Report from the Vegas summer league

G. has spent far too much of his life watching the NBA summer leagues. It began when the Celtics hosted the event at UMass, after a few weeks of which he was hooked. When the league made the leap to Vegas he went too. What follows is a combination off several exchanges we've had in the last few weeks.



I hear you as far as discounting summer dominance. I've watched far too much summer ball over the years and I've always tried to explain it this way: In order to pick details from SL games, you have to have a good deal of experience watching shitty basketball games. You can always tell newbie summer league viewers when one of the their first complaints is the reffing. You can basically discern nothing from a player's volume stats. The most important thing to pay close attention to is the manner and method a player uses.

For instance, three point shooting in summer league means fuck all. The threes taken are usually of the uncontested sort. This is why folks should be skeptical of what Allen Ray has done over the summer. From the one game I've seen now and a handfull of college games though, Ray can shoot a basketball - probably better than anybody else coming into the league this year. He looked to be a little out of sorts when he first went in but once that wore off, that shot looked pretty. This tells us nothing, however, about whether he can get that shot off against a real NBA defense.

I remember being freaked out by Delonte turning the ball over against pressure last summer, to the point where I was paying more attention to whether or not Will Bynum could play defense and be a possible replacement. And obviously Delonte was even worse at this once the real games started. I got caught up in the prick tease that was Orien Greene as well - a player who looked very good on the court even though nearly everything he did turned out awful. There is always an abundance of fools gold in the summer.

If you've been watching summer games since the old Reebok days, you've had more than enough time to acclimate yourself to shitty basketball. More than 99% of hoops fans, I'd say. Predict, brother. Its way more fun that way, its how you get better at judging what matters and what doesn't, and nobody remembers when you are wrong anyway.

I've had some pretty good success separating the wheat from the chaff. I could see straight away that Justin Reed might've been an All World summer league player, but it wouldn't translate. Kedrick Brown was an obvious bust, even when his numbers said otherwise. I remember one of those UMass SL games that same year you went where Banks had a ridiculous amount of assists, and once I got back, I wrote up a report on SoSH to calm those heathens down, as for every nice pass he made, he threw one into the fifth row. Gerald Green didn't do all that much last summer and folks seemed pretty down on him, but I liked what I saw a whole lot.

The one player recently that I've been way, way off on was Perkins. Every summer he's looked worse than some of the escaped seven foot Lithuanian mental patients that get drafted in the second round on a lark. But last year he makes a huge leap in the regular season. Still can't figure that one out.

As for this year: Rondo played like he doesn't belong in Vegas. He did so many things so well and in such a unique manner, it was really hard to find a negative. The Raptor guards couldn't keep him out of the paint at all. He distributed the ball beautifully. At one point in the game, he made an over the head rocket pass into the corner for an open three, then on the next possession, faked that same over the head thing and reversed it to another open man. Showed a great handle all game.

The thing that really stood out with Rondo wasn't the fact that nobody on the Raptors could do anything when he was on the court. It was the way he was doing it to them. Somebody would be looking to feed the post to Bargnani or the Hump and he'd get in the way of it, but his hands were low. Nobody keeps both hands low defending an entry pass. Ever. I've never seen it done before. So I'm sitting there and my brain is saying, "What the fuck is this guy doing?" Then I notice that his hands look to be almost scraping the floor and a bell goes off - the dude is mutant and he knows it. Nobody was bouncing anything past those arms - he was a brick wall. Another one that stands out was the way he tried for a steal when his man switched to the weak hand. Every righthanded person on the planet would attempt to swat the ball with their right hand while keeping the dude in front of them. Not Rondo. He angles the guy toward the sideline, then swoops around the ballhandler's right(!) side to go for the swipe from behind. Just crazy shit.

I've seen young kids get touted as defensive players coming into the league before and most of them turn out to be nothing. This kid is a one man wrecking ball though. The only way the Raptors were going to get something going offensively during that game was if somebody shot Rondo. One guy killed their outside game, their post game and any hopes they had of getting into the lane.

I can't be certain that everything/anything I saw will translate to the NBA. Nobody really can be. That said, based on one summer league game against scrubs, my best guess is that Rajon Rondo will be a regular rotation player and help the Celtics win games this coming season. If he can distribute the ball without being a turnover machine against NBA defenses, he could start for them at some point this season. If he can penetrate against pros effectively and learn to hit an outside shot to save his life, we're really looking at something here.

One summer league game, yes. But I was beyond impressed with this kid. He'll no doubt be traded for a stiff like Sam Dalembert shortly.

Jefferson was okay, as far as big men go in summer league games. He rebounded well. Showed nice touch from further out than we are accustomed to seeing from him. He also did a nice job passing out of a couple doubles. His body looks much better and his shoulders are far more square than they were, but he looked a little slow to me and didn't show any ferocity around the rim when it was required. His D looked alternately good and bad. How far has Al Jefferson fallen in two years? Is there anyone left who confidently thinks he’ll even be an above-average NBA starter?

Green was in top form. Doc was invited to chat with the broadcast team for a couple segments and nailed Gerald's problem. He really doesn't know how to get himself open. Anyway, he dominated the first quarter, dunked all over the Raps. Drove to the hoop at will and showed nice touch when he got there. His help defense was pretty good, as he got at least two or three steals jumping into a passing lane that I can remember. If the kid applied himself to rebounding the basketball a little more, he could get serious minutes next year.

Telfair started off very well, distributing the ball all over the place. After the first quarter though, the held onto his dribble way too long. He then started throwing a couple third row jobs. His defense early on was way better than I remember it. He even blocked a shot at one point and altered another. The coaches must be riding his ass about Rondo. His defense got lazy after they got a huge lead, which I won't bash him too much for. Still, I'm not really seeing it with him. To me, he just seems to lose his focus too easily. Plenty of And-1 moments though, which made the game entertaining.

Gomes hit two jumpers and the rest of his points came off nifty passes from the two guards. He didn't look slimmed down, contrary to what some of the early reports suggested.

Allen Ray's jumper is just lovely. His defense was passable. He got some extended garbage time minutes at the point, where he looked good penetrating and Delontesque setting up an offense. Man can shoot the basketball though, and his drives looked good as well.

Leon Powe is my new hero. Nobody wants a loose ball more than Leon Powe. There was one point where he was surrounded by three far bigger Raps, one of whom might've been related to an elephant, and when the rebound came off the cylinder, he went right back up with it and the bodies started flying. I love this guy but he might be the first player ever to kill someone on the court Last Boy Scout style. No way he lasts more than 5 minutes at a time in any game this year. He's in good shape, but if gets completely yoked out ala Ben Wallace, he'd be a terror off the bench. His offensive moves are kind of slow and he isn't the most graceful dude around, but if I'm building a team, I would always have a spot for a guy who would choke somebody out for a rebound.

Dwayne Jones looked at least partially retarded in the few minutes he saw the floor.

Fun game to watch. And we found out Heywood Workman is reffing scrub games now, so that was a huge plus. They are replaying the shit out of this game tomorrow, and if you weren’t such a jackasses you’d skip work, watch it and tell me if I'm crazy here.



BTW, if it's not clear from context, when G. says a PG looks 'Delonte-esque' setting up the offense it's the very definition of damning with faint praise.