The-Power wrote:reanimator wrote:I'll point out what I want and when I want.
Good for you, just don't expect me to not point out that posts like these are useless and dishonest given that you never took the time to actually address the points I made. Should be easy enough, no?
Even though I might regret it, I will try to emphasize my point yet again.reanimator wrote:You reference a (non convincing) Eurobasket performance and a small sample of NBA games to validate claims for Markannen being some future offensive anchor (I think this is a fringe opinion) when I doubt your projection would've been similar 11 games in at Zona yet speak in an absolute way about 2 prospects who haven't even started their conference schedule.
To me, it would be much more of a fringe opinion to claim Bagley or Ayton are going to be offensive anchors or anything close to it. I wrote that Markkanen could potentially be the center of a good offense, yes. I'm not saying he will anchor one by himself with little offensive talent around him like the top-tier offensive players in the league, but I do believe Markkanen's skill-set can be used to built around it.
Re: Not even conference schedule yet. True, we have to wait and see. But I don't expect Ayton's and Bagley's skill-set to change drastically over the course of the season. They might very well improve, sure, but I still wouldn't believe you can actually built a good offense centered around these guys because they lack the necessary skill-set which I outlined several times by now.
Markkanen has the potential to be different, however. I'm the first to admit that I wouldn't have spoken this highly of Markkanen eleven games into last season. But, and here's the critical difference, Markkanen had at least one crucial ingredient for being a genuinely great offensive player: his potentially elite shooting ability for a big man. What he further needs to actually there is a good high post-game, the ability to drive and ideally playmaking skills on the move and/or out of the post. I didn't believe Markkanen would improve and show this much this quickly even though I really liked him as a prospect back then (had him roughly in the same spot I have Ayton and Bagley right now). But with him it was always a possibility that he developed an off-the-dribble attacking game and qualities in the high post – which looks brighter and more realistic by the day.
Now, I will say that Ayton and Bagley are equally likely to develop in these areas. Especially Bagley is probably going to end up being better at driving to the rim and handling the ball. The difference is that I still strongly doubt that this would make them elite offensive players because I doubt that players with their profile can be the clear center of a good NBA offense. This is nothing against these two players in particular and this has little to do with how well they do or could potentially do certain things on offense. This is merely my conclusion based on analyzing players and their offensive – and defensive – impact in the NBA for years now. They can still be good and very useful offensive players, though. I'm not denying that.
I'm a firm believer in profiling when it comes to scouting. As much as, or even more than, looking at the details of their skills I tend to look at how their style of play, their skill-set and their mentality is likely to be successful in the NBA and this assessment is predicated on studying actual NBA players. I might have a hard time filtering out the outliers who are so good that they defy common schemes but I'm willing to accept this if I can be more confident in my conclusions of the majority of players. And therefore I stand by my statement that they would both have to become good defenders to be worth drafting in the top 3 and thus far I have little faith in their ability to get there.
Re: Doncic and Markkanen as anchors of a good NBA offense. I sincerely hope we can re-visit this topic a couple years down the road. We won't get on the same page here since I believe Doncic is by far the best talent in this draft because of his offense (you are skeptical of him) and I believe Markkanen has the potential to become one of the best offensive big men in the league (you clearly don't share this opinion). So let's wait and see, hopefully the Bulls draft Doncic and pair him with Markkanen.
Ok, I really don't have an issue with this post and agree with the Bagley/Ayton assessments *atm* but evaluations are definitely fluid, for example, do you think your Mo Bamba evals prior to the season hold up? Do these players actually lack the skillsets needed or do we simply not have the data? There is a difference. I get that you can only project what prospects show you but its definitely important to keep in mind the sample size/competition level, role/opportunity + roster construction, and rate of development.
Doncic fans seem to have a good grasp of this any time his flaws are brought forth and I can't blame them given his rate of development. Likewise, Bagley has had a rapid rate of development. Ayton has a poor team fit IMO. Most teams are still playing cupcakes. If you don't think some of these prospects will look drastically different in the Spring then thats fine but I tend to agree with JustWar's point that some will look totally different. Its probably why I'm not antsy to release a big board til deep in conference play.
