Posted by Bonn1997:
Would you give up even one lottery pick for Big Z?

Now, at 31? Of course not.

4 years ago? A better question would be who wouldn't.

Tyrus Thomas would be considered a pretty fair pick if he put up Z's numbers over his career.

...Eddy Curry is at another level.

babyknicks, what you are really saying is that because so many of our guys are young they are unknown quantities, and so long as their quantity is unknown we can hope that it will become large.

In truth, while some of our guys are young, and some show certain attributes, none seem truly exceptional, but we still ascribe exceptional potential to them. I guess that is always the case for the highly athletic. Athleticism keeps hope alive.

Someone said (may have been RemBee) that we love some of these kids until they become starters who have expectations attached to them. I think he's right. So long as they fly under the radar and come off the bench fresh, and their enthusiasm and hustle outweighs or masks their deficits, we will love them. But if they become the guys who, in extended minutes and pressure situations, become the guys falling behind or dropping too many winnable games, they too will know no mercy. And what hope will we have then?

Lets hope these guys are all you think they are. Or, lets hope Isiah can keep drafting unknown quantities to keep hope alive.

Posted by RemBee76:

Eddy Curry vs. Zydrunas Ilgauskas Head-to-head: 2007

23pts on 56% shooting (28-50) 6.5 rebs vs. 12.5pts on 44% shooting (19-43) 7.0 rebs

I could see how that rebounding advantage could tip the balance.

or not.

Regardless, Z has a higher PER for the season.

Posted by RemBee76:

Posted by Bonn1997:

You don't seriously think a sample of 3 or 4 games is the best way to compare players, do you?

Right, I could see why someone would think 4 games in which one center consistently schooled the other head-to-head would be totally irrelevant in a discussion of which center is better.

or not.

So you'll admit Zaza is a lot better than Eddy since he out played Eddy in the head to head match ups?

Posted by Solace:

How about all the games where Ey Curry cost us the game? Is that relevant?

And no, a few games is a very small sample size. While we're at it, how about this:

I flip a coin three times. It comes up heads all three times. Thus, it is more likely to come up heads. In fact, it will ALWAYS come up heads. Same logic, right?

There are 30 teams and 30 center match ups each year. If Eddy is just an average center and has a 50/50 chance of beating another, then there are going to be a bunch of match ups where he outplays the other center for the series and many where he is outplayed too. That's basically what makes you average.

Posted by nixluva:

Solace what is it that makes you think we can't build around Curry?

Because if Curry is your best player, you're f'd in the a. Very difficult to get stars when you're so far over the cap and lose all your lottery picks.

Posted by nixluva:

It's not like he's gonna stop you from succeeding if you have a good team around him.

When we get a good team around him, let me know.

Posted by nixluva:

Meaning you get a complimentary PF next to him and strong PG play and shooting around him.

In other words, overhaul the roster, because we don't have those things.

Posted by nixluva:

We aren't that far off if you look at the direction of this team. Just because we haven't yet reached our full potential doesn't mean we won't. With Steph, Jamal and Mardy at the point I think we'll have enough strong play at that position to make this offense work.

I like Mardy's style. I think Craw is okay as a guard who can play both the 1 and 2. Steph, hell no. He's a cancer and I'd waive him or execute him, whichever is quicker.

Posted by nixluva:

A huge part of the improvement on D will come with an improvement on O. In particular TO's. We must cut down on those and that will cut into the easy baskets and wasted possessions we have each game.

The irony is that if we improve on D, we'll likely improve on O. My plan for doing that is overhaul the lazy ass roster. Also having two guys who are TERRIBLE at FT shooting in the starting lineup doesn't help.

Having Balkman and Collins play more minutes will also help defensively.

Agreed. Those are good ROLE players, but we need a star if we want them to realize their full potential to helping us become a winning team. Curry is not that piece.

Posted by nixluva:

We obviously must improve defensively to make any real improvement. Curry will need to help more on D, but not just him. Having a PF who also plays better help D is also going to be essential.

So, trade David Lee AND Channing Frye to make up for Curry's flaws, correct?

Curry isn't a strong rebounder, but as a TEAM we're one of the BEST.

I have little complaint about rebounding, other than that his issue is effort and lack of jumping ability. Curry's other flaws are much more glaring.

Posted by nixluva:

As a TEAM we can be one of the best offensive teams and even tho we won't be one of the best defensive teams we have a chance to improve enough in that area to be a strong playoff team.

Not as currently constructed.

You have to keep some level of perspective when it comes to this team. We have a lot of players who are under 25 years of age

No, we have a few. As many as half the teams in the league.

and thus we have to allow time for them to develop. However what we need to do to improve isn't that far out of reach for this team. Even Curry himself doesn't have that far to go to be on an All Star level. 2-3 more bounds a game, a block, an assist or 2 more in addition to his scoring and he's a LOCK.

That IS far. That's VERY VERY far. That's an entirely different player. Not Ey Curry.

IMO our areas of weakness are few and fixable.

I disagree and your arguments don't allow you to arrive at that conclusion.

We don't necessarily have to have a KG or JO or Ray Allen or Pierce to solve the problem. We don't have to get it all done next season either. Time is on our side.

Yes, time... by the time our "young" players are past prime, we might actually be good... by then maybe we'll get lucky with a draft pick or two... but it's a LONG time away.

We just need to keep making gradual improvement

We haven't made any improvement. We're worse than we were six years ago. That's not improvement.

I think we'll get to an acceptable level of play and 2 years from now we may take a more serious look at the FA market.

Not unless we make a serious move to get far enough under the cap to sign someone good.

This is amazing...so apparently in the game of basketball how you play has nothing to do with who you play?

Sad. No other word for it.

Posted by Solace:
How about addressing the point for a change?

Can we not do this?

Read the thread.

As to your point? Yes, there is more to the game than scoring. And you guys make my point every time you compare Curry, one of the best Centers in the league in scoring, to guys who are average, at best, in all the other categories.

Posted by RemBee76:


As to your point? Yes, there is more to the game than scoring. And you guys make my point every time you compare Curry, one of the best Centers in the league in scoring, to guys who are average, at best, in all the other categories.

I don't want to take too much away from Curry, he is a very good low post scorer, one of the best in the game. But that is a very specific distinction that shouldn't be confused with something like Shaq being called the most dominant force in the game. Eddy is nothing like that. As you say, he's claim to fame is being one of the best scoring CENTERS in the game. But that's because so often a guy with range is played at PF. At one point in time guys like JO, Garnett, Bosh, Gasol, Dirk, Duncan, etc, would have been groomed for the center position by virtue of their height. Not anymore, so the other good scoring centers are drawn out of competition with Eddy. He almost becomes that best of the centers merely by evacuation of the position by scorers.

Also, with the extended range and mobility of today's players, more and more the centers of the league are not placed in that position by virtue of being able to score down low, but by the ability to defend down low, and that's where Eddy falls so short of his peers. Even 6'5 Malik does a better job in that regard.

So what you have with Eddy is a guy who is at center because he knows how to score down there but not how to pass or defend from there. The skilled players, who at another point in time might have driven his comparative worth way down the scale, have moved to PF and left Eddy looking like a strongman, when really it's a relatively weak position, and one he's only suited to at one end of the floor. He does one thing well, and that's to score from the low blocks, but the usefulness of that skill is highly dependent upon the composition of the rest of the team, and this particular one, (with it's reliance on an open lane for slashing, limited post entry skills and poor perimeter shooting,) doesn't seem well constituted for that style of play. They don't make him better, nor does he better them.

I'm a little bit reminded of Rod Thorn's feeling about Marbury on the Nets: "And he was, too. Better than everyone else, that is. But it all didn't add up to much, did it?"

[Edited by - blueseats on 05-10-2007 8:27 PM]

A considered response, Blueseats, truly. But I just have to disagree.

Posted by BlueSeats:
They don't make him better, nor does he better them.
[Edited by - blueseats on 05-10-2007 8:27 PM]

Marbury's and Crawford's games benefited immensely from the attention Curry got in the post. I think Lee's did too. This is an observation I can't base on stats, but I think it should be obvious to people who watch the games.

Can you call a guy who shoots almost 58% while being consistently double-teamed one of the best scorers in the league regardless of what position he plays? I think so. Please, look at Curry’s scoring numbers vs. Duncan and tell me where there is a significant difference.

Posted by RemBee76:

Solace,

While not necessarily ideal, it is acceptable to bombastically announce your opinions and belittle those who disagree with you if you back your claims up with logical thought and knowledge of the game. Your belief that a player's performance can be equated to the flip of a coin demonstrates clearly that you can not.

Until you tone your rhetoric down to a level that matches that of your capacity for logical thought, I won't address you further.

Peace.

Dude, you misinterpreted my example as meaning something other than it was intended. I'm not here to address your insecurities. Sorry, dude. Next time if you're confused, ask me what I mean. Don't tell me. Clearly you haven't a clue what the example meant.

I do not believe that a player's performance can be equated to a flip of a coin, nor do I ever say that. I was making an example about putting too much into small sample sizes. Nice try, moron.