Q12543 wrote:Right, if you are going to be a one-trick pony (scoring in this case), then do it well and do it efficiently. The 3-ball for Bazz has been a huge development. If that isn't falling, then all of his tunnel-visioned forays to the hoop, wild charges into people, and inability to be very good at anything else makes him very mediocre.
He has improved defensively, but it's hard to gauge by how much when he's a pure bench player going up against other second tier guys.
Early on in the season he was playing basically all his minutes against bench players. Once Lavine started playing with the bench a lot more Bazz has likely been playing some minutes against a starter. Regardless he is not being matched up against a top level offensive player. When do we give him his due though doing his job on that end? How often have we seen some random dude have a huge game against the wolves espcially from 3. I haven't seen that happen much when Bazz is on the floor guarding his player. It would be interesting to see if there was some charting of the levels of player not only starter vs bench but how good of offensive players they are.
Sure Bazz doesn't get assists but the key for a player like him is making good decisions which I think he has improved even starting later in the season last year. If he can't score he should be passing it up. If you were coaching would you find ways to put Bazz is situations to get assists? No. He doesn't have that in his game. Bazz's opportunities for assists probably revolve around his post ups if he gets double teamed or maybe after getting an offensive rebound throwing it out to someone. Bazz touches the ball 13.3 half court times a game per NBA.com. The only guys that touch the ball less on the team are Aldrich, Rush and other guys deeper on the bench. That's not a lot of chances for an assist. Generally when Bazz gets the ball in the offense he has a couple options.
Shoot or look to score
Swing the ball to someone else
Bazz isn't put in a position to create for others because...duh that's not his game.
What I have seen more this year from Bazz is him passing the ballmore when he gets his hands on it and doesn't have an obvious advantage. He still takes some shots and stuff that are tunnel vision types but just watching him there are times every game he passes the ball that he wouldn't have in the past. It's obviously a weakness of his game no matter how you slice it but is 2 more assists a game that big of a deal? I think it's other stuff is a bigger deal if he is moving the ball a reasonable amount of the time. Every offensive player on this roster tends to take a couple bad scoring opportunities. Bazz can keep cutting down on those espcially if his teammates and the offense works more in his favor which has been part of te reason he has been getting going lately.
To me Bazz this season has done some of things people have been asking for him to do for years and he has basically barely gotten any credit till recently when people have started to give him credit for inproving defensively. He hasn't improved much when it comes to his offensive skill set which is disappointing. It's weird he hasn't improved much as a ball handler. His shooting...may have improved but that was something that had some decent potential all along. His defensive improvement has been pretty significant and quite frankly I'd take that over him becoming a better ball handler anyway. Knock on woood his injury issues seem to be behind him and that was a legit concern but it's looking less of a problem as he has been mostly healthy.
Edit: And then I see he went 0-6 in a loss... lol
