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The stats may not bear it out (they don't always do so with a player like Perkins, a la Bowen), but he's a more valuable player than either of the O'Neal's, given where they're all at in their respective careers.
You can argue Rondo over Parker, but Ginobili easily trumps Allen and Hill is better than West and the potential is there for that gap to widen this season. Actually, West is a good comparison for Hill. Hill is like a more athletic version.Rondo, Allen, West.
I suspect Lebron will play some point in Miami also, like he did in Cleveland. Which would make a Lebron/Wade/Miller back court better.
And there's backcourts such as Bibby/Johnson/Crawford, Curry/Ellis/Bell, Miller/Roy/Bayless, Nash/Richardson/Childress that are arguably as good.
I still rank ours over those, but it's not that clear cut anymore. We'll see how Tony comes back.
James is a forward with guard like skills. He's still a forward, though.
Bell? Are you serious? I've always liked Bibby, but he's been reduced to mostly a spot up shooter at this point in his career. Bayless hasn't proven a thing yet.
It is clear cut.
Fair concern about McDyess, but he didn't show any signs last season of that. Sure, he was underwhelming throughout much of the regular season, particularly the early part, but as many suspected, he was merely pacing himself. With guys like that, they deserve the benefit of the doubt. Meaning: Until he shows he can't play anymore, I'm not going to predict he can't.Let's see... Duncan is Duncan, and even on the decline, he's still very effective. No doubt there. I love Blair, and he never stops being relentless, plus he looks committed and his energy will definitely help hiding his lack of size. I'm a believer there. The starting bigs look good.
Dice is still good when he decides to play, which lately is pretty much the playoffs. I don't have a problem with that. My only question is if he's getting too long in the tooth, and what happens if he can't flip the switch anymore when we need him (like Horry's last season). Time will tell. After that, we need to talk about potential. I mean, Tiago has played exactly zero minutes of NBA ball. He has spent 3 months, if that, with his new teammates and coach. Plus he's already banged up. I don't know what to tell you about him. I have more questions than certainties. Bonner, as far as defense goes, is useless, IMO. He should be at this spot, 5th big, and play situational minutes. Unfortunately, being that we're mostly an old team and we're going to need to rest our vets, and that Tiago is a big question mark at this point, I can easily see him being the 4th or even 3rd big. Which IMO is a bad sign as far our interior defense goes.
There's no logical reason to think Splitter won't be a solid player from day one. Do we know for certain? Of course not. We also don't know for certain that Duncan or Ginobili won't fall off a cliff next season, but we can make an educated guess and presume they'll be somewhere around where they were last season. We can do the same with Splitter.
Regular season Bonner might be that. Playoffs, I'd be surprised if (though this is somewhat dependent on match-ups) Duncan, McDyess and Splitter aren't the top three bigs. That is a solid defensive trio.
T. Allen.I'm just looking at the amount of minutes most top perimeter players play these days (which are the kind of players you would need to throw a stopper at). You will rarely see Lebron, Durant, Kobe, Wade, Paul, Rose, etc play less than 35-32 mins. I'm not saying you need a stopper all the time with those guys, but even if you cut it by 1/3, it's still 20 mins. There's a reason Bowen averaged 30+ mpg for us on our peak years when he basically had just that role. Sure, we're more talented offensively now, but I can't think you can cut that more than 1/3 and still be effective.
What about the Suns?It was a combination of both getting Billups, and jettisoning Iverson.
It really was addressing a need for that team, because the raw talent was always there, but there was no brain behind the wheel.
For example, Iverson shot more than Carmelo that last season he was there. Billups instead took second seat, let Carmelo be the star, and gave that team a floor general to better use guys like JR Smith, who has a lot of talent, but is a mental midget. The fact that they also picked up the Birdman and shored up their defensive depth on the interior didn't hurt either.
That's not true. Others have.You've been trying to play this card for 3 posts now, and the only one to bring up the sweep has been you. You can go back and look up my posts in last season's preseason (way before the sweep), and you'll read the exact same reservations about the state of our defense in general, and the role of guys like Bonner or Finley in particular.
So you're not ready to proclaim them a contender, but you're ready to insinuate they're not, all the while reserving the right to call them a contender in case they make you look like an idiot? Got it.I don't have a magic ball. I don't know if there's going to be injuries or trades that will change what the team looks like compared to right now.
I don't know how Tiago is going to look. I don't know what Anderson will bring to the table. Will they be great or busts? Too many unanswered questions.
Maybe you already know how everything will play out...
Some of us don't, and are not ready to proclaim this team a contender in October, but are also not ready to write them off in October. Maybe we need a dozen or so games to see what this team really looks like.
And while we're talking about looking like an idiot, pretending that people stop doing something on a forum just because you say so is actually pretty high up there in the re ed department.
