Game Day: Suns (1-4) @ Thunder (0-4), Sun 10/28/18

[In2ition]

More grist for the mill:

After six games, among players with significant minutes, Josh Jackson has a woeful -0.3 PER with 3.8 TOs per game.
He is shooting .377 from the field and .364 from the free-thrown line.

He's not fairing very well if he wants to win MIP this year.

[O_Gardino]

To highlight how good Ayton is: he is second on the team in assists, and has over a 3/1 assist to turnover ration. Nobody else is even close to that.

Booker: 27/22
Ayton 23/7
Ariza: 22/12
Canaan: 19/11
Jackson: 13/23
Anderson: 12/6
Okobo: 10/5
Warren: 7/7
Crawford: 7/4
Chandler: 6/6
Bridges: 5/5

[specialsauce]

Okobo
Booker
Bridges
Warren
Ayton

That’s needs to be the starting 5 going forward.

100% agree.

What a draft. Three rookies in the starting line up?

Time will tell, but so far this is looking like McDs best draft. Ayton was the easy pick, but Bridges and Okobo are looking like good talents. This is putting aside the debate whether Bridges was worth the cost.

[Superbone]

Because we don't have a competent PG who can turn the ball over.

That's a strange requirement.

[Superbone]

More grist for the mill:

After six games, among players with significant minutes, Josh Jackson has a woeful -0.3 PER with 3.8 TOs per game.
He is shooting .377 from the field and .364 from the free-thrown line.

He's not fairing very well if he wants to win MIP this year.

He's just giving himself a lot of room for improvement. Smart.

[Xylus]

Because we don't have a competent PG who can turn the ball over.

That's a strange requirement.

I’ll say!

[ShadowHawke]

Because we don't have a competent PG who can turn the ball over.

That's a strange requirement.

I’ll say!

Who remembers having KJ, Jason Kidd, and Nash on the roster at the same time?

[Superbone]

Because we don't have a competent PG who can turn the ball over.

That's a strange requirement.

I’ll say!

Who remembers having KJ, Jason Kidd, and Nash on the roster at the same time?

I do except that Nash wasn't Nash yet. How the mighty have fallen. This once proud PG strong franchise now has a scrub and a couple rookies.

[Democritus]

But we have a generational center now for compensation I guess

[Indy]

But we have a generational center now for compensation I guess

I am very happy with how Ayton has looked so far. He looks like a generational talent. Let's just hope having a generational center turns out better than having multiple generational PGs did for us.

[Democritus]

Well, I think that historically speaking, having a generational Center rather than a generational PG, turns out to be better for the team in general. Or like every other thing, It is the context that matters. I don't know. Robinson, Olajuwon, Shaq, Ewing, Embiid, Ayton vs Kidd, Nash, Stockton, CP3, Westbrook?

[Indy]

Who is the best center right now? I am not sure. I know for sure the best PG is Curry, and I am not sure another player in the game is more effective at determining your chances for winning.

[AmareIsGod]

Wow. Did Noel go off against Ayton? That stat line indicates that no matter how good Aytons numbers were, he let Noel do anything and everything he wanted. Pathetic.

[In2ition]

Wow. Did Noel go off against Ayton? That stat line indicates that no matter how good Aytons numbers were, he let Noel do anything and everything he wanted. Pathetic.

Noel played well against Ayton. Used a lot of energy and took advantage of Ayton's help. I think he was looking forward to playing Adams and didn't bring it right away against Noel.

[AmareIsGod]

Wow. Did Noel go off against Ayton? That stat line indicates that no matter how good Aytons numbers were, he let Noel do anything and everything he wanted. Pathetic.

Noel played well against Ayton. Used a lot of energy and took advantage of Ayton's help. I think he was looking forward to playing Adams and didn't bring it right away against Noel.

Seems to be a theme with this entire team. They don't know how to bring it right away (or at all, in some cases). Here's a hint. You are 1-5 and are getting waxed every night. You need to ALWAYS bring it at this point. Pathetic.

[In2ition]

Wow. Did Noel go off against Ayton? That stat line indicates that no matter how good Aytons numbers were, he let Noel do anything and everything he wanted. Pathetic.

Noel played well against Ayton. Used a lot of energy and took advantage of Ayton's help. I think he was looking forward to playing Adams and didn't bring it right away against Noel.

Seems to be a theme with this entire team. They don't know how to bring it right away (or at all, in some cases). Here's a hint. You are 1-5 and are getting waxed every night. You need to ALWAYS bring it at this point. Pathetic.

You're right

[virtual9mm]

One good thing about our team this year, and Igor's offense:

We are #1 in the league in assisted FGs. We have over 67% of our FGs assisted. Last year it was 55%, and 27th in the league. Last year GSW lead with 68%, and only 2 teams were above 65% (GSW, 76ers).

On the down side, we lead the league in TO/FG at 48%. We also led last year at 41%.

Great observation about the offense. It's pretty remarkable that we're also top 10 in the league in effective FG % but still getting blown out every night. Averaging 18.8 TO's a game will do that, I guess.

Exactly. Honestly, if we were around league average on TOs, that would also help our transition defense, and we would be saving about 10 points a game.

Honestly, this makes me feel a lot better about the state of our team. Even when they're getting blown out, they're still executing Igor's offensive schemes instead of reverting to straight-up hero ball. We can pin this problem to a simple root cause: No competent PG.

This statistic completely changes the way I think about Igor and his offense. If the problem is simply turnovers that can be cut down with more practice and more time on the court, and if the offense is generating assisted baskets, it means that sometime soon things will click and turn around offensively. Defense is a different problem, although cutting down turnovers will certainly help.

[Mori Chu]

I don't know that Ayton is giving a poor effort. It can be hard to judge effort on the basketball court when you're watching at home. Ayton plays with a controlled and methodical style. He's never flailing his body or out of control. He seems to be trying to stay out of foul trouble, to play within himself, to not reach. I don't think his defense is great right now, but I do like that he plays with a certain discipline and control. I for one think he plays hard and gives a fine effort, but I think he still has a lot to learn, especially on defense.

[Ring_Wanted]

This statistic completely changes the way I think about Igor and his offense. If the problem is simply turnovers that can be cut down with more practice and more time on the court, and if the offense is generating assisted baskets, it means that sometime soon things will click and turn around offensively. Defense is a different problem, although cutting down turnovers will certainly help.

Agreed. I don't know if it will last, but it's encouraging.

[Ring_Wanted]

I don't know that Ayton is giving a poor effort. It can be hard to judge effort on the basketball court when you're watching at home. Ayton plays with a controlled and methodical style. He's never flailing his body or out of control. He seems to be trying to stay out of foul trouble, to play within himself, to not reach. I don't think his defense is great right now, but I do like that he plays with a certain discipline and control. I for one think he plays hard and gives a fine effort, but I think he still has a lot to learn, especially on defense.

The issue comes when he just stands under the basket simply watching as the ball bounces instead of gobbling it up or even blocking out. Or when he slowly lets someone drive to the rim without being a menace.

Call it low motor, poor effort, bad defensive awareness or whatever, but it is there, and being clearly underconditioned compounds the problem, as well as the terrible allaround performance from his teammates.

Ayton will never have Faried's level of activity, but he is extremely coachable and I am confident in due time he'll palliate these deficiencies.

In my oipnion, a vet PF who can provide help defense and shooting would do wonders for Ayton. Bender could have been that type of player, but it seems he is done. Ariza was never going to be that guy, btw.