one thing i have noticed about this forum is that people vastly over rate josh smith. I watch a ton of games on league pass and i dont understand what people are fawning over. Sometimes I think people just look at the stat sheets. I just dont get it.
Much like many Celtics fans do with Rondo - just look at the stat sheets?
Here are Smith's regular season averages (per 36 Min) for his career:
16.0 Pts
8.4 Reb
3.4 Ass
1.4 Stl
2.2 Blk
46% FG
29% 3PT
66% FT
2.6 TO
Now none of those individual stats might really jump out at you, but look at his current season stats collectively and you will see that he is currently the
only player in the league who is averaging at least:
* 17 PPG
* 8 RPG
* 4 APG
* 1 SPG
* 2 BPK
* 45% FG
You might say I've swayed the stats in his favour to produce these results, so I'll entertain that idea. If you reduce the weighting of the defensive stats so that it includes everyone who averages at least 0.5 blocks and 0.5 steals (17/8/4/0.5/0.5/45%) the list now expands to include:
* Lebron James
Yes, the best player in the world. But lets make it easier for the smaller guys and bring down the rebound average down by one point (17/7/4/0.5/0.5/45%). Now the list grows to include one more player:
* Kevin Durant
Yep, probably the second best player in the world. Bring the assist average down by one (17/7/3/0.5/0.5/45%) and the list increases to also include:
* Blake Griffin
Now i'll bring the scoring down by two (15/7/3/0.5/0.5/45%) and the list increased to include:
* Greg Monroe
* Al Hortford
So even if you cut this down to all the players who average at least 15 points, 7 rebounds and 3 assists, 0.5 blocks, 0.5 steals and 45% FG you have a total list as follows:
* Josh Smith
* Lebron James
* Kevin Durant
* Blake Griffin
* Greg Monroe
* Al Hortford
I don't care what anyone says, that's pretty impressive company right there, and how far did I need to move on the stats just to open that list up to 6 people??
It's very easy to see why Josh Smith is one of the better 'swiss army knife' type players in the league. In the right system he has the potential to one day be a 20/10/5 player...to achieve this he would only need an extra 3 points, 1.5 rebounds and 1 assist per game.
He might not be a superstar scorer, but there are no other frontcourt players in the league bar maybe Lebron and Durant who can impact a game in so many ways on a nightly basis.
The problem with this is that we already have a 'swiss army knife' type player in Rondo. Having two stars on the team makes little sense to me if neither of those guys has 'scoring' as their primary talent. It makes sense right now when we have Pierce and KG on the team, but it lead to us being a horrific offensive team once those guys retire (even worse than we are now!).
I think either of those guys (Rondo / Smith) is a very valuable player, but they need to be in the right situation to give a team the most benefit.
Rondo IMHO needs to be on a team full of shooters, like New York or Orlando. He needs the ball in his hands a LOT so he needs guys around him who can catch and shoot quickly. When he has guys around him who need to put the ball on the floor to be effective (Terry, Green, Lee) he's not very effective, because he takes so much time off the clock that once those guys get the ball they only have time to take a jump shot...and aside from Terry neither of those guys are great catch and shoot players.
Smith can pretty much fit on any team so long as he doesn't need to be a number one scoring option. If Josh Smith is your number one scoring option it puts pressure on him to put up a lot of shots (rather than just getting his points in the flow of the offense), and when he's in that role he's going to start jacking up bad shots (as he often does now). If he doesn't need to take on that responsibilty then he's great for any team, because any team in the league wants a long, athletic guy that rebounds, scores, passes well and can defend any position on the court.
If you look at the current makeup of our team, Smith fits us better than Rondo does because:
1. We do not have a lot of good spot up shooters
2. Smith could be a #3 scorer behind Pierce and KG
If you look at our team once Pierce and KG retire, neither player fits us because:
1. We do not have a lot of good spot up shooters
2. Either Smith or Green will become our #1 scoring option
The thing is, in order to make Smith fit our team we would only really need to make one move - bring in a top calibre scorer (a Monta Ellis / James Harden type) and Smith could then settle in to a "Pippen" like role as the secondary star.
In order to make Rondo work though, we would need to change our entire roster - either trade away all of our current players (bar Terry) for more pure shooters, or try to force our current players to become pure shooters. Neither option is convenient for us, and neither of those is something I would want to go through just for the sake of suiting one player.
Anywhoo moving away from that point (the name "Rondo" seems to bring instant flames here) I think we can afford to have either one of Rondo / Smith on our team, but I don't think the two of them fit all that well together from a team perspective.