Francisco Garcia.. Remind you of someone?

[Padrino]

I actually think he can be a lockdown stopper/defender. You're not supposed to be as good defensively as Garcia is as a rookie -- there's a learning curve that Garcia has largely bypassed. He doesn't have the lateral quickness to say in front of people, but Artest is going to be a perfect teacher. Artest isn't the quickest guy in the league, but once someone gets past him he doesn't give up, he keeps pestering his man and pestering him to force his man into a bad shot. I can see Garcia being that type of a pestering presence, especially with the blocked shots.

i agree

i think very few players come out of college who are known as "defensive stoppers." and those who are considered defensive stoppers are primarily big men who can clog the paint. doug christie certainly wasn't known for his defense when he first entered the nba. in fact, if i have my histroy right, it was quite the opposite. doug never made a name for himself in the nba until he came to the kings, but he was more or less an offensive player. he became a defensive stopper while playing for the kings. and, strangely enough, he lost his offense. i think much of that was due to his performance against the lakers in the 02 western conference finals. he played very poorly in the last coupla games, and threw up an airball or two, if i remember correctly. i don't think he ever recovered from that, offensively. so he stuck with his defense, which had improved considerably.

now, as for garcia, i don't know that he'll ever be a stopper like DC, but i'm also not ready to say that it won't happen, especially if ron artest is around long enough to help mentor garcia, defensively. sometimes that's all it takes. defense is, for the most part, effort. technique, understanding, court awareness, timing...those are all defensive aspects that garcia can improve on over time. but, for now, the effort is there, and that's more than half the battle.