The Charlotte Bobcats Would Be Better Off Without Stephen Jackson

Whatever the Charlotte Bobcats can do to remove forward Stephen Jackson from their roster should be done posthaste. If they can find a team on which to unload Jackson, then that would be wonderful, but failing that, the Bobcats need to either release him outright or just buy out his contract. The Bobcats need to do this because there will never come a time when having Stephen Jackson on the roster will consistently help them win games or become an upper-echelon team. Instead, his presence on the team only hurts the franchise over the long run.

Jackson has made a career out of being a high-volume shooter but inefficient scorer, and this season is no exception as Jackson is playing near to his career statistics.

For the season, Jackson is using up 26.9 percent of the Bobcats' plays while he is on the floor, which is the highest usage percentage on the team. At the same time, Jackson is only producing 100 points per 100 possessions, giving him the 10th worst offensive rating on the Bobcats. For the record, 15 players have played for the Bobcats this season.

The fact that Jackson takes so many shots as if he were a good offensive player, 3.9 more field goal attempts per game than the next closest player, while shooting the ball so poorly from the field means he is a dangerous presence on the Bobcats offense since he is making the whole unit more inefficient than it needs to be. An inefficient offense, like the one the Bobcats currently possess with an offensive rating of 103.4 points per 100 possessions that ranks 25th out of the 30 NBA teams, is the calling card of a mediocre team.

When the team's offensive rating is higher than a player's, that player is a detriment to the team.

Overall, Jackson has only contributed 0.059 win shares per 48 minutes for the season. Again, that ranks him 10th out of 15 players who have played for the Bobcats.

This is actually the second season where Jackson's presence on the Bobcats has been less valuable than the majority of the team. Last season, Jackson again used the highest percentage of the team's plays with a 27.8 usage percentage; actually, he was second to Acie Law's 31.1 usage percentage, but Law only played 33 minutes across nine games for the Bobcats and it is a certainty he would not have used that many of the team's plays had he played more minutes.

Identically to this season, last year, Jackson only produced 100 points per 100 possessions, which was 10th on the 2009-10 Bobcats; I discounted Raja Bell's offensive rating because he only appeared in 5 games for the Bobcats. The entire team's offensive rating was 104.4 points per 100 possessions so having Jackson on offense made the Bobcats worse despite the fact his 21.1 points per game were the highest on the team.

Unsurprisingly, Jackson's 0.085 win shares per 48 minutes were 11th on the team; Raja Bell's statistic in that category was discounted for the same reason his offensive rating was ignored.

During his 126 games with the Bobcats, Jackson has yet to truly help the team and he is incapable of ever doing so, which is why the Bobcats not only do not need him on the roster, but would be better off without him.

The rest of the NBA should take notice of the kind of player Jackson really is in case a team thinks that having him on the roster would give them the missing piece to its championship puzzle. He simply is not because his skill set and approach to the game of basketball are not going to help any team.

Jackson plays the game as if he is a great scoring option, but he is not. His whole career where he has produced 101 points per 100 possessions and allowed 107 points per 100 possessions while contributing just 0.070 win shares per 48 minutes reveals his true nature, that of an awful NBA player.