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Dion Waiters Traded

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Grade the Trade (Waiters + Kirk/Amundsen + 2nd rd pick for Smith, Shumpert, and 1st rd pick)

  • A+

    Votes: 18 7.1%
  • A

    Votes: 68 26.7%
  • B

    Votes: 106 41.6%
  • C

    Votes: 44 17.3%
  • D

    Votes: 10 3.9%
  • F

    Votes: 9 3.5%

  • Total voters
    255
  • Poll closed .
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Last night was the kind of game that gets you excited for Dion and Kyrie to start clicking on the floor together. The Nets D sold out hard on Dion...if he and Kyrie can continue to improve their chemistry on the floor, situations like that will become a pick-your-poison circumstance for the other team. It's why I've always been so enamored by making this work and exhausting all options before dealing Waiters for a more conventional SG. The ceiling of a dynamic duo like this is so much higher, especially in a playoffs series where you will encounter last night's defense every game.

Good learning experience.
 
The whole long 2 vs. 3 argument is by far my least favorite thing to come out of the analytics movement. The debate doesn't need to be rehashed every other day.
perhaps it does if that's what it takes to beat it into the non-believers heads.
It's another area where advanced stats either mean very little or don't mean what you think they do. Even though a guy like Waiters is shooting 37% from 3, it doesn't mean if he is coming off the pick and roll that he should dribble backwards behind the line and shoot 3 over shooting the long 2. That would take him out of his rhythm and he wouldn't hit that shot 37% of the time.

Now does it mean that an offense in general should be more geared toward drive and kicks and getting guys open spot up 3s? Yeah I would say that. I wouldn't say it is a good idea to force either a 3 or a layup every time down the floor though because the high percentage looks won't always be there, and sometimes an open mid range jumper will be a better look than a contested 3 or Tristan getting raped at the rim again.
nobody says they should *never* shoot long 2s, just minimize them. yet some players - dion included - constantly take them and it absolutely kills their efficiency.

more importantly, you have to keep in mind the difference position makes re: shot selection. dion shooting a long 2 is a lot different than someone like dirk or aldridge shooting one. the latter two being able to shoot from there is good because essentially no bigs can make it out to 3 point territory so a long 2 is the next best thing for spacing for them.

"His mid-range game is really something he should get to," Cavs coach Byron Scott said on Monday at Cleveland Clinic Courts. "That's when he's the most dangerous.
"We see so many kids right now either taking the 3 or trying to dunk the ball instead of the old-fashioned, take two or three dribbles, get in the lane and pull up for a jump shot. For him, he has that in his repertoire and it's something he can do. I really want to encourage him to do that. He's getting better with it and more comfortable with it."
The Cavs (6-23) are trying to encourage Waiters to focus on attacking the basket more and not shoot as many 3-pointers.
"I want him to be a little more aggressive getting to the basket," Scott said. "If he can't get to the basket, the 14- or 15-foot pull-up jump shot for him is perfect. He's not settling for so many 3s right now, which is really good. He's looking to be more aggressive right now and be in attack mode."
lol byron scott
 
Maybe Dion is more comfortable taking long 2 vs. 3. It's all about rhythm and what he's comfortable with. His efficiency taking long 2s isn't bad enough to warrant the negative response it does. He's pretty good from mid-range so I think we should just let it be.
 
For those keeping track at home, that means Simmons -- the guy who berates Cavs' management for draft-day misses -- would have this core right now had he been running the Cavs from 2011-14:

PG - Brandon Knight
SG - Victor Oladipo
SF - Derrick Williams
PF - Thomas Robinson
C - ???? Andy, I guess?

How can you achieve his level of smugness while simultaneously getting it this wrong?

The real answer is "we don't know who would have been picked in the 2013 Draft, because if this were real life, Simmons would have been canned sometime during the 2012-13 season." But yes, your point stands -- that is not at all the foundation of a future contending team. That core has a ceiling of "perennial eighth seed/first-round cannon fodder." IOW, exactly the "treadmill of mediocrity" that is the worst thing that can ever happen to a franchise, or so we're told.

Using his own expressed logic, why would he have ever taken Knight over Valanciunas? If Vala was truly the only other guy in the 2011 Draft with multiple All-Star potential, then why would you pass on that? I suppose you could say "because he had already taken a big man at 1," but (a) D-Will ain't no big man, (b) it was just the first draft of a multiple-year rebuild (as Simmons said, "Cleveland's re-building anyway, what do they care"), and (c) isn't the goal to take the guys with the highest perceived ceilings? But there he goes again with that mental White-Out. He can conveniently re-write history. Unfortunately, if you're doing it for a living, you don't get to come back a year later and say "my bad, I want a do-over."

It amuses me when some fans seriously think a guy like Simmons would make a good GM. At the end of the day*, he's just a fan with an opinion. A longtime fan and a good writer, to be sure, but still just a fan.

*Included in order to comply, however nominally, with the requirement that this message have something to do with Dion Waiters.
 
Dion kinda got away from what was working for him against the nets. That was a shame. Suddenly he was going 1 on 1 rather than getting his teammates involved and reading the D. We will see more of these games where he believes he has finally arrived and lays an egg as he tries to act like a star. I do think he is going to be really good though. I just want him playing the balanced game that he has been.
 
Dion kinda got away from what was working for him against the nets. That was a shame. Suddenly he was going 1 on 1 rather than getting his teammates involved and reading the D. We will see more of these games where he believes he has finally arrived and lays an egg as he tries to act like a star. I do think he is going to be really good though. I just want him playing the balanced game that he has been.



He did have five assists, it's not like he didn't get his teammates involved at all.

Also some people on here really need to learn to temper their expectations about players . For example Dion has one bad game ( you could make a case that he had a bad shooting game ind Detroit but really he only short poorly on 3 point shots) and everyone acts like he's back to square one. It seems like a more logical line of thinking would be just to accept that Dion had an off game against a pretty good team ( Brooklyn has won 12 straight at home).


Even the top tier players (not saying Dion is one) have bad games every once in awhile . Dion had just had a streak of 5 or 6 really nice games he was due for a stinker honestly.
 
Maybe Dion is more comfortable taking long 2 vs. 3. It's all about rhythm and what he's comfortable with. His efficiency taking long 2s isn't bad enough to warrant the negative response it does. He's pretty good from mid-range so I think we should just let it be.

that is fine, but then can everyone stop bashing Jack for the same thing? Jack's shot is the long-range 2 pull-up shot, yet he gets crucified.
 
doesnt seem like he is. Jack is taking the same exact shots he took at golden state but at 41% instead of 45% and his 10-23 foot shot is gone well under 40% for the first time in his career.

jacks aevevrage shot is 16 and a half feet. Dions average distance is less than 14 feet. This is the first time Jack has averaged over 16 foot a shot attempt and its obvious he is rushing his shots and not taking that extra bounce or to or setting up in his sweet spot.
 
that is fine, but then can everyone stop bashing Jack for the same thing? Jack's shot is the long-range 2 pull-up shot, yet he gets crucified.

The problem I have with Jack is how often he passes up a completely open three to dribble in one step and take a contested jumper. It makes no sense.
 
that is fine, but then can everyone stop bashing Jack for the same thing? Jack's shot is the long-range 2 pull-up shot, yet he gets crucified.

I don't bash Jack for taking mid-range jumpers. I just have a problem with him taking that shot 3-4 seconds into the shot clock in transition without initiating the offense. I also have a problem with him having open 3s, pump faking, and then dribbling into a contested mid-range shot. Situation is everything. Jarrett Jack has a great mid-range pull-up. It's one of the best parts of his game. I just don't like his thought process at times.

Also Dion is shooting a better % from mid-range on the year than Jack.
 
Dion has 29.3 mpg on the season with averages of 15.4 ppg, 3.0 apg, 2.9 rpg, and 0.9 spg.

If he was playing around 38 mpg, which I believe he should starting next season, those averages bump up to 20 ppg, 3.9 apg, 3,8 rpg, and 1.1 spg.
 
I believe if Brown would have started Dion all season, we'd pretty much be a lock for the 8th seed maybe better.
 
I never thought I would say this and I do not think Dion is as talented as Kyrie. But, the game flows so much better with Dion running things than Kyrie, it looks a lot more like actual basketball.

This off-season it is going to be imperative that Kyrie finds a way to take his impressive skillset and translate it into something that equals winning basketball and not just empty numbers.
 
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I never thought I would say this and I do not think Dion is as talented as Kyrie. But, the game flows so much better with Dion running things than Kyrie, it looks a lot more like actual basketball.

This off-season it is going to be imperative that Kyrie finds a way to take his impressive skillset and translate it into something that equals winning basketball and not just empty numbers.
Whole team is playing better, they played better before Kyrie got injured too. It's not that this team is better with Dion instead of Kyrie, it's that they finally click as group.
 
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