Re: Where have the basketball gurus gone?

[Warwick Janetzki <giants@icplus.net.au>]

>         John Lyell,  Luc Longley is a very good center.  He does not demand attention.  He has a very big body.  He is fundamentally sound.  He knows how to set a screen.  He picks his shots well.  What do you think his numbers would look like if he had played with Bird?  Sure he has no place on the Celtics of today.  He couldn't keep up with fast pace press.  OR could he?
> 
> Any thoughts?
> 
Obviously, I'm a little biased ;) about Luc, but I do think that he
could keep up with it. He is way faster than Pervis. To me, I think he
is a bigger bodied version of Travis Knight. Pitino imho needs a center
who is an excellent passer if he gets double teamed, or someone who can
shoot (Knight and Longley) when Toine gets doubled. If you have a player
who knows when to take the shot, you've immediately got another presence
there. He may only score 12ppg, but with so many scorers on the team
(Jordan, Kukoc, Harper, Kukoc, Kerr) its hard to find enough points to
spread it around. I think he'd score 12-15ppg on the Celts, and if
Rogers developed and remained injury free we'd have the intimidator in
the front line to act as the Dennis Rodman type player.

Longley is probably at his peak now (fairly certain that he is) so I
dont know if hes the answer. If the C's got him, it would make a lot
more Celtic fans down here, something that I can only dream about. 

If he isn't the answer then the C's should seriously look to getting a
younger and slightly faster version of Longley because with the passing
ability and knowledge of the game that Luc possesses it seems like the
right style player for the Celtics.

You would still have 2 other centers there (Knight and Pervis) backing
Luc up a lot, so it may at times seem center-by-committee if none of
them were playing well.

What do you guys think of this team

 C- Longley   *DP*      Ellison*     
PF- Knight    Rogers    DeClercq   Thomas*
SF- Walker    McCarty   Minor*
SG- Mercer    Bowen     Brown*
PG- Billups   Edney     Barros

*DP* = Draft pick
name* = likely injury list.

Warwick

> Anyone?
> 
> Jp

-- 
MZ