Excellent post. Everyone seems to have annointed Exum as our PG of the future even though he doesn't seem to have a competitive bone in his body. That's reflected in the zero rebounds. Zero assists is more worrisome -- despite great size, speed and athleticism, Exum really doesn't know how to play the game. I go back and forth on Trey as the PG of the future, however, because of his shooting ineptitude. Then, again, there has to be a reason we only win when he's in the line-up. Didn't we lose 13 in a row last season when he was injured? And last night, the Jazz offense was like a car without a spark plug (speaking of ineptitude) with Trey home sick. It was amazing that the Jazz had to turn to Joe Ingles for any lane penetration, with Ian and Dante content to hover around the three-point line like Steve Novak. At least Trey causes things to happen with his improving dribble-drives and drive and kicks. So I started to think that we are undervaluing Trey by over-emphasizing shooting percentages.
I decided to see where Trey ranks in Assists Per Game (APG) and Assists-to-Turnovers (AT). In APG, he ranked 22nd among all players at 5.1 per game. Not surprisingly, Chris Paul ranks #1 at 10.1. If you consider an assist as equivalent to a made shot, then Trey's overall efficiency looks a lot better. With regard to AT, he ranks 15th at 2.92, so he's doing a decent job protecting the ball. The leader, again, is Paul at 4.55, followed by Barea (4.26), Harris (3.59), Lawson (3.45) and Andrei Miller (3.40). Also, Trey's assist numbers would be a lot better if we weren't such a mediocre shooting team overall at .453%. Golden State is No.1 at .483 and Dallas is .477, helping them place two guys in the Top 5 in assists. We all know John Stockton is the all-time assists leader thanks to playing with maybe the greatest finisher of all time. In his second season, he shot a glorious .499% but only 18% for 3s.
Although I find myself screaming when Trey has what Boler terms, charitably, "a tough night shooting," he really does make the Jazz offense better, certainly much more so than the heir apparent. I certainly understand that Trey needs to bring his shooting percentage up to at least 40%, but he's the stick that stirs the Jazz's drink. It's way to early to write him off in favor of a kid who has yet to show he has the competitive desire to excel.
