Second unit ballhandler: Smart or Rozier?

[jpotter33]

This thread is going to blow up. I agree with you though. My points have already been made. There is no stat in this world you can use to debate about Smart so I think you are wasting your time. Smart can do whatever he wants. The man can do no wrong. Here's to a team filled with future role players. Cheers.

I don't think I've ever seen a post on here that purported such.  There's lots of Smart supporters on here - myself included - but that doesn't mean we're not critical of him either.  That's besides the topic though.

Dude, you just had someone say Smart is an improved passer and ignored your assist stat completely. He's averaging 4 assists a game. He's not a good passer by any means. He actually has a lot of turnovers.

Second, you obviously haven't read the other Smart vs. Rozier debate topics because their is no stat you can literally use to prove your point to them. You'll see on this thread haha. Like I said, cheers.

See, this is why your basketball analysis is lacking, because you totally rely on statistics without ever taking into context or the eye test.

You say:

He's averaging 4.1 assists a game in 31 minutes a game. What a magnificent passer fellas. We got ourselves a Rondo.

But obviously you don't really understand what you're talking about, because in the context of how he plays, i.e. as a backup ballhandler that doesn't have the ball all that much, that's a pretty decent number. Further, it's clear to anyone that actually watches him play that he's a very improved passer with excellent court vision.

So by your logic, IT is a terrible passer because he averages more TO's than Smart? No, because that's illogical due to not taking into consideration the context - IT handles the ball much more than Smart with an overall much higher usage rate, which leads to more turnovers naturally. However, this same logic also puts Smart's assists in a different light - that many assists with his usage rate is actually pretty good.

Here's some advanced stats for you since that's all you want to look at:

          USG     AST%     TOV%

IT      33.7     33.9        9.0

MS    18.6     19.2       14.8

TR     15.6     13.9       10.2

So, though having almost twice the usage rate of Smart, IT is only averaging 2 more assists per game, which is pretty telling for Smart. Further, Smart's ast% is significantly higher than Rozier's, and Smart is averaging 2.3 more assists per game than Rozier with only a 3% higher usage rate, which is also telling. Compare that to IT averaging 2.3 more assists than Smart, but it taking him 15.1% higher usage rate to do so.

So stop with this fantasy basketball perspective non-sense. It's getting ridiculous that people have to explain context to people over and over and over again on here because they think real world basketball is just like playing an online game of basketball...

[liam]

Rosier has a lot of trouble making quick decisions unless it's to go to the hoop. He's a two guard in a point guards body and Smart is the opposite. I think that if they have a chance to grow together they could be a very good backcourt tandem.

[feckless]

This thread is going to blow up. I agree with you though. My points have already been made. There is no stat in this world you can use to debate about Smart so I think you are wasting your time. Smart can do whatever he wants. The man can do no wrong. Here's to a team filled with future role players. Cheers.

I don't think I've ever seen a post on here that purported such.  There's lots of Smart supporters on here - myself included - but that doesn't mean we're not critical of him either.  That's besides the topic though.

It's kind of true that Smart defies traditional statistics.  Nobody ever said he's without faults though.  I would say that if you're worried about 28% 3 point shooting, you don't get Marcus and you'll probably never like him.  I personally don't give a crap if he shoots 30% for the rest of his life.  He embodies everything it means to be a Celtic.

Marcus shoots poorly because he continues to take ridiculous selfish shots which means on offense he does not understand team play and does not embody what it means to be a Celtic. 

Marcus Smart continues, much of the time = Tony Allen, nothing more.

As for running the offense generally it means following the game plan--you guys get lost in Marcus's home run passes which sometimes work but just as often lead to turnovers and Marcus taking a bad shot rather than making a routine pass within the play. 

Marcus Smart right now is not even close with his handle nor his decision making, to being good at running the 2nd unit.   That is why Brad chooses Rozier to try to start the offense on the 2nd unit.  From what i see Marcus is the 3rd string PG on a team without a true point.

[dreamgreen]

Either or is fine with me, IMO Smart has shown to be a more mature ball handler/play maker at this point but I'm not a big fan of a dominant PG.