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Originally Posted by J-Train  Excellent work signing Billups to a very reasonable contract at just the right amount of years.
Pulled the trigger and kept Amir. Screwing that up would have been unforgivable.
Stucky looks to be a steal who will fill a perfect niche for us- the role Flip jr. was supposed to fill last year.
I was supportive, but lukewarm, on the Afflalo pick. After seeing how this team is shaping up, I'm very pleased with him. He's a top notch defender who looks like he can lock down all three perimeter postions. He does everything well, and although he struggled with his shot over a few games in Vegas, anybody who watched him play in college knows that won't consistently be the case in the future. Gotta love the way this kid competes.
Mejia looks like a solid prospect, which all you can ask for in a second round pick.
He still has some decisions to make, mainly what to do with Flip jr., but I'm pretty happy so far.
Grade: B |
Grade is D at this point.
He gave away a very good defesive player, who hustled to rebounds, handled the ball well, and even showed he can shoot the ball if he is let to shoot the ball. Delfino was a swingman, shooting guard, small forward, and he could play both positions well defensively.
Next, he drafted 2 shooting guards, both of which could play some small forward but lack Delfino's size to do so. So between drafting Afflalo and Mejia, while giving away Delfino, Joe Dumars did exactly nothing, and probably quite a bit less than nothing. Joe Dumars left us with no backup small forward, and a couple of shooting guards who are most likely a drop-off in talent from Delfino. Note, we never did play Delfino as the primary backup to Rip, but we should have. Toronto loves us for the gift.
So ok, Joe did do better on the other pick. He got a guy to backup Billups, only the guy is not really a point guard. Can Stuckey score in the NBA, against NBA defenses? We better hope so, because he is not going to play the point for us all that well. With this pick, we basically replaced Blalock, who was certainly a point guard, with Stuckey, who is most certainly not a point guard. Is Stuckey the better player. On the surface, maybe yes. But wait, you got to have a skill that actually works in the NBA before your really are better. I know Will Blalock is capable of getting inside the defense repeatedly, and finding the open man. Can Stuckey do this. Again, he better be quite a scorer if he can't. And oh thats right, Stuckey has no range.
Dumars so far has kept the same coach. Hmm, Sheed did not have an ankle injury this time, so what gives. What is Flip's excuse this time. Team communication broke down at a critical time. Me thinks he could be part to blame for that.
In sum, Dumars has let Blalock go, a point guard, and replaced him with a guy who we hope can score. He replace Delfino with two guys, who we hope can shoot better than Delfino did. (Althoug of course the coaching staff generally yelled at Delfino not to shoot, so we will not know how well he really could have shot, will we?)
This is not to say that Stuckey is not better than Blalock. But did we really have a great need to draft a backup point guard? Why not give Blalock a chance. And why not give Delfino a chance.
Ok, he resigned Billups. That is good. I suppose. Of course, since we did so poorly last season at the end, it really drove the price tag down on Billups a lot. Doing really bad in order to get something positive, so that you can do really good the next season, seems kind of circular. It gets you nowhere. If we would have gotten thru last season more successfully, and then Billups was retained for like a max contract, I would be more impressed.
We did resign Johnson. Probably to too short a contract. Dumars brow beat the league to ensure nobody tried to steal the guy away. Hmm, but you know, if Johnson is so great, why not a bit of playing time last season, when it counted. A few rather meaningless minutes at the end of the season, and then never dressing for the playoffs. Gee, how can you be happy about a signing that is so tainted. Again, if we had been successful, and Amir had been part of that success, then I would really be giving Dumars kudos for retaining Amir. As it was done, I just say shame on Dumars, get your priorities straight. You want A grade? Win something. You got A's from everyone in 04, cause you won it all. Still good grades the next year, even though you fell short. But going backward since?