The Jabari Discussion Thread - Back 2/2

[humanrefutation]

I was never of the perspective that Jabari was significantly overweight. I thought his size made him more physically imposing at the 3 and 4. But, he does look to be in really good shape in that clip.

In the long run, I hope he is able to add a little more muscle mass to his upper body. That'll really help him against more physical forwards out there. But I think the benefit of less stress on his knees is the most important priority at this point.

[AussieBuck]

I've obviously got my doubts about his defense and durability and that looming contract but I;m really excited to see him back out there playing. If Thon can find some form we can run a Jabari/Giannis two man game with spacing everywhere. Also off ball Jabari doing insane baseline cut and dunks.

[Prez]

Still maintain a healthy Jabari could've become like a forward Kyrie for us. Awful defender, special offensive talent, eventual killer go-to scorer. It really sucks we'll probably never see his true peak. There were so many flashes of shot creation ability that we just never really let him develop more. He did develop some awesome off-ball skills though.

[Chapter29]

I think Parker will surprise with his athleticism. I think we still have a chance to see his peak. Avoiding injury of course is going to be the key.

These injuries in part have helped him. He is more of a student of the game. He has been forced into the weight room and rehab areas of athletics that he may otherwise avoided IMO.

The jokes about him being fat are exaggerations obviously but they are based in some reality. He was kind of lazy and a bit soft if you will from a working out / lifting perspective. And his body showed it. Can still be a great player in the NBA but maybe not as great. Much prefer the Giannis route of building up the body.

Now, due IMO in part to these injuries, Parker is in really good shape. I don't think he has the body type to put on cut looking muscle like Giannis' leaness can but he looks great and I know his workouts have been really hard and much improved over the last rehab effort.

So now we have a much smarter player (hopefully) and a player with a stronger work ethic and body. This might just end well for us. I know its super risky, but man if there has been any dude not named Giannis I'd take a chance with....its this guy.

[coolhandluke121]

I think Parker will surprise with his athleticism. I think we still have a chance to see his peak. Avoiding injury of course is going to be the key.

These injuries in part have helped him. He is more of a student of the game. He has been forced into the weight room and rehab areas of athletics that he may otherwise avoided IMO.

The jokes about him being fat are exaggerations obviously but they are based in some reality. He was kind of lazy and a bit soft if you will from a working out / lifting perspective. And his body showed it. Can still be a great player in the NBA but maybe not as great. Much prefer the Giannis route of building up the body.

Now, due IMO in part to these injuries, Parker is in really good shape. I don't think he has the body type to put on cut looking muscle like Giannis' leaness can but he looks great and I know his workouts have been really hard and much improved over the last rehab effort.

So now we have a much smarter player (hopefully) and a player with a stronger work ethic and body. This might just end well for us. I know its super risky, but man if there has been any dude not named Giannis I'd take a chance with....its this guy.

He is in better shape, but isn't it weird that he had to tear his ACL twice to get there? Redd did the same thing. By the time he finally lost the extra weight he was carrying, it was too late. Jabari is younger and I think he has a decent chance of having a few more good seasons offensively before the long-term effects catch up with him, but damn it would have been nice if he had just been lean and fit every season from the get-go.

Regarding his improvement and making him smarter, I didn't see any improvement on defense or awareness between his first tear and the second one. The 3's last year were nice, but they dried up in a hurry when teams started respecting it a little more. And has he ever acknowledged needing to improve in certain areas, especially defense? After the first tear, he literally said the secret to his successful comeback was "doing nothing different" the whole summer and just playing like he always has. Then he wrote that long letter after the 2nd tear, but I was left wondering whether he even grasped that the team was playing better without him and how that could make people wonder about his impact. It's not that I expect him to come out and say "I suck on defense", but at least throw us a bone and acknowledge that there's room for improvement. Say you're going to get better in that area; don't just say you're going to come back and be able to dunk like you always have. Dunk dunk dunk dunk dunk. JABARI DUNK NOW. WTF.

[Wisky4life]

I think Parker will always be Carmelo to me. All scoring, little to no defense.

Carmelo hasn't gone anywhere in his career, but he never had a Giannis either. Hope he ends up proving himself when he gets that fat contract from us.

[HKPackFan]

I've seen a couple people critique Jabari's comment about how he just played ball over the summer and didn't work on his game. It's a valid point, but if I recall the article I thought the takeaway from that was it was more for his mental health than anything. The stress of him trying to fulfill expectations was getting to him to the point it was adverse to his mental health, so to alleviate that, he stopped worrying about it, and just had fun playing ball.

Again, not to defend Jabari, but when I read that article last year or whenever, it seemed his point was in the context of fixing his mental health. Maybe I read it differently.

[M-C-G]

I think Parker will surprise with his athleticism. I think we still have a chance to see his peak. Avoiding injury of course is going to be the key.

These injuries in part have helped him. He is more of a student of the game. He has been forced into the weight room and rehab areas of athletics that he may otherwise avoided IMO.

The jokes about him being fat are exaggerations obviously but they are based in some reality. He was kind of lazy and a bit soft if you will from a working out / lifting perspective. And his body showed it. Can still be a great player in the NBA but maybe not as great. Much prefer the Giannis route of building up the body.

Now, due IMO in part to these injuries, Parker is in really good shape. I don't think he has the body type to put on cut looking muscle like Giannis' leaness can but he looks great and I know his workouts have been really hard and much improved over the last rehab effort.

So now we have a much smarter player (hopefully) and a player with a stronger work ethic and body. This might just end well for us. I know its super risky, but man if there has been any dude not named Giannis I'd take a chance with....its this guy.

He is in better shape, but isn't it weird that he had to tear his ACL twice to get there? Redd did the same thing. By the time he finally lost the extra weight he was carrying, it was too late. Jabari is younger and I think he has a decent chance of having a few more good seasons offensively before the long-term effects catch up with him, but damn it would have been nice if he had just been lean and fit every season from the get-go.

Regarding his improvement and making him smarter, I didn't see any improvement on defense or awareness between his first tear and the second one. The 3's last year were nice, but they dried up in a hurry when teams started respecting it a little more. And has he ever acknowledged needing to improve in certain areas, especially defense? After the first tear, he literally said the secret to his successful comeback was "doing nothing different" the whole summer and just playing like he always has. Then he wrote that long letter after the 2nd tear, but I was left wondering whether he even grasped that the team was playing better without him and how that could make people wonder about his impact. It's not that I expect him to come out and say "I suck on defense", but at least throw us a bone and acknowledge that there's room for improvement. Say you're going to get better in that area; don't just say you're going to come back and be able to dunk like you always have. Dunk dunk dunk dunk dunk. JABARI DUNK NOW. WTF.

I'd like to hear him talk about the defense, but I thought he certainly improved his on ball defense. Part of the problem with him is that when he messes up it cringe worthy and it leads people being overly critical, but I've always maintained the defense is his problem to solve, the onus is on him. I think pairing him with a rim protector could really help out, I also hope they are making him sit with Sweeney during the games and having him talk about the defense non stop (I don't think this is happening, but it should be if it is not)

As for the dunk, dunk, dunk....I mean, in 2015 he had an average shooting distance of 7.7 feet, in 2016 he raised that to 10.6 feet, improved his TS% from .535 to .563, raised his % of 3pt taken from 4% to 22% of his shots, while raising his 16-3 average 4.5% and raising his 3pt average 11%.

I know you want to trivialize some of these improvements, but the dude improved pretty substantially. He put in the work but as usual he is a terrible communicator and you are getting hung up on the delivery of the message and I think your bias is preventing you from really seeing tangible improvements.

[LUKE23]

It will be very interesting to watch the O vs. D dynamic play out when Jabari comes back. Right now, I think the team has a good amount of shooters, but lacks a go to scorer sans Giannis when teams really cram the lane on him. Bottom line, I hope when Parker comes back he's near 100%, and we at least get to see two months or so of what a Giannis/Parker/Middleton/Brogdon offense can be like. Could be unstoppable, who knows. We have never seen that trio with all three guys at their peak.

[Prez]

I think Parker will always be Carmelo to me. All scoring, little to no defense.

Carmelo hasn't gone anywhere in his career, but he never had a Giannis either. Hope he ends up proving himself when he gets that fat contract from us.

A willing passer, team-oriented prime Melo is a monster 2nd option. I doubt Jabari gets there with his injuries but if he somehow does the team would be in amazing shape.

[engelmartin]

I wouldn't mind if he improved his rebounding numbers rather than defense. If he could average around 8+ rebounds a game for us that'd be a lot bigger than playing slightly better defense, imo. No reason he can't do both though.

[H2tObes]

Parker as a #2 option behind a 30 PPG scorer could be really good. I'm excited for Jabari's return

[Asian Celtic]

It will be very interesting to watch the O vs. D dynamic play out when Jabari comes back. Right now, I think the team has a good amount of shooters, but lacks a go to scorer sans Giannis when teams really cram the lane on him. Bottom line, I hope when Parker comes back he's near 100%, and we at least get to see two months or so of what a Giannis/Parker/Middleton/Brogdon offense can be like. Could be unstoppable, who knows. We have never seen that trio with all three guys at their peak.

Anybody have an estimate / idea when Parker will be back?

[MickeyDavis]

February

[ReginaldDwight]

It will be very interesting to watch the O vs. D dynamic play out when Jabari comes back. Right now, I think the team has a good amount of shooters, but lacks a go to scorer sans Giannis when teams really cram the lane on him. Bottom line, I hope when Parker comes back he's near 100%, and we at least get to see two months or so of what a Giannis/Parker/Middleton/Brogdon offense can be like. Could be unstoppable, who knows. We have never seen that trio with all three guys at their peak.

Anybody have an estimate / idea when Parker will be back?

AS Break

[Asian Celtic]

It will be very interesting to watch the O vs. D dynamic play out when Jabari comes back. Right now, I think the team has a good amount of shooters, but lacks a go to scorer sans Giannis when teams really cram the lane on him. Bottom line, I hope when Parker comes back he's near 100%, and we at least get to see two months or so of what a Giannis/Parker/Middleton/Brogdon offense can be like. Could be unstoppable, who knows. We have never seen that trio with all three guys at their peak.

Anybody have an estimate / idea when Parker will be back?

AS Break

Is it ahead of schedule or just right on time? Hope he gets back 100%. Thanks for replying btw.

[ReginaldDwight]

Anybody have an estimate / idea when Parker will be back?

AS Break

Is it ahead of schedule or just right on time? Hope he gets back 100%. Thanks for replying btw.

Right on time I think the pegged him soon after injury as 1 year recovery if I recall

[TroyD92]

Jabari's defense is the problem

[GimmeDat]

Some Bulls fans are under the impression that Parker's a 3 and would be worth taking a chance on as the future at SF.

From what I've seen he's a PF first and foremost.. thoughts?

[Ayt]

Some Bulls fans are under the impression that Parker's a 3 and would be worth taking a chance on as the future at SF.

From what I've seen he's a PF first and foremost.. thoughts?

He's definitely a 3. He stopped playing the 4 about halfway through the 2015-16 season.