Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Miami Heat: Greatest Team Ever?




No!

Right now I'm getting really tired of this "Miami Heat is going to roll through the league" crap. Everybody seems to be on the Miami bandwagon after "The Decision" was made. To be honest I don't even think they're the best team in the Eastern Conference right now. With the additions of Lebron James and Chris Bosh I have Miami as the third best team in the East. Now you might be thinking "How the hell? You are stupid!" Well you have to understand that I think very logically (I'm a computer programmer) so I look what Miami had before and what they have now. To me the biggest problem Miami had last season was their bench performance. Dwayne Wade was always going to be Dwayne Wade however production from the bench was horrible during the regular season and the post season. So now lets step back after all this hype and really analyze what Miami have.

As of today, after the signing of Shavlik Randolph the Heat have 18 players under contract. So ignore the top 3 because we all know who they are and we'll start with the other projected starters.

Projected Starting Center: Joel Anthony
This will be his fourth season with the Heat. Every season he gets decent minutes (20.8, 16.1 16.5 MPG) and Heat seem to like him. From what I've seen he's a good shot blocker (ranks 16th all time for the Heat in blocked shots in only 3 seasons) and can provide a defensive presence down low for the Heat. However it's clear to me why this guy went undrafted. He virtually has no offense what so ever, which is represented by his career 2.6 PPG and his less than 50% shooting percentage. To me he's like a watered down version of Ben Wallace. In order to be successful as the starting Center he needs to do all the "dirty work" in the paint. However he doesn't seem to be a terrific rebounder (career 1.8 RPG). In my opinion this guy is more of a role player energy off he bench type of guy, not a starting caliber center for a championship team.

Projected Starting Point Guard: Mario Chalmers
To me Mario will be the biggest X-factor for the success of the Miami Heat next season. I really liked him coming out of the Kansas and thought that he would have a better career than Derrick Rose. So far that's not the case because he's on D-Wade's team. However I think going into his third season this will be his chance to shine and really have a big year. It will be difficult to put up great numbers with the Big 3 on his team but I still think he can have a terrific year and he will be the key for the Heat. If he plays up to potential he can fill that starting point guard role.

Ok so now that we looked at the other projected starters lets look at their bench.

Back up center: Jamaal Magloire
Well Jamaal has resigned with the Heat after averaging only about 10 MPG last season. This upcoming season will be his 11th in the league. However the one time all-star's production has been dropping dramatically. He hasn't even averaged over 20 MPG since 2007. Also he hasn't averaged over 10 PPG since 2005. It's pretty clear this guy is a shell of his former self and at 32 years old I don't expect any late career revivals.

Back up center: Zydrunas Ilgauskas
At this point in his career he is clearly a backup center. This was evident in this year's playoffs where Varejao had gotten the majority of the minutes and only got about 10 MPG during the playoffs. His production has been slowly declining ever since 2009, you can't blame him this will be his 13th season and already 35 years old.

Back up center: Dexter Pittman
Well he's a big body.......that's pretty much it. He showed no promise at all during the summer league. He shot almost 30% as a center and when you watch him he's got no offense. However defensively since he's so big he can give a physical presence for the Heat. But I don't think he's ready to start at the NBA level just yet. He may get some PT during the regular season however.

Back up guard: Mike Miller
In my opinion this was the best signing Miami made during the off season (other than the Big 3). They pretty much used the rest of their cap space with this signing. Mike Miller just came off his second best three point shooting season of his career. He's still a very productive player and will give Wade and James a stand up shooter from when they penetrate into the defense. This guy will be a perfect complement to the Wade and James.

Back up guard: Carlos Arroyo
Well Carlos has never been a great NBA point guard but he does provide a solid back up to Chalmers. His production has been pretty steady throughout even last season averaged about 6 PPG. But he won't have any affect on Miami winning the championship or not.

Back up forward: Juwan Howard
Man is this guy old. He's going to be pushing for his 17th season! Last season was somewhat of a come back year. Well 6 PPG if you call that a come back from 0.7 PPG the year before and only playing 3 games. He got more playing time with the Blazers and they must've liked him because they played him during the regular season and the post season. He'll simply be a veteran presence that'll give Miami a little bit of depth.

Back up foward: Udonis Haslem
This was a great signing for the Heat. Udonis has always been a solid player and will provide terrific depth for the Heat front court. He's always been a 10/10 type of guy and this is the type of guy every championship team needs.

There are other players on the roster however I don't think they'll have any significance for this upcoming season. The biggest concern I have for the Heat is the center position. You need a solid center in order to win playoff games, plain and simple. Also their bench is not very strong other than Miller and Haslem. After watching this past NBA playoffs many if not most of the playoff games were won by the bench. It plays such a vital part when playing a 7 game series.

On another note, a lot of people compare this situation to what happened with Boston back in 2007. It's completely different. Miami just signed THREE MAX CONTRACTS and pretty much wiped their entire cap space for three guys. In fact after the signing of Wade, Lebron, and Bosh Miami only had 4 guys under contract because they had to trade Beasley to create cap space. Boston already had a team in place and just needed a few starting caliber players to become contenders. Boston didn't just roll through everybody they had 2 seven game series along with a 6 game series to reach the Finals.

Another thing that worries me about this Heat team is that they don't have any great perimeter defenders. If you look back at all the championship teams they all had at least one great perimeter defender. Usually these guys don't make all-star games because they don't rack up steals or blocks or anything like that. Ron Artest/Lakers, James Posey and Tony Allen / Celtics, Bruce Bowen / Spurs, Tayshawn Prince / Pistons,...... the list goes on and on.

In the end I think there is just way too much hype for a team that hasn't even played one game yet. During a Mavs summer league game Mark Cuban was interviewed and he said that no team has cleared all of it's cap space just to sign a few players and then go on to win a championship. This new dynamic trio will determine whether or not the future of the NBA will work like this.

Saturday, July 17, 2010

Jeremy Lin: What could've been


Now I know I haven't posted in two years however now that I'm done with college I'll have a lot more time to pay attention to my blog. So anyway I've decided to start blogging again because there has been a story this summer that really has peaked my interest. This is the story of Jeremy Lin.

Jeremy, if you haven't been paying attention to NBA summer league at all, had just gone toe-to-toe with the number 1 pick in the draft John Wall. The Mavericks were up against the Wizards a few days ago in the summer league. Wall had beaten Lin a few times in the first half with razzle dazzle drives however the forth quarter was all about Jeremy Lin. He blew past Wall for an easy layup, and then hit a huge 3 pointer right over him. Towards the end of the game when it was really getting close he was able to split Wall and a big man and then went on to an acrobatic 270 spin shot in which later he was called for the charge. Boy, everybody in the entire arena was angry about that call because by that time Jeremy Lin had gotten everybody on his side, including NBA scouts.

As I write this blog right now Jeremy Lin is on the verge of signing an NBA contract. In fact multiple teams have been interested in signing him. Who he's going to sign with I don't know but that's not the point of this post. I want to show how he's been able to get to this point with the "dream" coming true.

Jeremy Lin is a Taiwanese American who was born in California (Aug 1988). He started playing basketball because his father Gie Ming had picked up such a love for the game after coming to the states. In fact the entire family plays basketball including Jeremy's two brothers. From the get go Jeremy had extraordinary talent and became a very successful high school basketball player for Palo Alto high school. He led Palo Alto to a DII State championship his senior year over national powerhouse Mater Dei. Also he was the runaway pick for the Northern California DII state player of the year. Every publication in the Northern California area recognized that he was one of the best. Despite all of this Jeremy Lin received zero, I repeat, zero DI basketball scholarships. However he was offered a spot from Harvard but with no scholarship. Shortly after this teams like Berkley and Stanford offered walk on spots but it was to late Jeremy was destined to be a Crimson.

During his time with Harvard Lin was selected to be on the All-Ivy league 2nd team his sophomore year and 1st team his junior and senior years. Harvard also had it's best season ever during his senior year. Jeremy Lin I believe should go down as Harvard's best basketball player ever.

After finishing his degree in Economics at Harvard he put his name in the NBA draft. Some people were projecting him to be late-2nd round to undrafted. Now of course he went undrafted however Mavericks GM Donnie Nelson saw potential in him and right before the 2010 NBA draft ended he gave Jeremy a call to let him know he wants him on his summer league squad.

To be honest I didn't even know Jeremy Lin existed before his senior year at Harvard. I only started to take notice when I saw his 3o pt highlight he put against UConn. After watching those highlights I thought to my self, "this guy has got a chance in the NBA". Of course I later went searching scouting reports online about him and it seemed like the general consensus was that he wasn't athletic enough or have a good enough shot to have a chance in the NBA. But I kept watching the UConn highlights, and I see Jeremy blowing by guys off the dribble, hitting all sorts of jump shots, blocking shots, swarming his man defensively. I just couldn't understand where all these people were coming from. This is when I started wondering whether or not the fact Jeremy was Asian had any influence on these types of opinions. I didn't just watch the UConn game I watched him versus Boston College, Georgetown, Cornell. He always looked like he was the best player on the floor, even with Greg Monroe, Kemba Walker, Jerome Dyson. Going back to him being Asian, Jeremy himself feels like his ethnicity has caused people to over look his talents. In an interview with NPR Jeremy said being Asian definitely was a factor in his lack of recruitment coming out of high school. Even though Jeremy has proven he can dominate the top teams in college basketball scouts still question his ability to play at the next level. So I wanted to see what Jay Bilas, the NBA draft analyzer for ESPN, had to say about Jeremy Lin. Same thing, he wasn't athletic, but he has high basketball IQ (cause he's Asian and went to Harvard..joking), in the end he won't make the NBA. Wow I'm not surprised another person questioning his ability to play the game.

Jeremy has had to prove himself time and time again because nobody wants to give this kid a shot. Why? He's won everywhere he's gone, he has led his Harvard team to battle top teams in the nation. People want to question his athleticism but anybody who's watched him play intently knows he's plenty athletic.

Now we bring ourselves to the present where finally, after an impressive summer league performance, Jeremy has people finally believing in him. But man I just think to my self "What could've been for this guy". If a top D1 program had given him a chance and looked past his ethnicity, no doubt in my mind Jeremy would've been drafted. If an NBA team had given him a chance he could have possibly been a lottery pick. His road to the NBA would have been much easier with guaranteed playing time.