Paladin55 wrote:You could be right, but he's had no real playing time for most of this year, so you can't just write him off as a PG at this point.If the dream does happen and James is in blue and orange next year, Douglas fits into the B.J. Armstrong, Derrick Fischer role quite well, though.
I agree. Hard to speculate at this point. I mean the kid doesn't play at all now, save for some garbage mins. here & there. I see what Briggs is saying though - true, it doesn't look like he's a true point guard. But could he develop enough PG skills to the point where he becomes a serviceable floor general? I think so. We'll never know until Mike decides to throw him a bone and give him a prolonged look....Think Russell Westbrook for a sec. They were actually talking about this last night on either the pre-game or the actual broadcast --- Westbrook was never thought of as a pure PG when drafted but he's showing now that he can man the role. TD could have a similar projection to Westbrook. It all starts with playing time though, which is why I think that Mike's theory of sitting the two rookies in favor of his veterans isn't the most sound idea. I don't know why he thinks he can't have a happy medium - incorporating his rookies AND trying to win this year. I think his two rookies could only help the cause. Just listening to him last night on the latest Mike D'Antoni Show, he obviously doesn't see it that way. I guess in his mind, he just has too many vets to try to appease that are ahead of Hill and Douglas and that those vets offer up the best chance for him to win games...Development with these guys (Hill and Douglas) was basically scrapped for the rest of this year so I don't see us finding out anything anytime soon. Which to me is rediculous. I mean what if Hill and Douglas impressed, so much to the point where we're no longer interested in a guy like Chris Bosh in free agency or in Douglas' case, a starting caliber PG during the off-season? To me finding out more about these two (either here or in Reno) is more important in the grand scope of things than squeaking into the playoffs and getting blown out in the first round. Yeah that's a reasonable goal, but to me, finding out exactly what you have with these two is much more important so when the time comes to make important decisions shortly down the road here for this franchise (including Hill or TD in any trade, planning who to target in free agency, do you keep David Lee & Duhon, etc...) you now put yourself in position to make the best, most informed decision. Plus, as I said, I fail to see how playing Hill and Douglas right from the beginning would've had any kind of a negative impact on this team. If anything, I feel it would've been the opposite - they could've helped us. I don't feel we would've been in any worse shape than we are right now... As of right now, I don't feel this organization is in any kind of position to make an informed decision on either Hill or Douglas -- I have a pretty good idea what they are, but to be honest, no one knows what the hell these two guys could become right now. The proof is usually always in the pudding but there really hasn't been any pudding here to speak of...
Briggs mentioned his summer league play and thinking back on it, I'm still pretty impressed with what TD accomplished during that week in Vegas. His shot wasn't falling at all but what he did show, surprisingly, was good ability to drive and kick and find the open man. Then during pre-season and during the year at different times (at Milwaukee, at home against Utah) he showed some good offensive ability. Stuff he was known for. Together, I'd say we have some good things to look forward to...
wants to establish