Tag Archives: All Star

What offseason? Basketball Never Stops!

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As a fan of the game, I’ll watch any basketball game you have on the television, especially playoff games. But there’s a slight disconnect when your team is not involved. It’s not as emotionally taxing. With that said, I’ve never enjoyed basketball as a connected fan all the way into mid-June. Though I’m disappointed that we lost in the Finals, its fun to look at the calendar and know that in 3 months, training camps should begin to open up. I’ve forgotten what it feels like for the season to be over in mid-April. But this all leads us to the offseason. Time to rest and recover from the grind of the season. Oh, I forgot we have the draft coming up. And then we have Summer League. And all the offseason moves and transactions. All the while, we have the national team gearing up to defend its gold medal in this summer’s Olympics. What the hell does the off in offseason mean?

There’s a saying that the NBA season is a marathon, not a sprint. The things that happen after the All Star break, such as trades and the signing of recently released players, can have a big impact on the rest of the season and the postseason. The Thunder have been the beneficiary of both of these player transaction moves in the past two season. Two seasons ago, at the trading deadline, the Thunder traded Jeff Green and Nenad Krstic to the Boston Celtics for starting center Kendrick Perkins and ultimate cheerleader Nate Robinson. Then, last season, they signed point guard Derek Fisher off waivers after he was released from the Houston Rockets. Due to the team’s stability, the Thunder usually remain pretty quiet during the offseason, though.

2012 NBA Draft

This offseason, though, the moves have been quiet, but plentiful. Heading into the draft, the Thunder’s only draft pick was the 28th pick in the first round. When you are picking this late in the draft, this usually means your team already has the necessary players to succeed. For a team as set as the Thunder, there wasn’t an immediate need that any player chosen this late was going to provide. One of the biggest needs the Thunder had was a big that was agile enough to defend other athletic bigs while being able to score from the outside and inside. Players with this skill set don’t usually last this long in the draft. The thinking was that the team would draft either an athletic wing or an overseas player that would be stashed in Europe for a couple of seasons.

Sometimes, though, the stars and planets align, and a player you were needing all along falls into your lap. There was always concern about Perry Jones III’s work ethic. The word ‘motor’ usually came up when his draft status was discussed. But, no one could deny the potential he had. The description of a 6’11” athletic forward that could score from outside and inside is the type of player that usually has teams salivating for his services. But a day before the draft, they were reports that many teams were concerned with the condition of his knees. After the recent knee concerns of Greg Oden and Blake Griffin proved to be true, not many teams were willing to spend a lottery pick on a player whose work ethic AND knees were called into question. Surprisingly though, 11 other teams outside of the lottery chose to pass on Jones III also. So when the Thunder’s name came up, Thunder general manager Sam Presti never hesitated, and went with the best player available, which coincidentally also filled a need. The best thing about it, though, is that it comes at an extremely cheap price.

Orlando Summer League

After the draft, the focus turned to the Orlando Summer League, where the Thunder were participating with 7 other NBA teams. As I wrote previously, the Summer League is full of good young players, Fringers, and Dreamers. Some of the players are already guaranteed a spot on an NBA roster and just want to mix in some team-oriented scrimmages and practices during the offseason. Most of the players though, are clawing and scratching for an opportunity to get onto an NBA roster. The Thunder’s roster consisted of 4 guys that, barring a trade, will be on the Thunder’s opening day roster (Perry Jones III, Reggie Jackson, Lazar Hayward, and Cole Aldrich). The rest of the players were probably not going to make it onto the Thunder’s roster, but could make an impression on another team depending on how they played.

The Thunder finished the Orlando Summer League 3-2. Reggie Jackson played like the most seasoned guy on the team controlling the tempo of the offense and attacking the basket at will. He even gave 2012 NBA Dunk champ Jeremy Evans a taste of his own medicine. Lazar Hayward showed why he’ll be at the end of an NBA bench for the next couple of years. He does a lot of things good, but nothing great. Cole Aldrich’s play was mediocre, at best. For a player that is looking to step up and be the back up center, his lack of improvement was a bit alarming. But, I would ask people to please step off the ledge when it comes to Aldrich’s development. Summer league games are made for wing players. They are glorified street games with refs and NBA assistant coaches on the sidelines. Aldrich will be asked to defend the paint, set picks, and put up a couple hook shots in the regular season. He will be fine. Perry Jones III suffered a sprained ankle in the 2nd half of the 2nd game, but not before impressing with his array of inside/outside skills. He will be in the Thunder’s regular rotation, if not in the 2nd half of this season, then definitely in the 2013-14 season. Other notables were forward Latavious Williams, who needs to be on an NBA roster somewhere, and Garrett Temple, whose play was almost veteran-like.

Off-season Moves

The Thunder has never been a big player in free-agency in their time in Oklahoma City. But in reality, they’ve never had to be a big player. Their main focus has always been on player development. When you have players like Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, James Harden, and Serge Ibaka, that’s what you put most of your focus on. That came to fruition in the last two seasons with consecutive trips to the Western Conference Finals and a trip to the NBA Finals this past season. The Thunder had 3 players that were coming up on free agency and all of them were veterans. Nazr Mohammed, Derek Fisher, and Royal Ivey could have all been signed to cheap veteran deals. But due to their years of employment in the league, even their minimum salaries would have been upwards of $1.5 million. The Thunder chose instead to let those vets walk, and focus on cheaper, younger alternatives. With Perry Jones III signing his rookie contract, that left 2 more spots on the roster.

The Thunder signed much maligned center Hasheem Thabeet to a 2-year veteran minimum contract. Now the difference between Thabeet’s veteran minimum deal and any of the other 3 Thunder players that were up for an extension, is that Thabeet has only been in the league for 3 seasons. For the final roster spot, the Thunder signed undrafted free agent Hollis Thompson from Georgetown to a 3 year contract. Thompson is a sharp-shooter in the Thunder mold (tall and long) that could be a cheap replacement for Daequan Cook in upcoming seasons.

The two signings sent Thunder nation into a tizzy, and not for good reasons. Most were questioning the “lackluster” moves by the team, while the team that beat us in the Finals picked up former All-Stars Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis, and one of our biggest threats in the West, the Lakers, picked up a former 2-time MVP (Steve Nash) in their biggest position of weakness (point guard) without giving up a single player. The thinking was that the curse of the small market team was starting to take hold of the Thunder. That the ideology that small market teams can’t attract free agents and can’t spend money like the big boys was starting to rear its ugly head.

I, for one, completely disagree with that thinking. While it would be nice to sign former All-Stars ad-nauseam every offseason, the reality is that that would be bad business in this new NBA. The goal is to try and keep cost down while maintaining a competitive team. If your team does spend into the luxury tax territory, it better be winning. The Thunder have the right components in place to continue winning. The moves they made this offseason were made to keep those components in place. When you start talking about the luxury tax, every dollar counts. And if the Thunder are truly looking to keep both James Harden and Serge Ibaka on the same team as Durant and Westbrook, they are going to have to continue making these cost effective moves. Both Harden and Ibaka will demand deals that get them at least $10+ million per season. And, rightfully so. We’ll be in the luxury tax no matter what, if we keep these 4 players. The payments get more feasible, though, if you are competing for and winning championships.

Another thing that these signings do is maintain the flexibility that Presti loves. These signings not only have low cost-high reward potential, but they are also short term deals. That way, the team isn’t saddled with long-term contracts if the player, in question, either gets injured or doesn’t produce. Also, if someone better comes along, you could cut your losses with the player and attempt to obtain the better option. Cap flexibility is a commodity in the NBA, and Presti is one of the best at maintaining it.

Team USA

As if this offseason hasn’t been crazy enough, you have Team USA preparing for the Olympics in London. Not only that, but the Thunder has 4 representatives in the Olympics (Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, and James Harden for Team USA, and Serge Ibaka for Spain). Durant and Westbrook were near locks to make the team, but Harden was actually a surprise addition after players like Dwayne Wade and Derrick Rose bowed out because of injury. The team torched the Dominican Republic and eeked out a victory against a tough Brazil squad in the US leg of pre-tournament games. After this, it’s across the pond for a couple friendlies and then the real thing. Durant has a possibility of leading the team in scoring, while Westbrook will be the defensive pitbull/offensive sparkplug off the bench. Harden will probably play a role similar to what he does with the Thunder, but to a smaller degree.

As a fan of the game, I love this. Before NBA-TV, the offseason was usually a time to hear about a trade or two, and wait for football season to start. So, even though, this has been a whirlwind offseason, I still appreciate it. When this offseason gets too crazy, I always hark back to the 2011 offseason. Oh, you don’t remember the 2011 offseason? Oh, thats right, because there wasn’t an offseason that year.

Growing Pains

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One of the most difficult things to do as a parent is letting your children make their own mistakes, and hoping that they learn from them. As a father of 3, I know this very well. And being that my oldest is still under 10 years of age, I know that I have a lot more stresses coming my way in watching them live and learn. The end result is usually great, but the journey can be angst-filled.

It’s very comparable to being a fan of a team. Just like with your own kids, you take ownership of that team. You buy the season tickets and the merchandise, all in hopes of providing nourishment (capital) to the development of that team. You turn any available television to the local broadcast, wherever you are at, in hopes that increasing the number of homes in which the game is viewed will increase the advertising revenue for the team. You hope that, even though you are only one of probably tens of thousands, your contributions will help in the team rise up to its full potential.

As you invest in the growth of the team, you also expect for the players on the team to perform. But just as you expect your kids to perform well in school and behave in all facets of life, you also know that they will commit mistakes. Why should it be any different when it comes to athletes on the playing field? Mind you, when I use this analogy, I’m only speaking about the athlete on the playing field. I’m not talking about their lives outside of the playing surface. And this analogy carries a little more weight when most of the players on the team are young.

Case in point, the Oklahoma City Thunder. They are a peculiar case because they are so young, but have been through the postseason battles for the past 2 seasons. You really don’t see too many cases where a team goes from being possibly one of the worst in league history (starting off 3-29 in the 2008-09 season) to contending for the best record 3 seasons later, with basically the same nucleus. This isn’t a team that was built through free-agency. Instead, this has been a team that has been allowed to grow organically while shrewdly adding pieces to the core. We, as fans, have witnessed this progression and are emotionally attached to it.

As we’ve seen since the All Star break, the Thunder have been acting a little hard-headed. They are akin to a high school student, whom you know can pull off straight A’s, but you battle with constantly about their aloofness and lack of maturity. Lately, they’ve played unfocused basketball for 75% of the game, while choosing to turn up the cooker in the 4th quarter to mixed results. In the 8 games they’ve played since the All-Star break, they have been behind in the 2nd half in 7 of them, losing 3 in the process. While the Thunder have a penchant for making big plays in the 4th quarter, the law of averages dictates that, when they put themselves in this predicament, that they won’t win every one of those games. There are set backs to being too clutch.

What we saw two nights ago against the Houston Rockets was a bad day at school for one of the Thunder’s star pupils. Russell Westbrook’s meltdown in the final minutes of the 4th quarter sent Thunder Nation into a tizzy, even bringing up trade requests since it was 3 days before the deadline. Did his technical foul and turnovers cost the Thunder the game? Partially, yes. Could his post game interview antics rub people the wrong way? Yes. But look at it this way; it was a mistake (actually, it was a cascade of mistakes). The thing about Westbrook is that he usually learns from his mistakes pretty quickly. He is who he is: a cauldron of fire that sometimes blow its lid. The same energy that he uses to torch opponents can sometimes burn him if someone pushes the right buttons. And Goran Dragic was pushing all the right buttons that night. The good thing about all this is that it happened in March. I can guarantee you, because of these recent events, this will not take place in May.

Sometimes as a parent, you have to let your children learn on their own. Those bumps along the road are what forge the person that they become. One of the lines from the late rapper Guru stated, “Experience, the best teacher…”. As fans, we need to understand that young teams will make mistakes. The key is to learn from the mistakes and use that experience. It’s these experiences that will forge what the Thunder will do in the postseason this season, and what they will do in seasons to come.

Top Five Point Guards in Oklahoma City History

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So, I was perusing through the internets and came across this article from Yahoo!Sports, http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=ycn-10388361 . In the article, written by William Menna, it talks about the top 5 point guards in Oklahoma City Thunder history. Before even reading the article, I thought to myselft, “Wow, 3 years in, and we already have a Top 5 point guards in franchise history article. Let me see, Westbrook, Maynor, Watson, Ivey, and Ollie.” Kind of scraping the bottom of the barrell at the end of that list. But then I started reading the article and starting seeing names like Gary Payton, Lenny Wilkens, Gus Johnson, etc. It is then that I realized, “Crap, they are including the Seattle Sonics’s stats also.”

I’m one of those people that has a problem with the combining of Sonics and Thunder history. Its like going through an acrimonious divorce and having your new wife constantly bring up things about your old wife. You just don’t want to listen to it. Let it be known, though, that I have no problem with the emotions being felt by true Sonics fans. Those guys were left without a team and that part of the equation, in my opinion, is just wrong. Especially when its the little guys (a.k.a the fans) that suffer the most. In the 5 years that this team has been on OKC’s radar, I’ve felt every range of emotion towards Seattle and its fans. But, if this lockout has taught me anything, its that, in the grand scheme of things, we’re quite inconsequential. The other thing that it has made me realize is that missing basketball games sucks ass.

In reading this article, I realized the list of OKC Thunder point guards may be quite small, but the list of combined OKC Hornets and Thunder point guards can be enough to make a respectable Top 5 list. Yeah, you remember those OKC Hornets teams, right? The ones that played a combined 71 of 82 home games in the state of Oklahoma in 2 seasons spanning from November 2005 to April 2007. Here’s some pictures to remind you:

Using these 5 seasons of Oklahoma City basketball, here’s the list of the Top 5 point guards in OKC basketball history.

Disclaimer: Combo guards will also be included as point guards. They are just point guards that primarily score, anyways.

5. Speedy Claxton (OKC Hornets ’05-’06):

In his one season in Oklahoma City, Claxton provided good veteran leadership off the bench while mentoring the rookie Chris Paul. He averaged 12.3 points, 4.8 assists, and 1.5 steals per game. Though about 4 inches shorter than Chris Paul, he was sometimes inserted in the lineup as the shooting guard in small ball situations.

4. Eric Maynor (OKC Thunder ’09-’10 – present):

Maynor has been the guiding touch for the second unit off the bench in each of his seasons with the Thunder.  He is the antithesis to Russell Westbrook and provides a nice semblance of change when in the game. He has averaged 4.5 points and 3.1 assists in his 2 seasons with the Thunder and continues to improve and build upon his national acclaim as best back-up point guard in the game.

3. Bobby Jackson (OKC Hornets ’06-’07):

Brought in to replace Speedy Claxton, Bobby Jackson brought an instant spark off the bench as one of the premier combo guards in the league. Used primarily as a point guard, Jackson’s quickness helped the Hornets whether the storm of losing their best 3 players for the 1st quarter of the season to stay afloat for enough time to contend for a playoff spot until the final week of the season. His averages of 10.6 points and 2.5 assists don’t measure how valuable Jackson was for that team that season.

2. Russell Westbrook (OKC Thunder ’08-’09 – present):

One of the most dynamic players in the league, Westbrook (along with Derrick Rose and John Wall) is redefining what a point guard is in the league. This is what the game envisioned when it inserted the Hand Check rule before the ’04-’05 season. Someone that constantly puts pressure on the defense, while working his way into the lane. While still a work in progress, Westbrook has averaged 17.8 points, 7.1 assists, 4.8 rebounds, and 1.5 steals per game in his career, increasing his points, assists, and steals averages every season.  In his young career, he has already made an All Star game, been named to 2nd team All-NBA, won a World Championship gold medal, and led a team to the Western Conference finals. Although he is still learning the nuances of the position, there is no doubt that if his career trajectory continues in a similar fashion, he may undoubtly wrestle the No. 1 spot from this guy…

1. Chris Paul (OKC Hornets ’05-’06 – ’06-’07)

The current gold standard for NBA point guards, Chris Paul started off his career as a member of Your Hometown Hornets, becoming Oklahoma City’s only Rookie of the Year recipient. While still in the traditional point guard mold, Chris Paul was the beginning in a breed of point guards that do most of their damage driving to the hole and breaking the defense down while in the paint. Owning, probably, the best court vision in the league, Paul has led the league in assists twice and averaged close to double figures for his career. In it, he has averaged 18.7 points, 9.9 assists, 4.6 boards, and 2.4 steals in 6 seasons. He is the only player in league history to lead the league in assists and steals in the same season for 2 consecutive seasons. That’s John Stockton territory right there. He’s been named to 4 All Star games, 1 All-NBA team, 1 All-Defensive First team, has won 1 Olympic gold medal, and has been to 1 Western Conference Championship. Although injuries derailed Paul the last few seasons, he seems to be getting over that and getting back to his elite form.

The only negative part to most “Top 5 Whatevers Within the same Franchise” is that you’ll probaby never see any of the players on the list play against each other. You’ll never get to see Rajon Rondo vs. Bob Cousy. Or Yao Ming vs. Hakeem Olajuwon. But the great thing about this list is that you will hopefully see Westbrook and Paul duke it out for the better part of their primes for the next decade. And the only reason they’ll be duking it out, is for OKC point guard supremacy, right?