The Official Around the NBA: March 2019 edition

really ? I remember an article in one of the first years of CJ that has this quote from Stotts: "passing didn't come naturally to CJ"

 

One of the nastiest ally oops this season. Crazy thing is he didn't even actually dunk it!

 

IMO, there's a major difference between being a good shooter and being a good scorer. Both are good things, but different. Being a good shooter means being able to put the ball in the basket off a jump shot during the flow of the game and is best measured by raw FG%. That's CJ. Being a good scorer is putting points on the board in any fashion, measured by TS%. The leaders is TS% are never the best shooters in the league - I would venture a guess that the top 20 are all Cs and PFs. They get high percentage shots and lots of fouls, but are probably shit once you push them more than 5' from the hoop - certainly not good shooters. As you said, maybe it's semantics but I think it's an important distinction. I want a bit of both in my offense. Personally I prefer wings who can shoot to wings who can't, and I hate when wings just try to get fouled and get points at the FT line (Harden) - it's a bastardization of the game. On the flip, I like bigs who take high percentage, and high foul rate, shots.

Back to CJ/Lou. Again, their TS% is essentially the same. One gets more at the FT line, one gets more in the flow of the game. I don't see how swapping the two makes us better. Putting CJ in a 6th man role would be great, but trading him for a 6th man would not.

 

The team that's concerning to me is Houston. They've taken full advantage of OKC's recent slide by winning 8 straight. CP is rounding into form and their role players are playing well again.

 

OKC and Houston worry me. They both have multiple superstars on their team that will get the benefit of call from the refs. I hope we end up playing Utah to be honest for that exact reason.

 

Not really.

https://www.nbadraft.net/players/cj-mccollum

http://www.draftexpress.com/profile/C.J.-McCollum-5860

 

Harden has consistently NOT gotten the whistle in the playoffs. Wes manhandled him a few yrs back and always got the benefit of the doubt. Same with OKC guys. Refs allow for more physicality in the playoffs. Same reason why Ricky and CP worry me defensively against Dame. Rubio shut down Russell last year in the playoffs. I don't think Westbrook is nearly as good of a defender as he's credited as.

 

He was pretty tenacious earlier in his career, but he puts all that energy into the offensive side of the ball now that he's chasing a triple double every night.

 

I'll take your word for it. Just the thought of those guys complaining to the refs nonstop worries me.

 

And remind me since the Boobie-Doctor isn't around anymore......him putting up historic numbers is a BAD thing right?

 

Uh oh, Klay calling out the fans? Never a good thing.......

 

That dude is such a booger.

 

A player can be unselfish without being a great passer. The article you quote refers to him playing off the ball...not being the black hole/hero ball/iso addicted player he has become.

 

I still remember CJ's first summer league. They started off trying to make him the primary ball handler and he wilted every time he got pressured and had a high turnover rate when he got trapped. It wasn't really until his MIP season that he vastly improved his handles and started breaking people off the dribble.

 

it's true that if you count down the top-50 in TS%, a majority are bigs. But their are several wings and guards on the list

but if you want an apples-to-apples comparison, CJ is 51st among PG's and SG's and if you add SF's to the list, he's 84th. So, even when you eliminate bigs and confine to perimeter players, he's 84th out of 230; above average but a long way from elite. That wouldn't matter much except for the fact he's 15th out of 230 in salary. Elite salary for non-elite production. Of course, that's common in the NBA I guess

if you have a problem with TS%. how about points/shot?

Lillard 1.363
Layman 1.31
Aminu 1.307
Curry 1.228
Hood 1.202
CJ 1.186
Harkless 1.167 (1.296 last year)
Turner 1.09 (yeeeeesh)

well, I did say I wouldn't trade CJ for Lou; but that's because I'm holding out the faint hope that CJ will be traded for a better return. And of course, the argument can be broadened to include salary. Lou as an 8M a year super sub is a bargain; CJ as and undersized non-all-star 28M/year SG is not a bargain

as for the other, sorry blue, but I don't buy this "flow of the game" stuff. When Lillard gets to the FT line it's almost always because he was fouled within the flow of the game. Sure, Harden is an extreme example, but drawing fouls has always been an important factor...and it will always be

it just seems like in order to prop up CJ you're trying to reduce the parameters of judgement to a narrow enough set of gauges he looks better than he is. I mean, as I said, CJ shoots better percentages than Dame and it's practically irrelevant. The object of shooting is to score points. Dame shooting yields much better results than CJ shooting. Fact. To me, that makes Dame a better shooter

 

And on the flip it seems like you broaden the parameters in order to make him look worse than he is. I compare a player to other players who are the same position - doesn't make sense to me to compare CJ to PGs and SFs. But hey, whatever. I think we're basically in agreement - Lou and CJ are similar players.

CJ is not even close to being a major problem. His salary could be argued to be detrimental, but I would venture that man, most (or even all?) teams have similar or worse contracts. CJ got overpaid coming off a rookie contract. That seems to be what happens in the NBA - teams pay for potential. Lou was a known commodity and got paid based what an old dude with no untapped potential should get paid.

Just as an aside since CJ's passing has been mentioned, not in response to you: CJ has averaged 5.3 APG in games Dame has sat out over the past two seasons. Not amazing, but not terrible.

 

I just don't want us to drop to 6 or 7.