I'm still behind Oden. I wouldn't be suggesting ways to motivate him if I weren't. I want to do whatever it takes to get his butt in gear, and that may mean a demotion to the D-League. "Standing behind" a player doesn't mean you ignore the obvious problems with his game, or pretend that everything is fine when it isn't.
SSDD This thread is indicative of the ups and downs of this board. I still maintain that Nate isn't using Oden correctly. I've been saying it all season. I'll keep saying it until Nate finally understands how to utilize a dominant center.
Bingo! Great post, Eric. Oden can make things happen by hustling and scrapping and playing his heart out, but he's not doing that. I would like to see him get the ball more, but I think he WOULD if he was running harder, boxing out, and playing with some fire. It's very disappointing to me that he plays so lackadaisically on many nights.
rebound rate isn't meaningless at all. it gives you an estimate of the percentage of rebounds he gets when he's on the floor. bottomline is that oden is one of the best in the league at getting rebounds. and oden does get himself involved. he's 3rd in the league in offensive rebound %. i mean, i didn't see the game tonight, so i don't know specifically what happened with oden tonight, but in general for the season he's been very good in the rebounding aspect of the game. and he plays better when the team gets him some touches. that's no excuse for some of the silly fouls he gets at times that take him out of games or for him getting lost on a pick and roll or any of that. but it is what he is right now. seems like it wouldn't be too hard to run a few plays for him in the first few minutes of every game and see if they can't get him going.
Yeah, that was pretty hilarious. We should replace Greg with Channing who doesn't rebound and shoots jumpers. At least when he was playing he was getting more touches on offense than Greg. That's a pretty sad indicator of how misused Greg is on the offensive end.
Because it's easier to free up somebody for a jumper than it is to get someone in low post position. The Blazers need too look at how the Suns get Shaq posted up and start running some plays for Greg.
Oden isn't going to d-league or even going to be benched. He is progressing (at a slower rate than I hoped and we still have to deal with the rookie wall) . . . but at this point progressing is all that really matters. I get shooter's frustration . . . it's the same thing as the begining of the season in that I wonder if he is really into the game (compared to the sometimes quicker version of Oden). I wonder if he had one of his big games if Ptd could have pulled this out. But I think the path to be a true "contender" lies in the hands of Oden. He is a physical speciman, and if he ever figures this game out, that big dominate center will take this team over the top . . . so like I said, as long as he is progressing . . .
What's sad is Oden has way more offensive talent than Joel yet Joel gets more pick and roll pts, or just simply a pass when someone who is driving is double teamed. Greg doesn't get those same passes. Greg is absolutely fine. People need to stop changing their mind evey week. It's really annoying.
bipolar much? I thought this thread was a joke when I clicked it. Some of you are sooo far out there... http://sportstwo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=133472
I said it a short time ago when he was playing well, I said it months ago - He's a rookie coming back from microfracture surgery and he's going to be inconsistent ALL YEAR. I knew a good five game stretch would make every giddy again and then after a few unproductive games we do this all over again. I wonder what next week will bring.
Oh, I know. My statement was more on how we settle for jumpers so much instead of trying to get it to the guy working for position. The times when Greg isn't working for position always seems to be when the play-call is an obvious clear one side for Brandon to ISO and Greg moves over on the baseline and gets ready to try to run in for an offensive rebound. It's just so frustrating to see that we have this big man that defenses fear enough that they will double team him when he actually gets the ball, but then watch as the other team realizes we aren't going to get it to him and they double off of him to shadow LaMarcus. That play at the start of the New Orleans game frustrated me so much because they just knew Greg was going to be looked over even when he was jumping up and down and waving his arms at Brandon and we just passed it around the perimeter for a jump shot instead.
Well when I talk about progressing . . . I look at it more from a month to month basis. I think he is getting better (yes slowly) each month.
grant highschool taught me well It seems like you think it's the end of the world, just because he didn't get a bunch of boards or scored more than 10 points or whatever his average is, doesn't mean that he needs to go to D-league or trade him. Shit if we did that every time someone did that we would have a shitty team or no team at all. did i miss something there shooter? this is the internet not a college term paper
