Big Baby to San Antonio? Grant Hill to Boston?

[Cheddz]

Not ing because he's old, ing because he's a huge turd.

I don't really give a rats backside about Davis or Gortat or Sheed or whoever...don't get me wrong. I don't think Davis is Charles Barkley or anything....I just love the schizophrenic nature of Spurs fans when it comes to Free Agency.

I like the Haislip deal...that's a nice start. Getting Blair will hopefully work for us. Glen Davis (not the awesome former Astro) probably isn't really even on the Spurs radar....the front office will likely get one or two of those bargain basement guys like Walt Hermann who's tall and can shoot decently...like Rasheed (although I'd love for Zaza to be a Spur) to fill out the roster and call it a day.

And Spurs fans will hate the moves...until they pay off for awhile....and if the Spurs don't win a le this upcoming season, will hate them again.

[TacoCabanaFajitas]

I've wanted Big Baby on the Spurs since he came out of college, and I'm very happy with this deal IF it is not for the full MLE, and he drops a few more pounds. The guy drained some clutch shots in this last playoffs and showed a noticeable improvement in his game. He wasn't afraid to attack the basket and when left open he consistently hit that mid-range jumper. He's a young kid that plays with heart and is playoff tested, yeah I would have ed my pants if we signed Sheed but I'm not crying my eyes out that instead we got a guy much younger that still has improvements he knows he can make to his game.

[Cheddz]

I've wanted Big Baby on the Spurs since he came out of college, and I'm very happy with this deal IF it is not for the full MLE, and he drops a few more pounds. The guy drained some clutch shots in this last playoffs and showed a noticeable improvement in his game. He wasn't afraid to attack the basket and when left open he consistently hit that mid-range jumper. He's a young kid that plays with heart and is playoff tested, yeah I would have ed my pants if we signed Sheed but I'm not crying my eyes out that instead we got a guy much younger that still has improvements he knows he can make to his game.

I'd think that Taco Cabana Fajitas would run in fear from Glen Davis.

[Marcus Bryant]

Hopefully this is just speculation and not a strong possibility.

Davis is a horrible fit for the Spurs. A more cerebral, consistent, taller player is necessary to challenge the top teams. I would even prefer to start somebody like Rasho over Davis.

Is it just me or did not Pop put the "cerebral, consistent, taller" Radoslav on ice in the last postseason he was in SA and then the Spurs won a le the following season with Oberto getting heavy minutes next to TD?

[hater]

I'd rather get the Greek Baby Shaq over Davis. Literally cheaper by the pound

[bigdog]

Please, RC, DO NOT give this fool a contract.

[hsxvvd]

I like Glen Davis. I think he'll prove he is worth the MLE. Young, playoff proven, talent with potential for more, a good guy. He's also marketable and a positive locker room guy. Might not be the rebounding stud we need, but he's a welcome addition in my opinion.

I can't help but feel that the reaction of many in this thread is based more on the NOT getting of Sheed than their true thoughts about Davis.

[Muser]

I like Glen Davis. I think he'll prove he is worth the MLE. Young, playoff proven, talent with potential for more. Might not be the rebounding stud we need, but he's a welcome addition in my opinion.

I can't help but feel that the reaction of many in this thread is based more on the NOT getting of Sheed than their true thoughts about Davis.

Glen davis does not really bring anything new to the Spurs that we had in Gooden/Bonner.

[The_Game]

I bet Spurs are giving him the MLE...no reason to try and sign him for anything lower otherwise the offer sheet will get matched.

[Marcus Bryant]

Glen davis does not really bring anything new to the Spurs that we had in Gooden/Bonner.

Other than not missing rotations and not playing like a pussy in the postseason.

[Rummpd]

Big Baby had improved every year - showed guts to take a big shot and would also take up space inside and be able to lean on a Bynum and might also be the kind of player to get taller players in trouble with fouls. Agree he is not the total answer but yes thank you if he is one of two bigs coming in!

[hsxvvd]

Glen davis does not really bring anything new to the Spurs that we had in Gooden/Bonner.

289 pounds?

No but seriously, he's basically at least Gooden now.... and he's got a chance to be better. Bonner... do I even need to argue about Bonner?

The guy is a winner. Don't worry about what he doesn't do. We need young talent and it's Pop's job to find a way to make the best of those skills.

[Pucho!!!]

I like Glen Davis. I think he'll prove he is worth the MLE. Young, playoff proven, talent with potential for more. Might not be the rebounding stud we need, but he's a welcome addition in my opinion.

I can't help but feel that the reaction of many in this thread is based more on the NOT getting of Sheed than their true thoughts about Davis.

I never thought of Big Baby as anything more than a role player. The full MLE is a lot to give to sumone a lot of GMs feel is a role player in this league. I just can't c this deal happenin. Don't c what's so impressive about Big Baby. If we gettn him to be a backup then I'm all for it, but it looks like the Spurs have set themselves up with plenty of backups in the frontcourt. His playoff numbers r sumwhat inflated as well (the celtics were depleted on the frontline). Behind Perkins, who was there: Big Baby and Scalabrine (if I'm not mistaken, Powe was out with an injury along with KG). Wow, who would u give min to? 5.8 mil > Big Baby. Doin the C position by committee wouldn't be a good idea either, IMO. Look how well that idea turned out with the backup PG role last season. Regardless of my rant, I'm confident the Spurs will bring in sumone who can start, rebound, block shots and can hit a 15-18 ft jumper.

[DPG21920]

http://celticshub.com/2009/04/22/is-...a-good-player/

You may have seen that David Berri’s wins produced formula ranks Glen Davis among the 45 least productive players in the NBA this season. (For an explanation of the WP formula, go here). By net wins produced, only eight players in the league were worse than Davis; when broken down by minutes played (the WP/48 column in Berri’s post), 32 players on the list of 45 rank worse than Davis–he’s penalized in the net WP category because he played more minutes than most of the guys on this list.

No one reading this site thinks Glen Davis is a star. But to be told he’s one of the least valuable players in the league is surprising, if only because fans naturally develop an affection for players they watch a lot.

But is Baby really this bad? My quick reaction is that he scores badly here (and in PER) for two reasons: 1) He’s a bad defensive rebounder, and both metrics value rebounding highly; and 2) He was awful on offense until around mid-January. Let’s take these one at a time.

Offense

I want to start here, because I think net statistics miss the broader narrative we’ve seen unfold during Davis’ second season in the league.

To say Glen Davis has become a different offensive player this season is an understatement. Few NBA players change their offensive games from one season to the next as dramatically as Glen Davis did. In his rookie year, 29 percent of Baby’s shots were jumpers; 67 percent came from in close. This year, he nearly reversed those percentages–60 percent of his attempts were jump shots, and just 36 percent came from in close, according to 82games. I wonder how many players adjust their offensive games to this extent through their entire careers.

Let’s look at this in graph form, since graphs are fun and have colors. First, here’s Baby’s NBA hot spot chart from last season:




Glen Davis took 37 jump shots last year. Thirty-seven jumpers. All season.

Now, here’s the same chart for this season:



Glen Davis took more jumpers from the left baseline this season than he took from all over the court combined in 07-08. (Yes, Baby played 8 more minutes per game this season, but that doesn’t disprove the larger point). It’s a jarring change when you look at it this way.

And it started horribly. On January 12, Kelly Dwyer wrote the following on BDL: “Davis is killing the Celtics. Destroying this team. His PER on the season is around 8, which puts him amongst the worst rotation players in the NBA, and PER doesn’t account for his defensive attributes. Which are awful. Ruddy awful.”

(I love that Kelly Dwyer uses the word “ruddy” on a regular basis. He is awesome).

And Kelly was right. Davis’ PER was under 8, which is really, really hard to do if you’re playing real minutes in the league, if only because you’re not good enough to play real minutes. On Jan. 19 on my old blog, I pointed out that, on that date, Glen Davis was shooting 28 percent on jump shots for the season. I criticized the shot selection (and the connected decline in FTAs) and implored Baby to go to the hoop more.

The guys at Red’s Army, on the other hand, took a longer view. In posts I can’t find right now (Red’s is re-designing, it appears), Red’s called for Davis to keep shooting, arguing that he could help the team most by developing a jump shot.

Red’s was right, and I was wrong, and Glen Davis developed a jump shot. So what happened? Davis’ PER for the season is now around 11, and his shooting percentage on jump shots is up to 37 percent. Neither of those numbers are good (an average PER is around 15), but considering Davis had a 7.5 PER and a 28 percent mark on jumpers after 50 games, they show considerable development. Since late January, Glen Davis has compiled about a league average PER.

Rebounding and Defense, after the jump.


Glen Davis is not a good defensive rebounder. And if there’s one thing that makes people uncomfortable with Wins Produced and PER (note: I said “people,” not “me”), it’s that both systems give huge weight to rebounding. (Please note: Berri’s system makes adjustments for the fact that big guys get more rebounds than guards, and the numbers he ends up with rank players relative to those who play the same position/s).

Davis’s defensive rebounding rate is 12.8, meaning he grabs 12.8 percent of available defensive rebounds. This is terrible for a power forward. Of 81 forwards (SFs and PFs) who played enough to be eligible for the scoring le, only eight had lower DRB rates than Davis. In order from “best” to “worst”: Hilton Armstrong, Brandon Rush, Darius Songalia, Nicolas Batum, Thaddeus Young, Al Thornton, Steve Novak, Bruce Bowen and Jason Kapono.

Not good company for a burly power forward. (Celtics trivia: Pierce is 53rd; Powe 29th).

To his credit, Davis’ 9.4 percent offensive rebounding rate ranks him 22nd among these 81 players. That type of ORB-DRB rate gap seems unusual; the same players (other than Armstrong) populate the basement of both lists. (Celtic trivia: Leon Powe is #2 in the entire NBA in this category, trailing only Kevin Love. Get well, Leon).

I’m not sure why Davis is so bad at rebounding on one end and decent at the other, and we’re nearing the 900-word mark, so I’m not going to speculate now (though I have e-mailed a couple of NBA experts to weigh in).

As for defense, opposing power forwards put up a solid 18 PER against Baby, and the C’s defense gives up five more points per 100 possessions with Baby on the floor. The new Basketball Prospectus stats show he’s cut his opponents production by about seven percent, but that he’s typically matched up against bad players.

I’ll leave the full defensive analysis of Baby for another post. My goal here was to provide some explanation for why he fares so poorly in some of the most prominent player value metrics we have (including Hollinger’s new Wins Added, where Baby ranks 288th in the league, having “added” -0.6 wins to the Celtics total this season).

I’d be very curious to see how the New Baby–the post-Jan. 15 Baby–would finish in these metrics over the course of a full season. I wonder how much the Celtics are willing to pay to find out?

[K-State Spur]

http://twitter.com/Gary_Tanguay

"As I said it looks Big Baby will be a Spur. He feels he will lose minutes with Rasheed now a Celtic and Grant Hill on the way."

289 pounds?

No but seriously, he's basically at least Gooden now....

Outside of 2 weeks in the playoffs last year...not even close from an offensive perspective.

From a defensive perspective...well, my grandmother would give us what we get from Gooden.

[Pucho!!!]

I think the improvement in his offensive numbers in the 2nd half of the season came more due to KGs injury than a large improvement in his skills. Besides, do we need another young big? We got a whole barn full of them. We need a vet to teach these young cats the error of their ways.

[K-State Spur]

Personally, I think he'd get banished to the bench VERY early in the season.

He has a knack for jacking up contested jumpers with plenty of time left on the shot clock...and that was on a team where he was surrounded by KG, Pierce, and Allen.

[sa_butta]

If Big baby comes....San Antonio will run out of food with Blair already here.

[tmtcsc]

If Big baby comes....San Antonio will run out of food with Blair already here.

You do realize Blair lost 40 lbs right ? I don't think he's looking to gain that weight back. Although, maybe he should.

[lefty]

Big Baby has a great shot but that's it

[twilo73]

I really don't want Davis... if I got my choice it would be Varejao at this point.

[mudyez]

lets go for Zaza!

[z0sa]

please God no

[bigdog]

no

[Spursmania]

please God no

ditto