Jazz game tonight yada yada yada EXUM to Start!!

[Coach Ellis]

What's BJB? I'm not familiar with you young people's language.And yes, I'm a fan. What's your point?

BJB = "Black Jesus" Burke

Quin is a smart guy. Smarter and a lot more experienced than any of us. Already this year, we've seen significant improvements in play and attitude from Hayward, Favors, Kanter, Burks and Gobert. He's one of the top coaches in the league at developing young players. He's not going to go with a knee jerk reaction and completely cut either Dante Exum's or Trey Burke's minutes. He needs them on the floor to see how they respond to specific situations. They need time on the floor for the experience and the tape. There's millions of dollars on the line to get this right.

Quin Snyder has a plan for Dante Exum's growth and development and he doesn't really give a damn what Jazzfanz thinks of it.

 

[Coach Ellis]

I do agree that players should be held accountable, but I think it's very presumptuous for us as fans to even begin to think that we know what coaches or management have set as expectations for these players.

I've always found that competition is the best motivator. This is why you should always be turning over rocks to try and get better at every single level of the team.

 

[Harcher]

Thriller - thanks for posting... the thread was a bit boring until you offered up some opinion. Your summary point below that "players should be held accountable, young or old" is not the issue. In this case, it is about how to maximize the investment you have in an asset. As noted above by others, quin is probably part of the reason that Exum is hesitant, meaning he has given him permission to be 'soft' to some degree. (While I understand that Quin says stuff in interviews, I believe he retracts a few things from his public statements when he talks to his team.) I agree with the plan of bringing Exum along slowly to maximize the investment in him. Exum is weak compared to his NBA peers. Exum will likely get broken physically or mentally if a lot of pressure is placed upon him. The risk of breaking him is not worth the minor gain he might (probably) make by pushing him harder. And it's not surprising that the first game he starts, he's extra tentative... Couple steps forward (which he's made) and a step back once in a while. One of the local college coaches said about an incoming freshman football player: "he showed up here a grown man. There's no reason not to play him right away." I use that example to say that it is clear to coaches about the nature of a given individual. Exum is tentative. So coach him up accordingly.

Does it make you feel better when you fling out insults? Does it strengthen your point? Honest questions.

Why aren't points addressed? Why must this board always demean and insult another poster and do anything BUT address their points? Is it the anonymity of the Internet that makes people so uncivil?

After 15 years of playing competitive sports and 5 years of coaching, there remains one constant: THEE best motivator is to hold players accountable. The way to do that? Threaten their PT.

Ask yourself and be honest; no need to fling personal attacks or go off on tangents, which employee performs better? The one who knows they'll get the promotion no matter what? Or the one who is under pressure to be accountable and knows they must impress to receive the promotion?

Aggressive mistakes? You can let them at through them. Teach them when they're on the bench what is desired. But when a player plays with less than 100 percent effort or aggression? That's a no no. Ask any coach.

If you feel that Dante Exum is the exception, that's fine. We can agree to disagree.

One last thing, I remember being ridiculed on this board for demanding that Boozer be held accountable. My solution was to play Millsap more.
Same thing happened with Jefferson when I suggested we play Favors more to force Jefferson to play defense and stop being such a black hole.

I believe that players should be held accountable; young or old. You can agree to disagree without flinging insults.

 

[Coach Ellis]

Thriller - thanks for posting... the thread was a bit boring until you offered up some opinion. Your summary point below that "players should be held accountable, young or old" is not the issue. In this case, it is about how to maximize the investment you have in an asset. As noted above by others, quin is probably part of the reason that Exum is hesitant, meaning he has given him permission to be 'soft' to some degree. (While I understand that Quin says stuff in interviews, I believe he retracts a few things from his public statements when he talks to his team.) I agree with the plan of bringing Exum along slowly to maximize the investment in him. Exum is weak compared to his NBA peers. Exum will likely get broken physically or mentally if a lot of pressure is placed upon him. The risk of breaking him is not worth the minor gain he might (probably) make by pushing him harder. And it's not surprising that the first game he starts, he's extra tentative... Couple steps forward (which he's made) and a step back once in a while. One of the local college coaches said about an incoming freshman football player: "he showed up here a grown man. There's no reason not to play him right away." I use that example to say that it is clear to coaches about the nature of a given individual. Exum is tentative. So coach him up accordingly.

Great post. Repped accordingly.

 

[stitches]

I was wondering today who Dante reminds me of when it comes to the shots he's taking and I thought of Danny Green. Then I looked at their shot distribution and they are almost identical:

3P Danny Green: 60%
3P Dante Exum: 58%

10-23 feet Green: 15%
10-23 feet Dante: 15%

3-10 feet Green: 7%
3-10 feet Dante: 10%

0-3 feet Green: 18%
0-3 feet Dante:17%

 

[Stifle Tower]

that's a good comparison... Gordo had a rough rookie year... especially the first half.

But IIRC, he had the best 3PT% in the league after the all-star break. Have to admit the lack of confidence/attitude is what worries me most about Dante.

 

[rcb1820]

Excellent post. Everyone seems to have annointed Exum as our PG of the future even though he doesn't seem to have a competitive bone in his body. That's reflected in the zero rebounds. Zero assists is more worrisome -- despite great size, speed and athleticism, Exum really doesn't know how to play the game. I go back and forth on Trey as the PG of the future, however, because of his shooting ineptitude. Then, again, there has to be a reason we only win when he's in the line-up. Didn't we lose 13 in a row last season when he was injured? And last night, the Jazz offense was like a car without a spark plug (speaking of ineptitude) with Trey home sick. It was amazing that the Jazz had to turn to Joe Ingles for any lane penetration, with Ian and Dante content to hover around the three-point line like Steve Novak. At least Trey causes things to happen with his improving dribble-drives and drive and kicks. So I started to think that we are undervaluing Trey by over-emphasizing shooting percentages.
I decided to see where Trey ranks in Assists Per Game (APG) and Assists-to-Turnovers (AT). In APG, he ranked 22nd among all players at 5.1 per game. Not surprisingly, Chris Paul ranks #1 at 10.1. If you consider an assist as equivalent to a made shot, then Trey's overall efficiency looks a lot better. With regard to AT, he ranks 15th at 2.92, so he's doing a decent job protecting the ball. The leader, again, is Paul at 4.55, followed by Barea (4.26), Harris (3.59), Lawson (3.45) and Andrei Miller (3.40). Also, Trey's assist numbers would be a lot better if we weren't such a mediocre shooting team overall at .453%. Golden State is No.1 at .483 and Dallas is .477, helping them place two guys in the Top 5 in assists. We all know John Stockton is the all-time assists leader thanks to playing with maybe the greatest finisher of all time. In his second season, he shot a glorious .499% but only 18% for 3s.
Although I find myself screaming when Trey has what Boler terms, charitably, "a tough night shooting," he really does make the Jazz offense better, certainly much more so than the heir apparent. I certainly understand that Trey needs to bring his shooting percentage up to at least 40%, but he's the stick that stirs the Jazz's drink. It's way to early to write him off in favor of a kid who has yet to show he has the competitive desire to excel.

 

[freakazoid]

Thriller - thanks for posting... the thread was a bit boring until you offered up some opinion. Your summary point below that "players should be held accountable, young or old" is not the issue. In this case, it is about how to maximize the investment you have in an asset. As noted above by others, quin is probably part of the reason that Exum is hesitant, meaning he has given him permission to be 'soft' to some degree. (While I understand that Quin says stuff in interviews, I believe he retracts a few things from his public statements when he talks to his team.) I agree with the plan of bringing Exum along slowly to maximize the investment in him. Exum is weak compared to his NBA peers. Exum will likely get broken physically or mentally if a lot of pressure is placed upon him. The risk of breaking him is not worth the minor gain he might (probably) make by pushing him harder. And it's not surprising that the first game he starts, he's extra tentative... Couple steps forward (which he's made) and a step back once in a while. One of the local college coaches said about an incoming freshman football player: "he showed up here a grown man. There's no reason not to play him right away." I use that example to say that it is clear to coaches about the nature of a given individual. Exum is tentative. So coach him up accordingly.

Great post. Repped accordingly.

Agree.
-
Exum is doing fine considering the baptism by fire. This situation is a big reason why the NBA decided to make kids stay in college for a year, so teams wouldn't have to gamble so much on players that were several years away from being NBA ready. It's possible Dante never turns out the way people hope, but if he is the player many people(including "experts") believe he is, the only reason Utah got their hands on him was because we were able to draft him before he was NBA ready. Personally, I like our odds, regardless of the fact that right now he's a kid trying fit in with grown men.