I know Jack left but he was 6'3". Steve Blake, Sergio and Bayless are all listed as 6'3". Petteri Koponen is listed as 6'5". Personally, I don't care about height as long as he can play. I'd rather have a quick PG like Aaron Brooks, Chris Paul and TJ Ford than a slow tall one. People overreact when they say a small PG can be posted up.
I don't really care how tall they are, just what they can do. Obviously, coming into the league it seems harder to make it as a shorter PG, but all the people you've mentioned have been in the league, and people know what they can do.
Rudy was in the game, but so was Yao. Any player on our team could post up Aaron Brooks at will, but special NBA rules for Chinese giants apparently allow an indefinite camping permit in the paint.
As important as height is length, which generally expresses itself in reach. Nico Batum plays longer than his height because his arms are so long. I think Bayless probably plays shorter than his height because he's a T-Rex.
When you have nothing going at the PG position, what do you have to lose? The only place where the Blazer PG excelled this season was not turning over the ball. After that, it is hit or miss where their games were good. Each one has their own strengths and weaknesses. Blake can hit outside jumpers. Sergio can penetrade, but can't shoot a lick. Bayless is a scorer and has defense, but lacks passing maturity. The way I look at it is, we know what we have in Steve Blake. We pretty much know what we have in Sergio, who is probably gone anyhow. The unknown factor is Bayless. He has all the physical tools, he already has good defensive instinct. He just needs the passing part of his game to come along.
The Blazers have not had a good PG on the team since Greg Anthony left. How many fucking years in a row do we have to go into camp without a good PG on the team, for somebody in the front office to figure it out and swing a deal to get somebody in here. If you do not learn from history, you are bound to repeat it.
Even Greg Anthony was extremely limited in what he could do. All he did was play D and shoot 3s, which was good enough for those early 2000s teams. I'd say the last really good PG we had was the Kenny Anderson and Rod Strickland days. It doesn't seem that long ago but that's at least 13 years. And even Kenny might be questionable as a good PG, but I loved him when we had him. We just didn't have a very talented team back then in '96. I remember the struggles we had with backup PGs in the mid-90's, having guys like Rick Brunson, Rumeal Robinson, John Crotty, Marcus Brown, Randolph Childress, Steve Henson.. But yeah, it's been awhile since we had a really good PG.
We're the polar opposite of Phoenix in that respect, who has gone what, 20 years with at least one elite point guard every year?
It's interesting how many decent to really good power forwards have come through this franchise. Sheed, Brian Grant, Jermaine O'Neal, Zach Randolph, Aldridge. Portland has probably cycled through more good power forwards than any other NBA team over the last dozen years. Yet not a single point guard who was really worth starting, other than Pippen when we were smart enough to use him that way. A lot of that was due to the incredibly bad Damon Stoudamire contract and contract extension. We put so much money into that guy that we could never package him for someone decent. In hindsight we should've just done what we did with Steve Francis--just buy him out and let him plague some other team. I don't think I'll ever hate another player half as much as I hated Damon Stoudamire.
ALVIN WILLIAMS! (Who, of course, was traded FOR Damon Stoudamire, despite the team being 9-1 in games he started.)
Sergio will improve, in a faster system where he gets enough PT to make his mark. A pity it will be for another team, but in 2-3 years we'll be kicking ourselves for trading him away. Point guards who can actually make things happen are rare indeed. As I have argued (and shown) more than once: shooting improves with time. Mistakes can be reduced over time. But with almost no exceptions, passing is not something that gets better. Either a player has it, or he does not. Bayless' upside is a more explosive Jarrett Jack. iWatas
This is an interesting argument - and I tried to look at it using Assist% instead of ast/to or APG stats - with the assumption that if you are a good leading PG - you will get to be the main distributor on the team when you are on the court. Billups made a huge upgrade in AST% around his 5th or 6th year in the league. Andre Miller actually declined around his 5th year Steve Nash made a big jump in his 5th year and another jump when he moved to PHX J-Kidd has been steady as a rock...
I don't know if you meant more explosive Jarrett Jack as good or bad, but I doubt it. Nobody, and I mean, nobody turns over the ball in a more critical part of the game, then JJ. Secondly, JJ is the only guy who I saw come just short of a quadruple double. The 4th category being turnovers. If he hadn't been a turnover machine, he would probably still be here. So that being said, hopefully Bayless will not be that. Because IMO, the facts are, Bayless is our only hope for PG for the future. Our chances of obtaining one of quality are low. Our chances of drafting one are almost none, not only due to bad draft position, but due to lack of talent in the draft. If nothing else, Roy just needs somebody to help share the load, so he doesn't get "D'Wade'd" to the IR list prematurely.
