I kinda disagree. He has good hands. He has a few nice moves. He's got good touch. He just doesn't get the reps to polish it all and to keep him in the form and with the confidence to make it comfortable. Remember how, when James came back, his first game back, in the first half — how rusty and 'slightly off' he looked? Imagine trying to build your timing and form when never getting actual game touches. That's why it comes so sporadically.
We just don't have guards who look to feed the post, so at some point, your mental focus for offense is going to atrophy. I wouldn't blame him for being frustrated, but of course the way back into good graces is to hustle on the other fronts.
We have had situations where Rak has been fed the ball, made a move or two and swished a short shot with beautiful form. Next possession, MCW's jacking up a deep three with 20 seconds on the clock because 'it's his turn.' Not a lot of intellect. Rak has had mismatches and advantages, but, our scheme seems to be that we have no scheme. Southerland will get fed if he's hot, but that's easy. He's uncontested on the outside. If your guards have no confidence in your bigs, there's no way for them to develop. Add to that a 'laid back' personality, and we've got what we've got.
I sincerely wish we would get a real big man coach. Hopkins may be the next HC, but look at it this way — Hop has only ever played guard. He's only ever been coached by JB. And that's it. Aside from his Olympic experience — and we have little to go on about that — he's had precious few mentor coaching voices from whom to learn, and how much of that has been instrumental toward advancing our power players? The converse would never be entertained: let's bring back Arinze or Otis to coach our point guards... That dog doesn't hunt. Even if we give Mike the benefit of the doubt — maybe he's got a feel for it/has been studying 'big man stuff' on youtube privately... whatever — i'm still betting there's, at least, a slightly better option somewhere.
