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Tristan Thompson

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I dunno. TT's hands aren't among his problems from what I've seen. He actually has pretty soft touch from the 3-8 foot range, and rebounds stick to his hands. He just doesn't have very good instincts when he gets the ball under the basket, and he's not comfortable playing with his back to the basket either, both of which are major impediments to his progress as a scorer.

Regardless though, I'm much more concerned with his lack of progress on the defensive end. He should in theory be good, or at least average on that end, but at times he's been pushed around just as much as Hawes and Zeller.
 
Nathan S said:
I dunno. TT's hands aren't among his problems from what I've seen. He actually has pretty soft touch from the 3-8 foot range, and rebounds stick to his hands. He just doesn't have very good instincts when he gets the ball under the basket, and he's not comfortable playing with his back to the basket either, both of which are major impediments to his progress as a scorer.

Regardless though, I'm much more concerned with his lack of progress on the defensive end. He should in theory be good, or at least average on that end, but at times he's been pushed around just as much as Hawes and Zeller.
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I mentioned a few weeks ago how badly Tristan has been bobbling passes. I dont remember him bobbling as much but he definitely is not catching passes in traffic or under the basket cleanly.

Not sure if his hands are JJ Hickson small, but having smaller hands would explain a few things that irritate me about his game like gathering/double handed dunking.
 
I give up if I'm the only one here that thinks he can become a above average PF. Then I must be wrong and the FO needs to move him for a better option. Lets just hope it does not bit us in the ass.
 
If he could at least be automatic finishing drop offs from penetration then he'd be alright even with his lack of offensive game, imo.
 
I wish the stats were good enough to account for "non conversions". Guy wide open from 15 feet but passes it up. Or passes it up and dribbles into a contested 13 footer. Or plays where a clean catch would result in a high % score.

The worst thing is the patented Jack catch wide open from 3 dribble into an off balance 20' jumper.
 
RchfldCavRaised said:
I mentioned a few weeks ago how badly Tristan has been bobbling passes. I dont remember him bobbling as much but he definitely is not catching passes in traffic or under the basket cleanly.

Not sure if his hands are JJ Hickson small, but having smaller hands would explain a few things that irritate me about his game like gathering/double handed dunking.
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I really think it's more a mental thing. It's like he never has a good feel for where the defense is, and he's expecting a hand to come in and knock the ball away at any moment. He looks like a rookie who needs the game to slow down for him (except this is obviously more worrisome since he's a 3rd year player). When he catches the ball in his comfort zone a few steps away from the basket and he doesn't feel the defense breathing down his neck he's so fluid and confident looking. He doesn't always make the right play, but he looks like a semi-capable offensive player in those situations.
 
mAo_mAo said:
If he could at least be automatic finishing drop offs from penetration then he'd be alright even with his lack of offensive game, imo.
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For the shots that Tristan does take, I keep thinking if he was an above average finisher he should really be close to 60% TS%. I see where people point out that he's scoring and boarding but too often I see a guy who is spoonfed buckets or given wide open looks and just doesn't convert as many as he should. Would a replacement level guys like Amir Johnson or Ed Davis really cost us games if you flipped them for TT: not sure I see it. His per game averages show him to be more productive then his advanced numbers in part due to him seeing a lot of minutes (he is top 10 in minutes played among PF's).

I definitely agree that the jumper has been a big of a red herring, if he finished like Blake Griffin downlow people would be a lot more upbeat of his potential
 
Also if I hear one more time about how he switched shooting hands I'm going to go bezerker. He's paid at or above the league average. I care almost as much about his shooting hand change as if he converted to Judaism or if he only reads braille books. He should be a competent player/scorer as a 3 year vet. He should be getting it done.

Hopefully the next coach doesn't love h automatically like this one did. He gets way too many minutes.
 
Pioneer10 said:
Where are you getting this from? JON was a highly regarded prospect who couldn't get any PT because he happened to be stuck behind this guy named Rasheed Wallace who was umm pretty good and a stacked Portland team that was trying to win a title.
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O'neal was the backup center in Portland before being traded.

The point of that post was there's been plenty of bigs who have started slow and come on pretty strong. Go look at guys like Al Jefferson, Zach Randolph, Joakim Noah, Serge Ibaka, Paul Millsap, Marcin Gortat, etc. and see the rather significant jumps they made after a few years in the league.

I have no clue how good TT will ultimately be but some people are acting like he's 28 and not 22. To say he's even close to a finished product at this point, for someone with his intangibles and work ethic, seems silly. Especially at a position where guys have been blossomed later in their careers.

This team sucks. There's no sense in getting too antsy about the only young guy showing some semblance of improvement.
 
ImWithDan said:
O'neal was the backup center in Portland before being traded.

The point of that post was there's been plenty of bigs who have started slow and come on pretty strong. Go look at guys like Al Jefferson, Zach Randolph, Joakim Noah, Serge Ibaka, Paul Millsap, Marcin Gortat, etc. and see the rather significant jumps they made after a few years in the league.

I have no clue how good TT will ultimately be but some people are acting like he's 28 and not 22. To say he's even close to a finished product at this point, for someone with his intangibles and work ethic, seems silly. Especially at a position where guys have been blossomed later in their careers.

This team sucks. There's no sense in getting too antsy about the only young guy showing some semblance of improvement.
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I get what you're trying to say but the JON comparison just doesn't make sense or prove anything with regards to TT and trying to sneak in that he was somehow the backup C doesn't help here: he was a talented guy who couldn't get minutes because he was stuck not only behind Rasheed but also Sabonis, and Brain Grant in the Blazers frontcourt. TT has played far more minutes then JON ever did in his first three years and you're posting about JON makes me think you didn't watch much Western Conference basketball during JON first few years in the league. It was an arms race to get as much bulk to throw at Shaq as possible.

You're other comparisons are strange as well: Al Jefferson had a PER of 19.8 in his third year and the league and pretty much everyone had figured out he could get you points in the paint by that point
Zach Randolph problems was not production but he was a headcase. His PER was close to 20 starting his second year.
Noah was older when he came into the league but he was never considered a bust and every single year he's been in the league he's had a PER of 17 or higher
Milsap was also very productive right off the bat with a 17+ PER his rookie year
Ibaka by his 3rd year had a PER of 19.

Basically all these guys started from a much higher position particularly on the offensive side then Tristan has. He can certainly improve as many of the players you mentioned also improved but he has a much higher hill to climb. He's got to get better (mainly talking about on offense here) just to reach these guys floor. Can it happen? Anything is possible but I think a lot of posters are correct in saying that the odds aren't necessarily in his favor
 
Pioneer10 said:
I get what you're trying to say but the JON comparison just doesn't make sense or prove anything with regards to TT and trying to sneak in that he was somehow the backup C doesn't help here: he was a talented guy who couldn't get minutes because he was stuck not only behind Rasheed but also Sabonis, and Brain Grant in the Blazers frontcourt. TT has played far more minutes then JON ever did in his first three years and you're posting about JON makes me think you didn't watch much Western Conference basketball during JON first few years in the league. It was an arms race to get as much bulk to throw at Shaq as possible.

You're other comparisons are strange as well: Al Jefferson had a PER of 19.8 in his third year and the league and pretty much everyone had figured out he could get you points in the paint by that point
Zach Randolph problems was not production but he was a headcase. His PER was close to 20 starting his second year.
Noah was older when he came into the league but he was never considered a bust and every single year he's been in the league he's had a PER of 17 or higher
Milsap was also very productive right off the bat with a 17+ PER his rookie year
Ibaka by his 3rd year had a PER of 19.

Basically all these guys started from a much higher position particularly on the offensive side then Tristan has. He can certainly improve as many of the players you mentioned also improved but he has a much higher hill to climb. He's got to get better (mainly talking about on offense here) just to reach these guys floor. Can it happen? Anything is possible but I think a lot of posters are correct in saying that the odds aren't necessarily in his favor
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You're still missing ImWithDan's initial point, which is that young bigs develop slowly. Jermaine O'Neal wasn't the greatest comparison, he was a more talented, injury-prone center. TT is never going to average 24 a night like JO but by the end of this year he'll have started 2 consecutive full 82 game seasons. That's 2 more than JO had his entire career.

A couple better comparisons to TT are David Lee and Al Horford. All 3 posted similar numbers (around 12-10) in their age-22 years. While the other two kept incrementally improving it seems like TT is only one that reached his ceiling this early. At 22, before his rookie contract is even up.
 
I think you cant discount what TT has done from his rookie year to now, based solely on the level of teammates he has had. As this team starts to add more shooters, he will have more room to operate in the paint, and can focus on his rebounding and energy. The kid switched shooting hands less then a year ago, and has started to show signs that it will work. He is making FT at a good clip, and once he gains confidence in the mid-range shot, it will open up his game. To think a player cannot improve at the age of 22, and less then 1 year into a complete overhaul of his shot is insane. I really think next year is his make or break year.

I found this interesting in games we have won this year, he is averaging:

34.1 MPG .534 FG% 11.5 RPG 1.3 APG 0.5 BPG 14.6 PPG

Games we have lost:

32.1 MPG .434 FG% 8.4 RPG .8 APG 0.3 BPG 10.7 PPG
 
Just as a random aside, his shooting heat map also shows his offense is improving rather considerably, from a range perspective.

TT_shooting_heat_map.jpg


Look at his rookie year vs. year 3. He has a pretty reliable extension out to 15 from from both corner and the FT line. As he becomes more comfortable shooting the basketball, I'll be interested to see how that morphs.

Also consider his marked improvement in the back half of this season. Since Jan 1 he's shooting .498 from the field (160/321). He started the first half of the season at .452 (141/312)

I'm not driving the TT bandwagon I just don't understand why people are so down on him when looking down the road.

Do I think he'll be an All-Star? I think that is a stretch but he has the ability to be a well above average PF IMO.

On a team that doesn't have any other players, aside from Kyrie, projecting in a similar fashion, I think it would be wise to hold on to such a player... even if you overpay him in his mid 20's.
 
Listen. TT isn't a bad player by any means. Rather average to be honest. I think he's useful in Cleveland and I think he'd be useful on any team you put him on.

With that being said however, people don't want to trade him or reduce his minutes for no reason. If we didn't have another PF on the roster with way more upside this wouldn't be a problem. But we do. We'll eventually have to choose between TT and Bennett, so why not choose the guy who will be cheaper to retain with a higher ceiling? I think people need to put their personal biases aside and view this situation rationally.

Before anyone points this out, yes I know that Bennett is likely out for the year. Regardless though the writing is on the wall that TT is approaching his last days as a Cavalier. It would be unjustifiable to give TT a worthy extension (something around 4/32 or 4/40) when we just drafted a better prospect than him in AB. You can't have 2 guys that exclusively play 1 position splitting time with each other. That's not smart at all.
 
Jermaine Ali said:
Listen. TT isn't a bad player by any means. Rather average to be honest. I think he's useful in Cleveland and I think he'd be useful on any team you put him on.

With that being said however, people don't want to trade him or reduce his minutes for no reason. If we didn't have another PF on the roster with way more upside this wouldn't be a problem. But we do. We'll eventually have to choose between TT and Bennett, so why not choose the guy who will be cheaper to retain with a higher ceiling? I think people need to put their personal biases aside and view this situation rationally.

Before anyone points this out, yes I know that Bennett is likely out for the year. Regardless though the writing is on the wall that TT is approaching his last days as a Cavalier. It would be unjustifiable to give TT a worthy extension (something around 4/32 or 4/40) when we just drafted a better prospect than him in AB. You can't have 2 guys that exclusively play 1 position splitting time with each other. That's not smart at all.
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Enough with AB's upside, it's not a guarantee he's going to fulfill his vast potential. He gets treated like a 20-10 guy already, what has he done to justify moving TT before we have to? Being the #1 pick in the worst draft in 20 years?

AB was the better prospect before the draft, big whoop. That meant absolutely nothing as soon as he stepped on the court. Derrick Williams was the much more highly regarded prospect predraft than TT, who would you want right now?

Unless he makes massive improvements this offseason (not impossible, just doubtful) AB is going to be the one not living up to his salary in a couple years.
 
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