giberish wrote:RipPizzaGuy wrote:
Barnes>>James Anderson
Tolliver>Acy (as a stretch 4)
Afflalo>>>Belinelli
Air>Rondo
Joerger>>>>Karl
None or are players are old were we should expect a dip in production. Cousins and WCS will only get better. So the way I see it we upgraded the team in the now and brought in Bogdan/Papa/Skal/Richardson for the future.
Barnes > James Anderson - but with Gay and Casippi already at SF it might not matter much.
Tolliver > Acy -> Sure
Afflalo = Belinelli -> both are bad. 10th men at best, if you're desperate for SG help.
Air << Rondo -> Not that Rondo's that good, but he is a viable NBA rotation PG. Right now the team is set up to collapse whenever Collison sits (and especially if/when he misses a few games). You'd think that if the FO thought this was a problem they would have done something about it already, but I haven't even heard a statement about getting another PG, much less action.
Joerger >> Karl -> Certainly for the Kings at this time. Really the main hope for big improvement as I don't see the roster as being upgraded much given the backcourt issues.
I disagree about Barnes not making a difference because Casspi and GAY are on the roster. Last year Anderson played 15mpg in 50 games, he killed us everytime he saw the floor. Just an absolute terrible basketball player. Even if you just factor Barnes in for those minutes (which he will play more with the ability to slide 2-4) it's a huge upgrade.
I think your assessment of afflalo is just not true. 10th man? There's a reason that he keeps getting picked up year after year to be a starter or 6th man, he's a respectable scorer and averages 38.5% from 3 for his career. He also brings size to the position which creates mismatches when going against smaller guys who he can post easily. Certainly isn't the defender he once was but he is much more passable than Belinelli and will do just fine in Joergers system.
I also disagree about Rondo, that guy is just trash. He made everyones job harder by allowing defenses to double team cousins nightly and dont get me started on his defense i think at this point Calderon is a better defender. it's pretty obvious that the team knows they need a pg. I'm actually pretty happy the haven't rushed or panicked and went after a sessions type player. There's still plenty of passable backup guys in free agency and not rushing allows us to explore trades the next 2 months.
The coaching upgrade is huge and by far our biggest upgrade. As I mentioned in the past I'm expecting that difference alone to adjust our win loss 5-7 games minimum. We were 21-21 trending way up last season before the team basically quit on Karl, and it wasn't just Cousins it was nearly the entire team. Our team is designed to grit and grind and having Cousins run up the court non stop chasing Rondo and getting the ball on the 3pt line was mismanagement at its finest.
The most important thing is looking at the entire team composition. Last year the roster made no sense, we had no opening day power forward which basically meant playing 2 centers at once. Rondo/Gay/Koufos/Cousins was a disaster spacing wise for a team that wanted to run non stop. Now we have shooting in the back court with Collison/Afflalo. We know WCS will be our starting power forward. Our bench looks entirely more established and won't be losing us games. Do we have a backup PG problem? Absolutely, but the season doesn't start for 2 1/2 months so for now I have to give that part of the roster an incomplete. If we open the season with Collison/Cousins at pg then it will be a failure but I can't judge until I see the full picture and aside from pg I'm pretty happy with what we did.