I'm not sure they miss Rudy Gay and his inefficiency that much. After all, he was taking away offense from Gasol, Randolph, and Conley and they've still gone further without him than they ever did with him. The fact that they've replaced him with a bunch of bad players who can't hit open shots or are flawed in some other way (like Pondexter), though, that's a real problem. I've thought all postseason long how much better Memphis could be with a couple of actual shooters that Gasol and Conley could pass to. If they rectify that in the offseason, they'll be truly elite and almost impossible to stop.

At the beginning of this series, I picked the Spurs due to their depth, experience, and coaching compared to Memphis and I think all of those qualities are showing themselves now.

Yes. I'm so glad I wanted to be different from everyone when I was a kid and chose the Spurs over the Bulls.

Yep. I'm no Spurs fan, but there's no question that all three of them are HOFs. Manu's contributions at the world/Olympic level (gold in Athens, 2004) with Argentina do count.

I want to isolate this statement.

"Miller, Allen, and Battier have the same role on the team."

Do you want to stand by this statement, and claim that you are actually getting the upperhand in a conversation about basketball?

I will give you one opportunity to backtrack from that statement, out of courtesy.

All good points. Wilbon's point was that Rudy helped with spacing and spreading the floor out. I doubt if the Grizzlies miss all of shot taking though. They definitely need a scorer though.

Offensively their role is the same. The only difference is defensively Battier plays the 4

Someone like Kevin Martin could be very effective for Memphis.

That's not what he said. I'm giving him an opportunity to walk it back.

How are their roles different? They're all on the floor because of their 3 point shooting ability. That's pretty much it.
Posted via Mobile Device

#2 for all time play off double doubles. Timeless Timmy Duncan
http://images.ftw.usatoday.com/wp-co...bledoubles.gif

I always admired Duncun since he's modern day Bill Russell. The consummate team player

There are a lot of outstanding players in the Association right now. We may not know who all will end up in the Hall, but there are outstanding players and there will continue to be outstanding players. I

I've been watching the NBA since 1984 or so. There have been some down times, but there will always be an influx of excellent talent.

MJ himself said that the league is a mere shadow to the overall (including role players) competition that was present in the 80's

Why wouldn't he say that? Doesn't really mean anything.

it means that the skill level has diminished greatly. The league average in FTs are absurdly lower in comparison to the said eras I mentioned