Tayshaun Prince: Stealing Money?

we went through the same thing last year during the regular season, then tay was arguably our best player in the playoffs. he's stepped up when it's mattered (playoffs as a rookie, milwaukee first round, last year's playoffs, the block on reggie, locking down kobe in the finals), and that's what's important to me.

he's like battier - the ultimate glue guy. he's played great defense the past couple games, especially locking down caron butler along with delfino. and the fact that he's putting up career highs in several categories? i'll take that any day.

The next blasphemous tread will be about how Rip Hamilton doesn't hit enough mid-range jumpers.


Didn't we have the best starting 5 in the NBA last year? Why do they all become hacks when Ben Wallace leaves?

Wasn't talking about his numbers, but his demeanor. A lot of times, even when Darko played well, he was criticized for seeming disinterested or having poor "body language," even Delfino got the same criticizms.. Which I always thought was dumb, because Dumars played with the same attitude.

Here are the reasons:
1) The loss of the 4 time DPOY, multiple all-star, Ben Wallace.
2) the players and coach now realize that winning that many games was a waste of energy. We lost and Miami won. Miami coasted through the season.
3) Flip Saunders has finally had time to implement his philosophy and system.
[STRIKE]4) We don't have Darko anymore.[/STRIKE]

Hate to bring this up, but we argued about Tay's potential 3.5 years ago during the draft as we were all impressed about his shutdown of T-Mac during thye 02-03 playoffs. Because of that performance, players such as Melo, Wade and Bosh (now all bonafide allstars) were ignored based on hearsay of some great force overseas known only as DARKO.

The next season we saw Tay up his game in the playoffs with the "Block of the year" over the #1 seeded Pacers and propel the Pistons into the finals for an eventual title. Nobody cared about Wade, Melo or Bosh at the time because we were on top of the world and Tay played an integral part of the pie that got us back to the finals the next year too.

However even during the 04-05 and 05-06 seasons, the internet fans questioned his passion as he always seem to defer to his fellow players and spent to much time on the perimeter instead of attacking the rim and grabbing boards. The presence of Ben probably was one factor in this.

We all know how Flip will play a player until they call uncle. Well I think he has played Tay to much this past year and a half and that may be the reason for the less than stellar performance this season.

My suggestion to Flip and Joe if they will listen is to sit tay and have him come off the bench. Yeah that means starting Delfino or Max, but with the east still wide open, you still got time to experiment for a few games and still be leading or be near the top of the conference a month from now.

Why not just cut his minutes down so that he isn't so exhausted?

I feel the need to whip out the old +/- stat here. If Tay is truly the ultimate glue guy, then this should be reflected in the lenovo stats.

In last night's game, our top 3-man unit was comprised of TAY, Webber, and Rip (+24).

On the season, he is our 3rd best +/- guy behind CB and Rip. And Tay is barely behind them and way ahead of our 4th man, Sheed.

Tay is in our top two 2-man combos.
He is in the 1st, 3rd, and 4th 3-man combos.
He is in the top four 4-man combos.

Do you know who our worst +/- player is? I hate to say it, but it is Tay's backup, Carlos Delfino. CD comes in slightly worse than Flip Murray. This would seem to suggest that starting Delfino over Tay is not the ideal strategy.

Why is Tay's Roland rating the 3rd best on our team?

Because he is our 3rd best player.

He also has played 77% of the minutes this year, which leads the team. He never misses a game.

Because then, some of the Dolphin's biggest fans would have to admit that he's not getting the job done.

delfino comes in with lindsey who will kill a guys +/- and he's also usually paired with flip murray who will kill your +/-. he's also ripped from the game once the bench starts rolling and flip decides to put the starters back in. i think delfino in the starting lineup would be better than tay because he's ok doing the little things. tay can be the second option on the second unit.

Tay was the 23rd player taken in the 2002 draft. http://www.nba.com/draft2002/board/index.html Of all the players taken after him only 1 is an impact player and that is Boozer. Of all the players taken before him only about 5 are impact players.

You can piss and moan all you want about how we could have taken Yellow Mello or Bosh instead of Darko but it is a dead issue at this point.

Tay's stats for the year http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/players/3621/gamelog;_ylt=Apc.QW9_f2rd9xqbLCGECs6kvLYF

Tay is a top tier sf imo because he gets most of his points without needing the ball on every play to be effective.
He might not be the lockdown defender he was before the hand checking rule but nobody is but he still is better than most.
His mistakes are very limited, I think we all hate how he has the ball out there when he is backing his man down but that is about the only way he has turnovers. He does not get caught up in the air like Rip or force a pass that is not there I don’t panic when he touches the ball at all.
He always shows up. He is not spending 10 games here and there on I.R. he plays every game. I don’t think any other Piston has not missed a game in the last 5 years.

Tay could be the #2 option on just about half of the teams in the NBA and once Webber gets totally familiar with the team Tay will be option #5.

As far as I am concerned Tay is by far the best player Joe D has drafted and unless Oden slips to oh the 18th to 22nd pick in the draft he will hold that title for a long time.

This team still looks like crap when the bench gets subbed in. The bench unit seems to be lacking someone that is willing to be "the man" on the offensive end.

IMO, this could be Tayshaun, but he refuses to step up. It's not Lindsey, not Carlos ( a good complementary player, but not the main guy), and at this point in his career, not McDyess.

This is sort of why everyone is seeing that we still need a 2/3 that will demand the ball on the offensive end and be a legitimate scoring threat at all times....because Tay and Delfino want to be complementary players to that type of guy.

If one or both of them were willing to step up when paired with the bench unit, there wouldn't be rumors of Mo Pete and Bonzi Wells floating around.

That angle is being overplayed.

Tay is usually the guy that gets the most minutes with the bench unit. In those cases he could easily be option #1. The only thing keeping that from being so is his lack of aggression.

Heck, I would say his lack of aggression is keeping him from doing alot of things we'd like to see.

So when the bench guys come in Tay is suppose to be the #1 option? The way I see it he is more a facilitator when the bench comes in. Dyess is going to get his touches Delfino is going to get his touches its not like ok the rest of the starters are out its your team now run the show Tay. It is more like we need to keep you out there to keep the offense moving, or we don’t have a back up for you.

I have 1 question cloud what type of aggression do you want out of him?

He is not afraid to be out there and I have not really seen him not take the open shot. If you want him to be a mini me of Sheed it isn’t going to happen.

Agression doesn't mean cussing all the time and chasing the refs around the court

Aggression means demanding the ball when you are the supposed 4th best player on the team playing with guys #6 thru #10.

Aggression means realizing that you have a length mismatch on almost every guy on the floor save for the centers, and attacking the glass like a man once in a while.

Aggression means putting a guy on his butt once in a while rather than give up ridiculous basket and the foul freebees.

Aggression isn't taking open jumpers...aggression is passing up the jumpers to take the ball right to the basket.

At least thats what it means to me.

Perhaps a better term is "playing with force"

Isn't that the problem Carlisle had with him?


If Bonzi were playing with the bench unit, do you think he would be content with the role of "facilitator"?

IMO thats Tayshauns time to shine, and he turns away from the spotlight far too often for my liking.

Tay would be broken in half if he played that way!

I have a big problem right here. The reason Murray is sitting is because he thought "he was the man for the second unit". The second unit needs consistent minutes together with some of the starters and needs to know if they play hard it is O.K. to slip. With the way Flip divides the minutes between the starters and bench; the bench is on eggshells. It's perform in the first two minutes you are on the floor and don't make any mistakes or I'll sub for you as soon as a starter takes off his oxygen mask. I firmly beleive that given minutes and confidence from the coach and teammates that both Delfino and Max could pick up the scoring load. It is just every time they make a mistake they are looking over their shoulder at the scorers table.

Delfino's outside jumper would come around if he got 5-6 games of 20 -25 minutes in each. He needs to be able to take more than 3 shots a game; without getting the pass with one on the shot clock.

Tay could be great with the second unit but he cannot log all the minutes he does with the starters and then also be there to bail out the bench if they get in trouble. Flip needs to give the bench some minutes just like he is giving the starters.

Perhaps Delfino is killing Hunter and Murray's +/-....

+/- is killing this discussion.