[ChiBullsFan]

Your criticism of Williams tells me you don't quite understand the relevance of summer league. Summer league stats are TERRIBLE indicators of how a player will perform on the NBA level. Historically speaking, the numbers just never hold up. These are glorified pickup games, and I'm sorry but if you ever kept track of your stats in a pickup game they would not look so hot. You'd have tons of TOs and shoot a much worse FG% than you'd think.

In the past I've heard people go on and on about how Deshawn Stevenson or Shammond Williams or god knows who else are gonna be the next big thing because they dominate in summer league. Yeah, look how dominant they've been. It's just a completely different type of game than the NBA, and it does a disservice to fans to publicize the stats because they are so misleading. They honestly mean NOTHING.

Remember that each league that is not the NBA churns out very different looking stats. Euro League stats and college stats are generally poor indicators of NBA success. That is why there are scouts. These guys recognize how talent will translate in the NBA.

And Williams was the consensus top player in the draft, and with good reason. He will become a top PG without a doubt. Yes, he will take his lumps. Yes he will commit TOs in the beginning. Yes, he may not always have a good shooting night. BUT, his talent is unquestionable and he's proven himself as a top notch passer and scorer from the PG at the top college level for 3 years. You can call him a shoot-first PG if you want, but don't deny his ability to create for others, because he is a fantastic passer, and not at all selfish. So give the kid time because you will be pleasantly surprised with how successful he'll be.

 

[ChiBullsFan]

A couple points of note

TO MichaelOFAZ on JWill:

Williams IS, ALWAYS has been, and ALWAYS will be a PG. At Duke he was moved off the ball (but still handled many PG duties, especially in crunch time) because Chris Duhon was arguably the best pass-first PG in the NCAA. It made sense for the team, and is in no way a reflection of JWill's inability to handle PG duties. He was the primary PG his fresh and soph seasons (and a damn good one at that!), and his junior year he basically made room for Duhon in the backcourt.

Now clearly JWill may not be YOUR ideal PG, but a top-tier PG he is nonetheless. True, he is not a strictly pass-first guy. He is not in the John Stockton/Jason Kidd mold. No one ever said he was. he IS a great scorer, so he should use it to his advantage. As long as he gets his teammates involved it shouldn't be an issue, and Jay is certainly not a selfish player. He showed at Duke the ability to be a top scorer, while regularly getting his teammates involved and put up excellent assist numbers. He is more in the mold of a Gary Payton or Baron Davis - a scorer who can still put up 8+ apg and still being a great court leader.

As for the insinuation that he might flop because past Duke players have, that is a retty bad argument. First off, many schools produce flops - not just Duke. BUT, if you look at how the program has evolved in recent years, Duke who used to rely heavily on skill guys who lacked athleticism (Ferry, Laettner, Hurley) they have begun recruiting better athletes. As such, Duke has produced some great NBA players in recent years from Hill to Brand to Battier to Maggette. There's just not enough reason to believe that because he went to Duke that somehow he won't be good. He is independent of all other Duke players with the exception of how he's been coached, and I doubt you would want to question Coach K's ability to teach.