Quote:
Originally Posted by iggymcfly
Here are Haralabos Voulgaris's comments on Twitter today:
"No way in hell the Mavs should trade for Rondo if they have to include B. Wright."
"Who exactly is going to be their first big off the bench? Curious. And Rondo is not a good defensive PG."
(On idea of this being a move to set Mavs up for next year): "ya I guess, there chances of doing anything this year would drop pretty big tho. This year is wide open."
"I don't know where the rumor got started that Rondo was a great defensive PG."
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I love haralabob as much as anyone, but it seems to me like you're taking his opinion (which I will admit is deeply supported by the facts he presents) as gospel, when it is in fact one opinion, and one that he is mostly using to support his sports betting. I think the truth about Rondo, regarding whether he is a poor/lazy/disinterested defender or an elite game-changer on that end, lies somewhere in the middle.
I absolutely see and understand the concerns about his consistency and intensity on that end, especially since he really cut his teeth on those great Celtics teams of 5-7 years ago as a defender. Honestly, some nights he looks like he isn't engaged at all on either end of the ball, and his natural talents lead him to those effortless-but-still-underwhelming near-triple double stat lines.
Other nights, you can tell from the opening tip that he has an extra hop in his step and some fire in his belly. Those nights, he gets 11 rebounds and 19 assists, regardless of who he is playing with or against. My assumption is that he's a bit of a front-runner as a player. When he's on bad teams, he has a hard time getting up for all (or even
some) of the 82 games on the schedule; when he's on good teams, his low-energy nights still look pretty damn good, and his good games are unique, dynamic and jaw-dropping.
My guess is the MBT, in trading for Rondo, sees Rondo the same way that I do. If he's surrounded by a contending team, he's going to be one of the 3-4 best PGs in the league. If he's not, you are going to see his effort fluctuate much more often. And honestly, with how small of a window that we seem to have with Dirk, I'm okay taking that risk, because this organization is clearly committed to winning, and I think most NBA players see that.