Frankie Howard | Page 2 | Syracusefan.com

Frankie Howard

It's like me saying "If Kaleb comes in and plays like he did for the first half against Nova last year he's going to be a lottery pick next season".

It can be conditional all you want, but you can almost say anything has conditions and follow it with pretty much anything and it doesn't hold water.

I'm not sure it's the exact same thing but I can see the point. What happens with fans like us is that we all want these guys to succeed -- even the pessimists among us (myself included). But sometimes the optimists see potential that leads to us overrating our own players or, the pessimists pick nits out of habit and we underrate a guy because he's not Lebron. Then the discussion takes place like the one in this thread.

I actually see the upside a lot of people are talking about with Frankie. Think he could be a really good player for us. But where I fall on the discussion is that, while I'd love to see his jumper develop, I'd also be satisfied if he just got really good at the things he already seems to do quite well -- take care of the basketball/facilitate the offense, push the tempo, play good defense and create looks for teammates with his passing. I even think he's a decently creative finisher going to the basket in the half-court -- had a couple real nice buckets vs. UNC in the game I went to at Chapel Hill.

Honestly, if he got really good at those things and chipped in points when he was able to get to the basket or finish in transition -- we'd have a really, really good player. In a weird way, I'd argue that becoming a really, really solid shooter -- while certainly valuable -- is something of a bonus with him.

Not every player at the college level does a lot of things well and sometimes wanting your 6-8 swing guy to turn into Kevin Durant obscures the real goal, which is developing a go-to move in the post to simply accentuate the game he already has. I think this concept gets lost with the value everyone puts on players who are inside-outside-transition threats. Yes, that's great, but I'll take an Onuaku every day of the week over a Donte Greene, who I see as the downside of wanting players to be dangerous away from the basket.
 
It's like me saying "If Kaleb comes in and plays like he did for the first half against Nova last year he's going to be a lottery pick next season".

It can be conditional all you want, but you can almost say anything has conditions and follow it with pretty much anything and it doesn't hold water.


If I grow a foot , find a time machine and go back twenty years , and miraculously obtained monkey strength , I'm a lotto pick
 

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