jeff1624 wrote:Net Sentence wrote:Prokorov wrote:
Yet he is on his 3rd team while only being in the league 3 seasons. despite being dirt cheap. i hope he does well here, by my expectations arent "average or better starting PG"
Yeah Im not expecting much from Larkin. I am however a big Jack fan.
May I ask why aside from the usual heart and hustle stuff argument? What is their to love about Jack?
Because he doesnt settle for his shot. Jack does a good job of beating his guy 1 on 1 and breaking the defense. He is one of the best people in the NBA going 1 on 1 as seen by his high rankings on ISO plays. He is very good at taking bad shots. That sounds strange but most defenses will give you the long 2. Jack shot 45.5% on shots greater then 16 ft but less then 3 last season so he makes defenses play different then they normally do. Double teams come early vs Jack to try and take that shot away from him and it opens up the offensive glass if he does miss.
Jack is also a good three point shooter. He shot poorly last season but even that is misleading. For one, he took 14 heave 3pters. These are 3s that 30 ft or greater. One of the things that drove me crazy about DWIll was he didnt try the buzzer beater shots because they would count against his %. To prove my point, DWIll only took 5 shots greater then 30 ft.
The other thing you have to look at with Jack's 3pt shooting is where is he taking them from. Jack lead the team in 3pt% from the corner last season 46.5%. He shot 42.1% and 44.1% from the corner the previous 2 seasons so it's not a fluke. If you analyze the upgrades we made with Bargs and Ellington you can see how we can scheme Jack, and the team, into a higher 3pt%.
- Ellington shot 38.6% on above the break 3s last season.
- Anderson only hit 31.5% on above the break 3s but 42.3% on corner 3s.
- Mirza only shot 29.9% on above the break 3s last year.
- Bargnani shot 36.6% on above the break 3s.
- Joe Johnson shot 37.4% on above the break 3s.
If we switch Jack into Anderson's corner 3 role (46.5% vs 42.3%), have Johnson and Bargnani run PnR (36.6% & 37.4% above the break) and put Ellington on the other 3pt break (38.6%) we will putting the players in the best position to succeed.
The main thing that resonates from Jack is leadership. He sacrifices his own stats for the greater good of the team and its quite obvious that the players respect the hell out of him for it. We needed him to shoot from the top of the key last year and he did despite it not being a strength of his. DWIll never did that. He launches up buzzer beaters with no regard to what his shooting % will be. Once again, DWill would always hold the ball long enough so the shot wouldnt count. Jack is the first person cheering when he is on the bench, says and does all the right things off the court and puts time in with the young guys to help them develop. His ISO skills are extremely important in close games when we sit on the lead. Jack allows us to run the clock down while also getting a good shot. This is why he had so many game winners this year, you can trust him to make high pressure shots in big moments. We have been spoiled the last few years because JJ was great at this but he clearly passed the torch to Jack in that respect. PG is similar to QB in many respects. You have guys like Lawson who put up stats but dont win similar to Jay Cutler and you have guys like Jack who bring intangibles like leadership, maturity and positivity to the table like a Russell Wilson. This is his first real shot at a team of his own and I think he is going to do well with it.
