So long, Kay Felder

[Randolphkeys]

Needs more playing time and needs to be on the ball. Let him play his game when he is out there, otherwise no point.

Who should play less?

I am obviously of the belief he isn't ready to have a contending NBA team run their offense through him right now and he should be doing it in Canton more often. I'd rather the focus be on acclimating Korver.

 

[Kbiz]

Was odd that Lue sat him the entire 2nd half after proving effective in the 1st half.

Lue rode our starters a bit too long last night, IMO. Irving and LBJ almost played the entire 2nd half without coming out in a disjointed effort. I would've mixed it up a bit...Felder suffered from some questionable coaching, IMO.

 

[Rich]

Well there was two minutes early in the game to let Felder "play his game." I don't want to see it ever again.

 

[jlegg21]

Well there was two minutes early in the game to let Felder "play his game." I don't want to see it ever again.

He and Shump (our combined "backup PG") are giving us absolutely nothing... they're a net negative out there.

 

[wuck]

Well there was two minutes early in the game to let Felder "play his game." I don't want to see it ever again.

Hard to say if he was worse on offense in that first stint or worse on defense during garbage time. I think he's had two decent appearances on the road so far. Not tonight.

 

[Soar]

I'm not going to criticize the kid. He's the 54th pick. It is dumb to expect much.

But we need an upgrade here.

 

[rastamon87]

He's still inconsistent specially his shot, his passing is always there but they were not making shots tonight...if ever he develops into a dependable backup, it may take atleast a couple of years... but lately the whole team is playing sloppy and out-of-synch....

Sent from my GT-I9500 using Tapatalk

 

[Randolphkeys]

I don't want to pile on, but it's been clear for a while now that he prefers an off-balance shot to passing because of limited court vision outside of set plays. It's been clear since the summer league that he isn't seeing the court yet.

 

[inliner311]

I would like to see him rotate in with a group that will run and gun with him. Use him to push the pace to drive bench scoring. He rotated in with 3 of the oldest players on the roster tonight. I'd like to see a group that is willing to run for that 4-6 minutes a half he comes in.

 

[LeShaq]

Here are Felder's stats over the last 7 games, including the game tonight at Portland.

86 minutes played (about 12 minutes per game)
41% FGA (17/41)
33% THA (02/06)
09 assists
00 turnovers
03 steals


Pretty solid, although hopefully the shooting percentages can come up even a little bit more.

What's remarkable is that he has not turned the ball over even once in the last 86 or so minutes he's been in the game. I would imagine that some of this is because he's not handling the ball very much, at least when he's in with LeBron.

Rough game tonight. He's still got plenty to learn.

 

[rabman_gold]

It's not the stats I'm worried about. He can probably hit a mid-ranger jumper or two, he can probably also draw the occasional foul for free throws.

The five or so minutes he played at the end of the 1st/beginning of the 2nd were telling me a little bit:

1. If he doesn't have the ball, he's not showing much off-ball movement or the ability to take catch-and-shoot shots.
2. If he isn't able to hit the shots when he has the ball, it's virtually a one-and-done possession.
3. Even if he defends hard, if he loses track of the defensive play, the opponent will capitalize.
4. Even if he plays with LeBron, LeBron doesn't trust him much. And that means he has to play off-ball; go back to #1.

If you give him a couple of months, he might be able to come along, but that's not a given. We're not San Antonio where a team looks at unproven players while competing in the regular season.

This might be similar to Boobie Gibson's problem. But we had Damon Jones AND Eric Snow in front of him during the 2006-07 season. I think the experiment needs to end (Lue's forced to play him as the only backup PG). I'll be patient for the time being.

 

[LeShaq]

It's not the stats I'm worried about.

Well, you (and everyone else, not just singling you out here) should be worried about them. And there's a key data set you and others may be overlooking.

Here are our assist and turnover numbers for the past 7 games.

@CHO ---> (W).......17 assists, 06 turnovers............Felder 2 assists, 0 turnovers
NOP ------> (W)......16 assists, 11 turnovers............Felder 2 assists, 0 turnovers
CHI -------> (L).......13 assists, 15 turnovers........Felder 1 assists, 0 turnovers
@BRK ----> (W)......19 assists, 12 turnovers............Felder 0 assists, 0 turnovers
@PHX ----> (W)......15 assists, 20 turnovers............Felder 0 assists, 0 turnvoers
@UTA ----> (L).......15 assists, 16 turnovers........Felder 1 assists, 0 turnovers
@ POR ---> (L).......14 assists, 15 turnovers........Felder 3 assists, 0 turnovers


In case people missed the memo, we're having turnover and low assist issues right now. It's probably the core issue for the team at the moment.

Not only is Felder not turning the ball over, he's doing a solid job of setting guys up. I'm going back and looking over the video now of the past 7 games in my spare time. Let's take the Hornets game for instance. Felder had 2 assists, but he also had 6 unconverted assist opportunities. Where he passed the ball to a guy and that guy missed the shot.

If you listened to LeBron and Lue the last few postgames, they've been lamenting missed shots. As in, you can't get assists if guys don't hit shots.

In only the Hornets game, Felder had 8 would-be assists and 0 turnovers. That's exactly the kind of "experiment" we need more of right now, since we're not moving the ball well.

As soon as we can get an experienced backup point guard, we should get one. For sure. But Gilbert isn't in the mood to spend a lot of cash at the moment, it seems, and so this is where we're at.

But let's not blame someone who isn't the core problem.

We're 4-3 in our last 7 games. Our cumulative plus/minus in those games is -04.

Felder's cumulative plus/minus in the last 7 games is +13.

Let's be real here. Felder has a long way to go to be able to be a baseline rotation player in the NBA, but he's hardly the issue at the moment. Particularly on offense.

And he's improving. That's the key. He has improved already and hopefully will continue to do so in the second half of the season.

I hate losing. Really hate it. Every loss gnaws at me. Still, we're going to have some losses. I wish Gilbert would trade for a point guard tomorrow, but it's unlikely to happen and so my guess is we'll be stuck with platooning Felder/McRae as the 10th Man in the rotation at point guard until we finally acquire that backup point guard at some point.

 

[rastamon87]

I think a defensive tall center is more urgent than a pg... When Kyrie starts playing good again, Kay would be a good 3rd string pg (LeBron is really our 2nd PG anyways).... agree with LeShaq, Kay is not the main issue at the moment... we need more size inside for particular opponents, we cant rely at TT all the time since he is not thst tall...

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[Rich]

Team just needs to admit he's a long term project that may or may not pan out and send him to the D-League for the remainder of the season and go and sign a veteran. You can't tell me Tony Douglas can't give you more than Felder is giving you.

 

[Jon]

Next week, let's keep the focus on players rather than attempts to create a mean spirited argument.

Good plan, but it takes two. I've asked you in the past to PM me if you have an issue with my posting or ask another mod to intervene. You're of course an admin now, and if you don't want me replying to your posts or even posting at all, you just have to ask, but banning me for a week over something you started ... that's just crappy.

You said yourself you've missed parts of the games. It's not "personal" to ask you if you missed the parts where Kay looked good, and didn't deserve a snarky response like "I'm not here for a debate against the Devil's Advocate. I'm here to discuss reality." or "Grow up".

Obviously this thread has missed me. Nobody to point out for instance that while Shumpert's +/- is -20 in the past 2 games, that Kay's is +2.

Did he look over-matched against Portland's starters in the 4th quarter leading the second unit? Yeah, of course, that's expected for a rook and is part of the learning experience. Alas the rest of the team had no such excuse.