Detroit early offseason in review (HW/bondom34/dbrandon/Slava/Laimbeer)

[Mystical Apples]

Ellenson was tremendous value at 18. He's an elite defensive rebounder with rare ball skills for his age/frame. He slipped to 18 because he was cast as a stretch PF but his future is at center. He's not an intuitive passer and his shot selection needs cleaning up, however. Otherwise, DET grabbed top 10 value at 18.

Leuer was a solid signing for the price. The biggest knock overall is current payroll limiting their ceiling unless several players make unexpected leaps.

B

[HartfordWhalers]

Ellenson was tremendous value at 18. He's an elite defensive rebounder with rare ball skills for his age/frame. He slipped to 18 because he was cast as a stretch PF but his future is at center. He's not an intuitive passer and his shot selection needs cleaning up, however. Otherwise, DET grabbed top 10 value at 18.

Leuer was a solid signing for the price. The biggest knock overall is current payroll limiting their ceiling unless several players make unexpected leaps.

B

Others have said that Ellenson fell because he couldn't be an interior defender and effective rim protector. Which is why he was cast as a pf.

If he has flaws that make both positions not likely to work all that well, then he probably was fair value at #18.

[Han Solo]

Nice job.

[whitehops]

I'm not sure what the plan for Boban is considering he is not nimble enough to fit Stan's style of play on either side of the court

apparently one of the things they liked about boban was that they wouldn't have to change much about their defense schematically (compared to with drummond).

it will be interesting to see how they use him though.

[Colbinii]

Grading an off season on the potential of the #18 draft pick seems very foolish to me.

I thought Detroit had a solid off season. They kept their core together and added to it without any poor contracts.

[jazzfan1971]

I like what they did, much like Utah they shored up a very weak bench. If the starters come to play they could be a sleeper team.