Justin Jaudon

Um...Wiggins is better than Gordon at this point. I get that his defense and rebounding are not good, but he's a very good scorer who has a ton of potential. and... Jokic... really? He does a lot of nice things, but... whoa, yea, his advanced stats are crazy good. hn... you learn something new every day

I can get behind all of this except the letting Jennings go pissing him off. If Skiles liked Jennings so much this past year, he probably would have played him more. But, then again, maybe management told him not to even this past year, which actually paints the management in a really bad light if true. It's a thought, I guess.

1. NBA rotation player is nothing to hang your hat on with a mid-first-rounder, just not a black mark. 2. Yep, debatable he's the best player in that draft. Good pick. 3. Jury is still out, but so far it isn't a bust (not really out of the woods, considering the guys picked behind him, though; he's still got to play up to that potential) 4. I really disagree that he has very good potential. I don't see even a maxed out potential Payton being any better than Jeff Teague or Mike Conley. 5. He's still a baby, but that potential has barely been hinted at on the court. 6. In 2012: Evan Fournier, Jared Sullinger, Festus Ezili, Jae Crowder, some guy named Draymond Green, Khris Middleton, Will Barton, Mike Scott (and yes, even in 2012 I would have picked all of those guys ahead of Nicholson; I really had issues with Nicholson watching him get torched in Richmond over and over by a guy who is no longer in the league); In 2013: probably nobody, but Giannis is a nice player; In 2014: Zach Levine, Rodney Hood, and Jordan Clarkson all have more potential than Elfrid (or at least as much), and all are better players currently; In 2015: too early to tell for sure, but Stanley Johnson, Justise Winslow, Myles Turner, and probably Devin Booker all look like better players right now, with similar potential for most (maybe not Johnson, but he's going to very likely be a valuable 3 and D guy for years). 7. Harris, he won, I guess. But only because Milwaukee couldn't hold onto J.J. Harris is nowhere near Redick's level of player yet, though, and we no longer have anything from that trade. Fournier was a good trade, but he probably should have just drafted him before, rather than giving up assets for him two years later. 8. Frye certainly didn't work out, yea. 9. He wasn't exactly playing well before he got hurt, but sure, why not. Still, so far it's a terrible pick up, because past injury concerns have remained a problem.

Forgot about O'quinn. I like Dedmon too. Like I said, Hennigan has not been definitively good or bad, in my opinion. He has made good moves regarding talent, and he's made bad ones.

I agree with all of this. Payton has talent, and I've never advocated quitting on him. But I'm worried this organization is hitching their wagons to his development, and that's not making me comfortable with this management crew.

1. He's 22 and he's a sub-60% FT shooter, and he's just as bad from everywhere beyond 3 feet. The odds say he's never going to be a decent shooter. 2. No he really doesn't. He's slightly above average for a PG, but considering he's the size of a 2G, that's whatever. 3. He really isn't. Statistically, he's only slightly better than Jameer Nelson (as in 1% better), for a reference. 4. We have seen him make plays, yes. We've seen Kyrie Irving make plays too. So far shown the ability to be a really brief scary element of a boring dream. 5. He really does. He needs to improve from everywhere as a shooter. And if he does that, his decision making and effort still have to improve dramatically. 6. Yep, the whole team is apparently riding on his development. We'll see how it works out. 7. On what do you base this? I like Rob. I hope he's as good as people seem to think. But so far the results of his talent scouting have been very mixed. He has yet to land a good 2nd rounder, and his first rounders have been... okay, I guess. I like Dipo and Gordon, but neither has really lit the world on fire yet. I have no idea what to think of Mario, but at this point I really don't see how he's better than Myles Turner or Justice Winslow or a handful of guys who came after him. And I'm not sold on Nicholson and Elf at all. He brought in Harris, clearly chose him over Harkless, then Harris seemed to fizzle out so he traded him for expirings. He brought in Vuc, who's great on offense, but his problems defending the PnR severely limit his overall effectiveness. He traded for Fournier, who has been solid. He also signed Channing Frye and C. J. Watson. Again, on what are you basing this resounding faith in his abilities as a talent scout?

This whole situation just looks so bad. We could be the new Kings, guys. Except we don't even have Cousins... I've never wanted to be wrong about something in sports so bad, but this could be just the beginning of the s***storm.

whelp... this is just weird. He was doing a solid job here, but apparently there was a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes that we didn't know about. Kudos to Henny for being able to keep it all quiet. That all said, this makes Orlando look very bad. Honestly, firing him would have looked better. To have a guy leave, who's not failing by any stretch, because he thinks the players are soft and the GM is making the wrong decisions. This organization could be in a lot of trouble. Then again, maybe we get Vogel, and Hennigan and his players aren't a problem, and we trade for Paul George and sign Al Horford and win all the games. Who knows, at this point. This is such a weird situation. What is clear is that Skiles is stubborn as hell, and management is jockeying for power between Hennigan and Martins. It seems pretty clear Skiles was Martins' guy (that's always been a strong assumption, even if Hennigan never seemed to dislike the pick). Hennigan wanted to go to the owners with Skiles' comments, which is a power play. At least he didn't go overboard with it, which points to Martins being maybe more the problem than Hennigan. That said, Hennigan clearly is protecting his own interests in pushing the Elfrid Payton issue with Skiles. Elf was really bad this past year, one of the worst starting PGs in the league, at a time where PG is the most important position in the league. Elfrid's failures, along with Vaughn's, Harris' stagnation, and giving up on Harkless in favor of Harris, all would reflect poorly on Hennigan's decision making. To this point, Hennigan's big successes have been Vucevic (and he may be a guy who's never able to overcome his defensive issues), the Oladipo pick, and the Fournier trade. Now, maybe Elf's issues can be placed mostly on Skiles, but that is assuming a lot considering he's been successful with every other PG he's worked with. Maybe Harris' stagnation can be put on Skiles, but, again, that's assuming a lot considering Harris' main issue seemed to be poor fit, something mostly dictated by the players available to Skiles. Clearly, I'd be happy to have been wrong about Skiles being a solid coach, and about Elfrid being terrible as a starter. But, at this point, if the future of the PG position is the main beef, I totally get Skiles' point, from what I saw on the court this past season. Skiles, from what I can tell, wasn't a bad coach for us. He did good things to get Dipo's defense back on track, and he showed us Fournier's value, and he did a good job developing Gordon. He had his faults, like the inconsistent minutes of Dedmon and Nicholson (oh, how I hate admitting Nicholson should have seen more minutes!). But Skiles' tenure here seems to have ended like Skiles' tenures have in the past: he couldn't deal with management making decisions he didn't agree with, which does not bode well for him or us. For him, it likely signals that he's not getting another job in the NBA, if he has so often struggled accepting personnel decisions from management. For us, the problem is that he's usually been right that the management was messing things up. The Suns trading for Marbury was terrible, the Bulls wanting to blow things up after a slow start was the wrong move, and Milwaukee trading for Ellis was also idiotic. But, maybe Skiles is just bad at communicating with management and manufacturing winning attitudes in players. Once again, I hope very much that I'm wrong. I've been wrong before, and I am not a prideful man. I just want to watch this team succeed. I'm just worried about all the possible implications of what is going on.

Just read a crazy article saying Indiana is shopping Paul George... Anyone else heard anything about this?

And if they're still like this after season 2, maybe you have a point. But that's why you don't accept loosing with poor effort and lack of focus as a franchise, ever. Because it takes more than one season to wipe away that mentality, and sometimes it never works. Don't put blame on Skiles for Henny and Vaughn's mistakes.

I think pretty much this. Horford is the type of player a championship team has to have. He's not a traditional superstar, but he's like a center version of Draymond, in that he's a Swiss army knife in terms of how you can use him at that position.

If I were still an NFL football fan, I'd be excited. I was a Jaguars fan since the Brunell days. But the NFL lost me years ago, when something like 5 people broke the 30-year standing single-season passing yardage record in one season. Maybe one day I'll get over my hate of the rule changes that have turned the NFL into Arena Football with a bigger field... but, then again, maybe not. Time will tell.

This is statistically balderdash. Gordon is already a better-than-decent shooter for his position. His 3-point shooting is still developing, but he doesn't pass up shots. 25% of his shots come from outside. Statistically, he's a better mid-range shooter (and a much more willing one) than Draymond Green. Draymond had a terrific year from outside this year, but even last year (when he was still a very effective stretch 4), Dray was not much better if any than Gordon this year. And Gordon is 20 years old, with %s trending upward just like Draymond after his first two years. There is every reason to believe Gordon will be a fine stretch 4 on offense; in fact, his shooting from everywhere is good enough to be excited about from a 4.

I get what you're saying, but Payton at this point in his career is nowhere near the player Vuc is (and I've never been a big Vucevic fan, really, because I'm aware of what his defensive weaknesses do to a team). Vuc is a 20+ PER guy. Now I get that PER is not the end all of stats, but it isn't a useless stat either. Vuc is a really valuable player because he can score and rebound and other than defending the PnR he's not terrible on D (mostly he's average). He's a solid passer from the 5 position, and when he's aggressive and on he's nearly unguardable. Now, that PnR trouble is huge. It means rather than be an elite center he's a decent starter, because his weaknesses cause you to tweak the defense to make up for it. I want to upgrade the SF position, too. It's the position most likely to be upgraded, because it's the easiest considering there are multiple SF upgrades to be had. But Fournier is not our weakest starter. His defense is a problem sometimes, which is why I want an upgrade. But his offense actually manages to make up for most of that. He's still young, so his offense is likely to get slightly better. Aaron Gordon is 2 years younger and is statistically better than Elfrid at literally everything except passing and steals (only a little for the steals). He's a better defender, by any measurement. More defensive win shares despite playing far fewer minutes, better shot-blocking, DRtg, just watching the game; he's a better defensive player almost all of the time. He's a better rebounder, even considering the difference in position. Gordon is actually a solid shooter for his position, trending toward good from every distance. He's excellent close to the basket, acceptable and improving rapidly from mid-range, and good enough to at least draw attention from outside, with every reason to believe he will continue to improve from all of those ranges. Oladipo vs. Payton at this point isn't even fair. Payton, on the other hand, has no glaring strengths to make up for his weaknesses. He's a decent passer. Not elite, just decent trending toward good. He's a bad shooter. There's no getting around that. His 3-point percentage this year (which was still not good) is smoke and mirrors because he only shot when he was so wide open Shaq would have taken the shot. His mid-range shot is worse than his three point shot from a % standpoint. The only place he made a decent percentage of his shots was from 0-3 feet to the basket. 40% of his shots came from that range. But 60% of his shots came from places his was shooting between 28% and 37%. He had the second-highest FT rate among the starters (no one on the team is particularly good at this). Great! Except that he shot 58% from the FT line, meaning him getting to the line is not a high % play. Being being a bad shooter, he's been a poor defender. I know we all love his potential there, but both the statistics and watching him play show that he's a below-average defender at this point, because he's out of position constantly and he has effort issues. Basically, he has a lot of trouble guarding the PnR, plus he gambles and ends up letting guys go right around him. His block and steal %s aren't terrible, but his lack of discipline means he still has less than 2 defensive win shares at the end of the season (tied with Fournier for lowest among the starters). Payton has some talent. He's only 22 years old, so maybe he'll fix some of those problems. But he'd be a rare player indeed if he fixed all of them, and even then he'd be a poor man's Rondo, which I'm not sure is a good thing in today's NBA. So, calling Payton the worst player in our starting lineup is technically an opinion. But it's an opinion backed up by the stats, and also having watched nearly every game this year.

Wow... this is some of the most ridiculous stuff I've seen on here in a while. To sum up, if we don't agree with you, we're sheeple. So, if you come on here and tell us that Allen Iverson was a better player than Kobe Bryant, or something like that, and we all disagree, we're still sheeple? Because basically all the statistics say Elfrid was by far the worst starter on the team last year. He's the only starter with a PER under 14, only one with a TS% under 50, only one with a TO% over 12; he had the same number of defensive win shares as Fournier with 1/8 the offensive win shares. Literally the only thing he did better than the rest of the starters was get assists, something he did about as well as Brandon Jennings this year. The reason no one agrees with you isn't some sheeple mentality. I was probably the earliest to start calling for Elf to be benched, and I doubt my opinion carries much weight around here, because I really don't post that much. It's just that he's been arguably the worst starting PG in the league this year, ahead of maybe Rose only, and all the stats show that. It's not some conspiracy, it's just really obvious that at this point he's a terrible player.

I like Collison. But the amount of upgrade he is really depends on how much Elf improves. Defensively, he's probably no better than Elf right now, which is to say not very good. But I don't think there's any question he's a better player and a much better fit offensively, and probably overall. But if Elf gets his defense a little more consistent and gets some confidence doing something other than charging at the basket like a madman on offense, he'll likely be good enough that a Collison type player upgrade is not necessary. (still, though, Collison fits so much better into Skiles' offense and actually compliments the guys we have already, so maybe it's worth thinking about anyway).

Tyler Ulis is available in the first round. Kay Felder in the second. :bball:

To the no free throws discussion: What if you only get one foul per possession and then after that the other team is awarded 2 points? It's a thought...

Wow... I guess I should just stop watching basketball since I'm not a Lakers or Celtics fan. I mean, I do remember when the Thunder were forced to trade Durant and Westbrook, and back in the day when the Spurs gave Duncan to the Lakers for Cedrick Cebalos and a fruitcake. Seriously, this kind of thinking confuses me. The Knicks have been bad for ages, and the Nets, too; both teams in the biggest NBA market. True, those teams have signed or traded for big names, but that seemed to have had more to do with the players wanting to be in New York than the league forcing the issue. And they didn't get those guys for nothing. Both the Carmelo trade and the Deron Williams trade were pretty fair, considering the circumstances. And I seem to remember the league actively stopping the Lakers from acquiring Chris Paul. In fact, if the league wanted the Lakers or Celtics to have Minnisota's players, they could have arranged that by fixing the draft lottery. I get that Orlando has been screwed by two big men bolting for L.A., but both were giant ego's in man-baby physical form, so maybe that's on Orlando for drafting them. I mean, are we blaming the McGrady trade on the league? McGrady was desperate to leave, because he was one of the league's best players and we managed to surround him with Tyronn Lue and Pat Garrity. Grant Hill had an ankle injury that turned into a four season episode of House M.D. and we traded McGrady's best friend on the team (a solid developing player who was a former rookie of the year) for Drew freaking Gooden. The league didn't screw Orlando out of the 5 elite talents we've had since becoming a franchise, stupidity and injuries did. O'Neal - both team management and player ego at fault equally; Penny - injuries; Hill - injuries; McGrady - 100% on team management; Howard - 80% absurd ego, 20% terrible GM surrounding him with old retreads.

Because then Orlando would've waited a year without having a coach and hired him? I'm pretty sure if Thibs had had any interest in coaching the Magic, or any team last year, Henny would have brought him in.

Wow... the league is going to be in trouble in 3 years. Big trouble.

As for Conley; I love his game, but I worry about the tendonitis. Aside from that he is exactly what this team needs. But I really do worry that when tendonitis starts becoming a problem it seems to stay one.

Wow. Okay. I mean, that's still like 18% of the salary cap for a guy who will be 27 in July, has never had a PER over 13.4 over a season, and has a career high VORP rating of 1.2 this season.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic, or you didn't mean tobias harris. I have a hard time believing you'd really consider paying Kent Bazemore $64,000,000 over 4 years a steal. Maybe you mean a steal for Bazemore?

Well, let’s take a look at the comment I was referring to again, clarifying my comprehension of the comments specifically: “I don't think the Magic will (sic) be in a position where will (sic) be able to turn players like DD down if they want to come here.” This is what started me thinking that you were condoning signing any good player as long as that player wants to be here. You mentioned a good player who many have doubts would fit in our current roster, saying that the Magic would not be in a position to turn down said type of player. Not being in a position to turn someone down means that Orlando would have to sign him if he wants to be here, regardless of fit, personality, or the quality of the contract. “If we can get ANY (my emphasis) 2 relative big names, say Horford & Batum, I would be really impressed.” This begins to clarify that you are not simply referring to DeRozen, or players very similar to him, but any single player with name recognition (which, by the inclusion of Batum, apparently means anyone in the NBA who is a legitimate starter on a not terrible team). "There are players I would like more than others(,) but at the end of the day ANY (again, my emphasis) of these guys are going to improve our team.“ This further clarifies that you are referring to any player who improves the team. “That's why saying ‘I wouldn't want Derozan’ or ‘I wouldn't want Whiteside’ is just funny to me. Like those guys are just counting down the days till they can get on a plane and come to Orlando.” You finish up by ridiculing the notion that someone might not want a player who is a questionable fit and has been horrifically inefficient in the playoffs for consecutive seasons, as well as a guy with a questionable NBA history and who even his own team seems to consider to have a fragile psyche, on the basis that they probably have little interest in Orlando. This would seem to indicate that if they had any interest, not wanting that player might then be a valid consideration. But, considering that such an interpretation contradicts the comments directly above this statement, and that in this statement you specifically reference the previously made statements, an alternative meaning is properly sought out. And the easiest alternative meaning is that this statement is simply reiterating your previous points: that if these players have any interest in coming to Orlando, then Orlando would be foolish not to immediately sign them. I don’t mind you disagreeing with me at all, and if I didn’t understand what you meant in the post I was referring to, that’s unfortunate; but as I’m apparently not the only one who seemed to draw the same conclusions about what you meant in your post, and since after reviewing the post again with a considerable amount of literary criticism, I still come away with the same understanding of the post, then perhaps it is not my reading comprehension that is faulty here, but your own writing. It’s the first thing I learned in becoming a writer: never blame the reader without first questioning whether you may have failed in the writing.