Quibbling over who is/isn't injured is silly. The real issue is which injuries the Blazers *knew* they were going to have to work around. The Blazers knew Oden and Joel were hurt. They should have known something was up with Roy. They knew Williams was hurt when they drafted him. They don't get to use any of those injuries as an excuse. The only injury that caught them by surprise was Pendergraph. They knew about those other injuries, and it was their job to plan around them.
No. At the time of the draft, we had Camby, Oden was expected to be back before the start of the season and Joel was expected to be back shortly after the start of the season. That's three NBA starting caliber centers on one roster - and would have been the best, deepest center rotation in the league. And, we still had Pendergraph as an emergency back-up. But, that was June and this is November. Nobody knew Oden would need another microfracture surgery and no one new Pendergraph would get injured. Hindsight is always 20/20. When I look at what our roster looked like on draft night (we didn't know Roy was going to be injured and we still had Bayless, too) and who was available after Babbitt was picked, I don't really see anyone else that would have been significantly better, or filled a glaring need. I personally thought Babbitt was brought in to do one thing - be a spot up 3-point shooter. With Nate's ISO heavy offense, good spot up 3-point shooters are needed to make the defense pay for collapsing and cutting off the penetration. We no longer have James Jones or Steve Blake - two spot-up 3-point shooting specialists. Webster had great form, but his 3FG% wasn't great and he was terribly inconsistent. So, if that's the role they were looking to fill, I don't see anyone drafted below Babbitt that stands out as better suited to it than him. BNM
Look, we all know why Babbitt isn't playing and learning the game. It's because perfectionist McMillan thinks players should learn everything in the nursery of practices. The exception was Batum, when McMillan was forced to change because of injuries. Babbitt was the best shooter in the draft, and is still a great shooter in workouts, but will now lose his touch in games due to being nervous about being perfect in all aspects of the game. Almost every player loses his touch under McMillan. McMillan was the one who asked Pritchard to draft a top shooter this draft. So blame him.
The world is full of practice all-stars. And while practice earns PT on the floor, he still has to produce on the floor when given the chance. And while I somewhat agree with what you say about Nate and rookies, didn't he play Cunningham and Pendy a fair amount last year? And isn't AJ logging fair playing time this year? And his play has been a D+ or C-? (at best). That makes me think Luke isn't playing because he isn't as good a practice all-star as some people think.
D+? He's shooting over 50% from the field, he plays good pressure defense, he can penetrate the lane and he has above average court vision and can actually set an offense. Furthermore, his per40 numbers are 17/7/4 with a PER of 12.1 -- for a rookie playing the toughest position on the floor and a second round pick I'd say that's pretty damn good. You're expectations are either ridiculous or you don't understand how the position works.
By definition, a PER of 15 = average = "C". Saying a PER of 12 is a "D+" is just being realistic. It may be all we have any right to expect from a rookie 2nd rounder - but it is still a below league average performance. Like Cunningham last season, he appears to be an adequate reserve.....but the hype way exceeds the production.
By definition. a PER of 15 is the league average, but that is not to say that 15 is an average player, Hollinger defines 15 as a solid starter in the league and it's his formula so I guess he gets to decide what that means.
15 is the league average PER, but that's based on minutes. Since starters play the most minutes, a 15 PER is closer to average starter than average player. Babbitt is probably an average-ish to very slightly below average player. As a rookie, that's actually very good. Most rookies aren't average. If he were an average starter as a rookie (15 PER) that would be great.
I was talking about Armon and his 12+ PER (which I would call pretty decent for a rookie second round pick), Babbitt's PER is actually horrendous at -1.5 -- with the caveat that he's played a measly 26 total minutes.
There are slightly fewer than 450 NBA players at any one time, since not all teams keep 15 players. (30 times 15) So slightly fewer than 225 players should have PERs above 15, right? http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/tiny.cgi?id=RxRPC 141 above 15.0 007 at 15.0 253 below 15.0 ----- 401 total 15 isn't the average PLAYER. It's the average MINUTE played. The better players get most of the minutes. Hollinger's poor definition of PER never mentions this.
I didn't say he's a practice all-star. I said that he shot well in workouts (which are not necessarily scrimmages). In the video of him vs. Matthews in a preseason 3 point contest, he made about 17 straight 3-pointers, while Matthews' best streak was maybe 2. He'd learn the game faster if he averaged 5 minutes a game during moments when it doesn't hurt us--maybe 3 minutes backing up Cunningham and 2 minutes behind Marks. I'm not asking for much. In 14 games he's only played 24-26 minutes. No, you play a rookie to develop, not just to produce. Most coaches develop rookies in the first half or blowouts. McMillan waits a year till they've learned in practice what is his high standard of what he considers the basics. Batum, Cunningham, and Pendergraph were exceptions Nate made due to injuries. Johnson was an exception he made due to having no other sub PG. Exceptions forced upon him don't disprove the fact that he waits many months to play rookies. He believes they need no development time in game situations, only in practice. Summary: With another coach, Babbitt would have gotten some more minutes than he has, regardless of how good or bad he is. His lack of minutes isn't an indicator of how unpardonably horrible he is for a rookie.
