Twon: demon or demi-god?

["Thomas Murphy" <tfmiii@worldnet.att.net>]

It seems that a lot of the problems that Twon has now in terms of meeting
expectations are what seem to me the ridiculously high expectations that
people have him. People seemingly envision him as a demi-god and when the
reality fails to meet our fantasy Twon is demonized. That is not to say
that his game can't improve (I think it is improving) but I don't think
Twon will ever be a superstar like a Jordan, Bird or even Barkley. I guess
I've never been too down on Walker because I was never so high on him in
the first place.

I think Mark got it right when he said:

> . . .a point I've finally come to
> believe this season: Antoine is a classic example of a guy who put up big
> numbers on a terrible team because he was allowed to. 
> 
> We didn't have any reliable scorers, so he shot and scored a lot. We
didn't
> have any other rebounders, so he ended up with a lot of rebounds. 

The franchise was down in the dumps. Twon's stats looked (superficially)
great. ML and then Rick let him do whatever he wanted and as a result Twon
was anointed as the franchise savior. People wanted to believe he was a
Bball demi-god come to redeem the lowly Celts. Unfortunately it seems he'll
be paying the price for this perception the rest of his Boston career. 

Of course, Twon did not help matters once he started to believe all the
hype himself ("I'm a veteran all-star") because he took that as a green
light to continue playing outside his limits, needlessly jacking up shot
after shot on what was becoming an increasingly talented team. He seems to
be getting his head together this season however and whatever drop-off
statistically is in my mind more than compensated by his greater
appreciation of his own limitations. That is one of the wonderful things I
think that many people appreciate about Griffin: he plays within himself
and rarely tries to do too much.

I don't mean to whip on Joe, but he is the exemplary case of the
demi-god/demon dichotomy in action. Joe said:

> The problem is that he's having an horrible shooting year along with a
massive
> dropoff in rebounding production (just when his teammates desperately
need him
> to step it up with Fortson out). 

Cecil has a valid point concerning stats because to simply dump on Twon
because his "stats" are down ignores the important context of two very
different teams in terms of level of talent. Stats properly contextualized
can tell us a lot (as Alex has demonstrated time and again) but stats
without a context are useless, that's why we have the saying "lies, damn
lies, and statistics". This is the first year in which Pierce, Vitaly and
Tony have had a training camp together and as we all know Adrian Griffin
has emerged as well. Twon's teammate are hardly "desperate" when it comes
to the boards. This is easily the best rebounding team Twon's ever been on
even WITHOUT Fortson.

Joe also said:

> To be an apologist about Antoine's play this
> year is IMHO pretty equivalent to admitting that he's just an average NBA
> forward in the end.

Gee, I never thought I'd be an apologist for Twon - is a nearly 20ppg
average for an NBA forward? Twon is certainly not a shooter but he is a
scorer. He's damn versatile to boot, with a better handle than any other
non-PG teammate other than Griffin. I think Dan is right when he suggests
that Pitino (and ML too) have had a hand in handicapping Twon's
development. As you already know, I think he'd make much more progress as a
rough-and-tumble SF rather than an undersized PF. At least it would cut
down on his getting stuffed! Sure his % sucks, but it isn't any more
horrible than in years past - so where's the surprise? Yeah, he's not a
demi-god, but does that make him a demon?

Mark also said:

> Now, we
> have other scorers and rebounders and Toine isn't getting the number of
> shots he used to get. Unfortunately, his efficiency hasn't gone up. He
isn't
> taking better shots, just fewer. He isn't a 10-rebound a game player on a
> good team. He is what he is: An inefficent 19 ppg, 6 rpg player who isn't
> nearly as good as any of us thought he was. And he certainly isn't  worth
> the maximum salary.

I can agree with everything in this last quote except perhaps the last
statement concerning worth. Realistically, of course, no player is worth
even one million dollars never mind tens of millions, but in today's NBA
you've got to play the marketplace game. Twon getting the max is not
necessarily out of line with what other similarly talented and limited
individuals are making. Remember, he's not being paid for what he's done so
much as what he MIGHT do - but even at his best I doubt he'd ever be THE
MAN on any contending team. 

So why should he get the max? Maybe, like McCarty, he got a sweetheart
deal. Is he to blame? However in addition, and unlike McCarty, I see Twon
as an excellent complimentary player who could be a key piece on a
championship team (and hence worth a boatload of money) like Pippen: a
multitalented player with an erratic shot. Sure, Twon can't defend like
Pippen but then neither could Pippen when he first came out of college.
That's where coaching should play a key role. Twon's already improved his
'tude and his FT % and improved defense only requires the willingness to
work (and perhaps some better match-ups!). TOs, assists and - hopefully -
shooting % are all areas we can hope to see improvement, but I would
imagine only slowly and down the line. Even the legendary Bird only added
one extra "trick" per year - but of course he started pro ball with a
pretty full bag of tricks! 

Just as a final note, like John Mc I'm somewhat surprised that people
seemed so down during the losing streak - this was the part of the schedule
that we had all marked out as the most difficult, right? I myself was much
more upset at the blown leads earlier in the season than the last six
losses. Those earlier opportunities were when we should have been getting
fat (rather than tinkering) in order to better endure this lean part of the
schedule. If you think about it, it's hard to blame those losses entirely
on the starters' inability to close out games - out of six blown leads the
starters were able to salvage HALF for wins: Charlotte, NY (here), and
Houston (here). I was talking with a friend who lives in Tucson last night
and it is eerie how similar Olsen and Pitino seem at times. He told me that
Olsen had recently "coached his team into a loss" - not an unfamiliar
sentiment over the years to many of us U of A fans. I asked him how and he
told me "by screwing around with the subs and then rushing back the
starters too late and they were cold". You don't necessarily have to be a
"chess champ" to spot certain blunders. Olsen is an excellent coach but
even he has his shortcomings. Here's hoping that last night demonstrates
that Pitino has a better learning curve.

Thanks Celts for an early gift last night!

Happy holidays everyone - Tom Murphy