Let's not throw rocks in glass houses. Boston overhypes the crap out of their rookies as well.
Here's how NBA.com recently ranked the rooks: http://www.nba.com/2015/news/features/scott_howard_cooper/04/01/2014-15-rookie-ladder-week-22/index.html
#1 - Nerlens Noel
#2 - Andrew Wiggins
#3 - Elfrid Peyton
#4 - Nikola Mirotic
#5 - Jordan Clarkson
#6 - Jusuf Nurkic
#7 - Marcus Smart
Seems accurate.
And another from last week: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2415391-2015-nba-rookie-ladder-roy-race-heating-up-as-season-winds-down/page/11
#1 - Nerlens Noel
#2 - Andrew Wiggins
#3A - Elfrid Payton
#3B - Nikola Mirtic
#5 - Jordan Clarkson
#6 - Langson Galloway
#7 - Marcus Smart
lol... Galloway over Smart caught me a bit by surprise. Funny.
At least this proves I'm not alone in picking Noel.
What are these based on present performance? Future value? Nurkic for the last month plus has been averaging almost as many fouls as rebounds and cant seem to stay on the court for more than 20 minutes a night. If we are doing performance to day hard to see him being very high.
I also tend to side with the anti-clarkson people. Being on the west coast and the Lakers being one of the teams that are always on national tv for some reason. I get to see more of their games than I would ever want to. Like the 76ers, a lot of their games are absolute dumpster fires where they are down 30 points and a team is not playing its' starters in the second half. For example, Clarkson recently "exploded" for 26 points according to the ESPN fantasy site against Portland. However, if you watched that game Portland took a double digit lead in the first quarter that it never really relinquished and he spent a lot of the time being guarded by Blake. He had a lot of his points at the end of the second and third quarters against backups and the Lakers as a team only scored 12 points in the first quarter. This is just one game, but it happens a lot with them. Last night they were down 20+ at halftime again (although clarkson didn't pad his stats). I hope we can all at least acknowledge that if Smart was in a situation like Noel, Clarkson or Galloway his stats would look a heck of a lot different than playing in CBS system.
Its mildly disappointing that they have writers at these sites that don't recognize that either... Galloway in particular will not be in the NBA in a few years so having him as one of the best rookies says a lot about that writer talent/evaluator?...
I agree. My only question, however, is would he average more points but on the same percentages? That's what I like about Clarkson. He's just a really good player who at least knows his strengths and plays to them. Whether that's due to the difference in offensive philosophies between Byron Scott and CBS, idk, but at least Clarkson can get to the basket and make his free throws.
Smart IS in a situation like Noel, Clarkson or Galloway. His team just happens to be winning some games. Smart thus far has proven to be a bad offensive player. He can't just go to a bad team and put up 20 points per game... he's ON a bad team. They just happen to be winning a bit more.
That takes nothing away from Smart's defense. There's a reason why both of those sites rank him 7th out of all the rookies. Kid can play defense.
Team-wise, I agree, although the Celtics are probably the best of those three. However, unlike Clarkson, or even Noel (I don't keep up with the knicks), Smart isn't the focal point or even a primary option on offense because of how inept he's been when it comes to scoring, while Clarkson has essentially been given the keys to run the show because he's the best option at point guard that the lakers currently have. To me, in the case of Clarkson vs. Smart, it's really more about the eye test, and right now, save for about 5 games, iirc, Smart has made me want to gouge my eyes out, lol. 
Ugh.
Really? Do you hate countless hustle plays, huge clutch shots, intangibles, game-changing defense and competitive fire or something? Even if you don't like him, how can watching Smart make you wanna gouge your eyes out? Are you even watching? Cause if you were, you'd be watching him parked on the 3 point line opposite an AB curl off a screen or an IT/Zeller P&R. And then you'd see all those other things I just mentioned and say "Jesus, that kid is something" four or five times a game.
All I'm saying is your not being objective. Smarts team is much better than Clarkson's. Oh, and they're actually trying to win instead of trying their hardest to lose so their 1st rounder doesn't go away like LA is. If your trying to win, handing your 20 year old rookie PG the keys to the offense and game-planning around him is not the way to do it. And since we have guys with a bunch of different above-average offensive skills including a ball-dominant Turner and IT, Smart doesn't even bring the ball up court half the time. When your the only person on a garbage team that's a legit option and everything goes through you, like it has been lately with Clarkson, or course your gonna score more points and assists.
Saying something like "Clarkson is much better than Smart, I wish we had him instead" and pointing to highlight videos and box scores ignores context. There's more important things than just box scores when evaluating players, especially rookies.
Absolutely not - I love all of those traits that Smart exhibits without question, and he has hit a few big shots this year, I'll give you that, it's just that I was hoping for more from the 6th pick in the draft, and I mean offensively. Maybe I simply set my standards too high, but they've come down dramatically, lol.
At this point, all I want to see out of Marcus is him attacking the basket and setting people up, in addition to his defense, but his inability to score inside worries me. The first time I saw him attempt a floater the darn thing was so off that it went over the top of the backboard - yikes.
Maybe I'm not being objective, and I do think that our team is better than LA's, especially because, like you said, they're doing everything in their power to not have to hand over their pick to Phoenix, but I also wonder if our team was in the western conference and the lakers were in the east, would the records be virtually equal? I know that Stevens has done a fantastic job this year, even though he frustrates me at times with his inconsistent rotations and offensive philosophy, etc., but if we had to play primarily against western conference opponents over the course of the season, I'd have to think that we'd have the 4th-5th worst record in the league.
Finally, I completely agree and understand about box scores and video highlights, because you're right, they don't tell the whole story. All I'm saying is that I don't think it's unreasonable to expect that the 6th pick in the draft would have had a better year than a guy picked at 46, iirc. Is that fair, or am I way off base?
Topic: ROY: Andrew Wiggins or Nerlens Noel (Read 46585 times)