Pelicans @ Lakers Gameday Thread

[RUFshreve]

We got a blowout win on the road, and got to run the whole bench for extended minutes.

Some people just want to watch the world burn.

Or just see Jrue and AD play for 48 mins.

[arusinov]

Love Mekel. But I am concerned with him once defenses realize that he can't shoot. It will limit his passing lanes and teams will try and force his hand to shoot. Thankfully his limited usage with Dallas suggest he can finish near the rim, but not much else.

Hello from Petach Tikva, Israel... It's strange there're no bunch of israelians already here as it's on forums of teams where Casspi's playing

Now, situation with scoring is not as bad as it seems now... Mekel is not shooter, and not great scorer, but he can score some.
He just has ugly, unstable and slow-release jump shot. But he can score relatively well in other ways - not only around basket, but also with floaters (I know you've seen two misses including airball but he actually hits many of them and with really good percentage - not only in highlights). He also draws fouls and can do some other things (like post-up JJBarea... or hit turn-around shot if shotclock requires)

Concerning long-range shot - he will not take one expect he's wide-open (as it was today) or it's on last seconds of shotclock. And this preseason he seems to adopt a bit to NBA 3pt line - so I do think he will be able to hit some open shots - as it was in Israel.

Gal always looked first to pass and will always do - but I believe he'll be able to score enough to continue successfully pass ball to others. If he'll get chance to prove it

[Perth_Hornet]

Shalom

Thanks for your insight into Gel's game. He already shown amazing passing ability in 2 games, let's hope he can get his scoring up a bit too.

[Spaniard]

Hello from Petach Tikva, Israel... It's strange there're no bunch of israelians already here as it's on forums of teams where Casspi's playing

Now, situation with scoring is not as bad as it seems now... Mekel is not shooter, and not great scorer, but he can score some.
He just has ugly, unstable and slow-release jump shot. But he can score relatively well in other ways - not only around basket, but also with floaters (I know you've seen two misses including airball but he actually hits many of them and with really good percentage - not only in highlights). He also draws fouls and can do some other things (like post-up JJBarea... or hit turn-around shot if shotclock requires)

Concerning long-range shot - he will not take one expect he's wide-open (as it was today) or it's on last seconds of shotclock. And this preseason he seems to adopt a bit to NBA 3pt line - so I do think he will be able to hit some open shots - as it was in Israel.

Gal always looked first to pass and will always do - but I believe he'll be able to score enough to continue successfully pass ball to others. If he'll get chance to prove it

Please stick around and post more. I appreciate the information. Big welcome for sure.

[arusinov]

Please stick around and post more. I appreciate the information. Big welcome for sure.

Thanks!
I've researched a bit Gal's stats for his last 2 israeli league seasons - 2010-2011 with Gilboa-Galil (2nd place in regular season, lost in final) and (as he didn't play in Israel in 2011-2012) 2012-2013 with Maccabi Haifa (2nd place in regular season, champions).
As I want to give You general impression of Mekel's play I've just peform sum of all appearences. It goes as following:

63 games, 61 starts
per game :
32.29 min
13.06 pts - 4.59 fg / 9.69 FGA (47.2%), 0.83 3P / 2.51 3PA (32.9%), 3.13 FT/ 4.14 FTA (75.5%), e.g. 0.4 FTA per FGA, 26% 3PA of FGA
5.78 assists, 2.60 tov - assist / tov rate 2.22
3.49 reb
1.38 st

While shooting percentage for 2 pts (52.22%) is not very relevant as opposition wasn't of high enough level and it was much easier for Mekel to get to basket, we can see that he did shoot not very big but significant amount of 3pt attempts with somehow acceptable results (~33%).
Also Gal is getting to the line quite frequently.
Still his biggest strenth is certainly running offence and passing. In NBA assists credits are generally given much more generously than in Europe or Israel. While there's catch - if there's shooting faul and player converts FT attempts in Israel and most European competitions credit is given to player assisted to the fouled shot - but not in NBA, I still would say that ~6 assists in Europe should be converted to ~7.5 - 8 assists by NBA creaditing with assists "rules"

Also this summer Gal played for Israel NT in 2015 Eurobasker qualifiers. Israel finished 4:2 in group and qualified from 1st place (even our NT had to play "home" games in Cyprus because of ongoing war).
Gal was arguebly best PG in the tournament averaging per game 6.5 assists (joined 1-2 place) with 2.2 tov and 13.3 pts in 31.0 min. He also registred only tripple-double in the tournament with 14 pts, 11 assists, 11 reb againts Montenegro.
Here's stats page
Actually I think that highligths from this tournament are best representation of Gal's game as NT played very nice passing game (it was also very bad rebounding team and had problems defending against opposite teams bigs - even those were of not high level at all... but we're talking about Gal):
at Montenegro,
at Bulgaria,
vs Montenegro

[Mythrol]

Thank you for this. It's nice to get an opinion on Mekel from someone who has watched him far more than us. Stick around.

[Kumar]

Mekel has also assisted on a crazy 57% of our possessions in the 23 minutes he's been on the floor

[RaisingTheBar]

Thanks!
I've researched a bit Gal's stats for his last 2 israeli league seasons - 2010-2011 with Gilboa-Galil (2nd place in regular season, lost in final) and (as he didn't play in Israel in 2011-2012) 2012-2013 with Maccabi Haifa (2nd place in regular season, champions).
As I want to give You general impression of Mekel's play I've just peform sum of all appearences. It goes as following:

63 games, 61 starts
per game :
32.29 min
13.06 pts - 4.59 fg / 9.69 FGA (47.2%), 0.83 3P / 2.51 3PA (32.9%), 3.13 FT/ 4.14 FTA (75.5%), e.g. 0.4 FTA per FGA, 26% 3PA of FGA
5.78 assists, 2.60 tov - assist / tov rate 2.22
3.49 reb
1.38 st

While shooting percentage for 2 pts (52.22%) is not very relevant as opposition wasn't of high enough level and it was much easier for Mekel to get to basket, we can see that he did shoot not very big but significant amount of 3pt attempts with somehow acceptable results (~33%).
Also Gal is getting to the line quite frequently.
Still his biggest strenth is certainly running offence and passing. In NBA assists credits are generally given much more generously than in Europe or Israel. While there's catch - if there's shooting faul and player converts FT attempts in Israel and most European competitions credit is given to player assisted to the fouled shot - but not in NBA, I still would say that ~6 assists in Europe should be converted to ~7.5 - 8 assists by NBA creaditing with assists "rules"

Also this summer Gal played for Israel NT in 2015 Eurobasker qualifiers. Israel finished 4:2 in group and qualified from 1st place (even our NT had to play "home" games in Cyprus because of ongoing war).
Gal was arguebly best PG in the tournament averaging per game 6.5 assists (joined 1-2 place) with 2.2 tov and 13.3 pts in 31.0 min. He also registred only tripple-double in the tournament with 14 pts, 11 assists, 11 reb againts Montenegro.
Here's stats page
Actually I think that highligths from this tournament are best representation of Gal's game as NT played very nice passing game (it was also very bad rebounding team and had problems defending against opposite teams bigs - even those were of not high level at all... but we're talking about Gal):
at Montenegro,
at Bulgaria,
vs Montenegro

I encourage the rest of PR to watch these 3 videos. Arusinov follows Mekel and hand picked what he feels best demonstrates his skill set and the type of player we are getting. Thank you.

[Asteptooslow]

The jury is out. Hopefully, he avoids becoming selfish.

[ramsters60]

The jury is out. Hopefully, he avoids becoming selfish.

I have a feeling this might be the least of our worries....

[Spaniard]

From the limited amount I have seen thus far, Gal and Dante have been fantastic. It was never just a matter of talent from the bench, but the pace was awful. They had no energy guy, and no true quarterback. While I think they could still use an extra real scorer with the group, I think this bench has a real shot at coming together now.

[Eman5805]

Gal defends far better than I thought he would. If he makes the same kinda emergence Grevis made, we could have something significant here.

[N.O.Bronco]

From the limited amount I have seen thus far, Gal and Dante have been fantastic. It was never just a matter of talent from the bench, but the pace was awful. They had no energy guy, and no true quarterback. While I think they could still use an extra real scorer with the group, I think this bench has a real shot at coming together now.

I know it's frowned upon on this forum because of the irrational hatred spewing for the guy, but I would really like to see Jimmer get some burn with Mekel. Jimmer's redeeming value is his shooting, and frankly rivers has been rather lackluster defensively and offensively as of late so i wouldnt mind seeing if Jimmer can find some rhythm in his stroke with someone that can actually get him some good looks.

[Spaniard]

I know it's frowned upon on this forum because of the irrational hatred spewing for the guy, but I would really like to see Jimmer get some burn with Mekel. Jimmer's redeeming value is his shooting, and frankly rivers has been rather lackluster defensively and offensively as of late so i wouldnt mind seeing if Jimmer can find some rhythm in his stroke with someone that can actually get him some good looks.

I have been of the mindset that Jimmer putting it together was a major part in what we need. And he still may be. But I am not thrilled with the idea of Gal, Jimmer and Anderson on the court at the same time. It will be hard for them to score enough to match what they give up.

Not to say Gal isn't a capable defender, he's just not a big guy and neither is Jimmer. At least Rivers hives you a little more size, as much as I am just about done with him.