The Texas Legends participated in a peculiar one-team, ten-round expansion draft on Monday, in which Nancy Lieberman and her staff had their pick of the L.A. D-Fender litter. The Legends now own the rights to 10 former D-Fenders. Those 10 players are, according to a release from the team:
Name
Height
Weight
College
Age
Keith Clark
6-8
245
Oklahoma
23
Joe Crawford
6-5
210
Kentucky
24
Michael Fey
7-0
270
UCLA
27
Ryan Forehan-Kelly
6-6
195
California
30
Gabriel Hughes
7-0
240
California
30
James Peters
6-8
215
UNLV
29
Frank Robinson
6-4
220
Cal-State Fullerton
26
Diamon Simpson
6-7
230
St. Mary's (CA)
22
Dar Tucker
6-4
205
DePaul
22
James Wright
6-1
185
Colorado
29
For those keeping track at home, the D-Fenders not selected were: Lawrence McKenzie, Ray Reese, Rodney Webb, and Horace Wormely.
The Legends still do not have a roster. Though they now own the rights to the selected 10, not all of those players will be in the D-League next season, much less in Frisco. As Scott Schroeder of Ridiculous Upside noted last week, Diamon Thompson, Michael Fey, Ryan Foreham-Kelly, and Frank Robinson have already signed contracts to play overseas next season, and thus will likely pass on the opportunity to play for the Mavs’ affiliate. Of the remaining six, some will at least make it to Legends camp, though it’s unknown how many of those players will actually make the final roster.
The Legends have begun to take shape. Even if, for the moment, that shape is something of an amorphous blob.
I’m not quite sure how this slipped by me last week, but here’s the latest of the Texas Legends promo videos. Featuring: the exquisite stylings of J.R. Slagendorff, and relative newcomer on the scene, Draino.
Or, for those who can’t handle videos longer than 30 seconds:
Kelly Dwyer ranks Dirk Nowitzki as the fourth best power forward in the game, behind Pau Gasol, Tim Duncan, and Amar’e Stoudemire. Feel free to be angry, if that’s how you feel about these things. I will say this: when you get to the top of a positional ranking, you’re often going apples to oranges. Gasol, Duncan, Nowitzki, and Stoudemire are all great players. I happen to think Nowitzki will best Stoudemire in the upcoming season, New York’s offensive freedom be damned, but then again, I’m more of a citrus fan than most.
And because we can never get enough rankings, Dwyer also sorted out the top 30 centers in the NBA next season. Erick Dampier ranked 30th, Tyson Chandler 24th, and Brendan Haywood 19th. Chandler’s ranking I can understand, but Dampier and Haywood’s seem a bit harsh. Then you look at those listed above Haywood (Or below? Rank orientation always confuses me.), and it’s hard to find some unthinkable error.
Statistically speaking, defense does win championships. A certain Celtics dynasty skews the results a bit, but even exempting that team (and all teams prior to 1976) from the statistical sample yields a significant result in favor of prominent defensive squads.
Tyson Chandler on how it feels to be traded, the significance of having a role as a defense-first player, and the secret to playing good D (via DOH on Mavs Moneyball).
We knew that the genesis of the Texas Legends’ roster could somehow be connected to that of the now-defunct Los Angeles D-Fenders. We also knew that an expansion draft could be an important formative step for the Legends. What we didn’t know is that those two would methods of acquiring players would actually be one in the same, as the D-League announced on Thursday. There will be a D-League expansion draft for the Legends benefit after all…with a 14-player pool comprised of solely former D-Fenders.
From the team release:
The roster for the inaugural Texas Legends season, which tips off in November, will begin to take shape by way of an Expansion Draft, it was announced today. The 14-player expansion draft pool is made up of solely of the returning players from the 2009-10 Los Angeles D-Fenders, which will be on hiatus for the 2010-11 season. Included in the pool are guard Dar Tucker and center Michael Fey, two of the 30 players invited to the 2010 NBA D-League Elite Mini-Camp, held in June in Chantilly, VA.
…“This is another step towards our inaugural season,” Legends Owner Donnie Nelson commented. “The D-Fenders had a number of very talented players who have a real chance to develop into NBA athletes. The opportunity to draft their rights is the first step towards forming our team.”
Essentially, the Legends will have the right of first refusal on all of the D-Fenders, and there should be plenty of refusing. L.A. had the worst record in the Western Conference last season (and the second-worst record in the D overall), and the overall talent of the roster reflects that. I’m sure some of the D-Fenders will end up with the Legends to start the season, but don’t mistake this for anything more than the most basic of starter kits.
Available for the picking are Dar Tucker (also known as he who did this), Michael Fey, Joe Crawford, Diamon Simpson, Ryan Forehan-Kelly, Gabriel Hughes, Lawrence McKenzie, Frank Robinson, Horace Wormely, James Wright, Keith Clark, James Peters, Ray Reese and Rodney Webb. You can view all of their statistical information here, but keep in mind that someone has to produce on every team, even the second worst in the D-League.
UPDATE: Scott Schroeder of Ridiculous Upside ranked the top 10 D-Fenders and described them in greater detail. I’m inclined to defer to him on these matters. Follow along with Schroeder as he briefly explains each of the top 10 options, their relative standing, and why it makes sense to draft the rights of some players that have already signed deals to play overseas.
Maverick fans are fervent in their defense of Dirk Nowitzki, typically merciless in their examinations of Jason Terry’s weaknesses, and frequently enraged at the idea that J.J. Barea could take even a minute of playing time away from Rodrigue Beaubois. There are charged responses abound regarding a number of Dallas players, and yet no Maverick — not even Nowitzki — could trump the emotional pull of Josh Howard. Josh simply had a hold of the Dallas fan base in ways that are difficult to describe or fully understand, and from Draft day, 2003 to his eventual exile, Howard took the Maverick faithful on a hell of a ride. It wasn’t just to the NBA Finals and back; a portrait of Josh Howard the Mav would be properly painted in shades of gray, the same shades he wore so well through every stellar game, every off-court incident, and every questionable decision.
He didn’t need hijinks to be polarizing. Howard did that all on his own.
Zac Crain did a terrific job of capturing what it was that made Josh Howard Josh Howard over on FreeDarko last week, and that piece, like so many other thoughts and views of Howard, has been doing laps inside my skull. The fact that Crain used Mike Finley as a mechanism with which to view and understand Howard is even more confounding to me, as I’ve long considered Finley to be one of the more deeply flawed yet still sympathetic figures in Mavericks lore.
All of this is to say that Josh Howard throws me for a bit of a loop. I’m not entirely sure how to make sense of his time in Dallas (his inclusion on lists of the all-time Mavericks seems so wrong and about right), but I’m glad that Crain can.
As much as the positional revolution is a reflection of basketball progress and modernity, it also symbolizes something very basic and quite fundamental. Positionality is basketball’s existentialism, as looking into the nature of on-court roles is the closest the sport ever comes to pondering how the players as we know them have come to life. When a person steps onto a basketball court they become a player, and more specifically, a shooting guard. Or a center. Or a wing. Or a scorer/D2. They become something else and something more, and trying to understand that transition is a fascinating endeavor.
Fascinating enough, in fact, that the recent swell of discussion over positional freedom has sparked plenty of interesting writing in our little corner of the basketball world.
Last week, Jesse Blanchard of 48 Minutes of Hell honed in on the D1. After all, is any player in the league really capable of keying in on an opponent’s premier, quicker, point guard-type player? While I think the same could be said of the elites at every position, Blanchard’s point is well-taken, and his alternative system — which focuses on three different defensive styles (disrupt, deny, contain) — provides some delectable food for thought. Something to consider, though: Do Blanchard’s defensive positions really signify defensive function? Or are they merely stylistic descriptors? Does that even matter? Those classifications are a terrific exercise regardless, even if they aren’t best served as positions.
Matt Moore, writing at NBA FanHouse, chose to examine the revolution with Tyreke Evans as one of its foci: “An example? Tyreke Evans. Evans can attack the basket, snare rebounds, has terrific length and instincts defensively, and knows how to find his teammates (despite calls he’s a terrible passer, he averaged five assists his rookie campaign, with little to no weapons on the Kings). But because he’s tall and has better scoring ability than passing ability, he’s “not a point guard” which automatically makes him a shooting guard. Except he’s not a shooting guard. He’s best with the ball in his hands, setting up and creating within the offense. Hence our problem…So what’s so important about this discussion? At the scouting level, it means that players that could be very real assets for teams are either ignored or devalued based on their inability to fit our more traditional 1-5 positions. Unless they are super-freaks like LeBron James, we struggle with how to really implement them into systems (and even James has positional problems due to him consistently playing the small forward position, which has restrictions). From an evaluation standpoint, we assign negative values to players like Tyreke Evans, who are incredible stars, simply because they don’t fit our traditional model.”
Bethlehem Shoals took Moore’s take and ran with it, not only echoing the valuation of Tyreke Evans’ significance, but asserting that “point guards are the gateway to positional change.” The point guard designation carries with it the most specific and sacred responsibilities, so it’s no wonder that Shoals — and Blanchard, and Moore, and myself — see it as such an elemental part of a potential shift.
Kevin Arnovitz’s take, inspired by Kobe Bryant’s endorsement of positional evolution, preaches pragmatism. Not necessarily in the way that we talk about players or positions (in order to even engage in this discussion, your head needs to be at least brushing with the clouds), but in the way that a post-position (or at least post-traditional positions) world would need to function: “In short, pro basketball is ripe for a positional revolution — but like every revolution, those challenging the status quo must be ready to govern once they take control.”
Ay, there’s the rub. All of these scribes — and the many others who have tackled the revolution in the past and will hopefully continue to do so in the future — agree that we need a change, but what then? The point of our union is obvious, but moving from ideological consensus to actual implementation comes with a million hang-ups along the way. The easiest part of the transition is in the works: more and more people are beginning to understand and think about how terribly limiting traditional positions can be. From here on out? It gets exponentially more difficult. There are already numerous ideas for various positional frameworks (including the Scorer/Rebounder/Creator — DX system that will tentatively be utilized here), but determining their utility, viability, and all the while creating a system that is somehow new, informative, and accessible is no simple task. Yet as a collective of thinking fans, it’s our task.
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Lost? Start here, turn left there, and make a slight right here. Keep going.
Neil Paine of Basketball-Reference.com used offensive and defensive ratings to determine team offensive performance relative to the league average. From there, he determined which players (with a 15,000 career minutes qualifier) have played in the best offenses throughout their careers. Steve Nash topped the list. Dirk Nowitzki came in at ninth. Those rankings may not mean much to the role players on the list (Raja Bell, for instance, is eighth) but for stars like Nash and Dirk? It’s a testament to just how incredible they are as offensive centerpieces, both together and apart.
Kelly Dywer’s positional rankings continue, with Jason Terry coming in as no. 20 among shooting guards while Rodrigue Beaubois trails him slightly at no. 25. Pretty fair. Dwyer concedes to a conservative ranking on Beaubois in fear of a minutes mirage, and rightfully so. Plus, as Beaubois gets more and more playing time and is featured more and more prominently in the Mavs’ offense, he’ll face a series of increasingly difficult tests. We should all be pretty excited to see how Beaubois responds.
Dwyer has also begun his small forward rankings, but there’s no sign of Shawn Marion in the first intallment.
Kurt Helin of ProBasketballTalk on Caron Butler giving back: “Caron Butler this summer did his annual ‘Bike Brigade’ in his hometown of Racine, Wisconsin, where he gave away hundreds of bicycles to area youth. He hosts annual back-to-school drives like he did in Washington DC last year, he has hosted numerous charity basketball games, he went to Johannesburg, South Africa, to conduct free basketball clinics. I could probably fill up the Internet with Butler’s charity endeavors. He’s quick to tell you that he does all this because he wants to, because he wants to give back to the community. He’s sincere and he cares. He isn’t organizing and attending events for the publicity or to save some money come April 15. And he said there are a lot of players out there like him. ‘I think there are other guys out there doing it,’ Butler told PBT last week. ‘This is something I’ve been doing since day one, since I got into the league. I probably just had a camera crew out after four or five years of doing it… after a while people just started paying more attention to what I was doing and understand that what I did was from my heart and I was passionate about it. That wasn’t just a once a year thing, this was something I was committed to year in and year out. And I do believe there are other guys out there like that.’”
It didn’t take long for Mavs fans to latch on to Rodrigue Beaubois. It was more than just the usual rookie intrigue; from the moment Beaubois stepped on the floor a Maverick, he was a scoring sensation, bending and breaking the limits of our expectations with every bucket. One designed play embodied Beaubois’ allure perfectly: the point guard-to-point guard alley-oop. The sequence showcased Beaubois’ athleticism and Kidd’s impeccable timing, but more importantly, it worked. Very well, in fact. So well that the Mavs ran it fairly frequently — or at least, as frequently as you would run a lob play for a 6-foot-2 guard — and far more often than not, Kidd’s oop found Beaubois right at the basket.
Of course as the season went on, and teams grew wiser and wiser to Beaubois’ leaping abilities as well as Kidd’s intentions, Dallas ran the play less and less. It was broken up here or there by this team or that, and when Beaubois was buried in the rotation mid-season, so too was the play.
The sequence is easily identifiable (not many Maverick sets trigger with the same hand-off action on the wing) though, and for little purpose other than re-living one of Beaubois’ first NBA highlights, we’ll break down the set-up using FastDraw.
Note: The numbers do not indicate positions, but actual jersey numbers. For this example, the Mavs’ lineup will consist of Kidd (#2), Beaubois (#3), Dirk Nowitzki (#41), Shawn Marion (#0), and Brendan Haywood (#33).
The play begins with Kidd bringing the ball up on the left side of the floor, while the other four players remain stationary. Kidd hands off the ball to Beaubois, and begins to cut toward the baseline.
Nowitzki sets a pick for Kidd, who attempts to brush his man off on Nowitzki’s screen. From there he continues to cut baseline, heading toward Marion on the opposite wing.
Marion sets a similar brush screen for Kidd, who rounds the corner and heads back out to the perimeter while Haywood runs interference with another screen. Keep in mind that the purpose of these picks isn’t really to free up Kidd as it is to draw the attention of the defense. If the Mavs are running three screens for Kidd, it seems clear that they want him open in a specific spot. In a sense they do, but the screens here, while certainly beneficial in executing the play, are largely misdirection.
Beaubois dribbles to the top of the key as Kidd cuts up the sideline, positioning himself to make a simple feed back to Kidd.
Kidd receives the easy pass from Beaubois, likely with his man still trailing behind. At this point, the play resembles a set designed to open up Kidd for a three-pointer, but he doesn’t shoot. A defense may misread this as early success, thinking that they’ve botched the Mavs’ primary option on this play. Dirk heads to the free throw line extended, as he often does when the Mavs’ sets break down. Beaubois, after making the pass back to Kidd, begins to drift back to his prior spot on the left side of the floor.
Rather than receive the ball at the elbow, Nowitzki is another decoy. He sets a screen on Beaubois’ man at the elbow, and Beaubois darts toward the basket while the defense watches Kidd and Dirk. The opposing bigs are likely with Nowitzki, who is moving in the opposite direction, and Haywood, who is standing on the right wing. This allows Beaubois to cut to the rim, and finish with an undeterred slam.
Basketball positions are the names by which we call any player. Just as a rose by any other name would swell as sweet, a lanky 7-foot German would shoot as sweet by any other positional designation. They’re terms and notations that matter to others, but should hardly matter much to the players themselves. After all, it shouldn’t matter much to Chris Paul what position someone thinks he plays, as long as he’s busy doing what Chris Paul does: dominating basketball games.
Then again, it’s foolish to ignore just how loaded positional terminology can and has become. Part of the reason why re-defining positions is so alluring in the first place is the ability to clear the air of positional expectation. ‘Point guard,’ carries with it an arbitrary set of expected, predefined abilities, and our (our meaning the collective who creates, consumes, and reflects on the sport in just about any capacity) willingness to malign players who don’t color within the lines of those designations is nonsensical.
For those who have followed along through the firsttwo posts, this line of thinking is nothing new. However, the weight of positional expectation adds another interesting party to these discussions: the players themselves. While positions shouldn’t theoretically matter to the players, the fact that their position is so often used as an evaluative criterion gives them reason enough to be interested. I’m not saying that Jason Terry is going to stop by the comment section for a chat, but the opinions of the players have a place in this process, and it’s a mishmash of perspectives that’s hard to encapsulate.
Kobe Bryant has seen the future, and it is … him. Or something close to him. Speaking to the media during his World Basketball Festival appearance at Harlem’s Rucker Park last weekend, Kobe said the influence of international players in the NBA has helped create a “hybrid” culture, where players of all sizes possess skills in all areas and can conceivably play any position on the floor.
“That’s the one difference I’d like to see us kind of shift to,” Kobe said.
Bryant’s vision of a world with positional nebulousness is nice. Beautiful, in fact. A universe where all ballers can play in perfect harmony, stand as equals, and worry not over the endless criticism regarding their positional performance. That’s the endgame of all of this, and the fact that Kobe sees it too is a positive sign. Positions as we know them aren’t quite dead, but when one of the league’s pillars decrees them unworthy from atop his ring-and-trophy-adorned tower, people would be wise to listen.
Bryant is far from infallible, but he’s one of the sport’s more active scholars. He knows where this game has been and where it’s headed, and he has an intimate look into the eye (or rather, an eye) of the storm, to boot. From Pau Gasol to Derek Fisher, Shannon Brown to Ron Artest, and Lamar Odom to Kobe himself, the Lakers have a lot of versatile talent that evades convention. The entire league has a lot of versatile talent that evades convention, and that’s something both you, I, and Kobe can agree on.
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