didn't already have an acceptable jumper or post moves coming into the NBA ala rose, james, dwight, josh smith, rondo, ect.. either still don't have a reliable jumper or took 5 + years to develop one no matter how hard they tried (well from an outsiders point of veiw since we can never be sure how truely hard they worked at it). So my question is, why will Kanter be any different?

Again, window dressing. I literally do not care about his splits. Its his overall contribution that matters. If he scores 20ppg on 55% FGs and 60% TS, I could care less if every make came at the hoop and every miss comes away from it. It literally does not matter. Its net contribution that is important, and if he is an efficient scorer overall, then him sucking in one spot just means he's kicking ass in another.

You are desperate to invalidate him, but here is proof that he is right on schedule. Hate away, but you were already wrong about his rookie year. You'll be wrong next year, too. We'll see if you have the dignity to gracefully eat crow or if you fight it to the end.

[reapaman]

First, splits do matter. Your not gonna score 20 ppg or anything close too it with just put backs and dunks unless you have dwight howard athletism or somthing very close too it which he clearly doesn't have. Most guys ala Chandler, Noah ect... cap out at around 10 -12 ppg without some acceptable developed offensive game. As for Enes's rookie seson percentages, look at most sophmores ala our very own hayward and Favors. Most shoot worse than they did their rookie season due to the defenses playing them harder and them getting more defensive attention. Your assuming he's gonna shoot effeciently just because he was 50% FG and had a TS% combined with usage rating that was close to other rookies who turned out good or whatever in his rookie season and thats just plain wrong to assume. I would like to point out that as you stated in your very elightened statement, rookie tyson chandler had a TS rating of 54% and a usage of 16.6 then in his sophmore season he was 56% TS and a usage of 18.1 and look how he turned out offensively. So as I stated it means nothing and I know what I saw from Enes.

I know how to used those splits properly and as with guys like Favors (a guy who didn't show any real improvement offensively besides getting an extra shot per game from his rookier season), they tell alot. If you took away his shots besides the put backs and dunks then he is a 60 + % FG shooter. But you can only score so much doing that unless your dwight. Enes could easily be a bad offense player ala chandler for all you know. Why wouldn't Kanter's percentage take a hit next year like Favors did or chandlers eventualy did (3rd season)? Why wouldn't Kanter end up like someone like chandler offensively? Unlike you, I'm questioning how he gonna score all these points on put backs and dunks ala how chandler isn't doing anywhere near that. Plus him getting to the line wasn't impressive since alot of big men ala chandler were better at it at that age. Also like to point out that even tho I was harping on all the wide open shots he missed, he also made alot of wide open shots that may not be there when defenses start paying him more attention. So all in all it does matter that 40% of his shots are being blocked because some of the wide open shots he got last year that weren't blocked could be next year once the defenses start really getting at him. Then he's a guy without elite athletism who just doing dunks and put backs and you know what that means ... well you should.

BTW, I wasn't wrong about his play because he wasn't good. He just got more minutes than I thought he would and he didn't deserve that many minutes either. Thats the risk of making a bet like that, even if your right then you can still be wrong simply by them playing more minutes. I even said I hated that bet but took it just to look like I didn't punk out. Saying Kanter will shoot worse next year is a completely different thing and its about as easy to predict as the Hayward bet I made.