Two things: 1 good game does not make a season. He sucks. And most likely will always suck. If you're gonna use swish3... use it all the time... You didn't here, and that's really disappointing.
After last night's game, his season stats changed, so his name disappeared from that list. I made a new inquiry to update his season stats, and now Ferry no longer qualifies. Only Mills was as bad. http://bkref.com/tiny/hTRxO
I have to disagree wit hthis. I have seen improvement in Plums interior game. IT was said when he got he he had none. He obviously has some. Has a fairly soft touch ( though inconsistent) Is developing a hook. I don't blame for not intentionally running plays for Vonleh, that might be just too much for him. Maybe its plenty for him to be starting and experiencing the NBAs best night in and night out? This is all development. There is ALOT to develop and just because not EVERY aspect is developing as fast as we all want, doesnt mean the team isnt developing and Stott's is failing. Long term plans are long term and when you are bringing a bunch of young guys together, mostly in new roles, you don't throw everything at them at once. You take steps and those steps may be different depending on the player. Crabbe has developed, CJ has busted out. Alot of this has to do with floor spacing creating opportunities and the team as a whole is improving at this both on offense and Defense in my opinion. Again...give them time. Noah cant drink a beer yet man. He isnt gonna get 5-10 set calls a game. Hes gonna get development by starting and thats plenty for now.
I didn't say he should - I said he should get two. Surely Dame and CJ could each take one less shot per game to get Noah two post-up attempts. I hardly think that's unreasonable - especially since we're more than halfway through the season. There has been very little offensive development. Mostly the offense relies on making 3-pointers - that's not a sound offensive philosophy.
Dame at least goes to the rack several times a game. CJ does a couple times. But yeah. You're right on everyone else.
Mostly I'm referring to the fact that the offense relies entirely on Dame/CJ. Yes, Dame is developing his attack more and CJ is developing PG skills - but that's just them being who they are. Stotts isn't doing anything - if he was he'd have been able to get Dame some better looks last night. The offense needs to diversify AWAY from Dame/CJ. That's the development that matters.
There's more to it than that... there's a huge rabbit hole to go down when it comes to free throw rate- and whoever was making the comment about Meyers getting to the free throw line, well yeah- no kidding, he's standing at the 3 point line. You don't draw fouls there, and that's not his fault. Where there is an issue is with CJ's game right now- he is on a historic level for someone who has the ball as much with such a high usage rate- he doesn't get to the line at all. There... chew on that for a bit... that outta stir things up a bit
there's a bit more to it than that- part of it is his inability to finish at the rim. The second part is he tends to shy away from contact. I don't know if that's a thing he's always done- but if it's new, it wouldn't surprise me. I mean, think about it- you've had multiple injuries to your foot- does going into the trees make a ton of sense when you're really efficient from 8ft-25ft? I'm sure that probably factors in a bit- how much, I'll never know for certain. But one thing he can do to get more free throws is get all the way to the rim. He has a solid in-between game that he goes to quite a bit. I'm going to dive into his shot distribution here in a bit to see the full breakout, but I'm willing to bet he pulls up more often than he goes to the rim and he probably finishes better on the pull up too. I could be wrong, but that's my gut feeling.
I agree with O.B, I think Plums has been given the opportunity to work on his post skills. But I sure as hell do not want them to force feed him so he can get more attempts. That is what practice is for. I want Dame and CJ getting the majority of shots, especially when they play together. Crabbe is developing just fine IMO. Aminu, Harkless, and Davis will never have the role of scorer. Developing Aminu and Harkless is fine, but isn't the goal to replace them with a proven scoring SF? They get just the right amount of shots per game. Actually Aminu gets too many IMO. Henderson is never shy about shooting, he is getting plenty of shots per minute. And he is now a factor on offense. Vonleh is young and will get better, but him getting more shots while CJ and Dame are on the floor is not what I want to see. He has practice and this summer to develop more. He gets a few shots every time he is in there. Leonard is the one player who maybe should be getting more shots in the post. But he serves a purpose spreading the floor even when he is is cold. No one is leaving him open, daring him to shoot. Overall we have 4 players who average double figures. Same as the Warriors and Spurs. Plus we have two more who average 9 per game. So we could end up with 6 players who average double figures. I think that is pretty diversified.
Good post, but I have two comments. 1) With more minutes, I believe Harkless absolutely can be a 12-15 ppg scorer. He has not been given the opportunity here, but if minutes open up, I believe he has the tools to do something worthwhile with them. 2) As far as Meyers spreading the defense, from what I've seen, I would say teams absolutely are leaving him open. If he continues to shoot 49% from 3 (as he had over the past for weeks), that won't last, but he's not drawing a whole lot of defensive attention on the perimeter yet.
1) You could be right about Harkless. I sure would like to see it. 2) You are crazy There is no way anyone has left him open intentionally. Once in a while the other team's screws up on the assignment, or is late to get to him but that happens when bigs cover bigs outside. ( Or if they switch) But compared to last year teams are definitely covering him outside.
It's Leonard's fault that he's so limited, Stotts has to play a 7-2 guy far from the basket, so he gets no FTAs. If you want to stir things up, run the same search using this season's stats for McCollum instead of Leonard, taking out the 6-10 height parameter. http://bkref.com/tiny/wpkZf You are right, McCollum is historically bad at getting FTAs. That search has no height constraint. (After the next game, that search may have a different result since his season stats will change. But probably not. He's way out there in territory all by himself.)
Perhaps I am crazy, but the data indicates that his closest defender is about 5 feet from him on average when he shoots. Now that doesn't mean that teams are intentionally leaving him open and daring him to shoot, but it does suggest that his presence on the perimeter isn't impacting defensive spacing as much as one would expect based on his recent 3P%.
Meyers not so long ago went 1 for 20 or something like that from deep...scouting reports have probably indicated teams could sag off him but it's up to him to make them pay for doing that. The kid needs consistency. Seems to have lost it since Hughes was fired
