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He a 7'0, 220 pound, 19 year old kid who's only been playing ball for 3 years. To expect him to be anything more than a "Flash or Crash" player in the NBA, at this point in his career, is asinine. He's survives on is God-given talent; not his basketball IQ.Originally Posted by Pelicanidae
Again, nobody is saying he's some Tim Duncan basketball savant who plays flawless basketball. You're disputing a claim nobody has made.
He's not a flash or crash player. He's developed some legitimate defensive skills over the course of his rookie year, and even his offensive skills such as his passing and screening have developed massively. He still has many many steps to take, he's no way near elite defense, and he's very inconsistent, but he has actual abilities that aren't just the result of pure athleticism. That's just the reality of the situation.
Basketball.
Then there needs to be better dialogue. These past two days I've heard everything from: "he's playing max 20 minutes" to "there's no minute restriction." This is a coach/front office dilemma.
One of the funnest games I have ever been to! Not even gonna read the comments on this thread as I have a good feeling it’s a bunch of jumping to conclusions that once again aren’t actually true. Zion impressed me in many other areas outside of the scoring. One thing I love is this kid is going to be a serious triple double threat do to what looks like an elite ability to break down defenses and have the ability to hit the pass to the open man. To already show this skill as well as he has is very impressive!
Yeah, it's annoying.
Like two weeks ago, Gentry said he wont start, and there'll be a minutes restriction.
Then we heard that he'll start, but there'll still be a restriction.
Then we got starting, no restriction.
And apparently in game, we have starting but hard restriction.
This is just silly and it makes Gentry look terrible in-game. You're absolutely right, needs to be a better communication.
Better dialogue with who? The fans? I’m pretty sure Gentry and them had a very good idea of what the plan was this entire time. A very rare game occurrence happened that I don’t think anybody planned for that slightly altered the amount of minutes they had planned for him. I don’t understand why people are acting like they have any clue of what the organization is doing behind the scenes and are going to use rumors from reporters to make it seem like nobody was on the same plan.
Who played the 5 for most of the 13 game losing streak? How many points were we giving up during that stretch? What's the team's record since Favors has been re-inserted into the line-up. During that time, didn't JAX 'wow' us with some of his athleticism? Didn't he confound us with some of his ,um, 'on-the-court' decisions/indecisions? 'Flash or Crash' defined.
If you think I'm knocking him, I'm not. He's just not ready for prime time.
Okay sure.
If you're starting centre while your team's losing, you're bad. Doesn't matter if you're actually playing well and there are other issues, you're bad.
Saying someone is a flash or crash player is not the same as saying sometimes they do flashy things and sometimes they make dumb mistakes. If that's all ''flash or crash'' is, then Lebron James is flash or crash; Michael Jordan was flash or crash. They all have flashy plays and dumb plays, so if that's all it means then everyone fits.
But we know that's not what it means. We know that when you describe someone as being flash or crash, you're saying their game is either all flash, or all crash, with no in-between game made up of actual basketball skills. Jaxson doesn't fit those criteria. He has other abilities which are good and valuable, but which are not flashy, or dependent on athletic/flashy abilities.
The two players you mentioned had something JAX doesn't have...a cerebral game. Heck, aside from an extended AAU career, Jordan even played three years of college ball at an elite program. Those two can beat you in many ways....JAX can only beat with you with his God-given talent period (at this point).
If you're starting centre while your team's losing, you're bad. Doesn't matter if you're actually playing well and there are other issues, you're bad.
Saying someone is a flash or crash player is not the same as saying sometimes they do flashy things and sometimes they make dumb mistakes. If that's all ''flash or crash'' is, then Lebron James is flash or crash; Michael Jordan was flash or crash. They all have flashy plays and dumb plays, so if that's all it means then everyone fits.
But we know that's not what it means. We know that when you describe someone as being flash or crash, you're saying their game is either all flash, or all crash, with no in-between game made up of actual basketball skills. Jaxson doesn't fit those criteria. He has other abilities which are good and valuable, but which are not flashy, or dependent on athletic/flashy abilities.
Sorry, we disagree....Jaxson is 'Flash or Crash' at this point in his career. I think he may even have a longer career than Zion on his body type alone. (He would be a nice entrant for the Slam Dunk Competition in a few weeks, though).
Guess you missed EVERYONE saying how GASSED Zion was , They all said he was EXHAUSTED . AG is not my favorite HC but he said the med staff said NO
Everyone understands that the med staff said no. That wasn't the issue. I'll repeat his question:
The issue is not ''was Zion tired''. It was not ''is a minutes restriction reasonable''. It isn't ''is Gentry personally to blame?''.Why wasn’t he aware that Zion was on a minutes restriction or some type of restriction?
The question is: why wasn't the existence of this hard-cap limit properly communicated to both us, the fans, and more importantly, to Gentry. Gentry should not have been surprised midway through Zion's final shift by the med staff saying that's it, pull him. Gentry should have been made aware that it was 18 minutes tops, not ''it depends how things are going''.
That's a communication issue.
We don't know that it was a total mins played restriction , maybe it could have been an amount of mins in a stretch. Maybe the med staff thought he needed more of a rest before he was put back in . Myself , I thought he could have taken a 2 min breather and them went back in, but i'm not the med staff
Advanced Stats from this game (min. 15 minutes played):
Best Net Rating: Zion Williamson (+7.7). 2nd place to Lonzo (+5.6)
Worst Net Rating: Jaxson Hayes (-18.7). 2nd worst: Ingram (-10.5)
Highest TS%: Zion Williamson, 86.2%
Highest REB%: Zion Williamson, 23.3%
Highest AST%: Lonzo Ball, 42.9%. 2nd place: Zion Williamson, 30.0%
Worst TS%: Brandon Ingram, 41%
Lowest REB%: Jrue Holiday, 2.7%
Lowest AST%: Josh Hart, 5.6%
Most Deflections: Jrue Holiday with 6.
Most Screen Assists: Jaxson Hayes with 3.
Most Boxouts: Derrick Favors and Jrue Holiday, tied with 3 each. Second place goes to Zion and Ingram, both with 2.
Most 2pt Contests: Derrick Favors with 15
Most 3pt Contests: Jaxson Hayes with 6
Great to see Zion all over the leaderboard in his first game back.
The Pelicans could not not play defense in this game. But Zion got everything going in the 4th quarter. Can't wait to see him play like that for most of the game.
Saying this as a past fly on the wall...
Gentry knew. At halftime, nearly all teams coaching staff huddle of sorts in a room and talk about everything from adjustments and minutes based on all scenarios.
Gentry was following a regimen early in the game so ofcourse imo second half minutes was discussed at halftime.
While saying that, no one plans for what took place tonight. 17 points in 6 minutes is ridiculous. You just can’t plan for something like that. But to show consistency I suppose in the game (Not Griffins apparent untrue remarks before it), the call imo was made and he stuck to the regimen.
I don’t blame Gentry for following orders. But the sellable lie to isolate the players and coaches from the gears and fasteners that are the front office and medical staff...they chose to put the heat on the overly cautious medical staff because that’s a “understandable” narrative for the salivating media.
To me, they played the right card.
Zion FR out here averaging
44pts
14rbds
6asts
per 36
On 86.2% TS. 100% career 3pt shooter, move over Steve Kerr.
He ain't bad.Zion FR out here averaging
44pts
14rbds
6asts
per 36
On 86.2% TS. 100% career 3pt shooter, move over Steve Kerr.
He might pass Baynes in career scoring by next Friday...
After tonight's game, Zion has reached 0.008% of Baynes' total career scoring. The distance between Zion and Baynes is just too large... Zion is but a man, and Baynes, a myth. Insurmountable.
WARNING: SMALL SAMPLE SIZE ALERT!!!! DO NOT TAKE THIS SERIOUSLY
Here are some of Zion's advanced stats after a whopping 18 minutes of play. Obviously this is a none-representative sample, will almost certainly not end up being accurate to his full season stats, it's just silly to look at.
Per 100s: 56.9 points, 18.1 rebounds, 7.8 assists
PER: 38.1
BPM: 10.8
TS%: 86.2% (+30% above league average)
Just silly
It's the same thing with people who down Jrue and who thought Zion had a decent game defensively.....I think they don't fully get defense, yet. The league is all about offense and one or two flash plays on defense. Being a turnstyle for the majority of the game is a killer. LA got away with some pushing off but Jax was either getting mauled for the majority of the game or had to have help rollover which then led to a wide open look elsewhere. Favors, by the eye, had a good game but those fouls keeping him out really should make it considered a bad game. C is where this game was lost.
Good positive energy.
But also, yo mama's fat.
We really aren't giving the Spurs enough credit. They absolutely disrupted us from the jump. Zion is such a huge piece that we were like a new team trying itself out and they never allowed us to find ourselves. Defensively and offensively. I think had we played almost any other team we would have faired much better.
We are still a good team that will get on a roll. The Spurs are still not a great team. They will lose and we will overtake them. But they will have our number until we fully integrate Zion in and the rhythm gets going.
Eh, I feel like there's some truth in this, but also a bit of hyperbole.
Was Zion great on defense yesterday? Absolutely not
But was he like, absolute garbage all game long? Nah, he had some pretty decent moments, especially when you consider what his defensive issues were in pre-season. In preseason he was caught ball-watching frequently, and occasionally lost his man as a result. This got double worse when he was over-zealous with providing help, forgetting to recover or overhelping and leaving his man uncontested.
That happened much less last night; he had much better head movement, keeping an eye on his man and the ball, and there were moments where you could see he wanted to help, but staved off the temptation. As a result he stayed home a lot more, and the added awareness actually meant that he was switching pretty cleanly.
I guess I'm not really disagreeing with you; he was still overall not great on D, especially (I repeat) by the end. But I think there's a temptation to over-correct for the praise, and end up being more negative than maybe we need to be. Zion needs to adjust to playing defense at an NBA level, but he showed some encouraging traits.
@NOLAJake @DMGrubb @Fish_TBW @FearTheBrown @MasonGinsberg yeah I can't remember the last time a small market team, took the headline on the sports section of the L.A Times, over the Lakers at MSG... pic.twitter.com/3xAGa3eLMG
— Daniel Harris (@NOP48DH) January 23, 2020
Oh this is beautiful.
Zion Williamson and the Pelicans get the above the fold section of the LA Times Sports section, relegating Lebron and AD's Lakers @ MSG to second place news.
LMAOOOOO. Lakers fans gotta be tight.
Clue Daniel Harris that this idea that local market size means anything is antiquated. It's all about fanbase.
Zion has over 4 million followers on his ig alone. That probably near the size of the entire L.A. Times readership.
But...that is lovely lol. Zion also surpassed AD in points for an NBA debut. And I bet AD played damn near 40 minutes in his.
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