The Gradey Dick Thread Part 3

[Duffman100]

Whats your redraft that doesn't have Dick in the top 10?

i have already posted it when this discussion started 2 days ago

You gonna make me go back and dig around.... UGHHHHH

It was literally on the page before

[PoundTown]

i have already posted it when this discussion started 2 days ago

You gonna make me go back and dig around.... UGHHHHH

It was literally on the page before

I looked at the top 10, and if I'm projecting, I'm projecting the guy with the great jumper and IQ to eventually surpass Thomson brothers, who I don't think will ever really be able to shoot. Maybe, Ausar figures it out, but Amen won't, and we saw how that played out with Ben Simmons for example. Bilal has a long, long ways to go offensively, but he might get there, just has a lot further way to go than Gradey. Podz will not be better than Gradey in a few years.

[TimeForChange]

You gonna make me go back and dig around.... UGHHHHH

It was literally on the page before

I looked at the top 10, and if I'm projecting, I'm projecting the guy with the great jumper and IQ to eventually surpass Thomson brothers, who I don't think will ever really be able to shoot. Maybe, Ausar figures it out, but Amen won't, and we saw how that played out with Ben Simmons for example. Bilal has a long, long ways to go offensively, but he might get there, just has a lot further way to go than Gradey. Podz will not be better than Gradey in a few years.

you really didn't compare Gradey's IQ versus the Thompson twins, did you?

[TimeForChange]

"Podz will not be better than Gradey in a few years"

Trust me bro

[TimeForChange]

Read on Twitter

Imagine that. The Thompson twins both made the list.

I swear, some of you don't watch a lick of basketball outside of Raptors games and get all your opinions from Jack Armstrong

[brownbobcat]

Definitely top 10.

nah

but let's give it 3 years before we know for sure

Whats your redraft that doesn't have Dick in the top 10?

I think Podz, JJJ and Keyonte George have made very strong arguments to go in front of Dick. I think the top-5 all go in front of him again (pending severity of Ausur's blood clot thing), as does Lively. Most of the rest have had ups and downs similar to Gradey.

[brownbobcat]

You gonna make me go back and dig around.... UGHHHHH

It was literally on the page before

I looked at the top 10, and if I'm projecting, I'm projecting the guy with the great jumper and IQ to eventually surpass Thomson brothers, who I don't think will ever really be able to shoot. Maybe, Ausar figures it out, but Amen won't, and we saw how that played out with Ben Simmons for example. Bilal has a long, long ways to go offensively, but he might get there, just has a lot further way to go than Gradey. Podz will not be better than Gradey in a few years.

Ben Simmons was an All Star calibre player before his back (and mind) broke. Just sayin'.

Listen, I'm excited to see how Gradey develops going forward. He's got some nice tools and I hope he puts it all together and becomes great, but he's hardly some kind of basketball savant capable of seeing 10 moves ahead. Other dudes play basketball too.

[HiJiNX]

Joining the discussion, I think the Thompson twins both have future role player written all over them (and I prefer Ausar because I think he’s better at his impact skills than Amen). As for Gradey, I think he’s probably in the top 10% of player IQ for all players drafted in the last three years. He’s extremely aware. If he can get stronger and make strong drives into traffic then I think we have a very good player on our hands.

I’m not high on Podz in terms of ceiling—I think he’s already pretty close to it. He just lacks the physical tools which sucks cuz the guy is skilled and smart and a competitor, but genetics are genetics.

[Grew]

To early to worry about redraft position. I said something like this on draft night, we got the same value at 13 as the magic got at 6 when they picked black. All those guys 6-13 (outside of jett) were roughly in the same tier. We got a steal, and got away with not tanking harder.

[Dalek]

Joining the discussion, I think the Thompson twins both have future role player written all over them (and I prefer Ausar because I think he’s better at his impact skills than Amen). As for Gradey, I think he’s probably in the top 10% of player IQ for all players drafted in the last three years. He’s extremely aware. If he can get stronger and make strong drives into traffic then I think we have a very good player on our hands.

I’m not high on Podz in terms of ceiling—I think he’s already pretty close to it. He just lacks the physical tools which sucks cuz the guy is skilled and smart and a competitor, but genetics are genetics.

He also has like 30 charges on the year. Podz is a top rebounding guard as well as being a pretty good shooter.

Gradey does not have much if any defensive IQ. He just knows how to shoot from the corners and the occasional slick pass.

[Appostis]

Joining the discussion, I think the Thompson twins both have future role player written all over them (and I prefer Ausar because I think he’s better at his impact skills than Amen). As for Gradey, I think he’s probably in the top 10% of player IQ for all players drafted in the last three years. He’s extremely aware. If he can get stronger and make strong drives into traffic then I think we have a very good player on our hands.

I’m not high on Podz in terms of ceiling—I think he’s already pretty close to it. He just lacks the physical tools which sucks cuz the guy is skilled and smart and a competitor, but genetics are genetics.

He also has like 30 charges on the year. Podz is a top rebounding guard as well as being a pretty good shooter.

Gradey does not have much if any defensive IQ. He just knows how to shoot from the corners and the occasional slick pass.

You really don't watch the games do you?

[DutchCanuck]

No he doesn't Gradey isn't a great defender but his positional awareness/cutting lanes for steals is great. He get's the reputation of a bad defender because he's a white male.

[HiJiNX]

Joining the discussion, I think the Thompson twins both have future role player written all over them (and I prefer Ausar because I think he’s better at his impact skills than Amen). As for Gradey, I think he’s probably in the top 10% of player IQ for all players drafted in the last three years. He’s extremely aware. If he can get stronger and make strong drives into traffic then I think we have a very good player on our hands.

I’m not high on Podz in terms of ceiling—I think he’s already pretty close to it. He just lacks the physical tools which sucks cuz the guy is skilled and smart and a competitor, but genetics are genetics.

He also has like 30 charges on the year. Podz is a top rebounding guard as well as being a pretty good shooter.

Gradey does not have much if any defensive IQ. He just knows how to shoot from the corners and the occasional slick pass.

Gradey is in the right place at the right time a lot. But yeah he’s looked bad since he’s playing with a bunch of guys worse than him and he doesn’t have the ability to handle the ball that Podz has.

It’s interesting that you bring up charges because when I was at the Raptors open practice one of the things the coaches brought up was how frequently Gradey was in the right position and his potential to be a guy who draws a lot of charges once he starts to get more respect from NBA refs and develops his strength. I think Gradey also leads the Raptors in charges taken but I could be wrong about that.

Ultimately, it’s hard to see where Podz gets better as a player because of his physical limitations. He’s not special athletically, not particularly explosive, not tall, and not long. He’s already a great ball handler, smart, plays hard, and a good shooter. Well, his shot could improve from inside and outside the arc, so maybe it’s not fair to say he doesn’t have a lot of room to improve. Maybe what I should be saying is I expect incremental improvements that come with experience and offseason work but I certainly don’t expect a leap of any kind.

Gradey on the other hand is 6’8 with a quick first step, great midair body control and the ability to see the floor and make the right play. His body is underdeveloped, as is his handle and his ability to hit from the midrange, and he’s currently quick enough to guard his position but not strong enough, yet while off ball he finds a way to get his hand in on deflections or tap outs etc. Gradey is also far worse than Podz as a pnr ball handler at this stage of the game.

So you’re not totally wrong in saying Podz is a better defender, rebounder, charge taker, ball handler, and pnr player than Gradey right now—all those things are true. What I’m saying is that Gradey has far superior physical tools to Podz and a level of IQ/court awareness that you rarely see from rookies. He also has a great motor. So we’re looking at a guy who has all the intangible pieces of being a great player (starter on a contender type potential) and just needs to add the skills and experience. Podz on the other hand is a guy I see as a very reliable and effective backup guard for his career, able to play on good teams, but not a needle mover or a ceiling raiser.

In essence Podz is a high floor low ceiling guy. Dick is a low floor high ceiling guy, in my opinion.

Said another way, teams aren’t really worried about stopping Podz, whereas for Gradey, even at this stage of his career, his one true NBA skill is so good that although he’s very flawed in a lot of areas, he still creates a lot of gravity simply because he’s a very good shooter. Podz will never have that sort of gravity.

[Got Nuffin]

Ultimately, it’s hard to see where Podz gets better as a player because of his physical limitations. He’s not special athletically, not particularly explosive, not tall, and not long. He’s already a great ball handler, smart, plays hard, and a good shooter. Well, his shot could improve from inside and outside the arc, so maybe it’s not fair to say he doesn’t have a lot of room to improve. Maybe what I should be saying is I expect incremental improvements that come with experience and offseason work but I certainly don’t expect a leap of any kind.

I agree with a lot of what you say about Podz. My buddy is a gsw fan and we often watch the games together, and Podz is impressive because he is genuinely making an impact as a rookie. He is already a good defender, rebounds, hustles his ass off and at least keeps defences honest enough in that you can’t just leave him open.

But yeah, he has physical limitations. I posted this before and had a bunch of posters telling me that he had some crazy high vertical in work outs, but honestly i had no idea because you just don’t see it watching him play. It’s also because he has trex length wingspan and seems smaller than he actually is. He also does not have the handles that modern young point guard needs if he was to transition to that spot or become a team’s shot creator. He has quite poor efficiency at 9pts per 8fga just like a lot of rookies.

I just think Gradey’s path to being a borderline elite NBA player has a lot more precedence- squinting you could compare Dick to players like Kyle Korver, Klay, Rex Chapman, Rip Hamilton in the way he can use screens, Reddick and many others of that type of player.

When I watch Podz i imagine and see shades of.. Marcus Smart? Who shoots better but has short arms? Not saying Podz can’t somehow expand his skillset dramatically and become something else, but that’s kind of what you see from him right now. With Dick the skills he needs to take the next step are there plain to see, he just needs to work his tail off i refining what he already has.

[billy_hoyle]

Personal opinion.

Gradey has flashed high end skills and has a premium archetype (tall shooter, movement shooter). He also has translated better defensively than I thought he would.

I think there's definitely a possibility he'd go top 10 in a redraft right now. It will be for fit and projection, not based on current production.

There's easily been 10 rookies that have better stats this year. That shouldn't matter in a redraft.

For people who haven't followed ball for a long time, just go scroll through the all-rookie teams. There are future MVPs that weren't in their drafts top 10s.

Nash and Dirk come to mind right away. Had worse rookie years than: Travis Knight and Matt Maloney, and Micheal Doleac and Matt Harpring, respectively.

The grinding, defensive players typically have rookie impacts, but the high skill shooters have the ceilings.

[HiJiNX]

Ultimately, it’s hard to see where Podz gets better as a player because of his physical limitations. He’s not special athletically, not particularly explosive, not tall, and not long. He’s already a great ball handler, smart, plays hard, and a good shooter. Well, his shot could improve from inside and outside the arc, so maybe it’s not fair to say he doesn’t have a lot of room to improve. Maybe what I should be saying is I expect incremental improvements that come with experience and offseason work but I certainly don’t expect a leap of any kind.

I agree with a lot of what you say about Podz. My buddy is a gsw fan and we often watch the games together, and Podz is impressive because he is genuinely making an impact as a rookie. He is already a good defender, rebounds, hustles his ass off and at least keeps defences honest enough in that you can’t just leave him open.

But yeah, he has physical limitations. I posted this before and had a bunch of posters telling me that he had some crazy high vertical in work outs, but honestly i had no idea because you just don’t see it watching him play. It’s also because he has trex length wingspan and seems smaller than he actually is. He also does not have the handles that modern young point guard needs if he was to transition to that spot or become a team’s shot creator. He has quite poor efficiency at 9pts per 8fga just like a lot of rookies.

I just think Gradey’s path to being a borderline elite NBA player has a lot more precedence- squinting you could compare Dick to players like Kyle Korver, Klay, Rex Chapman, Rip Hamilton in the way he can use screens, Reddick and many others of that type of player.

When I watch Podz i imagine and see shades of.. Marcus Smart? Who shoots better but has short arms? Not saying Podz can’t somehow expand his skillset dramatically and become something else, but that’s kind of what you see from him right now. With Dick the skills he needs to take the next step are there plain to see, he just needs to work his tail off i refining what he already has.

Appreciate your insight. With Podz he’s a likeable player (love his interviews as well as how he plays) but at the NBA level if you don’t have size/athleticism you better have an extraordinary skill set and he doesn’t quite have that or project to have it. Then you look at Gradey who is already a great shooter and easily beats his man on the closeout and converts difficult finishes at the rim. Add that he’s 6’8 with a good wingspan and he just projects as being a higher ceiling player.

[HumbleRen]

Miller, Scoot, Wemby, Thompson Twins, Bilal, Keyonte, Cason, Lively, Cam Whitemore all easily go ahead of Dick in a redraft.

Gradey will be a good player but him being drafted 12th seems pretty accurate, his play this year hasn't really done much to change that in my opinion.

[brownbobcat]

Appreciate your insight. With Podz he’s a likeable player (love his interviews as well as how he plays) but at the NBA level if you don’t have size/athleticism you better have an extraordinary skill set and he doesn’t quite have that or project to have it. Then you look at Gradey who is already a great shooter and easily beats his man on the closeout and converts difficult finishes at the rim. Add that he’s 6’8 with a good wingspan and he just projects as being a higher ceiling player.

I like Gradey, hope he he does well.

But come on. "Converts difficult finishes"? Every now and then (like everyone else), sure. With regularity? No, he does not. He gets his shot blocked or altered at the rim frequently. He struggled to get separation from anyone yesterday. Podziemski gets to the rim way more often, at much higher unassisted rates, and finishes at a higher percentage - dude plays big, Gradey does not.

[OakleyDokely]

Rookie TS%, since Jan 1st, Non Bigs:

1. C Wallace: .595
2. Am Thompson: .587
3. GG Jackson: .570
4. C Whitmore: .568
5. G Dick: .566
6. K George: .554
7. B Sheppard: .552
8. Au Thompson: .538
9. B Miller: .538
10. J Jaquez Jr: .535
11. Marcus Sasser: .522
12. B Podziemski: .512
13. S Henderson: .497

[OakleyDokely]

Shooting is the big swing skill. There are a lot of guys in this draft that have elite skills in other areas, but it's really hard in the modern NBA to be a 35 minute impact player on a winning team if you can't shoot the ball efficiently, unless you're just a rim running, drop big.