Four hours after watching a very informative Detroit/Dallas matchup here on Day 7 of the 2008 NBA Summer League, I read on my cellphone TrueHoop's latest installment. Complete with renowned expert David Thorpe's support, Detroit guard Arron Afflalo is, unfortunately, given a big thumbs up...

Afflalo is a solid guy. He always knows what to do and where to be. He doesn't waste dribbles or movements. He digs in on defense and makes the right play on offense. Out here he is showing a better ability to score because that's his role.

I often read Thorpe's analyses on TrueHoop and respect his position/experience, never having found any reason to disagree with him. Until now. This is the second year I have witnessed Afflalo's play and I remain convinced that he should have stayed an extra year at UCLA.

Before I dissect the matter, let me make a case for myself. True, I have only seen two Afflalo games from last year and today's. Thorpe and today's TrueHoop author, Maurice Brooks, have seen him two more times this Summer League, and not surprisingly I don't know how many they saw from last year.

However, I don't think there is a requirement of seeing a whole bunch of a player's short-stint Summer League games to get a gist of his skillset, especially when we're talking about a foundation of fundamentals. Plus, I've seen his skillset from last year and now this year. Sure, a kid could have a bad game here or there, but if you know what, where, and when to look, you can get a sense of his bedrock of skills/talent.

The better the fundamentals, the more pliable with any given team chemistry. But I don't think Thorpe is saying that Afflalo is "impressive" in the context of the Detroit Piston regular season roster's chemistry. I think he is saying that overall, Afflalo is impressive and this assessment could be applied towards Afflalo theoretically joining any NBA team, not just the Pistons.

Obviously, I disagree. Let us dissect...

• First of all, Afflalo stands too rigid. To get explosiveness to the hoop, you need strong leg, butt, and back muscles. In short, unless you have those rare crossover abilities a la Allen Iverson, you need to be able to bend down quickly, use your shoulder to create a seam, and use your legs to propel you forward. Afflalo does not have said explosiveness. I thus remain skeptical that he can be an effective NBA 2-guard backup.
• Second, if you don't have explosiveness, you better have a reliable release. Afflalo's shot takes too long to develop. By the time he's jumped, set the ball ready for the flick of a wrist, and flicked that wrist, someone as slow as Richie Frahm could swat him. Oh, guess what, Frahm did swat him. Therefore, even before he works on his dribble drive skills, he needs to work on that shot. Lo and behold, an extra year at UCLA, otherwise known as maybe, what, ten thousand jumpshots accrued over the extra 365 days (?), would have done him some good. Plus, I'm still perturbed he left an almost-guaranteed follow-on Final Four appearance, meaning a lot of those necessary shot-development attempts would have been in pressure-packed situations.
• Almost every set offensive sequence the Pistons ran was for Afflalo coming off a screen. Clearly the organization has a role in mind for him, at least throughout this Summer League. Now let's compare his set to, say, Marco Belinelli's. Let's assume, even though I have not watched a Warriors Summer League game yet from start to finish, that every play the Warriors run is likewise run for Belinelli. Marco's averaging 16 attempts through 3 games. Why is Afflalo only averaging 12 shots per game through 4 games? It's because he hasn't the wherewithal to create that many scoring opportunities. Again, the lack of explosiveness or a quick release. Let's assume Afflalo had a bad shooting percentage day, which messed up his point total. He still only got 13 shots off. The volume of offense that goes through his touches should yield more than 13 attempts.
• Afflalo has not played against quality talent in his first 3 games, which netted him 16.0 ppg. I plan to scout the Lakers tomorrow, so I'll let you know if there is a bonafide NBA-ready 2-guard on the Lakers' summer roster. The Clippers game in which Afflalo scored 25? Well, you already know from the Jerryd Bayless post that the Clippers have no 2-guards that raise eyebrows. And it naturally follows that the Milwaukee Bucks don't have good 2's in Summer League either, so Afflalo's streak has been against weak competition, I believe. But I could backtrack from this bullet point because I haven't actually seen those 3 games (nor do I plan to).
• One thing I would not be able to backtrack from is that today's game against the Dallas Mavericks featured a bonafide defender on the 6'5" Afflalo: 6'8" Gerald Green. I also remember the aforementioned 6'6" Frahm guarding Afflalo, but specifically remember a time when Frahm asked Green to cover Afflalo so Frahm could cover a taller but less-mobile Deron Washington, a 6'7" forward on the Pistons.
• I must reiterate that Frahm blocked Afflalo's stop-and-mini-fade-pop. Afflalo just takes too long to get the jumper ready to be shot.
• I almost forgot about this, but Afflalo had to ask the coach if he was supposed to foul with 39 seconds left and down 4. If you're slated to be a backup to a player (Rip Hamilton) who has more skills than you, at least be a smart/aware backup to make up for some of the skill difference.
• The best player on the floor in this game was Green. Like I said in the Bayless post, this Detroit/Dallas matchup mostly involved jump shots and avoiding contact (which seems to suit Dallas draft pick jump shooter Shan Foster just fine). That being said, Green was the only player who could routinely dribble penetrate to the paint. It's because he's the only guy on the floor who can get his body low and in a torpedo-like attack position. Check my subsequent post on other game notes from Detroit/Dallas to hear about Foster, Frahm, Adrian Miles, Amir Johnson and Will Bynum.

All I have left are smaller bullet points concerning observations of the other games I saw today. So I'll put that all into one more post and wrap it up for today. The biggest eye-openers today were Jerryd Bayless and the unexpected praise of Afflalo.