I haven't been such a huge fan of Travis Outlaw in the past couple of years but he's starting to look like a guy who is trying to contribute when he isn't scoring, and I haven't always been able to say this about him. I think he's a very important piece right now and he's really improving on doing other things that are positive on the basketball court besides shooting or scoring. My only gripe about Travis Outlaw is his inability to be a solid starter.
Rudy is a SG. Roy is a SG. Pretty clear Rudy needs to take some of Roy's minutes. Anything else hurts us rather than helps us.
please don't pretend like rudy is good enough to be a goto scorer in the nba. that's ridiculous. the role rudy is playing right now is perfect for his abilities and the team. no reason to change it.
roy is playing 36.8 minutes per game(before tonights game). rudy is playing 27.8 minutes per game. there are only 48 minutes in a basketball game. pretty clear that rudy and roy can play more than just shooting guard.
Rudy is very good at creating his own shot. I've seen him numerous times this year put the ball on the ground and create space from his defender for a step back 3. Do you remember his crossover step back 3 in the Olympics?
Rudy is not as good a creator as Travis -- Rudy cannot get his shot anytime he wants to. Travis, with that elevation of his, can. I love Rudy - and Roy - and Trout. I wish Roy would distribute to Rudy more (Roy seems to avoid passing to Rudy, which is weird). But otherwise they have proven the ability to play very well together. The real wrench in this works is Webster. I don't think he is as good as any of the rest of them - at anything (though he plays within the offense better than Trout). I think this rotation is a thing of beauty. When Oden is back drawing double teams, it means Trout/Roy/Rudy/LMA should almost *always* get a good, open jumper at the basket. That is a formula for winning a lot of basketball games. iWatas
Yeah. Rudy is gettin pretty good minutes and shot attempts right now. I think it is perfect with how he is being used. I still think LMA is our 2nd best player.
1. I don't think we have to make Rudy simply into a scorer to be using him well. He's also an excellent passer. 2. With that in mind, why should it be Outlaw that gets traded? I know today is an odd day to say it (given his 20 points last night) but why not move Blake? That would make BOTH Spaniards more happy. Travis does drive me crazy, but he is essentially unguardable, and one of the announcers last night said he hit the 4th largest number of mid-range jumpers of anyone in the league last year, which makes him a pretty unusual (and therefore irreplaceable) part of our offense. Oh, and Rudy vs. Roy: Rudy can't penetrate anything like Roy. But Roy does hold onto the ball a lot more - Rudy's much more likely to move it. And right now Rudy's threes are better. I wondered if I should worry that so many of his shots are threes, but I think it's only a worry if he gets them just by camping in the corner and waiting (Martell can slip into this habit). But Rudy's always moving and always a threat to do different things. If he ends up behind the three, it's either in transition or because he's just lost his defender on a pick after running him ragged.
Exactly. Especially when you consider that it would be hard to replace Travis with someone that can score as he does - meaning the opposing team can pay closer attention to Rudy. Why waste Rudy's passes on someone that is not that good of a scoring target?
No fucking kidding. It makes for conversation to be able to debate the merits of one player over another, but the amount of time we spend tearing down our own players is astonishing -- instead of just being happy that both Rudy and Travis had huge games last night and helped us get our first road win against a VERY good team, we bitch and moan about player X "taking" touches away from player Y (This is why I hate fantasy basketball).
