The Official Washington Basketball Thread: Wizards, Mystics etc

[Going Commando]

I'd trade Blatche and our draft pick for Love. It speeds up the process of making this team good. Minny doesn't want to have to pay him do they can get the next big man in the draft am pay him a rookies price. Love doesn't want to wait for Rubio and Williams to turn into real players do he'd join Wall in year three. We'd be a player away.

I wouldn't make that deal. Love will hit the market when push comes to shove unless they trade him to another team. Derrick Williams is their PF of the future and Darko is a better fit at C if Williams is your PF. Can't have two slow, short players for your front court. Michael Beasley and Wesley Johnson are their 2 & 3 plus they still have Anthony Randolph floating around. They're loaded at both F spots and can't afford to keep Love.

I'm also not sure you can win a championship with a player like Love as your best player.

And trading what you offer for him would cripple our ability to get that one player we'd need to be a contender: a scoring wing. We'd be up against the cap with him, Wall, and McGee and have no draft resources for finding that wing on the cheap nor the cap flexibility to lure one here in FA.

I'd only sign him as a FA or offer players for him.

[RonArtest15]

You can make a case for Kevin Love being the best PF CURRENTLY in the NBA right now. Yea, I know he has an impending free agency decision looming, but if anyone is expendable on the Minnesota roster, it's Derrick Williams (in comparison to Love). No way he's going to be dealt unless he makes it 100% clear that he has ZERO intentions of re-signing.

[No Excuses]

You can make a case for Kevin Love being the best PF CURRENTLY in the NBA right now. Yea, I know he has an impending free agency decision looming, but if anyone is expendable on the Minnesota roster, it's Derrick Williams (in comparison to Love). No way he's going to be dealt unless he makes it 100% clear that he has ZERO intentions of re-signing.

This is basically what I'm thinking. Even if takes our lottery pick next year, you go get Kevin Love if he's available.

Let us please cut this bull**** that players are dying to sign in DC or that we will draft someone awesome. Kevin Love is the definition of awesome right now and he's young. Getting a big man who scores 25 a game and pulls down 16 rebounds a game is a franchise changer. Add in the fact that he has unlimited range. Imagine a PF who scores you 25 points a game on good efficiency, while shooting 42% from the three point line. Wall will have all day to drive in and score, or dish out to wide open teammates.

Even Javale would benefit with a PF with range allowing him to better use his size inside the paint.

Edited January 7, 2012 by No Excuses

[skinfan2k]

There isn't a better 4 in this league than Kevin Love. and please don't say blake i am so cool because i dunk a lot griffin

[Destino]

I wouldn't make that deal. Love will hit the market when push comes to shove unless they trade him to another team. Derrick Williams is their PF of the future and Darko is a better fit at C if Williams is your PF. Can't have two slow, short players for your front court. Michael Beasley and Wesley Johnson are their 2 & 3 plus they still have Anthony Randolph floating around. They're loaded at both F spots and can't afford to keep Love.

I'm also not sure you can win a championship with a player like Love as your best player.

And trading what you offer for him would cripple our ability to get that one player we'd need to be a contender: a scoring wing. We'd be up against the cap with him, Wall, and McGee and have no draft resources for finding that wing on the cheap nor the cap flexibility to lure one here in FA.

I'd only sign him as a FA or offer players for him.

Willaims is being groomed to take over for Beasely at the SF position and frankly it makes no sense for the timberwolves to move Love anywhere. They are close to being permanent fixtures in the post season. It would make more sense for them to trade Williams than it would to trade Love.

As for crippling our ability you seem to not think Love is as good as he is. He's a star and having him will attract others to join him and Wall. Rookies are nice but 2015 is too damn late and that's when a rookie drafted after this season will start reaching his potential. If that pick can get you a young enough proven star you trade it. All the great players in it can easily turn into good not great NBA players and this team needs a star. Love is a legit star and he's in his 4th season.

Then again there is no way they trade him and many teams will want him. Add him to OKC and they're a dynasty, for instance.

Edited January 7, 2012 by Destino

[Going Commando]

I actually like Vesely a LOT. He'll probably never be a good #1 option offensively, but there's stuff he does that translate well - he's an excellent finisher, he could be a decent shooter if he works at it, passable ballhandling with a good first step for his size, and decent passing. He's not Dirk coming into the league, but he has good to great tools, outside post moves.

Vesely will definitely never be a good #1 option. He's a comically bad shooter and has no post game. He can't create offense for himself because his handles are what you'd expect from a 6'11 dude. He has no offense beyond dunks and hustle points. Maybe he gets a post game one day but how long might that take? When you're such a bad shooter with poor touch, it's unrealistic to think you'll ever develop the consistency to be a 17+ PPG scorer in the NBA. I think Vesely is an offensive dead end when offense from our SF/PF is our biggest short and long term need by far.

Best case scenario for Vesely is that he's Andre Kirilenko in five years. We can't afford to wait that long for him and that's not all that great a payoff anyway.

Let's be honest, Vesely is trade bait.

I agree Grunfeld has no plan and just drafted the most athletic guy on the board, but Vesely is actually a good prospect.

Vesely wasn't a bad pick for where we got him--everyone in the lottery range pretty much sucked for us at that point. We weren't going to find an early contributor in the class outside DWill and Enes Kanter.

Vesely was drafted because he leaps well, has some movement skills, and is 6'11. We couldn't take any of the PGs who were the best bets around the point we drafted. So it was him or Kawhi Leonard, who's basically a poor man's Chris Singleton when you get down to it. Bismack was too short to be a Center and thus a reach at 6, he's got even less offensive upside than Vesely, and offered little in the way of an upgrade over Seraphin.

We've got a lot

My dream scenario is we land Drummond while getting solid value for McGee. In particular, I want a veteran shooter like Martin for Javale McGee, as well as a decent shooting SF/SG behind Singleton and a veteran backup PG.

Don't trade big for small unless the big is some scrub like Kwame Brown. McGee is an upper echelon starting center right now, with the likelihood of getting better.

McGee is also a better fit for us than Drummond because he is approaching finished product status. McGee will be Tyson Chandler by the time he's 26. You can clearly win a championship with a center like that. Most teams are doing far worse at the position. McGee's window is the same as John's, which is important.

The problem with Drummond is that he is his age. No well developed offensive game, has a reputation as a tentative scorer who defers, by all accounts, his one great skill is his passing--which we don't need in a big, we need a go to scorer. His appeal is his freakish body, fantastic runner for a legit seven footer who might top out around 7'2+ with a powerful build, carries 280 pounds well.

Drummond is at least year younger than the other Americans in the class. You're talking at least five years from now before he starts to glimpse his potential.

I have a bad feeling John Wall would be long gone before Drummond ever becomes a good player if we're trying to build around him.

I think we need to find bigs with skills that can come in and contribute offensively year one or two.

Now if you're picking second or third overall and Drummond is there, yeah you absolutely draft him. You don't pass on a potentially special center prospect when he's available because that can be the lottery ticket with a payoff of multiple championship runs, KG, Duncan, Howard, O'Neal, etc.

But you don't get rid of Javale McGee. Doing so basically ensures we'll suck for years until Drummond develops. And if that's the case, how do you convince Wall to stick around through that? Plus we'd still be untenably weak at our forward spots.

Chris Singleton is not a good starting SF on a contender, particularly not one with such a terrible 4.

Chris Singleton is a valuable role player and sixth or seventh man in the rotation on a good team. He's the perimeter stopper who isn't a total offensive liability because he's got the ability to catch and shoot from mid range and from three. He's no more or no less than a Luc Richard Mbah a Moute down the line, useful for defending the LeBrons and Durant's of the league but a liability unless you've got elite scoring from your bigs.

I'd be trying to turn a Drummond draft pick into Dwight Howard some how. That'd be our best bet for building a contender around Wall + another star and keep Wall. And between Dwight and Wall, there'd be so much space for us on the floor that we could field backup and middling starter caliber players at the 2-4 like Singleton and Young and be fine offensively.

But Dwight is a UFA and can't be traded for before we could draft Drummond, and the new team that signs him certainly wouldn't deal him. He won't sign with us if it's just him and Wall. Not this summer. If he wants to go play with a ready made great PG, why wouldn't he just go follow Deron Williams instead? Or go play with Rajon Rondo in Boston? Wall isn't good enough yet to draw a franchise player like Howard this summer.

I think our best (realistic) bet at keeping Wall is to trade for DeMarcus Cousins. Their windows are properly aligned, they're fast friends that love playing together, their skills perfectly compliment each other, and they could form the classic PG + Big pairing off of which you can build a contender. Cousins is a true center with a post game and the offensive potential to be a 20 PPG scorer working almost entirely in the paint. He doesn't have Javale's shot blocking or his ability to play above the rim, but he's no slouch athletically and he can shoot fairly well from 10-15 feet. And when motivated, he's got the body to be a legit 20-10 pivot.

I'd try and get him for Javale straight up, or some package of lesser guys like Blatche & Vesely.

If I swapped Cousins for Javale, I'd put everyone else on the roster up for grabs to get a legit 20+ PPG scoring 3 or 4 that can come in and rock by 2012/2013. Rashard's contract, Blatche, NY, Crawford, Vesely, whatever it takes. A guy like Danny Granger would be a good fit and might actually be available. Granger has a big contract and Indy can just move Paul George into his spot. Kevin Love is another option that I could deal for in those circumstances. I can live with Rudy Gay's contract if he gets back to the form he showed last year before his injury.

Or best of all would be finding a blue chipper at the 2-4 with our lottery pick in this draft, someone who can come in and be a 20 PPG guy by year 2 or 3.

---------- Post added January-7th-2012 at 06:33 PM ----------

What I don't understand is why Chicago isn't calling Orlando right now and saying, take anything on our roster you want except for Rose for Howard? I just don't see them winning a championship with the group they have.

Or better still, why isn't OKC calling up Orlando and saying here's Westbrook and Perkins and maybe even either Ibaka or Harden for Dwight?

-That's got to be the best offer Orlando could possibly hope to receive.

-It settles the back court scoring heirarchy problems OKC seems to have

-If you keep Harden you've got plenty of scoring between him, Durant, and Howard. Eric Maynor could run the point and any veteran PG in the league would sign cheap to ride that train to a championship.

Sure OKC can probably win a championship in the near future with their current core. But wouldn't trading Westbrook for Howard make that an inevitability? Wouldn't they be the overwhelming favorite to win it for the next five or six years straight? Wouldn't it be a double whammy because it keeps him out of Dallas?

If I'm Dwight Howard and Orlando doesn't trade me before the deadline, when summer comes I'm taking a slight pay cut to go play in Dallas and not considering any other options really. I'm actively coaxing Deron Williams to join me. That's the team that will beat the Heat and get me my consecutive championships for the forseeable future--we'd have the best chance to make a dynasty since Kobe and Shaq killed the golden goose in LA with their personal beef.

[Chachie]

I agree with McQueen. Keep McGee in almost all scenarios. He only goes as part of a deal for someone like a Dwight Howard, which isn't happening because nobody at that atmosphere is coming to DC.

[Gator Bait]

He is absolutely worth a max contract, but I can't see Minnesota letting him go. They'll match any offer thats made. Only way to get him would be by trade.

or if he signs the qualifying offer (which he has threatened to do recently if they don't extend him soon) and then he would be unrestricted the following year.

[Going Commando]

Willaims is being groomed to take over for Beasely at the SF position and frankly it makes no sense for the timberwolves to move Love anywhere. They are close to being permanent fixtures in the post season. It would make more sense for them to trade Williams than it would to trade Love.

As for crippling our ability you seem to not think Love is as good as he is. He's a star and having him will attract others to join him and Wall. Rookies are nice but 2015 is too damn late and that's when a rookie drafted after this season will start reaching his potential. If that pick can get you a young enough proven star you trade it. All the great players in it can easily turn into good not great NBA players and this team needs a star. Love is a legit star and he's in his 4th season.

Then again there is no way they trade him and many teams will want him. Add him to OKC and they're a dynasty, for instance.

Williams isn't fast enough to be an upper echelon SF IMO. He's a natural pick and pop PF with higher upside than Love. If their plan is to play him at SF they should just deal him.

Love's numbers are ridiculous right now but they'll come down to Earth. He's the richest man's version of the Luis Scola/Al Jefferson type. Slow, short, and unathletic but gets by with IQ and an impressive array of finesse skills like passing and shooting. He's a highly productive player, but he will never be a good enough defender to carry a team to a championship on his back and teams with great post defense like the Bulls will quiet him down in the postseason. A Love--Rubio construction can simply never beat the Heat.

If Love is the best PF in the league right now it's only because the crop of truly great ones like Dirk, Duncan, and Garnett are all aging. And even if he is, it's a temporary thing. Blake Griffin will be significantly better than him one day.

OKC couldn't fit his future max contract in their current construction without giving up Westbrook for one and probably someone else significant like Perkins. That's not a dynasty because that's a really poor defensive team.

I think Love is a bit flavor of the month based on his ridiculous scoring and rebounding numbers but the core skill deficiencies and limitations will always be there. You can't win a championship with him as your best player.

[RonArtest15]

SM, I think you're really discrediting how good Kevin Love is. I wasn't too high on the guy coming into last year, but he proved me wrong. This year (granted the sample size is small), he's gotten even BETTER and taken his game to new heights. He's a beast in the post, and now he's added a beyond-reliable 3pt shot to his arsenal. Let me ask you, because you said he's not a PF who can carry a team to a championship...outside of Dirk and Tim Duncan, who are the other PFs who have led their teams to finals victories? Barkley didn't, Karl Malone didn't, Garnett/McHale had PLENTY of help, etc etc....he's elite now. However, outside of a few anomalies like Dirk/Duncan, I don't think what you said is being entirely fair because it's a RARITY for a PF to put a whole team on his back and lead them to a championship.

Minnesota knows that they have something special with Love/Rubio. If anything, Williams is the one who will be expendable because he COULD bring in another piece of the puzzle via trade because of his own upside. T-Pups are setting themselves up pretty nicely for the foreseeable future. IMO, there is no way they let Love walk and he'll be the face of that franchise for the next 10+ years.

Edited January 8, 2012 by RonArtest15

[No Excuses]

SM, I think you're really discrediting how good Kevin Love is. I wasn't too high on the guy coming into last year, but he proved me wrong. This year (granted the sample size is small), he's gotten even BETTER and taken his game to new heights. He's a beast in the post, and now he's added a beyond-reliable 3pt shot to his arsenal. Let me ask you, because you said he's not a PF who can carry a team to a championship...outside of Dirk and Tim Duncan, who are the other PFs who have led their teams to finals victories? Barkley didn't, Karl Malone didn't, Garnett/McHale had PLENTY of help, etc etc....he's elite now. However, outside of a few anomalies like Dirk/Duncan, I don't think what you said is being entirely fair because it's a RARITY for a PF to put a whole team on his back and lead them to a championship.

Minnesota knows that they have something special with Love/Rubio. If anything, Williams is the one who will be expendable because he COULD bring in another piece of the puzzle via trade because of his own upside. T-Pups are setting themselves up pretty nicely for the foreseeable future. IMO, there is no way they let Love walk and he'll be the face of that franchise for the next 10+ years.

Pretty much. I'm not sure what he means by saying Derrick Williams has more upside than Love. Kevin Love right now is bar none the best PF in the NBA.

Last season he averaged 20 and 15. Adding six more PPG is not all that surprising for an improving dominant player.

This franchise will be LUCKY to draft anyone who turns out as good as Love has.

The undervaluing of his skill is amazing. You can replace the name 'Kevin Love' with 'John Wall' in sm's post and it would read out how an outsider probably views Wall. A guy who you can't win the championship with blah blah blah. You pair a dominant PF with a dominant PG and surround them with good and smart players, that is a championship caliber team.

---------- Post added January-7th-2012 at 07:13 PM ----------

This is a nice write up on the kind of player he's become:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/wizards/love-to-the-max-timberwolves-all-star-off-to-historic-start-as-contract-deadline-approaches/2012/01/06/gIQAENoVeP_story.html

Again, we'd be lucky to have anyone nearly as good as him to pair with John. No one and I mean no one should be off the trade block besides Wall if a trade for him is possible.

Edited January 8, 2012 by No Excuses

[Going Commando]

Love was always a good shooter from range. His important weaknesses today are the same as they were when he was a rookie.

No matter what kind of numbers Love puts up, he will always be a matchups player who's effectiveness as an around the rim scorer will always be dependent on the man playing across from him.

He's not the caliber of player that can dictate and win matchups against anyone like a Carmelo/Amare/Dwight/LeBron/Kobe/Rose/Wade so on and so forth.

He's a 6'8 shooter with a soft touch, good footwork, passing skills, good strength for positioning for rebounds around the rim, and a high IQ. That's how he puts up his numbers. But a long, dominant athletic PF will always shut him down in the post and force him into a perimeter shooter. And he'll never be able to defend long, quick PFs.

He's not a franchise caliber player because he's limited. So is Rubio for that matter. The true franchise caliber players do not have those kinds of limitations. The TWolves will never win a championship building around Rubio and Love. Maybe they can if they get a true difference maker to be the top dog. They're complimentary players to a true superstar. I think their ceiling is as poor man's versions of Nash and Dirk.

How can they possibly hope to beat the Heat? That's the benchmark everyone has to keep in mind when they build now.

[RonArtest15]

Pretty much. I'm not sure what he means by saying Derrick Williams has more upside than Love. Kevin Love right now is bar none the best PF in the NBA.

Last season he averaged 20 and 15. Adding six more PPG is not all that surprising for an improving dominant player.

This franchise will be LUCKY to draft anyone who turns out as good as Love has.

The undervaluing of his skill is amazing. You can replace the name 'Kevin Love' with 'John Wall' in sm's post and it would read out how an outsider probably views Wall. A guy who you can't win the championship with blah blah blah. You pair a dominant PF with a dominant PG and surround them with good and smart players, that is a championship caliber team.

On top of it all, if you compared both Love/Dirk at 23 years old...you could make a case for Love being the better player. And if his career can shape out the way that Dirk's has...well, I wouldn't be surprised at all if he DOES lead his team to a finals appearance or two along the way. Yes...I do think Love is THAT good.

He's a 6'8 shooter with a soft touch, good footwork, passing skills, good strength for positioning for rebounds around the rim, and a high IQ. That's how he puts up his numbers. But a long, dominant athletic PF will always shut him down in the post and force him into a perimeter shooter. And he'll never be able to defend long, quick PFs.

He's not a franchise caliber player because he's limited. So is Rubio for that matter. The true franchise caliber players do not have those kinds of limitations. The TWolves will never win a championship building around Rubio and Love. Maybe they can if they get a true difference maker to be the top dog. They're complimentary players to a true superstar. I think their ceiling is as poor man's versions of Nash and Dirk.

Funny thing is, you can apply what you just said about Dirk....and he now has a ring. Any 4 that can stretch the floor is a match-up nightmare. Doesn't matter if he can't defend long, quick, PFs. Give him a good defensive-minded center, and his deficiencies aren't nearly as glaring. I don't think we'll see eye-to-eye on this, but I think you're 100% off-base in your assessment of Love.

Edited January 8, 2012 by RonArtest15

[No Excuses]

How can they possibly hope to beat the Heat? That's the benchmark everyone has to keep in mind when they build now.

This is ridiculous and you know it.

Yes, let us go out and factory produce a freak of nature like LeBron. If you can't, you must not be good enough to be a champion.

Wait, are you telling me that the mighty Heat couldn't beat a one star man team with the lead star being someone who people called:

He's not the caliber of player that can dictate and win matchups against anyone like a Carmelo/Amare/Dwight/LeBron/Kobe/Rose/Wade so on and so forth.

He's a shooter with a soft touch, good footwork, passing skills, good strength for positioning for rebounds around the rim, and a high IQ. That's how he puts up his numbers. But a long, dominant athletic PF will always shut him down in the post and force him into a perimeter shooter. And he'll never be able to defend long, quick PFs.

That is the same exact thing people said about Dirk.

Sorry Steve, but you are way off base on this one. I can't further continue to debate about this if you discredit a player who pulls down 15+ rebounds and puts up 20+ points night in and night out, as someone who is just not an 'elite player'. If 26 and 15 is not elite, then the entire NBA should just retire. If you are holding his record against him, then you better have the same criticisms for Wall.

[Going Commando]

Numbers lie in basketball because they don't correlate directly to skills.

DWill has higher upside than Love because he's basically as big and long as Love is (actually a bit longer), as good a shooter as Love was his rookie year, and is a much better athlete with some upside to develop into a quality defender. You can run the whole playbook with him as your PF, pick and roll and have him finish at the rim like Love can't. Long PFs will still pester him but he's fast enough in the paint and has pretty good handles and has a better chance at getting his shot off against the dominant post defenders of the league.

Also Vishal, I think it's pretty certain you can't win a championship with John Wall as your best player--or at least your only top level player. He can't shoot and can't generate consistent offense in the paint. We'll never win a championship with him unless we've got a true difference making scorer to be our top offensive weapon.

---------- Post added January-7th-2012 at 07:22 PM ----------

Funny thing is, you can apply what you just said about Dirk....and he now has a ring. Any 4 that can stretch the floor is a match-up nightmare. Doesn't matter if he can't defend long, quick, PFs. Give him a good defensive-minded center, and his deficiencies aren't nearly as glaring. I don't think we'll see eye-to-eye on this, but I think you're 100% off-base in your assessment of Love.

Not true. Dirk is a legit seven footer that can get his shot off against anyone in any situation. Love isn't and can't. Love is a center with a small forward's height and length.

Dirk is also a quality defender now. And it took the Mavs until he and the rest of the team became quality defenders (plus acquiring the best coach in the league) to win their sole championship.

How do you feel about Jared Sullinger?

[No Excuses]

Numbers lie in basketball because they don't correlate directly to skills.

DWill has higher upside than Love because he's basically as big and long as Love is (actually a bit longer), as good a shooter as Love was his rookie year, and is a much better athlete with some upside to develop into a quality defender. You can run the whole playbook with him as your PF, pick and roll and have him finish at the rim like Love can't. Long PFs will still pester him but he's fast enough in the paint and has pretty good handles and has a better chance at getting his shot off against the dominant post defenders of the league.

Also Vishal, I think it's pretty certain you can't win a championship with John Wall as your best player--or at least your only top level player. He can't shoot and can't generate consistent offense in the paint. We'll never win a championship with him unless we've got a true difference making scorer to be our top offensive weapon.

Yes Kevin Love will get dominated by longer PF's. That's why no one at his position can stop him from getting 20 and 15 over a full season and this year he's dominating the crap out of everyone he's faced.

Derrick Williams will be lucky to average 20 and 10 in the NBA. Only in the magical never never land does a tweener SF/PF have higher upside than a 20 and 15 PF pure PF.

[No Excuses]

Derrick Williams will most likely pan out to be a better version of Antawn Jamison. Which isn't necessarily bad because Jamison was a quality player.

People had similar doubts about Love, but he's proven them wrong. The OJ Mayo/Kevin Love swap was criticized HEAVILY on draft night. Love has surpassed expectations and has developed an extremely rare skill set. It makes no absolute sense that someone who shoots the 3 as well as him also pulls in 5 offensive boards a game. Has a player with unlimited range ever been as dominant of a rebounder?

[Destino]

SM How can you say a guy that can score in the post, rebound, and hit shots from seemingly anywhere lacks skills? If you'd be rid of him for Williams, an undersized PF that himself admitted he was a better fit for SF in the NBA, I don't know what to tell you.

Remember this is Kevin Love, year 4. He's not done getting good yet.

Edited January 8, 2012 by Destino

[No Excuses]

Derrick Williams will most likely pan out to be a better version of Antawn Jamison. Which isn't necessarily bad because Jamison was a quality player. Or he might end up like Jamison as a SF/PF tweener who never has a defined position in the NBA.

People had similar doubts about Love, but he's proven them wrong. The OJ Mayo/Kevin Love swap was criticized HEAVILY on draft night. Love has surpassed expectations and has developed an extremely rare skill set. It makes no sense that someone who shoots the 3 as well as him also pulls in 5 offensive boards a game. Has a player with unlimited range ever been as dominant of a rebounder?

Edited January 8, 2012 by No Excuses

[Going Commando]

This is ridiculous and you know it.

Yes, let us go out and factory produce a freak of nature like LeBron. If you can't, you must not be good enough to be a champion.

You don't have to have a LeBron James to beat the Heat. But you probably need to have a roster like them--top five in the NBA in both scoring and defense.

Rubio/Love TWolves might be a top five offense in the NBA one day. But those two will always be a defensive liability and their teams will probably never be good defensively.

Wait, are you telling me that the mighty Heat couldn't beat a one star man team with the lead star being someone who people called:

The Heat were in year one of their construction, certainly the worst year of their window with Wade, LeBron, and Bosh (probably by a large margin). Outside of Wade, LeBron, and Bosh, that roster was scotch taped together.

And even still they steamrolled their way to the Finals and were the finest of hairs away from winning the championship. It took arguably the most transcendent playoff performance by a HoF 7 footer in the modern era to beat them, plus a blue moon coming together of the rest of the roster with elite bench scoring, great coaching, and great team defense to eke out the series win.

Today? As the Heat are getting comfortable, rounding into form and filling in the missing pieces along the way? There isn't a chance in hell that Mavs team beats them. I'm not sure anyone in the league can beat them right now.

That is the same exact thing people said about Dirk.

Not true. Ever since Dirk broke out, he's always been unguardable and able to get his shot on any one.

Sorry Steve, but you are way off base on this one. I can't further continue to debate about this if you discredit a player who pulls down 15+ rebounds and puts up 20+ points night in and night out, as someone who is just not an 'elite player'. If 26 and 15 is not elite, then the entire NBA should just retire. If you are holding his record against him, then you better have the same criticisms for Wall.

You're basing your assessment off of only numbers and not the skills.

I don't understand what you're point is in trying to compare Wall and Love. They couldn't possibly be more different.

Are you comparing them based on record? What's to compare? Love is in his fourth year and Wall is in his second. He's played three times as many games as Wall.

As far as potential goes, Wall's is much higher than Love's and he falls more in the Derrick Rose, potential MVP candidate range. Wall is arguably the best physical specimen at his position in the league while Love is average to below average physically at best. Wall has no limitations that he can't fix with time and reps. If he reaches his potential he can win any PG matchup in the league and defend positions bigger than his.

[The Robert Griffin Experience]

Vesely will definitely never be a good #1 option. He's a comically bad shooter and has no post game. He can't create offense for himself because his handles are what you'd expect from a 6'11 dude. He has no offense beyond dunks and hustle points. Maybe he gets a post game one day but how long might that take? When you're such a bad shooter with poor touch, it's unrealistic to think you'll ever develop the consistency to be a 17+ PPG scorer in the NBA. I think Vesely is an offensive dead end when offense from our SF/PF is our biggest short and long term need by far.

I disagree. His form isn't broken and he has range out to 3 point land. We see poor shooters develop a decent mid-range game from scratch - guys like KG and Jermaine O'Neal weren't great jumpshooters as rookies but they became good at it later. He was not a horrible shooter for Partizan, just a below-average one. As for his handles, he'll never be much more than average in terms of handles, but he has a great first step and he only needs one or two go-to moves to be effective.

Best case scenario for Vesely is that he's Andre Kirilenko in five years. We can't afford to wait that long for him and that's not all that great a payoff anyway.

I hope you don't remember how good Andrei Kirilenko was when he was healthy and in his prime. And you're saying Ves can be a 6'11 240 lb version of him? I.e, able to match up with 5s as well as 3s? And is a better finisher at the basket than Kirilenko could have dreamed of?

Bismack was too short to be a Center and thus a reach at 6, he's got even less offensive upside than Vesely, and offered little in the way of an upgrade over Seraphin.

I wanted Bismack. He's a rich man's Seraphin if anything - more NBA ready physically, much better rebounder, supposedly great BBall IQ, insanely long (protip: for big men, length is far, far more important than height - this is why guys like Big Ben and DeJuan Blair succeed, because they have insane standing reach)

Don't trade big for small unless the big is some scrub like Kwame Brown. McGee is an upper echelon starting center right now, with the likelihood of getting better.

I agree, he looks amazing, but we've seen this movie with Blatche. Blatche looked like a SUPERSTAR in that 30 minute stretch after Jamison was traded. 24/9/4 with the second best player on the team being Nick Young. Javale McGee has maturity and work ethic issues the same as Blatche (maybe to a lesser extent) so I'm still worried that it's fools gold.

McGee is also a better fit for us than Drummond because he is approaching finished product status. McGee will be Tyson Chandler by the time he's 26. You can clearly win a championship with a center like that. Most teams are doing far worse at the position. McGee's window is the same as John's, which is important.

I don't think he'll ever have the basketball IQ to be a Tyson Chandler. Chandler doesn't make an impact because he's athletic, but because he's fundamentally sound and is tough.

The problem with Drummond is that he is his age. No well developed offensive game, has a reputation as a tentative scorer who defers, by all accounts, his one great skill is his passing--which we don't need in a big, we need a go to scorer. His appeal is his freakish body, fantastic runner for a legit seven footer who might top out around 7'2+ with a powerful build, carries 280 pounds well.

If he follows Dwight's trajectory, this isn't a concern. Dwight was in the playoffs by year 3 with a horrendous team around him. If Drummond is even close to Dwight on both ends of the court (Dwight was a 17/12 guy at the time, nowhere near a go-to option), then we're fine. And if Wall is a truly special player, Drummond + Wall should be a playoff team at worst.

Chris Singleton is not a good starting SF on a contender, particularly not one with such a terrible 4.

Chris Singleton has a potential to be the perfect SF for a contending team, in the mold of Shawn Marion or Shane Battier or Bruce Bowen or Tayshaun Prince. Except he might be better than all of them when it's all said and done. He probably doesn't have the insane B-Ball IQ of Battier, or Marions insane athleticism, but he should be a top 5 perimeter defender with a decent 3 point shot. You need starters who are willing to defer offensively, otherwise you don't have enough balls to go around.

I think our best (realistic) bet at keeping Wall is to trade for DeMarcus Cousins. Their windows are properly aligned, they're fast friends that love playing together, their skills perfectly compliment each other, and they could form the classic PG + Big pairing off of which you can build a contender.

Absolutely. ****ing. NOT. No. Not in a million years. I wouldn't trade Andray Blatche for DeMarcus Cousins. DeMarcus is a cancer in the Blatche mold, yet worse. He's lazy, he has a horrible attitude, he's floor-bound, he's a bad defender, he is absurdly inefficient, especially for a center - the only thing he does well is rebounding.

I'd try and get him for Javale straight up

Rookie Javale > Cousins now. Cousins is bad. Really bad. Well, Cousins is a strong rebounder, but the guy is incredibly inefficient as a scorer, and is a black hole despite being a good passer.

Or better still, why isn't OKC calling up Orlando and saying here's Westbrook and Perkins and maybe even either Ibaka or Harden for Dwight?

I'd offer Westbrook OR Harden, Ibaka and prospects for Dwight. I wouldn't trade Westbrook AND Harden, Harden is a 20/5/5 player right now with an utterly insane TS%. If Orlando can't take that, well, boo on them. I'd also see if I could get back Ryan Anderson.

That's the team that will beat the Heat and get me my consecutive championships for the forseeable future--we'd have the best chance to make a dynasty since Kobe and Shaq killed the golden goose in LA with their personal beef.

Just saying, Kobe and Shaq probably weren't winning any more titles after 04. Shaq was getting older, and the supporting cast was an absolute nightmare because of the weight of their contracts. The team Shaq took to the finals was much deeper than the one in 04 imo.

The problem was that they made the wrong trade - they should have traded Shaq to the Grizzlies for Gasol, Battier and picks.

Edited January 8, 2012 by The Robert Griffin Experience

[RonArtest15]

Yes, Dirk can shoot over everyone....but there is no one better in the NBA at getting second-chance shots than Kevin Love due to his IQ and positioning. And because he can do that better than anyone else in the league, he presents a problem to whoever is defending him. On top of it all (and like I said before), due to the fact he can stretch the floor with his 3pt shooting, he's a matchup nightmare. You don't have to just worry about containing him in the post. He shot 41% last year from 3 and is up to 42% this year. I don't get the Love slander LOL....And when exactly did Dirk become a "quality defender?" When he as 31-32 years old? He's got close to 10 years on Love, and with the amount of work that Love puts into his game, that aspect will improve as well. I think he's the best 4 by a WIDE margin in the NBA right now, and I think it's absolutely insane that you believe that the T-Wolves brass holds Derrick Williams in higher regard.

[skinfan2k]

haha which 4's are actually longer than him and can actually play some defense lol?

[The Robert Griffin Experience]

As for Kevin Love, I agree that Love is nowhere near a championship level #1 option. The problem with Love is what happens once he gets in the playoffs - will he keep opposing bigs from going off defensively? Will he get his numbers against elite defenders? Will he not be a defensive liability because of his height and lack of length? Those are the questions you have to ask with Love.

If he gets to the playoffs and he puts up 26/11 against elite competition, then you can surround him and Rubio with big, long, strong defenders and a great defensvie C and have hope. But if he can't? Then forget it.

Edited January 8, 2012 by The Robert Griffin Experience

[No Excuses]

I think it's absolutely insane.

This is all you need to describe it. I cannot understand the muddled reasoning that leads someone to believe that a player who scores at excellent efficiency and puts up big numbers night in and night out, is somehow not physically adequate for his position.

I feel like I'm talking to a bunch of Ernie Grunfeld's who look at nothing but physical ability and potential and not at actual on the court production.

As far as potential goes, Wall's is much higher than Love's and he falls more in the Derrick Rose, potential MVP candidate range. Wall is arguably the best physical specimen at his position in the league while Love is average to below average physically at best. Wall has no limitations that he can't fix with time and reps. If he reaches his potential he can win any PG matchup in the league and defend positions bigger than his.

Kevin Love is already the best at his position. John Wall may be during his 4th season as well, he may not. There is a lot of over hyping of Wall, and it seems to me the same level of respect is not being given to some other great players in the league.

You can't explain how a player who is below average physically at best can go off for 25 and 15 consistently, have the first 30 and 30 game since Moses Malone and be the unanimously best at his position by his fourth season. This is incredibly ridiculous logic. Kevin Love is a very good athlete who is perhaps the smartest player at his position and all of NBA.

Edited January 8, 2012 by No Excuses