That in-bound pass was…something.

As for RJ, last summer I posted repeatedly, loudly, and clearly that we needed to trade him ASAP, because he isn’t consistently good, showed no evidence he’d become consistently good, was still seen as an asset, and would never be valued more highly because he had a year left on his rookie deal and was a #3 pick that people would talk themselves into having star potential. I was completely convinced by numbers and the eye test that the best case was a moderately better than replacement player. I didn’t get a lot of engagement on it, neither nay nor yea, and then we extended him for an absurd amount. “Under market value” maybe, “way too freaking much” definitely. I hope to hell he shows some flashes this playoffs so at least he’s moveable. But it was an obvious mistake before we did it, and I immediately lamented it as a huge unforced error.

Edit: and even with all that I didn’t expect his defense to fall off a cliff!

That being said, he didn’t kill us in game 1.

Uff.

For the reasons expressed by Raven, at the end of last year the non-max extension was considered fair by a number of people, other criticized it, but very few thought this would become a disaster.

And after his usual bad start, he was playing better in december and january before his injury in Dallas (remember when he was one of the league leaders in corner threes from one side of the floor?)

From then on the avalanche never stop, and the maddening thing is that our coaching staff was rarely able to take him accountable and cut his minutes (it happened, but in a very few instances).

And as bad as the shooting has been it’s his defense and overall basketball acumen that has really collapsed!

He’s been a maddening player for years, now he’s just a bad one, but his lack of steady development, his persisting Mamba mentality, his frequent zombie-like state are mistakes for which our staff must share a part of responsability.