J. O'Neil

I have no idea but pass.

^ Yes.

He hasn't been good for at least 2 years, and I kept up with him a bit because he played with the Heat. Have you seen his numbers from the Boston series? The guy averaged 4.2 points and 5.6 rebounds, on 20.5% (9-44). Are you serious?! Plus, despite that horrid series, he's still probably going to get something around the MLE, and LA sure as hell isn't going to give him that.

^ Yes.

His numbers on the year are EXCELLENT. I don't think we should look at his numbers against Boston, by that standard Odom is also washed up and no good anymore either, as well as Bynum and Kobe too! The Heat were WAY overmatched against the Celtics. If we signed JO, who can now go anywhere he wants (and wanted to come here three years ago but didn't want to sacrifice all the money he had left by opting out) he will essentially be filling in minutes off of the bench with Odom at PF and O'neal at the Center position. Call me crazy, but 13.6ppg, 6.9rpg, 1.3apg and 1.4 bpg on 52% FG is EXCELLENT in 28.4 minutes a game. Odom, by contrast, gave us 10.8ppg, 9.8rpg, 3.3apg and .7bpg on 46% FG in 31.5 minutes. Odom is a better passer and rebounder, but we're not talking about trading Odom for JO. Jermaine is WORTH the MLE. If we can get him to split it with someone else, we are in GREAT shape. Everyone has bad match-ups and bad series. With such a small sample size, it is not a fair assessment. I am ALL FOR JO! Imagine JO AND LO in the front court off the bench. LO could focus more on rebounding, and JO on shot blocking. I think it would be quite a combo JoLo!@

Snakell Beast wrote:His numbers on the year are EXCELLENT. I don't think we should look at his numbers against Boston, by that standard Odom is also washed up and no good anymore either, as well as Bynum and Kobe too!

Kobe? The only bad about Kobe was his FG%. The guy still averaged nearly 29, 4 and 8 a game. Yeah he didn't have a great Finals, but wow. And Drew was hurt, and despite that, he made an impact. Lamar didn't have a good series, but he atleast made an impact for his team. JO got paid over 23 million to make 9 baskets in 5 games. JO bragged on twitter saying how he's going to surprise many people, he's going to do this and do that, but he's the number 2 player on the team, and did nothing. A one legged Andrew Bynum did did more and made an impact. The same cannot be said for Mr. O' Neal. We can get better for less money. No way in hell does LA gives JO MLE.

13.6ppg, 6.9rpg, 1.3apg and 1.4 bpg on 52% FG, 28.4 mpg in 70 games. Not going to get more than that anywhere, even for the MLE.

Bynum last 5 games against Celtics:
21.2mpg
4.2 ppg
2.8 rpg
0.4 bpg
.346% FG

JO last 5 games against Celtics:
23.4 mpg
4.2ppg
5.6rpg
2.0bpg
.205% FG

WOW, yeah, Bynum is clearly way better in the same sample size. Well, not at defense. Or rebounding. Or scoring...But yeah, he shot better though...I'd kind of like to imagine if that would be the case if he were the #2 option though....guess we'll never know.

EDIT: You can make injury excuses, but jermaine is no where near as big as Drew (even healthy) nor did he have anywhere near the caliber of talent around him. Jermaine was asked to do TOO much for the Heat. His days of starting, or of being a 1, 2 or 3 option are over. Having said that, he can give us 24 high quality minutes off the bench. I imagine in that Celtics series, he would have fared a bit better going against Davis or Wallace as opposed to Garnett and Perkins, just a thought. If you are going to try to be a baby and belittle other people's opinions that is fine, just don't misrepresent reality to do it. And if you want to judge Kobe by the same merit as JO, how about game 7 against Phoenix in '06. 0-3 at the most crucial time for his team...pretty lame.

LOL how about posting the SERIES stats, since that's what I was talking about. And either way, Drew did better on one leg that JO did on two.

I calculated the series stats, taking into consideration that the One Legged bynum did not show up until game 3, when he re-injured his knee. You made the claim that Bynum outplayed JO on one leg. The stats don't bare that out, except for FG%. I imagine if JO were 7'1 and 280, he might have shot 35% instead of 20%...who knows...all I know is, the stats (which ARE from their respective series against the Celtics in the 2010 post season) are in JO's favor, not Drew's.

EDIT: If you call the same amount of points, with half the rebounds and 1 fifth the blocked shots better...I don't. I tend to let the statistics measure superiority or inferiority. But some people don't let little things like facts get in the way of their arguments.

Snakell Beast wrote:I calculated the series stats, taking into consideration that the One Legged bynum did not show up until game 3, when he re-injured his knee.

Wait, what? Andrew was always injured. The injury just got worse in G3 or G4. All I know is, and injured Drew did better as the 4th option than JO did as the 2nd. How the hell does a center shoot 9-44? And either way, LA is not giving O' Neal the MLE. They can do better, and spend less. There was an article that said LA doesn't even plan on using their MLE, which I doubt.

You keep saying Bynum did better. Last I checked, 4.2 ppg vs 4.2 ppg is the same. Last I checked, 2.8rpg is HALF of 5.6rpg. Last I checked, .4bpg is 1/5th of 2.0bpg...you know, .4 times 5. I suggest you get a calculator out. This is by no rational measurement superior, or even equal performance. Bynum re-aggravated his knee before game three, so since Bynum played on a better team, with a size advantage, against an injury depleted Celtics frontcourt, I figured that also taking their respective ages into account, all things were relatively equal for the final 5 games of each series. By that measure, YOUR OWN WORDS, Bynum was far inferior. Half the boards and 1 fifth the blocks...two things that Centers are most often measured by, especially in a defensive series. I'm done wasting my time with someone who can't even perform basic math. You go ahead and say that JO is worthless if it makes you feel better about yourself. And by the way, JO signed the contract he got that paid him 23 mil this season when he was a healthy, young perrenial all star averaging 20 and 10 every year. Talk to me when Bynum does that for even HALF a season!

Also, this is an ideas sub-forum. The theories or suggestions are SUPPOSED to be unrealistic or unlikely. That's part of the fun. If you want my PREDICTION of what we will do in the offseason, its simple. We'll let Farmar, Ammo and Brown go. Re-sign Fisher. Sign Mbenga to a minimum contract. Sign Caracter or Powell (whomever is better for the team) and Ebanks to minimums, and try to get one vet minimum point guard who will probably wind up being a total bust ala Aaron Mckie et al. Our roster will look like this:

PG: Fisher / washed up bum
SG: Kobe / Sasha
SF: Artest / Ebanks / Luke
PF: Pau / Odom / Caracter or Powell
C: Bynum / Mbenga

Take it to the bank!

For the whole playoffs, Drew has been hurt. He hasn't been 100%, especially since G6 of the OKC series. You keep saying Drew put up 4.2 points and 2 rebounds, where are you getting this? O'Neal averaged 4 and 5 a game in the Boston series, Andrew got about 7 and 6. And Boston was injury depleted Celtic front court? Perk was injured in game 6.

As for LA signing some washed up bum, why would they do that if he's playing behind Fisher? They may not get an All STar, but they're going to do better than awashed up bum.

Please, not someone trying to say Jermaine O'Neal is better or did better than Drew. Come on man, you know better than that and no I haven't been one of Drew's biggest fans, but the kid showed a lot of heart this year in playoffs. Am I tired of him being hurt at playoff time each year? Sure, guess what, I am sure he is too, but he is still better than O'Neal, either one of the O'Neals or Yao or the other crap I have seen him compared to.

I told you EXACTLY where I got the stats. Andrew Bynum, AFTER INJURING HIS LEG AGAIN FOLLOWING GAME 2, averaged the stats I gave you. If you go to NBA.com, it will give you the totals for Bynum in ALL 7 CONTESTS. I averaged out the 5 games wherein bynum was most negatively affected by his injury, the FINAL 5 games of the series. It is not fair to assess 7 games of one players stats versus 5 of the other. For all we know, Jermaine could have hit a 40 point game in one of those two extra games. Not likely, but again, I'm going by Bynum's reinjury and also a comparison of 5 games between both teams.

As far as us getting more than scraps, it's pipe. With only two or three major free agents out there, and so many teams with HUGE salary cap room, there is going to be a run to fill out rosters with the mid-level and lower level veterans. Guys who would normally get an LLE or vet minimum will be splitting MLEs or even getting them all to themselves. We are already so far over the cap that we cannot afford to even retain Jordan Farmar. So, assuming Farmar is the standard equivalent to his projected price, we are going to get a replacement player who's value is LESS. Farmar is pretty poor at this point, so anything less is nothing at all. You just have to do the math on this one.

Our payroll is the main reason why we will get a bum. This past season, our pay roll was $91,377,313, with the Luxury tax added, that's roughly $112,834,626. If we Let Ammo and Jordan go without a Qualifying Offer, and Shannon opts out, our payroll (not adjusting for luxury tax), before re-signing Derek, is $81,728,202 ($93,536,404 with Luxury Tax). The league roster minimum is 13 players (12 active and at least 1 inactive). In this scenario, we are down to only 7. So say we re-sign Fisher (duh!) at about what he made last season. Our payroll jumps to $86,776,202 ($103,632,404 after Luxury Tax) and we still need 4 more players to meet the minimum roster. OK, say we sign Mbenga and Powell to a minimum deal and we sign Caracter and Ebanks to Rookie minimums. Our payroll goes to $89,708,770 ($109,497,540 after Luxury Tax). If we use the MLE (estimate based on '09-'10 MLE) for our 13th roster spot, our payroll goes to $95,562,770 ($121,205,540 after Luxury Tax). If we simply sign a vet minimum instead of the MLE, our payroll goes to $90,701,450 ($111,482,900 after Luxury Tax). That is why we will NOT use the MLE... because the difference in payroll is roughly $4,861,320. And that's not even counting the luxury tax. With tax included, we will save roughly $9,722,640.

SignPippenNow wrote:Please, not someone trying to say Jermaine O'Neal is better or did better than Drew. Come on man, you know better than that and no I haven't been one of Drew's biggest fans, but the kid showed a lot of heart this year in playoffs. Am I tired of him being hurt at playoff time each year? Sure, guess what, I am sure he is too, but he is still better than O'Neal, either one of the O'Neals or Yao or the other crap I have seen him compared to.

Read my post. If you look at what I said, and the calculated stats I used, the argument can be rationally made that JO outplayed Bynum VS the Celtics after Bynum got reinjured in game 2. But only if you go by the "bynum on one leg was better" claim made by TT24. Anyone that reads what I wrote and interprets that I am saying that Jermaine O'neal is better than Andrew Bynum is not paying attention to what I am saying, or they are incapable of receiving anything but the most basic, simplistic arguments. Neither scenario is very flattering. Also, why would my post put Bynum as the starter and JO as the reserve if JO is better?

I believe Andrew Bynum has the POTENTIAL to be as good or better than JO, however, their career stats right now are about even, with JO coming out on top at every stat but FG%. Once again, size may have a lot to do with that...

Career stats:

Bynum:
10.3 ppg
6.7rpg
1.1apg
0.3spg
1.5bpg
.568% FG
.692% FT

O'Neal:
14.2ppg
7.5rpg
1.5apg
0.5spg
1.9bpg
.466% FG
.711% FT

Please do not ridicule opinions as illegitimate when they are, on the pure merits of the argument made, reasonable and debatable. I happen to believe that Andrew has it in him to be better than JO at the end of his career, but let's not forget that when JO hit his prime, he was great. For a period of 6 years, he was an awesome player.
Jermain O'neal - AVERAGES OVER 6 YEAR PRIME:
65 games
20.3ppg
9.8rpg
2.09 apg
2.37 bpg
.458% FG
.735% FT
Bynum has got to have a period of time that long where he is at least AS effective, if not more so, before we can already call him better than JO for their careers. And saying that JO is crap as a player over his career is incredibly ignorant and also untrue in the extreme. EDIT: and don't even get me started on comparing Bynum to Shaq or Yao Ming...yikes! He's not even in their league yet...he may never be...

Is there a reason why you're using Drew's last 5 games? It's a SERIES. I was comparing SERIES. Andrew was injured all playoffs long. Even though he was hurt worse against Boston, you could tell basically a playoffs long he wasn't healthy.

Snakell Beast wrote:

SignPippenNow wrote:Please, not someone trying to say Jermaine O'Neal is better or did better than Drew. Come on man, you know better than that and no I haven't been one of Drew's biggest fans, but the kid showed a lot of heart this year in playoffs. Am I tired of him being hurt at playoff time each year? Sure, guess what, I am sure he is too, but he is still better than O'Neal, either one of the O'Neals or Yao or the other crap I have seen him compared to.

Read my post. If you look at what I said, and the calculated stats I used, the argument can be rationally made that JO outplayed Bynum VS the Celtics after Bynum got reinjured in game 2. But only if you go by the "bynum on one leg was better" claim made by TT24. Anyone that reads what I wrote and interprets that I am saying that Jermaine O'neal is better than Andrew Bynum is not paying attention to what I am saying, or they are incapable of receiving anything but the most basic, simplistic arguments. Neither scenario is very flattering. Also, why would my post put Bynum as the starter and JO as the reserve if JO is better?

I believe Andrew Bynum has the POTENTIAL to be as good or better than JO, however, their career stats right now are about even, with JO coming out on top at every stat but FG%. Once again, size may have a lot to do with that...

Career stats:

Bynum:
10.3 ppg
6.7rpg
1.1apg
0.3spg
1.5bpg
.568% FG
.692% FT

O'Neal:
14.2ppg
7.5rpg
1.5apg
0.5spg
1.9bpg
.466% FG
.711% FT

Please do not ridicule opinions as illegitimate when they are, on the pure merits of the argument made, reasonable and debatable. I happen to believe that Andrew has it in him to be better than JO at the end of his career, but let's not forget that when JO hit his prime, he was great. For a period of 6 years, he was an awesome player.
Jermain O'neal - AVERAGES OVER 6 YEAR PRIME:
65 games
20.3ppg
9.8rpg
2.09 apg
2.37 bpg
.458% FG
.735% FT
Bynum has got to have a period of time that long where he is at least AS effective, if not more so, before we can already call him better than JO for their careers. And saying that JO is crap as a player over his career is incredibly ignorant and also untrue in the extreme. EDIT: and don't even get me started on comparing Bynum to Shaq or Yao Ming...yikes! He's not even in their league yet...he may never be...

Stats do not tell all. Bynum is way better the JO now. Maybe not as good as JO in his prime but as of right now Bynum is better. You can look at the last 5 games against Boston for support when in all reality he shouldn't even have been playing or over the whole play offs when he was still hurt but put up way better numbers then JO. JO has not been a top level player for a few yrs now. I would not give him the whole MLE, however if we could get a point for 2 - 2 1/2 MIL I would be fine giving him the rest.

How is it that we're basing a comparison off of a skewed sample? Andrew Bynum's knee has been hurt literally the entire season. It was deemed able to play, so it wasn't operated on. In the playoffs against the Thunder, it was hurt even more and after that he played on it throughout the playoffs. He was hurt the entire Boston series.

So let's look at the true stats regarding the two final playoff series for both men :

O'Neal -
Points 4.2
Rebounds 5.6
FG% 21 (9/44)
FT% 43 (3/7)
Assists 1.0
Blocks 2.0
Steals 0.80
Turnovers 1.4
Fouls 2.6
Minutes averaged 23.3

Bynum -
Points 7.43
Rebounds 4.29
FG% 46 (19/42)
FT% 74(14/19)
Assists 0.0
Blocks 1.29
Steals 0.15
Turnovers 0.86
Fouls 2.43
Minutes averaged 24.95

Simply by the numbers, Andrew averaged more points more efficiently but had less rebounds. Neither of them took care of the ball particularly well, each averaging more turnovers than assists. O'Neal was slightly more foul prone and played roughly the same amount of time.

Considering that Bynum became the third to fourth option on offense and that O'Neal was clearly the second option on his team, the point differential is somewhat ludicrous. The rebounding numbers seem reasonable considering that Bynum is rebounding with Pau Gasol next to him (11.58/game in the series), while O'Neal is rebounding next to Michael Beasley (5.8/game in the series). Looking at that, it should be expected that O'Neal average more rebounds.

While +/- is an imperfect measurement on impact for the game, O'Neal's total for the series is -29, Bynum's is -2.

Remember this is all with an injured Bynum.

Now I won't get into the argument that O'Neal would be a great backup Center. It's true, he would be. But the fact of the matter is that the Lakers aren't willing to spend on him and he will go where the money is.