And Assani ruins my sickest passing all-white frontline ever. Once again Assani's "24" rule sorta sucks for AK. I still like him here and I agree with Assani's points about the team shifts affecting his game. He's better as an undersized 4 active around the glass than as a wing on offense.

good pick. just hope that he doesn't have a vacation coming up before any important games.

I can understand why PER can be misleading. I can't understand how PPG and TS% when looked at together can be misleading.

QFT

LOL...as I said, he was only the #2 player on my board, but I didn't think he'd get back to me so I took a risk that my #1 player will. Hopefully none of you guys will get me back by taking my #1.

I admit that I havn't given that much thought, but is this the general concensus(I'd especially like to hear from Bobbo here)? Can he defend good scoring PFs well?

I do like the versatility he can bring. Duncan can obviously play the 4 or 5, AK47 can play 3/4 and probably the 2 also, and Penny can play the 1, 2, and 3.

Assani,

weird because he's my #2 too and I was thinking it was worth risking him getting back to me... but steroid boy and you clearly would have foiled my plans

assani,

not sure it matters whether he's the 3 or 4 a lot, but Sloan camped him out around the perimeter for that stinker year where he's better off slashing and distributing and crashing the glass.

Yeah AK is a significantly better defender at 4 than 3. He's too quick on the D for PF's to handle. Now all he mostly gets weakside blocks but he used to get on the ball ones more. Also, note the dropoff from being an all D team player before the Booze showed up. If there's one thing that Sloan hasn't done well with this team, it's utilize AK47 since Booze showed up.

His role in the game isn't defined by SF or PF offensively, he should always be moving on offense. Defensively he's way better at guarding the PF.

And if we had drafted Mookie after his age 24 season, he would still be looked at as a ridiculously inefficient player. His TS% in his 3 seasons up to age 24: 41.6, 45.5, and 46.5.


Also, as I said above, I think PG defense from a player whose height only lets him guard the other team's PG is not nearly as valuable as defense from any other position. I say this because many PGs aren't dominant scorers anyway, and several of them who are(Billups, GP, Kidd, etc.) will be able to take Mookie to the post, as Mookie is only 6 ft tall and 180 lbs and we know that they exaggerate those numbers too(fwiw I am no taller than 5ft 9.5in and they listed me at 6ft in college).

this is very much against the rules btw.

Thats awesome then and an added bonus because I think there are more quality SF/SGs left than PFs, so if AK47 can play the 4 then that makes me even happier with the pick.

+1

Theres a difference between skinny and short(for NBA standards) and skinny and tall regarding injuries imo.

Odom is a meh pick to me, which is strange since you'd think Odom would be more of a love him/hate him type player. Solid value, nothing spectacular imo.

Ok, maybe I'm crazy but I thought Ak47 would be a sick fit on the Nash/Gnobe team and I would have picked him there for the awesome (and globally diverse) whiteness.

This is something I never thought of.

Also AK47 >> Battier even if you do stick him at the 3.

edit: I see assani already pointed this out in his write up.

Yeah that would've been awesome. Offensively, AK is a poor man's Marion so obviously that would've fit nicely, but defensively AK can run the 4 (whereas Marion is better at the 3) so you could've had an ever faster lineup.

I'm not sure why you'd pick Odom with Ak47 still on the board, he's pretty much better in any possible way.

Disagree. From when I've watched him, AK cannot guard 3's (his best talent is blocking/altering shots in the lane), and he gets blown by a decent amount. Battier is much better swing player defender.

Battier and AK are kind of different players. Plus sticking him with Marion would be redundant.

With all of this said, I've always felt that AK was not as good as his numbers. Those Jazz teams sucked and even though they didn't have many other good players, if he was that good they wouldn't have been bottom third both offensively and defensively. So either he disappears offensively on a good team or puts up numbers on a bad team. Also, another guy with injury issues for Assani.

Might want to edit your post.