he hasn't started once, and his 9.0 PER is probably contributing to him playing fewer minutes than he has since 2004. Phil seems to see the same things that MM, much of the Portland fanbase, and the Blazers do. Mrs. Blake seems to be a bit biased...and frankly, you're not one to hold court on talents of PGs, either. I think MM is right on this, except I'd add: enjoy that 4/$16M contract.
except I'd add: enjoy that 4/$16M contract, and those Championship rings you'll be wearing. Like Popovich, Phil coaches teams, not individual players. Both coaches play many players rather than rely on 40 minutes per game from their stars all season long. This capitalizes on a player's talents and energy and keeps them hungry, while eliminating errors caused through fatigue or arrogance.
Mrs. Blake is probably hot, so she's probably right. Don't be surprised if Blake is the starter next year on all those national telecasts.
Blake and his wife loved (love?) Portland. I think they still live here in the offseason. Typical of Blazer fans on this board to take a dump on a player who actually wanted to be in Portland, and who started at PG for the best Blazer team in years.
45% from 3pt isn't bad, though. Luckily, Rudy decided to pull his head out of his ass the past week. If not, shooting would still be a major issue. Plus, Fisher had a PER of 9.6 last year (9.3 this year), and he won a ring in Jackson's offense. The PG in the triangle has never had a high PER, if you actually cared to research.
That's because Jackson has never had a point guard who was talented on offense, not because the triangle kills the stats of whoever occupies the position. Jackson's triangle emphasizes his best players, which were Jordan/Pippen, Shaq/Kobe and Kobe/Gasol...none of them played the point guard position. If he had Chris Paul and Kevin Durant, the point guard in the triangle would have a 25-30 PER. The most talented player that Jackson has employed at point guard in the last 15 years or so was Ron Harper, who was a defensive specialist by the time the Bulls acquired him. Blake isn't good. But Jackson doesn't need a good player to man the point guard spot. There is no classic point guard role on offense in Jackson's system. The "point guard" is simply the guard who defends the opposing point guard, generally.
What's your retort, PapaG, to the twitter in the OP? Do you agree that she should laugh about our situation, because her husband is "the pass-first PG that can shoot" that we need?
Blake wasn't traded for crap, or tossed overboard as a FA. In fact, he was traded for a very valuable commodity. That's not an insult.
Incorrect. Pippen guarded both Stockton and Gary Payton, not Steve Kerr. The "PG" in Jackson's system has one role typically in his offense. Wait for ball rotations and hit open 3 pointers. John Paxson, Craig Hodges, Steve Kerr, and Derek Fisher have all been able to do so in Jackson's variation of the triangle, and only Kerr was able to put up a decent PER. John Paxson was a 9ish PER player during the Bulls run with him. Judging Blake's efficacy in LA based solely on his PER flies in the face of the history of what has proven to be successful for Phil Jackson out of his PGs. Blake's PER right now is basically the same as Fisher's PER last season as a starter for an NBA champion. This is a fact.
I said "generally" because I knew you'd go for the edge cases. Pippen did not generally guard opposing point guards, nor did Jordan. Nor does Kobe, generally. Jackson certainly mixes things up based on circumstance, but Ron Harper generally guarded opposing point guards for those Bulls teams and Derek Fisher generally guarded the point guard for many of his Lakers teams. That's because Jackson was building his system around Jordan and Pippen and then Kobe and Shaq (and then Kobe and Gasol). If you honestly believe that, given Chris Paul and Kevin Durant as his best players, he'd have Chris Paul waiting for ball rotations to shoot jumpers, I think you're quite mistaken. Jackson has had superstars (or at least a very high level star in the case of Gasol) so it made sense to put specialized role-players around them. If he had Paul and Durant, he'd build around them and the shooting guard and small forward would be shooting jumpers when the ball rotated to them. That's a fairly trivial fact. I agree that Blake is as good as Fisher. Neither are very good players relative to the NBA. That's all that Jackson has needed around his top players.
I think we agree, then. Blake is good for what is asked of him in that offense. I still find using his PER as a Laker as a criticism to be unfair, considering the role asked of PGs throughout Jackson's career. He seems "good" in his role right now, at least based on Jackson's rather lengthy history as a coach.
So PER can just be tossed aside, and I know you use it all the time to discuss a player's value, but the rebuttal to a poor PER is just it's his role in the offense? Sweet. I'll log that one away for the three times a day you post a player's PER as a reason of anything.
Also, first Bull's championship, paxson, 14 PER, BJ 14.8. Second one, Paxson dipped to 10.9, but BJ was at 14.1, third, BJ 14.7. In fact, BJ was right around 15 his whole tenure in Chicago. And Harper went 14.4, 13.6 and 14.7. So I guess what PER is showing us, with 15 generally being an average NBA starter, is that the Bulls' PGs were right around an average to slightly, slightly below average. And Blake is well below that.
