Courtney Sims
The search continues and the prospecting seemed to have been harder than we ever thought.
No doubt Frankie Lim is feeling the pressure now as while the jelling and preparation of Smart Gilas simply intensifies day in and day out, the hunt for a naturalised American player continues to hound the overall preparation of Smart Gilas, tasked to bring back the Philippine flag in international basketball.
Reports said that Dwayne Jones is now headed to the NBA, losing what could have been a big catch for Gilas.
However I believe such is a blessing in disguise for Gilas as based on reports and also on the manner how I saw Jones play in the D-League, his focus is really to make it in the NBA.
It could have been more of a disaster rather than a benefit having Jones with Gilas. We have to understand guys that being a naturalised player is a far more committment of play than just simply playing as an import overseas.
With the way Jones has focused himself to the NBA, I do not think he is ready to take a long-term commitment being an adapted citizen for a country dedicated and commmitted to regain basketball supremacy.
Reports said that former University of Michigan Wolverines standout and Puerto Rican league (BSN) import
Courtney Sims is on the radar of SBP as there are unconfirmed reports that he has been released by his Puerto Rican team Capitenes de Arcibo.
I tried searching for confirmed reports if indeed Sims has been released by his current mother team but there is no official report available.
However, there has been several unfortunate events happening to his team Capitenes de Arcibo that could have led to Sims' departure with the said professional Puerto Rican team.
Capitenes de Arcibo was competing in the current 2009-2010 Premier Basketball League, this league is a professional tournament for commercial teams in North America. Capitenes was running second in league standings (14-3) when the PBL board of governors decided to expell Capitenes from the league.
The reason for the dismissal on Capitenes is failure to adhere to league rules, failing to show up in road games and deliberate miscommunication with PBL organisers. The assumption is that Capitenes is lacking in funds that is why they have failed to show up in road games, there were reports also that Capitenes has left some unpaid bills of their hotel accomodations in Quebec and Maryland during road games.
Courtney Sims was signed up by Capitenes last March 10 replacing old import Walter Hodge for their PBL stint, but because of the dismissal, Sims was only able to play 3 games for Capitenes. After 3 games for Capitenes in the said PBL, Sims registered 22.3 pts per game (second in the team) and 14.7 rebounds (first in the team).
After their dismissal from the PBL, life continues for the Capitenes de Arcibo team as they participated again in the new season of the Superior Basketball National (SBN) in Puerto Rico (the PBA version of Puerto Rico).
Capitenes is currently leading the league with a 7-3 record.
However, while the Capitenes team has played ten games now in the league, record shows that Courtney Sims only played 5 games. What is more intriguing is that Sim's stats are way way way below the numbers he registered from his PBL stint to that of the SBN.
This could really mean that Courtney Sims has already left Capitenes de Arcibo and may have been looking for any takers right at this time.
Courtney Sims was never drafted in the NBA even though he was one of the vital cogs for the Wolverines which paved the way for their runner up finish in the NIT tournament in 2006.
He played as a journeyman bench player to several NBA clubs and became an NBA D-League MVP in the 2008-2009 season.
Scouts described Sims as a very athletic player that has great size, nice lenght and decent frame. The 26-yr old is said to have a good basketball sense, creating some heady post-entry passes on high/low plays.
Scouts added that Sims is more developed as a offensive player while his defense is a suspect.
Sims has great footwork underneath, has finesse moves and can create his shots. However the hole in Sims' game is his lack of defensive intensity. Scouts said that Sims would easily give out position in the paint and is slow to rotate for slashing players in the weakside.
We do not know if Sims has improved his defense because that scouting report was done in January 2009.
For Smart Gilas, whether its gonna be Sims or not is not the concern but rather we need to find the right naturalised player now!
Time is not really running out but we all agree that the longer the reinforcement has been able to play with Gilas the better we have greater chances in performing creditably in future international competitions.