What to do with AK?

[vj_74]

Keep him. AK is underrated. Few players in the NBA have the ability to do the things AK can do without the ball. His passing and court vision add volumes to our offense.

Underrated my ***. He is getting paid more than Deron and turns in half the productivity.

And more importantly the ****er takes 15 games off on an average every season like it is almost a given. No one even reacts anymore when they hear he is down with some injury or the other. And he gets a free pass on that while Boozer got bashed every time he went down.

 

[vj_74]

Ooh, I know. Keep him, underuse him, make sure he's the sixth to seventh option, refuse any reasonable trade offers for him, and then blame him when the Jazz inevitably can't make it past the second round of the playoffs.

..while he is sitting on the bench in a suit watching the team play.

 

[Stickler]

I believe this has been addressed many times. Nobody is talking about his value as it relates to his contract. Underrated and overpaid are not mutually exclusive terms.

 

[SaltyDawg]

I believe this has been addressed many times. Nobody is talking about his value as it relates to his contract. Underrated and overpaid are not mutually exclusive terms.

Right, because AK's ridiculous salary had absolutely nothing to do with us losing Matthews and Korver, and nothing to do with us letting that Harpring TPE expire when we could probably get a good player like Gortat for it.

If you don't think his ridiculous salary is hurting the Jazz on the court, then you weren't paying attention when the Jazz gave away Brewer and Maynor in salary dumps last year, and let Korver and Matthews walk for nothing this year.

 

[billyshelby]

I'm not the type to put duplicate posts in multiple threads, but if there's going to be duplicate AK threads running around, it serves a purpose. These are the statistics for AK:

Last season, amongst small forwards, per minute, AK was:

13th in scoring
18th in rebounding
5th in assists
1st in steals
1st in blocks (doubling the number two guy.)
7th in PER (just under Gerald Wallace, just ahead of Paul Pierce)

For sake of comparison, here are the PER numbers of Jazz wings:

AK: 18.25
Korver: 13.99
Mathews: 12.35
Brewer: 12.55
Miles: 10.84

 

[Saint Cy of JFC]

I'm not the type to put duplicate posts in multiple threads, but if there's going to be duplicate AK threads running around, it serves a purpose. These are the statistics for AK:

Last season, amongst small forwards, per minute, AK was:

13th in scoring
18th in rebounding
5th in assists
1st in steals
1st in blocks (doubling the number two guy.)
7th in PER (just under Gerald Wallace, just ahead of Paul Pierce)

For sake of comparison, here are the PER numbers of Jazz wings:

AK: 18.25
Korver: 13.99
Mathews: 12.35
Brewer: 12.55
Miles: 10.84

Too bad he didnt play in the playoffs when we needed him.

 

[1-Jazzfan]

Underrated my ***. He is getting paid more than Deron and turns in half the productivity.

And more importantly the ****er takes 15 games off on an average every season like it is almost a given. No one even reacts anymore when they hear he is down with some injury or the other. And he gets a free pass on that while Boozer got bashed every time he went down.

He gets a Free Pass on more than that! Talk to Masha about that one.

Also the Booz Bash was that when he went down, he was down forever. It wasn't just a day or two back issue with Booz. It was almost always a month at a time injury.

 

[AtheistPreacher]

Right, because AK's ridiculous salary had absolutely nothing to do with us losing Matthews and Korver, and nothing to do with us letting that Harpring TPE expire when we could probably get a good player like Gortat for it.

If you don't think his ridiculous salary is hurting the Jazz on the court, then you weren't paying attention when the Jazz gave away Brewer and Maynor in salary dumps last year, and let Korver and Matthews walk for nothing this year.

Why can people not read?

As Stickler and I have been saying, we all know very well that AK's contract is God-awful, terrible, apocalyptically bad, or whatever superlatives you'd like to use. And yes, it's clearly tied the Jazz's hands in terms of making contract offers to other players. Show me where anyone claimed it didn't.

But, once again, we're not saying he's underrated *for his current contract*. No one thinks that. But it *is* reasonable to claim that he's still a good player, and better than some people think he is nowadays. As we've all agreed, $17 million is frickin' ridiculous, but I wouldn't mind having him for $7 million, or the mid-level.

So, once again, as Stickler said, "underrated" and "overpaid" are not mutually exclusive. He's much worse than his contract suggests but better than some of the haters around here think he is. Is that really so hard to understand?

 

[SaltyDawg]

Why can people not read?

As Stickler and I have been saying, we all know very well that AK's contract is God-awful, terrible, apocalyptically bad, or whatever superlatives you'd like to use. And yes, it's clearly tied the Jazz's hands in terms of making contract offers to other players. Show me where anyone claimed it didn't.

But, once again, we're not saying he's underrated *for his current contract*. No one thinks that. But it *is* reasonable to claim that he's still a good player, and better than some people think he is nowadays. As we've all agreed, $17 million is frickin' ridiculous, but I wouldn't mind having him for $7 million, or the mid-level.

So, once again, as Stickler said, "underrated" and "overpaid" are not mutually exclusive. He's much worse than his contract suggests but better than some of the haters around here think he is. Is that really so hard to understand?

And again, you are the one missing the point. AK is probably a good mid level player, but he isn't better than Matthews, Gortat, Al Harrington, and a minimum player. That is what the Jazz could have if they weren't paying AK- all of those players. In fact, we could have had all of those guys plus another mid level player instead of Raja.

So right now, this year, while you say AK is under rated, he is actally hurting the Jazz. The Jazz would actually be a better team without him. And if the Jazz would be a better team without him, there is no way you can tell me he is under rated.

 

[NotDeadYet]

No question AK has played very well for us at times. Other times he's been too much like Boozer; disappearing.
Comparing AK to other SF's is somewhat deceptive, as AK played a lot at BOTH the SF and PF positions last year. My contention is he's a far greater impact player as a PF than at SF. His heart is in the game when he's hustling and scrambling for loose balls, offensive rebounds, and going for steals and blocks. A lot more of that occurs with him at PF, closer to the basket, than at SF, farther from the basket. At SF his greatest strength is distributing the ball. Taking him away from the paint turns him into an average SF, as he's not a consistant scoring threat away from the paint.

 

[Jazz Traveler]

Keep him. The Jazz know what kind of player they have in AK. He can impact a game the way few players can. My beef isn't as much with AK as it is with the way Sloan has utilized him.

 

[carolinajazz]

...nobody is going to give us anything for Klinko. So, the best we can hope for is he stays healthy, plays hard and well on the final year of his contract like Boozer did last year, and helps us compete in our division. He knows our system, he's a board crasher who can drive hopper types crazy.....and has moments of brilliance! We are going to win 50 plus games with or without him.