Ainge: Fans expectations of Jeff Green are not right

[winsomme]

Ainge has a misunderstanding of fans expectations.  I don't think anyone expects Green to score 25-30 every night, but there certainly should be an expectation of more consistency within his numbers.  He shouldn't have numbers that look like this:

39
16
8
14
18
8
36

That is too much of a yo-yo.  That is the issue.  Now granted his shot attempts are certainly more consistent, but his foul shot attempts are not (which is indicative of his lack of aggression a lot). 

Fans are frustrated by Green because he is frustratingly inconsistent.  Some games he looks like Lebron James and sometimes he looks like he doesn't belong in the league.  I'd be much happier with something in the middle.

  The problem with Green is that some people claim he's inconsistent, everybody else claims he's inconsistent and when they watch him play they're looking for him to be inconsistent. They then see it.

  What they don't see is that if you look at non-star players on other things you'll be looking at, in general, inconsistent players. "Consistent" nba players have the ball in their hands a lot with the understanding that they're the first option on their team and they'll get a lot of shots every night. Most of their teammates don't have such consistent roles in the offense, hence their scoring is inconsistent.

I don't disagree with you at all, I was merely commenting on Ainge's point.  I mean Luol Deng (though he was a lot more consistent in chicago), Evan Turner, Jeff Green, etc. are all pretty much the same type of player with the same type of consistency.  They are on bad teams though.  Deng was much more consistent on Chicago then he has been in Cleveland.  Green, even when he was on the 50 win team, was still very inconsistent from game to game.  You look at a guy like Wesley Matthews (#3 in Portland) and he is pretty darn consistent.  7 games under 10, 6 games at 24 or more (and none higher than 28), with everything else in between.  That is what you would want from a Green level scorer.

  Again, though, it's all expectations influenced by others. In 2012 Deng had 9 games under 10, 23 games 10-19 and 20 games of 20+. This year Green's at 9 games under 10, 30 games 10-19 and 11 20+ games. Matthews is at 7 games under 10, 28 games 10-19 and 14 games 20+.

 If you look at those numbers for for those three players you could easily claim that Green was the most consistent, yet you're claiming that he's very inconsistent while Matthews and Deng(when he was on Chicago) are/were very consistent. You can claim that Green has slightly more of the occasional high scoring games than they do but you're just splitting hairs.

Green is certainly inconsistent as a scorer. Independent of what should be expected of him, he simply is inconsistent. That really isn't debatable. The question is why? Why is he so inconsistent? Saying he's not a star player isn't really an answer and that's the question I would like Danny or Stevens to answer. After his big game a couple of weeks ago, Stevens said they need to be running more plays for him, getting him into a groove early and that he was a rhythm scorer. That sounds like a guy that you want to be a focus of your offense.

Also, post-PP/KG trade, one of the big talking points was how Green's offense would blossom now that he would be getting shots. Honestly, this assessment of Green coming out of the Cs front office is pretty surprising...

[BballTim]

Ainge has a misunderstanding of fans expectations.  I don't think anyone expects Green to score 25-30 every night, but there certainly should be an expectation of more consistency within his numbers.  He shouldn't have numbers that look like this:

39
16
8
14
18
8
36

That is too much of a yo-yo.  That is the issue.  Now granted his shot attempts are certainly more consistent, but his foul shot attempts are not (which is indicative of his lack of aggression a lot). 

Fans are frustrated by Green because he is frustratingly inconsistent.  Some games he looks like Lebron James and sometimes he looks like he doesn't belong in the league.  I'd be much happier with something in the middle.

  The problem with Green is that some people claim he's inconsistent, everybody else claims he's inconsistent and when they watch him play they're looking for him to be inconsistent. They then see it.

  What they don't see is that if you look at non-star players on other things you'll be looking at, in general, inconsistent players. "Consistent" nba players have the ball in their hands a lot with the understanding that they're the first option on their team and they'll get a lot of shots every night. Most of their teammates don't have such consistent roles in the offense, hence their scoring is inconsistent.

I don't disagree with you at all, I was merely commenting on Ainge's point.  I mean Luol Deng (though he was a lot more consistent in chicago), Evan Turner, Jeff Green, etc. are all pretty much the same type of player with the same type of consistency.  They are on bad teams though.  Deng was much more consistent on Chicago then he has been in Cleveland.  Green, even when he was on the 50 win team, was still very inconsistent from game to game.  You look at a guy like Wesley Matthews (#3 in Portland) and he is pretty darn consistent.  7 games under 10, 6 games at 24 or more (and none higher than 28), with everything else in between.  That is what you would want from a Green level scorer.

  Again, though, it's all expectations influenced by others. In 2012 Deng had 9 games under 10, 23 games 10-19 and 20 games of 20+. This year Green's at 9 games under 10, 30 games 10-19 and 11 20+ games. Matthews is at 7 games under 10, 28 games 10-19 and 14 games 20+.

 If you look at those numbers for for those three players you could easily claim that Green was the most consistent, yet you're claiming that he's very inconsistent while Matthews and Deng(when he was on Chicago) are/were very consistent. You can claim that Green has slightly more of the occasional high scoring games than they do but you're just splitting hairs.

Green is certainly inconsistent as a scorer. Independent of what should be expected of him, he simply is inconsistent. That really isn't debatable. The question is why? Why is he so inconsistent?

  Again, though, if most 15-16 ppg players are pretty inconsistent scorers and Green's a 15-16 ppg scorer, why are you asking why?

[mmmmm]

Ainge has a misunderstanding of fans expectations.  I don't think anyone expects Green to score 25-30 every night, but there certainly should be an expectation of more consistency within his numbers.  He shouldn't have numbers that look like this:

39
16
8
14
18
8
36

That is too much of a yo-yo.  That is the issue.  Now granted his shot attempts are certainly more consistent, but his foul shot attempts are not (which is indicative of his lack of aggression a lot). 

I disagree.  For a 15-16 ppg scorer, I would rather have numbers like this rather than consistently scoring between 12 and 19 points almost every night.

Not when you are a third or fourth option (which is what Green should be).  those guys need to consistently perform.  You just never know which Jeff Green is going to show up and that is a big problem.

I actually think the opposite is true.

You need your #1 and #2 option to be consistent.  You want to slot a guy in that role who can give you 18-30 points every single night.

Now, for your 3rd and 4th option, you can afford to have a guy who has more variance in his game.  That way, you can still win when he has off-nights, and when he's having a great game it can basically seal the deal for you.

I think Green is ideal in that 3rd / 4th role because of that, especially because his skillset means he's not very good scoring when the defense is keying in on him, but he can take a team by surprise if the focus is elsewhere.

Below are Green's shooting percentages in those games.  You can't be that inconsistent as a 3rd option.  You need to be pretty consistent in your efficiency.  Sure some nights you might get 20 shots and other nights you might get 6 shots, but you need to be the 45-55 range on hitting your shots as a 3rd option type player.

53.8
41.2
15.4
30.8
38.5
15.4
61.1

You just can't do that.

Hooray for tiny sample sizes!

[winsomme]

Ainge was on his weekly segment on the Toucher and Rich Show and had this to say...

“Other than the LeBrons, Kevin Durants and Paul Georges of the world you really don’t get consistently 25, 30+ points a night,” said Ainge. “Most players don’t ever score 36 points in a game, and Jeff’s had two in the past two weeks. I think that’s just how Jeff is. He’s a very good player and not a superstar player where we expect him to do that.”

“I think the expectations of him are not right."

“$9 million a year expectations I think that’s what Celtics fans have,” Rich chimed in.

“Well $9 million is half of a maximum contract. Jeff is giving us 16, 17 points a game on a very efficient overall year he’s having. I think that’s what people should expect.”

This is one of those quotes where Ainge just can't help himself. Like even if it is true that we as fans shouldn't expect an all star player out of Jeff Green, why would you say that publicly? I mean, what does that do Green's trade value? You certainly can't present him to other GMs as a player who is on the verge of being a building block if you criticize fans for expecting that of him...

Maybe Ainge isn't planning on trading Green or maybe he is shopping Green to playoff teams as someone who can be a complementary player that can be fitted around established stars.

Which is a role I think he'd really excel at and he'd certainly have tempered expectations elsewhere if he's asking to be third banana.

The situation in Boston right now isn't really conducive to people jumping on the Green bandwagon.

If it was Lebron/Rondo/Green, people would be singing a different tune right now, IMO.

Here's what I don't get. Why doesn't he shoot more? I mean, he's averaging like 13 shots a game. If he shot 4 or 5 more shots per game, he'd be a 20 PPG scorer, No? And if that were the case, would we be even having this conversation?

[BballTim]

Ainge has a misunderstanding of fans expectations.  I don't think anyone expects Green to score 25-30 every night, but there certainly should be an expectation of more consistency within his numbers.  He shouldn't have numbers that look like this:

39
16
8
14
18
8
36

That is too much of a yo-yo.  That is the issue.  Now granted his shot attempts are certainly more consistent, but his foul shot attempts are not (which is indicative of his lack of aggression a lot). 

I disagree.  For a 15-16 ppg scorer, I would rather have numbers like this rather than consistently scoring between 12 and 19 points almost every night.

Not when you are a third or fourth option (which is what Green should be).  those guys need to consistently perform.  You just never know which Jeff Green is going to show up and that is a big problem.

I actually think the opposite is true.

You need your #1 and #2 option to be consistent.  You want to slot a guy in that role who can give you 18-30 points every single night.

Now, for your 3rd and 4th option, you can afford to have a guy who has more variance in his game.  That way, you can still win when he has off-nights, and when he's having a great game it can basically seal the deal for you.

I think Green is ideal in that 3rd / 4th role because of that, especially because his skillset means he's not very good scoring when the defense is keying in on him, but he can take a team by surprise if the focus is elsewhere.

Below are Green's shooting percentages in those games.  You can't be that inconsistent as a 3rd option.  You need to be pretty consistent in your efficiency.  Sure some nights you might get 20 shots and other nights you might get 6 shots, but you need to be the 45-55 range on hitting your shots as a 3rd option type player.

53.8
41.2
15.4
30.8
38.5
15.4
61.1

You just can't do that.

  Your expectation for game to game consistency in fg% for 3rd options is wildly unrealistic.

[winsomme]

Ainge has a misunderstanding of fans expectations.  I don't think anyone expects Green to score 25-30 every night, but there certainly should be an expectation of more consistency within his numbers.  He shouldn't have numbers that look like this:

39
16
8
14
18
8
36

That is too much of a yo-yo.  That is the issue.  Now granted his shot attempts are certainly more consistent, but his foul shot attempts are not (which is indicative of his lack of aggression a lot). 

Fans are frustrated by Green because he is frustratingly inconsistent.  Some games he looks like Lebron James and sometimes he looks like he doesn't belong in the league.  I'd be much happier with something in the middle.

  The problem with Green is that some people claim he's inconsistent, everybody else claims he's inconsistent and when they watch him play they're looking for him to be inconsistent. They then see it.

  What they don't see is that if you look at non-star players on other things you'll be looking at, in general, inconsistent players. "Consistent" nba players have the ball in their hands a lot with the understanding that they're the first option on their team and they'll get a lot of shots every night. Most of their teammates don't have such consistent roles in the offense, hence their scoring is inconsistent.

I don't disagree with you at all, I was merely commenting on Ainge's point.  I mean Luol Deng (though he was a lot more consistent in chicago), Evan Turner, Jeff Green, etc. are all pretty much the same type of player with the same type of consistency.  They are on bad teams though.  Deng was much more consistent on Chicago then he has been in Cleveland.  Green, even when he was on the 50 win team, was still very inconsistent from game to game.  You look at a guy like Wesley Matthews (#3 in Portland) and he is pretty darn consistent.  7 games under 10, 6 games at 24 or more (and none higher than 28), with everything else in between.  That is what you would want from a Green level scorer.

  Again, though, it's all expectations influenced by others. In 2012 Deng had 9 games under 10, 23 games 10-19 and 20 games of 20+. This year Green's at 9 games under 10, 30 games 10-19 and 11 20+ games. Matthews is at 7 games under 10, 28 games 10-19 and 14 games 20+.

 If you look at those numbers for for those three players you could easily claim that Green was the most consistent, yet you're claiming that he's very inconsistent while Matthews and Deng(when he was on Chicago) are/were very consistent. You can claim that Green has slightly more of the occasional high scoring games than they do but you're just splitting hairs.

Green is certainly inconsistent as a scorer. Independent of what should be expected of him, he simply is inconsistent. That really isn't debatable. The question is why? Why is he so inconsistent?

  Again, though, if most 15-16 ppg players are pretty inconsistent scorers and Green's a 15-16 ppg scorer, why are you asking why?

Because it's not clear why he isn't more....Why isn't he taking more shots per game? What is it about his game that makes him inconsistent?

[mmmmm]

Ainge was on his weekly segment on the Toucher and Rich Show and had this to say...

“Other than the LeBrons, Kevin Durants and Paul Georges of the world you really don’t get consistently 25, 30+ points a night,” said Ainge. “Most players don’t ever score 36 points in a game, and Jeff’s had two in the past two weeks. I think that’s just how Jeff is. He’s a very good player and not a superstar player where we expect him to do that.”

“I think the expectations of him are not right."

“$9 million a year expectations I think that’s what Celtics fans have,” Rich chimed in.

“Well $9 million is half of a maximum contract. Jeff is giving us 16, 17 points a game on a very efficient overall year he’s having. I think that’s what people should expect.”

This is one of those quotes where Ainge just can't help himself. Like even if it is true that we as fans shouldn't expect an all star player out of Jeff Green, why would you say that publicly? I mean, what does that do Green's trade value? You certainly can't present him to other GMs as a player who is on the verge of being a building block if you criticize fans for expecting that of him...

Maybe Ainge has no intention of trading him?

[Moranis]

Ainge has a misunderstanding of fans expectations.  I don't think anyone expects Green to score 25-30 every night, but there certainly should be an expectation of more consistency within his numbers.  He shouldn't have numbers that look like this:

39
16
8
14
18
8
36

That is too much of a yo-yo.  That is the issue.  Now granted his shot attempts are certainly more consistent, but his foul shot attempts are not (which is indicative of his lack of aggression a lot). 

I disagree.  For a 15-16 ppg scorer, I would rather have numbers like this rather than consistently scoring between 12 and 19 points almost every night.

Not when you are a third or fourth option (which is what Green should be).  those guys need to consistently perform.  You just never know which Jeff Green is going to show up and that is a big problem.

I actually think the opposite is true.

You need your #1 and #2 option to be consistent.  You want to slot a guy in that role who can give you 18-30 points every single night.

Now, for your 3rd and 4th option, you can afford to have a guy who has more variance in his game.  That way, you can still win when he has off-nights, and when he's having a great game it can basically seal the deal for you.

I think Green is ideal in that 3rd / 4th role because of that, especially because his skillset means he's not very good scoring when the defense is keying in on him, but he can take a team by surprise if the focus is elsewhere.

Below are Green's shooting percentages in those games.  You can't be that inconsistent as a 3rd option.  You need to be pretty consistent in your efficiency.  Sure some nights you might get 20 shots and other nights you might get 6 shots, but you need to be the 45-55 range on hitting your shots as a 3rd option type player.

53.8
41.2
15.4
30.8
38.5
15.4
61.1

You just can't do that.

  Your expectation for game to game consistency in fg% for 3rd options is wildly unrealistic.

Chandler Parsons has a lot less volatility (he is still up and down a bit, but not nearly as much).  Same with Wesley Matthews, Manu Ginobli, Chris Bosh, Serge Ibaka, David West, etc.  You know the contenders.  That is one of the reasons they are contenders i.e. their 3rd options are pretty consistent players.  In fact, Jamal Crawford is about the only 3rd option on a contender that has dramatically inconsistent efficiency (of course even when he was the 1st option that was his game).  That is the problem with Jeff Green.  He isn't a #1 or #2 scorer, but he isn't consistent enough to effectively play that 3rd scorer role.

[Snakehead]

I swear Ainge is just quoting one of my posts on Jeff.

[mmmmm]

Here's some statistical comparison:

StDev   Player
5.369509536   Batum
5.609612741   Ibaka
6.075118987   Parsons
7.227844889   Deng
7.235938363   Hayward
7.237800352   Thad Young
7.60783699   Jeff Green

Jeff Green is the most inconsistent.

  Small forwards who are closest to Green in ppg are Ariza, Josh Smith, PP, Nick Young, Evan Turner and Chandler Parsons. I'd guess there' more inconsistency in that group.

Things I would look at besides the simple ppg stdev, would be USG%, touches and minutes.

Unless players are being comparably used, in a similarly consistent basis, arguing over whether the players are consistently performing seems silly.

I also think it is absurd that anyone is looking for 'consistency' from any player on the Celtics over the last season and a half.

The only thing constant about this team has been ridiculously frequent and often dramatic change.

Last year was year of constant major changes, with Green starting the year coming back from a giant rehab, Avery missing, then coming back only in time for Rondo & Sully to be lost for the year and the roster to be rounded out by refugees from the China league.   Ironically, the roster, however flawed, was finally 'stable' over the last couple of months of the season.   Green seemed pretty consistent to me during that stretch, but again that depends on how you want to define 'consistent'.

This year, after trading away two of our best players and overhauling the roster with youth, we've had adventures at "point guard".   Green has played a little under 1700 minutes so far this season.  Only about 62 of those minutes have been with Rondo (who is coming back from a giant rehab).   The rest have mostly been with Bradley or Crawford at point.  Wheee! What a fun ride that has been!   We've also had a constantly changing front-court as Stevens has shuffled between different combinations of our PFs.

I'm sorry, but fans expecting 'consistency' (whatever that means) in any player through all that are simply, imho, not really paying attention.

[Snakehead]

Green is certainly inconsistent as a scorer. Independent of what should be expected of him, he simply is inconsistent. That really isn't debatable. The question is why? Why is he so inconsistent? Saying he's not a star player isn't really an answer and that's the question I would like Danny or Stevens to answer. After his big game a couple of weeks ago, Stevens said they need to be running more plays for him, getting him into a groove early and that he was a rhythm scorer. That sounds like a guy that you want to be a focus of your offense.

Also, post-PP/KG trade, one of the big talking points was how Green's offense would blossom now that he would be getting shots. Honestly, this assessment of Green coming out of the Cs front office is pretty surprising...

It's because he is a heat check player but is not a jacker really.  He's like JR Smith with a conscious.  Unless he's really feeling it, you won't see him force shots.

That's just his game.  It's not because he's afraid or he doesn't care.  Those are nonsense criticisms.  Some players just play differently and that's a mental thing.  So much of the game is mental.

I will really be interested to see how he keep playing with Rondo now because he's going to get the ball thrown to him and often he will be open because of how well Rondo runs an offense... this may force him into more shots than he would otherwise take.  It'll be interesting to see how it goes.

Anyways, I get why Jeff may go here in the long run as we have players to pay and we do need another big level talent or two to build our team out.  But he's not overpaid and he isn't lazy or afraid.

[BballTim]

Ainge has a misunderstanding of fans expectations.  I don't think anyone expects Green to score 25-30 every night, but there certainly should be an expectation of more consistency within his numbers.  He shouldn't have numbers that look like this:

39
16
8
14
18
8
36

That is too much of a yo-yo.  That is the issue.  Now granted his shot attempts are certainly more consistent, but his foul shot attempts are not (which is indicative of his lack of aggression a lot). 

I disagree.  For a 15-16 ppg scorer, I would rather have numbers like this rather than consistently scoring between 12 and 19 points almost every night.

Not when you are a third or fourth option (which is what Green should be).  those guys need to consistently perform.  You just never know which Jeff Green is going to show up and that is a big problem.

I actually think the opposite is true.

You need your #1 and #2 option to be consistent.  You want to slot a guy in that role who can give you 18-30 points every single night.

Now, for your 3rd and 4th option, you can afford to have a guy who has more variance in his game.  That way, you can still win when he has off-nights, and when he's having a great game it can basically seal the deal for you.

I think Green is ideal in that 3rd / 4th role because of that, especially because his skillset means he's not very good scoring when the defense is keying in on him, but he can take a team by surprise if the focus is elsewhere.

Below are Green's shooting percentages in those games.  You can't be that inconsistent as a 3rd option.  You need to be pretty consistent in your efficiency.  Sure some nights you might get 20 shots and other nights you might get 6 shots, but you need to be the 45-55 range on hitting your shots as a 3rd option type player.

53.8
41.2
15.4
30.8
38.5
15.4
61.1

You just can't do that.

  Your expectation for game to game consistency in fg% for 3rd options is wildly unrealistic.

Chandler Parsons has a lot less volatility (he is still up and down a bit, but not nearly as much).  Same with Wesley Matthews, Manu Ginobli, Chris Bosh, Serge Ibaka, David West, etc.  You know the contenders.  That is one of the reasons they are contenders i.e. their 3rd options are pretty consistent players.  In fact, Jamal Crawford is about the only 3rd option on a contender that has dramatically inconsistent efficiency (of course even when he was the 1st option that was his game).  That is the problem with Jeff Green.  He isn't a #1 or #2 scorer, but he isn't consistent enough to effectively play that 3rd scorer role.

  I just checked a few of those players and their fg% from game to game are all over the map. Again, you know Green's inconsistent, you don't pay enough attention to the other players to know if they are or aren't so you just assume they're consistent.

[CelticG1]

I find it funny that people on this blog seem to think that fans of other teams dont harp on the same crap with their players.

Do people think Jeff Green is wildly over paid? Should he be making less than Bass because he is less "consistent?"

Id take him over guys making more money than him like J smith, Galinari, shawn Marion, Gerald Wallace, no i cant say Pierce cause i love him, and over guys making slightly less likeWilson chandler

[Timdawgg]

The bottom line is a 3rd option, is paid like a 3rd option. Everyone else wants him to be #1. 

All we need to do is keep Jeff Green as a 3rd or 4th option.  Rondo is a 2nd option. 

The answer to all of this is we need to find a #1 Alpha and another 3rd or 4th option and we are good to go.(Sully will be that other 3rd or 4th option I believe. Getting a 5th option that is all about defense would put us over the top..

[Snakehead]

I find it funny that people on this blog seem to think that fans of other teams dont harp on the same crap with their players.

Do people think Jeff Green is wildly over paid? Should he be making less than Bass because he is less "consistent?"

Id take him over guys making more money than him like J smith, Galinari, shawn Marion, Gerald Wallace, no i cant say Pierce cause i love him, and over guys making slightly less likeWilson chandler

Like I've been saying, I think no one who complains about Jeff's contract has any idea what players around the league make.  Not that there aren't players as good or better on lesser deals, but he's just fairly paid.

Like Luol Deng makes what... 5 or 6 million more a year than Jeff does?  Never heard anyone say Deng is overpaid.  And he scores 1 more point per game and he isn't even shooting 30 percent from three.... perfect example of what I'm talking about.