Hinrich has been a solid if overvalued pro for a long career. He's getting hammered by the fans now, during the twilight of his career, but was once BELOVED by many. McDermott is a heavily hyped rookie that is supposed to be a ready to play out of the gate kind of rookie. The 11th pick in the draft. An actual 4 year college player. Who will have the better pro career when the book is closed on both?
How do you measure career? For three of the first 4 years Hinrich played, he was an average to above average player. Not awful like he is now. An average to above average players would start at 2 or 3 positions on this team and certainly be worthy to consider as 6th man. I'd start that good Kirk right now over Dunleavy for sure. But that ended for him in 2006-7. It's been that long McDermott gets my vote. If he's about as good as Dunleavy for his career, he'll have had a much better overall career than Kirk.
Lots of ways! Here are some of Hinrich's accomplishments. A member of the all-Rookie first team. A one time member of the all-defense 2nd team. A bronze medalist for team USA as a pro. I think Hinrich will have him beat on the all-rookie team inclusion. I wonder if McDermott will ever be invited to team USA as a pro? I wonder if McDermott will ever be on an all-NBA team, defensive team or win a major award (leg lamps don't count).
Kirk has a career PER of 13.0. DunVP has a career 14.2 PER. I think DunVP has had a much better career. At age 34, GarPaxDorf didn't bother to find a SF to start in his place. His PER this season (pre injury) and last are really close to Kirk's career PER and a mind boggling 2x this season's. If McBuckets really is McMorrison, there's no question Kirk had the better career. Doug won't get a big contract, if at all, after his rookie deal. My hope, still, is that McDNPCD turns out at least as good as DunVP.
Kirk wasn't a bad player back in the day. Of course seeing him perish on the court every night makes his image suffer, at least to me. He had a nice college career and at one point was regarded as a good/great tier defender.
My money's on Kirk. Kirk's prime was a 5 year run as a big minute 2-way player on a playoff team that you had to gameplan for. Most rookies never reach that point. They were both 4 year guys and the fact that Kirk's got out of the gate so much quicker speaks to his superior physical tools.
Kirk had his good days. In fact Deng and Hirnich gave us the defensive things this team needed early on. All the while Ben Gordon was our assassin! Trouble is, his better days were gone, before we traded him the last time. So that being said, transplant, I too hope it is Doug!
So what, if anything, did we learn about the current state of McDermott last night? 15 minutes of action. He looked to me like he's not really ready to be a NBA player at this point. Of course, there is still plenty of time for development and its only one game. Playoff seeding is important though.
McDermott played 15 minutes, missed all his shots, but the team was only a -1 in those 15 minutes. Net, he doesn't kill you out there, so during this shorthanded period, you might as well put him in the back of the rotation.
After not playing for most of the season, I wouldn't judge much from this one game. Snell didn't perform very well in random and spotty minutes but once given more consistent minutes, quickly developed into a useful player. If given consistent minutes for several games we don't see any improvement, then there might be some cause for concern.
He was anxious, but aggressive on offense. He will be fine, next season. Play him now to more or less rest some better players.
I want to see McDoug get 15-20 minutes every night until Rose and Butler return. PG - Brooks 30, Hinrich 10, Moore 8 SG - Snell 36, Moore 12 SF - Dunleavy 28, McDoug 20 PF - Noah 16, Mirotic 32 C- Gasol 32, Noah 16 I'd rather Taj not come back, but if he must: PG - Brooks 28, Hinrich 8, Moore 12 SG - Snell 36, Moore 8, McDoug 4 SF - Dunleavy 28, McDoug 14, Mirotic 6 PF - Noah 12, Mirotic 24, Gibson 12 C - Gasol 30, Noah 18 PLAYOFFS: PG - Rose 36, Brooks 12 SG - Butler 38, Snell 10 SF - Dunleavy 28, Snell 14, Mirotic 6 PF - Noah 20, Mirotic 20, Gibson 8 C - Gasol 34, Noah 14
I suspect you're right. To me, McDermott looked like that guy coming back from a long layoff who just isn't yet ready for the difference in speed between practice and games. I was happy to see him get solid minutes even if he struggled. But unlike Transplant, I thought he was doing damage in the fourth and wasn't disappointed to see him head to the bench. McDermott is probably going to need a full summer to really get into the flow of things. But let's see what happens this month. There's no accounting for how long it takes players to put things together.
