As our summer mainstay, Aaron's writing a 370-part series discussing almost every notable player who was -- as of last season -- getting minutes in the NBA. Intent is to get you talking, thinking, and appreciating the myriad of wonderful folks who play in our favorite sports league. Today we continue with Nikola Pekovic, Evan Turner, and Greivis Vasquez.

• • •

Follow Nikola Pekovic on Twitter at @14pek.

Let's say you're a mad scientist. You're the Dr. Marc Franken-Stein of science, a hoops connoisseur with lab and a mission. You're hired by David Khan. (Who else?) He wants you to build the perfect frontcourt partner for his superstar, Kevin Love. You think on it a while. It's an interesting question -- statistically, you don't need Love's partner to be the greatest player ever, but you need to hit some key benchmarks. He needs to be a good post player, so he can draw help and allow Love easy room to shoot the three. By percentage, Love is one of the premier defensive rebounding talents in the league, but he's average or slightly below for a big man on the offensive glass -- if you give Love's partner an excellent nose for the ball on the offensive end, the Wolves will hardly ever lose the possession battle, and that'll help compensate for the team's anemic defense. In order to keep the Timberwolves offense flowing, the center can't be a poor free throw shooter -- every possession, you want the ball in Rubio or Love's hands, and keep their sacred flow intact. Ideally, Love's partner would be a great defensive player in his own right, and help the Timberwolves out of the gutter -- barring that, at least having a partner with some offensive rebounding ability (as previously stated) is crucial. In an aesthetic sense, you probably want a bit of a bulldog, a tough and imposing figure to place next to Love's more aloof stylings. If you were this scientist, and you were successful? You'd probably have built Nikola Pekovic. Almost exactly.

There are a few gaps, but not many -- Pekovic is an absolute bruiser in the post, with a mid-size array of moves but an adept sense of how to convert the moves he has. Last season, Pekovic had the second highest offensive rebounding percentage in the game after Kenneth Faried -- the Wolves defense was incredibly permissive, but by simply gobbling up every shot and letting their deadly offense run its course in more possessions than the other team could muster, the Wolves had stretches of nearly-elite play. Poor free throw shooter? Hardly -- at 74%, Pekovic had the 6th highest free throw percentage among centers that played more than 25 minutes a night. Pekovic was a promising, bruising defensive player in his own right -- his help defense was lacking, to be sure, but Pekovic had a unique ability to roughhouse and nestle opposing centers with his size and strength. Most centers entered the year looking forward to a matchup with the Timberwolves -- not since the days of Rasho have the Wolves had a remotely imposing player at the center position. Pekovic takes that former position of weakness and spits on it, crumples it up, and flings it into the abyss of hell. (Yes, this speaks to the last bit of aesthetics -- Pekovic is about as tough as you get.)

This isn't to say Pekovic doesn't have his limitations. He doesn't really have a competent shot outside the paint. As mentioned, he's not the greatest defensive rebounder on the face of the earth -- although he came a percentage point from leading the league in offensive rebounding rate, his defensive rebounding rate was the 2nd lowest among centers that averaged more than 25 minutes a night. Attribute that to Love, if you want, but be wary -- his pace-adjusted offensive rebounding numbers were almost always superior to his defensive rebounding numbers in the Euroleague. Occam's razor dictates that he's probably just not as good at defensive rebounding as he is offensive rebounding. Which, as I've noted, is perfectly fine -- next to Love, one of the greatest defensive rebounders ever, I'd argue that's exactly what you want. But in a different context, where Pekovic isn't next to one of the greatest defensive rebounders in the game, his lacking command of the defensive glass could become a problem. So too could his help defense, which is definitively not an asset. Pekovic is probably the strongest player in the league, and it shows in his ability to individually cover all sorts of dominant centers. But with that strength comes a lot less of the mobility and fluidity that makes defenders like Kevin Garnett and Anderson Varejao effective as helpers in a broader scheme.

Still, that strength has advantages too -- although he hasn't gotten in the habit of setting a surplus of illegal screens (a la Garnett), Pekovic sets (according to many guards, including Tony Parker) the most painful screens in the NBA. And as I've outlined, Pekovic is a fantastic frontcourt partner for Kevin Love -- if his help defense was better, he'd be virtually perfect. It isn't, and given his obsessive desire to add strength to his frame and the resultant lacking fluidity, it's hard to imagine Pekovic becoming a game-changing help defender. The mobility is so crucial to that, and I just don't see how he develops it. Still, combine all his skills with the roster around him and you have a roster that's at a minimum contending for the playoffs in a loaded west, and a roster that could sniff home court advantage if a few things swing their way. Really can't wait to watch the Big Three on this Wolves team develop. Can you? Imagine Playoff Pek. Think about Love with the usual Olympic game-enhancement. Muse on Rubio with a full training camp. Lordy. It's going to be really, really fun to watch this Wolves team ply their trade. Can't wait.

• • •

F__ollow Evan Turner on Twitter at_ _@__thekidet._

I don't really know what to make of Evan Turner. As a rookie, I thought him rather disappointing. As a sophomore, my opinion of him seemed to change every time I watched him. One day you'd watch Turner and he'd be excellent -- rebounding like a big man from the guard position, chipping in on offense, and applying effective defensive pressure in the Collins scheme. He had games that impressed, and made it seem like he was making the most of his high draft selection. Then, seemingly at random, he'd have games that were terrible beyond reason -- 3-10 shooting nights against questionable defensive pressure, 22% shooting on 22 shots, and complete no-show performances in games the Sixers could've won. Hard to assess players that can translate to that last game less than a week after doing things like this, you know?

In how he's approached the regular season, you can see some moderately bad signs for his development. Consider his shot distribution, located here. From his rookie year to his sophomore year, Turner increased the number of shots he was taking outside of 10 feet while decreasing his free throw rate -- very bad signs going forward. Turner is an player who is at his best when he's on the attack, driving into the lane and slashing to the rim to draw free throws or get fouled. He's honestly pretty awful when he's trying to act as a large rebounding guard -- he camps out in the midrange, takes a bunch of ill-advised jump shots, and doesn't aggressively take the game and make it his own. That's really the key with Turner -- when he shows aggression and confidence, he shows flashes. But when he simply settles for what the defense gives him and allows himself to camp out at the long two or the three, he's just not very good. Turner is a large wing that should be playing the three-spot. Now that Iguodala's gone, he'll probably get to do that.

So, what is Evan Turner, exactly? He's a wing with a phenomenal touch for the boards, for one thing. Turner is one of the better pound-for-pound rebounding talents in the entire league, which does count for something. He's also a wing without a three point shot, which counts for something in the opposite sentiment. He's a decent passer, but nowhere near Iguodala's level -- he can set up the obvious basket, or find the open man, but he'll just as often throw the ball into a scrum and give the opposition a crucial fast break in a close game. When he shows confidence and aggression, he's great -- when he shows confidence in his jump shot, he's just about the worst player on the court. Overall, it averages out to a player with insane highs and stark lows. And a player that's as hard to predict as he is to assess. Jordan Sams could be right -- Turner could be poised for a breakout season. He also could be completely wrong, and this could be a season where everyone else in the league finally finds themselves fully acquainted with Turner's flaws. After all, good defenses seem to be getting better and better at goading him into his flawed and broken jump shot -- what happens when the entire league figures it out? I'm not really sure, and Turner's high variance game makes nothing assured. He could be great, he could be awful. In any event, he'll be an interesting player to watch next year, if not a bit of a stressful one for Ohio State and Philadelphia fans alike.

• • •

Follow Greivis Vasquez on Twitter at @greivisvasquez.__

You know how Evan Turner is going to get his own shot at playing a starring role next year? So will this guy. There isn't a single other point guard on the Hornets' roster, as it stands. When, exactly, are people going to notice this? I probably sound like a crotchety old man, but come on. It's one thing when you have Jarrett Jack there, and Vasquez acting as his backup -- they gave Jarrett Jack to the Warriors for virtually nothing, and they're left with a ridiculously strange conundrum at the point. Look at this depth chart. There aren't any point guards on the Hornets' roster other than Vasquez, and before you say Austin Rivers, let me tell you something. I watch point guards, I know point guards, point guards are friends of mine. Senator, Austin Rivers is no point guard. There's a reason I don't analyze rookies in this feature. It's harder to find footage of rookies, and I'm not a big college guy. But I went to Duke, so I have a passing interest in Duke's team and watch some of their games. So I can talk about Austin Rivers.

... and dear god, Austin Rivers is a bad passer. Rivers is a Jamal Crawford type player -- he has no problem getting his shot, anywhere on the court. He's got a great crossover -- seriously, it's legitimately great -- and he breaks more ankles with it than a toddler-sized Tonya Harding. That doesn't mean he can make shots from everywhere, but he sure as hell can get shots from anywhere. But his passing? Well... okay, I'm going to assume you're familiar with the problems with college statistics. Namely that a player's college stats have been acquired in a league where that player is being asked to do very different things than they will at the college level -- just because a 6'0" swingman averages 20-7-5 in college doesn't mean they'll have the ability to leverage even a 10-3-2 in the pros, because size matters and if they got five assists per contest as the primary ball-handler on a college team there's no way they'll get much more than 2 or 3 assists a night in the NBA. Simply no way.

Austin Rivers -- despite being Duke's primary ballhandler for the majority of the season and having a veritably insane amount of free reign from Coach Krzyzewski -- averaged two assists per game. In 33 minutes a night, in college. He was on a team emphasizing passing and getting open, and on a team with FOUR PLAYERS shooting over 40% from three, and two players "shooting" 60% from the floor (due to the fact that they took nothing but at-rim slams and tip-ins). He combined those 2.1 assists with 2.3 turnovers a night -- yes, he had an assist to turnover ratio that was actually below one. In Duke's last three games -- against Florida State, Lehigh, and Virginia Tech -- Austin Rivers played 108 minutes. He registered four assists over those 108 minutes. Total. One assist per 27 minutes of play. Again -- in college. Look, you can try and explain away a few individual problems in Rivers' game, and you can say that he'll get better. But Rivers-as-a-point-guard is a concept with more red flags than Tomáš ?epka. And I'm supposed to buy that Monty Williams -- an excellent coach with a good sense on how to put together the best rotation possible -- is going to play Rivers 20-30 minutes a night at point guard? Fat chance.

No, Vasquez is about to get a golden opportunity. He's going to be playing a ton of minutes on a relatively decent team, he's going to be starting for the majority of the season, and he's going to get ample opportunities to work on his busted three point shot. Vasquez isn't exactly a high upside player -- he's got lacking lateral quickness for the NBA game, his outside shot is poor, and he's already 25 years old. But he's got a lot of positives -- insanely prolific setup man (Vasquez sported the 13th highest assist percentage in the league last year, right behind Andre Miller and Kyrie Irving), very good size for his position (he's a legitimate 6'6" as a point guard, which is a huge asset for guarding post-up point guards like Andre Miller), and a ceaseless motor that should be the envy of every borderline NBA player in the league. I admit, I HATED Vasquez at Duke (and honestly, was there anybody in the ACC that DIDN'T hate him, outside of Maryland?) and I hated him in 2011 when he was slicing the Spurs up in the first round of the playoffs. His boundless confidence, his annoying smile, his skill at getting under the skin of opposing teams -- all of it rubbed me the wrong way. To some extent, it still does, but I thought he was fun to watch last year. So some of it has faded. I like what the Hornets are doing, and I'm excited to see what Vasquez does with a bigger role -- it's rare that a team puts this much confidence in a player after one decent season as a backup, but I think it'll turn out well in the end.

(... still think the Hornets should've picked Kendall Marshall, tho.)

• • •

At the end of each post, I'll be scribing riddles for the next group. Whoever gets the most right will get a shout out at the end of the next post. Tweet me your answers at @docrostov, or post them in the comments. For the first time in a long time, the best guess was 1/3! Come on, guys. The only player anyone got right was Pekovic. Crazy stuff.

• Player #97 is very interested in psychology. He likes magic, too.
• I absolutely loved watching him in college, even given my dislike for Syracuse. But watching Player #98 in the NBA is a painful experience.
• May be a bust now, but just wait til Player #99 steals Gordon Hayward's minutes! Wait. Dang.

As our summer mainstay, Aaron's writing a 370-part series discussing almost every notable player who was -- as of last season -- getting minutes in the NBA. Intent is to get you talking, thinking, and appreciating the myriad of wonderful folks who play in our favorite sports league. Today we continue with Michael Redd, Andrea Bargnani, and Hakim Warrick.

• • •

Follow Michael Redd on Twitter by buying a bible.

One of the neater stories of last year's NBA season was a relatively archetypal one. An old NBA veteran -- widely considered washed up and finished -- with no expectations goes to a good training staff, suddenly rebounds back from a precipitous dive into a useful player (to some extent) and shows flashes of brilliance as a sometimes-reminder of how good he used to be. In 2010, it was Antonio McDyess. In 2011, it was Tracy McGrady. In 2012? The former sweet-shooting Milwaukee star, Michael Redd. It was something of a feel-good story, and to anyone following last year's dismal Suns team, it often seemed like the only one. Redd wasn't fantastic last year, as most can tell -- after all, the once-efficient shooter only converted a scant 31% from three point range and barely sniffed a league average PER (average is 15, his was 13.9). And even atop his offensive struggles, Redd's defense was absolutely awful, far below replacement level. Which makes one think, after saying all this, that I'm crazy to call him a feel-good story. How can a player performing that badly be a feel-good story? Well, two reasons.

First, he got better as the year went on. And not just a little better -- the Redd we saw in April was markedly better than we'd seen the entire year, shooting 40% from three point range and 42% from two point range, despite taking almost no shots at the rim and acting at times as a primary floor spacer for a playoff-contending Suns team. He upped his minutes per game back to 18.8 during the season's closing month, and chipped in a few rebounds and an assist per game besides. He scored around 12 points in those 18 minutes, which roughly translates to a per-36 scoring average of 23 points a night, right above his career average. Some would say that the performance was fluky, and in some sense, I agree -- Redd certainly can't be expected to produce 23 points a night on 36 minutes a game anymore, and roughly a point every two minutes in limited burn is probably all we can expect. But if you were, like Redd, coming back from spates of season-ending injuries and working your way back into game shape after you thought you might retire, wouldn't you peak near the end? Wouldn't you be expected to play poorly until you got into shape? I'd say yes, and as such, I think the Redd that finished the season with Phoenix is a bit more akin to the Redd we'll see in the swan song of his career than the hollow husk that started the year.

The second reason? Expectations, expectations, expectations. Sure, if Redd had been expected to score 25 a night and act as Phoenix's second star, this would've been an incredibly disappointing year for him. But was anyone even expecting Redd to see the court? One of my favorite examples of this was in Bright Side of the Sun's season ending evaluation for Michael Redd, where Leiland Tanner (an excellent writer, by the way) extracted examples of what people had said at the time Redd was signed. My favorite was Scott Howard's comment that if Redd was the answer, the question you were asking was "how do you become the worst team in the NBA." Redd wasn't exactly a lights out star, but he sure as hell wasn't THAT bad. And he certainly was that bad the previous two seasons, so there wasn't all that much reason to expect Redd would recoup and have a solid better-as-he-gets-in-shape season. Really wasn't any reason to expect that. Because of that, the simple fact that Redd was able to be a contributor was impressive. Going forward? I'd expect Redd to recoup a bit from his health troubles and stay at a level somewhat close to the high he closed the season on for a few more seasons. Decent shooting, no defense, volume scoring backup. Not amazing -- especially for a guy who has been an incredible scoring talent his entire career -- but a suitable closing act for a guy whose injury-tarred demise in Milwaukee was far less than he rightfully deserved.

• • •

F__ollow Andrea Bargnani on Twitter at_ _@__AndreaBargnani._

Andrea Bargnani is an interesting player, to me. I think he's a heck of a lot better than most people think, especially defensively. You think I'm insane? Perhaps. But I'll list off a few facts that Matt Moore shared back in the summer of 2010, when he first got access to Synergy's video database and took some time to parse through the numbers. I saved them, and spent the entire next season paying extremely close attention to both players in an effort to see if the Synergy-based assertions matched what I was seeing. (I didn't have Synergy until mid-2012, so I could only really watch stuff like this by living on League Pass.)

1. While Bosh was in Toronto, Bargnani guarded the better opposing big 9 out of 10 times.
2. Despite guarding the better big Bargnani's man D was better than Bosh's man D.
3. He's actually a very effective post defender, and uses his athleticism and size to make easy shots challenging.
4. He's recently been in the top 15% of NBA players in isolation defense. When guarding big men shooting jumpers, Bargnani holds them to 30% shooting.
5. Despite all this, he's still been a net negative defender on the Raptors over his career.

When I first read all of these but #5, I thought Moore was playing a practical joke on all his basketball-inclined followers. Bargnani has been a notably defective help defender for years, to the point that his awful help defense can be noticed even by those who don't have a particularly trained eye for a player's defensive acumen. Bargnani ignores cutters, doesn't help off his man, and simply doesn't take the role of "protecting the paint" seriously when he's playing center. He always wants to float and focus on his man, which is fine when he's playing the large forward and playing alongside an actual center but atrocious when he's supposed to be the last line of defense. But note that I haven't said Moore was wrong. That's because, honestly, he wasn't. I can't assess #1, because I wasn't really paying attention to that when they played together, but I can state confidently that Bargnani is a effective defender in the post, a decent isolation defender, and actually very good at getting out to contest when his man takes a jumpshot. What's more, while Bosh is the far superior help defender, Bargnani's individual post defense and the totality of his overall individual defense is above that of Bosh, meaning that if I had the two of them on a team, I'd probably give Bargnani the harder assignment as well.

Of course, as I just pointed out -- his help defense is notably awful, enough so that it's hard to notice the things he does right on the defensive end. Not to mention his rebounding, which is the primary reason his defense is immensely disappointing -- even though Bargnani is an effective individual defender, if the opposing team gets 2 or 3 extra possessions a game from his lazy rebounding, fault has to fall on Bargnani's shoulders for ceding possessions that any other non-Lopez center could've gotten. This goes double when playing on a team as defensively hopeless as most of his pre-Casey Raptor teams -- you basically need to win the possession battle when you aren't a good defensive team, and when Bargnani is playing center, you're virtually assured not to. The rebounding problems have remained, but the help defense issues are starting to clear up -- as Dwane Casey has pointed out, he's gotten better. He fell off badly after his injury, so in the second half of the season, Bargnani had his problems. But at the start of the season Bargnani was communicating, and under Casey's scheme, he was doing a very good job of it. After years of wanting Bargnani out the door, most Raptors fans I know started to visualize a future with him on the team. It was cool.

What do the Raptors need to do, going forward, to bring out the best in Bargnani? Well, first off, they need to never ever hire Jay Triano again. Triano may very well be the worst coach the NBA's had in the last 10-20 years. He was abominable in Toronto, both at developing players and building schemes that fully utilized the team's talent. Casey is a great step forward in this regard -- he's already shown to be an excellent defensive coach and all accounts seem to indicate he's gotten a lot of buy-in from his players. The second thing? Stop pretending Bargnani is a center and allow him to slide over to the big forward position. Yes, he's 7'0" -- height alone doesn't make a center, and his rebounding and lacking instincts make playing him as the primary paint-stuffer is a terrible idea. In an ideal world, Bargnani would play the Dirk to some big man's Tyson Chandler -- the sweet shooting huge power forward who spreads the floor and uses his defensive talents on one man and one man alone. Jonas Valanciunas should be good for this -- not necessarily because of his talent, but simply because his size and game are prototypical for the five-spot. If he can chip in something like a per-36 10-10 in 20-30 MPG, the Raptors will be greatly improved for it. If the Raptors had picked up Steve Nash, I might've actually picked them to win their division -- it would've been a great situation for him, as he could've played 25 minutes a night and mentored their young players beautifully. Can't really complain, though -- in picking up Lowry instead the Raptors have a much better set-up going into the future, though the upside play for this individual season isn't quite as high. In any event, this team is a likely playoff contender this year, and if Bargnani plays a bigger-than-expected role in it -- chipping in some defensive chops to go with his to-be-expected 20 points a night -- don't be too surprised.

• • •

Follow Hakim Warrick on Twitter at @hdubb21.__

To say that Hakim Warrick hasn't been lighting the world on fire lately is to understate matters entirely. Warrick has been flat-out awful ever since he came to Phoenix, and as he moves on to flaunt his wares in New Orleans, the question is less about whether he'll recoup and more about whether the Hornets are even going to give him minutes in a crowded rotation. His game is that of the prototypical tweener -- offensive decisionmaking of a large wing, moderately enviable per-minute stats, and disgustingly poor defense. Really. His defensive instincts are worse than those of Amare Stoudemire, and while I held out some hope when Phoenix acquired him in 2010 that he'd thrive with Steve Nash, in practice he hasn't improved at all. He's been the same Hakim Warrick he's always been -- cuts, dunks, godawful defense, a somewhat ineffective midrange jumpshot, and foul-drawing up the wazoo. And some extremely questionable decisions in his shot selection -- as I said, he plays like a large wing despite not really having the body or the skillset to do it. Seriously, Warrick took almost one three pointer per 36 minutes last season, despite only making 10% of them. Bad news.

This isn't to say it's all bad -- the Warrick that showed up last season was awful, but in his career, he's traditionally been a talented offensive player. In one way, at least -- he's very good at dunks. Not layups, not post-ups, not jumpshots. Dunking the ball, especially off the pick and roll. Beyond that? He's great at putting other big men into foul trouble, because he's crafty and good at getting calls like a wing. And to be honest, earlier in his career he was a decent midrange shooter -- that's evaporated entirely in Phoenix, but perhaps it could come back. It still isn't going to mean much. Even at his peak, with an above-average PER and highly efficient scoring numbers, it was hard to see Warrick as a truly worthy backup -- his defense is utterly awful, combining the tentative qualities on man-to-man defense that help "big" men like Brian Cardinal avoid foul trouble with the lazy qualities that make big men like Bargnani awful help defenders.

Unfortunately for his career, I don't see any chance of Warrick getting significant playing time in New Orleans -- Anthony Davis and Ryan Anderson will dominate the majority of New Orleans' minutes, with Jason Smith and Robin Lopez filling the role of primary backups. Add to that Lance Thomas' ability to slide over to the four and retain Monty's defensive system, and you don't have significant minutes that Warrick could reasonably expect to carve out. If he could play some small forward it would be a remote possibility, but as his three point shot and busted long two would indicate, that's a heck of a long shot. If it'd happen under anyone, it'd happen under Monty. But it's unlikely. More likely, Warrick plays out the year with abysmal games played / minutes totals and moves on after the Hornets refuse to pick up his 2014 option, closing his career on a string of mildly productive runs as an instant-offense spigot off the bench for a few long-in-the-tooth contenders. (I wouldn't be shocked if he was a Celtic in 2014.)

• • •

At the end of each post, I'll be scribing riddles for the next group. Whoever gets the most right will get a shout out at the end of the next post. Tweet me your answers at @docrostov, or post them in the comments. We had several perfect scores on last week's last capsules, including Krishnan and Corn. Good work, fellas.

• Player #94 was one of the biggest surprises of last season -- out of nowhere, his offensive numbers from the center position compared well with Dwight Howard.
• Strangely enough, Player #95 appeared in ESPN's playoff lists for both the most disappointing performers and the most surprising. That basically sums up his confusing game.
• This is probably residual ACC bad blood, but I hate Player #96 and his annoying smile. Hate him. Can't deny that he's a decent backup guard, though.

As our summer mainstay, Aaron's writing a 370-part series discussing almost every notable player who was -- as of last season -- getting minutes in the NBA. Intent is to get you talking, thinking, and appreciating the myriad of wonderful folks who play in our favorite sports league. Today we continue with Chase Budinger, Jared Jeffries, and Tayshaun Prince.

• • •

Follow Chase Budinger on Twitter at @CBudinger.

I actually really like this incoming situation for Budinger. He's not an incredible player, but he's serviceable, and he starts day #1 of training camp as the best wing in the Timberwolves wheelhouse. In Houston, he's found himself often slotted behind emerging prospects and fell out of favor with Kevin McHale after Adelman's departure. In Minnesota, he'll be playing a ton of minutes beside Rubio's incredible passing talent, and at no point will he really be asked to be anything more than what he is -- a sharpshooting, athletic, non-defensive swingman that has a penchant for threes and experience with the reigning head coach. He's not great defensively, but he's not bad either -- he's athletic with a long reach, and he tends to lay off his man and let his length do his job for him. It doesn't always work, mind you, but does it ever? In any event, the reality isn't nearly as bad as his reputation on defense, which can only be a good thing coming to a team that desperately needs to upgrade its defensive talent.

As for the threes? Budinger shot (no typo) 48% on corner threes last year -- and not on some paucity of attempts either, he shot 48 of 100 from there! Imagine that with Rubio to set him up. He's not incredible on catch-and-shoot threes, but if Pekovic and Love can work out some tough screens and disorient the defense, Budinger can get free and make life hell on the other team's perimeter defenders, which makes him the only Timberwolves wing with the ability to do that. Consider this: Budinger only shot 34% on above-the-break threes, which isn't phenomenal. But even that 34% number is better than any true wing player that was on the Timberwolves last season. Seriously. Even Budinger's worst three was better than the totality of any Timberwolves wing. It's a huge upgrade for the Timberwolves, and I think the pieces are in place for the Wolves to shock. As I was saying on Twitter last night, the Wolves are now in a gaggle of about five teams that could get the four seed if everything gels and they don't suffer injuries -- assuming OKC, SAS, and LAL have the top three seeds rather firmly held, that leaves the four seed totally up for grabs between MEM, LAC, DAL, DEN, and MIN -- all of which could be really good teams. Which also ignores Golden State and Utah, both solid young teams that could take leaps this year. Should be a really fun west.

Off the hardwood, Chase Budinger is a two-sport athlete. He actually grew up as a volleyball player, only switching to basketball full-time when he reached college and realized he'd make virtually no money if he followed his volleyball dreams. I learned this during the lockout, and immediately wondered if his second sport has impacted his NBA game -- to that end, I explicitly watched a few Rockets games watching nothing but Budinger's movements, both off-ball and on-ball, to try and answer that question. In short? It has. Budinger is a lot more comfortable on the court when he's moving around, following trajectories and gliding through defenders as he prepares to rise up and strike. He's more offensively effective when he's moving off screens than when he's simply standing around waiting for the ball, because his volleyball background has him so much more well-adapted to perpetual motion. It's actually pretty cool, when watching him as compared to other wings, to pay attention to how differently Budinger moves than other NBA players -- it's not jarring, and you have to be looking for it, but there's definitely a sense of volleyball fluidity in his motion that makes his off-ball stuff more engaging than the average bear.

• • •

__

__F__ollow Jared Jeffries on Twitter by searching his name and finding endlessly cruel jokes about him____._

I'll admit, I'm not the biggest Jared Jeffries fan. I'm generally a bigger fan of players with interesting defensive styles that bring a strange mix of skills to the table, but something about Jeffries has always rubbed me the wrong way. His help defense is consistent, but I think the reason I tend towards being a bit negative on Jeffries defensively is his man-to-man defense, which suffers from some element of Amare disease. (For the uninitiated: Amare disease refers to the frustrating tendency from modern big men to produce game-changing defensive brilliance every few possessions and then completely to either take every remaining possession off or make boneheaded mistakes wrought in too much effort -- it results in a below-average defender, but gives a fanbase enough room to imagine what the player would be like if they stopped messing around and started applying themselves. It's torturous to sit through.) His help defense is brilliant, and his defensive skillset is interesting and original. And he tries very, very hard -- on the D'Antoni Knicks teams, Jeffries tended to be the one guarding the opposing team's best player, no matter their size, simply because nobody else on the team cared to do it. But the Amare tendencies in terms of quality variance aren't fun to watch, and Jeffries does tend to make one or two big-picture mistakes on individual defense every night.

Neither is his offense, come to think of it. Last season, Jeffries shot 41% from the field -- this included shooting under 50% in the restricted area, not making a single shot in the paint outside the restricted area, and shooting a hilarious 36% from midrange and 21% from the corner three. Even for an offensive player generally regarded as so-so to poor, that's startlingly bad. He's OK at a few offensive tasks outside of shooting -- for instance, Novak and Jeffries had an excellent two-man game last season where Jeffries would set a (sometimes slightly dirty) screen to get Novak open and Novak would obligingly jump to the open shot and make the three. But his shooting and scoring is so downright bad that it often doesn't matter. Still, all this said? I can't abide Knicks fans like this particular lady, who create "I Hate Jared Jeffries" campaigns and scream to the heavens about how bad he is. At least Jeffries gives a damn, you know? He hustles, he works, and he doesn't complain about the concentrated monstrosity that is the New York media. I've not once heard Jeffries complain about the insane and unrealistic expectations Isiah's bad contract thrust upon him. I can't fully appreciate his defensive game, though it's decent. His offense is a horror show. But if Knicks fans like the ones in the comments here can learn to love him, why can't everyone learn to at least accept him?

• • •

Follow Tayshaun Prince on Twitter if he ever gets one.__

What is there to say about Tayshaun at this point of his career, honestly? He's finally falling off. His post scoring was never absolutely great, but it was passable -- last season he fell off a cliff and shot only 26% from 3-9 feet. His long jumper and his elbow midrange were still about the same as always (that is, not as good as he thinks despite the fact that he takes a million of them a night), and he made a few threes on slightly above league-average percentages. He also had a bit more trouble getting up than he used to. In 2011, Prince led the league in at-rim field goal percentage with a 77% mark -- that declined to 63% this year, which is still good, but certainly not league-leading. He's an effective ballhandler for such a strangely proportioned man, sporting the ninth lowest turnover percentage among rotation players in the entire league last season. But overall, I'd say he's a bit of a negative on the offensive end -- as I outlined in the Greg Monroe capsule, the Pistons seemed content to completely ignore Monroe's talents for virtually the entire season. Prince's ballhogging to take awful midrange shots he shouldn't be taking was one of the big reasons for that.

On defense, he's still somewhat effective. Prince has a ridiculous amount of length, with a wingspan essentially matching that of a quality center -- because of it, he can bother players from farther away and at lower risk of fouling. He averaged about one foul per game last year, which is pretty incredible given that he's generally guarding the best player on the opposing team. The problem with Prince is that as his back problems get worse and worse and his speed decreases with age, he's gotten less able to cover star wings. Putting Prince on LeBron used to at least distract LeBron, a bit -- now he doesn't do jack against him or any other truly elite offensive player. Prince ceded his place as the best perimeter stopper in the league years ago. He's basically an old, degraded cover band who had a top-10 single early in his career, a few decent albums, and finally has reached the stage of the career where he's touring for god-knows what reason and while it's still entertaining it's a bit embarrassing for those who remember how good he used to be.

I don't think Prince's current contract -- $28 million over 4 years -- is terrible in every context. It's terrible in the one Prince is in, though. Look, as talented as he once was, Prince is absolutely not worth $7 million dollars a year to be the 3rd or 4th best player on a lottery team. As the 3rd or 4th guy on a contending team with a lot of great bench pieces, playing the Shawn Marion role on some futuristic Dallas team? Sure -- THAT'S a situation where his contract would've make a ton of sense. But no contending team wanted the risk that came with Prince's back injury, and Joe Dumars apparently wanted to continue making himself look like a fool. So instead of pulling a Marion and riding out his waning years on a team that's got the talent to fit him in, he's spending his waning years chucking up bad shots at the expense of Greg Monroe and pretending to be one of the game's top stoppers on an abhorrent defensive team. At least he's got his ring, I suppose. Is there anyone else that's a little surprised that Shawn Marion has ended up to have more longevity than Prince, and has remained a core piece to a very good team as long as he has versus Prince becoming something of a liability? Kinda crazy.

• • •

At the end of each post, I'll be scribing riddles for the next group. Whoever gets the most right will get a shout out at the end of the next post. Tweet me your answers at @docrostov, or post them in the comments. Weagle bailed everyone out, because barely anyone got any of these guys right. (Which is fine with me, as honestly, I'm not huge fans of any player we've covered today, heh.) Anyway. He got 2/3. Wonder if anyone can get 3/3 on this set...

• Player #91 is on his last legs, and he's nowhere near where he once was. But that Phoenix training staff has been great for him.
• Even while Bosh was in Toronto, Player #92 was still the big man who Triano would assign to cover the best opposing big man.
• I can't believe I thought this was going to be a good signing for Phoenix back when it happened. Oh well. Player #93 is in New Orleans, now.

Mulling over whether to do evening capsules. May do it, may not. We'll see. If not, see you next week!

P.S. ... what the hell was that, Orlando?

P.P.S. ... no, seriously, what?!

As our summer mainstay, Aaron's writing a 370-part series discussing almost every notable player who was -- as of last season -- getting minutes in the NBA. Intent is to get you talking, thinking, and appreciating the myriad of wonderful folks who play in our favorite sports league. Today we continue with Robin Lopez, Tyson Chandler, and Carlos Delfino.

• • •

_Follow Robin Lopez on Twitter at __@eegabeeva88___.

Ah, Robin Lopez. Let's start with the obvious: it's a great thing for all parties that Lopez got traded to the Hornets. The Suns, the Hornets, Lopez himself -- there's basically nobody that the trade doesn't help. For the Suns, they were able to bring in an asset at a position where they were relatively bare in the form of former lottery pick Wesley Johnson. No, Johnson isn't an excellent player, but he's still got some potential and at the bare minimum he'll eat minutes at the expense of Shannon Brown and Michael Redd. Not a bad thing. For the Hornets, they put an end to the (really, really bad) idea that would have Anthony Davis spend his first year or two in the league playing primarily the center position. It's true that naturally Davis is a center, but his weight and lacking strength would make life very hard on him offensively in his first year or two when any strong NBA center wanted to guard him, and would potentially put him at risk of more injury. Lopez may not be wonderful, but he's a true center, and he should help the Hornets put together a rotation with Davis only playing half his minutes or so at the center position. Which should help his development immensely. It's not an awful contract, either, and the Hornets have crystal-clean books going forward. So that's nice.

And finally, it helps Robin Lopez. There are problems, don't get me wrong -- last season, Lopez only had one particularly efficient play-type, and it was scoring as the roll man in the pick and roll at 1.11 PPP. He only was utilized in the PnR on 14% of his offensive possessions, primarily due to the fact that Lopez spent barely any time on the floor with Steve Nash. This is actually an OK thing going forward, as it tends to indicate that last season (and to a lesser extent the season before) Lopez had to adjust to life without Steve Nash's easy feeds and pinpoint passing. The Hornets don't have anything remotely close to Nash from a pure passing perspective, and are currently set to be placing the worst passer in the history of college basketball in as their point guard of the future. Having played for the last year or so with Ronnie Price and Sebastien Telfair as his point guards helps prepare him for what's going to happen in New Orleans, and a change in scenery (with a markedly better coach) may help his game recoup a bit from a few-year lull. Which is good, because all things considered, it probably needs some recouping.

He hasn't really approached the excellent play he showed at the end of the 2010 season since the Suns' Cinderella run to the Western Conference Finals ended. Which isn't necessarily an awful thing. After all, he's an unremarkable minute-sopping backup center. What's wrong with that? The problem with Lopez is mostly injury-related and difficult to cull out from Alvin Gentry's rotation decisions. How much of his falling out had to do with Gentry's distaste for his game? How much was skill related and how much was effort? It's hard to really tell. The other thing that should be good, at least in Davis' rookie year, is that he won't be slotted in a rotation behind a 30+ MPG can't-play-anything-but-center big man as well as a stretch-five that Gentry has a weird fascination with playing. That should increase his minutes per game considerably. So too should Monty's system -- Robin has skills, defensively, and while they weren't really properly utilized in Phoenix (see here -- he had good individual numbers but the Suns system actively tried to pull offensive players away from centers rather than relying on their centers for solid contributions) I have a lot of confidence in Monty's ability to figure out how they're best applied. Lopez isn't a great rebounder for his size, and he's extremely foul prone. But he's decent.

All things considered, he should be an asset on a very solid, rebuilding Hornets team and he has the potential to be a super-sixth off the bench for a very good team sometime in the near future. Nothing in that sentence is bad at all. Off the court, Lopez is a lot like his brother. Avid comic book nerd, somewhat of a surfer bro, very amusing guy. In one of the cooler things that I've seen a player do for a team blog, Lopez sat down and answered questions for Bright Side of the Sun readers way back in late 2010 -- tons of personality in his answers. His sheepish reveal that he basically eats nothing but pasta always makes me laugh out loud, because that's exactly what my little brother would do if he was an NBA player. Dude loves his pasta. Anyway, I've liked Lopez a lot since then, even if his game has been a bit disappointing up til now. I feel like this opportunity with the Hornets is a really strong one for Robin -- there's a lot of growth potential, and a designated role that's going to be 100% available to him. Really can't wait to see how he does, though I admit it does sadden me that the Suns apparently made this ridiculous free agency video for nothing. Nevertheless, should be fun -- and can you imagine how hilarious a lineup of Vasquez-Rivers-Thomas-Anderson-Lopez will look like on the court? Goofy white dudes galore. Gonna be swell.

(Also, I swear to god, that's actually his twitter name. Let's just let that sit.)

• • •

Follow Tyson Chandler on Twitter at @tysonchandler.__

Let's start with his game. Although Chandler's stats in the pure box score are a bit pedestrian, averaging a per-36 11-11 on his career, he has an outsized impact on the court that runs far beyond his averages. Offensively, Chandler's an exercise in restraint. Sure, he could shoot midrange jumpers and threes -- after all, when he was a hyped-up high school prep kid, that was pretty much all he did! He doesn't, though. Over the last five years, Chandler has taken 120 shots from outside 10 feet in 385 games (and over 12,000 minutes) played. For context, Yi Jianlian took 227 shots from outside 10 feet in the 2011 season alone (in which he played 63 games and 1,117 minutes). To say that Tyson Chandler doesn't care for the long ball is to say that John F. Kennedy didn't care for Fidel Castro. He's virtually allergic to it. And you know what? Good for him! One of the most aggravating traits in the modern NBA is the widespread desire for every big man to become a sweet-shooting Chris Mullin clone. There's something to be said for a player who steps back, assesses his talents honestly, and does what he's good at. It's refreshing, and it's helped Chandler become one of the most efficient, limited-use offensive players around. He's currently #4 on the career field goal percentage leaderboard, and with a few more seasons like his last two, he may end his career atop it. Not on high usage, mind you, like Shaquille O'Neal did. But Chandler is nothing if not effective in his role.

Effective on offense though he may be, the true meat of Chandler's game comes on the defensive end. Chandler once said that he wanted to have a culture-changing impact on the defensive end a la Kevin Garnett. I think Chandler's mostly succeeded, though instead of Garnett's spitting rage Chandler does his job with an effusive grin. Chandler's 7'0", and his standing height in shoes is closer to 7'1". He's got a hell of a lot of strength in that body, too, with a strong core and an excellent build. Just enough muscle to push people around on the block, just enough grace to fluidly cover the pick and roll. Tyson was a transformative defensive player in New York, taking the beleaguered franchise from a bottom-10 defensive rating in 2011 to a top-5 performance in 2012. He was effective on his man, he was effective helping off his man, he was effective in the locker room. He got the team to adopt some of the defensive principles that brought the 2011 Mavericks to the promised land, and he did it all with his glowing smile. It's no wonder Knicks writers like Jared Dubin love him so much! There are some things to work on -- NOT a long jump shot, which wouldn't fit very well in his game at all. What would fit? A better ability to catch the ball in traffic, and for Woodson to stop running so many sets where Chandler ends up stranded outside the paint. He's electric at the rim, why not leverage that? It'd also be nice if, going forward, he stays uninjured. Not really anything he has control over, but this team really needs him to stay healthy to have a title shot.

Off-the-court, Chandler's straight-up awesome. There's a fanzine dedicated to him, and what's more, he supported it! For those who don't know, a zine is significantly distinct from a magazine -- a zine is a small circulation indie publication. Usually filled with pictures, some zines end up being more like small collages than anything else. They aren't really made for profitability, nor are they made for mass consumption -- they're printed in small runs, distributed locally, and usually not several-part or monthly things. They're left to history. Chandler got wind of the zine from the creator, Ari Marcopoulos, and loved the idea -- he found it interesting and engaging, and while I'm not the type of hipster-bro who is generally into zines, I just find the whole story very cool. Chandler's style (which is underrated -- one of the snappiest dressers and most stylish guys in the league, for sure) is fitting to the whole concept. It all fits. Not to mention the resultant interviews, where we learn that Tyson Chandler paints in his spare time. I paint sometimes, so I find this really cool. (We also learn that the interviewer likes to randomly drop questions about stalkers, listen to stories about a player being stalked, and then never address it at all and immediately move on. I realize this is probably not what actually happened, and the interviewer probably talked to him about it in a not-released segment. Totally sensible. But as edited, the interviewer's complete lack of a response to Chandler's immensely creepy story about being stalked looks REALLY weird, you have to admit.)

One last thing, and an essential read for anyone who doesn't know a ton about Tyson Chandler -- this early 2011 SI profile, from before he became the linchpin to an incredible title run, is required reading. There's the story of Chandler's grandfather, who at the age of 80 picked walnuts for hours every day, trying to save up enough to sell for $180 and buy NBA League Pass to watch his grandson's first year with the Mavericks -- and by extension, how Chandler thinks about that before he goes on the court and thinks about the sacrifices those around him made for him. There's the story of Chandler's youth on the farm, and how naive he was when he came to San Bernardino county -- a kid asked to borrow Tyson's new bike for a spin around the block, and Chandler happily let him, watching confused as the kid rode away with his bike and never turned around. There's the note that Chandler tries to call heralded AAU prospects up on the phone to share his own experiences with the sleazeballs of high school basketball and improve their chances of success going forward. He's an incredible defensive talent, an incredible dude, and an incredible player. He's taken a strange route through the NBA, with a lot of false starts, bust accusations, and unexpected twists. But this farm-bred gentleman is not only the most likeable player in the glitziest city on Earth -- he's also the best one. A little funny, no?

• • •

Follow Carlos Delfino on Twitter at @cabezadelfino.__

Carlos Delfino played injured last year. That much was evident to anyone watching him. The way Delfino lumbered up and down the court, dragging a messed up wrist and a painful groin injury through the season. He actually suffered the wrist injury on the first game of the year, which was some extraordinarily poor luck for Delfino. He suffered the groin injury about a month after the all-star break, when he was finally getting his shooting touch back and putting together a few weeks of solid performances. Delfino played through the injury, though, both when his wrist hurt and when his groin was strained. Is that respectable? I think it's fair to say that most sports fans expect players on their favorite teams to play through injury, no matter the cost. Not most sports writers, who tend to understand why players don't do that, but sports fans tend to react with confusion when a player takes time off to heal.

I mention all this because Delfino is actually somewhat upset that the Bucks haven't reached out to him at all since his contract expired at the end of last season. I think he has a pretty good point. If what he says is true -- and we have no real reason to doubt that it is -- it's a bit of a classless move by the Bucks organization, in my view. If you don't want a player back, you don't have to offer them a contract -- but when a player played through injuries for your franchise and stayed relatively loyal throughout a tumultuous 3-year stretch, doesn't it behoove the GM to at least give an exit interview or a call to say thanks? Is Delfino an amazing player? No. He's really good at using screens to get open, and he has a nice misdirection dribble he uses to create space. And all things considered, Delfino has refined his game into being an excellent three point bomber (currently sits at 36% from three on his career). He gets assisted on the vast majority of his threes, mind you, but his ability to get open for three is fantastic and he'd excel in a system with a point guard like Kyrie Irving or Russell Westbrook, players who have a lot of court vision when they use it but are surrounded by players who can't get open.

Outside all of that, kind of eh. He's an average defender, decent rebounder, and a subpar passer. Overall, nothing particularly special, and it's true that Delfino relies quite a bit on his point guard. But he's effective at what he does, and he did just spend almost an entire season playing through nagging injuries to try and help his team. Maybe consider calling him up, John Hammond, and saying thanks? Just a thought. Bucks fans have a good point when they note that players have a strange and foreign aversion to playing in Milwaukee, but it may not just be the climate. With stories like this one, Jennings/Jackson wanting out, and Andrew Bogut's relatively poor experience with the Milwaukee management, it becomes a legitimate question whether the market-size disadvantage is half market and half management. I suppose we'll figure that out later, but for now, it's an open question that I'm not sure Bucks fans really want to answer. At least Hammond is decent on the trading block, I suppose.

• • •

At the end of each post, I'll be scribing riddles for the next group. Whoever gets the most right will get a shout out at the end of the next post. Tweet me your answers at @docrostov, or post them in the comments. This morning's best guesses were dual 2/3 responses from J and "Troy Barnes & Abed Nadir." Nobody got Robin right, though, which surprised me. Has everyone forgotten he's in the league? Oh well. Good job, folks.

• Player #88 is the best beach volleyball player in the NBA. As for basketball? Jury's out.
• It's rare that "I Hate You, [Player]" campaigns get traction, but the one directed at Player #89 has some followers in New York.
• There was no reason to pay Player #90 a full $28 mil past the age of 30. An underheralded but ever-present mistake, in my view.

As our summer mainstay, Aaron's writing a 370-part series discussing almost every notable player who was -- as of last season -- getting minutes in the NBA. Intent is to get you talking, thinking, and appreciating the myriad of wonderful folks who play in our favorite sports league. Today we continue with Yi Jianlian, Kwame Brown, and Derek Fisher.

• • •

Follow Yi Jianlian on Sina at his ridiculously popular blog.

The fall of Yi Jianlian as a reputable NBA player came quicker than most expected. Especially considering his history. Jianlian was drafted at sixth overall by the Milwaukee Bucks way back in 2007. At the time, this was considered a reach -- just check this post-draft article at DraftExpress covering international prospects, where Luis Fernandez stated that scouts had "concerns about Yi’s defensive ability and competitiveness, which ultimately might jeopardize even his success as a contributor on an NBA team." Not as a go-to guy, which he states earlier in the article he likely won't become -- as a contributor. And this was written directly after the draft! Before Jianlian did anything in the NBA. Good call, Mr. Fernandez. Good call.

Anyway, as for Jianlian's game. Last year was Jianlian's first stint on a playoff team. As tends to be the case for players that transfer from a career of bad situations to a halfway decent team, his minutes went down dramatically. Unfortunately for his case as a legitimate NBA player going forward, Jianlian's productivity didn't go up at all with the lessened role -- in fact, Jianlian's productivity tanked. He became an even less efficient scorer, his pick and roll defense (previously decent-looking) felt worse from a subjective standpoint in his more-limited minutes, and he simply provided the Mavericks a dearth of positive contributions when on the floor. Part of his issue has always been shot selection -- he primarily plays the pick-and-pop, offensively, but he isn't very good at it. Last season in particular, Jianlian's decreased role translated to increasingly bad shot selection. For his career, Jianlian takes roughly 44% of his shots from a 16-23 foot range -- with the Mavericks last season, that number rose to a clean 59% of his offense.

I don't have a table that's easily sortable for this data, but I'm reasonably sure that nobody else in the NBA takes that high a percentage of their shots from 16-23 feet. To be fair to Jianlian, he wasn't as bad at it as some might expect -- he shot 44% from that range, which is actually very high for that area of the floor. The big problem with Jianlian's offense? He doesn't do anything else. He shot an impossibly poor 42% at the rim last season, didn't make a single shot from 3-9 feet, and shot 20% from the "true" midrange. He did make three of nine three-point-shots, though! Hooray! This sort of offense would be potentially surmountable if he coupled it with extremely good rebounding, or passing, or defense, or something. But there's simply nothing else. His rebounding is charitably described as below-average, his passing is comically robotic and passionless, and his usage rate is way too high for a big man who can't shoot efficiently to save his life. And as I said -- his pick and roll defense looked decent when surrounded by the Wizards or the pre-Bogut breakout Bucks. But on a legitimately good defensive team like the 2012 Dallas Mavericks, Jianlian looked shaky and lost. Just look at his 82games stat page, where you'll note that Jianlian's man -- at either PF or C -- had a PER of 20-25 when he was on the floor. This is especially jarring given WHEN he played -- he was pulling mop-up duty all year! He was playing against backups-of-backups! His most-used lineup was sharing the court with (NBA Champion) Brian Cardinal! What!

A few interesting facts about the Chairman. Despite the fact that he's never been a particularly excellent NBA player, he's been a pretty amazing asset for team exposure over his career. Some say that the influence of China on overseas marketing and exposure is overstated. I totally understand where people are coming from with that, but it's very hard to deny the excitement that players like Jianlian bring to the Chinese market. In his sophomore season, Jianlian came in as the 3rd forward in the Eastern Conference all-star voting, ahead of reigning finals MVP Paul Pierce, Chris Bosh in a vintage season, and scores of other more-deserving players. His first game ever against Yao had over 100 million viewers in China, which is pretty incredible, but less incredible than the fact that his second game ever against Yao had over 200 million viewers in China. He was the Chinese flag-bearer at the 2012 London Olympics, making him one of many recent NBA players to serve as their country's flag-bearer -- Manu Ginobili in 2008 for Argentina, Pau Gasol in 2012 for Spain, Andrei Kirilenko in 2008 for Russia, Yao Ming in 2008 for China, and Dirk Nowitzki in 2008 for Germany. Want to know why NBA players are awesome at being flagbearers? Read this incredibly poorly-translated article from Tencent sports, detailing the many reasons why. I don't know why the article's translation made me laugh, only that it did.

• • •

_Follow in Kwame Brown's footsteps by becoming the first pick in the 2014 NBA draft.__

What is there to say about Kwame Brown, really? He's a relatively mediocre NBA player -- he can sop up minutes without absolutely killing your team, theoretically. Note the theoretically. This is only applicable if he can stay away from injury, which is rare -- since Brown turned 23, his best season for games played was his 2011 stint with the Charlotte Bobcats, in which he played 66 games in an 82 game season. His second best? Detroit, 2009, with 58 games. Ever since he's reached NBA middle-age, he's been consistently absent for 20-35 games a year, sometimes more. This makes Brown a bit of a risky pickup. He's a mediocre stopgap when he's on the floor, but with so many missed games, Brown is a mediocre player who over a full season gives you sub-mediocre production. Brown's injury woes raise with them an interesting question of value assessment -- how do you count context in value?

For instance, with last year's Warriors, part of the problem with Kwame's injury issues was that they simply didn't have anyone to play behind him. He started the season behind Biedrins, but quickly proved to be the Warriors best non-Udoh minutes-eater at center. That was good. But he followed that up by getting injured and being out for the rest of the season -- that was bad, because the Warriors simply didn't have anyone other than Udoh that really was fit for big minutes from the position. In any respect. Which meant that any game where Udoh showed fatigue, the Warriors had to play David Lee at center or bring up D-League guys or do crazy stuff like that. In context, even a less-than-mediocre player who could've played all 66 games would've been more conducive to winning games than Brown was. If you're a good team with a lot of depth, like last year's Bulls, durability doesn't matter quite as much. Durability is in and of itself an asset when you're looking at a team that lacks depth. Udonis Haslem would be significantly more valuable on a deeper team than the Heat where durability is less valued, and a lesser player with better general health would be better for the Heat than on a team with the depth that they can play fewer minutes. Context and team depth is important to assess when you try to figure out how valuable a player is in the NBA, and in statistical analysis, I think we often fail to properly contextualize players before we try to assess their value, or how valuable they've been.

As for Brown, again -- he's mediocre. He was less-than-that due to last year's injuries for the Warriors, but when healthy, he's a decent pick-and-roll defender with a large body and fluid movement. His offensive game is and has always been comically bad, though last season he finally seemed to figure some stuff out. Namely that he can't shoot worth a damn from outside 10 feet -- he attempted only 6 shots outside the restricted area, and only a single shot outside the paint. Which is good, and led to the third highest field goal percentage of his career. Per-minute he's a relatively proficient rebounder for a backup big, and he's got a great handle. ... Alright, I mostly was joking to see how many analysts I could make throw up at once. His handle is terrible. Last season, he had a turnover percentage of 20%. To contextualize how bad that is, think of it this way -- every 5 plays Kwame Brown touched, one of them turned into a turnover. Dear. God. He also is a career 57% shooter from the free throw line, which is... not very good, you know? It was 44% last season, bested only by Andris Biedrins' nigh-unbeatable 11% free throw shooting. (You think I'm joking? NOPE.) I thought the Sixers pickup was puzzling, but then again, consider context -- Philadelphia boasts a relatively deep front line, at least in the number of bodies on the roster, so a mediocre bit-minute player that might miss a few games is less deletrious than he was in Golden State. At least in my view. In sum: not very good, not very useful, not very interesting. Next!

• • •

Follow Derek Fisher on Twitter at @derekfisher.__

I was reading Le Morte D'Arthur back in 2010, around the NBA finals. It's Sir Thomas Malory's history of Arthurian legend, for those who aren't aware. I've always been at least passingly interested in the tales of King Arthur, though admittedly not enough for me to really sink my teeth into it -- I've never read Malory's opus all the way through, and I've always been a bit more fond of T.H. White's Once and Future King and Tennyson's Idylls. But that's beside the point. I was reading Book IV, the quest for the Holy Grail -- specifically the point at which Galahad heals the unnamed, maimed, and bedridden King before finding the Holy Grail and ascending to heaven. This King is one of Malory's several manifestations of the Fisher King, a somewhat ubiquitous character in Arthurian legend. According to legend, the Fisher King is the corporeal manifestation of the domain he rules over. In Arthurian mythology, the Fisher King is always wounded -- to the legs primarily, but often the groin as well. Through the King's wounds, his lands become barren and infertile. According to legend, the Fisher King is the keeper of the Holy Grail, and to bear the Grail one must heal him. Hence his importance to the story. Given his wounds, all he can really do is fish -- leading to the name, the Fisher King.

I've always thought of the Fisher King as one of the more interesting and abstract of the Arthurian legends. Most people don't know a thing about him, even though his existence is so inextricably tied to the Grail Quest in most texts that you can't really separate the two. I think it's a bit of a shame that there's so little known about him. Fewer stories drumming home the same point about Lancelot and Guenivere, more stories featuring the Fisher King and the other forgotten and tertiary Arthurian legends. Anyway. You might wonder what this actually has to do with Derek Fisher, and I admit, that's a good question. We'll start with the quality of his play. It's pretty bad. He's among the worst shooters in the entire league, at this point -- he's descended below league average from three point range and is below all reason from anything inside the arc. His physical strength would lead some to expect he'd be a good rebounder from the guard position -- good try, he's not. His assist rate is consistently among the worst for any point guard in the NBA, and his turnover rate has steadily gone up to the point where he's now a threat to turn the ball over virtually any time he's forced to handle the ball. Derek Fisher was one of the worst starters in the entire league last season, and upon being traded to the Thunder, he became one of the worst bench players in the entire league. He's turning 38 today. He's old, washed up, done. A shell of what he once was, and he was never that good to begin with. All he can really do is flop around like a fish and get a lot of calls.

And I can say all that, and drive the point home all I want. But that doesn't make it any less true that Derek Fisher is very likely to be the worst Laker in franchise history to get his jersey retired. Phil Jackson, Kobe Bryant, the Lakers organization -- virtually everyone around Fisher believes him to be an essential and necessary piece to win a title, and when he was traded, Kobe was furious. Without superstars at his side, what is Derek Fisher? What can he do? Without a team with a top-tier talent at every other position, what can Fisher really offer? Does it really matter? Fisher was considered by people who know what they're talking about to be the crux of the chemistry on five distinct title teams. Without healing the Fisher King, you can't sip from the Holy Grail. That much is true. But without letting Derek Fisher make a few clutch shots, healing the wounds of a fanbase forced to watch him chuck up terrible shot after terrible shot, every single game of the regular season? No Laker team in the last decade could sip the championship bubbly. So there you have it. Ever since I happened to read just the right excerpt of Malory's text right after I watched Fisher drill essential threes to steal what turned out to be the deciding game in Boston, I've associated the two. Sure, it's a bit of a convoluted comparison, and it doesn't really address several of the really important facts about the Fisher King -- the ephemeral changing connections with the grail itself, how the fishing aspect is merely a Christ-symbol replete with Catholic tie-ins, how symbiotically he exists with the Holy Grail. All true. But I've still called Derek Fisher the Fisher King from there on out, and I can't possibly be the only one.

... Well, this is awkward.

• • •

At the end of each post, I'll be scribing riddles for the next group. Whoever gets the most right will get a shout out at the end of the next post. Tweet me your answers at @docrostov, or post them in the comments. Sorry for the delay on this one -- I'm not feeling great, and yesterday was a hectic day at work. The riddle champion of Tuesday's post was Krishnan, who got the first and third players right but missed my forgettable second. Everyone always forgets Kwame.

• The best way to lure Player #85 into a room is to fill it with comic books and floppy hair wigs.
• I don't think there's a single non-Dirk player on the 2011 Dallas Mavericks I liked more than Player #86.
• This Buck was in and out of my fantasy team all year. Probably a bad decision, as Player #87 was terrible last year.

As our summer mainstay, Aaron's writing a 370-part series discussing almost every notable player who was -- as of last season -- getting minutes in the NBA. Intent is to get you talking, thinking, and appreciating the myriad of wonderful folks who play in our favorite sports league. Today we continue with Darko Milicic, Ryan Hollins, and Russell Westbrook.

• • •

Release Darko Milicic on Twitter at @FreeDarko. Wait, what?

I was pretty amused, yesterday, when people picked Hasheem Thabeet for this riddle -- that is, the riddle implying that this player was a true bust. I don't know if that's totally true. Yes, I know -- Thabeet is pretty awful. He was taken 2nd in a draft where 25 of the players after him are distinctly better than he is. That's pretty bad. But if I'm going for a #2 pick that's absolutely busted out in the NBA, I'd go for Darko Milicic any day. And not just for his lacking on-court. By all accounts, Darko is a pretty aggravating individual off-the-court -- he has a nasty temper, a highly inflated sense of self, and has never in his career been particularly coachable. The temper can be funny, sometimes -- it's led to two of the best NBA videos ever. But does anyone REALLY want that on their team? (Other than the certifiably insane David Kahn, who once called Darko "manna from heaven.")

In terms of properly representing what a bust really means, Darko hits every conceivable benchpost. Was he drafted above legitimately good players? Definitely -- he was drafted before Dwyane Wade, David West, Chris Kaman, Chris Bosh, Boris Diaw, Carmelo Anthony, Leandro Barbosa, Mo Williams, Matt Bonner, and many others. (With, of course, the last player on that list being clearly as good as the first player on it.) It wasn't like he was picked at 10th with nobody of note after him -- the Pistons passed up on several generation-defining talents to lock up the services of Mr. Manna. Does he have a bad attitude about it? Sure -- he's got a Kwame-esque immaturity about him, and a lack of understanding. Even in his most successful personal run in Minnesota, he couldn't quite get away from his personal issues -- Minnesota superstar Kevin Love was happy the Timberwolves got rid of "bad blood", naming no names but heavily implying Darko and Beasley as the objects of his distaste. And in terms of true talent level, and peak production? Darko Milicic is really, really bad. At his best, he's a maybe-OK defensive player that hogs the ball without actual scoring talent. He's a "maybe-average" passing talent that combines that average passing with awful rebounding and turnovers galore. That's Darko's "skillset."

Put it all together, and on-court, he's a mildly serviceable backup center. That's about it. But any mention of Darko (especially here) would be remiss in not at least paying some homage to the old standard of inscrutable basketblogging, FreeDarko. While most of the writers who wrote for FreeDarko have dispersed and still write the occasional piece, the whole collective is done, now. They've hung up their galoshes for good, which is sad, but I thought it was a little fitting and a little beautiful how everything ended. As Darko finally reached a franchise that believed in him and gave him free reign to become an accomplished NBA player, the folks at FreeDarko finally got too busy to keep the site running at the quality they wanted and shut its doors for good. This doesn't mean, of course, that Darko was truly freed. The point of FreeDarko always seemed to me that the Darko we expected -- this mysterious Serbian big man of impossible talent and skill -- was trapped within the confines of history and adversity. And that Darko, we can safely say, will never be freed. Hell, that Darko may have never existed. But it expanded and consumed and grew into an image beyond itself, beyond reality, beyond reason. And it underlined the writings of one of the better collectives and communities we've seen in a long time. So I tip my hat to FreeDarko, knowing that even if the reality of their mission was made irrelevant long ago, the fact of it still remains.

• • •

_Follow Ryan Hollins on Twitter at @TheRyanHollins.__

Dear Mr. Hollins,

Hello, sir. My name is Aaron. I am a loyal fan of the Cleveland Cavaliers. You may remember this particular organization, as it's the one at which you plied your trade up until the middle of last season. One and a half years, we were together. Not in a physical sense, obviously, but rather in the quasi-metaphoric understanding that comes with being a sports fan. When you burst onto my screen, I rooted for you. I hoped you would do well, and make Cleveland proud. I hoped that life would be better. For you, and for me, and for this world. These are the hopes that filled my head, swam through my bloodstream, and would've been readily apparent to anyone with X-Ray vision specially tuned to sift out every human being's hopes and dreams. This was me, for a time.

How did you get into the NBA? I say this seriously. I don't know if I truly understand. I know, I know. You're tall. You're very tall, actually, and you do have some talent. I have no doubt that if you were allowed to spend the next four or five years in college, you'd eventually average something along the lines of 10-3-2. In college, mind you. Let's talk about the NBA. What is it, exactly, that has allowed you to stay in the league? Your height and god-given gifts make you one of the best thousand basketball players on the face of the earth. Bully for you. Really. I don't think I'll ever be one of the 1000 best anythings in the world, all things considered. Certainly not wage-earners, certainly not statisticians, certainly not writers. It is a glorious accomplishment for you to be as you are. I realize and accept this.

But... why?

You see, Mr. Hollins, I have spent two years watching you outright ignore rebounding opportunities. I have spent two years watching you pretend that pick and roll coverage consists of staring blankly at your man for a few seconds, shuffling hesitantly from side to side, then simply standing like a tree as players glide past you and lay up a shot with no resistance. I have watched you "hustle" for loose balls only to explicitly redirect the ball to the other team, then outright refuse to run to the other end as they dunk on your teammates. I have seen you grow some of the worst facial hair in the history of the human race, and I have seen you needlessly egg on a seriously disturbed individual. For what purpose, I don't know. And in fact, I don't know the purpose to most of the things you do.

This isn't an indictment on you personally. You run an excellent basketball camp, sir, and other than the somewhat disturbing incident with Charlie V, I have no reason to think you an aggressive or mean-spirited person. But your basketball talents are just... what? Seriously, what? I watched you play almost 100 games with my favorite franchise. I don't get it. I don't understand how you can be 7'0" and sport a career rebounding percentage under 10%. If you are unaware, that means you rebound less than 10% of the shots you can possibly rebound. You are seven feet tall. I must state this again, in bold-face type: you are seven feet tall. Did you know, Mr. Hollins, that there have been 27 guards in NBA history -- players who are all below 6'5" -- that have had three or more seasons with rebounding percentages greater than 10%? Are you aware, too, that you are tied for having the fourth most seasons by a center with a rebounding percentage under 10% in NBA history?

Mr. Hollins, I do not understand this. I fear I never will.

Sincerely,

Aaron T. McGuire

• • •

Follow Russell Westbrook on Twitter at @russwest44.__

Sometimes, when writing about certain players, my thoughts run long and I end up with something way too big to turn into a subsection of these three-player packages. I’m making it a point to explicitly allow myself the leeway to produce those sorts of really long capsule, but I’m trying to also use them as an opportunity to spread word of the project to new readers. To that extent, I’m going to take these super-long post-sized capsules and spread them to different institutions we’re partnering with. Today, Russell Westbrook’s capsule goes up at Hardwood Paroxysm. In it I grapple with my fundamental problems with Russell Westbrook, and use Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan to try and frame the way I see Westbrook's broader game. Tried not to get too deep into the political theory, but I think it's a rather fitting example in this case. Check it out!

Here's the thing, though, that typifies both democracy and the Westbrook style. It works. Yes, there are warts -- I'm not one to say democracy's perfect, by any stretch of the imagination. But the warts on democracy are pinpricks compared to the hulking construct of woe and misery that comes with a lawless sovereign. There isn't quite that gulf with Westbrook, but there's a chilling sense that as he takes his tentative steps forward and grows into his role, he and his teammates discover that the "pure" point guard announcers are so quick to build up is a bit of an illusion. It's not a necessity any more than a Hobbesian tyranny is. When Westbrook is "good" Russell, he completely changes the game for his team -- the Thunder emerge like Team USA, simply playing a different brand of basketball than anyone else. No, they may not win by 83 -- they may not even win at all.

But they utterly change the game.

FOR MORE ON RUSSELL WESTBROOK, SEE TODAY’S PLAYER CAPSULE + ON HARDWOOD PAROXYSM.

• • •

At the end of each post, I'll be scribing riddles for the next group. Whoever gets the most right will get a shout out at the end of the next post. Tweet me your answers at @docrostov, or post them in the comments. Yesterday, our two best guesses were from J and Corn, both of whom got 2/3. Once again, neither got 3/3, but if you combined their guesses they'd get them all right.

• My scouting report says that Player #82 has trouble guarding many players, but has the most difficulty with "chairs."
• A lot of people though Player #83 was Player #79, but this guy is significantly less of a bust, in my opinion.
• Ah, the Fisher King. Prepare for me to go a bit Arthurian on you for Player #84, folks.

As our summer mainstay, Aaron's writing a 370-part series discussing almost every notable player who was -- as of last season -- getting minutes in the NBA. Intent is to get you talking, thinking, and appreciating the myriad of wonderful folks who play in our favorite sports league. Today we continue with Gordon Hayward, Grant Hill, and Markieff Morris.

• • •

Follow Gordon Hayward on Twitter at @gordonhayward.

I'm not totally sure about Hayward, yet. This isn't meant to be a super negative comment on his game -- Hayward's got quite a few valuable skills, which we'll get into. But call it a looks thing, a hobbyist thing, a college thing -- I don't really know. I just don't know if I trust Hayward's game. I know many Jazz fans (bless their hearts) who think Hayward is some reincarnation of Manu Ginobili who is going to produce Manu-type numbers for the duration of his career. All due respect to Mr. Hayward, that's ridiculous. While Hayward's percentages are similar from three, there's a reason the Jazz need to pick up designated three point gunners -- whereas Manu tries to take 37-45% of his shots from behind the three point line (and hits extremely efficiently from that range), Hayward only takes about 20% of his shots from that range. They both have a pet skill that's good for their position -- Hayward his rebounding, Manu his passing -- but Manu is an impossibly better passer than Hayward is a rebounder, and with the current glut of developing rebounding guards/forwards (a la Kawhi Leonard), Hayward simply doesn't stand out that much for that alone.

What stands out with me, for Gordon Hayward, is the full package -- I'm not exactly sure what he can do to push his game to the next level, or if he really can do anything. But the whole is greater than the somewhat mediocre sum of its parts. Much like Lou Williams, actually -- where Lou adds value to his game simply by doing nothing wrong, Hayward adds value to his game by simply doing nothing terribly. He's not an awful defender, although I don't buy the overwhelming opinion from Jazz fans that he's a really positive defender. While he's super athletic and certainly has the tools, the numbers have indicated he's been absolutely terrible and re-watching him on defense you tend to find some less-than-salutatory trends regarding his patterns on the pick and roll, and how he chooses to defend the three point line. While he's very athletic (possibly the most athletic white dude in the history of the league), he oftentimes lets that determine his entire game plan, and lays off way too much assuming that his superior athleticism is going to save the play. Rarely does. Still, the point stands -- even if he isn't a fantastic defender, he isn't an awful defender. And other than that? Passable rebounder, decent passer, very low turnovers (especially for someone asked to handle the ball like he does), solid three point shooter, dependable free throw shooter (who gets to the line!), and extremely durable.

Still, even given all these positives, I just have this general distaste for the idea that Hayward is some reincarnation of Manu Ginobili. Partly because Manu is still, even after all these years, dreadfully underheralded. Partly it's because it feels like people are comparing Hayward and Manu simply because Hayward happens to be a white guy who can shoot the three and pass, and that's all most people see Manu as. Manu has a similarly wide-ranging skillset, with very few negatives. But he simply does everything better. He's a better three point shooter, in his prime he was a far better defender, he's better at controlling the ball, he's more efficient, he shoots more, he rebounds better, and comparing their passing is like assessing the sophistication of Dora the Explorer to that of Breaking Bad. This isn't to say Hayward is bad -- as you probably gathered from the last paragraph, I think people sleep on him a bit. It's worth noting I'm not sure he'll get that much better than he is now. He took a quantum leap forward last season in the eyes of many, but the per-minute numbers tend to indicate he didn't make tremendous steps. And it indicated he mostly just played more minutes. Well, Hayward's at 30 minutes per game, and assuming a linearly increase in his usage of talent -- already so effective -- is a bridge too far for me. I think he's effective, interesting, and a player that's going to be a little better when he reaches his prime. But I suppose where I differ from Jazz fans is the assertion that I'm simply not so sure he's got all that much room left to climb.

Off the court? Hilarious. He's this generation's Tim Duncan -- not in basketball talents but in nerdy off-court gaming pursuits. Hayward is a very good Starcraft player, having played competitively during the lockout. He also got a tiny bit of flack for saying -- in the same link -- that the stress of playing in the NBA is similar to the stress of playing video games competitively. Not quite what you're going for, Gordon. Preeeeeetty sure Kobe would disagree with you there. Pretty sure basically everyone in the known universe would disagree with you there. But good try. He also is a level 60 monk in Diablo 3. Before you ask what that means, I must reveal that I am a level 60 wizard in that particular game. It's plodding, and I've stopped having all that much fun playing it because the worlds don't vary enough (or, well, virtually at all) for my taste and getting through the final difficulty level is bloody impossible without gearing up to ridiculous levels. But anyway. It took me about 30 hours of playing time to get my character to level 60 (the max level you can reach in the game), if I remember right, and I'm betting that if he got his character to 60 he's probably made it his goal to get through the game in full. So he's probably pretty damn far in that game. Also, for the record, if you took all the animals of the world and put them in a no-holds-barred deathmatch, Hayward believes the noble gorilla would win it all. Personally, I'd say the hippopotamus. Sure, they have a funny names, but they've got heads like sledgehammers, feet that can crush ANYTHING, and they're faster than humans on land. They also have very few weak spots. Barring that, I'd go with the big cats -- Tigers, Panthers, Jaguars, et cetera. Those guys are vicious, cunning, and durable. And they're natural hunters. Hey, Blizzard? Are you listening to this? Let's make this a video game. I've even got a title for it. "Gordon Hayward's Apocalypse Farm: The Reckoning." Let's get this done, fellas.

• • •

_Follow Grant Hill on Twitter at __@realgranthill33.___

I'm going to try and make this one quick, because Grant Hill makes me sad. All things considered, there's very little reason for Grant Hill to sadden me -- he's made over $140,000,000 playing the game of basketball, and he's made probably double that through his golden smile and his advertising chops. He's a 40-year-old who is still technically playing the game he loves, and his popularity intersects multiple NBA generations. He's got culpable excuses for his lack of a ring, having only been on one remotely contending team in his 17 year (yes, it's really been that long) NBA career. He's on a team with the best point guard in the game once again, and a team with a legitimate shot at winning the West (albeit I'm using legitimate to mean "at all existent", as I don't REALLY think the Clippers can beat the Thunder, the Spurs, or the Lakers -- but we'll see). He probably won't play much, if at all, but if the Clippers shock the world and win a title he'll have his ring and can ride off into the sunset to become a coach or a business owner or, honestly, whatever the hell he wants to do. He could even take the advice of another Duke guy and open a cream puff shop.

But it's a cold comfort. Because Hill's career will always leave me wanting. Grant Hill is eighth on the all-time triple-double leaderboard. That's ahead of Jordan and Clyde Drexler, which is rather impressive, because Hill hasn't had a triple double since Clinton was president. Seriously. His last triple double occurred in the 1999 lockout-shortened season, against the Stockton-Malone Jazz. This isn't some kind of fluke, either -- Hill was phenomenal in his first six years, while he was with Detroit. His career averages as a Piston are 22-8-6, with 47% shooting from the field and 75% from behind the line. With, again, 29 triple doubles. Make no mistake -- those are star numbers. The once-in-a-generation sort. He was also a really solid defender, in my view, though we obviously don't have synergy statistics or per-possession defensive stats for his time with the Pistons. Despite all this, Hill's career was derailed when (in his 6th season) Hill played through a bad ankle injury and stayed on the court until the ankle utterly gave out on him, breaking badly. But he wasn't totally to blame for it. Reportedly, the Detroit organization openly wondered whether he was "playing soft," and just funneled him stronger and stronger painkillers to keep him on the court.

I don't want to sugarcoat it -- if Hill is telling the truth (and we have no reason to believe he's not), anyone who remains from that Detroit training staff should be fired. This league is about the players. It's not about running them into the ground like that, or making them feel forced to play hurt. The ankle ended up destroying his career, as everyone knows. He was barely able to play at all in Orlando, and spent the next six years as low-down awful as he was amazing in the first six. And as he's slowly revived his career in the same way Antonio McDyess has (and as Brandon Roy may), there's this sense of surreal separation between the Grant Hill of then and the Grant Hill of now. It's like invasion of the body snatchers, in reverse -- the mind's the same as it always was, and the body's form is as it's always been. But the talent, the vitality, the strength -- it's gone, long stolen by his ankle and infections. It's not just the health -- it feels like the soul of Grant's game was wrenched from his person long ago.

So I look at Grant Hill and I watch him play and I feel glad that he's had a long, profitable career. I like Grant Hill, and other than Kyrie Irving and Gerald Henderson, there's not a single player from my alma mater I've ever liked more. But there's an element of sadness, this nagging sense that Grant Hill's ankle stole from us a once-in-a-generation talent. Some would say we can't miss what we've never seen, but that's simply not true. When Hill was a Piston, he showed himself to be exactly that. I miss the years he's never had for the years the world forgot. That's Grant Hill for you. A shadow, a shade, and a pressing and present reminder of the things fate takes away.

• • •

Follow Markieff Morris on Twitter at @T3.__

Markieff Morris looked really good to start the year. Most people don't remember this, because honestly, it didn't last long. But he totally did. Morris shot a silky-smooth 48% from three point range in December and January. He's not a great defensive player -- he fouls too much, letting his hands stay on the offensive player well after they've received the ball and gotten position. He also gets beaten on the pick and roll with startling regularity. But his three point shot -- while clearly cooler than 50% -- is relatively solid and even though his finishing isn't remarkable he's got post offense that one can imagine someday being an asset. Suns fans didn't particularly like the number of spot-up shots Morris took, and indeed, he went a little too hard on those. In some sense, this year's hot start from three point range doomed him -- same with Brandon Jennings' rookie year, when he started the year making an insane number of threes and has continued from then on shooting as though his "true" talent level would be that of a 40% three point shooter. In that sense, Morris' over-focus on his three-ball and spot up shots was exactly what we all should've expected. Hot hand theory doesn't just apply in a possession-only or game-by-game level -- it also exists in the macro level, where a player with a prolonged "hot hand" often inadvertently torpedoes most of a season trying desperately to return to a level of shooting they'll never reach again. Sometimes, in fact... it lasts entire careers. (Shout out to J.R. Smith! Whoa buddy!)

I do have my doubts about the Suns as a team that develops players well, though, and that's a problem going forward. While I understand that their last few drafts have been somewhat disastrous, what was the last Suns draft pick that the Suns really developed well? In 2010, you had Gani Lawal, an athletic talent from Georgetown -- he proceeded to play two minutes in a single game in the league, and is currently playing in France. You have Earl Clark the year before, a player the Suns gave up essentially as a throw-in to the Magic... only to have Clark develop (finally) into a decent defensive player and a very useful cog. You have Robin Lopez, who stagnated for years with the exception of a solid run in the 2010 playoffs, and who the Suns gave up for virtually nothing. You have Rudy Fernandez, who -- despite being the kind of shooter the Suns longed for years to put around Nash -- they gave up for actually nothing, as Sarver traded Fernandez and James Jones away for cash alone. (By the way, that's classic Sarver! Can't wait for him to trade the draft picks he gave up for Nash away to random teams for "cash considerations.") Beyond that, the Suns haven't really had any notable hits from a player development standpoint in the last while, and that's a problem.

It makes me wonder about the development of Morris, because he's easily the highest upside young player they've had in their organization for a long, long time. They really need to do a good job with him -- if he develops right, he could be their next linchpin. A Morris-Gortat core with Kendall Marshall as a tertiary piece doesn't sound all that bad to me, but only if Morris lives up to every inkling of his potential. What evidence do we have that he'll even live up to a modicum of it, with the Suns (and by extension, Alvin Gentry's) record of player development ? Virtually none. Hence the worry. Especially since his biggest issues are on the defensive end, where he gives up 60% shooting and 1.2 PPP when he's defending the post, per Synergy. Seriously, what? That's incredibly bad. According to Sebastien Pruiti, that's in the bottom 7% of NBA players. Ridiculous. Morris simply needs some time to develop and some work in the weight room. I trust the Phoenix training staff to keep players healthy and maximize the physical gifts of Markieff Morris to keep him on the court. But I sure as hell don't trust them to develop defense where none now exists, or to develop his offense to a better distribution of post-ups and spot-ups. And that's the problem that worries me about Markieff. It's okay, though. No worries. This is Sarver we're talking about. He'll probably get picked up by the Boston Celtics for "cash considerations" within the hour.

• • •

At the end of each post, I'll be scribing riddles for the next group. Whoever gets the most right will get a shout out at the end of the next post. Tweet me your answers at @docrostov, or post them in the comments. We had several 2/3 guesses last Friday, but nothing more. Shout out to Adam Johnson, J, and W -- all of whom got 2/3.

• There are busts that aren't really busts, and are a lot better than they get credit for. Then there's Player #79. Heh.
• You know how I hate Mike Bibby more than any player ever? I might've been lying. As a Cavs fan, Player #80 was worse.
• He'd make a bad fashionista, but Player #81 is a good NBA player. Will be a Hardwood Paroxysm crosspost.

As our summer mainstay, Aaron's writing a 370-part series discussing almost every notable player who was -- as of last season -- getting minutes in the NBA. Intent is to get you talking, thinking, and appreciating the myriad of wonderful folks who play in our favorite sports league. Today we continue with Jason Maxiell, Hamed Haddadi, and Al Jefferson.

• • •

Follow Jason Maxiell on Twitter at @JasonMaxiell.

I'm going to assume that most of our readers have graduated something. Not primary school, mind you -- college or high school is where it's at. Assuming you have, I'm also assuming most everyone has a sense of what it's like to hit that lull that comes gently wrapped with every student's senior year. You know what I mean -- if not from your own experience, from that of your friends. There's this feeling that wells up inside the heart of the graduate to-be. Essentially, if you're so close to the finish line, why expend that much effort finishing it out? Colloquially called "senioritis", the so-called disease presents with symptoms of missed assignments, comically lacking study habits, and incessant tardiness. The thing that amuses me about it is that it isn't simply something endemic to school -- I've seen two of my coworkers retire among the five jobs I've worked in my life, and the exact same thing applied to their work. As soon as they knew their retirement was coming through, their work became slipshod and their work ethic crumbled. Whether it was a fellow transcriptionist in college or a business analyst at a large organization, no presence was safe from the crumbling work ethic of the nearly-departed.

You may be wondering what this has to do with Jason Maxiell. It strikes me as a little weird, but when I watch Maxiell play, I don't get the sense that he's a player long for this league. I get the sense, actually, that he's essentially got senioritis. He's going to be gone pretty soon. It just looks like Maxiell plays with a foot out the door. Not out the door of the Pistons, necessarily, but of the league in general. This isn't incredibly surprising, on a broad scale. He's never been a particularly fantastic player. But his age is frankly rather shocking when you look at his play. Honestly? I thought he was over 30 when I was watching some Synergy footage to start this post. 32-33 was my guess. But no, he's 29. The problem with Maxiell isn't his age so much as his conditioning -- while he was an effective player in his youth as a raw athlete, as his athleticism wanes his ability to contribute anything tangible to a basketball team has waned just as badly. Why? Simply put, Maxiell never developed any real skills beyond his athletic dominance. He can't shoot a free throw to save his life, he has no pet post moves beyond his dunks, and his rebounding is incredibly anemic -- for a center or a power forward, it really doesn't matter which. So when the athleticism wanes, his entire game goes downhill.

As for the defense? As a young player, Maxiell was a reasonably competent defender. As he's aged and lost his leap, he's also lost a lot of mobility and quickness, which has turned him from a "bad" perimeter defender to a "holy crap, are you kidding me" perimeter defender. Open shots galore, if you put him on a strong shooter like Pau Gasol or Tim Duncan. His post defense is better, because he doesn't need to move as much, but it's still not good. This is all pretty sad, actually, as years ago Maxiell really looked to be a strong prospect. Undersized, sure, but a blue collar worker and showed flashes of being a potentially excellent defender. As his weight's ballooned and his conditioning has fallen off, he's lost the speed and leap that helped him stay a step ahead of his assignment. And then his size -- extremely small for a center, and even small for a forward at 6'7" -- comes to rear its ugly head and his defensive competency ends. He's still got the basic instincts, but with lessened speed he simply can't measure up to his old defensive chops. And it's because of this -- and, of course, his ridiculously poor touch and worsening finishing abiltiy -- that I wonder if Maxiell is even going to get a new contract after the Pistons ride out his current expiring deal. We'll see, I suppose.

• • •

_Follow Hamed Haddadi on Twitter at @HamedHaddadi15. (Do it. Really. He's cool.)__

Hamed Haddadi is 27 years old, so he hasn't reached the "falloff" stage quite yet. His skillset? Decent. He's a really good rebounder, which is great, and last season he finally showed off an improved field goal percentage courtesy of a more controlled selection of offense. Before last year, he tended to take a third of his shots as long, just-inside-the-three-point-line jumpers. He simply wasn't very good at them, converting under 33% of them in every season prior. This year, he revamped his offense a tiny bit simply by refusing to get suckered into taking extremely long jump shots. Still lost the ball a lot (seriously, a lot -- he'd average 4 turnovers a night in a world where he kept his averages up for a full 36 minutes), especially on post-ups, but he converted a better percentage and got his free throw form back to a well-above-average 70% after a poor season from there the year before. And his rebounding/shot-blocking was as effective as ever. His per-36 numbers impress, as 12-12 with 5 blocks is an impressive sum for a backup center. The issue with Haddadi is less the skillset, which is great, and more the ability to play big minutes. There's a reason he averaged only 6 minutes a contest last season, and it's not that Lionel Hollins hates him.

Haddadi's conditioning is simply not very good for an NBA big, and even a modicum of floor time tends to exhaust the poor guy. Haddadi's NBA career high for minutes is 21, which is remarkable given how productive he's been in his limited minutes. He simply lags out and gets tired if you leave him in too long, and Haddadi's defensive game is a little bit rough around the edges. He's got size and talent, but as with many of the players we've been covering recently, his decreased mobility makes it hard for him to cover guys with serious NBA quickness. In particular, Haddadi gets tired covering teams that run the pick and roll into the ground, which made him doubly ineffective last season against San Antonio. He only saw a combined three minutes in the four SAS-MEM games last season, and in those minutes, he got winded quickly. Green and Parker ran pick and rolls straight into him, and he simply couldn't cover. That's the issue with Haddadi -- other teams are aware of his conditioning, and while he's an effective per-minute player, if you run your offense with the express purpose to exhaust Haddadi (and take advantage of his mobility concerns) you'll usually succeed.

As for the personal aspect, Haddadi is Iranian. Just as Omri Casspi is cool for being from Israel, I do hold happiness at the knowledge that Haddadi was able to make it from Iran. And just as I respect Casspi for overcoming obstacles and boundaries, I respect the hell out of Haddadi. There isn't quite as personal a touch with Haddadi, as I'm Jewish, but the respect is still there. And on the subject of politics -- one important thing to note with Haddadi is the controversy he was involved in back in 2010, where Clippers announcers Ralph Lawler and Michael Smith both got themselves suspended a game for making absurd jokes on-air at the expense of Haddadi's ethnicity. Unlike what some in the media and blogosphere thought at the time, the suspension wasn't simply because the two of them dreadfully mispronounced Iran. At all. The suspension was rooted in two key problems -- the first was the dismissive nature of their comments regarding Haddadi, and the second was a tasteless joke likening Haddadi to Borat and saying Sacha Baron Cohen should play him in a movie. For the first, I think it's a reasonable gripe. There's nothing crazy or ridiculous about a decent player coming out of a country that rarely produces them, and the idea that we should be shocked or appalled that someone from Iran made the NBA is as ridiculous and culturally stunted as the idea that we should be shocked that someone from Israel or the Virgin Islands or any other unusual country makes the league. It's ignorant at best and dismissive at worst.

As for the joke... the whole Borat film is about a quasi-Kazakh culture. Kazakhstan and Iran are separated by two nations, and feature completely different cultures. Even if Borat was a perfectly respectable representation of Kazakh culture, the comparison wouldn't make sense. But it's not -- it's a quasi-insulting (though admittedly somewhat funny) mockery of their culture, and by essentially saying that it's a mockery of the entire middle east, you're taking an already somewhat offensive concept and making it that much worse. I think you can make an argument that the suspension was unwarranted, but I've yet to really hear anyone make it. (Though, now that I've posted this, I expect a twenty page rebuttal from @SherwoodStrauss defending Lawler and Smith.) I might be a little over-inclined to defend Haddadi here, though, because I really like Hamed Haddadi. Not as a player, necessarily -- I love his skillset, but the conditioning is extremely problematic. No, I really like him because he actually interacts with fans, even if the fan didn't mention him in the tweet. I mean, look at this. It's hilarious. He's a really funny guy to follow on twitter -- makes a lot of jokes (mostly good ones) and uses smiley faces like they're going out of style. Very worthy follow, I think, and seems by all accounts to be a ridiculously nice guy. Brightens my day. Big ups to Leigh Ellis of the Basketball Jones for pointing me in Haddadi's direction.

• • •

Follow Al Jefferson on Twitter. Wait, don't, he doesn't have one.
__

For an offensive-minded center, you can do a hell of a lot worse than Al Jefferson. Don't look at the overall percentage, where the sub-0.500 field goal percentage may make you think he's poor. Al Jefferson shoots above average from every shot location, which is pretty phenomenal. His field goal percentage is low not because of some failing of his own but because the Utah offense essentially needs him to be taking as many long shots as possible. The Jazz are a solid team with a lot of great talent, but until they track down a three point sniper that can really fill it up outside the arc, they're going to have problems -- they currently rely quite a lot on Al Jefferson's ability to spread the floor by taking long shots. Not threes, obviously. Jefferson's no three-point bomber. But Jefferson took 8 shots a game last year from outside 10 feet -- a ridiculous total. But in the same way that Tim Duncan sets up the Spurs offense by taking his long set shot and Kevin Garnett sets up Boston the same way, the Jazz absolutely need a center who can make shots like that. With no reliable three point shooters to spread the floor and a whole lot of cutters, the Jazz have never really had any reliable way to create spacing without Big Al's long balls. Which explains the distribution, and how an excellent center who's an above average shooter from every location on the floor somehow manages to shoot under 50% in a solid season.

As for the defense, well, I implied as much in the first sentence, where I told you he was offensive-minded! That's the problem with Jefferson that really bugs me. I'm a firm advocate for the belief that the defense of a center matters infinitely more than the defense of a guard. My thought has always been that in a very general sense, since the hand-check revolution, a defensively skilled big man is about four times as valuable as a defensively skilled wing, and that wing is about four times as valuable as a defensively skilled guard. The same holds true in an inverse sense, for how harmful a poor defender can be -- a defensively incompetent big man is about four times as harmful as a defensively incompetent wing, and that wing is about four times as harmful as a defensively deficient guard. The logic goes like so -- a center not only can patrol the paint, they essentially have to. In the modern NBA, post hand-check, even the most skilled defensive guard on earth can't really hope to keep Tony Parker ahead of him. The responsibility for guarding players like Tony therefore falls to the last line of defense -- that is, the big men. Wing players end up with a bit more leeway, as fewer wings have the speed to take full advantage of the current rulebook, but they too suffer from the problem at hand -- if a wing player drives and gets past their defender, the last line of defense is again tasked with picking up their man. You know. The big man.

The "four times" number is a bit arbitrary, but the point remains -- the big man has to clean up mistakes. In the modern league, that's basically the only way for a defense to function. Big men need to be able to function as the primary cog in the defense, because if they can't, functioning as a good defense becomes difficult. In a defense like Miami, LeBron and Wade hawk passing lanes and switch enough that they essentially function as big men -- in a possessional sense it's sometimes obscured but in last year's playoffs we finally saw LeBron perform openly as a big, in Bosh's absence. Bosh has developed into a very solid "final presence" in the paint, and while I mock Joel Anthony, he has value as a defender only. Al Jefferson? He's a really bad defender, and because of that, I have trouble thinking of him as anything more than a slightly-above-average center. Defense is simply that important as a center, and while Jefferson is a prolific shot-blocker... he's one of the worst pick and roll defenders in the league, he essentially pays no attention to the weakside whatsoever, and just doesn't rotate. His athleticism is lacking and his effort is worse. So despite his offensive talents -- which are incredible -- he's not an overly valuable player to a playoff team in this league. I can totally understand people who disagree with me, as Jefferson's offense is really really good. And almost underrated. But personally, I can't shake the feeling that the defense undermines it all. Sorry, Al.

• • •

At the end of each post, I'll be scribing riddles for the next group. Whoever gets the most right will get a shout out at the end of the next post. Tweet me your answers at @docrostov, or post them in the comments. Commenter J wins this set, getting a perfect 3/3. Good work, J! I really need to make these harder.

• Another Jazzman here. Funny looking, but I know people who are virtually in love with Player #76.
• Honestly thought he'd retire this year -- Player #77 completely and utterly fell off last year. Instead? New LA contract! Yay!
• Seemed like a lotto steal early in the season, but fell out of the rotation by the end of the year. Still think Player #78 can be good.

As our summer mainstay, Aaron's writing a 370-part series discussing almost every notable player who was -- as of last season -- getting minutes in the NBA. Intent is to get you talking, thinking, and appreciating the myriad of wonderful folks who play in our favorite sports league. Today we continue with Kevin Love, Jordan Crawford, and Marc Gasol.

• • •

Follow Kevin Love on Twitter at @kevinlove.

We can't really deny it anymore. Kevin Love is one of the best players in the league, and a budding star. Saying that feels strange to me. Way back when in 2011, I actively doubted Love's legitimacy. Not as a good player, mind you. From his first year, there were signs that Love was a legitimately talented (and very good) NBA player who had a future as a starter at worst. Many people looked at Love and wrote him off, either due to his low playing time or his low athleticism. He certainly isn't a guy who looks like an NBA player -- he's a bit pasty, and entering the league he seemed a tiny bit chunky. But his talents are myriad, and his flaws are finally starting to be addressed. We'll start with his strengths. First, Love is the best weakside rebounding talent in the NBA. Bar none. He doesn't sky for boards as an athletic marvel a la Dwight Howard, but his ability to covertly make space and throw his weight around to get in position is unparalleled. And he does it all without being particularly tall -- shockingly enough, Love measured up as 6'8" without shoes, making him shorter (without shoes) than LeBron James. But he's still a fantastic rebounder.

In fact, I'm of the opinion that in a pure battle to assess the better defensive rebounder, Love's command of the boxout and ability to use his weight to make space would actually make him a better rebounder than Dennis Rodman was. His body control is exquisite, and he's overcome so many physical handicaps to become a superstar that I'm not sure I'd bet against him in a well-scouted rebound-off between him and the Worm. I'm not 100% sure about this opinion, but I don't think it's blasphemous to think it. Offensive rebounding, obviously, would go to Dennis -- but defensive? Not sure. Love is too damn good. And that isn't simply his rebounding that's incredible -- Love's talents stretch beyond, as he's the best shooting big man in the league today. I don't say that lightly, either -- his three point stroke has gotten better every single year. While he's no great shakes as an isolation three point shooter, he's developed his shot to a designed consistency that makes it one of the strongest spot-up shots in the game. He's a post scorer who gets it done, especially from his pet area in the low block -- and has enough gusto that he generally rebounds and putbacks any shots he happens to miss or get blocked. Which, by the way, has happened less and less. As his role's evolved over his career, Love has been blocked fewer and fewer times per season.

He's come a long way from his rookie year, where a startling 11% of the shots he put up were blocked. Last year, 6% of his shots were blocked -- right below the league average for power forwards. He's put a lot of work into making his post moves harder to predict, and it's paid off in spades. On defense? This is where I can finally give Love his now-deserved due. While Love has been a relatively awful defender for years, last season under Adelman's system, Love finally started to put together a few key skills that evacuated him from the "bleeding liability" stages of defensive development. He's got quick feet, for someone who comes across often as an unathletic schlub, and if you watch him on defense you'll note just how quick those feet can get. Just as he's developed to get better at throwing his weight around in the post, Love has gotten significantly better about sliding over to the weakside to help on the pick and roll. He's developed into a reasonably good post-zone defender, as well -- when Minnesota zoned up and allowed him to cover the paint (quite often the case), Love proved startlingly effective at quashing easy post-ups and keeping in close quarters to slow offensive players in the post. Love's lacking athleticism will always handicap him on the defensive end, but by utilizing him in a zoned defensive scheme, Adelman was able to turn Love's defense from a punch line to a reasonably solid positive. And when you're as effective at rebounding and scoring as Love is, all you really need to solidify your status as an elite player is a merely passable defensive skillset. After years of work, Love's finally got that.

And with it? He's got validation as one of the best players in the game, legitimately. Now that he has some defense, the video game numbers finally have some crunch. Which is a good thing, as he's a pretty funny dude. I will say, although I'm not overly fond of his oddly franchise-threatening comments about Minnesota, there is one thing in Love's personal wheelhouse that will always keep me smiling. I refer to his big-brotherly relationship with Ricky Rubio. There's Ricky learning the intricacies of the English language. There's the storied rookie backpack play (with a guest appearance from Uncle Brad!). There's the trash talk -- which deserves special note. As an older brother myself, I completely understand Love's tactics here. Let the younger have their moment in the sun, and bluster about how they'll dominate the competition. You don't respond in the moment, you just wait. Then later, after totally trashing them in whatever they were nettling you about, you come back with a retort 10x better than one you could've done at the time. Admittedly, this is a high risk/high reward play -- if you actually lose, you've basically given up all ability to contradict the original taunt and instead leave yourself open to further, strengthened taunts that you can only respond to with toothless retorts of the "well... well... I'M OLDER! Nyeh!" sort. But if you win the game, any retort you make is just that much sweeter. Solid, solid play by Love here. Nine out of ten for the classic execution and the thoughtfulness. Exactly what I'd expect out of a man whose closest mentor is Brian Cardinal.

• • •

_Follow Jordan Crawford on Twitter at __@jcraw55.___

I've constantly noted the lack of elite talent at the two guard position -- beyond the golden (and rapidly aging) triad of Kobe, Wade, and Manu you have a relatively bare stable highlighted by James Harden, Eric Gordon, and not-a-whole-hell-of-a-lot-else. The position makes up for it by having about 20-30 versions of the same archetype -- not really elite, nor very good, but essentially your garden variety Jordan clone. Takes hard shots, makes a few, forgets to impact the game in any other way. Very easy to overrate for casual fans and very easy to watch. Jordan Crawford qualifies as one such player, although it's worth noting that he's significantly worse than most of them. I hate to put players down like this, but lord, I just can't stand Crawford's game. It's prone to be overrated due to his capacity for "big" scoring nights -- and after all, he averaged nearly 20 points per 36 minutes -- which makes people forget all the nights he simply can't make a shot to save his life. "Look at his scoring -- it's so prolific! He can't be that bad, right?" Don't be sure about that! Crawford is what one would call a "shoot-always" guard, despite the fact that he's a reasonably effective passer when he deigns to give up the ball. Crawford put up 872 shots in just 27 minutes per game, which is actually pretty incredible.

In the past decade, only four players have managed that kind of a pace -- Crawford, this season's awful incarnation of Brook Lopez, 2010 J.R. Smith, and 2009 Charlie Villanueva. Not a good look, all things considered. It'd be one thing if he was doing it efficiently, but the blistering inefficiency with which Crawford plies his trade really takes it over the top. Crawford is well below the position average from three (28% for Crawford, 35% for the average 25 MPG SG), just below average at long twos (39% for Crawford, 40% average), above average in the 10-15 foot midrange (44% for Crawford, 40% average), very below average at close non-rim shots (32% for Crawford, 38% average), and a tad below average at the rim (61% for Crawford, 63% average). The by-distance percentages look better than you'd expect looking at his overall numbers (40% from the field, 28% from three), but they're a bit misleading -- Crawford takes very few shots from the ranges he's average at, instead choosing to ensure that one of every three shots he takes comes from three point range (where, again, he shoots 7% less than the position average) and an additional one of three from the long midrange. The overall average-ness of his percentages would tend to indicate that, indeed, if he cleaned up his shot selection he'd be a league average offensive player. I'm not sure about that, though, as it would take a full-scale remodeling of his tendencies and traits for him to achieve that. And even then -- he's a pretty massive liability on the defensive end, he's (while better than Nick Young) no great shakes as a rebounder from the guard position, and he doesn't pass very willingly. Is he an NBA-quality backup on a middling team? Sure. Would he dominate in Europe, if given free reign? Absolutely. Is he a starter? Pretty sure the answer is "no way," Jordan comparisons or not. But I'm open to being surprised.

According to NBA.com, Jordan Crawford majored in liberal arts, which I honestly didn't know was possible. Perhaps as a statistician with a minor in economics, I lack the culture that underlies that major. But... seriously, what? I always thought "liberal arts" was simply a large designation of majors, not a major in and of itself. According to the Xavier website, they generally only offer a degree in majorless liberal arts to transfer students and part-timers. It appears from my cursory research that a no-major liberal arts degree tends to involve some element of customization in the student's learning plan. I actually have a friend who majored in "fairy tales" when at Duke (not a joke, she actually majored in this, it's a real thing) with the help of her advisor -- it's not an actual major the school offered, but it's how she set up her degree. So, may she has the same sort of customized "liberal arts" degree. The question I have, though, is what exactly his custom degree was focused on. How to stop worrying and love to chuck? The baking life aquatic? Keeping cool white boys around? So many options. What do you think? (Question goes double for the folks at Truth About It, who I'd bet would know better than anyone. A small shout-out, here -- the Wizards coverage they provide is simply incredible. It rivals that of any blog I can think of. Weidie, McGinnis, Mobley, and the rest of their excellent stable -- their writers all do a wonderful job, and if you're a Wizards fan who aren't reading them, you're a Wizards fan whose life is incredibly flawed. Read them early, read them often. You won't regret it.)

• • •

Follow Marc Gasol on Twitter at @MarcGasol.__

Marc Gasol's season was interesting, last year, if not a bit depressing. He started the year on an absolute tear, leading to the big Spaniard's first all-star appearance of his career, then simply wheezed out down the stretch and found himself forced to limp across the finish line. The numbers reflect that -- before the all-star break, Gasol put up a line of 15-10 on just under 50% shooting, along with his patented brand of muck-it-up, tough-nosed defense. After? Gasol's line plummeted to 14-7 on 47% shooting, and his defense fell off. This culminated poorly in the playoffs. While his scoring output came back after he realized he was being guarded by Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan, his rebounding fell off the proverbial cliff -- seven boards in 37 minutes per game is not going to cut it for a grind-it-out team like the Grizzlies, and part of what helped the Clippers pull off the tight series was Gasol's inability to lock down the boards in the same way he did in the Grizzlies' 2011 run. Not to mention the defensive end, where Gasol simply wasn't as effective as he had been all season for Memphis.

All things considered, I don't think it's fair to fault him entirely for the performance. There's a good reason pure centers rarely play over 36 minutes a night -- it's absolutely exhausting to play the center position in the modern league. This reflects in how coaches allot minutes -- collectively, guards have combined for 208 individual seasons averaging greater than 36 MPG in the last decade. Forwards total 213 such seasons. Centers, even including players designated forward-centers, in that timeframe? 17. No typo. Were you to charitably split the guards and forwards into the five cardinal, positions, you'd get somewhere on the margin of one hundred 36+ MPG seasons at every non-center position. Then, for centers, just seventeen. It's astonishingly low, though it makes my point -- playing a center is really really hard. You get fouled hard seemingly every other play. Opposing centers push you around in the post, and wing players fling their bodies into you looking for foul calls. You're also simply bigger than the other players -- it's hard to lug around a seven foot frame up and down the court thousands of times in a season. Then you add in workouts, the travel in uncomfortably small quarters, and the grind of a full season? Few centers have frames that can really support that kind of a grind. Few people, really.

Marc Gasol, to his credit, did not complain at his over-36 a night minutes load -- Darrell Arthur was injured, you see, as was Zach Randolph. Without Marc on the floor, the Grizzlies spent much of the season parading out a semi-hilarious potpourri of big men. And Marc's skills are considerable. His defense, as mentioned, is wonderful -- very solid widebody defender individually, and he puts in his effort on help defense. His large size and weight does negatively impact his help defense, as it harms his mobility and ability to properly recover onto his man if he evacuates for a weakside shooter. But don't let that lessen your view of him -- Gasol's defense absolutely defines the Grizzlies when they're at their best, and although he has his challenges, he's an incredibly smart defender that always seems to make the best possible decision on a coverage. Great shutdown paint defender, when the Grizzlies run modified zones, and a passable offensive player. Not a creator of his own offense, really, though he's a good passer when he's on -- he's more of the "set me up and I'll drop it in" sort, at his offensive best when Mike Conley is setting him up at the rim or with a nice pocket pass in-rhythm. He's got a nice little hook shot and a decent close-range turnaround he likes to rely on -- both are effective, if not moves he tends to do more than a few times a night.

But, again. The minutes load got to him, and by the end of the year, Gasol was completely gassed. It was an unfortunate end to what's been a prolonged, two-year coming out party for one of the most effective two-way centers in the league. I'm no Grizzlies fan -- I mean, cripes, what Spurs fan would be after 2011? -- but I've always really liked watching Gasol play. And not just for the basketball, which is entertaining as hell -- it's the little things, like his awkward fist-daps and the way he walks around during timeouts. It's partly his size, partly his funny proportions, and partly the fact that he looks like one of my old Spanish teachers, a little. And partly the fact that he does things like this when he thinks nobody's paying attention. He's a goofy dude, a good player, and although his season may be looked at as a disappointment by Grizzlies fans, I think that's a mistake. Expecting an athlete like Marc to take a workload like that and show no signs of wear at all is unrealistic at best and completely ridiculous at worst. Next season, with Arthur back in form and a full year's contribution from Randolph, I expect Hollins will be able to keep Gasol from getting quite so worn down. And with it, I expect the Grizzlies to be a hell of a lot of a harder out than they were this year. Should be fun, at the very least.

• • •

At the end of each post, I'll be scribing riddles for the next group. Whoever gets the most right will get a shout out at the end of the next post. Tweet me your answers at @docrostov, or post them in the comments. We got a 3/3, but only with help! Smitty Weberjagermanjensen (who, as always, was number one) got every player right, but he originally missed the boat on #3. It was only with the help of noted riddle-guessing talents Weagle and J that he realized the error in his ways, and fixed the Bynum/Gasol mix-up. Good job team. (I think I need to make these harder.)

• Good at dunks, though I admit to finding it rather scary that a Google search for Player #73 brings up "[Player #73] eats babies" as a "related" search. I know it's a T-Shirt, but... seriously, what???
• Player #74 seems to actually twitter-search his name and respond to EVERY SINGLE MENTION, even ones that don't use his twitter handle. I know this because he replied to my untagged statement about the zoo. Seems like a nice guy!
• Great post game, varied offensive skillset, solid fundamentals. All that said? Fans of Player #75's first franchise STILL like him a hell of a lot more than fans of his former and current.

As our summer mainstay, Aaron's writing a 370-part series discussing almost every notable player who was -- as of last season -- getting minutes in the NBA. Intent is to get you talking, thinking, and appreciating the myriad of wonderful folks who play in our favorite sports league. Today we continue with David Lee, Kevin Seraphin, Jerryd Bayless.

• • •

Follow David Lee on Twitter at @dlee042.

David Lee sneaks up on you, a bit. If you're making a list of the best big men in the league, Lee will never deign to crack it -- his stats are on-the-whole phenomenal but his game is on-the-whole average. He's an above average offensive player from most areas of the floor -- for his career, he generally shoots in the 40% range on 16-23 foot twos (though clocked in well below that at 36% last season), near 50% from the true midrange, around 44% on close-but-not-at-rim shots, and in the high sixties on at-rim conversion. That's very good from midrange and very good at the rim, while semi-passable from the long midrange and pretty awful at his post-move, 3-9 foot shots. This reflects in how he distributes his shots -- Lee is pretty good about staying away from doomed post moves and sticking to what he's good at. Strong moves to get as close to the basket as possible, in-rhythm midrange shots, and just enough floor spacing to draw a big out of the paint every now and again. He's good in isolation, good in the pick and roll, and good at keeping the ball under control when he runs his own plays. Still, though. Does his game really help his teammates?

This is what I've really struggled with. I've never really watched a game with Lee and thought, "wow, Lee's play has really opened up the floor for his teammates." The problem with Lee's game is that, as a player, he's extremely slow and lumbering. He's also relatively easy to telegraph. This doesn't necessarily make him easy to guard, per se -- Lee's been relatively slow his whole career, which has made him adapt to the extra coverage he gets. Lee can finish in traffic, or make shots while guarded. In some ways, it makes his offensive game that much more impressive. But the problem with Lee is that his slow frame means that his offensive talents don't really help the guards around him that much. Sure, Lee's midrange is great, but it never really spaces the floor very effectively. His man plays off him until Lee is guaranteed to shoot, then lunges in knowing they'll have time to recover if Lee decides to pass it. Alternatively, if he tries a fancy post move, defenders have about twenty years and some change to prepare their angles for a clean and easy block. Why do you think he shoots so poorly from 3-9 feet, and always seems to be among the league's big-man leaders in percentage of shots blocked? (No, Virginia, not blocks -- percentage of THE PLAYER'S shots that get blocked.) Lee's game is potent, and his offense is very impressive for a man his size. But his lack of speed and mobility do no favors for his teammates, and while his stats have always been rather excellent, I've never been quite as big on him as most.

The other reason -- also connected with his mobility -- is his defense. While Lee hustles for rebounds with the best of them and gets into scrums like his life depends on it, his lack of quickness and length will always impact his ability to really contribute on the defensive end. This isn't to say he doesn't try. Lee puts effort in on the defensive end, and he doesn't at all strike me as a Carmelo-type who simply falls asleep and takes plays off. But he just isn't that good, you know? Physically he can't hack it on the defensive end, despite his fantastic offense. He has a very poor sense of when players are rushing past him when he's on the weakside, and while he tries to stay to his man, his poor fundamentals like his footwork and physical failings leave him doomed against 90% of the big men in the league. He is a relatively decent rebounder -- or rather, was. He's actually been relatively bollocks on the boards since he arrived in Golden State, and while he was a phenomenal rebounder in New York (both per-possession and in the aggregate totals), there's little sign that's extended to his Golden State days. Still, I'm very excited to watch him this coming year. Bogut is a defensive game-changer, to the point of hiding Lee's crummy defense. And I have a feeling that Lee and Bogut will space out offensively very, very well. Assuming they both stay healthy, mind you. Perhaps not the fairest assumption, but one we'll always make before injuries inevitably defer the dream.

• • •

_Follow Kevin Seraphin on Twitter at __@kevin_seraphin.___

It surprises many, but Kevin Seraphin is actually a really solid basketball player. He's not a star, no -- Seraphin's ceiling is probably of the 14-8 sort, sopping up minutes as a big-time glue guy on a contender. But you can do things with that in this league. Offensively, he's got a minor repertoire -- he's essentially bunk beyond 10 feet, with poor free throws and no consistent jump shot to speak of. But within that range? Look out. Seraphin is hyper-athletic, strong, and multifaceted -- he's the owner of what might be the best currently-employed hook shot in the NBA, and his at-rim finishes are as breathtaking as they are efficient. Poor rebounder, as of yet, but he has a bit of time to figure out how to box out. Probably never going to be a double-digit rebounds kind of guy, though -- very important that the Wizards place good rebounders around Seraphin, to hide that aspect a bit.

On defense, it's definitely a credit to his genetics and childhood coaching-- the raw skillset Seraphin has shown in his scant years is the league is extremely nice. He sets -- according to teammates -- the toughest screens in the NBA. There are some issues -- he bites on too many pump fakes, needs to build a bit more bulk, and needs to develop better instincts on when to help. But Seraphin's pick and roll defense is quite effective even at his young age, and he has the athletic tools to be an absolute beast. And unlike many hyper-athletic prospects, Seraphin isn't too old to still make good on his potential. He actually only began to learn the game of basketball at the age of 15 -- at 7 years into his basketball learning, Seraphin is dropping games like this excellent one against the best defense in the league like it isn't a huge deal. But it is. Seraphin's toughness, hard work, and talent have carried him to a very interesting spot, and one that Seraphin surely wouldn't have expected seven years ago. When, remember, he didn't know a damn thing about the game. Fancy that.

Now, some funny Seraphin stuff. Kevin Seraphin is on the book as a big supporter of the segwey -- he bought one off JaVale McGee back in late 2011 and proceeded to drive it essentially everywhere, taking his newfound means of transport out to the Washington Monument, around Georgetown, and (according to some sources) to practice. Also, Seraphin used it to (as he said) "drive around the house." To be honest? If I were to get a segwey -- and this will never happen, but let's suspend reality -- I'd probably do the same thing. Can you imagine how hilarious that would feel? The bleeding edge inefficiency of driving a segwey around a personal home slays me. Seraphin is also the proud owner of two interesting pets -- a snake named Snakey and a bird named April. While I admit that I don't know French and can't understand a word he says in the bird video, the information is invaluable to me. After all, after JaVale McGee burst our bubble on the belief that he owned a platypus, I needed proof that at least one NBA player used some portion of their wealth to buy interesting pets. I needed it. And for providing that, Seraphin has instantly become my favorite Wizard. Good show, Kevin.

• • •

Follow Jerryd Bayless on Twitter at @jay_bay4.__

Well, I'll be damned. For once, a player's stats completely took me by surprise. I watched a bunch of tape through Synergy sports, though, and I can safely conclude that the 42% shooting from three point range that Bayless put up isn't an error in my data. I really thought it was -- Bayless has up-til-now been a relatively awful shooter from distance, with his previous best season a barely-average 33%, and every season prior to that being in the mid 20s, early 30s. Still. I realized he'd had a better year last season, but THAT much better? All things considered, last season was something of a revelation for the relocated Arizonan. Bayless seems to have ironed out some of the kinks in his shot (although his shot selection still drove me nuts when I watched Raptors games). He's always had the potential to do that, mind you -- he's shot over 80% from the free throw line over his career, and when you're that accurate from the line, you usually have at least the potential to be a good three point bomber -- but it was only last season that his outside shooting really started to match the intuition on his shot.

For the first time in his four year career, Jerryd Bayless posted an above-average PER and a WS/48 above 0.100. Although he was a bit turnover prone in prior seasons, he was able to finally find a good medium between overhandling and passing, posting the best assist rate of his career coupled with one of the lowest turnover rates. There are still some issues, though -- we like to talk about players doing what they're best at and taking the ball inside, but Bayless is simply not of that brood. Over his career, he takes only one or two shots per game at the rim, and there's a good reason why. The secret with Bayless is that he's simply not a good finisher, and he doesn't have a go-to shot in the 3-9 foot range that he can really rely on. He's also doubly prone to turnovers when he drives it into the paint -- Bayless is at his distributing best when he's precipitating his moves around the perimeter and dropping pretty passes to cutting bigs. The reason, so far as I can explain it, is that his size and ball control is compromised when he's moving too quickly. He's a good standstill passer, and a good passer when he's moving leisurely, but the tradeoff between a Bayless pass made in rapid motion and one made in casual motion is that he simply can't make unpredictable (or even hard-to-predict) angles when he's moving quickly. This leads to him telegraphing his pass something fierce and losing his handle more often, hence the poor shooting and the constant turnovers in the painted area.

Still. His issues driving and finishing in the paint notwithstanding, if Bayless keeps his three point shot up to his recent standards, he should be a decent player in the NBA. Offensively, he has talent -- he's above average from the long two as well as (now) the three, and takes the majority of his shots from that range in an effort to spread the defense for his big men. Generally to some success. Defensively, he's pretty awful, though that's rather par for the course for shooting guards stuck in point guard frames. When he tries to apply defensive pressure he genuinely struggles to stay out of foul trouble. And although I love summer league, this is worth noting. Bayless was the MVP of the 2009 summer league. He proceeded to be a marginal, 14 minute-a-game stopgap the next season despite being healthy for virtually the entire season for a Portland team struggling with injuries. Summer league is a trip, and a great experience -- but all that said, even the highest success in the summer league is no guarantee of stardom -- or even anything more than stopgap production -- in the big leagues. Very little translates like you'd expect. Well, except a Jimmer/DeMarcus reality show. That probably translates about as well as you'd expect.

• • •

At the end of each post, I'll be scribing riddles for the next group. Whoever gets the most right will get a shout out at the end of the next post. Tweet me your answers at @docrostov, or post them in the comments. If you combine J and Brian -- one of whom got Lee and Bayless, the other who got Seraphin -- you'd have a 3/3, but as-is you've just got two 2/3s and a sense that they coulda been contenders. Alack.