Kizz Fastfists wrote:BadWolf wrote:Does it matter who 15th guy is?
Not really. The 6th (5th? 4th?) through 15th guys on the roster will all just be a different flavor of garbage.
The roster could easily be:
Russ
Dipo
Adams
Abrines- developed into semi-garbage
Sabonis - developed into semi-garbage
Rookie Garbage
Unplayable Garbage
Unplayable Garbage
Unplayable Garbage
Unplayable Garbage
Unplayable Garbage
Unplayable Garbage
Unplayable Garbage
I know we have very different views of what a successful season is, but this is a fundamental problem with roster building and people on this site. Put in the right situations a bench consisting of Unplayable garbage can still be a successful unit. That primarily means identifying what the expectations are for that unit, game planning to meet that expectation, then finding players who fit that gameplan. In that sense it matters very much who those Unplayable garbage players are. It's clear that we can't have 5 guys incapable of creating their own offense, 4 guys incapable of defending anyone, and 3 guys who don't effect the game positively on either end.
Starting with the bench foundation (and assuming we can move kanter, if not then the equation changes) you have Alex and domas who can't be given up on due to age and potential, okay so what should we surround them with? Neither can create offense for themselves so we need a shot creator, Alex can't defend so we need a wing defender, domas can't block shots or rebound but does contest at the rim and on the pick and roll fairly well so we need a weakside shot blocker and a big that is strong in traffic and on the glass.
I'm assuming Donovan isn't going to become a mastermind overnight, so we need to play similar to the first unit
Recap needs:
Shot creator
Wing defender
Adequate floor spacer
Big center who can rebound/finish through contact
Weakside Shot blocker
I don't believe we can find all of these this off-season due to cap constraints and assets so let's plug in our own players that MIGHT fit the bill.
Shot creator- we don't have one, must prioritize. A kanter trade for Jordan Clarkson could make sense. I'm not a Clarkson fan, and he's overpaid, but he's a legitimate possibility. Still, this is a tba position.
Wing defender/floor spacer/shot blocker- Huestis/Grant, Grant struggles on the wing and is more of a shot blocker than a real defender. I'd honestly prefer giving Huestis a chance. We know he can defend and he's hitting 38% from 3 on a lot of attempts in the d-league. He probably fails, but that's better than Mcdermott/singler who we've already seen fail. Bonus points to both Huestis and grant for being great weakside shot blockers.
Big center that can finish and rebound- ideally that's what dakari is, but he may not be athletic enough to do it against NBA players.
Using that as the framework, who do we draft? If Mitchell is there, and you're comfortable with him as a pg in year 1, then he makes a ton of sense. I am a big Bam fan, I think he could be an ideal center in the modern game and fits a need. Josh Hart is a plug and play guy with little upside but could be solid on both ends. Frank Jackson might give you Jordan Clarkson v2. Terrance Ferguson is Josh Hart with upside. There's a bunch of centers that might meet needs but we'd likely be waiting a few years on.
The bench isn't going to be good next year, but it could be relatively productive if we threw together a cohesive unit with defined roles and then upgraded the players as we went along.