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thinkingwarriors wrote:

Scoots1994 wrote:

floppymoose wrote:
Russell. Why are people even saying "big 4"? Russell hasn't proven a lot yet.

How many players on the team have been named all-stars?

I got this, it's 4. A "big 4" one might say.

Where do folks put D'lo in the WC guard hierarchy? I have him in tier 3.

Tier 1: Curry, Harden, Lillard, Westbrook
Tier 2: Booker, Conley, Holiday, CP3
Tier 3: Murray, Russell, Mitchell, McCollum

If Russell is in my tier 3, I'd have him at the edge of it. For me, I think i would slide Westbrook to Tier 2 but I guess that wasn't your question.

thinkingwarriors wrote:

Scoots1994 wrote:

floppymoose wrote:
Russell. Why are people even saying "big 4"? Russell hasn't proven a lot yet.

How many players on the team have been named all-stars?

I got this, it's 4. A "big 4" one might say.

Where do folks put D'lo in the WC guard hierarchy? I have him in tier 3.

Tier 1: Curry, Harden, Lillard, Westbrook
Tier 2: Booker, Conley, Holiday, CP3
Tier 3: Murray, Russell, Mitchell, McCollum

I'd put all 4 guys in tier 3 ahead of Booker.

A few years back I started a thread saying that Draymond should start at the 4 moving forward. This was during the final year of Mark Jackson and I was convinced that Draymond starting would be an immense boon to our defense and would also strengthen the bench by putting D Lee as the backup center to feast on second units. This did happen to some extent, but poor D Lee never got to fulfill his role as sixth man bench scorer because Speights started playing the 5 and Kerr saw Lee's basketball IQ as reason to use him as a post passer...

Anywho, it's interesting looking at this thread and the varying opinions on Looney's minutes and comparing it to how we viewed Draymond on this board in 2013-2014. To some extent I understand Kerr's preference for deploying Looney as the super sub off of the bench, especially if the team is worried about preserving Looney's health. But I do think that a lot of those concerns come out of this somewhat misguided belief that Looney is undersized at the center, which is something I don't really buy. Yes, Looney is smaller than some of the beefier western conference 5's like Adams, Gobert, Cousins, and Jokic, but Looney has a long wingspan and he's only an inch shorter than Dwight Howard. Obviously Loon isn't built like Howard, but it doesn't really scare me to think of Looney facing up against the bigger 5's in this league. If they want to attack him, go ahead. Loon is a solid defender and that's a fine way to waste possessions.

I think I'm mostly in favor of Looney being the bench big so that WCS can have almost all of his minutes attached to Russell so they can lob together, but going back to the Draymond arguments makes me wonder if it doesn't just make more sense to play the higher impact player as much as possible. In the 2013-2014 thread about Dray as a starter, several posters whose opinions I respect -- Sleepy in particular -- argued that Draymond was best used as a fixer off the bench to put out fires and stabilize the bench. That argument wasn't wrong, but the team truly took off when Draymond became a starter. I don't think this team has as a high ceiling and I don't think Looney will have the same impact as Draymond did in the starting lineup, but I do think down the road it will probably make sense for Looney to be our long term starting C.

A fun fact: Draymond was 24 years old when he entered the starting line up in 2014-2015 as a third year player. Looney is going to be 23 to start the season as a fifth year player. Looney has a long career ahead of him and he's still 3-4 years from his prime, which bodes well for the future.

thinkingwarriors wrote:

Scoots1994 wrote:

floppymoose wrote:
Russell. Why are people even saying "big 4"? Russell hasn't proven a lot yet.

How many players on the team have been named all-stars?

I got this, it's 4. A "big 4" one might say.

Where do folks put D'lo in the WC guard hierarchy? I have him in tier 3.

Tier 1: Curry, Harden, Lillard, Westbrook
Tier 2: Booker, Conley, Holiday, CP3
Tier 3: Murray, Russell, Mitchell, McCollum

I'd put Russell over Booker by a little, and Conley and CP3 are coming quickly to their ends while Russell is 23. That said Murray and Mitchell are still on the way up too, and McCollum is really good. The Spurs' Murray may make that list this year too.

Booker is so weirdly underrated by NBA fans. I get his defence isn't great, but 27-7-4 on 58% TS is elite. That's prime Kobe numbers on a 22 year old, yet people treat him like he's not even an all-star calibre player.

Hmmm....interesting. I've been wondering who Warriors could package with D-Lo for a bigger name.

Anyway...I've a big time Looney fan and think his ceiling is what the Warriors allow him to do. I think he has a better 3 point shot than Green...so should be used as pick and role more and more with a pick and pop three an option.

Looney is going to be very solid if he stays healthy. As Mylie had said, I think he can average a double double. I think his biggest impact is on the defensive end. Another big who can guard out to the perimeter causes a lot of problems for the other team.


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Warriors vets will have to help Kerr and Adams get all the knew guys used to playing in the Warriors system. Warriors vets need to keep the team culture going.

Who are the Warriors vets?
Curry, Draymond, Klay when he gets back; and then......
Looney.
Looney is the only other guy that has been around more than one year.
McKinney and Evans are the only other guys that were here last year.

Warriors have much greats than league average player continuity for a long time. Not anymore.
Looney is sort of in a leadership role now.

Warriors Analyst wrote:A few years back I started a thread saying that Draymond should start at the 4 moving forward. This was during the final year of Mark Jackson and I was convinced that Draymond starting would be an immense boon to our defense and would also strengthen the bench by putting D Lee as the backup center to feast on second units. This did happen to some extent, but poor D Lee never got to fulfill his role as sixth man bench scorer because Speights started playing the 5 and Kerr saw Lee's basketball IQ as reason to use him as a post passer...

Anywho, it's interesting looking at this thread and the varying opinions on Looney's minutes and comparing it to how we viewed Draymond on this board in 2013-2014. To some extent I understand Kerr's preference for deploying Looney as the super sub off of the bench, especially if the team is worried about preserving Looney's health. But I do think that a lot of those concerns come out of this somewhat misguided belief that Looney is undersized at the center, which is something I don't really buy. Yes, Looney is smaller than some of the beefier western conference 5's like Adams, Gobert, Cousins, and Jokic, but Looney has a long wingspan and he's only an inch shorter than Dwight Howard. Obviously Loon isn't built like Howard, but it doesn't really scare me to think of Looney facing up against the bigger 5's in this league. If they want to attack him, go ahead. Loon is a solid defender and that's a fine way to waste possessions.

I think I'm mostly in favor of Looney being the bench big so that WCS can have almost all of his minutes attached to Russell so they can lob together, but going back to the Draymond arguments makes me wonder if it doesn't just make more sense to play the higher impact player as much as possible. In the 2013-2014 thread about Dray as a starter, several posters whose opinions I respect -- Sleepy in particular -- argued that Draymond was best used as a fixer off the bench to put out fires and stabilize the bench. That argument wasn't wrong, but the team truly took off when Draymond became a starter. I don't think this team has as a high ceiling and I don't think Looney will have the same impact as Draymond did in the starting lineup, but I do think down the road it will probably make sense for Looney to be our long term starting C.

A fun fact: Draymond was 24 years old when he entered the starting line up in 2014-2015 as a third year player. Looney is going to be 23 to start the season as a fifth year player. Looney has a long career ahead of him and he's still 3-4 years from his prime, which bodes well for the future.

Looney starting isn’t nearly as controversial as Draymond starting. Looney is already penciled in to get a larger role and should be avg 30+ minutes this year.