This season has to have the most parity in a long time. There is no overwhelming favorite and a lot of underachieving teams (Nets, Sixers, Clippers, Lakers, Heat). The Warriors don’t look like the juggernauts of seasons past. The top team in the league is probably the Bucks. They’ve been playing well without Middleton. Who knows, when GP2 comes back and Shaedon can continually improve through the course of the season, we might be able to make a deep run in the playoffs.
i think if we can get a bonafide rebounding/shot blocking big to come off our bench and maybe a ball handling PG off the bench we could make a deep run. We got abused big time on the boards even in the games we squeaked out
If we have Ant then we don't need a ball handling backup PG. Ant is a high level starting PG. He's more effective at that position than he is as an SG but he does play team ball while playing SG so he doesn't cause the same problems as CJ did... I mean he hasn't yet in this limited sample size. That backup big would be nice and even nicer if he was what you said and had a three point shot but Eubanks isn't a bad change of pace backup to Nurk. He held his own when he was in the game against Joker.
I don't think that's true. A 'high level starting PG' is going to have an assist rate over 30% and an assist/turnover rate well over 2.0 while leading a team to wins. Ant hasn't checked any of those boxes....yet. He may, eventually, but at this point he hasn't even elevated himself to a high level scoring guard, at least not if consistency is a component of that classification I think he'll probably get to being a high level scorer. Not sure about the PG component though. What Ant absolutely has to do is elevate his FT Rate....a lot. He won't be high-level anything but a catch-&-shoot player if he doesn't
A high-level catch-and-shoot player can be an important part of a championship team. What is Klay Thompson's free-throw rate? Ant does not absolutely have to elevate his free-throw rate for the team to win.
That might be tough to do (and unnecessary) if his teammates are dishing out dimes. I mean if you count Winslow as a PF last game, the position dished out 11 last assists. (Winslow and Grant) I love that especially when we generally have 3 good shooters on the floor.
For this season only, I say........ 1- Appreciate Drew Eubanks....dude can play and is a very serviceable backup to Nurk. Drew does a lot of dirty shit that doesn't show in a box score. He is one of the dawgs on this team. 2- No trades. Period. Let this cake cook. We haven't even seen GPII or Trendon..Let's see what they have for the entire year...2024 is THE YEAR any way. 3- Run DawgsRun!
your format was screwed up, but I figured out what you wrote I wasn't really speaking to Ant's overall talent/impact. I was talking about him not being a "high level" starting PG. he just doesn't pass the eyeball test for that, and he doesn't have the numbers I think we know he's going to be a fairly elite shooter. But to expand from that he needs to get better at some other things like getting to the FT line. Ant's FT rate the last couple of seasons has been in the .130 range. Devin Booker's career mark is .320; Dame's is .336; Morant is .360 currently, Josh Hart has a better assist rate and assist/turnover ratio than Ant, and he's no PG
I hope some of these ‘super teams’ keep digging themselves a big hole record wise they gotta dig out of.
In my view, using numbers to compare high-level starters with those of a guy who's come off the bench behind CJ for nearly all of his career is pretty much an apples and oranges endeavor. Throw in the fact that he's been used in more of a combo guard role rather than being slotted as either a PG or SG and it really makes for an incomplete and inaccurate view. Ant certainly has holes in his game, but he also has some star-level shot-making ability. This year, now that he's out from behind CJ's shadow, should be when we get a clearer view as to what his ceiling is. I would be ecstatic if we can see by the end of the year that the post-Dame future of the Blazers' backcourt, whenever that occurs, looks to be secure in the young hands of Simons and Sharpe.
It looks more and more that the "super team" label attached to the Lakers, Nets and, maybe, the Clippers could be more aptly changed to the "has beens".
The fact that he isn’t collecting carts in the COSTCO parking lot surprises me. Anything he does out there is gravy FAMS.
