A Tale of two Brandons - Who won the trade?

[BigFatBob]

To say knight is better than jennings is straight up false. Knight isn't a point guard.

How many times can I re-post this?

[Blkbrd671]

Westbrook has had 2 season over 8APG. Marbury had 7 seasons above 8APG. Knight might reach that level 1 or 2 games a month. There is room in the league for scoring point guards, but you also need to be able to pass if you are going to be the primary ball handler.

1.) There are a ton of Scoring point guards in this league, there's plenty of room.

2.) APG is not a good indicator of " ability to pass "

3.) Hitting Kevin martin, or Kevin Durant in a corner is most definitely different than hitting Jonas Jerebko.

4.) If you've ever watched brandon knight, he has the ability and vision to pass, its a matter of gettin into that position and making the right pass(lob, bounce, chest). The fact that BK shows he has the ability, means that he possess the ability, the difference is that the great ones do it consistently. If you know basketball, you know that takes longer for some than others. Also some never learn that consistency. Point is that BK has the ability, its a matter of translating it to the court

[joseph mamah]

Id take BK over Jennings 10 times out of 10, but I dont think you can say anybody really won the trade yet. Both teams were bottom feeders last year and neither Knight or Jennings had that good of a year. It'll be interesting to see what BK can do this year playing next to (potentially) a good #1 option in Parker and what Jennings is able to do with SVG coaching him. It'll probably be a little more clear after this season who won the trade.

[kurtis48239]

Westbrook has had 2 season over 8APG. Marbury had 7 seasons above 8APG. Knight might reach that level 1 or 2 games a month. There is room in the league for scoring point guards, but you also need to be able to pass if you are going to be the primary ball handler.

1.) There are a ton of Scoring point guards in this league, there's plenty of room.

2.) APG is not a good indicator of " ability to pass "

3.) Hitting Kevin martin, or Kevin Durant in a corner is most definitely different than hitting Jonas Jerebko.

4.) If you've ever watched brandon knight, he has the ability and vision to pass, its a matter of gettin into that position and making the right pass(lob, bounce, chest). The fact that BK shows he has the ability, means that he possess the ability, the difference is that the great ones do it consistently. If you know basketball, you know that takes longer for some than others. Also some never learn that consistency. Point is that BK has the ability, its a matter of translating it to the court

I gotta disagree on number 4, that is one of his worst areas, his second is ball handling. Knight had 4 apg last season starting for the bucks. Vision and passing is a skill,and say what you will about jennings, but he has it and alot of fans think hes meh or sucks, so what does that say about knight? I think knights biggest problem is he has to many holes in his pg game, and instead of working really hard at 1 or 2 and getting really good at them, he trys to fix everything at once and overwhelms himself. Could brandon become a good starting pg, yes, but alot of guys have that potential,. The question is does he have the brains, and even tho he was a good college student, I dont see that in his basketball Iq. Dont get me wrong,Iam not saying hes stupid on the floor and I know he has a good work ethic,but the kid just cant put it together or figure out that he needs to slow down,which shouldnt be that hard.

I

[tmorgan]

I don't think he does have the ability, but I respect the opposing viewpoint. Will he improve as a PG? Time will tell.

[Uncle Mxy]

Chauncey Billups had a similar # of assists per game starting out. IF BK was gonna be the next Chauncey Billups, would we have had time to wait for him to develop?

[Billl]

Westbrook has had 2 season over 8APG. Marbury had 7 seasons above 8APG. Knight might reach that level 1 or 2 games a month. There is room in the league for scoring point guards, but you also need to be able to pass if you are going to be the primary ball handler.

1.) There are a ton of Scoring point guards in this league, there's plenty of room.

2.) APG is not a good indicator of " ability to pass "

3.) Hitting Kevin martin, or Kevin Durant in a corner is most definitely different than hitting Jonas Jerebko.

4.) If you've ever watched brandon knight, he has the ability and vision to pass, its a matter of gettin into that position and making the right pass(lob, bounce, chest). The fact that BK shows he has the ability, means that he possess the ability, the difference is that the great ones do it consistently. If you know basketball, you know that takes longer for some than others. Also some never learn that consistency. Point is that BK has the ability, its a matter of translating it to the court

1. Yes, but they need to be point guards. BK has the worst pg skills of any starting pg.
2. It certainly is a good indicator. It's not perfect, but its pretty good. So is assist to TO. Being at the bottom of both is a very bad thing for a pg.
3. Knight barely played with JJ.
4. I watch every pistons game. Knight can't pass or run a team. He has no court vision. He regularly runs right into a double or trap and can't deliver the ball to an open teammate. He just doesn't see the play.

[epheisey]

I'll join in and say I don't think Knight had any resemblance of vision or passing ability. He's not a PG, plain and simple, he's an undersized SG. If you go back to watching him in college you could see that.

As for waiting for him to develop because Chauncey did after many years....first, we didn't draft him, so the patience factor is completely different there. Second, we already got burned once by waiting on Stuckey to turn into Chauncey.

I'm actually happy to have Jennings here. He's far from perfect, but he's not the combo-guard turned PG that Joe D kept trying to force into working out. IMO a PG needs to be a PG first and then add to his game around a foundation of being able to run the offense. You can always fall back on moving the ball if your shot isn't falling, or you can't get to the basket, etc. If a PG doesn't have that as a skill base, and they struggle to score, they're left with very little to help the team win. Now Jennings needs to learn how to adjust his shot selection and volume accordingly, but he's been doing that slowly since he arrived in the league. Believe it or not, last season was his lowest in terms of shots per game.


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[kurtis48239]

Chauncey Billups had a similar # of assists per game starting out. IF BK was gonna be the next Chauncey Billups, would we have had time to wait for him to develop?

I dont like the billups compairison,billups had talent,but he needed the right team to give him minutes and actually let it be his team.Knight has gotten alot of opportunities early in his carrer that billups didnt get early on.

[Uncle Mxy]

I don't think BK will be the next Billups. My point was -- even if he were, should we have held onto him for a half-dozen years or so for him to finally get it together?

[epheisey]

I don't think BK will be the next Billups. My point was -- even if he were, should we have held onto him for a half-dozen years or so for him to finally get it together?

No. In a league where PG is probably the easiest position to obtain a reasonable starter, the turnover should be relatively quick. Bringing in Jennings was a gamble for sure, but there is more upside there, and it's a short-ish contract, while the team is still making moves to set up for the long term. Knight wasn't going to be the answer here, so you move on to the next option. As of today, Jennings is not the answer either, so we bring in Augustin for a quick trial run. Most likely, he's not the solution either. We can keep running through options until it becomes imperative to have a steady player to help the team climb the ladder.

IMO a PG is not a make or break position for this team RIGHT NOW. For that reason, I'm fine with the carousel of players. Hopefully we find one that sticks before it becomes a necessity and then we'll be set.

[laploutocratie]

How can you ever win a trade if you're on the receiving end of Brandon Jennings -- let alone while giving up assets in doing so?

Knight doesn't have to be a good PG in order for the Bucks to have won the trade. That's a silly way of trying to justify Brandon Jennings.

[princeofpalace]

Jennings is a significantly better facilitator than Knight in addition to being a better shooter. Knight is a better defender. At the end of the day, we are better off with Jennings at PG than Knight, not because Jennings is so good but because Knight was atrocious.

Knight was probably Dumars' biggest draft misses in recent years. That being said, its too bad that we couldn't have gotten a better return for Knight + Middleton than Jennings. Jennings has stretches where he's brilliant, he teases us with his potential, although he's unlikely to ever live up to that potential. However, Knight has no such potential, his ceilng is as a backup combo off the bench.