re: West Standings (Updated: 2/2) - Who Stays? Who Goes?

Oh I agree. There's a reason we're ranked higher than them in Hollingers power rankings. There's also a reason we can't sit Davis more than 3 minutes in the second half of a remotely close game.

I'd say Udrih and Rivers are a wash. Anderson should be sixth man of the year so they don't have anyone to matchup with him, no one does. But koufos is a very solid 3rd big in his own right. I feel confident matching up with their first 7, but their 8-12 is much better than ours. Which doesn't matter in a playoff series but over the course of an 82 game season with injuries very well could.

Sure you can find flaws in their bench, but you can do that with every teams bench except maybe GS

Wholeheartedly agree. My point is that they are 8 deep, and after that it gets pretty bad. We are in worse shape than that, but I will take our 6 over theirs.

This season, if we stay healthy, is gonna be a fricking blast.

quote:

---

I would take almost anyone on their team over Reke.

---

Its irrational reactionary statements like this that warrant you losing speaking privileges

quote:

---

Its irrational reactionary statements like this that warrant you losing speaking privileges

---

Whats reactionary about it? Link me to a post where I've ever believed anything to the contrary. Maybe when he first came here and I hadn't seen him play much. I think he makes teams worse. Period. And I don't think Memphis has anyone on their roster who makes teams much worse.

Y'all need to come up with something because I'm hearing a lot of Lake Wobegon on this board. Everybody's above average. Jrue is above average, Tyreke is above average, Ryno is above average, EG is above average, Asik is above average. Guess what, when you have 5 above average players and the 2nd best player in the league, you don't follow Thunder games hoping they'll go 12 games under .500 before their best players come back so that we have a chance of maybe getting the 8th seed.

I'm as optimistic about this team as anyone because of Davis' development and my belief of how far a star can carry a team. But come on, there are obviously problems with this team. I believe a massive portion of it starts and ends with Tyreke. Also, people overvalue how valuable a stretch 4 who is a liability on defense. I love Ryno and he is very good at what he does. But it just isn't that valuable of a thing to have. Somebody like Z-Bo or even Asik just translates to so many more wins. If it were as valuable as ppl make him seem, we wouldn't have been around and under .500 last year even when everybody was healthy. Obviously, Monty and the bench are other huge problems.

quote:

---

Yeah because 10 games warrants forgetting about his insane play last season...

GTFO

---

What insane play last year? He's been on losing teams playing loser ball his whole career. He runs out the shot clock by holding it and then forces the offense to have a low percentage play(often his own layup). Thats fine when the opportunity cost isn't high which is why he will always be a solid player for a lower team IMO.

With him at the helm, the offense will get .9 points per possession with whoever he plays with. For a bad team that scores .8 points per possession, thats great. For playoff teams that score at least 1 point per possession, he's making the team worse. Thats why I say he plays loser ball.

I'm making these numbers up to illustrate my point. But this is how I've always felt about him. If he actually kept up this shooting, he could be coached to not hog the ball and be an asset to the offense. But he seems reluctant to do that and I'm not trusting his 30 shot sample size over the 646 he has shot in his career just yet.

Reke is far from perfect, but he gives opposing teams fits.

alter and/or moron alert

you, sir, are the weakest link



GOOD BYE

quote:

---

On what world is Calathes a very good backup PG? His PER last year wasn't even in the top 50 among PGs

---

He was a rookie last season and wasn't very good for the first half of the season until Bayless was traded away and he was forced to starts some games in Conley's absence. He was the Western Conference rookie of the month for the job he did when Conley went out.

We had the 2nd best bench in the NBA behind the Spurs once Gasol came back in large part due to Calathes' passing and defense.

quote:

---

Is his defense outstanding?

---

In one of the games he had to start we beat the Wizards in large part because he held John Wall to 4 points.

A gump fan calling me a dumb arse, lulz. Don't you have a lonely cousin you should be tending to?

I get it, you are a Grizzlies fan. You overvalue your team like we overvalue ours. With that said, when you look at the stats, when you are objective, you are 8 deep. We are not in better shape, and I never claimed we were.

quote:

---

This is the most insanely idiotic thing ive ever heard. What does what the fans do early on in the season have to do with the price of tea in China?

---

You are the idiot. My point is that even the fans know that we aren't an amazing team. Its the Lake Wobegon effect as I stated earlier. They claim to think everybody is above average. But they know that the sum of the parts is an average to slightly above average team even with the MVP frontrunner. Those are their expectations as evidenced by comments made about our playoff chances.

So subconsciously they know that some people on the team aren't that good. Somethings got to give. You can't just defend everyone as a good player and arrive upon the conclusion that we aren't a great team.

Anderson gives us awesome shooting!
Tyreke can create mismatches!

Yes, I know. Most NBA players can do at least one thing. They also suck horribly at defense/rebounding and game management respectively. Time to start putting some weight behind the statements. Whats the value they bring to the team relative to other NBA players, not relative to this benchmark of a player literally good at nothing?

I would just like to have a realistic conversation where the sum of the parts actually meets what we think of the team. Boom is a terrible troll but at least what he claims to think of the team makes sense with his expectations of them. Reading this board, you would think that its possible to have the MVP, 6th man of the year, defensive all-NBA guy and 3 all stars and still miss the playoffs because the bench and coach aren't good.