<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>Rookie Season A Washout In response to a question from an Italian reporter Saturday, Don Nelson said that guard Marco Belinelli wouldn't be ready for NBA competition until, "probably next year. Hopefully." That was the first time Nelson has explicitly brought up the notion that Belinelli's rookie season will be a washout in terms of on-court impact, but the coach backpedaled somewhat Sunday, saying, "I don't think I've changed my stance (on Belinelli) in three or four weeks, if that's what you mean." -- Contra Costa Times</div>
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (GM3 @ Dec 24 2007, 12:46 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>This is so odd, I thought he would be in the perfect system given his strengths.</div> I think it's the pace of the game and bigger, stronger and faster players. You have no let up and have to bring it night in and night out. Shooting threes and shooting is a lot of feel, so if he's trying to adjust, he'll have problems. Summer league wasn't as tough. I'm for this actually as we tend to be too harsh and give up on our players too easily. It's a fine line between who you give up on and who you don't.
The Warriors lack a true shooter. I was hoping Bellinelli would provide that for the team this year but I guess he's still learning
I understand about the game pacing and battling stronger players, etc. But we've seen Belinelli miss on lots of wide open looks too, I mean his shot just flat out went into a nosedive and I can't understand why. Looked great in preseason, I didn't expect him to be an Allstar but he has surprised me with how bad he looked. iLL PILL is right, the Warriors need a true shooter and I also hoped that Belinelli would finally be that. The Warriors need a guy who is not going to fall in with the team-wide shooting slump that sometimes plagues them from the opening tip.
I think Belinelli could be good, but maybe he is not ready. I love his off balance 3 point shots/dunks, but something smells fishy when the guy who is labeled an amazing shooter with comparative upsides to players like Ray Allen and Peja Stojakvic, doesn't shoot 85% for his career freethrow shooting in Euroleague. Is the foul line further away over there or something? It's like either somebody isn't practicing enough or they are headcases in a real game situation. Bellinelli not playing is also probably because Azu/Ellis gives the Warriors more of what we need. We need guys who can take the ball inside, play some D with their feet, and I'm not sure if Belinelli is that type of guy yet. ...and sorry to potentially hijack this thread and make it an Ellis thread, but I just had to give props to Ellis after complaining about his point guard game so much and not really mentioning how lucky we are to have his type of character and talent level around here. --- I just had to point out Monta Ellis' new career high with 35 points scored against the Twolves. When they interviewed him about that, he just commented on how the T-wolves climbed back into the game and how resilient and talented the other team was. Then he complimented his teammates, primarily his captains. Now that is pretty class for guy that probably isn't old enough to drink yet. Of course we always knew he was this way from the reports on how he'd call his elders, "Sir" and how he was very polite and attentive to what others had to teach him. But Wow... I'm thinking that we are just so lucky to have talent, great physical attributes, maturity in the same package in a young guard. It's like having a Lebron James classiness/improving talent, but one that isn't so old looking. --- Okay, so now that I got jocking Ellis' game out of my system, I'm going back to talking about Belinelli. Marco Belinelli is probably a guy that Nelson likes, but he just doesn't possess the stuff that we need to win games at this moment. Maybe the deal is if Belinelli can find some way to improve his inside/midrange game like Ellis and be a suitable defender, he'll see more action. That's probably the most important thing we need from a guard right now. We don't need another guy who will just gun for 3 point shots we can get at any time. We need inside finishing, a high % intermediate shooting game, and more defense/defensive rebounding if anything... It's like watching Harrington in his off games... he just gets horrible. Can't even make an easy layup without getting denied by the rim or play defense or even rebound... Wouldn't that sort of be like Belinelli in his off games? Maybe he'd pass better, but ugg.... That'd be like Dunleavy's offense game with less rebounding and Baron Davis defense when he starts to reach in a lot.
