Fortson

[Alex Wang <awang@mit.edu>]

> It's the projected roster for next year.  It includes a Ron Mercer trade.
> I'm not sure if Fortson is tall enough (I think only 6'7" for a PF) but is
> he really that good.  Can he do well under Pitino?

I proposed a Fortson and Keon Clark for Mercer trade a while back and
got a similar response about Fortson being a tweener. Does anyone actually
have evidence that he gets abused on the defensive end because he is
short, i.e. has anyone actually seen him play? I'm very suspicious of 
the "measuring tape" method of player evaluation. You can have two players, 
one which measures 6'7" but has long arms and a short neck, and one which 
measures 6'9" but has short arms and a giraffe neck. How does having that 
long neck help in basketball? You don't grab rebounds or block shots with 
your head. Beyond all that, how about Charles Barkley, who has been
destroying taller power forwards for a long time.

Fortson's 4.2 offensive rebounds per game in only 28.3 minutes is an
amazing figure to me, especially since he was playing as an undersized
center. And in April, he got 15.2 ppg and 13.5 rpg in 33.6 mpg. If it
is actually the case that he can adequately defend power forwards, I'd
love to see this guy added (and it actually makes sense for Denver too).

Alex