Pelicans finalizing trade for Asik

[RaisingTheBar]

I have watched every single P&R possession on defense from last two years. Also, every possession when he switched onto a guard. I was blown away. If AD keeps getting the mental part of that side down, those two can be the top two big men in the league once Noah starts to slow down at defending the pick and roll

Man....how much time that must have taken

[Kibner]

So every employee that worked for us was fired when Monty took over? He was still there for the other 4 players I mentioned, but thanks on cherry-picking one.

Well, since you said "Chandler was the big one", I figured that was a core piece of your argument. Also, I was clarifying the original posters point, since it did not appear to be fully understood. And, actually, re-reading his post, even I probably misread it.

It appears he is saying that we have six players currently on the team that have been here for at least two years (and have shot at least 50 free-throws during that time). Of those six, four of them have improved their FT%.

[RaisingTheBar]

Well, since you said "Chandler was the big one", I figured that was a core piece of your argument. Also, I was clarifying the original posters point, since it did not appear to be fully understood. And, actually, re-reading his post, even I probably misread it.

It appears he is saying that we have six players currently on the team that have been here for at least two years (and have shot at least 50 free-throws during that time). Of those six, four of them have improved their FT%.

Never once argued that point, although I would be curious to see the names of those players. But my main argument was that quite often when players leave here their FT% increases.

[MichaelMcNamara]

Man....how much time that must have taken

Not long thanks to Synergy. 2013-14 only took about 35 minutes. 2012-13, about an hour.

Guy is fantastic. Post defense on the agenda for the weekend.

[Tin_Food]

Who'd have thunk it, a new generation of Twin Towers. i didn't think that could exist in today's NBA.

[Mythrol]

Really? A whole 4 players? That's nice. Now look at how players improve after they leave here. I'll throw out the ones I remember just off the top of my head. Okafor, Ariza, Marco Belineli, Carl Landry, Chandler was the big one, that's when we showed we weren't doing something right.

Okafor after leaving here played one season somewhere else and shot below his career average from FT.
Ariza's last season here he shot 77.5% from FT. He has played 2 seasons for WAS, only 1 of those did he shoot a better FT %.
Landry's difference between his last season here and then moving on is less than 2%. His year he came here he increased his FT by 5%.
Belineli has shot within the same 5% range his entire career. Early in his career he shot less than 1% from where he is shooting now.

None of these are valid examples at all.

Tyson did make a jump. But he played here over 5 years ago under a different owner and a completely different coaching staff. How can you base any opinion about our coaching staff on a different organization? That'd be the same as me saying we have won a title because the Spurs have.

I give you a list of 4 people (out of 6) or 67% who under our current coaching staff have made improvements from the FT line. You name players who have either been long gone or have not clearly proved anything.

Also, as has been discussed, the Hack Asik method won't even work because of his FT% and having other bigs who can hit FTs.

[MichaelMcNamara]

Who'd have thunk it, a new generation of Twin Towers. i didn't think that could exist in today's NBA.

If this team gets a good defensive SF, dumps Gordon, and stays healthy, it should be a top 8 defense minimum. Get a great defensive SF and that 1st unit could rival Indy and Memphis as best defensive unit in the league once they start to gel.

[Kibner]

Never once argued that point, although I would be curious to see the names of those players. But my main argument was that quite often when players leave here their FT% increases.

I wasn't making an argument at all; I just wanted to make sure that both sides were clearly understood without extraneous information that doesn't relate strongly to the original point.

In all honesty, I'm not really invested in this particular discussion re: coaching improving free throws. I feel they can improve form to make results more consistent and the rest is on the players. So much of it is psychological and it can swing a good bit between seasons for no discernible reason.

[RaisingTheBar]

Found the players:

Roberts - improved from 91% to 94% - technically meets the requirement we were discussing but not really my point, dude was already a great FT shooter
Ryno - didn't improve from orlando, career FT is bumped from an inflated FT% this year where he took 62 FTs....he actually had his worst year FT wise his first year in New Orleans with a normal seasons sample size
Gordon - don't see much improvement from Clippers. maybe 1 or 2 % but has taken wayyy less attempts
Smith - drastic improvement
Rivers - good improvement from rook to soph year, not good shooting though
AFA - % got worse every year he has been with us

So out of those 6 only Rivers and Smith to me are the only ones that showed clear improvements.

[wuggie]

Asik has the agility and quickness of some guards. Really though I thought I would be the only one who would be this shocked by him on defense. Ill admit that I dont pay too much attention to defense, but I havent seen many big guys defend(especially PNR)like him. Him and Davis on defense for us? No way, but yes way dudes. Yes way.

And can we still use the term Block Party even though the cornball BS created it? Lol

[Kibner]

If this team gets a good defensive SF, dumps Gordon, and stays healthy, it should be a top 8 defense minimum. Get a great defensive SF and that 1st unit could rival Indy and Memphis as best defensive unit in the league once they start to gel.

I will be glad if this happens regardless, but I sure hope the offense is more aesthetically pleasing than either Memphis or Indy (especially Indy, goodness gracious).

[i am cow lolz]

Jrue, Davis, Asik is a great defensive core. I hope Benson is willing to pay the luxury tax because we may go over it to try to keep Asik next year.

[Mythrol]

Well, since you said "Chandler was the big one", I figured that was a core piece of your argument. Also, I was clarifying the original posters point, since it did not appear to be fully understood. And, actually, re-reading his post, even I probably misread it.

It appears he is saying that we have six players currently on the team that have been here for at least two years (and have shot at least 50 free-throws during that time). Of those six, four of them have improved their FT%.

Thanks. A clarification of what my point was,

We have 6 players who are currently on this team who have been on it 2 years AND have taken over 50 FT attempts each year (to remove small sample size). Of those 6 players, 4 have increase their FT year over year. Most by 5% or higher.

[MichaelMcNamara]

Jrue, Davis, Asik is a great defensive core. I hope Benson is willing to pay the luxury tax because we may go over it to try to keep Asik next year.

I cant see us coming close to the lux tax until 2016-17 at the earliest. Basically no way we can get there until Davis's new contract kicks in. And even then it will be hard because Jrue and Tyreke will be on such cheap deals.

He will probably have to face that decision in 2017-18, as AD will be on his max, Jrue and Tyreke will need new contracts, and hopefully we will have Asik, Ryno, and whatever SF we signed in 2015 still on the books.

[Mythrol]

Found the players:

Roberts - improved from 91% to 94% - technically meets the requirement we were discussing but not really my point, dude was already a great FT shooter
Ryno - didn't improve from orlando, career FT is bumped from an inflated FT% this year where he took 62 FTs....he actually had his worst year FT wise his first year in New Orleans with a normal seasons sample size
Gordon - don't see much improvement from Clippers. maybe 1 or 2 % but has taken wayyy less attempts
Smith - drastic improvement
Rivers - good improvement from rook to soph year, not good shooting though
AFA - % got worse every year he has been with us

So out of those 6 only Rivers and Smith to me are the only ones that showed clear improvements.

Smith doesn't count because he didn't shoot over 50 attempts. Even though he would have strengthened my argument.

Roberts first and fits. He shows improvement and had over 50 attempts each year.
Rivers has shown A 9% improvement. That is great.
Ryno FT % went from 84% his first year to 95% his second year with us. It's clear he took his FT stroke to a new level.

Gordon and Aminu are the two that I counted as regressing (though an argument could be made that. Gordon has been random every year and he is well within his range while here).

AD is the other player who improved that you didn't put on the list. He has doubled his FT attempts and still increased his FT by 4%.

[RaisingTheBar]

Smith doesn't count because he didn't shoot over 50 attempts. Even though he would have strengthened my argument.

Roberts first and fits. He shows improvement and had over 50 attempts each year.
Rivers has shown A 9% improvement. That is great.
Ryno FT % went from 84% his first year to 95% his second year with us. It's clear he took his FT stroke to a new level.

Gordon and Aminu are the two that I counted as regressing (though an argument could be made that. Gordon has been random every year and he is well within his range while here).

AD is the other player who improved that you didn't put on the list. He has doubled his FT attempts and still increased his FT by 4%.

To me 91% to 94% doesn't mean too much because that's already an all time great percentage. Probably had 0 help with his free throws.

Rivers clearly improved. Excellent.

Ryno took 557 FTs the year before and 62 last year. You cannot say "it's clear he took his FT stroke to a new level". No he didn't the sample size isn't enough. His first year here after the first 2-3 months of the season he was on pace to SHATTER the record for 3 pointers made in a season. Did he do it? No because as the season went on the law of probabilities/averages/whatever came into play. I'll point out again that with a full season he had his worst year his 1st year with us. I don't expect that to happen again, but I don't expect him to shoot 95% either.

Anthony Davis, yes he clearly improved as did his jump shot as well. My overall point is that generally, when players leave here, their FT% improves.

[Kibner]

I know it doesn't mean much to you, but 91 to 94% can also be thought of as reducing missed freethrows by 33%.

A (stupid) example for an equivalent jump in missed freethrow percentage would be a 67% shooter jumping to 78% and 55% to 70%.

Numbers are weird and I don't know the best way to use them when trying to quantify a player's improvement at something they already have a high success rate in.

Sent from my DROID3 using Tapatalk 2

[Dave_]

Asik already proved that Hack-an-Asik doesn't work

5:30

[Kibner]

And that only came to mind because of some old video game. You reduced damage taken in that game by a percentage. The best armor in the game could give you anywhere from 80-95% damage reduction. Because ~*~* numbers *~*~, a suit that was at 95% reduction would have you take half the damage you would at 90%.

Sent from my DROID3 using Tapatalk 2

[RaisingTheBar]

I know it doesn't mean much to you, but 91 to 94% can also be thought of as reducing missed freethrows by 33%.

A (stupid) example for an equivalent jump in missed freethrow percentage would be a 67% shooter jumping to 78% and 55% to 70%.

Numbers are weird and I don't know the best way to use them when trying to quantify a player's improvement at something they already have a high success rate in.

Sent from my DROID3 using Tapatalk 2

Do you really think a person who shot 91% received extensive coaching to improve his free throws?

[da ThRONe]

Those two franchise changing players can't get out of the first round. I think Harden is he most overrated guy in the league. Plays ZERO defense, and in the playoffs it's harder to get to the line and that's where about 1/3 of his offense comes from. He disappeared in his only finals appearance - on a team in which he was clearly the 3rd best player. The fact that he was 1st team all-nba is a joke.

Yeah, but he's getting his team to the playoffs. I don't love Harden and I'm on record saying if I was the coach and he give that effort defensively I wouldn't even play him. However you can't take away the impact that he has had on the Rockets. If people are going to give Kevin Love is due James Harden has accomplished more at this point.

[da ThRONe]

I don't think Asik is the quickest big in the league, but he sure isn't slow. When you pair that with his defensive instinct and motor it's really impressive to watch.

[fullcourtpress]

Jrue, Davis, Asik is a great defensive core. I hope Benson is willing to pay the luxury tax because we may go over it to try to keep Asik next year.

if we did loose him we could go after one of the FA center's with gordon off the books
couldn't we?

gasol
chandler
hibbert

[All Metro]

Asik already proved that Hack-an-Asik doesn't work

5:30

Sweet shot by Harden at 6:05

[RaisingTheBar]

if we did loose him we could go after one of the FA center's with gordon off the books
couldn't we?

gasol
chandler
hibbert

Tyson Chandler is getting old and Hibbert, did you just really say Hibbert?

Would only be interested in Gasol, and that's Marc.