2021 NBA Draft Day - 29th July

[AusPel]

I'd like to address the Pels youth as well as their reluctance to add too many 2nd rounders, two way guys, etc. very quickly.

There seems to be a fallacy, in the NBA and especially in regard to the Pels in particular, that the more bites of the apple the better when it comes to the draft. I'm as guilty of it as anybody where I always want youth youth youth. The issue with this, though, is an NBA team only has so many developmental resources available, even for a team like the Pels who now has their own G-league team. The Pels only have one Spoon and one Fred Vinson. Anyone in the league will tell you that Vinson is so valuable because he literally never stops working. Even if Vinson worked 24/7 365, that is still a finite number, meaning only so much of that time can be allotted to certain players.

The numbers vary, but the prime years of an NBA player are roughly age 24-30. Where that comes in to play for the Pelicans is they currently have 9 players under the age of 24: Brandon Ingram, Zion Williamson, Nickeil Alexander Walker, Jaxson Hayes, Kira Lewis, Trey Murphy, Didi Louzada, Naji Marshall, and Herb Jones. That means all nine of these guys are still in the developmental stages of their career, varying a bit by age and athletic potential.

I think anyone on here would agree that most of the developmental resources should go to Zion, followed by Brandon Ingram. That is our core, and that's who the focus should be. Then, these developmental resources should be allotted to NAW, Jax, Kira, and Murphy. Finally you have guys like Naji, Didi, and Herb who get the remainder.

The issue with adding additional second round picks to this group is that every player that you add, you have to take away developmental resources from someone else. If you add Brandon Boston and JT Thor, those are resources that are now stripped from the likes of Zion, BI, etc. I think everyone on here would agree that we don't want to take away crucial developmental minutes from Zion. We would all prefer to have a 99 overall Zion than have a 94 overall Zion and a 72 overall Brandon Boston.

So you say, why pick Herb over Boston if Boston has more potential? It isn't that simple, however. If you look ad Didi, Naji, and Herb, the one thing that they all have in common is that, if they had a jump shot they would be useful role players because they are all ready to contribute in other ways both defensively, on the glass, and in transition. That means that the only developmental resources you really have to put into those guys is on their jumpshot, and the rest can go to your players with higher ceilings who you invested more draft capital in. Brandon Boston, on the other hand, may have some nice potential theoretically, but you have to invest resources in every single aspect of his game in order for him to reach even that of a useful role player. He is an entirely raw player. So for a team like the Clippers who do not have any other developmental players on the entire roster, he makes sense as a project because they can invest the time he needs to reach his ceiling. The Pelicans simply have too many players higher in the developmental pecking order.

Point being, while we all want to add the unknown of a high ceiling 2nd rounder, we don't always consider the ripple effects these additions may have for the rest of the team. The Pels are already loaded with youth, and at a certain point you will start to see diminishing returns if you spread yourself too thin. The better plan, while you develop BI, Zion, NAW, Jax, Kira, and Trey, is to kick the 2nd round can down the line until 2024 or whenever we are ready to contend, when we have the resources available to develop the Brandon Bostons of the world.

As a side note, I think this is why we went after a supposedly lower ceiling guy in Murphy instead of a Kai Jones or Usman Garuba. With the talent and potential on the roster, you really needed to bring in a guy with a well rounded skillset so that you can focusing on very specific areas of his game and allow him to learn a role. That was the Spurs model for years, and it has been adopted by the Grizzlies with great success

There were guys left on the board at 43 that will be much, much better than Didi. He's at that bottom of the massive logjam of 2/3s.

Cooper, for one, would have made a tremendous back up point guard

[smcgull]

#Pelicans defied a major #NBA draft trend in recent years by adding a pair of players with significant college experience. Trey Murphy and Herbert Jones combined to play seven NCAA seasons, expect to bring defensive mentality to New Orleans: https://on.nba.com/3zRIJ1h
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[AUSSIE_PELICAN]

There were guys left on the board at 43 that will be much, much better than Didi. He's at that bottom of the massive logjam of 2/3s.

Cooper, for one, would have made a tremendous back up point guard

How many rookies do you want on this team?
They will use the rest of the roster on vets.

[AusPel]

How many rookies do you want on this team?
They will use the rest of the roster on vets.

Swap out Didi for Cooper because we have zero floor generals on this roster

Didi is virtually Wes Iwundu. Herb Jones makes Didi instantly redundant.

He will hustle until he's tired and he can't shoot

Also, having talented guys at the end of the bench is very useful in trades

[As I See It]

Swap out Didi for Cooper because we have zero floor generals on this roster

Didi is virtually Wes Iwundu

Hustle until he's tired and can't shoot

Also, having talented guys at the end of the bench is very useful in trades

Don't sleep on 'Mugsy'.

[donato]

Swap out Didi for Cooper because we have zero floor generals on this roster

Didi is virtually Wes Iwundu

Hustle until he's tired and can't shoot

Also, having talented guys at the end of the bench is very useful in trades

Didi’s offense has a long way to go, but he looked a lot better than Iwundu last year.

[AusPel]

Didi’s offense has a long way to go, but he looked a lot better than Iwundu last year.

And I'd take Cooper 100/100 times over Didi/Wes

You're veering into strawman territory here

[AusPel]

Cooper is taller than CP3 and he's an elite floor general

No reason in the world to pass on him

We've got our big wings now with BI/Murphy/Jones/Marshall/Hart

Need lead creators. Need play makers

[Pelicanidae]

Cooper is taller than CP3 and he's an elite floor general

No reason in the world to pass on him

I think we have to be fair about Cooper. I was a huge fan, I wanted us to take him or Butler at 35, and he does have a few top top top tier skills. Absurd passer. Gets to the rim at will, draws a TON of FTs and shoots well from the line. Both of those things are immensely valuable, and they're why I said that Atlanta basically got budget Trae Young as a backup for Trae Young.

But all of the same flaws Trae has, Cooper does too, plus some others. He's bad on defense. I think he's got the processing and recognition as well as the lateral quickness to eventually be okay but he'll be forever limited by his size in a way that someone like CP3 isn't because he doesn't have the same body type and outlier strength for his size, and he doesn't put that much effort into it either. And right now, he can't shoot. At all. Again, that may be something that eventually clicks because he's shown decent touch and he's a good FT guy and everything, but he'll need to up his core strength a lot because right now he's just catapulting.

Those are reasons to pass on him, if someone like Butler - who doesn't have those issues - is available.

Not a reason to pass on him for the Almighty Cash Considerations though.

[AusPel]

I think we have to be fair about Cooper. I was a huge fan, I wanted us to take him or Butler at 35, and he does have a few top top top tier skills. Absurd passer. Gets to the rim at will, draws a TON of FTs and shoots well from the line. Both of those things are immensely valuable, and they're why I said that Atlanta basically got budget Trae Young as a backup for Trae Young.

But all of the same flaws Trae has, Cooper does too, plus some others. He's bad on defense. I think he's got the processing and recognition as well as the lateral quickness to eventually be okay but he'll be forever limited by his size in a way that someone like CP3 isn't because he doesn't have the same body type and outlier strength for his size, and he doesn't put that much effort into it either. And right now, he can't shoot. At all. Again, that may be something that eventually clicks because he's shown decent touch and he's a good FT guy and everything, but he'll need to up his core strength a lot because right now he's just catapulting.

Those are reasons to pass on him, if someone like Butler - who doesn't have those issues - is available.

Not a reason to pass on him for the Almighty Cash Considerations though.

Butler went at our old pick and Cooper was the next best for mine

How many creators does this team have? Only 2 right now

That's not going to cut it

I might be insanely high on Naji though. He did show some great creation stuff late

[Pelicanidae]

Butler went at our old pick and Cooper was the next best for mine

How many creators does this team have? Only 2 right now

That's not going to cut it

That's fine, and I agree that more creators is almost always good. Just gotta be careful not to make it look like Cooper was flawless, because he wasn't and his flaws are both big and obvious.

That said, do we only have two creators? I think it depends on what you mean. Self creators - that is, guys who can generate their own shot - I feel like we have 4 right now. Zion and Ingram are clearly there, NAW I think has shown increasing capacity at it, and Valanciunas can make his own shot anywhere inside of 10 feet quite easily.

If you mean creating for others, then yeah I think that's a bit more limited but I still think that there's a some credit to be given to NAW for being a pretty good passer most of the time. Plus, if the franchise believes they're getting Lowry in FA, then really we have at least 3.5 creators (Zion, Ingram, Lowry, NAW is the .5) which is much better.

[AusPel]

That's fine, and I agree that more creators is almost always good. Just gotta be careful not to make it look like Cooper was flawless, because he wasn't and his flaws are both big and obvious.

That said, do we only have two creators? I think it depends on what you mean. Self creators - that is, guys who can generate their own shot - I feel like we have 4 right now. Zion and Ingram are clearly there, NAW I think has shown increasing capacity at it, and Valanciunas can make his own shot anywhere inside of 10 feet quite easily.

If you mean creating for others, then yeah I think that's a bit more limited but I still think that there's a some credit to be given to NAW for being a pretty good passer most of the time. Plus, if the franchise believes they're getting Lowry in FA, then really we have at least 3.5 creators (Zion, Ingram, Lowry, NAW is the .5) which is much better.

Always the level head. And I agree

[PELICANSFAN]

Didi is virtually Wes Iwundu.

Could be true, but why don't we at least let him get some practice and playing time before making that declaration.

[donato]

And I'd take Cooper 100/100 times over Didi/Wes

You're veering into strawman territory here

You said he was virtually Iwundu. Do you even know what a straw man is? I'm going to go with the FO here on choosing to keep Didi over taking Cooper lol.

[AusPel]

My whole argument is that Cooper is much more valuable than Didi on this roster

[As I See It]

My whole argument is that Cooper is much more valuable than Didi on this roster

Even if Cooper is that much better than DiDi offensively (Cooper is strictly a busboy who sets the table because he can't deliver on his own), I prefer DiDi.

DiDi is much, much the better player defensively. This alone, to me, makes Louzada the better prospect.

(Note: I am not a big DiDi fan at all)

[ramsters60]

Might be all wet, but looking forward to Alvarado in the summer league..... not very big, but exceptionally gritty and determined....

[As I See It]

Might be all wet, but looking forward to Alvarado in the summer league..... not very big, but exceptionally gritty and determined....

I'm definitely in!! I love his 'whatever it takes' mentality.

We have a team full of "Oh Well maybe next timer's" but need that guy who says, "we may not win, but I refuse to lose". I hope he's that guy. He may never see the court, but he would keep practice interesting.

"Rudy!!! Rudy!!! Rudy!!!"

[msusousaphone]

My whole argument is that Cooper is much more valuable than Didi on this roster

We'll find out a lot in FA. I'd argue that Kira will eventually turn into that floor general and NAW can be half of one.....like....a floor lieutenant. But if we bring in Lowry, suddenly we have a bevy of possible floor generals.

We also don't know Green/Griff's plan for Zion as a primary ball handler. Supposedly Griff loved "point-Zion". Supposedly Griffin made a coach or two back out of the search because Griff wanted too much gameday input. We'll get a good idea of where that stands by the personnel they bring in through FA.

[JunkHead]

I just learned, from twitter, that Kira Lewis and Herb Jones played together for 2 years at Alabama.

Being from Alabama, I like this. and I hope to see this actually amount to something.






(But it probably won't, sadly)

[smcgull]

I thought Kira did good with the playing time he got, as a rookie.

[As I See It]

I thought Kira did good with the playing time he got, as a rookie.

He had a teeter-totter season. I thought he was 'meh'. Very good handle, but wasn't impressed at all with his sub-40% shooting. Really concerned about his on-ball defense (like Zion, he did a lot of chasing). But the young man is only 20 years old.

[Eman5805]

Herb would also know Sexton pretty well.

[msusousaphone]

He had a teeter-totter season. I thought he was 'meh'. Very good handle, but wasn't impressed at all with his sub-40% shooting. Really concerned about his on-ball defense (like Zion, he did a lot of chasing). But the young man is only 20 years old.

Yeah. But keep in mind (not to you specifically but in general) the type of offseason(s) our guys have been having. Green will be the Lakerguys 4th coach in four years and they apparently didn't get much development time while in LA......

[Which is a very good point against using all of the picks. Just look at how BI was stunted in LA and then went MIP here or how Zo appeared to be a bust in LA and then has improved so much here. Had we drafted all of those guys, the same thing would have hsppened to them. There is only so much time coaches like Vinson have to spread around and only so much court time.]

....we'll see what having a full offseason can help our young players. But also, one of the most important and underrated factors in the NBA is continuity. The big gains will happen in year two and three of Green's tenure.

[luckyman]

He had a teeter-totter season. I thought he was 'meh'. Very good handle, but wasn't impressed at all with his sub-40% shooting. Really concerned about his on-ball defense (like Zion, he did a lot of chasing). But the young man is only 20 years old.

You do realize that just because a player is "chasing" on defense doesn't mean they are playing bad defense right? There are techniques such as "lock-and-trail" that REQUIRE you to be on your opponents hip as you chase them over and around screens right?

You do realize sometimes (a lot of times) it is your teammates responsibility to tag and dig to slow the ball down right?

Just because a player is in "chase" mode doesn't automatically mean they are the ones screwing up.