You need to back your opinions up with evidence–and think things through in more detail. Don’t make up your mind with made up differences which may not be valid.

Jordan is much more of an athlete than you seem to think. In NBA workouts, he had an amazing standing vertical leap. That is partly what led him to rise into the first round. (Javaris also rose in the workouts due to his athleticism). Unlike Javaris, and due to his amazing vertical jump which comes out of nowhere, Jordan has blocks to his credit, including an “NBA block” of one of the opponent bigs going in for a dunk.

On defense, Jordan played “bigger” than 6′ 4″ Smush Parker, but he did not always stay in front of the quick opposing point guards.

Do you think that Javaris is quicker? Being 6′ 5″ may not be as much of a defensive advantage as you think against Bibby and Iverson.

Farmar struggled a bit at the 3 last year, because the pro 3 point distance is further out, but in college, the clutch 3 was his specialty. He’s been rumored to be working on the pro 3 point shot all summer–like Fisher, Cook, and others before him did successfully.

Javaris will likely suffer the same way the first year.

In the NBA, Javaris is a “tweener,” maybe not quite quick enough to keep from getting pickpocketed or to keep up with Nash, Bibby, Parket, and the other PG’s, but not quite big enough to be a shooting guard–especially on the defensive side.

We know that Farmar can play the triangle, because he already did it last year. In Summer league last year, Rambis said that Farmar learned the 3 faster than anyone else who ever came to the Lakers.

Playing the triangle in high school does not make Javaris NBA ready for the Lakers.

That’s not to say that Javaris doesn’t have potential and may complement Derek and Jordan under some circumstances. His ability to get to the basket is impressive.

However, Kobe and Lamar aren’t too bad either and there only is one basketball.

Who knows? We really won’t have any idea until the middle at best, maybe the end of the season, with Javaris. Give the kid some time before crowning him or thrashing him.

That’s in part why I scored the Lakers -2 for Kobe in my subjective evaluation. I believe that the Smush/Farmar initiator difference will go the other way big time.

(119) Chise,

We all sense some potential for Javaris–but we don’t know how much yet. You seem to be jumping the gun and relying on very subjective impressions. This is a Laker team that uses a triangle offense that makes strange demands of its players.

I’m not sure what data that you are relying on in comparing Jordan to Javaris. Are you comparing Javaris at Georgia Tech with Jordan at UCLA? Jordan played two college years–Javaris one. In 2nd year stats, Jordan had 13.5 pts., 2.6 rebounds, and 5.1 assists. Javaris had 13.4 pts., 3.5 rebounds, and 5.6 assists. However, UCLA was an extremely defensively oriented team that scored few points and overachieved. Georgia Tech was good enough to get into the NCAA tournament but lost in the first round.

Jordan did lead UCLA to the championship game of the NCAA tournament, and was the lone UCLA player that did not wilt against Florida in that championship game.

We can’t do a real comparison between Javaris and Jordan until we have some NBA data. Right now, Jordan is our starting PG, Derek steps in or takes over as necessary, and Javaris is not in the regular rotation. Because of the signing of Derek Fisher, Javaris might not get much more than token playing time. Barring an injury, his playing time might be so low that he will spend most of his time in the development league.

Last year, with very weak pg’s, many of us thought that Jordan should start by mid season. He finally made it at the tail end of the season after a few games in the development league. Last year, as a point guard, Jordan averaged 4.4 points, 1.9 assists, and 1.7 rebounds and 15 minutes.

Let’s compare to Kobe.

In his first year as a Laker shooting guard, Kobe Bryant did not start, played 15+ minutes, did not play in some games, and averaged 7.6 points, 1.3 assists, and 1.9 rebounds for the season. He doubled his time and stats the next year.

First, Critt is a type 1 player; Farmer is a type 2 player.

I forget the exact classification of a type 1 vs a type 2 player, but relatively speaking, Critt has more potential than Farmar and will be a true PG/SG prospect in Year 1. Why give up the player with the higher ceiling? Putting Cirtt around LO and Kobe, and potentially JO, is much better than anything else we could come up wiht.

There has been numerous conflicts of thought regarding Farmar and Crittenton. Kurt I hope you start a thread regarding these 2…

My contention revolves around keeping Farmar UNLESS a solid PG comes along. Regarding the possibility that one of them MIGHT be part of a trade package, I was also pointing out that if the opposing team chooses Farmar, they can also demand the 08 1st. Whereas, if they prefer Critt, they can take the 09 1st at best.

Just a suggestion Kurt… it would make an interesting debate.

Payton will be 39 next season, hates the triangle and doesn’t get along with the Lakers coach, and if you watched him at all the last two seasons you know he is but a shadow of the hall of fame player he was a decade ago. Why would you want to take minutes away from developing young PGs to give it to GP at this point in his career?