Patty Mills comes back to earth

16 points in a loss.

 

Mills was a very streaky shooter at St. Mary's. It's unreasonable to expect that trend to change in the handful of games he's played in the D League.

In college, he scored quite a bit, but he took (and missed) a ton of shots. He's basically a high volume shooter who shoots low percentages. He can shoot his team to victory when his shot is falling, but he can also shoot them right out of the game when it isn't - and when his shot isn't falling, he just keeps right on chucking away.

Which is why I don't think he'll ever be a starter on a decent team in the NBA. I see him more as an instant offense of the bench guy. When the shot is falling he can give you a welcome scoring boost. When it's not, park his butt right back on the bench where he won't shoot you out of the game.

BNM

 

I personally don't hold much hope for Patty as a future rotation player, but I don't really find his performance all that alarming, guys have rough shooting nights, and like BNM said this was kind of his MO at St. Mary's -- hot and cold.

 

Going to go check him out tonight here in Boise. Hopefully he has a better night, and last night was just a result of realizing he was stuck back in the D-League.

Still, though, 16 points isn't the end of the world, even if it was on 33% shooting.

 

If that's coming down to earth, then earth must be one hell of a place.

 

Don't forget his great speed, one of the fastest in the NBA. Even if he can't shoot, he can play like Bayless does. He's a couple of inches smaller, but he can put on some muscle and then try.

 

31 points is more like it - but outscored by Coby Karl (I don't mind that - I think Karl is a good player) and more importantly, Desmon Farmer (Go Trojans!). And 2 assists to 3 turnovers doesn't dispel the "tiny shooting guard" rep. So, mook, did you go?

 

My summary was here:
http://sportstwo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=153055

As far as the lack of assists, like Bayless in his first summer league, he was so much more of an effective offensive weapon than anyone else on his team (besides Karl). Some of those guys are just really bad. Idaho had 61 points at the half, a lot of it from Mills. Idaho was leading by 2. In the second half the other team got it out of his hands more by double teaming. Karl feasted then, but Idaho lost by double digits.

Before I'd get too overjoyed with Mills' scoring 31, keep in mind that both teams combined for 245 points. Neither side was playing much defense.

 

Here are a couple of highlights if you want to watch them, but really it just shows him hitting a few 3's.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dhoDbMKwtU

 

Yep, that's what I've been saying since we drafted Mills - he's a scoring guard, not a point guard. He constantly looks for his own shot and isn't a good distributor. I usually consider a guy who has >2x as many FGA as AST a shoot first PG. Last night Mills had 22 FGA to 2 AST a ratio of 11:1.

BNM

 

True. But do you need a true PG next to Roy?

 

Not necessarily on offense, but defensively you probably need a guy who can get it done, especially with how mediocre Brandon's D is.

 

Yea, and who wouldn't assume that?

Yea, next to Roy, I want a PG that can't play defense. Um yea.....

 

I'm just saying that through no fault of his own, Mills is going to have a very hard time being an effective defender. At 5'11" and not being particularly "blocky" or stout it's going to be tough for him to contest shots since guys will be able to shoot over the top of him, and he's going to be susceptible to post ups by bigger guards.

So my point was that I don't see Patty being a particularly strong candidate for Roy's running mate in the future.

 

No, but I also don't need a guy who jacks up 22 shots a game. Obviously, he won't be doing that next to Roy, but it would be nice if Roy was paired with someone who wasn't only looking for his own shot.

Long term, I think Bayless has a better shot at being that guy than Mills. As I said in another thread, the best case scenario (long term) is that Bayless becomes that guy and starts next to Roy and Mills can provide instant offense off the bench.

A lot of the Andre Miller bashers (where have they all one????) accuse him of shooting too much, but his FGA/AST ratio is 1.90. It's not exactly Steve Nash territory, but given that Miller didn't start with, or play much with, Roy for half the season and he's currently playing with a decimated roster with few other scoring options, it's pretty damn good (and getting better now that he's been moved into the starting PG role).

BNM

 

Agreed. Bayless is a better candidate for that role. Mills' best case scenario if he remains a Blazer is to bring instant offense of the bench.

BNM

 

Sounds about right - 30 teams and 32 "pass first" PGs. The 2.0 FGA/AST is just a nice round number (one I can check at a glance) that I've been using for years. Of course, there are different degrees of "shoot firstness". Some PGs are up in the 2.5 or greater range. Others like Nash and Stockton are/were down in the 1.25 range.

The 11:1 Mills put up last night is a single data point. Not really fair to judge him by that one number. In his 4 games in the D-League, he's at 3.64:1 - still a small sample size, but in line with his college numbers. In his two season's at St. Mary's, he was at 3.34 and 4.0 - reinforcing that he's a scoring guard, not a distributor.

BNM

 

any way you slice it 26.8ppg/5.3apg on .481/.576/.824 through 4 games is pretty dern good, even for dleague