THE OFFICIAL JOEL FREELAND THREAD

He is quietly improving the last 8 games that he has played. It is not necessarily the numbers but he also looks more comfortable out there finally.

Cutting down on his fouls has helped him stay in the game a couple minutes longer then he normally would.

Thoughts on him going forward?

P.S. If there is a thread for Will Barton then we might as well do one for any bench player that will be on the team next year.

 

I actually thought Leonard looked pretty good out there last night. Freeland...just kind of blended in. I guess that's a step up from eyesore.

 

Freeland has been one of the biggest disappointments this season for me. I didn't expect him to set the world on fire, but I at least figured he'd be a solid contributor off the bench. The guy has been a complete waste of cap space.

 

While I agree with that sentiment overall, I have seen growth lately. Taken him longer then I would have liked but I think he is on the right track now.

He isn't going to ever be a star imo but he can hold is own in the future at least and give our bigs a breather.

 

He might still develop into a rotation player, but I just figured he'd be more NBA ready than this.

 

Wasn't he one of the best bigs in the ACB league? Freeland not being able to make an impact on a team like ours says a lot about the quality of the players in that league.

 

I haven't seen much of him this year, so this might be wrong, but he just doesn't look very athletic at all. He looks surprised at how athletic the rest of the league is when he tries to post up or when someone outrebounds him. That's no excuse for him missing wide open ten footers though.

 

Maybe Im a homer or just hopeful but I want to believe that he could still become a solid rotation player like say Tiago Splitter

 

Splitter did look lost his first year in the NBA yet he got more time.

 

I felt this way too. It was sooooo much buzzkill that he came out like a late second rounder rookie. I expected at least a player that could give us some production off the bench.

 

The guy has not missed a shot in the last three games he has played. No one else in the NBA can say that. No not even Lebron.

Seriously though judging him on sporadic minutes here and thee is kind of useless. Not to sound like a broken record, but until he has a chance to play even as much as Claver has, we won't know for sure. Yes he missed wide open shots early in his first NBA season. Means nothing. He has hit his last 4. (Again means nothing)

Hopefully in another week or so Terry will be ready to find some steady minutes for him to see if he can be that role player. Because IMO none of us know right now. Were not Colin Cowherd...........

 

He told me there is some British National Team stuff, but he's not participating this summer. Going home for a month than returning to play in Vegas and work out here.

 

I like Freeland for his smarts but his future in the NBA seems to be very limited. At least he doesn't hurt us with stupid things.

 

He was far from Rudy-quality in Europe, so I didn't expect much from a #30 pick. Pendergraph was #31 in a different draft. Good comparison.

 

After starting the season 1-18 (one of the worst starts in NBA history - Hello Rodney Stuckey), Freeland has steadily improved. Since that 1-18 start, he's shot over 50% from the field (35 - 68). He's not a great rebounder, but he has the second highest TRB% on the team after Hickson. His PER is still single digit, but continues to move up. He has the 3rd highest PER of our bench players (damning with faint praise), behind Leonard and Maynor.

I'm not saying he's a keeper, but he's signed for another 2 years. So, I hope he continues to improve.

BNM

 

Well that's your fault. NBA big is the hardest position to learn, and Joel doesn't exactly have athleticism in his favor. Just because he had experience overseas does not mean that he wasn't a project from the start.

 

Call me Mr. Sunshine and rainbows........ that is the only part of your post that matters to me. And even that makes little difference to to me. (But thanks for sharing them none-the-less)

But I don't care about how a a players shoots in his first 10 NBA games, and I don't care about their PER when they get extremely inconsistent minutes

Again I say we just don't have enough to go by.

 

Officially: Joel freeland sucks

 

We drafted Josh McRoberts. Between D-League stints where he looked terrible, McMillan played him 28 minutes all season.

He's now in his 6th season. Freeland will improve.

 

That is a pretty good example IMO. Sure they are two different types of players, but none-the-less fans were making fun of him. Never could figure out why when he barely played.