I have grown to hate TJ Ford this season for the following reasons. 1. He makes terrible decisions as a PG. On 2 successive occasions, he passed to Rasho on a fast break only to watch him flub the reception. He had Bargs on the wing the first time, and AP the next. Why would you pass to your big man in traffic when you have 2 capable players on the wings? 2. He trys to be the hero late in games....and unlike Mike James, he never hits the shot. How many times has TJ taken the final shot and missed...he tries to be prime time and constantly folds. 3. He often makes up his mind while coming up court to shoot. He'll dribble around a while and try to slash to the basket, and when that dosen't work, he settles for a jumper or a fade. 4. He often dumps the ball in the post to Bargs or bosh with 5 seconds or less left on the shot clock. You have to give them more time. If Bosh or Bargs gets doubled, they don't have much of a choice but take a bad shot. They don't have enough time to find the open teammate. 5. He is turnover prone while over-dribbling in traffic. 6. He takes too many chances on D, when he should be using his superior speed to keep himself between the opponent and the net. If we could somehow make the salaries work, i'd ship him to the calves for Anderson Varejao and Daniel Gibson. Varejao would give us the hustle rebounder that we desperatly need, and Gibson and Calderone could split the PG time....I mean he starts alot of the games for the Cavs. The Cavs would finally get a true starting PG (seems to be his rep around the league).
<div class="quote_poster">AirJordan Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">lol you shoulda put that up before todays game :/</div> Most of that stuff can still apply to the knicks game. The fast break point happened today, and the fourth quarter was brutal, he kept dribbling and making terrible choices.
I'd agree with you that Ford has many of those qualities, but when his jumper is going he's a force to be dealt with. I think he would definitely benefit from a more structured offense. He just gets out of control sometimes and we never make the adjustments necessary to get him back on track. His B-ball IQ is super low compared to Calderon's so he needs something to help that. But then again Calderon is playing like crap lately, so maybe those qualities we saw in him before were overstated.
Calderon's injury is a blessing in disguise... Since he's been playing like crap as of late, he needs the break to rest, and watch from the bench. So when he returns before the playoffs, he will fit in more and pick his spots better.. TJ is a man on a mission, only 2 full years under his belt, SKY IS DA LIMIT FOR HIM....
GiveTJ some time. This is basically his 2nd year if u take away the year when he had surgey. He will get bettr better every year, we gotta be happy to have TRUE PG in our team. And about those last plays where TJ forces freakin layup everytime, we should blame on MITCHELL for that.
that pass wasnt to rasho by the way, it was to garbo, rasho just thought it was for him and deflected it out
Yeah most Raptor fans fail to understand that this guys is 24 years old, not like he suppose to come in and become Magic Johnson or something, he only has 2 years, still has a ton of things to improve on, and yet people like you are bashing him and sending him off. Relax, in time he will mature and stop making these mistakes. Plus no way is Anderson Varejao leaving Cleveland. Without TJ Ford, Raps = No playoffs. Need a good reason? Look @ the Bucks.
I wouldn't be very comfortable with Calderon and Gibson manning our point guard spot. I'm not even sold on Gibson being a legit NBA player yet. And as great as Varajeo is, he's still a role player. In terms of pure raw talent, there aren't very many PG's out there that can match Ford. Someone started a thread like this in the Bucks forum, so I'll give the same sort of defense of TJ that I gave there. Clearly Ford isn't a finished product. He can be out of control sometimes and in those periods, he tends to hurt our offense more than anything. However, I think he really suffers from playing in a relatively simplistic offense. Basically, we live and die by the high pick-and-roll. There's very little off-the-ball movement when we run our plays and most of the time the rest of our players sit at the perimeter waiting for TJ to penetrate and draw a defender. This works when his mid-range J is falling (like the last 3 games) or when team's have to respect our outside shooting. Otherwise, defenses anticipate the drive and he ends up overdribbling and hoisting up bad shots. But, you can still see his great passing ability every once in a while, when he makes that play through a few defenders to an open player under the basket. Calderon's looked better for most of this season and I think that's because he has a higher basketball IQ and his European experience has made him better at improvising off a broken play. That doesn't necessarily make him a better player, as he still has a lower ceiling and can't run the break as well as Ford. I think if we had a less predictable offense with more motion (like the Pistons, Suns, etc.), ?ou'd really see what Ford's capable of. Right now I think we just aren't taking full advantage of his abilities. I know for sure that Mitchell leaves him at a disadvantage whenever he draws up a set play at the end of a game that inevitably breaks down.
Yeah, before the last few games, I would totally agree with you. (He's very young still, and is making a lot of bad decisions despite his athleticism) and i especially HATE when he's trying to eat clock and he keeps on dribbling until there's 5 seconds on the clock and the defender know's he's gonna take a outside jumper, which he does - and misses, and thats the reason we lost the dallas game.. <u>BUT</u> in recent games, he's sort of done the opposite, I.E. making very good passes (which is why he did get 18 assists), driving into the paint a lot. (He has almost always done the drive-and-kick very well but he's done it even better recently)
I would have to disagree with anyone saying he's turned the corner as of late. He's playing the same style he always has the only difference is that his jump shot is falling, and when that happens he's a force. He's yet to prove he can hit the jumper on a consistant basis yet though, so it's still a work in progress. What I dislike is his shot selection is pretty bad. The moment (which seems to happen once a game) where he runs up court and jacks up a jumper with no rebounders under the net and no passes to his teammates makes me want to break my TV. I also have some problems with the over dribbling but that's more our offensive strategy than Ford.
How about his Defense....he should be owning people with his speed, but he takes chances and goes for steals. He should just keep his body between then opponent and the bucket. That should be easy for him. As for gettin 18 assists against the Knicks, man everyone was hitting near the end of the game. He made a pile of his assists just passin to bargs and bargs would hit the 3 ball or the jumper with a hand in his face. Those aren't good passes, when steve Nash gets 18 assists, he leads players to the bucket and splits defenders with bounce passes, TJ does none of that.
Well, we can't expect TJ Ford to be Steve Nash but i do see your point. I did think the 18 assists was a bit of an overstatement compared to the chances he actually created. Regarding the finding the open player though, I can't but help think of one play last night where Graham cut across the key and Ford slipped the pass in and it was an instant dunk. The first thing that struck me about that was 1) someone actually cut off the ball ? wow, that never happens in our offense. The only guys who cut usually are Parker and Peterson 2) Ford never makes those passes. Usually when you see a guy cut or come off a curl Ford sits there and dribbles the ball as they run by because he's looking at Chris Bosh in the post.
Well, Ford is limited with how effective a defender he can be. He gives up a lot of height and weight to most PG's and as a result he has to rely on his quickness to force turnovers. Basically, he's gambling and reaching to compensate for his lack of size. I think this was most noticeable against Marbury. Stephon got any shot he wanted against Ford, but TJ still managed to play decent defense by being aggressive with his hands and collapsing on the entry pass into the post. I still think he's got great passing ability. You really see it on the fast break, where he'll pull out an amazing pass every so often. But, you can't really blame him for not making Steve Nash-type passes, because he doesn't play in Steve Nash's offense. Most of the time, we feed Bosh for an iso or drive-and-kick to the perimeter. There really aren't many other options for him in this offense.
Dude, you couldn't have picked a worse time to make a thread like this. Over the past 4 games he's been averaging 12 assists and has been key to our current winning streak. I've been very critical of TJ in the past, but lately he's been playing under more control and making better decisions. Most of it has to do with his improved shooting, him getting to know the tendencies of his teammates better, and his teammates being able to hit their perimeter shots (defenders can't clog the lanes if the whole team is hitting their shots). And I agree with Chutney, a lot of his struggles has to do with our simplistic offense. If our shot's not falling and we're not making any off the ball movement, then TJ's gonna have a very difficult time creating for everyone else and that usually leads to him over dribbling and taking a forced shot. As already mentioned, he's still young and he's still getting used to playing with a new young group so we can't expect him to play like Nash. But judging from past few games, you can see the potential he has and that's something you can't take for granted. And although Calderon is probably the smarter and more controlled pg atm, Ford is able to do things that Calderon would never be able to do so I don't think it would be wise to trade Ford and assume Calderon could easily take his place.
I wasen't trying to imply he should be like steve nash. I was simply stating that a player like nash uses his passing to generate offensive, therfore his assist totals directly relate to his contribution on offense. TJ just dumps it to some player and they score....thats not really the same. Alot of his assists are incidental, as they don't really lead to a good scoring play. TJ has been frustrating me alot. I was at the game against the knicks, and my girlfriend and I were both disgusted by his play. He was overdribbling to the point where the offense was stagnant. Then late in the fourth, I look up at the board and notice 18 assists. I thought it was a mistake. Its not like his passing was glaringly obvious. It was for the most part, incidental, and clearly not indicative of his play.
I don't know about the clutch thing, I've seen him hit a lot of big shots for the team down the stretch, not game winners per-say, but he takes over succesfully many times. I definately wouldn't do the suggested trade for him though.
On the overdribbling, you have to remember that Nash overdribbles as much as any guard in the league. But, the difference is that he has people constantly moving and trying to get open when he's keeping his dribble alive, and its a lot easier for him to find players in scoring positions. When TJ's got the ball, everyone is stationary and he has to create their scoring oppurtunities for them by drawing defenders, etc.
