NBA Radio - Donovan Mitchell Should Go. Not to Knicks

[LoPo]

Dude almost no one blamed donovan for past playoff failures. How could they?
as a 23 year old vs denver in the playoffs he averaged 36 points per game on 53% from the field and 52% from three. No one cared about his defense. He was phenomenal.
Against memphis last year he averaged 29 ppg on 45% from the field and 40% from three. Again, fantastic. No one criticized him
against the clippers he averaged 35ppg on 45% from the field and 45% from three. All good in the hood.
He was pretty good against okc as a rookie. Sweetness!
He sucked pretty bad in 2 different series vs the rockets. He probably got criticized along with a bunch of other guys (rubio got hella criticized from what i remember)
Against dallas he shot 39% from the field and 20% from 3 and played horrible defense. He averaged 25 ppg on 22 shots. And again, horrible defense. He was outplayed by brunson.

Basically when he plays poorly he gets criticized. When he plays great he gets praised. This is what happens with pretty much every player.

Gobert plays poorly sometimes too and gets criticized but because of his role and his game style his fluctuations aren't nearly as great. Donovan goes from being literally the best player in the nba in the playoffs sometimes to being horrid (like against houston twice and against dallas) and less valuable than brunson. Did you know that rudy averaged a double double in literally every playoff series he has ever played in? (excluding his first playoffs when he only played 21 minutes a game so just didn't play enough).
His numbers are pretty consistent from series to series so even when he struggles it doesn't stick out as much as he is rarely the focal point of the team. And when he struggles defensively its often due to scheme rather than individual play or effort. When donovan is shooting horribly and not trying at all on defense then its much easier to be critical of him rather rudy who isn't touching the ball much and is constantly busting his *** on both ends.

I appreciate this post. And I agree with you. Don deserves criticism. He had his first bad series in 3 years. He deserves heaps of criticism.

He had a poor series, but it wasn't all bad. He wasn't the reason we lost the series by any means yet almost the entire forum wants to send him off. I just don't get the logic. It's more personal and hate-filled than merited.

As for Rudy's double doubles, I don't consider that a measure of success at all. He's literally planted underneath the basket on both ends when every shot goes up. He doesn't run the floor in transition so he can concentrate on rebounding. If he didn't average 10 rebounds, I would be shocked. I also don't think Russell Westbrook stats are worth going crazy over.

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[SteakNEggs]

Career high assists of 11... Twice

In 345 games.

 

[fishonjazz]

Its pretty simple really. donovan is the face of the franchise. He is the playoff superstar with the nuclear codes. He has to be the best player in the series for the jazz to advance. In the dallas series he was either the 4th, 5th, 6th, or 7th best player in terms of positive impact for his team. I definitely put luka and brunson ahead of him. I also definitely put clarkson ahead of him. So at best he was the 4th best player in the series. That wont cut it. So he is getting blamed a lot right now.

And remember @LoPo, Cy gave conley the worst grade on the team and had a few others below donovan too. I gave conley my worst grade. Most peopled did. Im pretty sure if you make a poll asking who was the worst player for the jazz in the mavs series that donovan wouldn't get the most votes.

But he has the highest expectations and unfortunately that matters. I expect donovan to average 30 ppg game on 45% from the field and 40% from three. Thats just the way it is. I dont even care if he plays defense. He didn't get it done. I expect Gobert to average 14 points and 12 rebounds and protect the paint. He pretty much always meets my expectations.

Having said all that I have finally gotten to the point that I dont think rudy works in the playoffs. I think he should be traded. I want to keep donovan. But then again I think he wants to leave and he nets us the most assets where as rudy wants to stay. It is what it is.

 

[fishonjazz]

I appreciate this post. And I agree with you. Don deserves criticism. He had his first bad series in 3 years. He deserves heaps of criticism.

He had a poor series, but it wasn't all bad. He wasn't the reason we lost the series by any means yet almost the entire forum wants to send him off. I just don't get the logic. It's more personal and hate-filled than merited.

As for Rudy's double doubles, I don't consider that a measure of success at all. He's literally planted underneath the basket on both ends when every shot goes up. He doesn't run the floor in transition so he can concentrate on rebounding. If he didn't average 10 rebounds, I would be shocked. I also don't think Russell Westbrook stats are worth going crazy over.

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Rudy runs the floor harder than pretty much anyone. baseline to baseline. He gives tremendous effort.
And again, a big part of the reason almost the entire forum wants to send mitchell off is because they believe he wants to send himself off. And we could get a big haul in a don trade. We dont want to be left with nothing like hayward situation.

 

[Hearsky]

Two consistent themes with guys like you:

- you don't know how to identify the issues

- so you don't know how to make improvements

The whole time, you get overly invested in certain players and get super defensive even though you are completely oblivious to what's happening.

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Two consistent themes with you:
-Dumb
-***

 

[Ben10]

Career high assists of 11... Twice

In 345 games.

But is that because he doesn’t pass? According to second spec data for the last 3 years Donovan has averaged over 10.4 passes a game that would count as assists if the shot was made. Plus he has always had another guy that is considered the PG playing.

 

[LoPo]

Rudy runs the floor harder than pretty much anyone. baseline to baseline. He gives tremendous effort.
And again, a big part of the reason almost the entire forum wants to send mitchell off is because they believe he wants to send himself off. And we could get a big haul in a don trade. We dont want to be left with nothing like hayward situation.

I just don't see it that way. I don't see Rudy trying harder than everybody else. I don't see him running baseline to baseline in transition like what I was referring to.

I saw Rudy time and time again stand underneath the basket not even contest a Brunson shot after Brunson got past Royce. Literally moments later, the same weak crap went up and Whiteside sent it to the stands.

A 14-12 center playing 35mpg and not asked to run in transition doesn't impress me at all. I'm impressed when Rudy protects the paint because he's the best in the biz, but takes plays off. He doesn't contest when possible.

The problem with Don is that people haven't dealt with their Hayward issues yet and they are taking it out on Don. He has 3+ years on his deal.

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[Ben10]

He had a poor series, but it wasn't all bad. He wasn't the reason we lost the series by any means yet almost the entire forum wants to send him off. I just don't get the logic. It's more personal and hate-filled than merited.

I don’t think 90% of of here want to send Donovan off like you are saying. We just feel like he doesn’t want to be here so get the most you can for him before he demands a trade or just leaves at the end of his contract

 

[Hearsky]

I just don't see it that way. I don't see Rudy trying harder than everybody else. I don't see him running baseline to baseline in transition like what I was referring to.

I saw Rudy time and time again stand underneath the basket not even contest a Brunson shot after Brunson got past Royce. Literally moments later, the same weak crap went up and Whiteside sent it to the stands.

A 14-12 center playing 35mpg and not asked to run in transition doesn't impress me at all. I'm impressed when Rudy protects the paint because he's the best in the biz, but takes plays off. He doesn't contest when possible.

The problem with Don is that people haven't dealt with their Hayward issues yet and they are taking it out on Don. He has 3+ years on his deal.

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Pfffff.....you are absolute joke. 100% incapable of being even remotely objective.

 

[SteakNEggs]

But is that because he doesn’t pass? According to second spec data for the last 3 years Donovan has averaged over 10.4 passes a game that would count as assists if the shot was made. Plus he has always had another guy that is considered the PG playing.

Yes. 350 games and his career high is 11 shows he does not pass. Law of averages would suggest him hitting at least 15 once or twice if he got others involved for easy baskets. Some guys make the team around them better.

 

[LogGrad98]

It's just funny how yall can watch a series, see Rudy get 100% schemed out of games to our detriment, clog the paint inable to be much help on offense, and still use our failures to blame Donovan.

No wonder the Utah Jazz has a reputation for having the dumbest and worst fans in the NBA.

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It's funny to me that you cannot understand that they schemed the entire team defense out of the game, not just one player. And if we had more competent defenders it would mean a lot less that they can scheme any one player out of the game.

Also should be eye opening that scheming ONE SINGLE PLAYER out of the game is enough to submarine the entire team with little to no effort.

 

[SteakNEggs]

It's funny to me that you cannot understand that they schemed the entire team defense out of the game, not just one player. And if we had more competent defenders it would mean a lot less that they can scheme any one player out of the game.

Also should be eye opening that scheming ONE SINGLE PLAYER out of the game is enough to submarine the entire team with little to no effort.

Exactly... Rudy's man was not averaging 32 ppg through the first 5 with a total of 28. If we wanna talk bad defense let's talk about bad defense. It's not Rudy who allowed this... Blaming Rudy for Donovans poor defense is pretty messed up.