Do you think Aaron Gordon will emerge as a breakout star this year?

[pepe1991]

AG is just getting ahead of the game for players of his mould. Sure, he could develop a post up game and continue scoring as a high flyer until age or injury strips him of that ability, but even if he became good at those his shooting limitations would hold him back.

But he's working on his jumpshot now, instead. And that should only help the rest of his game.

I mean, what's the ultimate ceiling you see for him as a player? I'd say some version of Draymond Green or Millsap. Neither of those guys were great shooters at 22, let alone 21. Griffin, Bosh and Horford didn't become reasonable 3pt shooters until their late 20's. Jabari Parker only started nailing the 3 this season.

I think it's a great sign that AG is so focused on his shooting and ballhandling. It shows that he's got aspirations on being more than just a role player. But, his actions on the court show that he's also not selfish enough to impose that on the team regardless of the cost.

Either way, I reckon he's still got 3 more years of solid development in him until we start seeing what a complete AG will actually look like. Whether fans and management have the patience to wait that long is another question.

I think that there is huge disconnect on this forum what Gordon is and what people want him to be . Look at a names you dropped.
Chris Bosh. Blake Griffin. They were great offensive players who expended their game.
Chris Bosh at age of 21 averaged 22 points per game, on 58,5 % TS and was already named an allstar ( officially played first allstar game in his third season -at age of 21-22 ).
Blake Griffin. 22 ppg in rookie year, allstar in first season in nba, at age of 21.


He simply isn't that level of talent, he never was. All you need is to compare first 3 years of Griffin, Bosh and Gordon to laugh at his 12 ppg, they were getting that by halftime.

Now Millsap and Green are hard to judge , for what they were and what they are.
Millsap played in shadow of ,at times, good PF Carloz Boozer. We talk about times before he painted his head in black to "fake out " hair and before Carloz Loozer was a thing.

Green is even harder to judge because he is third (to fourth ) best player on championship team ( 2015 ),where 2 players ahead of him on that team are all time greats. Curry is already making case for one of greatest PGs of all time and Klay is headed to same direction, as top 5-8 SG of all time as well. And in 2015 you can make strong argument that Igoudala was better, more important for them than Green.

To me, Gordon is heading into Oladipo and Harris direction for two years now, where there is clear disconnect between what fans want him to be and what he is. Both ex Magic players were targeted as " A guy" at one point of their career, and both of them never lived up to that ,because they simply didn't have tools to do so. Not to mentioned that Gordon actually showed less on offense than any of them, but for whatever reason he gets away from being medicore much easier than two of them ever could.

Now i could make whole list of reasons why Magic fans have so much expuces why he isn't star yet, but that's topic for another day. To me it's simple. He isn't star for same reason I'm not basketball player. Lack of talent. That's why you see Embiid in rookie year looking like a beast, that's why you see Porzingis in rookie year looking great, that's why you see KAT being star from gates.... and that's why you see me on forum, not in nba

See, you spent all that time dismissing a comp of AG to Griffin/Bosh which I never made. I simply put their names down as examples of bigs who didn't expand their games to being respectable 3pt shooters until later in their careers. As in, you would never have looked at rookie Blake Griffin and said "oh yeah, he'll be hitting 34% from 3 on 3 attempts a game at some point", because it just didn't seem to gel with the rest of his game.

My comp was to Green and Millsap, who are invaluable utility guys who play smart, unselfish basketball on both ends of the court, and who can score at a decent clip pretty efficiently.

I'm not disagreeing with what you've said about AG not showing offensive skill to this date. Last season he was much more hesitant than I would have liked him to be. Sure, you could write him off at 21 and say "well, he'll never be any more than what he's showing us right now". But I believe he's got the mentality and attitude to continue growing and becoming a much more complete player, and I think that growth will continue on until his late 20's.

Harris certainly has more natural offensive instincts than Gordon. Oladipo doesn't, and didn't. He came into the league and was thrust into becoming a ball dominant scoring guard which he'd never been before, at AG's current age. We could do the same to AG to try to expedite his development, but we choose not to, and he chooses not to force it.

Keep watching AG. I'm prepared to make a longterm bet that by age 27, he'll be posting similar numbers to what Millsap has been doing the past couple of seasons, and he'll be a top 3 player on a highly competitive team, with similar impact to Draymond/Iggy on the Warriors. But, that's 5 years away, so chances he's doing it with Orlando seem slim.

He was moved to SF, asked to shoot from outside and from "new Griffin" went to " new Paul George" in eyes of the Magic fans and media around the team. As we saw, he was terrible at it and whole thing was huge fiasco. You could make strong argument that he was one of worst starting SFs in whole league .

My problem with him working on his jumpshot and jumpshot only is how people here simply ignore how it's not just shooting that makes him below average offensive player. It's all around offensive game, or lack of the same. He can't drive, can't draw fouls, has no pumpfakes and no post game. It's not like he is jumpshot away from being Chris Bosh, it's more that he is jumpshot away from being Thad Young.

I picked Young because at age of 21-22 he was also posting 13-14ppg and where Millsap made another leap in his career, Young simply never did the same. btw if you compare third Gordon's season to Millsap and his third, in advanced stats Millsap smokes him in pretty much each and every category. From raw FG, eFG% win share per 48 ,OBPM, DBPM to shooting from range.

Going into his 4th season and contract year i really have hard times convicting myself, based on nothing else but wishful thinking that he will have breakout year. He is turning 22 in 8 days ,how many years you can ride youth juice and get away with it? Jokić , Kat and Porzingis are same age as him as well, so why they had more developed offense in 5th grade than he has now ?

[VFX]

Are we going to pretend that 22 people that voted actually believe AG will be a breakout "star" by the end of the year?

wow...

[The Real Dalic]

Are we going to pretend that 22 people that voted actually believe AG will be a breakout "star" by the end of the year?

wow...

I voted no, but let them believe anyway. No reason to bring that up. Especially since they can make a case for it. I'm always happy to see optimistic fans on here.

[Bensational]

See, you spent all that time dismissing a comp of AG to Griffin/Bosh which I never made. I simply put their names down as examples of bigs who didn't expand their games to being respectable 3pt shooters until later in their careers. As in, you would never have looked at rookie Blake Griffin and said "oh yeah, he'll be hitting 34% from 3 on 3 attempts a game at some point", because it just didn't seem to gel with the rest of his game.

My comp was to Green and Millsap, who are invaluable utility guys who play smart, unselfish basketball on both ends of the court, and who can score at a decent clip pretty efficiently.

I'm not disagreeing with what you've said about AG not showing offensive skill to this date. Last season he was much more hesitant than I would have liked him to be. Sure, you could write him off at 21 and say "well, he'll never be any more than what he's showing us right now". But I believe he's got the mentality and attitude to continue growing and becoming a much more complete player, and I think that growth will continue on until his late 20's.

Harris certainly has more natural offensive instincts than Gordon. Oladipo doesn't, and didn't. He came into the league and was thrust into becoming a ball dominant scoring guard which he'd never been before, at AG's current age. We could do the same to AG to try to expedite his development, but we choose not to, and he chooses not to force it.

Keep watching AG. I'm prepared to make a longterm bet that by age 27, he'll be posting similar numbers to what Millsap has been doing the past couple of seasons, and he'll be a top 3 player on a highly competitive team, with similar impact to Draymond/Iggy on the Warriors. But, that's 5 years away, so chances he's doing it with Orlando seem slim.

What said in the last paragraph is what I've saying about him/hoping for since he's been drafted.

Plus, I find your second to last paragraph perplexing. The Magic forced Oladipo to become something he was not, and the Magic have done and are continuing to do the samething with AG by sliding him into the 3 to make him the default go-to-guy on offense which much worse than the Vic experience. Oladipo coming into the league in his rookie year showed flashes of taking over a game while being ball dominate (That infamous Knicks game where he went back-and-forth with Melo and the Pacer game where he took over down the stretch). That's why there was hope for him for the time he was here. Gordon in his 3 years at both the SF or PF position hasn't showcased ANY of that. I think you need to stop focusing on his mentality (because I think he's got a high BBIQ and plays the game the right way when he's not forced out of position). But its more of him having his talents misused.

He's not a ball-dominate/offensively inclined player that's ever going to consistently take you off the dribble/pick and roll. He's never played that way from High School/College/NBA, so is that going to change now? It's best for him to just kind of work on his strengths and build from there as a player. If he pick up a decent offensive game, fine. But his money will be made by being a utility player on both sides of the ball like you said.

The Magic didn't make AG the default go-to guy, though. Fournier was the default go-to guy. AG was quite often just given the ball on the wing and left to figure it out, or pass it off. And, he generally froze up and made nothing of those. But he was hardly given the aid of picks or screens at all, which is what any other legit offensive on-ball option would be given. Oladipo got to play through terrible games and terrible decisions and was encouraged to continue to keep doing it. AG either takes himself out of games, or the coaching does. Just look at his game-log for his big scoring nights, and the amount of FGAs he took in follow up games.

PHI - 20 pts on 14 attempts. Next game, 8 attempts.
LAC - 33 points on 21 attempts. Next game, 12 attempts.
MEM - 30 points on 14 attempts. Next game, 5 attempts.
NYK - 22 points on 19 attempts. Next game, 11 attempts.
LAC - 28 points on 17 attempts. Next game, 5 attempts.
UTA - 21 points on 14 attempts. Next game, 6 attempts.

Also, to say AG hasn't showcased ANY of what Oladipo did ignores the highlight games which I just mentioned - which were just as impressive as a lot of Oladipo's early games.

You're right, he's not a ball dominant guy, take you off the dribble/pick and roll kind of guy - currently. What's the harm in him attempting to develop that? It will only make him a more effective utility guy. To say he should continue working on his strengths sounds a bit empty. What, is he going to be the best alley oop option in the league? He's not a post up guy, so developing that part of his game is just, if not more raw than his shooting game. He seems committed to defense already, so I don't think he needs to put extra work in on that front. He just needs to expand his game in general, and starting with shooting is the best place since it's become the most crucial part of the game these days. Why anyone would be opposed to him developing that part of his game is, frankly, perplexing.

[Bensational]

See, you spent all that time dismissing a comp of AG to Griffin/Bosh which I never made. I simply put their names down as examples of bigs who didn't expand their games to being respectable 3pt shooters until later in their careers. As in, you would never have looked at rookie Blake Griffin and said "oh yeah, he'll be hitting 34% from 3 on 3 attempts a game at some point", because it just didn't seem to gel with the rest of his game.

My comp was to Green and Millsap, who are invaluable utility guys who play smart, unselfish basketball on both ends of the court, and who can score at a decent clip pretty efficiently.

I'm not disagreeing with what you've said about AG not showing offensive skill to this date. Last season he was much more hesitant than I would have liked him to be. Sure, you could write him off at 21 and say "well, he'll never be any more than what he's showing us right now". But I believe he's got the mentality and attitude to continue growing and becoming a much more complete player, and I think that growth will continue on until his late 20's.

Harris certainly has more natural offensive instincts than Gordon. Oladipo doesn't, and didn't. He came into the league and was thrust into becoming a ball dominant scoring guard which he'd never been before, at AG's current age. We could do the same to AG to try to expedite his development, but we choose not to, and he chooses not to force it.

Keep watching AG. I'm prepared to make a longterm bet that by age 27, he'll be posting similar numbers to what Millsap has been doing the past couple of seasons, and he'll be a top 3 player on a highly competitive team, with similar impact to Draymond/Iggy on the Warriors. But, that's 5 years away, so chances he's doing it with Orlando seem slim.

He was moved to SF, asked to shoot from outside and from "new Griffin" went to " new Paul George" in eyes of the Magic fans and media around the team. As we saw, he was terrible at it and whole thing was huge fiasco. You could make strong argument that he was one of worst starting SFs in whole league .

My problem with him working on his jumpshot and jumpshot only is how people here simply ignore how it's not just shooting that makes him below average offensive player. It's all around offensive game, or lack of the same. He can't drive, can't draw fouls, has no pumpfakes and no post game. It's not like he is jumpshot away from being Chris Bosh, it's more that he is jumpshot away from being Thad Young.

I picked Young because at age of 21-22 he was also posting 13-14ppg and where Millsap made another leap in his career, Young simply never did the same. btw if you compare third Gordon's season to Millsap and his third, in advanced stats Millsap smokes him in pretty much each and every category. From raw FG, eFG% win share per 48 ,OBPM, DBPM to shooting from range.

Going into his 4th season and contract year i really have hard times convicting myself, based on nothing else but wishful thinking that he will have breakout year. He is turning 22 in 8 days ,how many years you can ride youth juice and get away with it? Jokić , Kat and Porzingis are same age as him as well, so why they had more developed offense in 5th grade than he has now ?

Where else do you think the best place for him to develop an offensive game starts, though? If he develops a jump shot, it opens the door up for him to introduce pump fakes, and learn to take players off the dribble. I mean, what's the point of working on pump fakes when nobody is there to guard your shot, anyway? lol.

Thad Young is the role playing, minimal version of Millsap. He doesn't have the knack for handling or passing the ball the way Millsap does. I'd say AG already has better instincts on the ball (or at least with passing) than Thad has currently. If you reach for Millsap and land on Young, fine. But if you only reach for Young, you might be missing out on an untapped Millsap.

I understand why you compare players of the same age, but it's not the one and only means of measuring a player's development. (Also, it doesn't help when you move the goalposts comparing a 24 year old Millsap to a 21 year old AG, and then complain 21 year old AG isn't as good as 21 year old KAT/KP/Jokic). Players develop at different rates. I mean, Millsap didn't really show how good he could be until he was 25. Same with Butler. Same with Lowry. Same with Ben Wallace. All these guys wouldn't have survived under the lens of "but they're not as good as [insert HOFr]", but they're still extremely valuable to a team. I mean, Millsap was good enough to lead an ECF team. None of KAT/KP/Jokic have got out of the lottery yet. Hell, AD has only made the playoffs once in his career.

[JF5]

The Magic didn't make AG the default go-to guy, though. Fournier was the default go-to guy. AG was quite often just given the ball on the wing and left to figure it out, or pass it off. And, he generally froze up and made nothing of those. But he was hardly given the aid of picks or screens at all, which is what any other legit offensive on-ball option would be given.

I do agree he wasn't the default go-to-guy (my over-reach)... but I have a hard time believing they didn't start AG at the 3 JUST because he was the best option. Jeff Green ended up playing more than him there and he was awful himself. The damn headlines, Vogel himself, and the overall intent from the Magic was to use him perimeter like a Paul George to see if he would work there.

And the way you're saying it for him to "figure it out"... THAT WAS THE DAMN POINT. They gave him plenty of opportunities to try to take these guys off the dribble and create something out of nothing in iso situations like the Elite Wing players they aspired him to be. He couldn't do it what-so-ever and the experiment just didn't work out...

You can't have it both ways here Ben... You can't claim the Magic set him up to fail while they tried the necessary steps to develop him into a player you wanted him to be. That's how stars usually develop...

There's only two options here... he's either YEARS away from being that player (Which you stated with reaching that plateau at age 27 which is what you've stated) or he doesn't have it all. From what I've seen I'd say he just doesn't have it, but that's my opinion

Oladipo got to play through terrible games and terrible decisions and was encouraged to continue to keep doing it. AG either takes himself out of games, or the coaching does. Just look at his game-log for his big scoring nights, and the amount of FGAs he took in follow up games.

PHI - 20 pts on 14 attempts. Next game, 8 attempts.
LAC - 33 points on 21 attempts. Next game, 12 attempts.
MEM - 30 points on 14 attempts. Next game, 5 attempts.
NYK - 22 points on 19 attempts. Next game, 11 attempts.
LAC - 28 points on 17 attempts. Next game, 5 attempts.
UTA - 21 points on 14 attempts. Next game, 6 attempts.

Also, to say AG hasn't showcased ANY of what Oladipo did ignores the highlight games which I just mentioned - which were just as impressive as a lot of Oladipo's early games. [/b]

I SAW those games just like you did (Because he had many discussions over the season) and I wasn't impressed with most of them due to the fact he was assisted on most of those baskets. I as a matter of fact had an argument with one of the fellow poster about this same topic about Gordon creating his own shots effectively a few months ago.

I posted all the highlights to his best games (Which are mostly the ones you pointed out) and AT LEAST around 60-65 of his shots were assisted. Most of his shot were either open or cuts to the basket.

Its not the same compared to a guy who was doing it in a variety of ways from penetrating from into the pain, creating off the dribble from mid-range/outside the arc, and dishing it to the teammates while playing pretty good defense. Vic compared to Gordon got better as the season went on (as his best games were as the season progressed) compared to AG whose overall production from the 3 spot was pretty sparing. Acting like he was really any good outside of a few games he did play well is pretty laughable. Periods of the season where h shot 1-4 or 1-5 from the 3 point line were consistent, and there were certain stretches of the season he was shooting under 20% from the arc. The only real time I feel like he looked good was when he moved back to the 4.

You're right, he's not a ball dominant guy, take you off the dribble/pick and roll kind of guy - currently. What's the harm in him attempting to develop that? It will only make him a more effective utility guy. To say he should continue working on his strengths sounds a bit empty. What, is he going to be the best alley oop option in the league? He's not a post up guy, so developing that part of his game is just, if not more raw than his shooting game. He seems committed to defense already, so I don't think he needs to put extra work in on that front. He just needs to expand his game in general, and starting with shooting is the best place since it's become the most crucial part of the game these days. Why anyone would be opposed to him developing that part of his game is, frankly, perplexing.

Should focus on shooting, no doubt as every player needs to improve on that front... But him trying to shoot off the dribble and trying these different shots from all over the court doesn't make any sense to me. He should be focusing on being a better spot up shooter because his jump shooting ability in itself is so terrible him trying to fly rather than take baby step per say makes no sense. If he were like a Giannis who does everything for his team it would make sense, but he's not on that level. That's where I'm getting at. Focus on being a better role player first rather than becoming a star player.

[Bensational]

The Magic didn't make AG the default go-to guy, though. Fournier was the default go-to guy. AG was quite often just given the ball on the wing and left to figure it out, or pass it off. And, he generally froze up and made nothing of those. But he was hardly given the aid of picks or screens at all, which is what any other legit offensive on-ball option would be given.

I do agree he wasn't the default go-to-guy (my over-reach)... but I have a hard time believing they didn't start AG at the 3 JUST because he was the best option. Jeff Green ended up playing more than him there and he was awful himself. The damn headlines, Vogel himself, and the overall intent from the Magic was to use him perimeter like a Paul George to see if he would work there.

And the way you're saying it for him to "figure it out"... THAT WAS THE DAMN POINT. They gave him plenty of opportunities to try to take these guys off the dribble and create something out of nothing in iso situations like the Elite Wing players they aspired him to be. He couldn't do it what-so-ever and the experiment just didn't work out...

You can't have it both ways here Ben... You can't claim the Magic set him up to fail while they tried the necessary steps to develop him into a player you wanted him to be. That's how stars usually develop...

There's only two options here... he's either YEARS away from being that player (Which you stated with reaching that plateau at age 27 which is what you've stated) or he doesn't have it all. From what I've seen I'd say he just doesn't have it, but that's my opinion

Oladipo got to play through terrible games and terrible decisions and was encouraged to continue to keep doing it. AG either takes himself out of games, or the coaching does. Just look at his game-log for his big scoring nights, and the amount of FGAs he took in follow up games.

PHI - 20 pts on 14 attempts. Next game, 8 attempts.
LAC - 33 points on 21 attempts. Next game, 12 attempts.
MEM - 30 points on 14 attempts. Next game, 5 attempts.
NYK - 22 points on 19 attempts. Next game, 11 attempts.
LAC - 28 points on 17 attempts. Next game, 5 attempts.
UTA - 21 points on 14 attempts. Next game, 6 attempts.

Also, to say AG hasn't showcased ANY of what Oladipo did ignores the highlight games which I just mentioned - which were just as impressive as a lot of Oladipo's early games. [/b]

I SAW those games just like you did (Because he had many discussions over the season) and I wasn't impressed with most of them due to the fact he was assisted on most of those baskets. I as a matter of fact had an argument with one of the fellow poster about this same topic about Gordon creating his own shots effectively a few months ago.

I posted all the highlights to his best games (Which are mostly the ones you pointed out) and AT LEAST around 60-65 of his shots were assisted. Most of his shot were either open or cuts to the basket.

Its not the same compared to a guy who was doing it in a variety of ways from penetrating from into the pain, creating off the dribble from mid-range/outside the arc, and dishing it to the teammates while playing pretty good defense. Vic compared to Gordon got better as the season went on (as his best games were as the season progressed) compared to AG whose overall production from the 3 spot was pretty sparing. Acting like he was really any good outside of a few games he did play well is pretty laughable. Periods of the season where h shot 1-4 or 1-5 from the 3 point line were consistent, and there were certain stretches of the season he was shooting under 20% from the arc. The only real time I feel like he looked good was when he moved back to the 4.

You're right, he's not a ball dominant guy, take you off the dribble/pick and roll kind of guy - currently. What's the harm in him attempting to develop that? It will only make him a more effective utility guy. To say he should continue working on his strengths sounds a bit empty. What, is he going to be the best alley oop option in the league? He's not a post up guy, so developing that part of his game is just, if not more raw than his shooting game. He seems committed to defense already, so I don't think he needs to put extra work in on that front. He just needs to expand his game in general, and starting with shooting is the best place since it's become the most crucial part of the game these days. Why anyone would be opposed to him developing that part of his game is, frankly, perplexing.

Should focus on shooting, no doubt as every player needs to improve on that front... But him trying to shoot off the dribble and trying these different shots from all over the court doesn't make any sense to me. He should be focusing on being a better spot up shooter because his jump shooting ability in itself is so terrible him trying to fly rather than take baby step per say makes no sense. If he were like a Giannis who does everything for his team it would make sense, but he's not on that level. That's where I'm getting at. Focus on being a better role player first rather than becoming a star player.

Alright, look, let's just clarify a few things first before we push on further with this discussion. It feels like you're settling in for an argument against some kind of wild conclusion I'm making. I'm not. Last season, yes, I was bullish about the prospect of AG, but his performance was humbling and didn't live up to my expectations. So with the headline cleared up, there are a few things with the way you're going in this discussion which feel more antagonistic than they need to be. This may not be your intention, but I feel I should let you know what my interpretation is. Like, when you make a point of saying my name, it feels like an attempt to be condescending or patronising. Again, this may not be your intent, but I don't really like it and I'd appreciate it if you stopped doing that in future. Second, the hyperbole is just an invitation for escalation. Saying an opinion is "laughable" isn't inviting someone to want to discuss matters further, it's an invitation for them to defend or attack. I'm not interested in either of those.

Back to the topic, let's start with AG being left to figure it out. I'm admitting that he failed in that regard. He didn't show any natural instinct for creating in iso situations. There's no disagreement there. But, considering that's not his game (as has been pointed out several times), wouldn't the smarter approach be to give him some training wheels in those situations? If he can't use his handle to create space on his own, why didn't we give him a screen to help him get some space? We had two bigs who could help create space as pick and pop options, and they gave screens for Payton, Fournier, Augustin and Meeks to create - but not AG. Just seems like he was expected to fly before he could walk. Even Oladipo saw the benefit of PnRs, as that was almost entirely all we ran for him. So comparing the opportunities AG was given the ball and tasked to create, to the opportunities Vic had, just isn't a level playing field.

I agree with you that AG either has the ability to develop and become a significantly better player, or he doesn't. You're totally entitled to believe he doesn't have the ability. I don't think you're wrong for having that opinion.

In terms of flashes AG has shown, they're flashes, but that's still evidence of capability/potential. Does he have a long way to go from turning those flashes into consistent nightly play? Absolutely. But he isn't trying to do something he's never shown he can do before, because he's shown he can do it. What he hasn't shown he can do is to do it consistently.

As for him developing skills shooting off the dribble, I didn't see him say that. Sure, he's shown that he likes to take some fancy shots off the dribble and hopefully he either quits that or just gets really good at it, but all I've seen him say is that he is that he's been working on shooting. He hasn't said he wants to come out and be a star. So as long as he continues to improve and become more efficient, I don't think his volume of shots or the shots he takes should be a matter of concern.

[pepe1991]

See, you spent all that time dismissing a comp of AG to Griffin/Bosh which I never made. I simply put their names down as examples of bigs who didn't expand their games to being respectable 3pt shooters until later in their careers. As in, you would never have looked at rookie Blake Griffin and said "oh yeah, he'll be hitting 34% from 3 on 3 attempts a game at some point", because it just didn't seem to gel with the rest of his game.

My comp was to Green and Millsap, who are invaluable utility guys who play smart, unselfish basketball on both ends of the court, and who can score at a decent clip pretty efficiently.

I'm not disagreeing with what you've said about AG not showing offensive skill to this date. Last season he was much more hesitant than I would have liked him to be. Sure, you could write him off at 21 and say "well, he'll never be any more than what he's showing us right now". But I believe he's got the mentality and attitude to continue growing and becoming a much more complete player, and I think that growth will continue on until his late 20's.

Harris certainly has more natural offensive instincts than Gordon. Oladipo doesn't, and didn't. He came into the league and was thrust into becoming a ball dominant scoring guard which he'd never been before, at AG's current age. We could do the same to AG to try to expedite his development, but we choose not to, and he chooses not to force it.

Keep watching AG. I'm prepared to make a longterm bet that by age 27, he'll be posting similar numbers to what Millsap has been doing the past couple of seasons, and he'll be a top 3 player on a highly competitive team, with similar impact to Draymond/Iggy on the Warriors. But, that's 5 years away, so chances he's doing it with Orlando seem slim.

He was moved to SF, asked to shoot from outside and from "new Griffin" went to " new Paul George" in eyes of the Magic fans and media around the team. As we saw, he was terrible at it and whole thing was huge fiasco. You could make strong argument that he was one of worst starting SFs in whole league .

My problem with him working on his jumpshot and jumpshot only is how people here simply ignore how it's not just shooting that makes him below average offensive player. It's all around offensive game, or lack of the same. He can't drive, can't draw fouls, has no pumpfakes and no post game. It's not like he is jumpshot away from being Chris Bosh, it's more that he is jumpshot away from being Thad Young.

I picked Young because at age of 21-22 he was also posting 13-14ppg and where Millsap made another leap in his career, Young simply never did the same. btw if you compare third Gordon's season to Millsap and his third, in advanced stats Millsap smokes him in pretty much each and every category. From raw FG, eFG% win share per 48 ,OBPM, DBPM to shooting from range.

Going into his 4th season and contract year i really have hard times convicting myself, based on nothing else but wishful thinking that he will have breakout year. He is turning 22 in 8 days ,how many years you can ride youth juice and get away with it? Jokić , Kat and Porzingis are same age as him as well, so why they had more developed offense in 5th grade than he has now ?

Where else do you think the best place for him to develop an offensive game starts, though? If he develops a jump shot, it opens the door up for him to introduce pump fakes, and learn to take players off the dribble. I mean, what's the point of working on pump fakes when nobody is there to guard your shot, anyway? lol.

Thad Young is the role playing, minimal version of Millsap. He doesn't have the knack for handling or passing the ball the way Millsap does. I'd say AG already has better instincts on the ball (or at least with passing) than Thad has currently. If you reach for Millsap and land on Young, fine. But if you only reach for Young, you might be missing out on an untapped Millsap.

I understand why you compare players of the same age, but it's not the one and only means of measuring a player's development. (Also, it doesn't help when you move the goalposts comparing a 24 year old Millsap to a 21 year old AG, and then complain 21 year old AG isn't as good as 21 year old KAT/KP/Jokic). Players develop at different rates. I mean, Millsap didn't really show how good he could be until he was 25. Same with Butler. Same with Lowry. Same with Ben Wallace. All these guys wouldn't have survived under the lens of "but they're not as good as [insert HOFr]", but they're still extremely valuable to a team. I mean, Millsap was good enough to lead an ECF team. None of KAT/KP/Jokic have got out of the lottery yet. Hell, AD has only made the playoffs once in his career.

Most of players you mentioned were never given 3 years of open reign ,unlimited number of shots and 30 mpg no mattter what like Gordon is given.

Players like Butler and Lowry were never given true chance to show their real skills during their younger age, mostly because both of them were late picks who, in general don't get much PT. One time ago i made huge Lowry's career career analysis, he was hurt during whole rookie season, played behind Navarro and 4th ovrall pick in Conley after that.
Daryl Morey traded for him by saying that he was "We feel like we accomplished it. Kyle is going to be a guy the town really loves. He’s a really tough competitor, up-tempo player, a winner. Jay Wright at Villanova thinks he’s the smartest point guard he ever had. He is someone we’ve had our eyes on really since the draft." - it was 2009, Lowry was nothing but injuried backup at that point, yet one of better GMs in nba figured out that he has potential to be good. At age of 24 ,as a starter Lowry had first good season ( 14 ppg 6,7 apg ,solid efficiency ).

As I said for Millsap, he was effective but played behind , at times much better Boozer, who was borderline allstar. In 2008-''09 Millsap averaged 13,5 ppg (at age of 23 ) on 48 wins team and year later "regressed" to 11,5 ppg not because he actually got worst but because Boozer missed half of 2008-09 season and in same time averaged 20 ppg-11 rpg in 2009-10 season. It's important to add that Jazz were contenders and won 53 games in 2009-10 season.
To have something in mind, 23 years old Millsap started 2008-09 season averaging 19 ppg, 11,3 rpg, 2,7 assists,1,3 blocks, 1,9 steals during whole December of 2008 , doing it on impressive 59% FG.

That's why i think that comparing Gordon to late first round picks based on data and how they panned ou isn't fair to them ,because most of them, being late picks had to battle uphill battle to even get a chance to play, where guys like Gordon were given PT from gatest .Not to mention how guys like Butler were second round picks drafted to contenders and were literally buried on the bench . Butler basically didn't play during rookie year ,and it took almost life of Deng ( spinal tap complications ) to even get the starter role. But it didn't just take injury of Deng to make him a starter, Rip Hamilton had to basically retire in middle of the same season so Butler can gain any serious PT. Thibby was forced to use Jimmy because he had nobody else to put on the floor, literally. It was decision between 34 years old broken Hamilton, Jimmy Butler or broken Radmanovic

[Bensational]

Most of players you mentioned were never given 3 years of open reign ,unlimited number of shots and 30 mpg no mattter what like Gordon is given.

<snip>

That's why i think that comparing Gordon to late first round picks based on data and how they panned ou isn't fair to them ,because most of them, being late picks had to battle uphill battle to even get a chance to play, where guys like Gordon were given PT from gatest .Not to mention how guys like Butler were second round picks drafted to contenders and were literally buried on the bench . Butler basically didn't play during rookie year ,and it took almost life of Deng ( spinal tap complications ) to even get the starter role. But it didn't just take injury of Deng to make him a starter, Rip Hamilton had to basically retire in middle of the same season so Butler can gain any serious PT. Thibby was forced to use Jimmy because he had nobody else to put on the floor, literally. It was decision between 34 years old broken Hamilton, Jimmy Butler or broken Radmanovic

Yeah, but AG hasn't been give 3 years of open reign unlimited number of shots and 30mpg no matter what - at all. He hasn't even averaged 30mpg for a season yet. He hasn't averaged over 10fgas for a season. Let's not pretend he's been Andrew Wiggins or Devin Booker out there.

But fair enough, we don't want to compare him to guys who were later picks and had to wait longer to earn their starting shot.

Looking at recent lottery picks and comparable players, there's a spectrum of:

Terrence Jones - Harkless - MKG - Markieff Morris - Tobias Harris - Otto Porter - Paul George - Giannis - Kawhi

And currently I'd place AG somewhere in the MKG - Harris region.

Now, I want to be clear that I'm not saying AG is or will ever become him, but I do see some similarities between his current level and rookie Kawhi. Apart from the obvious difference in shooting ability, both current AG and rookie Kawhi played a lot of opportunistic basketball. Kawhi went from a guy who scored off open 3's, backdoor cuts and athletic transition plays, to a guy who can break his man down. Given that we've got the assistant coach who helped Kawhi get there, I've got hopes that Gordon can become much more competent in those regards. Again, not saying he'll reach those heights, but he could get to Millsap/Green levels.

I'll just be happy to see him hitting 3's in volume at 33% this season, though. Then see if he can build on that.

[pepe1991]

Most of players you mentioned were never given 3 years of open reign ,unlimited number of shots and 30 mpg no mattter what like Gordon is given.

<snip>

That's why i think that comparing Gordon to late first round picks based on data and how they panned ou isn't fair to them ,because most of them, being late picks had to battle uphill battle to even get a chance to play, where guys like Gordon were given PT from gatest .Not to mention how guys like Butler were second round picks drafted to contenders and were literally buried on the bench . Butler basically didn't play during rookie year ,and it took almost life of Deng ( spinal tap complications ) to even get the starter role. But it didn't just take injury of Deng to make him a starter, Rip Hamilton had to basically retire in middle of the same season so Butler can gain any serious PT. Thibby was forced to use Jimmy because he had nobody else to put on the floor, literally. It was decision between 34 years old broken Hamilton, Jimmy Butler or broken Radmanovic

Yeah, but AG hasn't been give 3 years of open reign unlimited number of shots and 30mpg no matter what - at all. He hasn't even averaged 30mpg for a season yet. He hasn't averaged over 10fgas for a season. Let's not pretend he's been Andrew Wiggins or Devin Booker out there.

But fair enough, we don't want to compare him to guys who were later picks and had to wait longer to earn their starting shot.

Looking at recent lottery picks and comparable players, there's a spectrum of:

Terrence Jones - Harkless - MKG - Markieff Morris - Tobias Harris - Otto Porter - Paul George - Giannis - Kawhi

And currently I'd place AG somewhere in the MKG - Harris region.

Now, I want to be clear that I'm not saying AG is or will ever become him, but I do see some similarities between his current level and rookie Kawhi. Apart from the obvious difference in shooting ability, both current AG and rookie Kawhi played a lot of opportunistic basketball. Kawhi went from a guy who scored off open 3's, backdoor cuts and athletic transition plays, to a guy who can break his man down. Given that we've got the assistant coach who helped Kawhi get there, I've got hopes that Gordon can become much more competent in those regards. Again, not saying he'll reach those heights, but he could get to Millsap/Green levels.

I'll just be happy to see him hitting 3's in volume at 33% this season, though. Then see if he can build on that.

Oh well ,time will tell.
I don't agree with analogy that Gordon has 4-5 years to "fully develop" , i think that most player are what they are by the end of their third to fourth year, and most players are just better versions of their rookie selfs until age decline starts. That's why most of nba allstars today made their first allstar game before they turned 24 ( that happend to be third to fourth season for most of them ).

http://www.nba-allstar.com/players/lists/players-by-age.htm

[JF5]

Alright, look, let's just clarify a few things first before we push on further with this discussion. It feels like you're settling in for an argument against some kind of wild conclusion I'm making. I'm not. Last season, yes, I was bullish about the prospect of AG, but his performance was humbling and didn't live up to my expectations. So with the headline cleared up, there are a few things with the way you're going in this discussion which feel more antagonistic than they need to be. This may not be your intention, but I feel I should let you know what my interpretation is. Like, when you make a point of saying my name, it feels like an attempt to be condescending or patronising. Again, this may not be your intent, but I don't really like it and I'd appreciate it if you stopped doing that in future. Second, the hyperbole is just an invitation for escalation. Saying an opinion is "laughable" isn't inviting someone to want to discuss matters further, it's an invitation for them to defend or attack. I'm not interested in either of those.

I apologize for coming off patronizing... But the "laughable" comment I'll stand by because AG's shooting was god-awful for segments of the season. Any word you want to put on it like laughable, atrocious, or terrible he just wasn't that good from the arc. That in itself is what it is.

Back to the topic, let's start with AG being left to figure it out. I'm admitting that he failed in that regard. He didn't show any natural instinct for creating in iso situations. There's no disagreement there. But, considering that's not his game (as has been pointed out several times), wouldn't the smarter approach be to give him some training wheels in those situations? If he can't use his handle to create space on his own, why didn't we give him a screen to help him get some space? We had two bigs who could help create space as pick and pop options, and they gave screens for Payton, Fournier, Augustin and Meeks to create - but not AG. Just seems like he was expected to fly before he could walk. Even Oladipo saw the benefit of PnRs, as that was almost entirely all we ran for him. So comparing the opportunities AG was given the ball and tasked to create, to the opportunities Vic had, just isn't a level playing field.

The Magic did eventually put him in P&R situations later on where he got switches on bigs where he exploited them on the occasion. The problem with him using the P&R consistently is that he's not much of a threat outside of driving against a big because he can't shoot/pass/penetrate consistently to make the defense pay. Like its been pointed out he's an awful shooter (so teams will just go under the screen and let him shoot). He's not really a adept to making passes off the dribble on the perimeter like a wing player so that also kills the other parts of his usage in that situation. And his handles were too poor for him to get into the paint unless it was against a big who couldn't contain his initial quick burst. Overall, P&R situations at the 3 with him are pretty much useless given his abilities.

Its just bizarre for me to even argue about Gordon/Oladipo given Vic was clearly a much better penetrator/creator/scorer that Gordon via eye test and numbers.

Plus this is slightly off topic but this is where I get confused and a little upset about this discussion. You know and admit its not his game, you know he currently doesn't have the abilities and nor should he have a higher usage on offense because of his current deficiencies. You want this team to put him on "training wheels". Yet, you consistently throw guys like Vucevic under the bus for apparently "holding him back" and shouldering the offensive load when you're pretty much admitting this guy isn't ready to be a main option. How does that make any sense?

In terms of flashes AG has shown, they're flashes, but that's still evidence of capability/potential. Does he have a long way to go from turning those flashes into consistent nightly play? Absolutely. But he isn't trying to do something he's never shown he can do before, because he's shown he can do it. What he hasn't shown he can do is to do it consistently.

That just difference perception. I pretty much saw a guy knocking down open shots in which he couldn't knockdown in games prior. Guys like Jodie Meeks and J.R. Smith do that all the time where they have games where they score 25-30 points off hot shooting. Its about proving you can do it in variety of ways and somewhat consistently. He had too many down periods and dreadful performances for me to take those hot shooting games seriously.

[Skin]

Are we going to pretend that 22 people that voted actually believe AG will be a breakout "star" by the end of the year?

wow...

[VFX]

Are we going to pretend that 22 people that voted actually believe AG will be a breakout "star" by the end of the year?

wow...

I would expect nothing less from you.

[tiderulz]

Most of players you mentioned were never given 3 years of open reign ,unlimited number of shots and 30 mpg no mattter what like Gordon is given.

<snip>

That's why i think that comparing Gordon to late first round picks based on data and how they panned ou isn't fair to them ,because most of them, being late picks had to battle uphill battle to even get a chance to play, where guys like Gordon were given PT from gatest .Not to mention how guys like Butler were second round picks drafted to contenders and were literally buried on the bench . Butler basically didn't play during rookie year ,and it took almost life of Deng ( spinal tap complications ) to even get the starter role. But it didn't just take injury of Deng to make him a starter, Rip Hamilton had to basically retire in middle of the same season so Butler can gain any serious PT. Thibby was forced to use Jimmy because he had nobody else to put on the floor, literally. It was decision between 34 years old broken Hamilton, Jimmy Butler or broken Radmanovic

Yeah, but AG hasn't been give 3 years of open reign unlimited number of shots and 30mpg no matter what - at all. He hasn't even averaged 30mpg for a season yet. He hasn't averaged over 10fgas for a season. Let's not pretend he's been Andrew Wiggins or Devin Booker out there.

But fair enough, we don't want to compare him to guys who were later picks and had to wait longer to earn their starting shot.

Looking at recent lottery picks and comparable players, there's a spectrum of:

Terrence Jones - Harkless - MKG - Markieff Morris - Tobias Harris - Otto Porter - Paul George - Giannis - Kawhi

And currently I'd place AG somewhere in the MKG - Harris region.

Now, I want to be clear that I'm not saying AG is or will ever become him, but I do see some similarities between his current level and rookie Kawhi. Apart from the obvious difference in shooting ability, both current AG and rookie Kawhi played a lot of opportunistic basketball. Kawhi went from a guy who scored off open 3's, backdoor cuts and athletic transition plays, to a guy who can break his man down. Given that we've got the assistant coach who helped Kawhi get there, I've got hopes that Gordon can become much more competent in those regards. Again, not saying he'll reach those heights, but he could get to Millsap/Green levels.

I'll just be happy to see him hitting 3's in volume at 33% this season, though. Then see if he can build on that.

players like Butler, PG13, Hayward, Kawhi, they didnt have open reign on shots either.

[Bensational]

Oh well ,time will tell.
I don't agree with analogy that Gordon has 4-5 years to "fully develop" , i think that most player are what they are by the end of their third to fourth year, and most players are just better versions of their rookie selfs until age decline starts. That's why most of nba allstars today made their first allstar game before they turned 24 ( that happend to be third to fourth season for most of them ).

http://www.nba-allstar.com/players/lists/players-by-age.htm

Yeah totally. At this point, I think people are completely justified if they see AG as a guy who will be a limited offensive player going forwards. I'm not trying to convince anyone otherwise. I just have my opinion, which is admittedly driven by a good chunk of optimism, but also because AG is young and he's only just started trying these things out. Like, he's 21, and he's only just started trying to incorporate perimeter elements to his game, but he has a great attitude and work ethic which I think will drive him to polish them to being effective at the very least. If you treat those as rookie season numbers for him, he's got another 2-3 years still to make his first allstar game before turning 24.

[Bensational]

I apologize for coming off patronizing... But the "laughable" comment I'll stand by because AG's shooting was god-awful for segments of the season. Any word you want to put on it like laughable, atrocious, or terrible he just wasn't that good from the arc. That in itself is what it is.

No sweat man. Like I said, might not have been your intention, that was just my interpretation. I obviously got the wrong end of the stick with what you meant by laughable (with it being a comment on AG's shooting, whereas I thought it was a comment on someone's opinion).

The Magic did eventually put him in P&R situations later on where he got switches on bigs where he exploited them on the occasion. The problem with him using the P&R consistently is that he's not much of a threat outside of driving against a big because he can't shoot/pass/penetrate consistently to make the defense pay. Like its been pointed out he's an awful shooter (so teams will just go under the screen and let him shoot). He's not really a adept to making passes off the dribble on the perimeter like a wing player so that also kills the other parts of his usage in that situation. And his handles were too poor for him to get into the paint unless it was against a big who couldn't contain his initial quick burst. Overall, P&R situations at the 3 with him are pretty much useless given his abilities.

Its just bizarre for me to even argue about Gordon/Oladipo given Vic was clearly a much better penetrator/creator/scorer that Gordon via eye test and numbers.

Plus this is slightly off topic but this is where I get confused and a little upset about this discussion. You know and admit its not his game, you know he currently doesn't have the abilities and nor should he have a higher usage on offense because of his current deficiencies. You want this team to put him on "training wheels". Yet, you consistently throw guys like Vucevic under the bus for apparently "holding him back" and shouldering the offensive load when you're pretty much admitting this guy isn't ready to be a main option. How does that make any sense?

Fair call. I just haven't really liked the way this team has handled development of our draft picks, so far. I don't think it's a mutually exclusive matter of giving AG training wheels whilst also running the offense through him more often. We did that with Oladipo. We found plays he could actually pull off, and then basically ran that over and over, and gave him the chance to expand from that core play. Like I said with AG, we kinda just threw him the ball and just went "well, you wanna be a scorer, go score".

There's 2 ways to develop a guy, I guess. 1) You give him the Devin Booker treatment and just give him the ball and let him chuck away and figure things out whilst you lose a ton of games. 2) You bring them along slowly, first as a competent role player, then someone taking on a larger role within the offense, and eventually giving them a top role within the offense.

We've gone for option 2 with AG. I think that's fine, if you've got a team which is competitive already. If you've got Kawhi having to play behind Duncan/Ginobili/Parker, or McCollum playing behind Lillard/LMA, or Butler playing behind Rose, etc etc. But we've got AG playing behind guys who don't deserve to be featured material, in my opinion. Vuc, in particular, is the McDonalds of offense. We go to him because he gets the job done, but you can't live off it, and you can't have it every day or else you'll just become very unhealthy.

Plus, we've pushed Vuc's development to its ceiling. We've maxed out that investment. With AG, we're still figuring out where that ceiling is. Until we get a star player, I want to see the team move on from anyone who's maxed out and not star level, and continue investing in guys who could be stars. That's just what I want to see with a rebuild.

[PennytoShaq]

Oh well ,time will tell.
I don't agree with analogy that Gordon has 4-5 years to "fully develop" , i think that most player are what they are by the end of their third to fourth year, and most players are just better versions of their rookie selfs until age decline starts. That's why most of nba allstars today made their first allstar game before they turned 24 ( that happend to be third to fourth season for most of them ).

http://www.nba-allstar.com/players/lists/players-by-age.htm

Yeah totally. At this point, I think people are completely justified if they see AG as a guy who will be a limited offensive player going forwards. I'm not trying to convince anyone otherwise. I just have my opinion, which is admittedly driven by a good chunk of optimism, but also because AG is young and he's only just started trying these things out. Like, he's 21, and he's only just started trying to incorporate perimeter elements to his game, but he has a great attitude and work ethic which I think will drive him to polish them to being effective at the very least. If you treat those as rookie season numbers for him, he's got another 2-3 years still to make his first allstar game before turning 24.

Also, it is sports. Some guys on here just want to be right and they leverage numbers that work for them and act like they know everything that will happen before it does. There is nothing wrong with being optimistic about a young 21 year old player at all. If everything happened exactly as scripted than no one would watch sports at all.

Gordon's shooting #s were not that great but I saw Milsapp was mentioned. Gordon destroyed him at PF. Milsap could not get by him on offense without using his off arm and finally getting whistled for it, and he could not defend Gordon at all.

If all AG is doing his getting his jumpshooting down, then I believe he will improve it. The debate is to what level. If he improves it to high level, he actually could have a break out year. This is a guy who scored 30 plus 5 times and also put up a donut as well. That tells me the main issue is having a consistent J. If he develops that, he could very well be a foundation player for us and a guy who averages 18ppg moving forward. If it's looking like that will not happen, I see the FO moving him at the deadline for a pick or a PG. Who knows yet. Lots of question marks on this upcoming season that no one can answer yet.

[VFX]

Oh well ,time will tell.
I don't agree with analogy that Gordon has 4-5 years to "fully develop" , i think that most player are what they are by the end of their third to fourth year, and most players are just better versions of their rookie selfs until age decline starts. That's why most of nba allstars today made their first allstar game before they turned 24 ( that happend to be third to fourth season for most of them ).

http://www.nba-allstar.com/players/lists/players-by-age.htm

Yeah totally. At this point, I think people are completely justified if they see AG as a guy who will be a limited offensive player going forwards. I'm not trying to convince anyone otherwise. I just have my opinion, which is admittedly driven by a good chunk of optimism, but also because AG is young and he's only just started trying these things out. Like, he's 21, and he's only just started trying to incorporate perimeter elements to his game, but he has a great attitude and work ethic which I think will drive him to polish them to being effective at the very least. If you treat those as rookie season numbers for him, he's got another 2-3 years still to make his first allstar game before turning 24.

Also, it is sports. Some guys on here just want to be right and they leverage numbers that work for them and act like they know everything that will happen before it does. There is nothing wrong with being optimistic about a young 21 year old player at all. If everything happened exactly as scripted than no one would watch sports at all.

Gordon's shooting #s were not that great but I saw Milsapp was mentioned. Gordon destroyed him at PF. Milsap could not get by him on offense without using his off arm and finally getting whistled for it, and he could not defend Gordon at all.

If all AG is doing his getting his jumpshooting down, then I believe he will improve it. The debate is to what level.

The poll is whether or not he becomes a breakout "star" by seasons end. AG could very well become a solid player in a few years. He could even make large strides this year.

Star? I have a hard time seeing that for him ever. 22 people aren't being realistic with their expectations.

[pepe1991]

Oh well ,time will tell.
I don't agree with analogy that Gordon has 4-5 years to "fully develop" , i think that most player are what they are by the end of their third to fourth year, and most players are just better versions of their rookie selfs until age decline starts. That's why most of nba allstars today made their first allstar game before they turned 24 ( that happend to be third to fourth season for most of them ).

http://www.nba-allstar.com/players/lists/players-by-age.htm

Yeah totally. At this point, I think people are completely justified if they see AG as a guy who will be a limited offensive player going forwards. I'm not trying to convince anyone otherwise. I just have my opinion, which is admittedly driven by a good chunk of optimism, but also because AG is young and he's only just started trying these things out. Like, he's 21, and he's only just started trying to incorporate perimeter elements to his game, but he has a great attitude and work ethic which I think will drive him to polish them to being effective at the very least. If you treat those as rookie season numbers for him, he's got another 2-3 years still to make his first allstar game before turning 24.

Also, it is sports. Some guys on here just want to be right and they leverage numbers that work for them and act like they know everything that will happen before it does. There is nothing wrong with being optimistic about a young 21 year old player at all. If everything happened exactly as scripted than no one would watch sports at all.

Gordon's shooting #s were not that great but I saw Milsapp was mentioned. Gordon destroyed him at PF. Milsap could not get by him on offense without using his off arm and finally getting whistled for it, and he could not defend Gordon at all.

If all AG is doing his getting his jumpshooting down, then I believe he will improve it. The debate is to what level. If he improves it to high level, he actually could have a break out year. This is a guy who scored 30 plus 5 times and also put up a donut as well. That tells me the main issue is having a consistent J. If he develops that, he could very well be a foundation player for us and a guy who averages 18ppg moving forward. If it's looking like that will not happen, I see the FO moving him at the deadline for a pick or a PG. Who knows yet. Lots of question marks on this upcoming season that no one can answer yet.

Gordon destroyed him at PF. Milsap could not get by him on offense without using his off arm and finally getting whistled for it, and he could not defend Gordon at all.

Since IBaka trade , Magi and Hawks faced off grand total of one time, and that happend to be second night of back to back game, not to mentioned that they played first game at home, after a game took a flights to Florida to play Magic 16 hours later, who were at home since allstar break at that point, only playing Blazers 2 nights before that game (also at home ).
That's definition of scheduled loss.

Not to mentioned that in other 3 games Millsap was getting his 15-17 and 21 points against Magic. So yea, Gordon outplayed dead tired player in second night of back to back. It would be pretty damn bad if he (and whole team) didn't. In head to head matchup before that game, Hawks won by 27 and played 13 men rotation.

7pages into a topic and nobody had hard argument or flat out fight yet. Wow . Good for us

[PennytoShaq]

Again with the stats and numbers. I just watched the game dude. AG abused Millsap and looked like the better player. We can fire down excuses for any game if we want. The point of that game is that is the only one where Gordon played PF instead of SF. Milsap had no issues with Ibaka the 3 games before. He had serious problems with Gordon and the back to back is not the reason. The reason is that AG makes a guy like Millsap look slow, and the point is that he can use that to his advantage a lot more if he does get his jump shot going.

Have to learn to really read posts before just trying to be "right" all the time.