I disagree. He had a big role and good chemistry on a contending team early in his career. That's the exact type of player we need right now. Someone who can build chemistry and understands what it takes to win - and been around big time players and winners.
RJ is a near perfect fit, if you ask me.
I didn't say that. If you had said "He's only an average defender," and left it at that, I could see your perspective. However, simply calling him an average defender AT BEST is a far fetched opinion. I think, in this situation, at worst he's an average defender since he's focusing so hard on that end. I expect pretty great things defensively from him, not statsheet filling maybe, but good, solid D night in and night out. I don't care much about the stats anyway; I'm quite familar with an all-time great defender named Bowen who didn't contribute much to the stat sheet essentially ever, yet still played one of the biggest roles on multiple le winning teams. I'm not comparing the two's skills or attributes as much as their willingness to fit whatever role the team needs.
Good for you!
Again, I didn't say that, though I do see where you're coming from. That said, OTOH you have a guy who was the number 1 option often last season yet barely averaged 2 TOs. He doesn't create a lot of offense for others, but he's more efficient than you imply.
By carrying the offense, that means score score score. We need him to put points on the board and play solid defense on the other end. He's not going huge amounts of defensive attention anymore, especially when he's got Parker, Manu and/or Tim on the floor with him. You don't realize that is why we traded for him - to take some of the scoring load off our big 3, while providing athleticism and the ability to play D, and to do it consistently ie without injury. Those guys aren't worried about shots during the regular season, they're worried about rings at the start of next season, especially Tim.
Dude, I counter-argued this before you even posted it so you don't have to "keep repeating yourself." TIM WANTS TO CONTEND THIS YEAR. The Spurs owe to him and the fans to put a contender out there rather than waste another year. Additionally, you don't see that if by waiting til 2010, we may still lose Manu and yet still don't have RJ. What's better for winning a le in 2011: Manu and RJ, or Joe Johnson?
Zero options? We have a great team and we're basically penciled in to the playoffs as a contender already. We got IMO a perfect piece in RJ, without losing Manu, who can limit Manu and Tim's minutes without sacrificing offense. We lost garbage that didn't do jack for us last playoffs or retired subsequently. There's really no cons, only possible pros in this situation.
Manu isn't going anywhere anyway. You act like we don't hold all the cards - remember, we're the ones who didn't offer him an extension. Let's see how much money he fetches even with a solid 2010, before we start jumping to conclusions. He's most likely best off here if he wants to keep winning les AND keep earning a pretty damn good paycheck.
They're not going to trade RJ. He's in our longterm (next 2 years of contention) plans. He's our instant-offense, he's healthy, he can play big minutes, he's athletic and one of our most exciting new players in years (it is a down economy and everyone's hurting) and he's probably going to D up the opposing star player pretty damn often.
The Shaq trade looked horrible on paper IMO, the JRich one didn't look exactly great to those who knew Bell and especially Diaw's worth. It's an entirely different subject with entirely different people and ideas, but Shaq and Nash's styles are too conflicting to summarize and oversimplify the issues.
Ariza has talent, but there a couple reasons why we didn't go after him. First and most importantly, we could not have signed both him and McDyess. Our bigman situation was and is still more important than the perimeter logjam, but that said no one would be stupid enough (no offense intended but you're opinion is fairly wild) to pass up that Gasol-collusionesque trade for RJ.
Second and more fundamentally oriented, Ariza doesn't have the experience or proven offensive ability to have been "that" perimeter guy we needed - at least, not yet, not in time for Tim to win more les. Ariza has a le under his belt and he played a solid role, but that's all he did - roleplay off the superstars. His defense is better, maybe even much better than RJ's, but his offense at this point is a complete mystery, as is his ability to hold up as a 1/2 option night in and night out for an entire season. With RJ, we know he can play 82 games as a number 1 or 2 option night in and night out, while averaging 20 points and 5 boards. Ariza doesn't know what thats like.
Come the on! Come off it, you're overly self-righteous Those are the most relevant stats you can use at this point, and that's the only reason I used them.
First of all, I DID use his career 3p%. Reread.
Second, you can't use last year's FG% to accurately predict how well he's going to do in this new role. This role is going to be much more like the one he had in NJ, only he will be making more of his own offense. It's going to be a sort of mix between the roles - he'll still get open court looks from Manu/Parker and others, but he'll also be calling his own number in the half court. That is why I used his career FG% rather than last year's.
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