LeBron James of the Cleveland Cavaliers and Deron Williams of the Utah Jazz are two players that are making things happen for their respective squads in the ongoing 2008-09 NBA season. James had so far carried the Cavs on his broad shoulders all season long to post the best over-all win-loss record thus far in the league. But not to be outdone is Williams’ current form that help the Jazz to a 45-27 mark to date.
Williams, a 6’3 guard out of Illinois, had played behind the shadows of his more illustrious 2005 rookie batchmate Chris Paul of the New Orleans Hornets during his first three years in the league. What is incredible in Williams’ so far short-term career is the year-by-year improvement in points (10.8 ppg in 05-06, 16.2 ppg in 06-07, 18.8 ppg in 07-08 and 18.9 ppg in 08-09) and in playmaking ability (4.5 apg in 05-06, 9.3 apg in 06-07, 10.5 apg in 07-08 and 10.6 apg in 08-09). Truly he is playing beautiful music with the rest of the Jazz reliables like Carlos Boozer and Andrei Kirilenko. Both Williams and Boozer are also part of the Team USA gold medal winners in the last Beijing Olympics.
The way I see it, Williams had no visible weaknesses in his game. His maturity transformation process is really remarkable and his consistency in quarterbacking the squad from start to finish is quite impressive. Coach Jerry Sloan had given his go-signal for Williams to take the last shot in close games and there are countless outings this season in which he bailed out the Jazz from the claws of defeat.
It would not be surprising at all if Williams’ Jazz outsmart Paul’s Hornets in the coming play-offs. That would definitely be a shining moment in Williams young career as he would finally breakout from Paul’s shadows and eventually becomes the league’s premier point guard.
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