Darius Morris to Lakers
41 pick? Shoulda stayed at Michigan at least one more year. Lakers doesn't seem like a bad position to be in. Too bad you gotta fight to make the team, being a second rounder. Good luck Morris.
Yes, but the guys he's "fighting" are...Steve Blake and Jordan Farmar. In fact, I'd imagine all three of them, along with Fisher, will be on the Lakers' roster. And I think that DMo will vulture minutes from both Blake and Farmar. Neither have been remotely impressive. Frankly,. if DMo can't beat those guys out and prove himself a better NBA player than either by, say, the end of his 2nd year in the NBA, then his future is pretty bleak as an NBA point guard.
Is a New Jersey Net, just fyi. So the "fight" got a little easier.
Good luck to him.
This is awesome. I thought the Lakers were the best fit for DMO a few months ago and I still believe they're the ideal team for him. He'll be surrounded by tons of talent, an older PG whom he can learn from and eventually take over, and he's got a new coach who Morris can work to impress. Great fit IMO. Also, he'll be right at home here.
He's got 3 things he'll have to improve to get significant minutes for LAL. First two are obvious: shooting (has to be able to knock down 3s at a rate near the league avg, he doesn't do enough other stuff on the court to be an offensive liability in the way that say, Rondo, is) and defense (he's got to prove he's quick enough to stay in front of NBA point guards). But third, he has to learn to play without the ball. He's not going to dominate the ball the way he has his entire career, only NBA superstars get as much of the ball as Morris did last year, and that's obviously Kobe's role on the Lakers. Morris will have to figure out how to be effective with a much lower usage rate.
Your third point is really intelligent (seriously). I hadn't thought of that, but I completely agree. At U of M, he dominated the ball; his usage rate was absurd, and he created more team points than any player in the country (points off of assists plus own points). With LA, it's going to be a different ballgame. He won't be the floor general if he's playing with the better players on that squad; perhaps in garbage time he could be, but that's not a great path for him if he wants to succeed. He's going to make some significant adjustments in a mental way/approach to the game beyond just the usual ones for a rookie.
cheering for Dallas, or Portland, but cheering for LA is way better than watching him play for Miami.
like the Lakers (does anyone outside LA?), I love D-Mo. I wish the best for him in his NBA career.
IDK about liking the Lakers but I routinely root for them as Kobe is my favorite player. Being from the Detroit area, I don't really like the Pistons oddly enough (Tigers, Wings, Lions, UM fan) so I dunno. I don't really mind the Lakers, I have no reason to really hate them. They've always had players I've liked.
i live in LA(more OC), but I hate the Lakers. I am going to support D Mo regardless, but maybe this will make me hate them less. The thing about the Lakers is that it is more so the obnoxious bandwagon and fair weather fans that makes me hate them.
Well, this is awkward.
They definitely need help at the point guard position and he should be able to contribute early to a great franchise and his hometown team. Couldn't have asked for a better situation!
Good luck Darius!!!
What if he came back, led us to the Final Four and was a boarderline lottery pick? I feel like that would have been a much better situation.
For us? yes. For him from a financial standpoint, as far as guaranteed money? No doubt. Chances of him leading us to a Final Four? Hard to say. Probably less likely than him performing well for the Lakers and earning a guaranteed contract. So let's say he does that, gets drafted, say, 12th overall to a terrible franchise where he has no one to learn from, a poisonous lockerroom, and he flounders. Yes, he's got the guaranteed money from that first contract. But his eventual earnings, success, and happiness may not be as high as they end up being in the current situation. It's obviously too early to say, and there are a ton of hypotheticals involved. For example, say he blows out his knee, Shaun Livingston-style in game 5 next year for the Maize and Blue and didn't take out an insurance policy? Point is, from a strictly basketball standpoint, he is in one of the best 3 or 4 situations he could be in. Since we can't see into the (hypothetical) future if he'd stayed, it's hard to really say.
Also: Erazem Lorbek's rights were just traded. He played for MSU and left in 2005. This is funny.
Most of them have or have had personal issues. Even Derek Fisher, but I wouldn't consider it a negative issue. The main reason why FIsher left the Jazz is so that he could be closer to an eye specialist for his daughter. Fisher from all accounts is a very good guy.
Gasol had some thing with a teammates wife or girlfriend telling Pau's girlfriend to dump him. The rumor is that Kobe's wife told Pau's girlfriend to dump him. There was a rumored falling out between Kobe and Gasol because of this during the playoffs. Many people think that this is why Gasol played poorly or seemed off in the playoffs.
Lamar Odom is married to the beast Kardashian and released a gender neutral fragrance with her.
Artest is Artest. Pretty active on twitter. Couple of my friends met him because he lets people know where he is at. From what my friends have told me he is a really nice guy, but I think something is off with him.
I just hate Kobe and his stupid snarl thing and he had his issues in the past. It seems like his wife keeps him on lockdown now anyways.
Luke Walton had a BBQ restaurant that failed. I never went to it after I found out it was his restaurant.
Matt Barnes's wife, gf or ex-something or rather is on some reality show. I think there was some issue or drama from that. I don't really know since I have never seen the show.
Andrew Bynum's issues have been injury related and I guess maturity. People is LA over reacted when Bynum was carrying playboy playmates on his back right after he had surgery.
Shannon Brown is a sparty. Enough said.
i'm happy that at least he's going to his hometown team. but another poor gamble by entering the draft. he lost millions. the league minimum salary is under $500k, assuming he makes the Lakers (i think he does for sure). but being a first round selection would guarantee him at least twice that salary and several million if he became a lottery pick.
he and manny will obviously be making good $, but they potentially lost millions by leaving too early. another lesson learned, hopefully.
I still think it can be argued that Manny left too late.
If he stayed with Darrius and THJ the team could have amazing. There was no way for him to know 2010-2011 wasn't going to be a rebuilding mess. Manny could have been a Top10 pick in tihs draft.
It's all hypothetical of course. I would have guessed coming off of the tourney run in '09 Manny would have been at least a second round pick. But then again, if he got picked by a team without a lot of roster space, maybe he doesn't get the chance he had going into a gutted out Cavs team to make a name for himself. We'll never know is the only thing we really know.
That can be true. Being drafted in the second round as a throwaway "best player available" pick can be a bad thing. But if you can get drafted by a team that has a need at the position (which is the case here), it's not so bad. If he were an undrafted free agent, the Lakers are one of the franchises he'd have probably picked anyway.
It's still not clear this was a "poor gamble" by Morris. He probably would have continued developing next year (not 100%, but very likely), and in theory this would have raised his draft stock. But the draft next year is going to be LOADED because 10+ guys who could have been drafted this year didn't declare due to the upcoming lockout. So even if he improves his stock 10 or so spots, it might not have done him any good. Combine that with the injury risk of staying in school, and the non-zero risk of not improving his numbers significantly, and it's not clear this was a terrible decision.
I selfishly wish he had stayed, but he's in a good situation in LA and it's not clear things would have been meaningfully better after another season. I hope he has a great career out there.
Not to mention, frankly, your "big" NBA contract doesn't come with your first deal. 1st round picks have slotted salaries. I'd take the gamble of being in a situation where I am far more likely to succeed as, you know, a basketball player (the one he's in) vs. shitty hypothetical lotteryish team (best case scenario if he raises his stock all the way up to, say, pick 10-20 of next year's draft). I think a decent example is a guy like Rajon Rondo. Frankly, he was not that good at Kentucky. His shot was about as bad as Wayne Turner's from back in the day, he seemed to have a terrible attitude, he didn't pass well and had a decent but not great handle. However, his athleticism paired with the invaluable tutelage of the guys he's been around since he arrived in the NBA has made him into what he is today. It isn't just talent. It's talent, mental toughness, and the formation of one's skills and continued progression of those skills and attitude, which the organization one is in and the teammates one is provided with...have a massive impact. Unless you're a "can't miss" guy, but then again, many "can't miss" guys do, in fact, miss. See: entire 1986 first round.
if only improved his outside shot marginally, i think he would be a shoe-in 1st rounder next year
That might be true if the 2012 draft field were as weak as this year's, but it isn't. This year's draft class was unusually weak, while next year's will be strong. For him to simply have treaded water and remained the #41 player would have required significant improvement. For him to improve into the top 30 would have required a big step up in performance.
Just curious, but why is next year's draft so much stronger? I get that Sullinger and Barnes will be there, but they're only two guys. Is the incoming freshman class that much stronger? Mock drafts show 7-8 one and done's, that's not far out of line with this draft.
I get that the next draf might be better, but when NBA people consider the quality of the draft, they don't often consider anything beside the top 10-15 picks. Even in a "deep" draft, anything beyond that isn't necessarily an instant impact type player.
Your statement that he would have required significant improvement to be the 41st player in next year's draft is crazy. He would need to improve only to show scouts that he hasn't peaked, but significant imrpovement would make him an easy first round choice.
It's always been my general position that if you leave early for the NBA and don't get taken in the first round, you made a mistake. I'm not going to change my mind just because I like Morris and hope that he's succesful.
Its just something people like to say because it sounds good, especially in the case of Darius Morris leaving early.
Fact is, a season as the man on a Michigan team competing for a Big Ten title and making a run in the tournament probably would have shot Morris up into the mid-20s and made him a lot more money.
Could it have went the other way? Possibly. But worst case scenario is he'd probably be sitting where he is now.
That assessment sounds an awful lot like where he was projected this year. There were plenty of mocks where he was projected to go into the mid-20s this year. Things just fell poorly and he went 41st.
You're advocating a position where he doesn't improve his stock at all and loses a year's salary. He made the right choice.
but what?
Should I have put it into meaningless percentages so it is easier to understand?
Okay, so if he stayed in school and improved and Michigan has a good season, there's a 75% he would be a middle to end first round pick, probably in the mid-20's.
There' also the possibility that he could find himself exactly where he is is today. Say a 12.5% chance.
There's also a possibility that he plays so well that he rises into the lottery. 7.5% chance.
There's also a chance he declines - unlikely - and finds himself at the tail end of the second round or undrafted. 5%.
There.
I'm advocating he should have come back to Michigan, been the best player on a rising team and earned himself a better payday by playing himself into the first round. He came out because that's what he wanted: to go as high as he could. I think I'm correct in saying that 41st was not the position that he craved. He could have done better next year.
Quite frankly, this is odd to me: Did none of you have any faith in his ability to improve next year?
Percentages would be useful if they weren't completely arbitrary and gamed to favor your point of view.
Several people have mentioned it already in this thread, but I'll repeat it: NBA teams draft off potential, not production. There is little he could have done next year to change their opinion on his potential, making those percentages you stated unrealistically optimistic. He couldn't have improved his value enough to justify giving up a year's pay.
Then stay until your Senior year and make millions as a first rounder. 41 over all has ZERO upside.
Two years is a long time away. I don't think he was prepared to wait that long. He was either going pro this year or next, and this year's draft class was considerably weaker.
Enjoy your time back in your home city.
Congratulations to Darius. Seems like a pretty decent spot for him to be in. Obviously guarateed money would have been preferred, but he's got a shot, so good for him.
Darius succeeding will be good for UM as well when it comes to recruiting and the Beilein sterotypes, so go out and make it happen.
Because we're not impressing recruits with 2nd round dreams.
perfect situation for D-Mo. Goin back home to lead the lakers.....who by the way basically don't have a PG.
I wonder what type offense the Lakers plan on running in the future. Darrius is defintely NOT made for the Triangle offense but would be great in pick-and-roll with Gasol or Bynum.
They will not be running the triangle. I have no idea what kind of offense Mike Brown runs, but it seems like the ownership(Buss) wants to return to the style of the showtime era.
No one knows what kind of offense Mike Brown runs.
Would have been nice to have gone in first round, but he'll fit well with the Lakers, play in the playoffs regularly over the next few years and have an opportunity for significant playing time in a couple years. Really couldn't have asked for a better situation from a basketball perspective. Still wish he woulda stayed, but godspeed young man.
Above.