RE: Vescey's knowledge and Indiana

["John Lyell" <jlyell@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

If we can get him for Walker we should take O'neal and Artest for Walker and
Williams and Delk. O'neal is still a kid but more of an inside force then
Walker will ever be. We need someone to battle Kenyon Martin and Ben
Wallace. Does he have his weaknesses? Of course, but as if Antoine does not.






-----Original Message-----
From: owner-celtics@xxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-celtics@xxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of
Snoopy the Celtics Beagle
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2003 6:44 PM
To: Celtics@xxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: Vescey's knowledge and Indiana


At 01:10 PM 9/10/03 -0400, Berry, Mark  S wrote:
>Shawn asked:
>Does anyone else on list have an opinion of Jermaine? What's the concensus?
>--- --- ---
>I don't understand Snoopy's problem with O'Neal either. He's a stud. He
>scores, rebounds, blocks shots, runs the floor and gets better every
>year.  As for the crunch-time criticism, I think it's somewhat valid
>although easily understandable....
>So, did Jermaine struggle at times (not all the time) down the stretch of
>games? Sure. But he was saddled with a coach without a clue and perimeter
>players not really capable of either creating or making an open shot.

Basically, that's my problem.  I've never said O'Neal wasn't a good
player.  He is.  But I think he's prone to problems at crunch
time.  Several times, I have seen him blow a play, or commit a dumb
foul--but ONLY in high pressure situations.  The closest--though
faint--analogy is Shaq.  He's a tremendously talented player, but in a
close game that's going to be decided by free throws, I wouldn't want to
ride the game on his FT percentage.

I'm willing to concede the possibility--though I think it unlikely--that
Jermaine's problem stems from Thomas as a coach.  How badly can you really
be shaken by the coach if you've got Reggie Miller to back you
up?  Granted, Reggie's on the tail end of his career, but he's not chopped
liver either.  Given a choice between O'Neal and Artest, I'll take O'Neal
because I think Artest is too big a pain in the patootie to be worth
babysitting until he starts acting his age and not his shoe size.

But right now, the Celtics have FAR too many close games to have anyone on
the court who isn't rock solid at crunch time.  Jermaine would have to show
me grace under pressure to convince me he's worth the risk in the win/loss
column.