[GodfatherParticipant]

STOP MAKING PREDICTIONS BASED ON THE SUMMER LEAGUE.

This is a league in which Randy Foye and Nate Robinson have won MVP.

This is a league in which Nikoloz Tskitishvili has won the scoring title.

Saying player X, or player Y will be good in the NBA based on the summer league is just insane. If you are going to be an all-star, you better tear up this league like no other. These guys aren’t even playing against Channing Frye, Marco Bellinelli, and other guys who aren’t considered close to the best on their teams.

This is a league in which last year, Adam Morrison scored over 20 ppg. Although 18.7 of those points came from his opponents eyes burning from looking at him, still, the fact that he could average 1.3 legitimate ppg, is rediculous.

Sure, the Summer League is fun to watch, because it’s all we NBA fans got right now, until a Lamar Odom, Chloe Kardashian porno comes out, PLEASE GUYS YOUVE BEEN MARRIED FOR A FUCKING YEAR THIS IS WAY OVERDUE!!!!!

Please, let’s just stop making bogus predictions on one of the most illegitimate sports leagues.

[joecheck88Participant]

well said and you are absolutely right. i think you can see glimpses of potential in summer league but you usually cant tell exactly how a player will be.

[GodfatherParticipant]

FOR EXAMPLE

Last year I remember Toney Douglass played very well. He was a first round draft pick, of course he has talent, and he showed it. He would have been a Summer League all star if they could have them. And he was a good role player for one of the worst teams this year. But yes, he does have potential, and you saw that. You can’t say that someone is gunna be the real deal based on the Summer League. It just doesn’t happen.

[GodfatherParticipant]

WHOS PSYCHED FOR SOME MORE SUMMER LEAGUE PLAY TONIGHT?

[OhCanada-Participant]

Heres the thing…You get to see a players skill set and improvements.John Lucas has played amazing and from watching that I can tell he is going to get an oppurtunity in the NBA. He has the potential to be NBA Summer leagues MVP and possibly even fight for the Chicago Bulls backup PG position playing about 12MPG.

Now when you talk about guys like Caracter and Ebanks I agree with you. For example Caracter gets 20Points 10Rebounds 3Assists 2Blocks in 35 Minutes although he has 8 turnovers and 8 fouls and everyone thinks hes amazing when in the real world he was out of the game a long time ago for either foul reasons which makes his team weaker, or turnovers which no Championship calibur Franchise will put up with.

If Derozan averaged 35Minutes Per Game he would score about 30 points per easily and may have one 40-50 point game.

In all you look at the players motor, savvy, athletisism, IQ and skillset from these games to determine how their game will translate to the NBA level, and beleive me, the NBA Summer League sorts out alot of things for competitive basketball worldwide.Next year Gerald Green could be playing in Madrid for all we know, John Bryant could be on the Heat intimadating every weakling in his path, and Dupree could be (while just about anywhere..but hell be somewhere).

Leave the Summer League alone…

[Bison 49Participant]

Good point, but as some have said summer league is all about context. If they player seems to have “it” to play in the league, and has a good opportunity, then goes to summer league and lights it up, there is a good argument to be made that the player will take a good step provided the opportunity is there.

Quite a few players have hinted in summer league that they are taking a big step in the coming year (e.g. Westbrook and Zac Randolph). On the other hand, there are guys that you know are meant to be good in summer league, playing with the kids, but do not have it to play well with the big boys.

Watching DeRozan his summer league performance can be seen as very promising, because people know he has potential. They also knew there were areas that he had to improve on (shot creation, strength, and defence). His play (not stats) are showing this improvement.

[GodfatherParticipant]

Ya true, but people here are making extreme predictions about how these players will play come November.

A guy like DeRozan showed a lot of potential last year in the REAL league, so we know he is good.

But if a player has “it” in the summer league, he has “it” in the summer league. Although it might seem like he has “it” in the real league, how do you really know? He hasn’t gone up against LeBron, Kobe, Dwight, etc. yet.

[Bison 49Participant]

Great to see him cut his hair. That has to be his best offseason move. Dude just bought some self respect for about $5.

[OhCanada-Participant]

But now we can see not only is Derozan showing potential, but he is starting to live up to that potential and it is evident with his body langauge, driving abillity, midrange consistancy and the fact that he has been attempting 3 point shots and making them confidently.

[GodfatherParticipant]

Yes but how do you know if he is living up to that potential?

I was on varsity basketball this year. I wasn’t as good as the other players but I was picked on potential, that hopefully next year I would be amazing. Whenever we scrimmaged the JV team, all of that potential showed.

That is what the summer league is to the NBA. It is the worser varsity players showing that they are good, but against the JV players.

[OhCanada-Participant]

Because he already is living up to his potential by exceeding his expected improvements.

[Tyreke JohnsonParticipant]

Great thread I agree completely, you can’t really start truly praising players until they play a full NBA season, summer league is kind of like scrimmaging, you try and practice your best moves and demonstrate what you can do, and in the process show off potential but until you play a full or even half of an NBA season you can’t really say if a player is a bust or a future all star.

[GodfatherParticipant]

Thank you Tyreke, I think that the summer leauge is fun to watch sometimes for those reasons, but still, it is not good for predictions

[OhCanada-Participant]

Predictions are one thing and improvements are another. If you watch properly you should be able to see improvements in somebodies game. When you start off the Summer League and say “I hope to see DeMar Derozan improve his ballhandling, consistancy shooting, agressiveness and confidence” and during the games you watch and you notice he improved alot in all of those areas you are no longer predicting. To me the Summer League is a fun way to watch how the Rookies we watch in college adapt to NBA coached systems. Also it is fun to watch who has put in work this offseason and watch because its basketball during the offseason! Walker lost 20 pounds…Shavlik Randolph has a very unique post game…Jeff Adrien is a mean player.When you see the improvements Derozan made after watching 82 Toronto Raptors basketball games (sometimes Id catch Game In An Hour) and how he played durinng the games he played you can see this is a completly different player. Raps may have gotten a steal at 9.

[GodfatherParticipant]

Okay, so we were saying two different things.

You were talking about noticing things, which I agree

I was talking about prediciton on that, which you agree.

And I was also saying people here should stop making threads about predictions based on Summer League, because playing against a JV team doesn’t show how good a varsity player is against other varsity players, (the analogy earlier)

[OhCanada-Participant]

Yeah I dont really see Wayne Ellington averaging 20 PPG or Cheikc Samb blocking 7 shota in the NBA.That would be ridiculous and Ebanks and Carecter arent even the 2 best players on that Summer League team, they are just justifiable draft picks getting over played to have padded stats. They are still far away from having Big NBA Impacts.

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