CJ Miles is wildly inconsistent, which makes it easy for both fanboiz and haterz to make a case for/against him - they just highlight his best/worst and they can make a decent case. For example, his best month of basketball (IMHO) came between Nov 20 and Dec 20, a span of 16 games where the Jazz went 12-4. During this month:
- Overall he shot 45% from the field, 35% from deep, and averaged 14.1 ppg, 3.4 rpg, 2.0 apg, 0.9 spg, 0.5 bpg and just 1.3 topg in an average of only 24 minutes/game.
- 6 times in this span he scored 20 points or more, including two games of 25 or more, and all 6 of these games were wins.
- 6 times in this span he scored in single digits, and three of these were losses (in our fourth loss, he scored only 10).
- In the Nov 20 game against Portland, he shot 7-10 from deep and finished with 25 points, and was primarily responsible for the win (IMHO).
- Over the next seven games he shot a total of 7-28 from beyond the arc, and failed to reach double figures 4 times, but we only lost one of these games.
- In the Portland game he shot 8-13, also shot 8-13 the following game, and also had a combined 8-13 mark from the arc over those two games.
- He followed these two games with two games where he combined to shoot 3-14 overall and 0-7 from the arc.
- Over the first 9 games of the December calendar month, we alternated wins and losses, starting out with a win. Miles scored 13, 9, 20, 8, 26, 10, 20, 5 and 16 in these games.
- His three-point shooting in these games went 2-6, 2-6, 3-7, 0-3, 4-6, 0-5, 2-6, 0-2 and 2-5.
- Over this period, his scoring from one game to the next game varied by +/-10 points or more on 11 occasions.
Even though his overall stats for this month are good for a sixth man, his performance from game to game was anywhere from All-Star level to D-Leaguer (and my recollection from watching the games was his performance within a game was inconsistent too). These numbers would be why he was in the "6th man" list on ESPN around that time, because we all know they don't watch any Utah games, so would have been unaware of his actual on-court play.
His worst month would be February - 35% shooting, 27% from deep, 11.3 ppg, 3.3 apg, 1.3 apg, 0.7 spg, 0.8 bpg, 0.7 topg in 26 mins/game. In 12 games he hit hit half his shots only once, scored double figures six times, in the rest of the games he totalled 30 points. His best games were the two against Phoenix, both times he shot 8-19 and ended with 19 points, which he followed with a 20-point game. No need to analyze this month too much, the only real difference between his good month and his bad month were the highs were not as high, and the lows were lower, but the variation between the two extremes is pretty much the same.
Over the entire season, Miles' scoring has fluctuated wildly:
- He has more games scoring 20 points or more than he has scoring 4 or less (12 against 9)
- However, he has more games scoring single digits than scoring 15 or more (24 against 21)
- He has 6 games where he has scored 20 points exactly
- He has 5 games where he has scored 2 points exactly
- His best 6 scoring games are 26, 25, 24, 22, 22, and 21 points
- His worst 6 scoring games are 2, 2, 2, 2, 2 and 0 points
- He has one 4-game streak of double-digit scores, seven 3-game streaks, and two 2-game streaks (out of 35 double-digit games).
- He has registered a 10-point swing or greater in his scoring output in successive games 22 times, including a streak of 7 successive games, with a largest swing of 19 points.
I simply find him frustrating. His best is fantastic, his worst is putrid. And although I have focussed on his scoring in this post, all aspects of his game are the same - rebounding, passing, defence, all inconsistent, and also all generally worse than his offence but not too bad for someone coming off the bench (IMHO). But we don't need his best, we need him to be consistent. A 6th man scoring 12 ppg is fine, as long as he's consistently bringing 8-16 ppg, with the occasional dip below and breakout above, and contributing with boards and defence. What we don't need is a random contribution off the bench of somewhere between 2 and 24 points from someone who may or may not go for rebounds and may or not guard his man.