What's Tristan Thompson's trade value? Is he a bust?

[uberhikari]

Cavs fans are in serious denial about Thompson. He's a below average defender by any metric you wanna use: steals, STL%, blocks, BLK%, opponent's FG% at the rim, on/off splits, dRTG, defensive win shares, DRPM, synergy, etc. No analyst I've ever read (including Zach Lowe who's written about Thompson in 2-3 articles) ever claims he's even an average defender. According to synergy he's a good (not great) P&R defender and a solid post up defender, but that's it. And he simply gets destroyed by stretch-4's. Plus, the people making excuses for his block numbers by claiming that Mike Brown plays "positional defense" are clearly wrong. Why? Because he's always out of position. That's why he gives up 59% shooting at the rim. He does not have good defensive awareness and anticipation, which makes him a terrible weak side/help defender.

On the flip side (offense), he's just as disappointing. He's not developing a jump shot people. Just stop it. 43.5% of Thompson's shots come within 3 feet of the basket where he shoots 58%, after that he's wretched. 37.8% of his shots come from between 3-10 feet where he shoots 42%. And asking Thompson to create his own shot is like asking someone to turn water into wine. The only move in his entire arsenal is a floater. Yes, you heard that right: if you're a PF and the best move in your arsenal is a floater, that's very bad. And do you know why Thompson has to go to a floater? Because he gets 13% of his shots blocked, an unholy percentage. (In 2013 it was 15% of his shots so he's improved from being historically bad to just horrible.) He simply lacks the footwork and fundamentals necessary to create his own shot as an undersized PF (6'9 230). Thompson has been reduced to getting almost all of his points off of broken plays, put backs, dunks and layups.

The only thing Thompson does well is rebound. That's it. Thompson is a worst version of Kenneth Faried. He can't shoot over 50% from the field, he's not as athletic as Faried, he can't run in transition for easy buckets like Faried, etc.

[Antrim]

To this point, Jonas has not shown a thing to say that he's better than Tristan.

The fact that you haven't seen them doesn't mean he hasn't shown them.

You're gonna have a hard time finding someone who thinks Thompson's value is equal or higher than Valanciunas.