BSG on Walker Becoming Webber & Playoffs

[Way Of The Ray <wayray@ix.netcom.com>]

http://www.bostonsportsguy.com

THE BSGY2KNBAPD 
NBA Playoff Notes (updated 5/3/00) 



Welcome to Sports Guy's 2000 NBA Playoffs Diary... or as I like to call
it, the BSGY2KNBAPD. The ultimate goal here: I'll be updating this thing
at least twice a week, the same way Rob Neyer updates his baseball
postings on ESPN.com. I've always been jealous of Neyer's gig -- he's
not writing full-fledged columns, but he always loads that page with
enough interesting opinions/info that it's still a must-read. Hopefully
you'll feel that way about the BSGY2KNBAPD, at least if you're one of
the 12 people who still care about the NBA playoffs.

Onto today's entry...

WEDNESDAY, MAY 3
Watching Chris Webber carry the Kings past LA for the past two games
made me remember our old buddy Antoine Walker, whom I alternately want
to trade/keep depending on which way the wind blows each morning. I
watched Webber play in Boston three seasons ago, when he was still on
the Bullets, and he sulked and scowled his way through the whole game --
firing bad threes, loafing up the court, not even bothering to play
defense and so on. It was a disgraceful performance. And I remember the
whole game because C-Webb had been one of my favorites ever since I read
Mitch Albom's book about the Fab Five. That night at the Fleet Center, I
finally gave up on him. 

A few months later, so did Washington. Now Webber is playing hard in
Sacramento and concentrating on the things he does best -- rebounding,
running the floor and posting up down low -- and he's probably one of
the best 5-or-6 players in the league.

Could the same thing happen for Antoine down the road? C-Webb isn't the
only young guy in the league who took awhile to blossom; Gary Payton,
Rasheed Wallace, Jerry Stackhouse, Jalen Rose and Glenn Robinson all
took a few years before turning the corner. Webber's leap was probably
the most dramatic. Ironically, Webber, Stackhouse, Rose and Wallace all
needed a change of scenery before they turned their careers around...
and if you remember, Seattle offered GP to Boston after the '92 season
straight-up for Dee Brown, and Dave Gavitt turned them down.

You can see why the Celtics would be so hesitant to trade Walker; I've
been watching him up-close for three years and still haven't come close
to figuring him out. Just when we thought he was "getting it" last
March, he loafed his way through much of a ten-game losing streak and
started pulling that "looking at my posse/shooting dumb threes/bitching
at the refs" stuff again. It was enough to make me stop watching the
Celts entirely during the final three weeks... I even turned down free
tickets from my Dad on more than one occasion. Go figure.

So Antoine could go either way. If you told me he was following the same
career path as Bernard King, I'd believe you. If you told me he was
following the same career path as Sidney Wicks, I'd believe you. Maybe
it will happen here, maybe it won't. Maybe he'll get in shape this
summer, maybe he won't. Maybe they'll trade him, maybe they won't. 

No answers, only questions. Once upon a time, you could have said the
same thing about Chris Webber... now he's battling the best team in
basketball to a standstill and carrying an entire city on his back. It's
enough to make me think the Celtics should keep Antoine around next
year.

Tomorrow, I may feel differently.


***** ***** ***** ***** *****

Just so you don't think I'm completely insane, check out the stat
averages for the first four years of Walker's career compared with the
first five years of Webber's career... than look at what happened for
Webber in the last two years (once he moved on to Sacramento).


Year  G   FG%   FT%   3P-3PM  REB  AST  STL  BLK  TO   PTS
96-97 82  .425  .631  52-159  9.0  3.2  1.3  0.6  2.8  17.5
97-98 82  .423  .645  91-292 10.2  3.3  1.7  0.7  3.6  22.4
98-99 42  .412  .559  65-176  8.5  3.1  1.5  0.7  2.8  18.7
99-00 82  .430  .699  72-285  8.0  3.7  1.4  0.4  3.2  20.5
TOTAL     .424  .646  .31%    9.0  3.4  1.5  0.6  3.1  19.9

Year  G   FG%   FT%   3P-3PM  REB  AST  STL  BLK  TO   PTS
93-94 76  .552  .532   0-14   9.1  3.6  1.2  2.2  2.7  17.5
94-95 54  .495  .502  40-145  9.6  4.7  1.5  1.6  3.1  20.1
95-96 15  .543  .594  15-34   7.6  5.0  1.8  0.6  3.3  23.7
96-97 72  .518  .565  60-151 10.3  4.6  1.7  1.9  3.2  20.1
97-98 71  .482  .589  65-205  9.5  3.8  1.6  1.7  2.6  21.9
98-99 42  .486  .454   4-34  13.0  4.1  1.4  2.1  3.5  20.0
99-00 75  .483  .751  27-95  10.5  4.6  1.6  1.7  2.9  24.5
TOTAL     .503  .587  .31%   10.1  4.3  1.5  1.8  3.0  20.9
***** ***** ***** ***** *****

Some other random playoff thoughts...

* I'm starting to think we shouldn't recognize the 1999-2000 Spurs
championship, as good as Duncan was last spring. Nobody realized how
badly the lockout affected the quality of play last year until we
watched the games this season -- throw in MJ's sudden departure and the
general disarray in the league and it was a pseudo-trophy. I went to the
Basketball Hall of Fame last weekend and couldn't believe they had a
whole wing devoted to those guys. Puh-leeeeeze. They couldn't even make
it out by Phoenix without Duncan this season!

* Which reminds me... why wouldn't Duncan flee San Antonio? If you were
Duncan, wouldn't you rather live in Orlando and play for Doc Rivers with
guys like Darrell Armstrong, Bo Outlaw, Cocoon star Don Ameche and maybe
even Grant Hill or T-Mac?

* As someone who hastily leapt onto the Kings bandwagon last night --
nearly fracturing my collarbone in the process -- I think I speak for
everyone here with this request for Rick Adelman: 

Listen, we like watching White Chocolate. He's exciting as hell. Good
guy to have in the league. With that said, if he even gets a sniff of
crunch time in Game Five, you should be drawn & quartered after the
game. I've seen 11-year-olds in CYO games with better shot selection
than White Chocolate.

* That Pacers-Bucks series is just mystifying. Nobody can figure that
thing out. Is anyone streakier than Milwaukee from quarter to quarter?
And does any team have more disjointed parts than Indiana? I wouldn't
bet on Game Five if you paid me... to, um, bet... um... that doesn't
make any sense. 

* That reminds me... I hate to say it, but The Man is getting outcoached
for the second time in two years (Van Gundy worked him last June). Now
excuse me while I duck this lightning bolt.

* I hate Portland -- I think I hate every single guy on that team, even
Pippen. It must have something to do with the rain down there because
people put on a Blazers uniform and suddenly they're griping and
bitching about everything.

(Random question: What if Portland got knocked out this year and
summarily traded Stoudamire and O'Neal for Gary Payton... then they
swapped Rasheed Wallace and Bonzi Wells in a sign-and-trade for Tim
Duncan? With some cap maneuvering, both deals are exceedingly possible,
especially if Duncan wants out and the Spurs try to get semi-equal value
for him.)

* I hate to say it, but Penny Hardaway is B-A-C-K.

* When you think about it, the Celtics aren't that far from the Bucks...
on paper, anyway. (Pierce & Walker) = (Allen & Big Dog) - (two years
experience). Anderson does a lot of the same things that Cassell does,
right down to the streak shooting and maddening shot selection. The
Vitaly/Fort/Battman combo is more accomplished than Milwaukee's
Johnson/Williams/Ham combo. The only big difference is Tim Thomas, the
3rd-year forward who's really coming on for Milwaukee. Boston doesn't
have anyone like him who can create plays at the 3-spot (much less make
an open jumper at the 3-spot).

* Speaking of Thomas, we've seen three players play visible roles in the
playoffs who were selected after Billups and Mercer in the '97 Draft --
Thomas (#7), Tracy McGrady (#9) and Austin Croshere (#13). Throw in Mo
Taylor, Derek Anderson, Brevin Knight... maybe that draft wasn't so bad.
McGrady turned out to be better than everyone in that draft, with the
exception of That Guy.

* It doesn't get any better than Marv Albert and Mike Fratello. It just
doesn't.

* My friend Jim Ramsey is starting a personal crusade to have sports
fans stop abbreviating athlete's names as nicknames (A-Rod, T-Mac,
J-Dub, etc). I didn't really care until he called me "B-Simm" at the end
of the e-mail... now I agree with him. The madness has to stop.

* Kobe's been electric this spring. Just awesome. It's fun watching him
take his game to The Next Level.

* No player in the league has deteriorated more rapidly than Vin Baker,
who looks like he's pushing three bills right now and may or may not be
battling a drinking/depression problem. I remember seeing him play
Boston in his rookie season ('94) and the Bucks had some injuries, so
they spread the floor down the stretch and had him bring the ball up
like a "point forward" and abuse X-Man and Radja off the dribble. And it
worked! Baker looked like a 6-foot-11 Magic Johnson that night. Now he
looks like a guy on his way out of the league. 

It will be fun to see how the NBA nudges him off the Olympic Team and
sneaks Webber in his place... because you know it's happening.

* Biggest disappointment of the first round, at least for me: Kevin
Garnett (his stats were okay but he didn't make The Leap this spring
like Kobe did). From the games I've seen, it seems like his offensive
game solely relies on his jumper. If he's making it, he's unstoppable.
If he's missing it, players can play off him. And he's just not strong
enough yet to take a horse like Wallace or Duncan down low and pull a
McHale on him. 

(Note: The T-Wolves were 3 or 4 plays away from getting past Portland in
Round One, if you're keeping score at home.)

* As for Charlotte, remind me never again to pick a team filled with
guys who never won anything before to make the Conference Finals. Once
crunch-time came around, all the shaky guys on that team (Coleman,
Mason, Wesley) started playing selfishly and the guys with a penchant
for disappearing in big moments (Campbell and Jones) were MIA. A lesson
learned for Big Poppa.

* Shawn Marion is a big-time player: long arms, great body, leaper,
active, plays hard, superb defender, seems to get stronger as the game
goes on. I'd love to see Phoenix stick him on Kobe in Round Two (if the
Lakers win tomorrow night).

(As Lieutenant Sam Weinberg would say, "I'd take Marion over Vitaly
Potapenko every day of the week and twice on Sunday." Forget Andre
Miller; Marion was the guy Boston would have taken at #8 last June had
they not made the Cleveland deal, which I defended at the time. Big
mistake.)

* Predictions for the rest of the week: Sonics win tonight ... Bucks
pull off a stunner tomorrow ... Lakers by 30 on Friday ... Utah cruises
at home in Game Five.

* Final thought: Sacramento has the best fans in the league. We used to
be that loud in the pre-Jumbotron days. 

Sigh.