Game 55: Suns (18-36) at Lakers (21-31), Tuesday, Feb 6th, 8:30PM MST

[wordsenuff]

I don’t think the board is “overrating” TJ. I’ve seen positive things written about him but it’s not like people are claiming he’s destined to be an all star.

[Saberestar]

When people list TJ as a building block going forward, he is hugely overrated. All he does is score at average efficiency (please dont give FG%), terrible defender and has still not shown much improvement of being a playmaker. He is a 6th man.

Terrible defender??

If he is a terrible defender I do not know if there are more than 10 decent defenders in the league in your opinion.

Our team has 17 terrible defenders? Because RIGHT NOW who is a better defender than Warren on our team?
Well, if that is the case and our complete roster is full of terrible defenders is a **** miracle that we do not get 200 points per game.

Look, I watch every single minute of every game and I swear you that the guy does not make mistakes on defense and he stays in front of his man. He is not a game changer on defense by any means, but he makes his job on that side.

I am pretty sure that Triano is happy with his defense (IQ + effort) because he looks right now way better on defense than our other players (youngs or vets) and he is usually defending the best perimeter player early in the game.

[Saberestar]

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[DaleyBlind]

When people list TJ as a building block going forward, he is hugely overrated. All he does is score at average efficiency (please dont give FG%), terrible defender and has still not shown much improvement of being a playmaker. He is a 6th man.

Terrible defender??

If he is a terrible defender I do not know if there are more than 10 decent defenders in the league in your opinion.

Our team has 17 terrible defenders? Because RIGHT NOW who is a better defender than Warren on our team?
Well, if that is the case and our complete roster is full of terrible defenders is a **** miracle that we do not get 200 points per game.

Look, I watch every single minute of every game and I swear you that the guy does not make mistakes on defense and he stays in front of his man. He is not a game changer on defense by any means, but he makes his job on that side.

I am pretty sure that Triano is happy with his defense (IQ + effort) because he looks right now way better on defense than our other players (youngs or vets) and he is usually defending the best perimeter player early in the game.

Terrible is probably an over exaggeration but he is defintley a minus defender. He does make mistakes because i have seen him blow rotations every night. Chandler, Len, Bender and Dudley are all better defenders than him for sure. Then there a few others in the same category as Warren - the bad defender category.

[Saberestar]

When people list TJ as a building block going forward, he is hugely overrated. All he does is score at average efficiency (please dont give FG%), terrible defender and has still not shown much improvement of being a playmaker. He is a 6th man.

Terrible defender??

If he is a terrible defender I do not know if there are more than 10 decent defenders in the league in your opinion.

Our team has 17 terrible defenders? Because RIGHT NOW who is a better defender than Warren on our team?
Well, if that is the case and our complete roster is full of terrible defenders is a **** miracle that we do not get 200 points per game.

Look, I watch every single minute of every game and I swear you that the guy does not make mistakes on defense and he stays in front of his man. He is not a game changer on defense by any means, but he makes his job on that side.

I am pretty sure that Triano is happy with his defense (IQ + effort) because he looks right now way better on defense than our other players (youngs or vets) and he is usually defending the best perimeter player early in the game.

Terrible is probably an over exaggeration but he is defintley a minus defender. He does make mistakes because i have seen him blow rotations every night. Chandler, Len, Bender and Dudley are all better defenders than him for sure. Then there a few others in the same category as Warren - the bad defender category.

We disagree here because I do not think any of those players are better defenders than Warren.

Chandler obviously was a great defender in the past, but he is not anymore.

Warren needs to improve his help defense a bit more, but other than that he is very solid on defense.

[DaleyBlind]

Terrible defender??

If he is a terrible defender I do not know if there are more than 10 decent defenders in the league in your opinion.

Our team has 17 terrible defenders? Because RIGHT NOW who is a better defender than Warren on our team?
Well, if that is the case and our complete roster is full of terrible defenders is a **** miracle that we do not get 200 points per game.

Look, I watch every single minute of every game and I swear you that the guy does not make mistakes on defense and he stays in front of his man. He is not a game changer on defense by any means, but he makes his job on that side.

I am pretty sure that Triano is happy with his defense (IQ + effort) because he looks right now way better on defense than our other players (youngs or vets) and he is usually defending the best perimeter player early in the game.

Terrible is probably an over exaggeration but he is defintley a minus defender. He does make mistakes because i have seen him blow rotations every night. Chandler, Len, Bender and Dudley are all better defenders than him for sure. Then there a few others in the same category as Warren - the bad defender category.

We disagree here because I do not think any of those players are better defenders than Warren.

Chandler obviously was a great defender in the past, but he is not anymore.

Warren needs to improve his help defense a bit more, but other than that he is very solid on defense.

So I assume you think TJ is our best defensive player?

[PackSuns]

Terrible defender??

If he is a terrible defender I do not know if there are more than 10 decent defenders in the league in your opinion.

Our team has 17 terrible defenders? Because RIGHT NOW who is a better defender than Warren on our team?
Well, if that is the case and our complete roster is full of terrible defenders is a **** miracle that we do not get 200 points per game.

Look, I watch every single minute of every game and I swear you that the guy does not make mistakes on defense and he stays in front of his man. He is not a game changer on defense by any means, but he makes his job on that side.

I am pretty sure that Triano is happy with his defense (IQ + effort) because he looks right now way better on defense than our other players (youngs or vets) and he is usually defending the best perimeter player early in the game.

Terrible is probably an over exaggeration but he is defintley a minus defender. He does make mistakes because i have seen him blow rotations every night. Chandler, Len, Bender and Dudley are all better defenders than him for sure. Then there a few others in the same category as Warren - the bad defender category.

We disagree here because I do not think any of those players are better defenders than Warren.

Chandler obviously was a great defender in the past, but he is not anymore.

Warren needs to improve his help defense a bit more, but other than that he is very solid on defense.

Warren has to guard point guards now because our team is so inept on defense. He has been very solid though. His current coach, prior NBA coaches, his GM and finally a bunch of analysts have been praising his defense. I wonder if some folks even watch the games.

[Saberestar]

Terrible is probably an over exaggeration but he is defintley a minus defender. He does make mistakes because i have seen him blow rotations every night. Chandler, Len, Bender and Dudley are all better defenders than him for sure. Then there a few others in the same category as Warren - the bad defender category.

We disagree here because I do not think any of those players are better defenders than Warren.

Chandler obviously was a great defender in the past, but he is not anymore.

Warren needs to improve his help defense a bit more, but other than that he is very solid on defense.

So I assume you think TJ is our best defensive player?

It is sad, but he probably is our best defender right now.

Dudley IQ on defense is great, but he is not in basketball shape so he can't make an impact on defense.

I think that Jackson is gonna be better than him in the next future and he is gonna be able to defend multiple positions, including PFs. Jackson loves to fight inside, and Warren doesn't like to bang with frontcourt players, so I think this is gonna make a big difference in the future.

Bender has shown flashes, but he needs to get stronger and be more agressive. I like his potential on defense and his help defense is already good.

Len is not a good defender in my book. He jumps on shot fakes easily, he always is in foul trouble and he can't switch at all on perimeter players. He is OK as a rim protector because of his size, but that is not enough.

And the rest of the roster is clearly worse than Warren IMO.

[DaleyBlind]

Terrible is probably an over exaggeration but he is defintley a minus defender. He does make mistakes because i have seen him blow rotations every night. Chandler, Len, Bender and Dudley are all better defenders than him for sure. Then there a few others in the same category as Warren - the bad defender category.

We disagree here because I do not think any of those players are better defenders than Warren.

Chandler obviously was a great defender in the past, but he is not anymore.

Warren needs to improve his help defense a bit more, but other than that he is very solid on defense.

Warren has to guard point guards now because our team is so inept on defense. He has been very solid though. His current coach, prior NBA coaches, his GM and finally a bunch of analysts have been praising his defense. I wonder if some folks even watch the games.

Thats all noise and puff pieces , Numbers still indicate he is a bad defender and watching the Suns this year hasn't changed my mind either.

[Mr Puddles]

It will be nice. Would be even better if we still had your pick. Doh!

Yeah that deal was confusing

The only thing preventing me from drinking myself out of a job is the fact that the Lakers aren't bottom 3 this year.

I've been desperately trying to suppress the thought that we have potentially traded away our first ever #1 pick for Brandon Knight. Especially since I've been angry about this trade since the day of the trade.

There are only two Suns trades that had me furious over the past few year and that was using the money we saved on amare to trade for the worst contract in the league at the time (Turkoglu) and trading away one of the assets I anticipated the most (LAL pick) for a player I didn't want on our team.

[NavLDO]

When people list TJ as a building block going forward, he is hugely overrated. All he does is score at average efficiency (please dont give FG%), terrible defender and has still not shown much improvement of being a playmaker. He is a 6th man.

Terrible defender??

If he is a terrible defender I do not know if there are more than 10 decent defenders in the league in your opinion.

Our team has 17 terrible defenders? Because RIGHT NOW who is a better defender than Warren on our team?
Well, if that is the case and our complete roster is full of terrible defenders is a **** miracle that we do not get 200 points per game.

Look, I watch every single minute of every game and I swear you that the guy does not make mistakes on defense and he stays in front of his man. He is not a game changer on defense by any means, but he makes his job on that side.

I am pretty sure that Triano is happy with his defense (IQ + effort) because he looks right now way better on defense than our other players (youngs or vets) and he is usually defending the best perimeter player early in the game.

And now, after this thread, he's woefully underrated

I also love posters that say "...and don't bother bringing up blah, blah" because, that well, goes against their argument, so of course you don't want to bring it up...

I don't believe ever reading that Warren should be an All Star or anything, on these forms...only that he's our second best player, and has earned his place as a starter.

So, he doesn't shoot 3s...ensure we get other players that do. Until we get better players, he is what he is.

And, until someone steps up, Warren will be talked about favorably because he is our 2nd best player.

[darealjuice]

I don't mind losing, but I wasn't a big fan of letting them have a dunk contest against us toward the end of that game. The ball movement was solid on offense last night, but we don't have the scoring or spacing we need to capitalize without Booker out there.

I'm not too banged up about Dragan's play last night. He really got beat up by Randle early, but I thought he did a good job adjusting to the physicality after that. It's good that he stayed fairly aggressive and got a decent amount of shots up despite not shooting well from the jump. One thing I didn't like is that he was falling back on a few of his shots though, there's just no reason for him to do that. I do think that not having Booker hurt his ability get open shots on pick-and-pop though, since they just went under screens for everyone and left a defender on Bender to take away the 3. Still a long way to go for Bender, but the more frequent flashes of passing ability and more aggressive rebounding have been nice to see the last few games. He has the tools and skillset to be a very good player in the NBA, but it's not going to happen until/unless he gets stronger and develops a more aggressive mindset. I think he's taking steps in the right direction, but he needs to play like the last few games for the like 90% of the rest of the season before I get my hopes too high.

[bwgood77]

Terrible defender??

If he is a terrible defender I do not know if there are more than 10 decent defenders in the league in your opinion.

Our team has 17 terrible defenders? Because RIGHT NOW who is a better defender than Warren on our team?
Well, if that is the case and our complete roster is full of terrible defenders is a **** miracle that we do not get 200 points per game.

Look, I watch every single minute of every game and I swear you that the guy does not make mistakes on defense and he stays in front of his man. He is not a game changer on defense by any means, but he makes his job on that side.

I am pretty sure that Triano is happy with his defense (IQ + effort) because he looks right now way better on defense than our other players (youngs or vets) and he is usually defending the best perimeter player early in the game.

Terrible is probably an over exaggeration but he is defintley a minus defender. He does make mistakes because i have seen him blow rotations every night. Chandler, Len, Bender and Dudley are all better defenders than him for sure. Then there a few others in the same category as Warren - the bad defender category.

We disagree here because I do not think any of those players are better defenders than Warren.

Chandler obviously was a great defender in the past, but he is not anymore.

Warren needs to improve his help defense a bit more, but other than that he is very solid on defense.

Warren has definitely been improving and is being a pretty solid defender as of late. We just don't have many great defenders. Bender and Jackson have shown some stuff. Booker is still among the worst overall in the league, and Daniels is pretty much the worst in the league except for Mudiay I guess.

If Warren continues to improve there that is good, because he has become great with steals, has really been passing more, rarely turns it over (most of our team turns it over quite a bit, so it's nice he doesn't). The only real major thing that's missing is the 3 pt shooting, which is important today, but given his elite scoring, and the way he keeps moving, he usually doesn't clog things too much, because if a guy leaves him on the 3 pt line, he moves somewhere else and his defender has to try and keep with him, and usually fails.

[thamadkant]

Jackson is the team's best perimeter defender clearly.


Warren puts a lot of effort... But Jackson has the skills and the impact. He's just too weak at the moment. But he is put on players that usually kills the suns and he contains them. This is clear by watching the games. He is on point with switches and great at anticipating passes.


Chandler is the smartest inside defender but his body doesn't match his IQ anymore.

Dudley too... High IQ. But lack of athleticism and fitness clearly shows. But he coached on court pointing to spots so players defend it.


Completely disagree that Warren is the suns best defender. He's one of the better ones.. But a few players above him through eye test alone.


Jackson is put on the best offensive players usually and he clamps them unless he is screened easily due to him being too skinny.

[Damkac]

Define 'great'

Maybe not great but he's already trending towards being a better player than TJ.

TJ is overrated massively on here, so thats not saying much.

What? TJ? Overrated? By who?

[DaleyBlind]

Maybe not great but he's already trending towards being a better player than TJ.

TJ is overrated massively on here, so thats not saying much.

What? TJ? Overrated? By who?

90% of this sub

[NavLDO]

Terrible is probably an over exaggeration but he is defintley a minus defender. He does make mistakes because i have seen him blow rotations every night. Chandler, Len, Bender and Dudley are all better defenders than him for sure. Then there a few others in the same category as Warren - the bad defender category.

We disagree here because I do not think any of those players are better defenders than Warren.

Chandler obviously was a great defender in the past, but he is not anymore.

Warren needs to improve his help defense a bit more, but other than that he is very solid on defense.

Warren has definitely been improving and is being a pretty solid defender as of late. We just don't have many great defenders. Bender and Jackson have shown some stuff. Booker is still among the worst overall in the league, and Daniels is pretty much the worst in the league except for Mudiay I guess.

If Warren continues to improve there that is good, because he has become great with steals, has really been passing more, rarely turns it over (most of our team turns it over quite a bit, so it's nice he doesn't). The only real major thing that's missing is the 3 pt shooting, which is important today, but given his elite scoring, and the way he keeps moving, he usually doesn't clog things too much, because if a guy leaves him on the 3 pt line, he moves somewhere else and his defender has to try and keep with him, and usually fails.

Exactly my point from weeks back in being ok in keeping him as a starter...now, however?? After it appears we will not be making any deals?? Well, unless a miracle happens, Warren better recognize that Booker is a 2, we're drafting a 1, JJ's a 3, and we already have 2 x 4s, and oh, we'll be drafting a 5, most likely, unless Chriss/Bender go to the 5...but point is, we did not 'sell' picks for winning players now, so he's mostly gone from the starting spot, as long as JJ keeps progressing (last night, they both sucked).

Anyway, Warren is just a unique talent in today's game, and while it may not translate directly, like you said, as long as he shows positive 'D' actions (I really don't care much for any 'one' defensive metric alone; especially when he produces the steals/blocks he does, being top 14 in the league, and Top 10 among Starting SF in Stls/TO).

He also is 4th in ORR, yet he's 52nd in DRR. So he's active on the Offensive Boards, but nearly invisible on the defensive boards...just odd...which I'm sure is why his DRtg/DBPM/DRPM reflects him not being great on D. He's just different, but Defense is so hard to measure. But so long as the 'eye test' and other indicators like Stls/Blks show he's contributing positively on D for us, well, I'm not worried about it, TBH.