2017 NBA OFFSEASON

Ball was a fairly good dribble-driver in college, but when he got to the hole he was mostly looking to pass first, layup second.

He's weirdly passive, he always seemed to shy away from pressure whenever people keyed on him on D. He's such a pass-first guy that when he faces a good defender, like De'Aron Fox in the S16, he doesn't try to force the issue and lets his teammates force the issue.

He will definitely benefit from having Luke Walton as a coach, instead of Steve Alford

Also, it made sense for him to drive and kick in college considering his team was stacked with long-range bombers at every position

i am in the "lonzo ball will be good" camp

good is a pretty low bar for the #2 pick!

Ball was a fairly good dribble-driver in college, but when he got to the hole he was mostly looking to pass first, layup second.

― black covfefe in bed (voodoo chili), Sunday, June 25, 2017 1:33 PM (eleven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Also, it made sense for him to drive and kick in college considering his team was stacked with long-range bombers at every position

― black covfefe in bed (voodoo chili), Sunday, June 25, 2017 1:36 PM (eight minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i cld see him developing a good floater game but he doesnt seem like someone who will get to the rim regularly in the pros, if thats true that he was turning down layups for passes thats very bad decision making! tho i think its more likely that he just had trouble getting past the second level of the defense

he shot 70% on 2s but thats prob almost entirely in transition where he is legit great

― lag∞n, Sunday, June 25, 2017 12:46 PM (twenty-seven minutes ago)

shooting this high on 2s is a really good indicator, isn't it?

― k3vin k., Sunday, June 25, 2017 1:15 PM (thirty-two minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

draft express has his half court ts% at 47 fwiw

and every breakdown of him ive watched lists halfcourt scoring as a weakness

good is a pretty low bar for the #2 pick!

― lag∞n, Sunday, June 25, 2017 1:44 PM (five minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i think he will justify his draft position

not that there's been a particularly great #2 pick in a decade

what shd be expected of a #2 pick recent misses notwithstanding, multiple allstar appearances? a first team all nba selection

being better than the guys picked after him

thats a bit unfair because player development is a thing. i'd like to see average career WS and 3-year peak WS by draft position

Ehh, I would argue that driving to kick rather than is a good strategy in college, considering the shorter 3PT line

He def does need to work on his finishing though, that's one of the reasons I think Fox is gonna be better than him in the long run

i think if youre not getting a star at #2 youve prob swung and miss, tho obvs some drafts just dont have the talent, the problem with a lot of those draft value charts is they have the misses baked in, like so many stats theyre conceptually flawed

i trust the big baller brand to deliver in the 21st century

they should have the misses baked in - the point is not to show you what a hit is, just what has happened historically

you can look at the distribution rather than just the average if you want to come up with a line for 'hit'

no i dont think so

thats a bit unfair because player development is a thing. i'd like to see average career WS and 3-year peak WS by draft position

― ciderpress, Sunday, June 25, 2017 2:25 PM (twelve minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

there was actually a recent espn article that had bar graphs of all the picks by career WS

those charts are designed to give a value to each spot, if youre a better than average gm using one then u wld be undervaluing high picks

certainly every stats guy who has one writes abt them as if theyre predictive rather than just a stroll down memory lane

yeah just in general ive noticed sports stats ppl like to act as if everything is predictive

just $0.02 worth, but it seems obvious that with the current prevalence of one-and-dones, predicting a draft pick's career arc has become much harder than when the NBA drafted college seniors pretty much exclusively. this basic fact has devalued a team's position in the draft order and made it even more difficult for badly run teams to improve.

this feels true, but i'd like to see if there's any stats evidence to back it up

player development a lot more important imo

the spurs don't just happen to always hit on the draft

yeah thats important too. its not like a struck of luck "how do they find these guys?" they know how to evaluate talent and fit and work really hard to develop skills.

and the players they pick are usually guys who know theres going to be a lot of work to get their games up to nba standards.

that seems like the most difficult part figuring out if a 19 y/o will work insanely hard

yeah, some of that is personal, but a lot of it is the culture of the team. i'll use dejounte murray as an example. when he got drafted, he talked a lot about wanting to work on his game. it helps when the best player on your new team is an award-winning multiple all-star and a total gym rat.

so i totally expect him to be a quality starter even though he was drafted 29th bc thats just what happens with spurs PG draftees (tony parker, george hill, cory joseph, beno udrih)

spurs also never draft in the lottery so they get to focus on finding their guy rather than evaluating all the top talents

http://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story/_/id/19657372/the-best-picks-every-nba-draft-slot

League sources: Cavs, Pacers and Nuggets have discussed a three-way deal that would land Paul George in Cleveland and Kevin Love in Denver

— Marc Stein (@ESPNSteinLine) June 25, 2017

kevin love and jokic could form the best offense outside of GSW but defensively it would be an adventure

that is....odd for denver

my issue with the love deal is it doesn't address either of the nuggets biggest problems: defense or point guard

that's not to say i wouldn't love watching love play every day. i'm still a believer

i believe in a th- *taken out by The Basketball Sniper*

i dont think the nuggs shd give up young players for kevin love

same

young teams that have an ahead of schedule good season and decide to accelerate the process usually doesnt work out great eg phoenix suns

i mean if u cn get him for super cheap fine but seems unlikely, also yeah that frontcourt wld be so flammable

love is underrated imo and gets a lot of shit thrown his away, sometimes deservedly i admit, but i think it would be cool to see paul george play w/ lebron and kyrie

the trade wld def be good for the cavs lol

nuggs should try to make the playoffs before they get too rowdy with trades. current roster should be able to do it, they were one game out this year despite taking half the season to figure out their rotation

they do need a point guard though

zach lowe touched on this briefly in his butler/wolves write up but teams that have a bunch of good young players have to decide which ones they want to trade bcuz you can't usually re-sign all of them under the cap

i.e. the nuggets already know they have to max our jokic and probably will have to w/ murray at some point as well, maybe they don't want to give gary harris a huge second contract as well idk