For you guys that are killing Rozier and Brown, have you seen that Tatum has been tentative, inconsistent and forcing mid range jumpers this year. Have you noticed that Brown is actually playing better defense than Smart. Did you see Morris, Smart, Hayward, and Horford we're as bad or invisible as Brown and Rozier tonight and Smart and Morris had worse +/- than Brown tonight in less minutes.
Yeah, you guys love harping on the same players because they are struggling in the early season as they learn to take on completely different roles, but the fact is the only players producing regularly on the whole team is Morris and Kyrie. That's it. Everyone else has been inconsistent and performing below their career norms.
Yeah, outside of a few games, this just isn't true. He did as good as one can on Kawhi last night, but that's kind of the problem - that's the only time he shows up as a defender. When he has a big matchup individually, he's generally pretty good at staying with him and making things difficult for him, but similar to Rozier he is a mess when he's off the ball defensively, as he has no sense of how to play help defense or off the ball team defense, which are major factors in good basketball defenders and why players like Smart and Horford are so valuable defensively.
Mitchell made him look silly when he was on him tonight.
EDIT: Also, posters here (me especially) are highly sensitive to those with low BBIQ, which not coincidentally fits both Rozier and Brown perfectly, as neither of them have even average BBIQs, especially Rozier.
Yeah, one, you're wrong about Jaylen's defense, he has been this team's best defender. After the first few minutes of each half, he wasn't even on Mitchell tonight. In the first 4 minutes of this game he shut down Mitchell and forced Utah to miss two layups because of his defensive pressure on the drive. Then he went to the bench and didn't come back until the second quarter.
Also, you are completely wrong about his basketball IQ. Players with low BBIQs don't play great defense, aren't the best cutters off the ball on the team, don't improve their handle every year he is in the league, doesn't improve his passing off the drive as much as he has, doesn't miss defensive switches at all. He is doing what he is coached to do....shoot the open three when you have it and be aggressive to the basket and pass to the open shooter on the outside when the drive isn't able to be finished.
I'm legitimately awe-struck that anyone can watch Brown and think his BBIQ is adequate.
1) He's a pretty good individual defender, though I wouldn't say great. But he's primarily an individual defender, not a team defender, which is largely due to his measurables and athleticism. He's completely lost off the ball. Watch him the next game; he regularly gets caught watching the ball and loses his man, along with overhelping at times. He's no Smart or Horford, who actively lead the team from the defensive side of the ball.
2) He's not that good at off-ball movement offensively, so I'm not sure what you're seeing there. If he was, our offense would be much better. In fact, I rarely see him moving off the ball, and he rarely scores off of backdoor cuts or anything of that nature.
3) Uh, it's easy to improve your ballhandling every year when you start at such a low bar. He could barely dribble and chew gum at the same time when he entered the league, and at best right now he is an average ballhandler, likely still below average for his position. That's one of the main factors that limits his ceiling.
4) See above. Brown is still not a good passer. Like the cutting aspect, not sure where you're pulling this stuff from.
5) He's definitely missed on some switches, but with how much we switch that's not really a criticism I can make of him.
Hell, Scal was just saying the same things I have been saying. You can't point to just one or two guys when the whole team sucks. You can't concentrate on one or two games when he was playing better a bunch of games before that. And that it's up to the whole team, coaching staff and other players to help maximizing Jaylen's ability. He barely touches the ball when playing with the starters. Most of the time he sits in a corner waiting for a kick out open three. That's on the coaching staff to use him better and his team mates to get him involved more.
I mean, I like Scal, but Scal is an overly positive pushover who is just trying to keep his job. He's not giving any objective analysis.
And I'm not pointing to just one or two guys. Pretty much everyone outside of Kyrie shares some blame, as he's the only one who has really been giving any consistent effort and play lately.
For whatever reason, I think you're overprotecting/giving too much credit to Brown here, pointing outward on all of his issues rather than giving him any of the blame whatsoever, even though he's seemingly not improved his game at all since last year, even in the areas that shouldn't be affected by him adjusting to a new role.