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Lack of the go-to guy....

Will no go-to guy hurt or or help us?

  • Hurt us, we will lose games we may have won.

    Votes: 6 33.3%
  • Help us, they won't know who to defend.

    Votes: 6 33.3%
  • No impact either way.

    Votes: 4 22.2%
  • Who cares?

    Votes: 2 11.1%

  • Total voters
    18

LogGrad98

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So is a lack of a clear go-to player/scorer going to hurt us or help us or not really have any impact this year? I am not talking about lack of an all-star, but really just no alpha-scorer that we can get the ball to in crunch time. Like him or hate him Hayward was that guy for us, and he really did well in those circumstances for us. Without a clear person in this role will it hurt us in the long run, or will it make us harder to guard since any one of 4 or even 5 guys could be "the guy" any given night?



I kind of think the latter. Everyone knows that we don't have that alpha player right now, yet we have had at least 5 players in double figures each of our first 3 games. I think, since we don't have that go-to guy, it will make it better for us the way our team is constructed right now. It could be Joe Johnson who gets the ball at the end, or even Ingles. Of course more often than not it will be Rubio handling the ball in that circumstance, but he will likely not be the one to shoot it, but when he does it could be a surprise that throws the other team off.
 
I don't see anything to worry about. After watching the game tonight, it seems like the Thunder are the ones that need to go out and get a go to scorer.
 
Jingle Joe is our new primary go to guy. He’s averaging like 16 ppg.

Top scorer does not equal go-to guy all the time. Right now at the end of games I would prefer to see the ball with Joe Johnson or Rubio over Ingles. I want Ingles on the court at the end of games but not necessarily being the guy to try to do it all if it calls for it.
 
Hayward would have drawn a lot of the attention for the last shot in Minny last night. Ingles passed it up. We will miss him in those situations. Rubio can facilitate, but do you really want the ball in his hands when you're down by three with two seconds left? It will be an issue.
 
Joe Johnson is a go to scorer. Some nights he's not as effective, but on nights he's on, he's still one of the best you'll find. For all the hype over losing Haywood, that dude was a coin flip on whether or not he'd choke under pressure. That's why we missed the playoffs the year before, after losing that game to the clipper's scrubs. Haywood couldn't even handle the ball under pressure, let alone try to score in traffic.

Utah's offense this year isn't going to suffer nearly as much as people thought. Rubio makes up for a ton of what we lost with Hill/Haywood, because of his ability to run an offense. Between that, and Quin trying to milk the hot hand on any given night, our offense is going to be good enough to outscore teams who are getting wrecked by our defense, way more than people expected.
 
Joe Johnson is a go to scorer. Some nights he's not as effective, but on nights he's on, he's still one of the best you'll find. For all the hype over losing Haywood, that dude was a coin flip on whether or not he'd choke under pressure. That's why we missed the playoffs the year before, after losing that game to the clipper's scrubs. Haywood couldn't even handle the ball under pressure, let alone try to score in traffic.

Utah's offense this year isn't going to suffer nearly as much as people thought. Rubio makes up for a ton of what we lost with Hill/Haywood, because of his ability to run an offense. Between that, and Quin trying to milk the hot hand on any given night, our offense is going to be good enough to outscore teams who are getting wrecked by our defense, way more than people expected.

Utah's weakness isnt the lack of "go to guy", it's a lack of having a "go to guy" who also gets to the FT line at a high rate. Jazz got Hood and Johnson as isolation scorers, but neither has a good free throw rate.
 
Yup... lack of a go to guy completely screwed us tonight... oh wait.
 
It would obviously be better if we had an efficient 20+ ppg guy. Duh.
 
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