Lithuanian Point Guards

[Straight forward]

Interesting how things will develop for Jokubaitis (will his minutes increase next season?) and Kasparas Jakucionis. 2 best PG prospects of the country. New Barca's coach Roger Grimau was coaching Jakucionis with U18 team. But seriously, 17yo Jakucionis should be loaned, IMO. Would be fun to see him in some Nevezis, LKL.

[Hepcat]

Any thoughts on which players might compete for the second and perhaps third PG slots behind Rokas Jokubaitis this summer? The most obvious candidate seems to be Margiris Normantas. And then perhaps Arnas Velička. Sadly both Vaidas Kariniauskas and Žygimantas Janavičius seem to be past their best-before dates but desperate times call for desperate measures.

[LuDux]

Kariniauskas is invited to camp

[Straight forward]

Jokubaitis preparing. Last summer he had health issues, now he has time for individual workouts. I expect him to be ready, fresh and hungry for good performance:

https://twitter.com/NBA_NewYork/status/1675939561493393412

[Straight forward]

This! Jakucionis ability to shoot threes off the dribble with ease and high %. We needed that kind of player. That's one of contemporary trends. Traditional PGs nearly extinct, we don't see them in NBA generally anymore. Jokubaitis is a bit hesitant to shoot threes off the dribble (he has deadly mid range jimmy, but threes going mostly from the spot up) and his release is slower than Jakucionis. IDK about "he's not PG" and so on narrative. He's modern 1 who primarily occupied with scoring and most importantly he can really shoot. He's the product of Curry and Damian Lillard era (Lillard and Ja Morant are his favorite guards).

https://www.instagram.com/p/Cuyg8JTMwax/

We should have 3 very different PGs. Jokubaitis is most complete offensively, Jakucionis is most gifted in terms of pure scoring (shooting) from position 1, Marciulionis is traditional facilitator and best defender. I see all three completing PG section from something like 2027 or going further. I throw in Jakucionis and see how hot he is, sort of "instant offense from the bench", if he's hot we're rolling as fu...offensively. If his trigger cold, I play good old school Chris Paul kinda PG (in terms of facilitation) Marciulionis, who would involve others more. Potentially stellar PG rotation.

[Straight forward]

Kalnietis listed as 6th best WC passer historically. Played in 2006, 2010 and 2019. I think that injury in 2014 didn't allow him to show his best in his prime. So overall 3,6apg is not so impressive. And his best tournament 5.4apg in 2019. Let's see if Jokubaitis can exceed that just from scratch:

https://www.fiba.basketball/basketballworldcup/2023/news/fiba-basketball-world-cup-top-20-passers

[Straight forward]

Jokubaitis' season high. Main thing to improve and add - polish three point shooting off the dribble.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UU6XQnNXl5g&t=4s&ab_channel=SPGHighlights

[Shawshank]

Mantas Kalnietis in between 2012-2017 fiba tournament in 4 of them had 7asist+ averages and was leading in assists like in 3 diffrent fiba tournaments

Taking very raw 2006 and young Mantas 2010 tournament + one old Kalnietis fiba summers 2019 and making conclusion that he was just 3,4 assists per game playmaker wow

reality of peak Kalnietis looked like this:

2012 Olympic qualifying 7,0 assist per game
2015 7,8 assists per game
2016 Olympics 7,5asists per game
2017 7,2 assists per game

Picturing one of best fiba assists Pgs in 2011-2017 years as like very average passer its so dinosour expert level analyses

[Straight forward]

Dude, you are retard Complete retard I mean how stupid can you be, something...

I pointed my self exactly that Kalnietis couldn't show his best in WC cause in his prime he didn't play in this tournament (got injured 2014). I mentioned 3.6apg (correcting the article's author who named 3.4asp) only because that fact was mentioned in the ranking and it's not fair to emphasize such number. So I tried to make more justice and clearance of the situation.

Lastly it's WC ranking. We talk exactly about WC. Do you get, dummy? When you rank WC tournament, you take WC tournament numbers, that's the whole point of that article. And when I say that "let's see if Jokubaitis can exceed Kalnietis instantly" I mean WC perspective exactly, like literally, can't you get it?

Dude, you can't get simplest points. You don't really understand how funny you are not being able to handle easiest interpretation You randomly unleashed silliest homersim of Kalnietis while no-one even attacked Kalnietis here. I actually shared this because I think it's super cool that FIBA ranked him so high as 6th spot of all time, specially knowing he didn't even showed his top performance there.

[Shawshank]

Dinosour expert

I wrote facts,those averages is real picture of Kalnietis and what he meant for NT in 2010s decade


Im saying u should know better what asisist number was ,not copying joke 3,4 number of not peak years


So take Jasikevicius numbers from raw years 1997-1999 + old years 2011-2012 and also we can conclude that he was very average guard and playmaker. Thats what you did with Kalnietis 3,4 average number here and im saying thats bullshit


Why to copy such nonsecal numbers here of not peak years ? because u want to minimaze how good Kalnietis was in NT?



Saying that Jokubaitis need to beat 5,4 asist number,no dude All time LTU best PG numbers was

Marciulionis 8,2 , Jasikevicius 8,2 and Kalnietis 7,8 thats what numbers Rokas need to get to one day to be winning floor general and help NT win something not to just average 5,4 number

[Straight forward]

Seriously?

I think you lost your mind completely...

[Shawshank]

Sarunas Jasikevicius played 9 games in World championships and averaged 1,4 assist per game


If go by smart idiots logic and how he compares numbers conclusion is this:


If Kariniauskas will manage to average 1,5 asists per game in 2023 champ he is better backup PG than Jasikevicius in world championships

[Hepcat]

Mantas Kalnietis in between 2012-2017 fiba tournament in 4 of them had 7asist+ averages and was leading in assists like in 3 diffrent fiba tournaments

reality of peak Kalnietis looked like this:

2012 Olympic qualifying 7,0 assist per game
2015 7,8 assists per game
2016 Olympics 7,5asists per game
2017 7,2 assists per game

That is correct. Kalnietis set the bar. Those are the numbers to which a young Lithuanian PG must now aspire.

Who knows, had Kalnietis not injured himself just before the 2014 World Cup, he might well have led Lithuania to a medal.

[Straight forward]

Velicka is still too turnover prone. I'm not sure we'll ever see him in the NT. I think he will remain NT borderliner. His best chance to make NT may be 2025 as later he will also have to compete with Kasparas Jakucionis (not only Marciullionis) who I think is improved version of Velicka in a way. Both are sort of combo's, but essentially PGs, but Jakucionis is more agile, more crafty and much better shooter and bit less wild. Velicka is pretty good, but lacking something to become true EL material. Essentially the consistency of the decision making.

[Hepcat]

Yes he gave up far too many turnovers in Rytas' second game of the season but I'm willing to wait until Arnas Velička has at least a couple of dozen games under his belt before pronouncing upon his season.