The Warriors never qualified him and he's an unrestricted free agent this summer. I actually forgot about him until I glanced over the list of Warrior free agents. Unfortunately, for O'Bryant he was drafted the same year Nellie became head coach and never found a comfortable role on the team. Struggling early on seems to have rattled his confidence, but do you think the Warriors wrote him off too, early? The Warriors must have seen something promising in him to take him #9 overall and had to have known it would take time to develop his game. Legit 7 footers always seem to hold value in the NBA. It just seems like a waste of a lottery pick of the Warriors have given up on him already.
If Nelson is back, forget it. He'll never thrive under Nelson. He'd be lucky just to PLAY under Nelson. If there's a new head coach, I'd like to see him for another year.
I think POB started out as a soft, timid piece of cheesecake. But somewhere along the line -- perhaps in Nellie's doghouse, perhaps in the D-League -- he developed a little attitude, a little anger or edge on the court. And, he's really matured physically. I could see POB becoming a Tyson Chandler type player under the right system. I don't know with Nellie, though -- he already basically gave up on POB, it might be too late to change his mind.
I think POB is somewhat young still. If my memory is right he was about 20 when he was drafted so he's probably about 22 or 23 now. But I noticed that he is not on the Warriors' summer league roster so I am guessing he is going to try to play somewhere else. It would be interesting to see if he is on another team's summer league roster and to learn about which team exactly that is. It might be best for him to go somewhere else as well. So all in all I don't think there is much of a chance POB will be on the team next season. But since the question is whether I want him on the team or not: I'd say that I wouldn't mind keeping him. He is tall and very long and seems like he could do some positive things on the court. I guess it just hasn't really clicked together and he has yet to really get much of a chance. I'd like to see how his career pans out. I hope it ends up being pretty good.
I thought more people would rip POB to shreds as a 100% bust, the next coming of Adonal Foyle or being worse than Foyle, or just being a big pile of doo doo in the street after the 4th of July parade. I'm resigned to POB being a wasted lotto pick. It's too bad. He only played about 200 minutes total in his two years here. I've heard Miami is interested in him and wish him well over there. At least, he'll be going to a nice destination.
It's way too early to call him a bust. He never got a chance to play regularly and when he did play at the end of the season, you could see that he has made strides since he came into the league. I don't think he'll ever be an offensive star but he look like he is becoming a very good defensive center. I would love to have him back but at one point last season he said flat out that if Nellie comes back then he will not. The situation sucks because Mullin picked him without knowing he was going to get Nelson to coach. Nelson didn't feel a need to develop him becuase POB wasn't his pick but at some point Mullin has got to make sure that his project draft pick at least gets a chance to become something.
It sounds like Boston is giving Patrick O'Bryant a look. Tall order The Celtics continued their search for a big man by working out Patrick O'Bryant, Golden State's first-round pick (ninth overall) out of Bradley in 2006. The 7-foot center showed decent range and solid footwork taking feeds in the post. But when he hit the low post against Wisconsin's Brian Butch and Detroit Mercy's Ryvon Covile, who had each been practicing since 9 in the morning, O'Bryant was tugging at his shorts not even 15 minutes into the drill, struggling to muster enough strength to defend either. Celtics spokesman Jeff Twiss pointed out that O'Bryant arrived in Boston at 1 a.m., although he tired quickly against players who had been on the court all morning. O'Bryant took the court at approximately 11 a.m. Ainge, watching from the sideline, had already taken a look at Chris Andersen, David Harrison, and Kirk Snyder, and said, "We've had a lot of guys come in and work out. We're just continuing the process. We're just trying to find out who's available and find the best ones for us."
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Clif25 @ Jul 5 2008, 02:15 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>It sounds like Boston is giving Patrick O'Bryant a look. Tall order The Celtics continued their search for a big man by working out Patrick O'Bryant, Golden State's first-round pick (ninth overall) out of Bradley in 2006. The 7-foot center showed decent range and solid footwork taking feeds in the post. But when he hit the low post against Wisconsin's Brian Butch and Detroit Mercy's Ryvon Covile, who had each been practicing since 9 in the morning, O'Bryant was tugging at his shorts not even 15 minutes into the drill, struggling to muster enough strength to defend either. Celtics spokesman Jeff Twiss pointed out that O'Bryant arrived in Boston at 1 a.m., although he tired quickly against players who had been on the court all morning. O'Bryant took the court at approximately 11 a.m. Ainge, watching from the sideline, had already taken a look at Chris Andersen, David Harrison, and Kirk Snyder, and said, "We've had a lot of guys come in and work out. We're just continuing the process. We're just trying to find out who's available and find the best ones for us."</div> Next! Chalk one up for the naysayers. At this point, POB is a wasted pick regardless .
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (jason voorhees @ Jul 5 2008, 01:23 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Clif25 @ Jul 5 2008, 02:15 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>It sounds like Boston is giving Patrick O'Bryant a look. Tall order The Celtics continued their search for a big man by working out Patrick O'Bryant, Golden State's first-round pick (ninth overall) out of Bradley in 2006. The 7-foot center showed decent range and solid footwork taking feeds in the post. But when he hit the low post against Wisconsin's Brian Butch and Detroit Mercy's Ryvon Covile, who had each been practicing since 9 in the morning, O'Bryant was tugging at his shorts not even 15 minutes into the drill, struggling to muster enough strength to defend either. Celtics spokesman Jeff Twiss pointed out that O'Bryant arrived in Boston at 1 a.m., although he tired quickly against players who had been on the court all morning. O'Bryant took the court at approximately 11 a.m. Ainge, watching from the sideline, had already taken a look at Chris Andersen, David Harrison, and Kirk Snyder, and said, "We've had a lot of guys come in and work out. We're just continuing the process. We're just trying to find out who's available and find the best ones for us."</div> Next! Chalk one up for the naysayers. At this point, POB is a wasted pick regardless . </div> POB is a bum, regardless of what he could have been without Nelson as coach.
Maybe the ESPN draft analysts knew a little something about POB when they asked him on draft day, "So you want to be a Chef." To me that sounds like a strange, inappropriate comment where if I was mentioned something like that I'd reply, "No, I want to be a top flight center in the nba. Hell, the only thing I'll be cooking up is domination in the paint and dunk a la in-your-face. Har har har." At least he didn't see the court so he could be blamed for direct losses. He avoided the Dunleavy treatment. Here's my personal take on POB. Raw, good potential for a center in a weak draft. We didn't give him any time and the general observation about most young big men is that they take the longest to develop and we just gave up on him. So, it was a wasted pick by Nelly more than anything. Sorry, Nelly POB has potential to rebound and block shots, but he's got the mobility of a center not a power forward and he doesn't shoot 3's or weigh 230 lbs to get up and down the floor like a SF/PF body. Now the answer: I would want POB back as long as Nelson ain't the coach. Nelson simply does not use all the nba positions he has to his advantage. He'd bench Shaq or Yao if he felt we weren't scoring enough. He's got no ability to make adjustments going bigger even if he had the pieces.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Custodianrules2 @ Jul 6 2008, 05:31 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Now the answer: I would want POB back as long as Nelson ain't the coach. Nelson simply does not use all the nba positions he has to his advantage. He'd bench Shaq or Yao if he felt we weren't scoring enough. He's got no ability to make adjustments going bigger even if he had the pieces.</div> I hope you're not saying that you'd want POB over Nellie. I'm pretty sure you're not saying that.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Kensaku @ Jul 6 2008, 08:54 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Custodianrules2 @ Jul 6 2008, 05:31 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Now the answer: I would want POB back as long as Nelson ain't the coach. Nelson simply does not use all the nba positions he has to his advantage. He'd bench Shaq or Yao if he felt we weren't scoring enough. He's got no ability to make adjustments going bigger even if he had the pieces.</div> I hope you're not saying that you'd want POB over Nellie. I'm pretty sure you're not saying that. </div> Yup, I'm not saying that at all. I'm implying that a true center prospect doesn't have a chance under Nelly. If Nelly doesn't have Tim Duncan I bet he'll go with any center/power forward that will emulate Raef La Frentz/Nenad Krstic (in skill) or Jeff Foster/Andris Biedrins (in terms of athleticism). Other rookies or prototype centers won't get a chance under Nelly. He wants his centers extremely mobile that they can fit the power forward bill in terms of weight or shot range so they can either get up the court in a hurry or spread the floor to draw opposing big men to the outside. If that center prospect is anything from Shaq, Curry, Magloire, Andrew Bynum, Chris Kaman, or any type of strictly in-the-paint/halfcourt player, I'm sure Nelly is skipping on those guys because it won't fit his run n' gun, no defense, no rebounding type ways. He's already having his guards try to run or hoist up shots rather than executing any plays. Of course POB doesn't have a chance. There are a few big players that are exceptions in Nelly's offense, but they have to be the good tweeners it seems like. Nelly's offense could use a big power forward that is ready to play right now like a rookie 250 lb Dwight Howard, a Tim Duncan out of college, an ROY Amare Stoudamire, Jermaine O'neil Pacers era, ROY Emeka Okafor and the such. Those guys would be primarily used for defensive purposes and to also outhustle their slower counterparts down the court. But if a true center demands touches and they take a while to get up the court, I bet Nelly won't want to deal with that type of player in his offense. Nelly wants his centers to be mobile like a power forward and to play a lot of out of position defense. I'm sure Camby or Jermaine O'neil would be a Nelly type of guy because they border along being power forward type bodies, they can score some, and they are some of the best weakside defenders in the league. Really big guys like Big Z, Shaq, Bynum, Yao can take a while to get back up the court because they're dragging more weight around. So I feel like Nelly will never really care for a guy like POB, much like he wouldn't if he had gotten Jermaine O'neil as a rookie. Why? Because he just has a thing against center prospects and especially rookies that can't play for him now. There could only be one exception for a big guy in Nelly's schemes and that guy would probably be Tim Duncan. The guy isn't the best athlete in the world, but he's super strong, super skilled, and he was ready coming out of college. I'm sure Nelly would crave him (a power forward with a center body) as a center. Any other type would slow up his ideal tempo. And we know Nelly is only capable of going one direction in terms of tempo. He goes fast. So if we play another team that wants to play fast or can play fast, we find ourselves losing to guys like the Hawks, Suns, Spurs, Sixers, whoever doesn't really play halfcourt ball anyway or is used to running after forcing turnovers on D. Nelly's been the best coach we've had since Nelly, but he's a one trick pony and I'm going to possibly dread what comes after him.
Too bad, POB seemed to pick it up a little last year. Never had a chance with Nellie though. I'd want him back, he's a valuable player with some talent and potential. But he's good as gone. He'll find a job somewhere, if Jarrod Collins has a job, POB will have one.
