I think I hear where you are coming from. I’m actually not having a brand discussion at all, as it doesn’t much matter to me. I understand the connection you were making based on their own personal monikers, but I guess I fixated on the difference between them and how they are presented. One seems to scream “look at me” a lot more than the other one, and when I combine that with the long history of narcissistic comments made by LeBron, it just fits the narrative that I have already bought into LOL Many others are willing to let all of that disappear from their mind because he signed with the Lakers. Unfortunately, I am unable to do so at this point. I think our players will benefit tremendously from seeing his preparation, how he handles himself most of the time, the gravity he creates on the court to give others open looks, and much more. I do hope not to see our guys in cut off pant suits, carrying purses, and with long nasty beards though LOL Having three of the top assist guys in the whole league on one team is unprecedented, and I’m looking forward to see how it all comes together
This is all I was saying and I understand for sure that you're not going to embrace the guy. As the author of the LeBron thread, I have been preparing myself for this for a while. I get not liking LeBron, but to me this stuff is all the same. The best players use their name and their brand at every opportunity these days, it's all just a machine. Let's all just unite with Josh Hart in rejecting a certain someone's shoes in the locker room.
I’m with fabfour, I will be extremely agitated if we saw he missed most of training camp (loss of opportunity to develop with the team), preseason... and he comes into the regular season essential with no improvements of what we needed him to approve on (field goal percentage, free throw percentage, floater/finishing around the rim, durability). I know his outside shooting has been magnified because it’s been bad and the actual shooting motion is extremely ugly.... but there are was a big guard like Lonzo could dominate at the point guard position without being a effective shooter (see ben Simmons). I could live with Lonzo being a skinny Ben Simmons, who is better at guarding point guards. To get to that point he still needs to improve on finishing around the rim and free throw shooting.
Either way we have Rondo waiting in the wings, with plenty of guard depth if he is miles away. Rondo/Hart KCP/Lance Or switch Lance and Hart if you want.
He's only been able to semi jump and shoot for what .... 3 or 4 weeks if that? And he is changing a life long habit to look that much better? Markelle after a month trying to remember how he shot only 3 months earlier looked "comical" with his 2 arm pushes. Way to go Zo. Step in the right direction to breaking bonds with your old man's influence on you. If Kobe could will himself to shoot well left handed you can transform your right handed stroke to a more advantageous motion like you're doing. Props!!
It’s definitely quicker and cleaner, his elbow is straight on the release, which you want. We can only hope it translates to the real games, good on him for trying to tweak it though.
Obviously it’s not textbook but if you look where his hand is he goes from the left to midline. His release looks like a more traditional shot. If he can consistently hit that point he should be fine. It’s funny because Steph Curry’s shot is not textbook as his release hand starts on the side of the ball and then rotates as he releases. Lonzo does that but from the other side. Perfect or textbook form... Klay Thompson. Beautiful to watch...
Ball has minimized that obvious swing from the left side of his head. Old habits die hard however so he has to keep sticking with his new mechanics. Yes, Thompson has a nice perfect picture J but:
The angle that it really looked changed in that clip above was toward the end when he was near the right baseline. It didn't seem from behind to come from the left side. That's how he needs to spend a lot of time working and practicing this .... is coming off his dribble going right when it makes zero sense to pivot the wrong way. Those seem like wouldn't take forever for him to get better shooting them that way in closer especially over smaller players until he gets comfortable. He's taking zero of those effectively now. Arenas broke that down perfectly in this video someone posted a few weeks ago. Which shows how it's pretty physically impossible to go right and then with that momentum twist his upper body left for his shot.
Agree... From the footage, Ball looks like he has a bigger frame so it would be fine for him to attack the basket, draw fouls or collapse the defense then find open perimeter shooters. His release seems a tad faster too. Ball will pick his spots to shoot but he is a pass first player.
If you are going to shoot like crap, might as well not look like silly doing it. It's not like he could shoot worse than last year, so he might as well fix the shot whatever it takes. It's hard to go lower than 30%. Right?
