Hopefully the Jazz draft a Tarheel
by clarkpojo on Jun 20, 2009 8:46 PM MDT
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Tyler Hansbrough is a tough, tough basketball player. All you have to do is see the clip of his nose gushing blood all over his chin after Gerald Henderson sucker-elbowed him in the face to be convinced. And his nose wasn't even broken. You know that Jerry Sloan would just love the effort that this kid would put in the gym and on the court. It's no wonder so many Jazz fans are so excited about the prospect of bringing in the guy to replace either Boozer or Millsap.
And after the official measurements came out reading Psycho T as more athletic and long than many realized, many other teams' fans are clamoring for the lunch-pail attitude and basketball ability that Hansbrough possesses. I am just not one of the fans that hopes he comes to the Jazz. You see, there is a teammate of Hansbrough that I covet about 10 times more.
The player that the Jazz should be targeting right now as we speak, is not Tyler Hansbrough, but Ty Lawson. And just for the record, I wanted the Jazz to take Lawson over anyone else who would possibly last until 20th before John Hollinger wrote this or Dave Berri, the SUU professor wrote this. There really isn't a good reason not to take the best player on the best college team of last year in this year's upcoming draft.
Before I go into making a case for Lawson, I need to get one thing out of the way. The best move in the draft 9 times out of 10 is to draft the best player available. I would say that right now teams draft for need about 50-60% of the time, but justify most of those decisions by saying that it was, in their mind, the best player available also. To illustrate my point, lets look at the Clippers this year. The last position they need to fill, is the power forward position, but everyone would call them crazy if they took anyone but Griffin, because he is more talented than the other players in the draft. That same train of thought still applies at the 15th pick, or the 30th pick. In fact, when teams pick for need, they draft players like AC Law, or Sam Bowie, or Goran Dragic. It fails more often than succeeds. About 3 seasons, ago, if a basketball team was up by 3 points and the other team had the ball in the closing seconds, less than half of the teams would foul in that situation. Now, you are criticized harshly if you don't foul in that situation. The drafting strategy of GMs is going to become the 3-point lead situation in a few years. The league will catch up and realize that drafting for a need is not the way to go. With that said, if Ty Lawson is still on the board when the Jazz are ready to use the 20th pick, then I am 99% confident that Lawson will be the best available player left in the draft.
I am not going to spend a lot of time in breaking down Ty Lawson's game, but to prove how much I love his game, I have decided that if I had the 5th pick or lower, I would draft Lawson. I think he is the 2nd or 3rd best point guard in the draft. Most of you have seen him play in college and I will just pass on a couple of tidbits of information.
1) He was the most important and best player on the national championship team last season. I am not a UNC fan, but I live in North Carolina and I listened to the talk radio and watched the ACC games and the Heels didn't need a good game from Tyler Hansbrough to win. But they did need Lawson to have a good game to win. He carried them in the NCAA tournament.
2) He is lightning quick and upon his first NBA game, will immediately be in the top 5 percent of fastest players in the league joining the likes of Aaron Brooks, Nate Robinson, Jonny Flynn, and Chris Paul.
3) He can shoot it from outside- he shot better than 50% from the field in his 3 years at UNC and last season, he shot 48% from the college 3 point line and his continuing improvement with the outside jumper shows he may be able to get even better. Similarly to Aaron Brooks, Chris Paul and other speedy point guards, if you can't keep a guy in front of you and you can't back off him and let him shoot open jumpers, how do you guard him?
We can call Lawson Psycho T if it will make disappointed Jazz fans feel better.
The way I see it, there are only three reasons that Jazz fans would give for not wanting Lawson to be the pick. Two of them I can refute.
REASON #1- Why would the Jazz draft a guy that will only play 5-10 minutes behind our best player every night? We don't need another point guard.
If this is how you feel, take a minute and ask yourself if you are falling into the drafting for need trap. Other than the Lakers of last season, championship teams have always had a very good back up point guard. Sam Cassell, Lindsey Hunter, Beno Udrih, Derek Fisher and BJ Armstrong all came off the bench and helped their teams keep or extend leads. When the Jazz were at their collective best, they had one of the team's best back up point guards in Howard Eisley. And in the Jazz system a back up point guard needs to only do two things: run the team offense and make an open jumper. Last season, Ronnie Price couldn't run the team offense and Brevin Knight couldn't hit an open jumper with consistency. Lawson has some of Ronnie Price's shooting mentality, but more importantly, he played the point in college and he knows how to run plays and get the ball to scorers.
If Lawson only played 10 minutes behind Deron Williams it would make the team a lot better, but if he is productive, Sloan could easily find ways to give him more minutes. For instance, I could see Lawson and Deron playing in the backcourt together for 5-10 minutes every game. Deron doesn't love playing shooting guard, but he does it when Sloan asks him too. I would also love the idea of throwing a lineup of Lawson, Williams, Brewer, AK and Okur and just running and gunning a few weaker teams off the floor when we are on the road. Which just really sums up my whole best player argument. The best move is to take the best player and then figure out the details later and get creative. But two good players at one position is always better than one good player and one barely scraping by at two different positions.
REASON #2- Lawson has a toe injury that is worrying some teams.
This is the one argument I cannot refute with 100% confidence. I don't know what his toe issues are specifically and I haven't seen any x-rays or diagnostic tests on it. What I do know is that the toe kept him out of a couple of games this last season, but I also know that his toe was injured during the NCAA tournament and he was the Most Outstanding Player, so I think he can probably work it out okay.
REASON #3- Lawson won't even be there at number 20, so don't worry about it.
This might be true, but one or two people that are projected to go top 20 are going to fall this draft. It will just happen. And I would bet a hundred dollars that at least one very good point guard will fall to 20. And there is probably a 50/50 chance that Lawson is there when the Jazz draft. Here is a list of teams that could or will take a point guard before the Jazz select:
1. Kings
2. T-Wolves
3. Golden State
4. Knicks
5. Bucks
6.Pacers
7. Suns
8. 76ers
9. Hawks
Here is a list of point guards that are projected to go higher than Lawson on most draft boards.
Ricky Rubio
Stephen Curry
Jonny Flynn
Tyreke Evans
Jrue Holiday
Brandon Jennings
Jeff Teague
Eric Maynor
Ty Lawson
So if you do the math one of two things needs to happen in order for Lawson to fall to 20th. Either another point needs to pass Lawson on the list or else one or two of those listed teams, needs to take someone other than a point guard. The latter scenario is not only possible but likely. Guys like Earl Clark, James Johnson, DeJuan Blair, and BJ Mullens are going to tempt teams into avoiding there need to take a point guard. And yes, I said a need, because you know they will be looking for needs. Of course, the flip side is that only one team in the 1-19 spots needs to fall in love with Lawson and this is all a moot point. But looking at the media outlets of all those listed teams, only Philadelphia has shown an inkling for Lawson over other similar point guards. That is why I think Lawson being there for the Jazz is a 50/50 chance. If he gets past number 17, I think the chances of him being at 20 will raise to about 80%.
The good news is that if Lawson does get snatched up by an earlier team, then another talented point guard or great player at another position will fall to them. Right now I think that there is a good chance that the best player available will be a point guard, but there are a few sleepers that may fall at the forward spots. In closing here is my list of the best players in this draft with position making no impact on the list. If any of these players are available to the Jazz, then they should be drafted.
1. Blake Griffin
2. Ricky Rubio
3. Stephen Curry
4. Hasheem Thabeet
5. Jrue Holiday
6. Jordan Hill
7. Ty Lawson
8. Tyreke Evans
9. Jonny Flynn
10. Earl Clark
11. Dejuan Blair
12. Demar DeRozan
13. Brandon Jennings
14. James Harden
15. Eric Maynor
16. Gerald Henderson
17. Jeff Teague
18. Terrence Williams
19. Tyler Hansbrough
20. Derrick Brown
It's not that I don't like you Tyler. Cheer up. I put you in my top 20.
All comments are the opinion of the commenter and not necessarily that of SLC Dunk or SB Nation.
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Nice post.
First, the Nets could also go PG.
Second… re: UNC. I put up my top-10 targets for the Jazz, and it features 3 Tar Heels… Lawson, Green & Hansbrough. Lawson at #4, Green #7 and Hansbrough #10.
(I really don’t like Hansbrough… as I’ve mentioned here a couple of times).
Third… Sadly, I don’t see Lawson falling to us. He could be a lottery pick now. Or go to the Hawks at #19… they’ll probably take the best PG available.
And your list & my list… they don’t exactly mesh. Of course, I left off a lot of guys that’ll be gone, and I did add a couple of guys that’ll be reaches.
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RIP Nick Adenhart. 4/9/09
by UtesFan89 on Jun 20, 2009 9:14 PM MDT reply actions 0 recs
Nice argument for Lawson...
Not that I needed it. I love Lawson. He reminds me a little bit of Mike Conley because of his efficiency. Your right about drafting BPA instead of needs. Okay what if Hansbrough and Lawson are available at 20…probabaly neither will be but “what if”…..what do we do then? I put my money on Sloan drafting TH….even though the best bet for the Franchise would probably be TL….
Nobody knows when the injury bug will bite….it would be nice to have a feeling of security if DWill ever went down for a while….like we did with Boozer.
"You can live for Nothing or die for Something, it's your call" - John Rambo
by Matt_Grbac on Jun 20, 2009 10:39 PM MDT reply actions 0 recs
The NBA
is in a golden era of point guards. There are still some older ones in Billups and Parker and Nash, our two faves in DWill and CP, last year brought us Derrick Rose, and there’s a tough class this year. The list could go on… Rondo…Bibby played pretty well for Atlanta…Reefer Alston is going to make it hard for Orlando to keep him off the court…. how about OJ Mayo… If you like small ball, this is a great time to be an NBA fan.
I'll make it coach.
by MTN on Jun 20, 2009 11:50 PM MDT reply actions 0 recs
That's true. And the Lakers inability to handle talented point guards was almost their downfall this year.
But in this draft it is like a 4:1 scenario of good point guards to good players at other positions. I just think there is a good chance that the BPA will be a point guard and I will be disappointed if the Jazz go size over heighth.
The more you try to erase me, the more that I appear.
by clarkpojo on Jun 22, 2009 4:08 AM MDT up reply actions 0 recs
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