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"He tends to take some criticism because he has sort of a weird body, but he takes a lot of pride in his game." |
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It has been widely rumored for weeks, and Draft Express is now reporting that Anthony Parker will leave Maccabi Tel Aviv and sign with the Raptors for three years and around $4 million per season. Considered by some to be the best non-NBA player in the world, Parker will likely get minutes at both the two and the three, so he essentially solves the Raptors' depth concerns at those positions. Looking at his accumulated stats with Maccabi (regular season and playoff numbers combined), Parker seems like he brings the complete package to Toronto. Last season, he averaged 35 minutes, 14.8 points, 55.9 percent shooting, 36.5 percent three-point shooting, 6.8 rebounds, 1.6 steals and 3.7 assists. The assists average is particularly intriguing since they're a lot stingier at awarding assists in that league – Parker finished seventh in that category for Euroleague games. Something else is worth noting on the stats page linked above. They have a stat called "Index Rating" that combines a range of stats to produce an overall efficiency ranking. Parker had the second-best Euroleague rating last season and Jorge Garbajosa was fifth-best. Bargnani Watch – After two summer league games, the early reports on Andrea Bargnani indicate that his offensive game is NBA ready, but the rest of him has a ways to go. The 16 points per game in 29 minutes on 63 percent shooting (12 of 19 from the field, 4 of 7 from trey-land) is encouraging. The three rebounds and eight fouls per game – not so hot. Based on this extensive evaluation of his first game on 82games.com, it seems that Bargnani doesn't have much of a post game yet. Also, based on the rash of turnovers at the end, his conditioning is going to need improvement. None of this is news to me, but I think it shows that we'll need to manage our expectations in his rookie season. He's not going to compete for rookie of the year, and I would be surprised if he cracked the starting lineup for any reason besides injury. In the Raptors' frontcourt, he'll likely start the season fifth on the depth chart behind Bosh, Nesterovic, Garbajosa and Humphries. As I see it, his main contribution at this stage of his development will be stretching the defence so Bosh can wreak havoc down low. Most of you were probably hoping for more of an inital return on the Raptors' first overall pick, but it looks like Bargnani's rookie season will be more like Nowitzki's (8 PPG, 3 RPG, 20 MPG) than Gasol's (37 MPG, 18 PPG, 9 RPG). |
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