OMFKG! The Michael Kidd-Gilchrist Thread

[Liver_Pooty]

MKGs downside is hes just too damn nice. He defers too much.

[doc.end]

I already explained how Barnes season looks better than MKG's (and much better than Taylor's), because context counts too, not just raw stats (or else people would look at Ricky Davis at say "gee, what a good player to have"). Just ignoring it does not make it go away.

That's Golden State jerseys effect, right?

[jman2585]

You think the Jersey is making him play better? Well, if you insist. Look, I don't mean to be rude about it, but you guys are by far the worst team in the NBA this year. I like the way you're building through the draft, but I think it's safe to assume there are very few good players on a team with your record (if any), otherwise the record wouldn't be what it was.

[BlackOutBuzz]

Ugh, I don't know where to begin. I'll just say his freaking 19 years old, whether you're happy with his progression or not it's ridiculous to make any judgments at this point about ANY rookie in this class. Also, half of these posters were pretty quiet when he was putting up 10 and 6 in every game since the All-Star break, one stinker and he's a "bust" again. Patience.

And we're the worst team in the league (by far though? Come on Orlando is garbage and I think we catch them) largely by choice. Building through the draft and not divvying out stupid contracts, it's no coincidence that there's so few good players on our team. We're not ready to make that final push, I'd assume we'd make a greater effort this offseason to sign some people but even then I don't think we really try to compete until after next year's draft.

[jman2585]

Your differential is almost double Orlando's. It's not just the 3 wins. You have clearly been the worst team this year. Your SRS is also last.

It's crazy to fully judge someone in their rookie year, but not making any judgments? That's even crazier. We can see quite alot at the moment.

[JMAC3]

jman2585- who is your team?

Nobody is saying that MKG is a star player now or will be by the end of the season, but to say that he is what he is and will not improve is foolish. He was the youngest player drafted, played on a stacked team in college where he wasn't forced into taking over games. However, if you actually watched Kentucky play last year MKG was a major reason they were so good and able to win title.

Even when he played in Highschool he played alongside Kyrie Irving and played mainly on the block as either a 4 or 5. He is still adjusting to playing on the perimeter and playing against NBA length at the rim. I have no doubts that he will adjust and continue to get better at finishing at the rim. He already is rebounding pretty well and protects the paint with blocks.

His jumpshot will be a work in progress. You guys act like he is out there air balling and bricking shots off the backboard or shoots 40% on free throws. He is a good free throw shooter, which means he has potential to be a good jump shooter, but he needs to work on his consistency and confidence. And honestly its not like he is out there throwing up 6 jumpers a game, He is taking like 2-3 jumpers per game, so he knows his limits right now.

If he had a consistent jumpshot right now, He would be extremely scary player at 19 years old. I think by 21 he will be one of the most well rounded players in the NBA. I think guys think that jump shooting is what defines a player, "well he can't hit threes in 2k, so he must suck".

If he played for a good team where his only job was to play defense, get rebounds, but got to play 30 minutes consistently he would put up numbers just from getting minutes. or if got glorified for all the little things he does like "Kawhi, Battier, and Sefolosha" do because they are consistently on tv he would have better publicity. Put him with a great passing team and he was rewarded for cuts or had a coach that put him in positions to succeed like a Popovich then he would be without a doubt better then Kawhi.

I just don't understand why everyone wants to hate on this guy right now, when he is not getting consistent mintues, on a team without a real offensive gameplan, or good enough players around him to help make game easy for everyone.

[TheKingofSting]

How many 25-12 games does Barnes have this season? Thanks for stopping by, can we keep the trolls out please?

[TheKingofSting]

i dont understand, do you think posting one report of a college scout that turned out to be wrong means anything?

It hasn't turned out to be wrong yet. Kemba couldn't shoot last year and he improved, When LeBron was 19 he couldn't hit a jumper to save his life but he improved...

[Liver_Pooty]

I believe MKG will be just like Biyombo in the sense that we won't see them truly pay off until the season after next. Patience is a wonderful thing.

[vorbis]

this whole argument of projecting careers of 19 years old is very tired and unproductive. i prefer to look at the player MKG IS, rather than who he looks like or who came before him. he has definite skill. the main thing holding him back isn't anything he actually does on a basketball court, IMO. he has to find the confidence and mindset to aggressively implant himself in the outcome of a game. something he excelled in 90% of the time at UK, and something that i find hard to believe will never show up in the NBA. he's even shown more than enough glimpses in his rookie season as a 19 year old. there's a lot of people claiming to have a solid handle on what his game will be like in 5 years, and none of you know. you sound like idiots when you talk about how sure you are.

[LamarMatic7]

Guys, guys... you clearly missed out on the best post in this thread from the last couple of days.

it beats the hell out of my bball bio

fats bball bio

40 years old 5'6", 140lbs, once averaged 6ppg off the bench as a combo guard in church league for a team that finished in 2nd place. played 3 years of intramural ball at college once scored 10pts in game to 11 (4x4 half court) vs some meatheads on my dorm floor soph year, back when i had long hippie hair and they were shocked and called me basketball jesus. and most recently dished out 9 assists in 32 minutes of game time in pick up ball. my game has been said to resemble a cross between sam cassell on offense and augustin on defense, with the size of earl boykins. in 10th grade i memorized about 70% of the NBA encyclopedia, which i got for xmas that year.

[KembaWalker]

if his TS% falls below 50 I'll be really depressed

[LamarMatic7]

by the way, since we're talking about his shortcomings and his shooting form being the most obvious one - he did make six jumpshots during the span of four games (before the Clipper game). He's obviously working on it and actually I think that when he makes them his form doesn't look that bad. I mean, at this point we can't expect him to become a great shooter, all we need is him to be good enough to knock down the wide open jumpers so teams couldn't totally ignore him and sag off. Moreover, I believe that in many cases you rather have a guy stick to his shot, no matter how bad it might be. We've seen guys with weird shot releases work on it and become quality shooters. No reason why a hard-working guy like him couldn't achieve this.

If anyone's wondering or has noticed me not being that active, I'm still around and watching Cats games or at least portions of them. As I've said before - it's hard not to watch the better teams by spring time. Due to me not having that much free time I'm mostly only lurking on the board.

Oh and another random thought. Bill Simmons had a good podcast with Antoine Walker during the all-star break and I found what Toine said about his rookie year interesting. He remembered how at a certain point M.L. Carr approached him and said that the team is definitely tanking the rest of the year and that he'll play him for 40 minutes every night from here on out and even start him at center. Feel free to check out basketball-reference as you can see that he's not exaggerating (except the center part, he got a bit carried away there. though he did start alongside the immortal Marty Conlon), there came a point where his minutes took a bump. So he said that the experience helped him mightily, he learned a lot and he basically looked back at the situation as a positive thing. I'm wondering what would we lose, if he played MKG for 35 minutes until the end of the year...

[fatlever]

can MKG handle 35 minutes per night right now? some of us have speculated that part of his problem is exhaustion.

[fatlever]

after last nights 3 missed jumers, MKG is down to 23.7% on jumpers.

as lamar mentioned MKG has hit some jumpers since the break, raising his jumper % back up to 24.5% for the season.

[fatlever]

after last nights 3 missed jumers, MKG is down to 23.7% on jumpers.

as lamar mentioned MKG has hit some jumpers since the break, raising his jumper % back up to 24.5% for the season.

still below his numbers from the 1st time i looked on 1-22-2013 when he was at 25.8%

[fatlever]

final splits for jan
7.1ppg, 5.2rpg, 1.1apg, 39%

final splits for feb
5.6ppg, 4.1rpg, 1.5apg, 31%

minutes down from 25 to 20

[e4Nf6]

One should be very careful about saying that a 19-year-old will "never" get better at something...

Also, à propos of nothing...

(or else people would look at Ricky Davis at say "gee, what a good player to have").

Ricky Davis' stats peaked at "Average" and fell to "quite bad" his last few years.

http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... sri01.html

Statistics don't lie, they can't. They are sometimes used to try and prove something they don't, but that is not the stats fault.

If you feel a statistic is being cited to prove something that it does not, than explain why. don't just say "stats lie,"

[LamarMatic7]

can MKG handle 35 minutes per night right now? some of us have speculated that part of his problem is exhaustion.

damn, I didn't think about it. might be so...

[HornetJail]

If exhaustion is his problem, that's bad because he's playing 15-20 minutes lately.