More than the OP

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"The Frank Comes Out At Night", "The Frank Comes Out at Night"

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BJ Armstrong is close. Yeah, I know, his were always wide open. How about Glen Rice? Steve Nash. All these guys are close. Over 40%. And then there's Steve Kerr. 45.4%

When they hit at that percentage while shooting 12 of them a game and being the focal point of their offense I will acknowledge they are close.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Mf'ers act like they forgot about Ray.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

My last post applies to him too. And every nba player ever.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Now Ben Simmons there someone who's OVERATED

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I'm going to bounce from the spot for awhile but I will be back at some point to argue with you about this hoops stuff again. Playoffs have been great this season. See ya up the road.

I'm out.

Nah he is probably the most criticized player in the League. Good thing that his coach knows how good he happens to be. His team has been in the plus category in wins from the moment he suited up in the league. You can continue to fight the good (Embiid wasted draft pick, Simmons overrated) fight however

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If you don't work on your weak spot (shooting) you're a fugazi. It's embarrassing to be a PG and have the hack a shaq employed against you.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

Sometimes you work on things and you don’t get any better. Eventually you work on something that’s a better use of your time. In basketball and in life. Really makes you think .

He is very good at every other aspect of the game. I can live with him not being able to shoot. When you are 6'11 and defend, rebound, pass and get downhill the way he can shooting is optional. Its not required,.

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If you have Simmons and Embiid on the same team then every other player on your roster needs to be able to shoot threes.

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Simmons should be working on his post game, not shooting

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

I think he needs to play downhill more. He doesn't attack nearly as much as he should but I think its because he plays with Embiid. They run so many post ups for Embiid that it clogs the lane for Simmons and his forays down the lane. When Embiid doesn't play the floor is spaced and they play extremely fast.. He attacks the lane much more then

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Simmons should be working on his free throw shooting

_________________
I'm going to bounce from the spot for awhile but I will be back at some point to argue with you about this hoops stuff again. Playoffs have been great this season. See ya up the road.

I'm out.

This has always concerned me about his game. He's going to encourage future NBA players to take a bunch of crazy shots that he can consistently make, but they can't. Players taking and missing three pointers does not exactly make for exciting basketball.

I agree but we saw the same thing with iso ball by average players in the early 2000s because of MJ. It did hurt the game a bit. I’m not saying Steph’s influence is a positive for the game but his influence is undoubtedly generational.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Definitely. If he does nothing else he has to shoot 80% from the line at least

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Agreed.

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He should work on it obviously but generally you are who you are as a FT shooter. There’s virtually zero chance of him becoming an 80% FT shooter. Find other ways to score.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Nah he can get better. Guys like Webber and others were terrible free throw shooters and by the end of their career they were great. Karl Malone too. Free throw shooting is one of the areas guys can improve with practice and repetition.

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Neither of those examples rebut my statement. Karl Malone was shooting the same in his 4th season as he did at the end of his career. Similar with Webber but Webber fluctuated like Duncan and Lebron do.

You can improve a bit at FT shooting but generally speaking you’re not gonna become good at it as a pro. It should be practiced, and I’m sure he does practice it, but that’s now the type of skill you want to spend a whole offseason improving because it’s vastly different than real game FT shooting. Ben needs to add another offensive skill set to his game and a post game makes a shitload more sense than jump shooting right now given his other skills and size.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Huh? Malone improved by 30% and so did Webber. Both had numerous years where they shot 80% from the line. Simmons has already improved by about 15% from his rookie season. He already has improved. Guys like DeAndre Jordan have improved to shoot 65%.

I have much more confidence in him improving as a free throw shooter than I do him developing a post game .He does have a jump hook right now.

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Simmons only improved 5% from his rookie year

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Malone was a better FT shooter his 4th year in the league than his last. Developing a post game is a lot easier as a pro than sustained FT improvement.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Malone improved his free throw percentage by 30% at one point in his career. So did Webber. If I were to search further I'm certain there are other examples. Simmons needs to improve as a free throw shooter much more than he needs a post game. They are already employing the hack a Shaq with him. If he doesn't get decidedly better as a free throw shooter he will be unplayable late in games. His lack of free throw shooting has caused him to run away from the ball late in games during his career already. If he has apost game all of this still happens.
His inability to hit free throws already cost them a game against Washington last week.
Even if he doesn't get to 80 then 75%. Can't be sitting at 61% not going to cut it.

Doc subbed him out today after the Hawks went to a hack a Ben strategy.

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It’s pretty easy to increase your FT%. Shoot it grandma style or whatever. I get why nobody does it though.

I don't disagree that he's good at the things you mentioned. But he places his team at a competitive disadvantage due to his lack of willingness to work on his game. Guys can easily sag coverage to guard against his drive and help out on others because he's not a shooting threat. Then at the end of games he's a liability because he's not a shooting threat and you don't want him at the line. Just Kobe it up and shoot 5k free throws or jumpers on your off day or whatever every year. It's not that hard if you have an ounce of commitment to your craft. The basketball community let even Ason Kidd get his J back after he worked on his shot.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

How much of a liability can he be if his teams have won 70% of the games that he and Embiid have played together since they have been in the league? Having a hole is one thing but the guy is hardly a liability. My only criticism of him is that he isn't aggressive at times. When he attacks the rim he is unstoppable at times. He just doesn't do it nearly enough and i think the primary reason is that Embiid takes up so much space on that part of the court.

Roster construction is also a huge problem Vegan. They should have found someone else to run backup point for them so that Simmons can move around more. Philly has not had a viable backup to Simmons at any point since he has been in the league. If they did he would be able to play off the ball more. This would help alleviate some of his shooting troubles.

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I assume they desire more than just being regular season champions, that's why Simmons is holding them back. I think you're evading the main issue: why isn't Simmons shooting 5k jumpers and free throws on his off-days? He's made 5 three pointers in five years. Think about that - that's unconscionable. His penetration skills won't matter if he can't shoot and again he's a liability in the half court game, when defenses clamp down. He becomes one dimensional. Yes, he can morph into Bruce Bowen on defense and add value that way, but his ceiling is/should be way higher than whatever he does right now. I've got Morant, Young, Dame, Curry, Luka, and Irving above him right now. That changes once he learns to shoot. Might even compete with Luka if that ever happens.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY