Some interesting notes on Rondos jumpshooting from ESPN

[BballTim]

I was very optimistic that the TEAM USA experience would motivate Rondo to reassess and round out his game.

I was wrong again.

DH

  He was playing like an MVP candidate before the injuries kicked in. How much more than that were you expecting?

 

Sorry but I'm lost here... he was playing like an MVP in the Team USA qualifyiny/friendly games?  But he still would have been cut from the team?

  No, he's talking about the nba season, after team USA.

[cavman]

I was very optimistic that the TEAM USA experience would motivate Rondo to reassess and round out his game.

I was wrong again.

DH

  He was playing like an MVP candidate before the injuries kicked in. How much more than that were you expecting?

 

Sorry but I'm lost here... he was playing like an MVP in the Team USA qualifyiny/friendly games?  But he still would have been cut from the team?

I believe he was referring to the 2010-2011 season, not Team USA.  Rondo was playing VERY well, and then the injuries and trade deadline slowed him down.  The expectation was expressed for learning from the Team USA experience.

[Finkelskyhook]

I was very optimistic that the TEAM USA experience would motivate Rondo to reassess and round out his game.

I was wrong again.

DH

  He was playing like an MVP candidate before the injuries kicked in. How much more than that were you expecting?

 

Sorry but I'm lost here... he was playing like an MVP in the Team USA qualifyiny/friendly games?  But he still would have been cut from the team?

I believe he was referring to the 2010-2011 season, not Team USA.  Rondo was playing VERY well, and then the injuries and trade deadline slowed him down.  The expectation was expressed for learning from the Team USA experience.

How exactly is he going to "round out his game" playing in meaningless mismatches of pickup games? 

Rondo would get more competition in Celtics' team practices than the sacrificial lambs they played in these glorified street games. 

[CelticG1]

If Rondo has another par year of shooting for himself this next year are we going to be going through the same arguments?

If he shoots 65% from the free throw line are people going to really consider that an improvement worth noting?

Rondo has set the bar so low with his shooting it's ridiculous.

He is an incredible player but he has to work so much harder than  others due to his shortcomings.

  I don't think he needs to work harder than others due to his shortcomings because he has skills that compensate for them.

What skills compensate for him not having to work harder than others? He has to constantly be moving on offense or else he is pretty useless. He can't act as a decoy and can't spread the floor so he is constantly cutting and penetrating when he is on offense. If he doesn't do that our offense definitely suffers.

[BballTim]

If Rondo has another par year of shooting for himself this next year are we going to be

If he shoots 65% from the free throw line are people going to really consider that an improvement worth noting?

Rondo has set the bar so low with his shooting it's ridiculous.

He is an incredible player but he has to work so much harder than  others due to his shortcomings.

  I don't think he needs to work harder than others due to his shortcomings because he has skills that compensate for them.

What skills compensate for him not having to work harder than others? He has to constantly be moving on offense or else he is pretty useless. He can't act as a decoy and can't spread the floor so he is constantly cutting and penetrating when he is on offense. If he doesn't do that our offense definitely suffers.

  I'd say things like vision, passing and running the offense. He doesn't help spread the floor but he gets the team a fair amount of easy buckets.

[CelticG1]

If Rondo has another par year of shooting for himself this next year are we going to be

If he shoots 65% from the free throw line are people going to really consider that an improvement worth noting?

Rondo has set the bar so low with his shooting it's ridiculous.

He is an incredible player but he has to work so much harder than  others due to his shortcomings.

  I don't think he needs to work harder than others due to his shortcomings because he has skills that compensate for them.

What skills compensate for him not having to work harder than others? He has to constantly be moving on offense or else he is pretty useless. He can't act as a decoy and can't spread the floor so he is constantly cutting and penetrating when he is on offense. If he doesn't do that our offense definitely suffers.

  I'd say things like vision, passing and running the offense. He doesn't help spread the floor but he gets the team a fair amount of easy buckets.

I guess those things help slightly but overall Rondo has to work incredibly hard to be successful. When he's not going at 100% he struggles and it hurts the team

[greenpride32]

  I'd say things like vision, passing and running the offense. He doesn't help spread the floor but he gets the team a fair amount of easy buckets.

So guys like Paul, Nash, D-Will don't have vision?  They don't get their teams easy buckets?  They do that AND they can score the ball. 

[BballTim]

If Rondo has another par year of shooting for himself this next year are we going to be

If he shoots 65% from the free throw line are people going to really consider that an improvement worth noting?

Rondo has set the bar so low with his shooting it's ridiculous.

He is an incredible player but he has to work so much harder than  others due to his shortcomings.

  I don't think he needs to work harder than others due to his shortcomings because he has skills that compensate for them.

What skills compensate for him not having to work harder than others? He has to constantly be moving on offense or else he is pretty useless. He can't act as a decoy and can't spread the floor so he is constantly cutting and penetrating when he is on offense. If he doesn't do that our offense definitely suffers.

  I'd say things like vision, passing and running the offense. He doesn't help spread the floor but he gets the team a fair amount of easy buckets.

I guess those things help slightly but overall Rondo has to work incredibly hard to be successful. When he's not going at 100% he struggles and it hurts the team

  Help slightly? Really?

  I would say that if CP3, Rose, Williams or any other top pg struggles it also hurts the team. But you're making it sound like he has to outwork and outhustle other players to be effective, like AV or maybe Leon Powe. That's not the case, there are a number of things he generally does better than his opponents.

[BballTim]

  I'd say things like vision, passing and running the offense. He doesn't help spread the floor but he gets the team a fair amount of easy buckets.

So guys like Paul, Nash, D-Will don't have vision?  They don't get their teams easy buckets?  They do that AND they can score the ball. 

  I don't think they all do it equally well. I don't think, for instance, that Williams has the same vision or passing ability as Nash. But those four and Rondo are the cream of the crop, and I'd put all the other point guards well below them.

[deekhead]

I was very optimistic that the TEAM USA experience would motivate Rondo to reassess and round out his game.

I was wrong again.

DH

  He was playing like an MVP candidate before the injuries kicked in. How much more than that were you expecting?

 

I had hoped that  Rondo would come out of the Coach K/TEAM USA adversity with humility and maybe a sober reassessment of his skill set and what needed to change. Didn’t happen.

Instead Rondo played an even more frantically skewed game including a weird obsession with racking up dimes at the expense of the rest of his offensive game, something that suffered mightily.

He ran himself right into the ground apparently believing that he could somehow redefine/revolutionize PG play, making it into a virtual non-shooting position.

Good luck with that, kiddo.

DH

[BballTim]

I was very optimistic that the TEAM USA experience would motivate Rondo to reassess and round out his game.

I was wrong again.

DH

  He was playing like an MVP candidate before the injuries kicked in. How much more than that were you expecting?

  

I had hoped that  Rondo would come out of the Coach K/TEAM USA adversity with humility and maybe a sober reassessment of his skill set and what needed to change. Didn’t happen.

  I'd feel a lot worse about having Rondo on the team if he changed the way he played on the Celts to improve his chances to be selected for the next version of Team USA. Thankfully he's nowhere near that selfish a player.

Instead Rondo played an even more frantically skewed game including a weird obsession with racking up dimes at the expense of the rest of his offensive game, something that suffered mightily.

  Because what Rondo understands (and many people here don't) is that *his* offensive game isn't important, *the team's* offensive game is what matters. People noticed that Ray had to change his play to fit in better with KG and Paul and his individual offensive game suffered and lauded his team-first attitude. When Rondo does the same it's some huge character flaw.

  Rondo could come back next year playing mediocre defense and with no better than average passing/floor general skills but better outside shooting and hitting more of his free throws and a number of people here would go back and forth between praising his improvement and wondering why the offense worse.

He ran himself right into the ground apparently believing that he could somehow redefine/revolutionize PG play, making it into a virtual non-shooting position.

Good luck with that, kiddo.

DH

  Yes, he's trying to "revolutionize" the pg spot by passing the ball. And how exactly is it so tremendously taxing to pass the ball than shoot it? Would LeBron be tremendously fresher at the end of the game if he always shot and never passed? That makes no sense at all.

[ballin]

Here's the real issue:

Ballin's Law of NBA Improvement

"A player shall not play at a level significantly above what they have thus demonstrated in their first four years as a player in the NBA."


Go to basketball-reference.com and check out the stats, and tell me if I'm wrong. Some notes:

1. Those that are high on Rondo Jeff Green had best observe this rule.
2. Ballin's Law applies to FT% as well as everything else.
3. Steve Nash isn't human, so this doesn't apply to him.

  Aside from Nash (and, technically, canadians are considered humans), start with JO and Billups. I'll find more if I get bored. It's probably easier to do with free throws, btw.

The fact that you'd have to proactively look for more players just proves that I'm right and the two players you've mentioned are the exceptions rather than the rule.

Anybody that thinks Rondo's jumpshot will improve significantly from this point on is just engaging in extremely wishful thinking.

I really think it's foolish to bank on Rondo ever surpassing his 2009/2010 level of play, all things considered. I'd keep him around for this year and then see what we can get for him when we start rebuilding.

[BballTim]

Here's the real issue:

Ballin's Law of NBA Improvement

"A player shall not play at a level significantly above what they have thus demonstrated in their first four years as a player in the NBA."


Go to basketball-reference.com and check out the stats, and tell me if I'm wrong. Some notes:

1. Those that are high on Rondo Jeff Green had best observe this rule.
2. Ballin's Law applies to FT% as well as everything else.
3. Steve Nash isn't human, so this doesn't apply to him.

  Aside from Nash (and, technically, canadians are considered humans), start with JO and Billups. I'll find more if I get bored. It's probably easier to do with free throws, btw.

The fact that you'd have to proactively look for more players just proves that I'm right and the two players you've mentioned are the exceptions rather than the rule.

  Haha. So, to summarize, you make a claim about players, challenge people to check it out on basketballreference and claim that the fact that I was quickly able to find examples where you were wrong proves you right. Nice.

  BTW, I didn't notice your original claim said that it applied to everything, add Rodman's rebounding to the list, Magic's three point shooting as well. What you have is a trend that most players follow, not a law (or a law with a lot of exceptions).

Anybody that thinks Rondo's jumpshot will improve significantly from this point on is just engaging in extremely wishful thinking.

  Maybe, maybe not. The fact is that many if not most players shoot better when they're older.

I really think it's foolish to bank on Rondo ever surpassing his 2009/2010 level of play, all things considered. I'd keep him around for this year and then see what we can get for him when we start rebuilding.

  When Rondo was healthy last year he was playing at a level well above that level of play. Those who expect him to regress back to that 2009/2010 level are just engaging in extremely wishful thinking.

[cman88]

isnt rondo really already an exception to the rule though?...its not often you draft an allstar calibar player at #24 in the draft...his first year with the big 3, he really wasnt a HUGE factor, but his game has developed more and more to where he's now the "straw that stirs the drink"

so, I think trying to say "well (so and so) is an exception" and using stats to say rondo cant/wont do this or that are pointless...because most often you arent getting a player like rondo at #24 and he's come back every year better than the one before.

[bfrombleacher]

isnt rondo really already an exception to the rule though?...its not often you draft an allstar calibar player at #24 in the draft...his first year with the big 3, he really wasnt a HUGE factor, but his game has developed more and more to where he's now the "straw that stirs the drink"

so, I think trying to say "well (so and so) is an exception" and using stats to say rondo cant/wont do this or that are pointless...because most often you arent getting a player like rondo at #24 and he's come back every year better than the one before.

That's so, so true. A 24th pick earning less than other elite point guards is in the same conversation as those point guards. Before his injury (or maybe Marquis's injury), he was in the race for the MVP. He improved every year. One can not help but be optimistic about him. Maybe he gives off a vibe of arrogance but there is clearly hard work put in and I'm sure he will get over his hump and get a jumper.