Know Thy Self - A Look at Damion James

Damion Marquez James

Twitter: KONJames10

Nickname: None, but New Jersey fans were pushing for Stone Hands

Born: 12/7/1987 in Hobbs, New Mexico

A town of 43,000 people Hobbs in located near the Texas border between Lubbock and Odessa. Hobbs High is actually a New Mexico basketball powerhouse winning 16 boys state titles. That's not really important here as Damion moved across Texas to Nacogdoches, Texas and played high school ball there. Nacogdoches is actually a smaller town at only 32,000 people but has had more notable residents like musician Don Henley. Nacogdoches has actually produced quite a few athletes too like soccer player Clint Dempsey, linebacker Jeremiah Trotter and football coach Bum Phillips. Nacogdoches is a city of firsts for Texas like publishing the first English-language newspaper and in 1859 it was home to the first oil well in Texas.

College: Texas

Everyone knows Texas as the college football behemoth that even has its own athletics television network. With more than 38,000 undergraduate students at any given time, it's likely that many would become famous. Movies are extremely well represented by Longhorns with Owen Wilson, Renee Zellweger, and Matthew McConaughey in front of the camera, and Robert Rodriguez behind it (Desperado, Spy Kids, Sin City, From Dusk till Dawn). Music isn't UT's strong point but Janis Joplin did attend UT although she didn't graduate. Even though Texas had two First Ladies graduate from there I think the most famous Longhorn was Walter Cronkite. Being evening anchor from 1962-1980 at CBS during the age of three networks can do that. In terms of famous athletes, there are many to choose from and while a case can be made for Earl Campbell and someday it might become Kevin Durant, right now the most famous Longhorn athlete is probably Roger Clemens. A hall of fame career punctuated with a doping scandal and trial about perjury before Congress will do that.

Personal Notes: Damion was technically an Atlanta Hawks (Rick Sund era) draft pick although he was immediately traded for Jordan Crawford and the 31st pick which was sold to Oklahoma City. Damion originally committed to Oklahoma but switched to Texas when Coach Kelvin Sampson left OU for Indiana. Going from his tweets Damion like 5 Guys Burgers.

ESPN Top 500 rank: 439 just behind Pablo Prigioni (437) and Chris Wright (438) but just ahead of DeSagana Diop (440) and Kim English (441).

Wingspan: 84.75"

basketball-reference.com sponsorship price: $25 - think of this as a Q-rating for basketball. Better known players have hiring rates because in theory their stat page will get visited more often.

Horoscope: As a Sagitarrius I found this free sports horoscope for the year: You resolutely engage your basic energy within the framework of your work, this year. Indeed, you are at the same time tranquillized from the results which you had spring last, and galvanized by those to go still further. The last Jupiter rays encourage you in this direction, and rightly. Your bonds with your superiors s' announce fluid because you will have the art to make circulate your ideas with tact and good sense.

Chinese Zodiac: Born in the year of the Rabbit. People born under the sign of the rabbit are gentle, sensitive, compassionate, amiable, modest and merciful, and have strong memory. They like to communicate with others in a humorous manner. They cannot bear dull life, so they are good at creating romantic or interesting spice. They are soft-spoken and welcoming, being fond of peaceful love life. They lack meditative abilities and often sink money into ideas that may cause failures in their career. They are amorous and not determined, soft in appearance and stubborn inside. People born under the sign of the rabbit are gentle, sensitive, compassionate, amiable, modest and merciful, and have strong memory. They like to communicate with others in a humorous manner. They cannot bear dull life, so they are good at creating romantic or interesting spice. They are soft-spoken and welcoming, being fond of peaceful love life. They lack meditative abilities and often sink money into ideas that may cause failures in their career. They are amorous and not determined, soft in appearance and stubborn inside.

The earthly branches of rabbit and dragon, Mao and Chen, are of harm to each other. Therefore, dragon and rabbit people are not compatible. Rabbit people will still have a hard year in 2012.

Workplace Compatibility:
>Work best with monkeys and dogs (none on the roster).
Not so good with pigs (Devin Harris), roosters (Kyle Korver and DeShawn Stevenson), and goats (John Jenkins).

Stats: This block is a combination of data from basketball-reference.com and 82games.com to give an idea of the playing style and effectiveness of a player.

Quick Analysis: It was in limited action of only 7 games, but horrible stats across the board. The offensive rating of 76 is among the lowest I've seen and the hands rating of 0.3 is unbelievable low. Everything is low except his propensity to rebound the ball. If James sticks with the team or even in the league will depend on his doing the dirty work like rebounding and defense, because his offense would have to improve substantially just to be considered bad. I know this read negative, but those stats were horrible. I hope Damion makes the team because I really like the way he rebounds from the SF position and he has the athleticism to become a lock down defender. The rankings are out of 478 players listed on basket-reference.com for last season with no qualifying minimums to provide some context for the numbers.

Hopefully, you feel you know a little more about Damion James than before. Let me know what you think in your comments. Do you think Damion can make the roster? If so, do you see him contributing?