Bringing this up again because I feel like Billups is the main problem in all of the Nuggets' losses.
I am a huge fan of Billups. When I got NBA 2k6 the first thing I did was pick the Pistons (his team at the time) and score only with him. I have a cousin that played on the same basketball team as him when they were in George Washington High School and coincidentally used to be good friends with one of his nieces (slightly off topic.)
Point is, I think Billups is a great player, but at this point in his career he is just hurting the Nuggets.
Billups is shooting a point guard low of 34.6% which will only decrease after his performance of 4/14 tonight. His assist average only continues to drop as it now slightly hovers above 4. As of Sunday, 15 players are averaging at least 7 assists. It is clear that he is more of a shooting type point guard than a pass first point guard but with Carmelo Anthony on the team any starting PG averaging over 31 minutes should be able to easily notch AT LEAST 5 assists or shoot an average field goal percentage of over 45% with Carmelo drawing all the attention.
He throws up bad shots at bad times and at times seems to refuse to give up the ball and only try to force some points himself. One of Billups' random three pointer toss up with over 20 seconds on the clock in my opinion killed the momentum that the Nuggets had with attacking the basket and moving the ball around.
Tonight in Phoenix, the solid double digit lead was blown once Billups was inserted in the line up. He is a heavy liability on offense as well as on the defensive end. Every player he is assigned to this season has lit the Nuggets up, such as Jason Terry or Collison.
Billups is a great leader. This has been proven by the season that the Nuggets went to the conference finals, so I do not think the Nuggets should look to trade him away (unless a great trade comes along of course) but I think he really needs to have his minutes taken down a notch or even come off the bench altogether. Going just off his numbers he would not be a starting PG on the majority of the teams in the NBA.
