emunney wrote:xTitan wrote:emunney wrote:
Just looked it up. Dort had 33 on 15 FGAs. Career high!
At any rate I am optimistic about Merrill's offense.
Not sure how good Merrill can be on defense, but he never covered the other teams best scorers because he was indispensable....the fact he scored 27 on Dort is amazing.
Watching it now. I'll let you know.
I have more detailed notes on my computer but I'll give my takes from my phone:
- He did match up with Dort quite a bit both ways. Dort had him almost every possession. He had Dort less than half the time, but enough to see that he was physically overmatched. That said, he competes. He's not Jimmer or one of these guys who just loafs off ball. He drew one charge and probably should have had another.
- Offensively, he's everything to them, like we knew. He's just very difficult to defend. Very sneaky off the ball and a constant red alert with the ball in his hands. Uncanny sense of the defender's balance, blew by Dort more than once. He's got all the skills and knows what to do with them.
Overall, I think we're looking at a guy who is not likely to be more than Matt Thomas in the NBA, but who can likely run a G League team and could get more than spot minutes in certain matchups. If his body is radically different to the extent that his athletic performance has dramatically improved, that could change his outlook.