Mike DeCourcy on Gerald Henderson

[brevity]

From Mike DeCourcy's article "Five college hoops developments we want to see":

5. Gerald Henderson making threes. The guy they call "G" was 20-of-63 from 3-point range last year as a sophomore for Duke. In a related item, Memphis' Chris Douglas-Roberts went from 19-of-58 as a sophomore to 45-of-109 in his junior season -- and made first-team All-America as he led the Tigers to the NCAA championship game.

Sounds optimistic. He also mentions that the Sporting News college basketball yearbook predicts a last-place ACC finish for Maryland, which surprised me.

[mgtr]

Gerald is clearly a superior player. If he can hit, say, 35% from the 3 point line and still get to the rim when desired, he will be absolutely awesome. Certainly first or second team all-american.

[Newton_14]

I think a lot of people forget too, that after hurting his wrist in the UNC game, it greatly affected Gerald's shooting the remainder of the year. IMO he would have posted much better numbers had the injury not occurred.

To his credit though, even with the injury he greatly improved his free throw shooting in the latter stage of the season last year..

I am still putting my money on a breakout year for Gerald this year to the point where he challenges for ACC POY..

[kramerbr]

Gerald is a man amongst boys. A healthy season will show it game in and game out. That play at the end of the Belmont game was effortless. Look for him to have the ball in his hand when the game is on the line.

[Kedsy]

Gerald is clearly a superior player. If he can hit, say, 35% from the 3 point line and still get to the rim when desired, he will be absolutely awesome. Certainly first or second team all-american.

I don't understand. Are you saying Gerald is clearly superior to Chris Douglas-Roberts? If not, I apologize for the question, but if so, what are you basing that on? Also, last year he hit 32% of his 3-pointers and wasn't close to an All-American. Are you suggesting nudging that up to 35% would make that big a difference? Sorry, I'm confused.

[JDev]

I think the comparisons to CDR are appropriate, to an extent, and hopefully accurate. The key parrallel would be that typically a college basketball player makes their largest skill jump between their freshman and sophomore years, but CDR made a big leap between his sophomore and junior seasons. The Duke nation is hoping that occurs with G as well.

[pfrduke]

I think a lot of people forget too, that after hurting his wrist in the UNC game, it greatly affected Gerald's shooting the remainder of the year. IMO he would have posted much better numbers had the injury not occurred.

To his credit though, even with the injury he greatly improved his free throw shooting in the latter stage of the season last year..

I am still putting my money on a breakout year for Gerald this year to the point where he challenges for ACC POY..

Except that he shot slightly better from 3 after hurting the wrist than before. He was 10-35 through the first UNC game, and 10-28 after. Neither was particularly lights out.

I do agree, though, with the hunch that he'll improve his 3-point shooting and his free throw shooting this season (although I think he will continue not to shoot very many threes - about the 2/game that he shot last year).

[phaedrus]

I think the comparisons to CDR are appropriate, to an extent, and hopefully accurate. The key parrallel would be that typically a college basketball player makes their largest skill jump between their freshman and sophomore years, but CDR made a big leap between his sophomore and junior seasons. The Duke nation is hoping that occurs with G as well.

Gerald improved quite a bit between his freshman and sophomore years. I don't think we would be disappointed if he fell a bit short of that level of improvement this year.

[Edouble]

I think a lot of people forget too, that after hurting his wrist in the UNC game, it greatly affected Gerald's shooting the remainder of the year. IMO he would have posted much better numbers had the injury not occurred.

Gerald improved quite a bit between his freshman and sophomore years. I don't think we would be disappointed if he fell a bit short of that level of improvement this year.

G definitely made the big leap from frosh to soph that many great players go through. At the beginning of last season, I thought that the perimeter firepower of Nelson and G looked sort of like a two-headed basketball beast: Nelson's immensely powerful dribble drives where he would finish strong at the rim, juxtaposed against G's quicker finesse drives that ended in a stop-and-pop 15 feet out for a soft mid-range floater.

After the wrist injury, G couldn't shoot anymore and our offense was never the same. I expect G to pick up where he left off last year pre-injury, with probably an additional level of offensive threat, considering the departure of Nelson and an extra off-season of hard work.

I think Boozer may be right. With all of the talk of a breakout year for Henderson, are people "remembering" G pre or post injury? Because pre-injury, he had practically broken out already. Phaedrus points to this too--there's really not much more improvement that G needs to make. He was explosive and dangerous last year, and our post-January downslide correlated not only with tired legs, but with his wrist injury.

[Jeffrey]

At the beginning of last season, I thought that the perimeter firepower of Nelson and G looked sort of like a two-headed basketball beast: Nelson's immensely powerful dribble drives where he would finish strong at the rim, juxtaposed against G's quicker finesse drives that ended in a stop-and-pop 15 feet out for a soft mid-range floater.

Hi,

I think this is where Gerald benefits from Nelson's departure. I expect Gerald to take the ball to the rim much more this season given his amazing hops and quickness. This will obviously require additional strength on the drive and I expect we will also see that. IMO, Gerald has the required toughness. I think their offensive skill sets are more similar than you believe and Gerald will show that ability this season.

Best regards,
Jeffrey

[DukieInBrasil]

i too think that The Gerald shooting at or above 35% on 3s would add a dimension to his game freeing him up even more in the middle of the floor, don´t forget the stripe is moving back this year. He definitely needs to improve on his FT% if he´s gonna have the ball a lot this year, he´s a guy who can get in the lane where he could draw contact and go to the charity stripe. He needs to hurt the other team if they try to bang him.

[ncexnyc]

G could elevate his game to where he became proficient with both the left and right hand. If he gets to that point, defenses won't be able to cheat when defending him.

I would also hope that his defensive skills improve to the point that he becomes a lockdown defender.

I wouldn't mind him improving his 3 pt shooting, but I really hope that isn't something the team would really need. I'd much rather see him going to the rim at will and running up the opposition's foul totals.