Chi town wrote:When was the last time Lauri had 4 assists?
Last year 4 games of 4 assists. Year before 6 once, 5 once, 4 twice Rookie 3 games with 4 assists.
Regardless, in 171 career games he now has 4 or more assists 11 times. Only two of those were more than 4.
Generally, passing isn't his thing as I have been saying but I really liked last night. Again, he doesn't have to be Steve Nash. Beyond that, assists are created by dribbling the ball or posting up so him driving will open this stuff up.
Chi town wrote:When was the last time Lauri had 4 assists?
Last year 4 games of 4 assists. Year before 6 once, 5 once, 4 twice Rookie 3 games with 4 assists.
Regardless, in 171 career games he now has 4 or more assists 11 times. Only two of those were more than 4.
Generally, passing isn't his thing as I have been saying but I really liked last night. Again, he doesn't have to be Steve Nash. Beyond that, assists are created by dribbling the ball or posting up so him driving will open this stuff up.
See to me that wasn't Lauri going above and beyond. That's what I expect from him. I do think he could do this stuff last year but he just wasn't given the opportunity.
Also why I disagree with your "Lauri is selfish" take coldfish. If a scorer is given only 5 touches with the ball, he's obviously going to try putting them up as shots. Expand that to 10 and then maybe 7 are shots and 3 are playmaking? Expand it to 20 and then it becomes 13 shots and 7 attempts at playmaking.
Last year it was 5 touches with 3 being catch and shoot 3s and the other 2 as sh*t post ups.
Lauri should be getting touches EVERY PLAY. It doesn't need to end up a shot for him but usually it's a positive outcome. This game again showed the potential of Lauri pnr. The assists count only show 4 but he did find multiple guys for open shots and wcj/gafford for FTs on his other attempts. This was the highest "potential assists" game from him so far. Yes he had two bad pass turnovers but again, with volume I think you'd see assists go up more than turnovers.
If you go to 1:50 or so, you will see a play where its an open 3, a good closeout and a drive. 3 Bulls are in position to defend the drive and all of them actively choose not to as you can see their heads are pointed right at the ball handler. This kind of stuff goes on all the time and always has with Lauri. Its a big part of the reason why he is a net negative player over the long term. When he shoots well, he makes up for this but when he doesn't, he kills the team. IMO, he is frequently so far out of the play that fans don't realize that he was supposed to be helping.
I'm not looking for Ben Wallace here. Just some type of effort. High school coaches would be furious at that sequence. Junior high too.
See I agree that's bad defense on the cleanup but the point where the defense breaks first is again the guards. If archi doesn't bite on the pump fake we don't have that situation. This was what I pointed out in my defense thread and it was continually happening with our starting guards too. And then compound it with the horrendous turnovers and it was game over from the jump.
Lauri is not a rim protector. Said it before and I'll say it again. Continually putting him in those positions is how to not help him succeed. He's fine as a big wing guarding the weaker of the two wings. The benefit of Lauri is the efficient offense (if he can get the ball) and passable defense (if not over extended). A la trae young. If trae was only used as a corner spacer/shooter and then put on the toughest defensive assignments I don't think he would be looked at the same way either.
This isn't realistic. The number 1 weapon in the NBA is the 3 pointer. That means that guards have to close out hard and go over screens to contest outside shots. Off ball defenders HAVE to help because you are giving up the drive. Its simply not a skill that a C/PF/SF can choose not to have.
I gave the example, now I'll repeat the stat. Lauri ranked 309th in the NBA for defensive rpm last year. Accounting for his teammates, he is still really bad at that side of the court.
The above sequence is likely why PW is starting over Otto. It wasn't just Lauri screwing up there.
There is more nuance to it than that. With a set drop defense, the objective of the guards is to funnel the opposite guards to the dropped bigman wall at the mid-range area. In that sense yes, help defense and rotations are crucial from the other players.
On scrambling transition plays like the one you mention. That's on the guards to stop the initial penetration while the defense is getting setup. That's why all 3 players were in no man's land not just Lauri.
Our defense is breaking at the point of attack because of our guards. In the past few years, WCJ was enough of a positive on defense to negate/mitigate these mistakes. Now we don't even have that so it looks worse than the sum of the parts.
For Lauri specifically if you put him around solid defenders he won't be a game breaking bad defender. However, he's not a defense elevator. If you put him in a bad situation, his struggles are amplified. He has enough defense to be average/slightly above average if the rest of the defense is good but he's not going to be able to mitigate bad defense.
Obviously you can live with average defense if he's a good positive on the offensive end (consistently) which I think he can be....but he needs USAGE!!!!
PaKii94 wrote:Lauri is not a rim protector. Said it before and I'll say it again. Continually putting him in those positions is how to not help him succeed. He's fine as a big wing guarding the weaker of the two wings.
They ran an ISO for Kevin Huerter on him and Huerter just easily dribbled around him to score off the dribble. I haven't watched tons of Kevin Huerter by any stretch of the imagination, but he doesn't strike me as a guy your team runs isos for often. If you can't defend Kevin Huerter in an iso situation, I'm not sure you can claim he's going to be able to guard the weaker of two wings.
He's just a defensive liability. Passable defense is a huge stretch. He's the worst defender in the starting lineup that doesn't really feature good defenders. I agree with your overall point that if he scores very efficiently on offense that he may make up for that, and I think he did that yesterday. I expect his defense will consistently be this bad, I'm skeptical that his offense will stay well above league average.
Huerter is a guard not a wing...and I'll have to go back and rewatch to confirm but I'm pretty sure it was in a set drop defense. In that case Lauri is playing the guard role on defense. What's the guards role? To funnel the player to the bigman. I'm pretty sure Lauri did that. I gotta go back and rewatch where the breakdown occured.
Anyway regardless, Lauri guarding wings one on one is pretty good because he can use his length to contest. His defense is in the tune of "bend not break" like in football. Due to his short arms, it's better for him to let the player get into his chest then contest with his length. Sometimes the opposing player will make a contested shot over him. Majority of the time, the shot is contested well enough that it's a miss.
coldfish wrote:I'm going to be positive about Lauri for a second.
The last few games he has been consistently attacking with the ball. He isn't just hanging around the perimeter. When he drives, he collapses the defense and gives himself better shot opportunities. Last night, I didn't think any of his shots were selfish. He was trying to pass. He even took Bogdanovic in the post on a switch and made it.
Lauri doing this kind of thing on offense puts a floor on his game contribution. Even when off with his shot, he can still create some offense for both himself and others.
I agree this was a floor because he still didn't put up many fga. Last year he just didn't have these opportunities so what we saw was his floor from shooting contributions.
Now we gotta put them together and he has a pretty good overall floor. With many boom opportunities
That's the Lauri I want to see and expect to see on a regular basis. I think that's a reasonable expectation. Nothing he did last night is beyond his means. His release looked super quick. Not sure where that came from out of nowhere, but I'll definitely take it.
While he had a very nice game, he could have had an even better one if we got him more than 9 shots. Not that it would have made a difference in the outcome. We need to make more of an effort to get him involved, get him more cuts and looks going to the basket. Too much of a Boylen vibe last night where he started off red hot and barely got the ball as the game wore on. He's a big, not a guard, he needs someone to get him the ball, like all other bigs minus a select few of the elite superstars.
Defensively he remains a solid on-ball defender and I think the doom and gloom about his help defense last night is a bit overblown. I'll have to rewatch it, but from what I saw he didn't look completely lost on help D. If WCJ and our guards were doing their jobs defensively it would be a lot easier to hide Lauri's defensive shortcomings.
I love the 4/5 P&R we've been seeing and I love this flash of playmaking we saw from him. More of that please.
TSS wrote:The worst plus/minus is because Lauri did not play on 4th when Atlanta played their scrubs.
This is exactly why Bulls need to get rid of him.
And everybody else who played in first 3 quarters. If I follow your logic.
To me that's one of the weirdest cooked-up anti Lauri statements I've seen in a while. I mean, that sentence included no logic. Would like to see it being elaborated...
MrSparkle wrote:I don't see a scenario here or there where Lauri becomes the "7-pick we thought he could be." If you remove his 3P ability, he's worse than Felicio by a mile.
12/2/2022 I like the quote- it makes me chuckle. And it was/is pretty much true.
GoBlue72391 wrote:That's the Lauri I want to see and expect to see on a regular basis. I think that's a reasonable expectation. Nothing he did last night is beyond his means. His release looked super quick. Not sure where that came from out of nowhere, but I'll definitely take it.
While he had a very nice game, he could have had an even better one if we got him more than 9 shots. Not that it would have made a difference in the outcome. We need to make more of an effort to get him involved, get him more cuts and looks going to the basket. Too much of a Boylen vibe last night where he started off red hot and barely got the ball as the game wore on. He's a big, not a guard, he needs someone to get him the ball, like all other bigs minus a select few of the elite superstars.
Defensively he remains a solid on-ball defender and I think the doom and gloom about his help defense last night is a bit overblown. I'll have to rewatch it, but from what I saw he didn't look completely lost on help D. If WCJ and our guards were doing their jobs defensively it would be a lot easier to hide Lauri's defensive shortcomings.
I love the 4/5 P&R we've been seeing and I love this flash of playmaking we saw from him. More of that please.
Should've definitely gotten more than 9 shots considering how on he was. But the guards likely were trying to redeem themselves because how putrid they were all night instead of recognizing it's not their night and trying to feed the hot hand. It's easier to do that and jack up a shot when you always have the ball in your hands.
Also, Lauri at the 5 was pretty bad since he doesn't provide ANY rim protection whatsoever. It's crazy because for somebody that tall, you always see him go up to contest, but the other team never has any problem scoring on him - and I'm not talking about just last night's game, but throughout his career. But at this point with WCJ so putrid and providing nothing, I guess might as well?
GoBlue72391 wrote:That's the Lauri I want to see and expect to see on a regular basis. I think that's a reasonable expectation. Nothing he did last night is beyond his means. His release looked super quick. Not sure where that came from out of nowhere, but I'll definitely take it.
While he had a very nice game, he could have had an even better one if we got him more than 9 shots. Not that it would have made a difference in the outcome. We need to make more of an effort to get him involved, get him more cuts and looks going to the basket. Too much of a Boylen vibe last night where he started off red hot and barely got the ball as the game wore on. He's a big, not a guard, he needs someone to get him the ball, like all other bigs minus a select few of the elite superstars.
Defensively he remains a solid on-ball defender and I think the doom and gloom about his help defense last night is a bit overblown. I'll have to rewatch it, but from what I saw he didn't look completely lost on help D. If WCJ and our guards were doing their jobs defensively it would be a lot easier to hide Lauri's defensive shortcomings.
I love the 4/5 P&R we've been seeing and I love this flash of playmaking we saw from him. More of that please.
Overblown he was terrible literally whenever they got the switch on Markkanen they scored at ease and he couldn't even contest shots at the rim he 7'0 feet and just slow trying to play defense.
So no it's not overblown doesn't matter how much he scores if he can't defend a lamp post.
Chi town wrote:When was the last time Lauri had 4 assists?
Last year 4 games of 4 assists. Year before 6 once, 5 once, 4 twice Rookie 3 games with 4 assists.
Regardless, in 171 career games he now has 4 or more assists 11 times. Only two of those were more than 4.
Generally, passing isn't his thing as I have been saying but I really liked last night. Again, he doesn't have to be Steve Nash. Beyond that, assists are created by dribbling the ball or posting up so him driving will open this stuff up.
See to me that wasn't Lauri going above and beyond. That's what I expect from him. I do think he could do this stuff last year but he just wasn't given the opportunity.
Also why I disagree with your "Lauri is selfish" take coldfish. If a scorer is given only 5 touches with the ball, he's obviously going to try putting them up as shots. Expand that to 10 and then maybe 7 are shots and 3 are playmaking? Expand it to 20 and then it becomes 13 shots and 7 attempts at playmaking.
Last year it was 5 touches with 3 being catch and shoot 3s and the other 2 as sh*t post ups.
Lauri should be getting touches EVERY PLAY. It doesn't need to end up a shot for him but usually it's a positive outcome. This game again showed the potential of Lauri pnr. The assists count only show 4 but he did find multiple guys for open shots and wcj/gafford for FTs on his other attempts. This was the highest "potential assists" game from him so far. Yes he had two bad pass turnovers but again, with volume I think you'd see assists go up more than turnovers.
Again, no one is generating an assist from every pass they make. That's an irrational stat unless you are somehow counting them for every player. Lauri is generally a selfish player who takes a shot a disproportionate percentage of the time when he touches the ball. This is reflected in his low assist numbers.
Overall, last night was notable for Lauri in that it was a big departure from his normal play. As I showed above, he rarely even has 4 assists in a game despite a ton of touches. That's actually hard to do unless you heave it up almost every time you touch it.
I would love to get a leaguewide stat from last year on FGA / A. I'll call it the selfish chucker stat. I bet Lauri is among the league's worst.
PaKii94 wrote:
Spoiler:
coldfish wrote:
PaKii94 wrote:
See I agree that's bad defense on the cleanup but the point where the defense breaks first is again the guards. If archi doesn't bite on the pump fake we don't have that situation. This was what I pointed out in my defense thread and it was continually happening with our starting guards too. And then compound it with the horrendous turnovers and it was game over from the jump.
Lauri is not a rim protector. Said it before and I'll say it again. Continually putting him in those positions is how to not help him succeed. He's fine as a big wing guarding the weaker of the two wings. The benefit of Lauri is the efficient offense (if he can get the ball) and passable defense (if not over extended). A la trae young. If trae was only used as a corner spacer/shooter and then put on the toughest defensive assignments I don't think he would be looked at the same way either.
This isn't realistic. The number 1 weapon in the NBA is the 3 pointer. That means that guards have to close out hard and go over screens to contest outside shots. Off ball defenders HAVE to help because you are giving up the drive. Its simply not a skill that a C/PF/SF can choose not to have.
I gave the example, now I'll repeat the stat. Lauri ranked 309th in the NBA for defensive rpm last year. Accounting for his teammates, he is still really bad at that side of the court.
The above sequence is likely why PW is starting over Otto. It wasn't just Lauri screwing up there.
There is more nuance to it than that. With a set drop defense, the objective of the guards is to funnel the opposite guards to the dropped bigman wall at the mid-range area. In that sense yes, help defense and rotations are crucial from the other players.
On scrambling transition plays like the one you mention. That's on the guards to stop the initial penetration while the defense is getting setup. That's why all 3 players were in no man's land not just Lauri.
Our defense is breaking at the point of attack because of our guards. In the past few years, WCJ was enough of a positive on defense to negate/mitigate these mistakes. Now we don't even have that so it looks worse than the sum of the parts.
For Lauri specifically if you put him around solid defenders he won't be a game breaking bad defender. However, he's not a defense elevator. If you put him in a bad situation, his struggles are amplified. He has enough defense to be average/slightly above average if the rest of the defense is good but he's not going to be able to mitigate bad defense.
Obviously you can live with average defense if he's a good positive on the offensive end (consistently) which I think he can be....but he needs USAGE!!!!
Again, when you account for the players around him, Lauri was around 309th in the NBA for defensive rpm last year. It really is him.
And no, there is no nuance to the play that I highlighted. You have a player with the ball, uncovered going to the rim from 15 feet away. Its basic fundamental basketball that you leave your man and try to stop him. We are talking stuff taught to kids under 10 years old at this point. This is the kind of thing that comes after basic passing / dribbling / shooting skills.
As long as Lauri keeps making bad decisions like that, he is going to hurt the defense as soon as he steps on the floor. This is well below replacement level defense. It doesn't matter if he has 4 all world defenders around him or not.
coldfish wrote:Again, when you account for the players around him, Lauri was around 309th in the NBA for defensive rpm last year. It really is him.
And no, there is no nuance to the play that I highlighted. You have a player with the ball, uncovered going to the rim from 15 feet away. Its basic fundamental basketball that you leave your man and try to stop him. We are talking stuff taught to kids under 10 years old at this point. This is the kind of thing that comes after basic passing / dribbling / shooting skills.
As long as Lauri keeps making bad decisions like that, he is going to hurt the defense as soon as he steps on the floor. This is well below replacement level defense. It doesn't matter if he has 4 all world defenders around him or not.
I checked full play highlights and nothing indicates that Lauri was bad or reason to bad D that Bulls had.
"Larry Nance Jr is better than Lauri Markkanen" -RealGM 2021
coldfish wrote:Again, when you account for the players around him, Lauri was around 309th in the NBA for defensive rpm last year. It really is him.
And no, there is no nuance to the play that I highlighted. You have a player with the ball, uncovered going to the rim from 15 feet away. Its basic fundamental basketball that you leave your man and try to stop him. We are talking stuff taught to kids under 10 years old at this point. This is the kind of thing that comes after basic passing / dribbling / shooting skills.
As long as Lauri keeps making bad decisions like that, he is going to hurt the defense as soon as he steps on the floor. This is well below replacement level defense. It doesn't matter if he has 4 all world defenders around him or not.
I checked full play highlights and nothing indicates that Lauri was bad or reason to bad D that Bulls had.
I didn't say that Lauri was the sole reason that the defense was that horrible. I have noted the many, many players who contributed to it.
If you watched the game and came to the conclusion that Lauri's defense was fine, there is no point in having a discussion. You live in a different dimension than I do and I have no idea how we are communicating.
coldfish wrote:Again, when you account for the players around him, Lauri was around 309th in the NBA for defensive rpm last year. It really is him.
And no, there is no nuance to the play that I highlighted. You have a player with the ball, uncovered going to the rim from 15 feet away. Its basic fundamental basketball that you leave your man and try to stop him. We are talking stuff taught to kids under 10 years old at this point. This is the kind of thing that comes after basic passing / dribbling / shooting skills.
As long as Lauri keeps making bad decisions like that, he is going to hurt the defense as soon as he steps on the floor. This is well below replacement level defense. It doesn't matter if he has 4 all world defenders around him or not.
I checked full play highlights and nothing indicates that Lauri was bad or reason to bad D that Bulls had.
I didn't say that Lauri was the sole reason that the defense was that horrible. I have noted the many, many players who contributed to it.
If you watched the game and came to the conclusion that Lauri's defense was fine, there is no point in having a discussion. You live in a different dimension than I do and I have no idea how we are communicating.
I don’t think he is good at D but not as bad atm as his reputation is. Preseason was fine and as I said in highlights (lot’s of plays) there was just few things he could do better. He said that he has focused on D and it shows to my eyes.
I feel for critics tho. It’s just 1 game where he looked like best playmaker (alleys), best shooter (3p%) and overall looked only one with PWill that was even trying. Maybe next game peeps that have fate in Lauri’s progression will drop to ground again.
"Larry Nance Jr is better than Lauri Markkanen" -RealGM 2021
coldfish wrote: Last year 4 games of 4 assists. Year before 6 once, 5 once, 4 twice Rookie 3 games with 4 assists.
Regardless, in 171 career games he now has 4 or more assists 11 times. Only two of those were more than 4.
Generally, passing isn't his thing as I have been saying but I really liked last night. Again, he doesn't have to be Steve Nash. Beyond that, assists are created by dribbling the ball or posting up so him driving will open this stuff up.
See to me that wasn't Lauri going above and beyond. That's what I expect from him. I do think he could do this stuff last year but he just wasn't given the opportunity.
Also why I disagree with your "Lauri is selfish" take coldfish. If a scorer is given only 5 touches with the ball, he's obviously going to try putting them up as shots. Expand that to 10 and then maybe 7 are shots and 3 are playmaking? Expand it to 20 and then it becomes 13 shots and 7 attempts at playmaking.
Last year it was 5 touches with 3 being catch and shoot 3s and the other 2 as sh*t post ups.
Lauri should be getting touches EVERY PLAY. It doesn't need to end up a shot for him but usually it's a positive outcome. This game again showed the potential of Lauri pnr. The assists count only show 4 but he did find multiple guys for open shots and wcj/gafford for FTs on his other attempts. This was the highest "potential assists" game from him so far. Yes he had two bad pass turnovers but again, with volume I think you'd see assists go up more than turnovers.
Again, no one is generating an assist from every pass they make. That's an irrational stat unless you are somehow counting them for every player. Lauri is generally a selfish player who takes a shot a disproportionate percentage of the time when he touches the ball. This is reflected in his low assist numbers.
Overall, last night was notable for Lauri in that it was a big departure from his normal play. As I showed above, he rarely even has 4 assists in a game despite a ton of touches. That's actually hard to do unless you heave it up almost every time you touch it.
I would love to get a leaguewide stat from last year on FGA / A. I'll call it the selfish chucker stat. I bet Lauri is among the league's worst.
To me it sounds like you're neglecting a fact. The fact is Lauri is a much better shooter than passer, some might even argue (like I) that's he's arguably in his best nights Bulls' best shooter.
Why the heck would a player with that quality look more for passing the ball when the better, more logical option is to let it fly? Many even ridicule him for being a mere spot-up shooter. In this context I don't get your argument why using your strength is suddenly a selfish move. Is he even very high on the list of FGA, I doubt it...
White and Lavine are the selfish chuckers who ought to keep the ball moving and pass more than shoot.
MrSparkle wrote:I don't see a scenario here or there where Lauri becomes the "7-pick we thought he could be." If you remove his 3P ability, he's worse than Felicio by a mile.
12/2/2022 I like the quote- it makes me chuckle. And it was/is pretty much true.
GoBlue72391 wrote:That's the Lauri I want to see and expect to see on a regular basis. I think that's a reasonable expectation. Nothing he did last night is beyond his means. His release looked super quick. Not sure where that came from out of nowhere, but I'll definitely take it.
While he had a very nice game, he could have had an even better one if we got him more than 9 shots. Not that it would have made a difference in the outcome. We need to make more of an effort to get him involved, get him more cuts and looks going to the basket. Too much of a Boylen vibe last night where he started off red hot and barely got the ball as the game wore on. He's a big, not a guard, he needs someone to get him the ball, like all other bigs minus a select few of the elite superstars.
Defensively he remains a solid on-ball defender and I think the doom and gloom about his help defense last night is a bit overblown. I'll have to rewatch it, but from what I saw he didn't look completely lost on help D. If WCJ and our guards were doing their jobs defensively it would be a lot easier to hide Lauri's defensive shortcomings.
I love the 4/5 P&R we've been seeing and I love this flash of playmaking we saw from him. More of that please.
Lauri needs to be more aggressive in demanding the ball. He's too passive. If he's on then he needs to be getting the ball and taking quality shots. The offensive flow was off but he still needs to command the ball.
Louri wrote: I checked full play highlights and nothing indicates that Lauri was bad or reason to bad D that Bulls had.
I didn't say that Lauri was the sole reason that the defense was that horrible. I have noted the many, many players who contributed to it.
If you watched the game and came to the conclusion that Lauri's defense was fine, there is no point in having a discussion. You live in a different dimension than I do and I have no idea how we are communicating.
I don’t think he is good at D but not as bad atm as his reputation is. Preseason was fine and as I said in highlights (lot’s of plays) there was just few things he could do better. He said that he has focused on D and it shows to my eyes.
I feel for critics tho. It’s just 1 game where he looked like best playmaker (alleys), best shooter (3p%) and overall looked only one with PWill that was even trying. Maybe next game peeps that have fate in Lauri’s progression will drop to ground again.
*UIUIUIUIUIUIU* My BS detector just went crazy, bud.
Relax. Au contraire, I think he enjoyed himself being the go-to scorer. Like last season when he scored 37 and said he could do more. Maybe so much that this time, if Donovan doesn't put him on a leash and Lavine sits back quietly, he'll try and establish himself as the #1 option.
MrSparkle wrote:I don't see a scenario here or there where Lauri becomes the "7-pick we thought he could be." If you remove his 3P ability, he's worse than Felicio by a mile.
12/2/2022 I like the quote- it makes me chuckle. And it was/is pretty much true.
See to me that wasn't Lauri going above and beyond. That's what I expect from him. I do think he could do this stuff last year but he just wasn't given the opportunity.
Also why I disagree with your "Lauri is selfish" take coldfish. If a scorer is given only 5 touches with the ball, he's obviously going to try putting them up as shots. Expand that to 10 and then maybe 7 are shots and 3 are playmaking? Expand it to 20 and then it becomes 13 shots and 7 attempts at playmaking.
Last year it was 5 touches with 3 being catch and shoot 3s and the other 2 as sh*t post ups.
Lauri should be getting touches EVERY PLAY. It doesn't need to end up a shot for him but usually it's a positive outcome. This game again showed the potential of Lauri pnr. The assists count only show 4 but he did find multiple guys for open shots and wcj/gafford for FTs on his other attempts. This was the highest "potential assists" game from him so far. Yes he had two bad pass turnovers but again, with volume I think you'd see assists go up more than turnovers.
Again, no one is generating an assist from every pass they make. That's an irrational stat unless you are somehow counting them for every player. Lauri is generally a selfish player who takes a shot a disproportionate percentage of the time when he touches the ball. This is reflected in his low assist numbers.
Overall, last night was notable for Lauri in that it was a big departure from his normal play. As I showed above, he rarely even has 4 assists in a game despite a ton of touches. That's actually hard to do unless you heave it up almost every time you touch it.
I would love to get a leaguewide stat from last year on FGA / A. I'll call it the selfish chucker stat. I bet Lauri is among the league's worst.
To me it sounds like you're neglecting a fact. The fact is Lauri is a much better shooter than passer, some might even argue (like I) that's he's arguably in his best nights Bulls' best shooter.
Why the heck would a player with that quality look more for passing the ball when the better, more logical option is to let it fly? Many even ridicule him for being a mere spot-up shooter. In this context I don't get your argument why using your strength is suddenly a selfish move. Is he even very high on the list of FGA, I doubt it...
White and Lavine are the selfish chuckers who ought to keep the ball moving and pass more than shoot.
Career numbers per game: Lauri 13.2fga 1.4a 9.4 fga/a Korver 7.5fga 1.7a 4.4 fga/a Lavine 14.3fga 3.6a 4.0 fga/a White 12.2fga 2.2a 5.5 fga/a
So, when you rank players by the selfish chucker stat, Lauri comes out far and away the highest. I included Korver because obviously he is a much, much, much better shooter than Lauri yet he still gets more than twice as many assists per FGA. Why does Lauri actually shoot it more often than Kyle Korver and have less assists despite having the lower shooting percentages? Well, its because up until now, he has been a selfish chucker.
As a side note, I agree about Coby White. He is also a selfish chucker.
Again, no one is generating an assist from every pass they make. That's an irrational stat unless you are somehow counting them for every player. Lauri is generally a selfish player who takes a shot a disproportionate percentage of the time when he touches the ball. This is reflected in his low assist numbers.
Overall, last night was notable for Lauri in that it was a big departure from his normal play. As I showed above, he rarely even has 4 assists in a game despite a ton of touches. That's actually hard to do unless you heave it up almost every time you touch it.
I would love to get a leaguewide stat from last year on FGA / A. I'll call it the selfish chucker stat. I bet Lauri is among the league's worst.
To me it sounds like you're neglecting a fact. The fact is Lauri is a much better shooter than passer, some might even argue (like I) that's he's arguably in his best nights Bulls' best shooter.
Why the heck would a player with that quality look more for passing the ball when the better, more logical option is to let it fly? Many even ridicule him for being a mere spot-up shooter. In this context I don't get your argument why using your strength is suddenly a selfish move. Is he even very high on the list of FGA, I doubt it...
White and Lavine are the selfish chuckers who ought to keep the ball moving and pass more than shoot.
Career numbers per game: Lauri 13.2fga 1.4a 9.4 fga/a Korver 7.5fga 1.7a 4.4 fga/a Lavine 14.3fga 3.6a 4.0 fga/a White 12.2fga 2.2a 5.5 fga/a
So, when you rank players by the selfish chucker stat, Lauri comes out far and away the highest. I included Korver because obviously he is a much, much, much better shooter than Lauri yet he still gets more than twice as many assists per FGA. Why does Lauri actually shoot it more often than Kyle Korver and have less assists despite having the lower shooting percentages? Well, its because up until now, he has been a selfish chucker.
As a side note, I agree about Coby White. He is also a selfish chucker.
Misleading. He’s a big. Guards by nature and system are the playmakers. Probably only Jokic is the lead playmaker as a big in the league.
Again, no one is generating an assist from every pass they make. That's an irrational stat unless you are somehow counting them for every player. Lauri is generally a selfish player who takes a shot a disproportionate percentage of the time when he touches the ball. This is reflected in his low assist numbers.
Overall, last night was notable for Lauri in that it was a big departure from his normal play. As I showed above, he rarely even has 4 assists in a game despite a ton of touches. That's actually hard to do unless you heave it up almost every time you touch it.
I would love to get a leaguewide stat from last year on FGA / A. I'll call it the selfish chucker stat. I bet Lauri is among the league's worst.
To me it sounds like you're neglecting a fact. The fact is Lauri is a much better shooter than passer, some might even argue (like I) that's he's arguably in his best nights Bulls' best shooter.
Why the heck would a player with that quality look more for passing the ball when the better, more logical option is to let it fly? Many even ridicule him for being a mere spot-up shooter. In this context I don't get your argument why using your strength is suddenly a selfish move. Is he even very high on the list of FGA, I doubt it...
White and Lavine are the selfish chuckers who ought to keep the ball moving and pass more than shoot.
Career numbers per game: Lauri 13.2fga 1.4a 9.4 fga/a Korver 7.5fga 1.7a 4.4 fga/a Lavine 14.3fga 3.6a 4.0 fga/a White 12.2fga 2.2a 5.5 fga/a
So, when you rank players by the selfish chucker stat, Lauri comes out far and away the highest. I included Korver because obviously he is a much, much, much better shooter than Lauri yet he still gets more than twice as many assists per FGA. Why does Lauri actually shoot it more often than Kyle Korver and have less assists despite having the lower shooting percentages? Well, its because up until now, he has been a selfish chucker.
As a side note, I agree about Coby White. He is also a selfish chucker.
Well for one thing, including Korver to that list is kind of odd IMO. An old, career bench player who's played in much better environments, he's never really had the responsibility to score. Could you pick for a comparison a young player, starter, who's played his entire young career in a scrub team with a chip on his shoulder to score?
If Lauri continues to shoot 3Ps like against the Hawks, 13 FGA seems like a number to be increased. Lavine shot 19 and wasn't even hot. Although as you earlier described, Lauri driving and creating himself and others room to pass is obviously a good thing but I'd rather see him taking 19 FGA per night.
The way our offense has been run the last few years makes me believe our entire team is pretty low on assists. Or is Lauri the only starter who's assist numbers stand out?
IMO selfishness really doesn't fit in this narrative.
MrSparkle wrote:I don't see a scenario here or there where Lauri becomes the "7-pick we thought he could be." If you remove his 3P ability, he's worse than Felicio by a mile.
12/2/2022 I like the quote- it makes me chuckle. And it was/is pretty much true.
