How'd He Do?: David West

After a couple of off days blogging about the salary cap, the draft, and our current needs, it's time for the third installment of the How'd He Do? series. So far, Mo-Pete has received a 67% approval rating, and Melvin Ely has gotten a 41% approval rating. Get to it if your vote hasn't been counted yet. Today we have one of our key cogs, a presence down low and on defense, a prolific yeller at refs, a possessor of an undying scowl, a world class tuba player (in his own mind), the seventeen foot assassin himself: David West.

via media.2theadvocate.com

Now you see it. Now you don't.

Positives: All-Star selection (and don't let anyone tell you B-Diddy was better; DX had a higher PER and a higher Usg%), nice jump in defensive rebounding rate, legitimate non-CP3 scoring option, played terrific help D allowing CP to gamble for steals, lowered his turnover rate as the year went on, showed some nice passing ability in the last month and a half, career best .850 free throws, increased his FTA/g for the fourth year in a row, SEVENTEEN FOOT ASSASSIN.

Negatives: Offensive rebounding rate dropped for the fourth straight year to a career low 7.2%, committed 4th most Illegal D violations in WC (12), committed 4th most offensive fouls in WC (39),

My Grade (1 to 5): 5, Explanation: He was the perfect complement to Chris Paul on both offense and defense. Offensively, he gave the Hornets a much needed post scorer and made sure CP3 didn't tire himself about by creating every shot on every play. Defensively, his terrific help D allowed CP to gamble for steals (and end up leading the league in the category). He was durable (76 games). At the end of the day, I still think he's underrated. At the beginning of the year, everyone was calling him underrated. After his All-Star selection, people couldn't stop raving about him. As CP made his MVP charge, everyone lumped DX's year as part of CP's year, saying Chris Paul "created" David West. So in the course of a year, he's gone from underrated, to possibly overrated, back to underrated again... which is probably just how he likes it.