Beware of injured animal , gsw will have a lot to prove
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Breath easyBeware of injured animal , gsw will have a lot to prove
Hey guys, I’ve been watching the rookie of the year race with interest. Being a Jazz fan I’ve watched every game Mitchell has played and being an Aussie I have watched about 80% of Simmons games.
While I know Ben stuffs the stat sheet and does some amazing things, I honestly don’t think he impacts his team or the game more than what Donovan does. While he gets more assists and has had multiple triple doubles. So many of his assists are just hand offs to shooters that don’t really assist them at all. The other night when he got his tenth assist to get his triple double, all he did was bring the ball up the court and hand it off to JJ Redick who then took a dribble to lose his man and stepped back/sideways to clear room for himself before launching his three. I’m not actually sure how Ben assisted him getting the shot off, let alone scoring the points. So many of his so called assists are like this.
While Donovan doesn’t get as many assists, his passes are much more purposeful and when he does record an assist it’s not because he got cut off and had to pass out for a shot, or dribbled and handed off to another shooter, he usually drives and creates space before passing beautifully to Gobert or Favors or he skip passes to Ingles, Rubio or Jerebko. But in so doing he gets less assists. A lot of the commentary says he is just a scorer but I see him as so much more than that.
If you watch both of their games I feel Mitchell has a much bigger impact and he also does it when the game is on the line in the fourth quarter. If we end up in the 4th, 5th or 6th seed in the Western Conference being led by a rookie, tell me when that was last achieved. So while Simmons does get more stats, I think Mitchell impacts the game more, at the most important time and has contributed more to his team relatively than Simmons and in a tougher conference.
When you say this on any website, you just get drowned out by people saying Mitchell is just an average volume scorer whereas Ben is the second coming of Magic Johnson. I’m sorry but I think people saying this are not watching Jazz games, and their putting more weight in stats rather than the simple eye test. I don’t remember Magic getting so many assists from just bringing the ball up the court and handing off for a contested 3 that happens to go in. I mean watch the assist that put Ben over the 500 assist mark. He handed off to Embid who then proceeded to take multiple dribbles, driving and out manoeuvring his man with great footwork to score at the rim. All Ben did was hand him the ball 22 feet out from the basket. How is that an assist? Joel created that basket all by himself. Whoever is giving out the stats is handing them to Ben when they aren’t really deserved. And yet that is what everyone is pointing to as the reason why he deserves the award more than Mitchell.
I don’t know if this will ever be highlighted in the mainstream media but it should be so that people see it for what it is.
I think Ben will win but I just don’t like a lot of the commentary about Donovan and I think the way Ben arrogantly said he hadn’t noticed any other rookies and laughed when it was suggested as being a two horse race between him and Mitchell was poor and didn’t reflect well on him. He comes across as an arrogant a-hole to be honest, whereas Donovan seems like a really great guy. It would be interesting to see what Dante thinks given his knowledge of DM and his friendship with Ben.Late to the party but I think you're a mile off. Make no mistake Mitchell is having an excellent rookie season but his impact on games isn't anywhere near Bens. On the defensive end Simmons has a massive advantage and is one the better defenders in the league already, Mitchell isn't bad in this area but I wouldn't say he is good defender yet and to a certain degree he has been disappointing in this area given my preseason expectations, although he has had to shoulder a far greater offensive load than I expected him to which has effected his effort defensively. Offensively though I can't help but feel you're overrating Mitchell and underrating Simmons. You're right in saying Mitchell is more than a scorer but even so his feel for the game is lacking, yes he can make good passes but he doesn't know how to run an offense and its not a coincidence that Jazz started winning more games once Rubio was given more responsibility to run the offense over Ingles and Mitchell. Compare that to Simmons who is excellent in this area already which is very rare for a rookie PG and is an area often overlooked when talking about the Simmons, people get lost in the flashy passes and highlight dunks but his ability to control the game at his tempo is more important than either of those two things. This isn't necessarily a criticism of Mitchell as over time he will get better in this area but when talking about the rookie of the year race factors like this and Simmons defense have to come into consideration and is the reason Simmons is significantly ahead despite Mitchell ridiculous rookie season.
Anyhow beyond the ROY race. Its been great to see Exum return and hopefully his excellent play over the last few games should see him get more significant minutes against decent opposition. I also think Favors is deserving of more opportunity as he has been excellent recently but is finding himself playing less minutes than Crowder which isn't right. Either we play more Favs/Gobert combo or we give Favors the opportunity at the Center position in place of Gobert like we did today.
As a Nuggets fan I have to say I love the rivalry we have going now. Hopefully Mitchell v Murray and Joker v Gobert continues for years to come.