Looks like we dodged a bullet here.
https://deadspin.com/add-kyle-kuzmas...rab-1838530653
Hope AD likes playing with JaVale McGee
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Looks like we dodged a bullet here.
https://deadspin.com/add-kyle-kuzmas...rab-1838530653
Hope AD likes playing with JaVale McGee
Last edited by 13 - 3; 09-27-2019 at 01:38 PM.
Lol, nobody wanted Kuzma in the first place. His name only ever came up as leverage, since everyone knew that the Lakers brass loved him.
He sucks, hard. As hard as I am on Ingram, Kuzma is twice as bad. And older.
Edit: also gotta note, obviously I'm not glad he's injured. I try not to celebrate injuries, the vast majority of the time. But I (and many others) did say that the Lakers had set themselves up poorly, with no depth, and were a couple of injuries away from big trouble. If this turns into a Thing, rather than just a thing, then there could be some problems for them out of the gate.
Basketball.
Confirmed by ESPN
https://es.pn/2n724LG
Looking forward to finding out if a Rondo-Bradley two man combo is enough to drag two players as talented as LeBron & AD to a negative net rating overall https://t.co/RlX3UG4AiF
— Mason Ginsberg (@MasonGinsberg) September 27, 2019
Some interesting info from the Lakers camp here.
If Kuzma is out to start the season, do we see Rondo/Bradley/Lebron/AD/Dwight start the year?
If so.... lol
There is no way AD stays next year. Team is awful for the future.Originally Posted by Pelicanidae
#DoitBig https://t.co/jjTNVfK3jK
— Shamit Dua (@FearTheBrown) September 27, 2019
LMAO!
In other news, Lakers are a garbage fire.
Now kind of upset Griff didn't get this year's pick. Although going forward just how awful are they going to be. Maybe Philly-like awful.
It’s funny how ESPN is spinning this as “No big deal”. Anthony Davis saying he can’t wait to play with Dwight and McGee. I spat my soda everywhere in laughter. If he wanted a clown show he certainly got it. Oh I can’t wait to see Rondo and Dwight sharing the ball. LOL.
Last edited by 13 - 3; 09-27-2019 at 05:54 PM.
Couldn't get this year's pick. Can't do consecutive years, so if they gave us the 2020 pick, we couldn't get the 2019 pick. Which is what we used to get off Solo's deal, pick up Hayes, NAW, and Didi, and acquire Favors (space created by moving Solo). So I'm pretty pleased by the way we did it.
A team with AD and Bron won't be garbage, even though the pieces may not appear to be complimentary.
I believe an argument can be made for AD as the best player in the league when healthy, Bron is still a top 5. That's enough for a team to at least be solid, even if the supporting cast is suspect.
We had a team with AD, Jrue, Demarcus Cousins (pre-Achilles explosion), and a better supporting cast than the Lakers have now, and we still barely made the playoffs.
Is Lebron's value, in year 17, going to essentially equivalent to Jrue's + pre-Achilles Cousins, plus the extra necessary to make up for the terrible supporting cast?
I doubt it.
That's a valid argument.. maybe we just have a difference of opinion on what constitutes a garbage/awful team.
And yes I do think Bron who still put up exceptional numbers last season, with Green is a better supporting cast for AD than what the Pels had. I also don't think anyone considered the Pels an awful or garbage team. It always seemed to me that all that was needed was one more marquee player to team with AD. I will acknowledge I'm working with a limited sample size since I didn't catch a lot of the games. So I might be wrong about that.
I've been scratching my head on potential lineups for both the Lakers and Clippers. Javale pretty much came out the other day saying he expects to start, and gave the impression thats be disappointed if he doesnt.
So for the Lakers is it:
Rondo/Green/Lebron/AD/McGee
Lebron/Green/Kuzma/AD/McGee
Rondo/Green/Kuzma/Lebron/AD
Replace Rondo with Bradley in above lineups
People talk about the Pelicans spacing problems, yet in any of those lineups you have two possible reliable shooters and only if Kuzma starts. Bench not very deep.
Clippers
Beverly/Leonard/George/Harrell/Zubac
Beverly/Leonard/George/Harkless/Harrell
Beverly/Williams/Leonard/George/Harrell
Beverly/Leonard/Harkless/Harrell/Zubac* (George expected to miss early part of the season)
Beverly/Williams/Leonard/Harrell/Zubac* (George expected to miss early part of the season)
No matter how you slice it, the Clippers look punishable inside with limited floor spacing or holes on defense while George is out..
People dont want to talk about them, but the best 1 - 5 lineup I've seen is definitely Utah.
Last edited by luckyman; 09-27-2019 at 06:27 PM.
I'm not entirely sure what you mean when it comes to the Clippers.
All of those Clippers lineups have at least 2 players who are strong perimeter threats (Leonard/George, Leonard/Beverley, Beverley/George, etc) and then you've completely neglected to incorporate JaMychal Green, who the Clips resigned and who is also a capable shooter (shot 40% last year on 3+ attempts per game with Clips), who will probably get more run than Zubac and who graded out as a reasonable defender, even if he's not elite.
I'm not sure how a lineup like the Clips, which features Beverley (39% from 3 last year), Leonard (37% from 3 last year), PG13 (38.6% from 3 last year), Green (40% from 3 last year), Landry Shamet (42% from 3 last year) etc, is a team that has ''limited floor spacing''.
Especially when you consider that team also contains PatBec, Kawhi, PG13, Mo Harkless, and Harrell, I'm not sure how it's a team with big holes on defense either. Like, maybe when you mention they'll be punishable inside, there's some truth to that because neither Harrell nor Green are elite rim protectors, but it's not like they're sieves either: Harrell in particular held opponents to 6.7% worse than their averages at the rim last year.
Also, Kuzma isn't a reliable shooter whatsoever.
Beverly/Leonard/Green/George/Shamet will never be a Clippers lineup any more than NAW/Jackson/Redick/Moore/Melli will be for the Pelicans. You just threw together all their best shooters as if that would ever be feasible to put on the floor together. Thats wierd and makes no sense whatsoever but ok.
Two, you include Green who has played in 24 and 41 games in the last two years, averaged only ~20 mins per game, and has not averaged more than 3 three point shot per game (only 2.3 last year), yet you rail on Ingram because his attemps are around 2 per game? Thats also wierd and makes no sense whatsoever but ok again.
For three, I said there are exploitable holes on their defense. This is true. Zubac, again, has only averaged around 17 minutes per game and has only played in 26 and 33 games in the last two years. Nothing jumps off the charts for him defensively. Harrell is not particularly explosive at 6'8" and in the most minutes he's played in his career last year, averaged 3 fouls per game. He plays hard and wont give up anything easy, but can be exploited against decent bigs.
You can run to the stat page further if you like, but against a team with good bigs, a front court of Zubac/Harrell is highly exploitable and only goes downhill from there.
I also didnt say every of their lineups has limited floor spacing. The key word is OR punishable inside.
Last edited by luckyman; 09-27-2019 at 07:06 PM.
I wasn't listing them as in ''these people will all play together at the same time''. The point wasn't ''the Clips will run THIS lineup!'', the point was that if a team has 5 or 6 players who are all VERY high calibre shooters, then they will always be able to have 2 or 3 or those individuals on the floor at any given time. Teams generally only run rotations 8 to 10 men deep. If you have 5 above average shooters across all 5 positions, then any 5 man group you create out of a 10 man group can easily contain at least 2 of them.
That's all you really need to space a floor adequately for a modern NBA offense. Obviously they're an extreme example, but look at Golden State. They've been able to spend years running lineups that contain multiple absolute non-factors from deep like Iguodala and Green because the other few players like Curry and Klay have been so good that you only need a few at a time. That's an extreme, and obviously LAC has nobody of the Curry/Klay calibre, but it's demonstrative of the point.
With JaMychal Green, I'm not really sure what you're talking about. He played in 65 games last year alone, not ''24 and 41 games in the last 2 years''. He got traded mid-way through last season. I think what you've done is look at his one season on Basketball Reference that's divided into two columns (one for each team he played with) and taken that as separate years, when they aren't. They're the same year. 65 games. You made the same mistake with Zubac: he hasn't played in ''26 and 33 games in the last two years''. He played in 59 games last year. That's one year, where he got traded, and you've misread the columns.
And Green shot 2.7 threes per game in that year, at 40%. Not sure why you're bringing up Ingram, because the requirements for a stretch 5 are different from the requirements for a ball-dominant forward, but even so, call me when Ingram hits takes 2.7 threes a game and hits 40% of them: I will be very pleased about it. For Ingram, that would mean shooting at a career best in efficiency, at the same time as shooting at a career high in volume. I'll take that, very gladly.
As for Zubac and Harrell's defense, I don't disagree that neither of them are all-League defenders. But at the same time, neither of them (particularly Harrell) are scrubs. Yes, it's true that neither of them can handle, say, Joel Embiid or Nikola Jokic with any facility, but how many centres can? Very few. The fact is that Harrell is a capable defender who can do a perfectly respectable job on most centres in the league. Is that ''exploitable''? Maybe against 4 teams in the NBA. Unless you're Philadelphia, Denver, Milwaukee, or the Lakers, I wouldn't count on that being too soft a spot for you.
If you're rolling out a 5 man starting lineup where Montrezl Harrell is your absolute worst defender, you're in a very good place there.
Can Davis stay healthy?
I think so.. I just think you guys are overstating the Lakers shortcomings.
Out of the 5 names in the LA projected starting five listed above, Rajon Rondo is their best shooter.
Only one of the five (Davis) was a plus on both sides of the floor.
They have a grand total of 2 two way players (Danny Green, AD), and only three players on the entire roster who can create for themselves on anything like a consistent basis (Lebron, AD, Kuzma). One of those three names is one of the worst big-minute players in the NBA.
The Lakers have issues. Big ones.
Think you missed my point. What I said.. "I just think you guys are overstating the Lakers shortcomings".. You said.. "In other news, Lakers are a garbage fire."
I've acknowledged the roster has issues. Saying they're awful, or suggesting they're garbage is a bit hyperbolic in my opinion.
I think a roster that has 2 two-way players in total, and only 3 people who can create their own shot, one of whom is Kyle Kuzma, is a garbage roster.
If any other team outside of maybe Boston had constructed a roster like this, there is no way anyone would consider it a sure fire playoff team, let alone a finals contender, like they do with the Lakers. If this exact same team was in Orlando, or Minnesota, or hell, New Orleans, people would be saying that either AD or Lebron would be demanding a trade by mid-season because the front office had failed to give them support. But cause it's LA, we're supposed to pretend that it's not a complete trash heap? Nah.
Yea.. definitely hyperbolic in my opinion. You have two of the top five players in the league on the same squad, with a soso supporting cast. No, that is not what I'd call a trash heap. I think sometimes we talk past each other. You stated.. "no way anyone would consider it a sure fire playoff team, let alone a finals contender, like they do with the Lakers."
That has nothing to do with my very simple rebut, that characterizing the Lakers as garbage is a bit much. Objectively speaking.. As constructed I have no idea what they will or won't achieve, but I do know they aren't a trash, or awful team. One can believe this while not being impressed with the roster construction. We don't have to be on the far end of the spectrum either way.
My mistake on Green and Zubac, but my point still stands that on far as shooters, you cant count Green but disregard Ingram. Green is a stretch 4 who can shoot as many 3s as a shooting forward. But he has long stretches of a season where he might shoot no more than 1, 2 or 3 per game. While he and Beverly's stats might say they are making 3s at an above average rate, neither of their games are centered around shooting, or just scoring a lot of points period.
So imo I just don't count those guys as "floor stretchers" like a JJ Redick or Etwaun who's games are built around that. Or even Ingram who will be expected to score and expected to put up many more 3s in Gentry's system. I'd put Shamet in that category before either Green or Beverly.
And the Lakers have some question marks about their roster, but I sure as hell wouldnt call it garbage.
Last edited by luckyman; 09-27-2019 at 09:38 PM.
I can't count the guy who, last season, shot more threes than Ingram ever has in a season at higher efficiency than Ingram ever has in a season? Weird.
Beverley takes more than 50% of his FG attempts from 3. His offensive game is, very much, centred around being a threat from outside. It's true that he's not called upon to score a lot of points, but neither is Kyle Korver, and I think we'd all agree that this fact doesn't prevent Korver's shooting from stretching the floor.
It's true, of course, that someone like Patrick Beverley is not counted on as a floor stretcher in the same way that Redick is, because he doesn't provide the same manipulation of offense via running off screens and off-ball movement that Redick does, but that doesn't change the fact that he IS a shooter, who WILL hit threes, regularly, and who CANNOT be ignored on the 3 point line. The Lakers have precisely one player with that level of shooting on their entire roster in Danny Green. As a side note, I wouldn't count Moore as a floor stretcher in the same way as Redick either: his volume is much lower, and much like Beverley his off-ball movement is on a much lower level.
I did list Shamet as well, so... yeah.
I'm gonna list all of the actually good players on the LA roster. You ready?
- Lebron James
- Anthony Davis
- Danny Green.
Done. 55 wins and a ring sound realistic to you?
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