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Message: [QUOTE="Forza Azzurri, post: 2830284, member: 1452"] I find you to be a very rational poster so I will respond to you. I disagree completely but will caveat and explain later. The premise, coming into this year, was that this team would be a final four contender. Why? Several reasons. Last year's team was a very good defensive team and this year's team was expected to be equally as good. This year's team was expected to be much better offensively due to both the addition of new players and the improvement of returning players. So, let's take a look with the caveat that there is a small sample size of games in the current season with Frank and even fewer if you exclude cupcake games. Brissett: Brissett is worse seems to be the consensus. True of False? False. Brissett is not worse. He is different. His shooting percentage has actually improved relative to last year across the board (both 2s and 3s). What has changed is his shot composition. He is taking approximately the same amount of 3s as last year but he is taking 3 fewer 2s a game as he spends more time on the perimeter. A consequence of this is that he is taking fewer Fts and getting fewer offensive rebounds. Battle's shooting percentages have also increased across the board (both 2s and 3s). The biggest difference for Battle, however, is that he has doubled his average FT attempts relative to last year. Howard: First the good. He is taking much better care of the ball. His asst to TO ratio is 2 to 1 this year vs 1.3 to 1 last year. He is also making others better. Brissett, Battle and Hughes are all shooting better since his return. The bad? His offense. He is averaging 7 fewer points on 7 fewer shot attempts with the biggest difference being the fact that he is taking 6 fewer 2s per game. He is not penetrating and scoring (how many of those patented little floaters have you seen him take this year?). THe team is also much better defensively with Frank - giving up 5 fewer pts per game and opponents are shooting a lower % from the floor, and from 3, with Frank. The team is actually better offensively this year. Our PPG is +3. Our shooting % are up, especially from 3, and we are getting to the line more. And this is with a FH who is not close to being the offensive force that he can be when healthy. We do need to get back on the offensive boards as offensive rebounds have dropped by 50-100% depending upon how you look at it (this is where different Brissett is bad for the team). The problem is that our offensive improvement has been offset by a decrease in our defensive efficiency. Surprisingly, at least for me, this boils down to one area: Fouls. Our opponents are going to the line 6 more times a game this year and getting 3 more points a game from the line (exactly offsetting our offensive improvement). Unless this is fully attributable to the insertion of Hughes, I believe this can be rectified and we can get back to being the same team defensively that we were last year. Bottom line, there is nothing here that tells me that Carey should start over Frank. We are a better team, both offensively and defensively, with Frank on the floor. But the picture painted also tells the story of a team that has not improved relative to last year. And therein lies the rub. The solution is really simple. Get Frank back to being Frank. If Frank gets back to being Frank, this is a much better team. But, if Frank cannot get back to being Frank then we are, once again, a bubble team. So, then the question becomes, if current Frank is Frank's ceiling this season, for whatever reason, then does the insertion of JC raise the ceiling? I don't know the answer to that. [/QUOTE]

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