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The nucleus of this team going forward (if we can agree) is Zion, BI, JAX, Lonzo (maybe), Hart, NAW and Melli (maybe). Who amongst them is a shutdown defender capable of playing 'lockdown defense' on a 'primary' offensive weapon? Maybe DiDi is the guy, huh?
Of course it the makeup of the team is a consideration.
By the way, dae....
Just for "S & G's", how many of your six criteria does JAX check off?
I see Hayes having the potential to have everything except shot creation off the dribble.Originally Posted by As I See It
Stuff he absolutely already has shown:
- Elite tier finishing at the rim
- 1v1 defense
- Good passing feel
Stuff I think he has potential for that he's already hinted at:
- Shooting (not elite, but good for a centre)
- Team defense
Don't see him as ever being an incredible off the dribble scorer. When I say shooting I mean relative to position, so I'm not picturing him ever being a 45% 3pt shooter on 10 a game or anything, I just mean 3 or 4 a game on 36% is within reality.
Basketball.
We mostly agree. I don't see that Melli or NAW are part of the nucleus of the team (it's possibly but I think it's far from a given) and I don't think Lonzo has a place on this team long term at all.
So we're left with Zion, BI, Jax, Hart.
I think Zion has the potential to be a good team defender and very good 1v1 defender. He showed that at Duke, and he never really got a normal rookie season this year to improve on D, especially after the injury. I could always be wrong and maybe his Duke D will never translate to the NBA, but I think it's too early to count it out.
BI is a good shooter, can create his shot off the dribble, is an okay passer and a very good finisher. Bad defender, this is true.
Hart is a pretty good defender, very good finisher especially in transition, and an okay shooter: mediocre at everything else, we all know he's a roleplayer.
Jax's issues, I've described as above.
I don't think Didi is secretly the guy that some people think he is. I've seen a lot of people acting like he's gonna come over from Aus and light the world on fire, mostly from people who I don't think actually watched him in Aus this year very much. In a perfect world I probably leave him over there for another year: his shooting was nothing like what we hoped and while he was solid defensively, he wasn't incredible or anything.
So the question isn't ''can we field a championship team next year with these guys'', it's ''can you build a strong defense around these guys over the next 3 years or so?'', and I think the answer to that is yes.
Like they say, "everyone has one."
He's shown good passing feel, multiple times, including off the dribble surprisingly. And his 1v1 defense, especially in the paint, has largely been fine. His issue has always been whenever he has to think about more than one thing at a time.
Yes he's foul prone but so is damn near every good big man as a young player. Go look up Shaq's rookie foul rate and be prepared to cry when you see he averaged fouling out per 100.
Umm... Zion? Pretty obvious to me. Maybe Lonzo if he bounces back from last year, though man defense isn't even the main problem with him. Hell, even Hart is ok and I think as long as he doesn't guard forwards or super quick guards Ingram can become solid in that department too. And then you talk about JAX, who has the potential to anchor a defense one day, which is much more important than individual defense. This narrative that no one on our team has the tools to be a great-to-good defender is patently false, and reactionary no less.
Last edited by Funcrusher; 08-21-2020 at 06:26 PM.
We mostly agree. So as I said, there is no one on this team capable of being a shutdown defender (if Zion is a maybe).
I totally agree with you about DiDi (he may never wear a Pelican uniform). (NOTE: I would be delighted to be wrong.)
And points 5 and 6 in your profiling tool is a must if we are building around the guys we've mentioned.
My thought process is that you can always afford to have 2 defensive liabilities on the court at once (as long as they provide other value) as long as the other 3 are legitimately good defenders. An example of this, this year, would be the Heat being able to put together the 11th best defense despite starting Duncan Robinson and Kendrick Nunn for most of the year, both of whom are really poor defenders: Butler, Adebayo, and Leonard are all good or great defenders, so it works out.
We have Zion, who I think can be potentially a good-to-great defender. We have Hart, who is a good defender. We have Jax, who I think is/will be a good defender.
Then we have Ingram who is a poor defender. That's 4 players: realistically, you have 10 players in your normal rotation at any point. That means we can afford to have another poor defender or two on the team and in the rotation (again, as long as they are providing positive value elsewhere) as long as there are always defenders on the court with them.
That's why I don't care too much if we draft someone who is a mediocre 1v1 defender this year at #13: we can probably get Tillie or Tillman later in the draft, and they're both very good defenders, and then we still have Jrue for now as well. Then, going forward into next years draft and next year's free agency, we can make sure we maintain that balance of defensive to offensive talent.
Obviously in a perfect world everyone on your roster would be a great 2 way player but that's just not realistic.
The Pelicans were literally a bi-polar team this year....
They were the fourth best offense.....and the fourth worse defense (even with the great Jrue Holiday). We leaked like a sieve. Defense has got to be a priority now if there is any hope of bright future in Smoothie King (especially if the team moves Holiday).
BTW: I certainly don't see any Curry's, Harden's, or Luka's in this draft so the elite offensive player in the 2020 Draft is a myth.
My point isn't that there's secretly Luka sat there in this draft. They are extreme examples to demonstrate the point, which is that if you are good enough at other things, you can be a productive NBA player even if you are not great at 1v1 defense. There are obviously role-player examples of this as well (JJ Redick, Kyle Korver, Lou Williams, Tony Parker for most of his career, etc etc) but I wanted to give clear, unarguable examples. Otherwise I'd mention Kyle Korver and risk the ''ah but is he even that valuable'' argument, which I was trying to avoid for the sake of a clear example.
We did leak like a sieve, but that's not because of any one player, and I will repeat, constructing the team long term around what sounds convenient for the short term is a mistake. When you draft a player, you essentially have them in your control for 7 years, assuming you do the extension at the end of the rookie scale. So when you are drafting a player, you are making a potentially long term decision. If you draft a player specifically so that they fit with E'twaun Moore and Jahlil Okafor, and then both of those players are gone before they hit their second season, then you've messed up.
Draft the player you think is going to be the best, and if you're considering fit, do so with only your franchise type players in mind. I don't care if we draft someone who is a bad defensive combo with JJ Redick, because JJ Redick won't be here when we're competing for championships because there's only one year left on his deal and he's 37.
You are drifting away from our conversation. I haven't once said that either Moore, JJ, or Jah were part of the nucleus. But, since the players we do have control of for the foreseeable future lack an acuity for playing defense (Zion ???) ....somebody better.
Somebody better. But you don't have to necessarily draft that person right now. There are multiple drafts, in which we have multiple picks, and multiple free agencies between now and when we're going to be competing.
So we can agree on 4 key guys for the future: Zion, Ingram, Jax, and Hart. We can also agree that 3 of those 4 are, or at least have the potential to be, solid defenders.
So when we go into this draft, we do so with the intent of drafting the player who we think will be the best. If that happesn to be a player who is defensively minded, then that's cool and great, but if they aren't then it doesn't really matter because we have a long time and a lot of resources with which to tailor the roster.
'Potential' and a 26th rank defense = Lottery Pick in the ensuing draft.
Please for the love of god give me a good lottery pick in the 2021 draftCade, BJ Boston, Scottie Barnes, please!
But this is my entire point. You're going ''adding potential to THIS defense, gives you a lottery pick NEXT year''.
We won't have this defense cause half this team won't be here, and I don't care about next year. My priority is accumulating the talent under cost controlled contracts so that we can compete for championships in 3, 4 years from now.
In the era of 1,000 screens per possession, having a lockdown defender doesn't mean much of anything. You need multiple "good" defenders, or a TEAM that understands how and when to switch and bigs with good lateral movement.
So you obviously need players with physicality to fight through/around screens, and for dear god once you force a bad shot, have to ability to go get the rebound.
Half of that equation, with a young team, only comes with time and experience.
I do believe they will target a big capable of that Dennis Rodman/Bill Winnington very unsexy dirty work. Pick won't be popular among fans, especially if the guy can't shoot 3s, but on this team it is very much needed.
Team defense > 1v1 defense.
Hopefully this will be another place where we agree
I think Lonzo being a part of this team moving forward will depend 100% on the coach we hire.
Some coaches will not put up with a guard shooting 40% Free Throws, and launching asinine step back 3's out of nowhere.
Consistency is what most coaches are looking for, and Lonzo has none of it.
Unless Jax develops an outside shot, he's not the right 5 next to Zion
Don’t agree. A strong finisher is still a good piece to have next to Zion. Zion will be able to bait defenses with his gravity leaving Hayes wide open on the baseline or backside. Griffin and Jordan did this for years. While it would be nice for Hayes to develop an outside shot, it’s not necessary for the two to exist... especially if you expect Zion to develop a perimeter game like Giannis. With Zion’s Versatility to play on both the perimeter and in the post over time, it’s likely the Pelicans will need a dominant shot blocker with good hands and a strong aggressive finisher and a stretch big to Round out the rotation.
Can you imagine the pick and roll game with Zion/Hayes once Zion develops into a primary ball handler?
Last edited by Snarly; 08-22-2020 at 01:56 AM.
Pretty much completely agree with this.
I do hope Jax will develop a shot, and I think he has the potential to do so. If he doesn't, it is true that we will need another big who can shoot to provide that variation in looks and lineups, as well as options for offense. It's not impossible, for example, if Zion develops as we believe he will, to run Zion at the 3 and put a shooting big at the 4 and then a more traditional big like Jax at the 5, depending on who the other two guys are.
It's been a minute since I updated this. I didn't have per 100 stats for Poku so I assumed Greek A2 is 75 possessions per 40 minutes. If anyone has a better estimate, let me know! https://t.co/Ui50OUl2vm pic.twitter.com/GsxXKvnfAF
— You know it, I know it, we all know it’s Wiseman (@thecity2) August 21, 2020
Just so you know, these stats are basically accurate: the Greek league is about 75 possessions per 40 (it's 75.9, apparently, so barely off).
The X axis is stocks (steals+blocks) and the Y axis is FT%+ASTs. It's not a perfect metric, but it's just a rough look at the statistical defensive production of a big combined with the strongest signifiers of touch and playmaking (ft% being better for projecting shooting than just raw 3pt percentage a lot of the time, and assists obviously being the best simple number for passing skill).
Pokusevski is in rare air. He's just below Brandon Clarke, Embiid, Jaren Jackson Jr, and Zion in the stocks (Anthony Davis waaaay off in front in stocks) but is by far the best showing here in the FT%+AST category. Nobody really comes close to him: second place goes to Draymond Green. It's kind of bonkers how ahead he is in that stat.
Now, it does have to be noted that he's playing against worst competition than these guys were, but come on. When someone plays against bad competition, if they're good, you expect them to dominate, and he's dominated. This is exactly what you would want to see from him.
Right now, neither of those two player play adequate NBA Defense. So they can't co-exist anytime soon....if ever.
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