Batum for #4 pick?

So teams that he's on go from sucking to sucking. Yeah, he's a great player alright!
How was MEM after they traded him?
How was TOR after they traded him? (I honestly don't know for certain - the East sucks so I don't pay attention. But I'm pretty sure they got better.)

 

Toronto had one of the best records when he left. Memphis had a much better record after he left. The Sac stat is skewed because Boogie was also hurt when gay was hurt.

 

Memphis actually got better after he left, which is more of a testament of Gasol coming along. What was Toronto's record this season (the season after Gay left)?

 

Thank you! Post of the thread!

 

Actually it was more of an indicator that Gasol made them much better. The year they had that huge improvement had Gasol's numbers go up dramatically. Gay's usage actually went down that season.

 

So, Gay gets all the credit for MEM's improvement in those years? It had nothing to do with the additions of Gasol, Conley, ZBo, etc.?

MEM got even better after they traded the elite scorer for a broken down, shadow of his former self Tayshaun Prince.

BNM

 

I suspect MIN's improvement had a lot more to do with a guy named Garnett than Marbury. Yeah the season Marbury was traded MIN finished .500. but that was the 50-game lockout shortened season. The next year, with Terrel Brandon at PG, MIN won 50 games for the first time in franchise history.

After swapping Marbury for Jason Kidd, the Nets immediately went from 26-56 to two consecutive finals appearances.

BNM

 

I would not. I would also not trade the #4 for Gay.

 

The "more winning" you listed was small, incremental improvement over multiple seasons when there were several other key personnel moves. Nothing nearly as dramatic as improvement MIN and NJN made the season immediately after trading Marbury.

I have no idea. I don't know what the Knicks plans are. They were definitely dumping salary last season. So, does that mean they were clearing space to surround Carmelo with other high priced veterans, or does that mean a total rebuild as soon as they can get Carmelo off the books? If the former, yes, but I'd also want the #23 and one other asset. The other asset would not need to be a young player. They have so many holes to fill, even a veteran center like Kaman on the cheap would be useful to them. Even if they sign a starting center with their cap space, they'll still need a back up. I'd probably also try to force the Blazers to take Calderon and his contract to preserve as much cap space as possible to sign other players.

Honestly, that roster is such a train wreck, I'd probably totally blow things up and build around youth - which means no, I wouldn't trade the 4th pick for Batum, or anyone else except a player who is already and all star and under the age of 25.

BNM

 

The Knicks need a fresh start in the worst way possible.

New owner.

New team.

New coach.

The verdict is still out on PJax. He wanted Kerr really bad and that appears to have been a really good call on his part.

 

Best case scenario for the Knicks: the euro-flavor-of-the-month goes top 3 and either Russell or Okafor fall to #4.

Worst case: they have to "settle" for Winslow.

Why would they trade an asset that valuable for a vet with 80% of the talent and 4 times the salary?

 

Well said...

I think they should of blown shit up last season. The new problem was signing Melo to a max deal. That means they want to build around Melo. Because of that, they need veterans that can accommodate and support Melo's high potent ISO offense and low defense. I think Batum is versatile enough to be that guy, especially on the cheap (being an expiring if it fails).

Adding more youth will not help them now. Definitely helps them in the future. But if NY wants to work for the future, they would have let Melo walk last summer.

 

1) Fair enough. Most players in the playoffs are not making 12+ million and there third best player. I'm not about to go through every team that made the playoffs and figure out who their third best player is and look at what there PER is. I did it with two examples (2 out of 16 teams, so 1/8) and it proved my point. If you care to look at more third options and list there PER, go for it. We are arguing two completely different things it would appear; im not comparing Batum to every player, I'm comparing Batum to what we need him to be in order to be successful - in accordance with what other teams third options do for them to be successful in the playoffs.

Furthermore, I am talking body of work not JUST this playoffs. For example;

Damian Lillard regular season PER through his career on avg - 18.5. In the playoffs? 18.0
Lamarcus Aldridge regular season? 20.3. Post season? 19.0.
Batum? 15.2. Post season? 12.3.

(All of the above are career averages in reg and post season PER wise.)

So, you tell me who is consistently significantly worse in the playoffs of the core 3?

2) So, you're defending a player who has a below average PER? Okay... Not sure why, but ok.

3) I'm singling out Batum because this thread is Batum for the #4 pick, is it not? It isn't Lamarcus, Damian, Wesley, Meyers, CJ, etc. It appears I'm not the only one cherry picking since I noted that in my post that they have their flaws as well, but this specific post is about NICOLAS BATUM and I responded in accordance with the player mentioned in this thread; in fact, I believe I even stated that while those other players have flaws, Batum has the most value as an asset for us as a team, due to how good he is in the regular season, but he (as shown earlier) is worse in the playoffs by a pretty decent margin throughout the length of his career.

4) Also, in regards to the players PER increasing - McCollum and Leonard, THAT IS WHAT WE NEED IN THE PLAYOFFS from role players. Because, yes, Lamarcus and Damian face MUCH tougher defenses and are schemed out of the game. Any half decent coach will tell you, they do not want you getting your first or second option. That is why the third option is critical. Furthermore, it was stated that McCollum was openly being game planned against and still managed a postitive PER shift (I'd attribute that more to a poor regular season, but whatever "defenses are so much better in the playoffs and Memphis is "a really fucking good defensive team"). Additionally, All of the rest of the players were/are scrubs with the exception of Afflalo (who shouldn't have even been playing, tbh) of the 7 you listed. We NEED a better team but this THREAD is about BATUM our THIRD best player. Kaman and Blake are not championship worthy, but they don't make 12+ million or play 30+ minutes a game. So we had TWO players step up while Aldridge and Lillard were facing two of the best defensive players in the league, McCollum and Leonard, neither of which have the role or importance of Batum.

5) It is apparent to me you disregarded a majority of my post as I mentioned that there are flaws with other players BUT advanced stats don't show them being consistently significantly worse in the postseason (my words), as evidenced by PER, throughout the course of their careers (I gave the numbers earlier.) The numbers don't lie, Lillard and Aldridge stay approximately the same (Lillard has limited experience, but Aldridge sure as hell doesn't) and Batum gets much worse. He disappears in the playoffs in accordance with the statistics that I provided, which formulated my opinion for my theory that he disappears, supported by numbers. I don't care about his per game stat increases as much as I care about him being inefficient and being a BELOW AVERAGE NBA player in the playoffs - consistently.

So, no. I'm not going to question our two best players who stay relatively the same while our third best player becomes below average. I'll question the guy making 12 million and playing as a below average NBA player while facing defenses not geared towards stopping him long before I'll question Lillard (guarded by Tony Allen and Mike Conley) or Aldridge (Zbo and Gasol). There are reasons that Lillard and Aldridge should be significantly worse and less efficient - there is no reason Batum should be significantly worse. He should get more open shots due to defensive assignments and rotations due to the defenses being geared towards Aldridge and Lillard (and McCcollum LOL)

 

We've beaten this pretty well to death, and I'm certainly not going to look at regular season vs. playoff PERs for every 3rd option on every playoff team. Just a couple general points. Batum should not have been our 3rd option against MEM. He was actually our 6th leading scorer during the regular season (5th if you count Wes and Afflalo as 1 option since we got Afflalo about a week before Wes went down). Batum's major strength is his rebounding and facilitating. He averaged 8.6 RPG and 5.2 APG in the playoffs. Other than LeBron, name one small forward in the playoffs this year that topped one of those numbers, let alone both. I think most teams would take that kind of production, plus his 14.2 PPG, from their small forward in the playoffs. Again, I'm not saying Batum played great, but you don't average 14.2 PPG, 8.6 RPG and 5.2 APG (or 15.2 PPG, 7.6 RPG and 4.8 APG last year) by disappearing.

And, it wasn't just this year. Batum played very well against HOU last year and both his PPG and RPG were up, and his APG about the same in the playoffs last year vs. the regular season.

I admit I discount Batum's earlier playoff performances under Nate McMillan. McMillan always severely under utilized Batum. Under Nate, Batum's one and only role was to stand in the corner for the occasional corner 3.

Second, PER isn't the be all end all stat to begin with, but it's absolutely HORRIBLE when comparing small sample sizes, like a single playoff series (in Batum's case). Just look at Spencer Hawes, for example. He had an absolutely stellar PER = 18.8 in the post season, compared to a rather crappy PER = 9.8 during the regular season. If you're just going by PER, it certainly looks like Hawes was one of those role players that stepped up his game in the playoffs. The truth is much different. Over two series, Hawes played in 8 playoff games, but did not make one single meaningful contribution to his team. He only played garbage time minutes. In the first round, he scored 2 points in a 27-point loss to SAS. In the second round against HOU, he scored 2 points in a 25-point win, 8 points in a 33-point win and 11 points in a 21-point loss - all meaningless garbage time points that had zero impact on his team's playoff success. But, there's that gaudy playoff PER of 18.8.

Yeah, I know it's just one example, but PER has always led to a large number of what I call S^4 - Small Sample Size Superstars, guys who have all-star like PERs, but don't really help their teams win. Of course, with a small sample size, it can also swing in the other direction. If a player has one bad game, it can drastically skew their PER in a 4 or 5 game playoff series.

BNM