Ish Smith has had a roller coaster year, but a lot of that is due to Stan Van Gundy. What grade does he deserve on the season?
Regarding the Detroit Pistons’ Ish Smith, if you’re listening to “Pistons twitter” they might tell you Ishmael Larry Smith isn’t good enough.
“Can’t shoot”
“The defense doesn’t even have to guard him on the perimeter”
These types of things. I read them all season. I suppose they might be true on some level.
While he might only have true shooting percentage of just over 52 percent and only shot threes at just under 35 percent in 2017, those are solid compared to his career numbers.
They are also good enough numbers to keep the defense honest. Even though the eye test in most games Smith started says otherwise. Let’s look at a few different aspects of his game and see if we can come up with an accurate grade.
The first and most obvious thing to bring up is what happened to Ish Smith when Reggie Jackson went down with a sprained ankle in December. Thrust back into the starting lineup again, he showed some flashes but a lot of what the chatter says about him rang true.
The defenses could sag off him, and the Pistons did struggle offensively when that happened.
Let’s call it the “Rondo rule” (regarding veteran point guard Rajon Rondo).
When your point guard isn’t the best shooter, defenses only need to guard against the take. It’s just how it is. The problem with blaming Smith for that, is that Coach Stan Van Gundy failed to put adequate shooters around Ish a majority of the time.
The wiser move in my opinion would’ve been to import newly signed Langston Galloway or G-League call up Dwight Buycks into the starting lineup with Reggie Bullock, Stanley Johnson, Tobias Harris (and later Blake Griffin), and Andre Drummond. This would’ve provided better spacing. With Smith, Johnson, and Drummond on the court together shooting was/is few and far between. Van Gundy did not put Ish in the best position to succeed with the lineups he often chose.
Along the same lines we should also mention that one of Ish Smith’s most notable qualities is that he’s one of/if not, the fastest players in the league. He gets up and down the court. While playing increased minutes with the starters he ran and pushed the pace less. It takes a lot of energy to keep it moving like that and it didn’t appear he was able to keep up the same pace in starting minutes. Oops that’s another SVG blunder.
Switching it up a bit, Ish improved his three point percentage this past season from beginning to end. Recognizing a need to improve that part of his game. Which leads me into my next area of evaluation for him. His professionalism.
Ish smith is 29 years old and one of the most professional pros on the team. His effort was consistent all year. Emotions not too high or too low ever. He’s definitely a good locker room influence. One it seems some of the younger players on this team might need sometimes.
The last thing I’d like to get into regarding Smith is the number of clutch, buzzer beating, and or improbable shots he made this year. Without them the team would not have even been in a number of their close games. He deserves an amount of recognition for that so I feel it deserves mention.
Smith has one more year left on his very reasonable contract and the Pistons have no money to spend. More than likely they’ll bring him back and I support it.
While he does have limitations in his shooting ability, he also exhibited good vision, an incredible motor, amazing speed that works great as a change of pace back up to Reggie Jackson, a knack for hitting big shots, and a great rapport with his teammates. For all that I wanted to give him a B.
The largest problem with Ish Smith this past year was Stan Van Gundy. A coach’s job is to put players in position to succeed, and mitigating Smith’s effectiveness by raising his minutes and playing him often with poor shooters doesn’t affect my grade for him.
His inability to consistently space the floor does though. Even though he showed improvement over the last month. It is still a hole in his overall game and it does still have an effect on the team. He’s also not the greatest defender as a 6 ft guard in the NBA. Had to be mentioned as well.
Ish Smith 2017-18 Season Grade:
B-
“Ish Smith is a journeyman, backup point guard that can’t shoot”.
Might be true but he’s grown into a very effective backup that opens up the game for his teammates when his role is proper. Let’s hope next year whomever the coach is sees what he can offer and utilizes it better.