Published Monday thru Friday    

Basketball from a fans perspective

“You need lofty goals. Then cement it with a great work ethic”  

Jerry West 

Is this the “real” team

I can only speak for myself, the NBA exhibition season fails to paint a true picture of play. Veterans only appear for minutes and in some instances miss games entirely. Despite this statement I was anxious to see Victor Wembanyama in action for the first time. For unexplained reasons I tuned into the Spurs-Heat game late and saw Wemby score his “only” basket in real time. He was probably on a minutes restriction and was removed from the game so I was forced to see Wemby game highlights later on NBA TV. Wemby played power forward in the game, he scored 23 points on a variety of shots and dunks.

To prove to some he wasn’t one dimensional i.e. all offensive minded only, Wemby registered 4 blocked shots in the game. A single game does not describe a season especially when it’s an exhibition game. The January lull is always mentioned regarding rookies, by the first of the year college players would have played an entire season, the NBA is different. Despite playing as a pro in France Wemby played about the same number of games as a college season. The increase number of games will affect him as he adjusts to the NBA in his rookie year. I will repeat my earlier statement, I will wait and see how the 7-foot 4 teen adapts to play with the big boys.

I’m so confused

My basketball knowledge is old school, I know rebounds, field goal percentage and the like. What I’ve been reading over the last few years is strictly a foreign language to me, I have no idea what is being presented as evidence. As an example I see PPP behind a player, what the heck does that mean? Well I had to conduct a search for a definition. For those who are familiar you can skip this account, “Points Per Possession PPP becomes more meaningful when it is broken down into events such as PPP in isolated plays, PPP in pick-and-roll.” Those are but two examples of how PPP is utilized to access a players performance. Wait, there is more stuff requiring a definition check this out…Ortg. The term is defined as “Offensive Proficiency rating or offensive productive efficiency is a statistic used in basketball to measure a team’s offensive performance.” 

We also have eFG%, that should be easy its field goal shooting, well that’s not quite the case. It’s actually “Effective field goal percentage but accounts for the additional value of a 3-point shot.” I’m going to close this exercise with the term PER, “Player efficiency rating which accounts for 3-points, blocks, steals, assists, rebounds.” Are you confused by some of the terminology in use today, I certainly can admit I am. This is not the end, what you’ve read are just a few I was able to provide a definition for you. In truth there probably is little reason to go this deeply into an athletes performance unless you are a scout or coach. For reasons beyond me there are scores of individuals who believe this type of information is valuable to me, I cannot answer for you however this ain’t me.

The “fishbowl” was too large…maybe 

It seems like I’ve been writing about Emoni Bates for quite a while now. Just in case you missed it the youngster was made a late second round pick by the Cavs. That might not be quite as bad as you might believe, hopefully the pressure to produce is off Bates now. Pressure, yes national high school player of the year as a sophomore…changing high schools and then leaving early for college. Despite being sidelined with an injury it was clear Bates wasn’t ready to play at Memphis. In my view it got even worst returning home and enrolling at Eastern Michigan. The team was poor, which forced him into a leadership position which he might not have desired. His numbers looked good but the games I was able to view Bates was often his team’s only offense.

When Bates declared for the draft I believed he’d made another mistake, I thought he needed additional seasoning. Now some 4-5 months later I’ve changed my mind, if he’d remained at EMU little would have changed. Perhaps Bates will never be the star he was projected to be but that’s not totally bad. A 6-foot 10 athlete with shooting prowess could prove valuable to the Cavs or some other NBA team. I could use JJ Redick as an example, he arrived in the NBA from Duke prepared to take over. The problem was that he was unable to attain success at the NBA level until he modified his game. Redick would transition to a 3-point specialist, in addition to making himself valuable shooting the rock he also managed to earn a huge payday based on his years in the NBA. Could that be the future for Emoni Bates, I don’t know but it certainly could be conceivable. You think it’s just me, these are the words of teammate Donovan Mitchell sent on X (Tweet) regarding the most recent Bates game. “Did we mention this guy can HOOP? Our rookie had himself a fourth quarter last night”

Reclassifying

We’ve discussed the rise of Cooper Flagg in the ranks of superior basketball prospects. Although he was ranked number one in the Class of 2025 he decided to reclassify and move into the Class of 2024. Flagg leaped from number one in 2025 to the number one prospect in the Class of 2024. For a high school player to undergo a class change of this nature is not that uncommon anymore. How about another name, we are introducing to some and discussing A.J. Dybantsa,

Dybantsa know becomes the top prospect in the Class of 2025, who is Dybantsa you might ask? Turns out he’s a 6-foot 8 200-pound small forward playing for Prolific Prep in Napa California. Dybantsa was born and raised in Brockton Massachusetts. In an interview Dybantsa indicates he’s got no particular school in mind, there are 13 with scholarship offers. He claims for now he’s not ruling out G-League Team Elite or OTE as possible destinations. There are reports Dybantsa might be the top draft pick in 2026 however I intend to withhold my view for the immediate timeframe. I will attempt to keep you updated on this youngster to determine his ultimate destination.