A Daily Babble Production
Another week of the NBA's off-season is behind us, and this one brought with it signings for two players believed to be among those possibly on the Celtics radar.
Veteran swingman Michael Finley re-upped for another go-around with the Spurs. Former Hornets guard Jannero Pargo packed up shop and decided to head overseas for $3.5 million to play with Dynamo Moscow.
The good news here is that neither player merits consideration as a true 'loss' for our beloved Celtics, particularly Pargo.
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As we discussed in this space a few weeks back, acquiring Finley would have been an understandable enough move, but it also had its share of downsides. He would have provided a solid veteran swingman presence to help provide insurance for the likes of Tony Allen and J.R. Giddens, and he also could have added some perimeter shooting off the bench as well as a strong character guy and another locker room leader. But he would have been far from an ideal fit.
Finley is 34 years old, and as many of our readers observed last time his name came up here, he clearly appeared to have lost a step or several down the stretch this past postseason. His shooting efficiency hasn't been as good as one would hope (52.6 percent true shooting for his career isn't terrible but isn't great either), and he may be better suited to the two than the three at this point in his career, which was the lesser of the Celtics' concerns at the swing spot. While Finley hasn't completely hamstrung the Spurs defensively, good friend and Spur of the Moment author David 'Southern Hospitality Incarnate' Thiessen (among others) has pointed out that Finley's quickness has eroded to the point that he is absolutely woeful on an individual level defensively and would not have been a good addition for the Celts from that point of view. He also isn't anything special as far as his rebounding and passing. All that said, while Finley brings certain things to the table, there is plenty that he can't do, and the Celts can live without using a roster spot on the guy.
On the other hand, the green needed absolutely no part of Jannero Pargo. Bringing some offensive punch off the bench is one thing, but being an unmistakable chucker is another. Sadly, Pargo is the latter. The guy gets in the game, and the ball goes up early and often, but there is no guarantee that it will be going anywhere near the hoop. Pargo shoots 39.5 percent from the field and 36.5 percent from deep for his career, both of which are uninspiring components to a disgusting true shooting mark of 47.8 percent. Pargo has only broken 50 percent true shooting once in a season, yet the man still averages 15 field-goal attempts per 36 minutes for his career. Yes, he can score in high volumes, and on certain nights, he can shoot a decent percentage if he heats up, but the numbers make it pretty clear that this by and large isn't the norm. Pargo is a tremendously inefficient player who specializes in heaving above all else, and it's interesting to note that the Hornets were 5.5 points less efficient per 100 possessions offensively with him on the court than off it last season. This post from Pounding the Rock's Matthew Powell just about says it all with regard to Pargo's shooting.
If the scoring inefficiency wasn't enough of an issue, Pargo doesn't add much else when he gets on the floor. He isn't much of a rebounder, and he is also only 6-foot-1. For a guy who spent the vast majority of his minutes at the two last year, his height and 175-pound frame leave him vastly undersized, likely making him a defensive liability as well. This is not the sort of player the Celtics needed.
While we're certainly looking to show Danny Ainge and the front office the good faith earned for delivering a championship, the view here remains that the roster could still use some tuning up in order to make this team as dangerous as possible in hopes of repeating come next June. But neither Michael Finley nor Jannero Pargo was necessary towards making those improvements, and the Celts will move past these two non-acquisitions with ease.