The Corner Has Been Turned

[mcHAPPY]

Some very good posts here. Patience is not a common characteristic around here. I'm not sure why that is. The idea of making the playoffs should be a distant thought. Let the young players make their mistakes. It is the only way to ensure the season is all for not.

[Buddahfan]

However, what you fail to mention is that since coming over to the Raptors, he is shooting career best numbers, while playing minutes he hasn't really seen on a consistent basis at all in his career. 43% from the field and 35% from 3 are pretty decent, for someone that plays his style of game. Go look back at that Detroit game he won BY HIMSELF. Perhaps it'll refresh your memory.

Anyone can have a short hot or cold streak. EJ started off the season shooting something like 17 for 75 or .227 on his three ball shots. Now he is up to .340 and climbing compared to a career number of .370. Since that awful start he made 52 of 125 or .416.

Basketball is a game of streaks including shooting streaks. Water and players number reach their normal level over a period of time.

Johnson started out the season with a PER and WS/48 over 20 and over .200. Now he back to his career numbers which are in the 17 and .150 areas respectively.

Yes a person can improve their shooting however in Bayless case he is shooting 14 of 43 under .330 from the field in his last 10 games. So has he really improved?

[Buddahfan]

Bayless has been off since his ankle injury (his most true PG-like game, coincidentally), and hasn't been at 100% since then. He also gas an offensive rating of 107 and a PER of 15.5. He's barely gotten any PT, I don't know how people can just immediately write him off like that; in the same way people thought DD was a disappointment only 1/3 into his sophomore season.

And Bayless got traded twice, because his previous teams (and this one, so far) aren't willing to let him play through mistakes and develop.

You can't use injuries as an excuse. All players get injured and some play while injured and others don't. I don't recall ever complaining that Johnson's numbers were off, which they were, while he was playing with his back injury. That is just part of the game.

It seems to me that half a season is not enough to see if there is improvement. A player needs to do it for a full season or even longer before one can say that yes that player has improved.

Lets see what Bayless 2010-11 numbers look like come next April before we celebrate any improvement in his shooting.

[huskies2raps]

Let the youth movement prevail, I'm all for it, but the intent should not be to lose every game and try and finish with as little wins as possible. this is the same team that has shown it is capable of hanging around and even beating top tier teams - i still think the raps are one or two moves away from a solid team, and if it's on Triano to develop Davis, Bayless, and Derozan, then the rest of the work lies on Colangelo to get us those pieces