I hope you are not referring to DMC when you say the guy is already 23 years old. According to NBA.com he was born June 20, 1985. My math computes him to be 21 years old. This was also the first year that he played over 770 minutes which works out to about 9 minutes a game over a 82 game schedule. Even college starters play more than 770 minutes a year and of course DMC never played college ball.

This year was actually the first year that he has really played any substantial minutes and he was only 21, younger that some of the 1st round picks this coming year. He also averaged 8 points and 5.5 rebounds per 24 minutes (per game).

Dyess by comparison 8.0 points and 6.0 rebounds per 21 minutes (per game). So in effect in DMC's first full year of legitimate NBA playing time at the still very young age of 21 he put up numbers comparable to our best reserve, who most posters on this board, including yours truly, think is a top notch power forward.


NBA.com : Darko Milicic Info Page

NBA.com : Antonio McDyess Info Page

I've been very happy to post on this, and many other threads. It's good to know that there is still a lot of hope out there for Darko. I was never intrigued by his potential. If he wasn't good enough to get minutes, then have a seat. I kept forgetting though that he was so young, and that Larry "long bench" Brown was his coach. Still, he'll never reach the level of a #2 pick in this league...........

We could probably pull up posts from past Darko threads and find most of these comments...
I think that Wade & Bosh would have been in the same boat as DMC...
LB wasn't gonna play any rookies with the mature talent on the team.
Could Darko have had more success than either of those guys if the teams were reversed?

It's hard to say this without disparaging DMC's character, but I think that Wade and Bosh have both proved themselves to be leaders and very mature individuals.

As has been mentioned before by myself and others, DMC just doesn't seem to show the body language that he just loves to play the game.

He's either dispassionate or too cool for school. Either way, it is hard for me to connect with a player like that.

Totally subjective observations, but I will stand by them.

It's all hindsight anyways. I was excited when we drafted Darko.

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Nov 13 LW Milan Lucic had an active night. He scored his first goal in eight games since his Oct. 25 hat trick and also pounded Michael Komisarek in a third-period fight. Lucic cut his hand in a fight with Michael Komisarek. "I'll be fine," he said. "(X-rays are) negative, but there's so many broken bones in there from before you can't really tell."

I don't know BBJ, TDrib was LB4LBs choice. And played well as a backup. I think Dumars moved TDrib to rid the Pistons of all of LB4LBs influence. Cause there was no good reason to move CarArr.
...Aside from that this thread seems accurate.
I forget teams would've thrown huge money at Wade, Bosh and Melo...Allan Houston situation.
The Grapes of Draft pick stealing.

I dunno, roscoe, I have always liked the players who were not demonstrative. I liked Barry Saunders who whenever he scored, just handed the ball to the ref and trotted off the field.

It seems that I like those players who are cool about winning and do not jump up in the air and throw their fists and such. It is like they expected to win, all along, and were not "surprised" when they succeeded.

I dearly loved Sugar Ray Leonard and thought he was one of the best fighters, ever. But that habit of jumping up on the ropes and flailing his gloves around and yelling always bothered me. It was like winning was a joyous surprise to him.

Back in high school (yes, I can still remember that), the cool guys were the ones who always seemed to be running in slow motion. No wasted effort, just made the plays.

I think for Darko it goes along with the not wanting to play garbage time. He just does not like rubbing oppoinents noses in it. And that is what all this celebratory stuff is all about.

And this lack of meanness might be what is holding Darko back.

Just one way of looking at it.

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Things appear to be at their darkest . . . . . . . . . just before they go totally black!!

Has Darko ever showed any emotion?

The problem with Barry Sanders is that he was great but not a winner.

I'm not saying you have to be emotional to play the game well, but let's face it. More of the greats have been emotional and leaders than they have not.

Grant Hill is another example.

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Nov 13 LW Milan Lucic had an active night. He scored his first goal in eight games since his Oct. 25 hat trick and also pounded Michael Komisarek in a third-period fight. Lucic cut his hand in a fight with Michael Komisarek. "I'll be fine," he said. "(X-rays are) negative, but there's so many broken bones in there from before you can't really tell."

In Bosh's rookie year he played 75 games and averaged 33.5 minutes a game. He put up 11.5 points and 7.5 rebounds per game. Toronto was 33-49 that year, so it is easy to understand why Bosh got the minutes.

Bosh numbers in his rookie year about the same per minute as DMC put up this year, which was the first year he actually got legitimate playing time. 24 minutes a game 8.0 points and 5.5 rebounds per game.

The Pistons won the NBA title in DMC's rookie year and advanced to the Conference finals the remaining years that DMC was with them. And during that time that had Sheed, Big Ben and Dyess. Who did Bosh have to compete with at Toronto for playing time? Nobody.

I think in all fairness to DMC we need to wait two more years to assess whether or not he was a legitimate #2 pick.

And in DMC's rookie year the Pistons also had Okur ahead of him. In hindsight I think it is fairly easy to understand why DMC never got the minutes in Detroit and developed a bad attitude.

To quote DMC "I didn't come to America to sit on a gymnasium bench".

He was drafted by the wrong team. It was his misfortune that that as a #2 pick the team that drafted him would win the NBA title in his rookie year with 4 NBA All-Star big men on the squad ahead of him.