Dat2U wrote:
High usage mixed with high efficiency is an elite skill.
Wiseman is a C that cannot defend... that means he's pretty much worthless.
That Golden State package is not enticing at all.
Wiseman isn't Bryant. He has the athletic profile to be a really good defensive C but he's lacking in game sense. Will that get better? Who knows. But if "young player with bad game sense" is a dealbreaker for you, I guess there's no hope for that Rui Hachimura guy.
As for Beal, yes, high usage + high efficiency is great. But that's his only elite skill. Championship level guards need to be elite at 2 of the following on high usage, and ideally, not a liability in any area:
- overall efficient scoring
- 3 point shooting on high volume AND elite range (Steph, Lillard, Trae)
- high quality defense (Beal is, depending on how you look at it, a modest liability or a major liability here)
- elite playmaking (think someone like Luka or Trae or CP3)
Beal is really good at the first point. He's only an average 3 point shooter, and even if he returns to his early career percentages, he's not the kind of pull up shooting threat the 3 point shooters I mentioned are. His volume scoring numbers look a lot like James Harden, but Harden is a much better playmaker and creator. Now, could this be Brooks system? Who knows. But right now we haven't seen it.
If we really look at Bradley Beal, his production looks closer to a Zach Lavine (high volume, high efficiency) or a CJ McCollum (very clearly the 2nd banana to Lillard) than to a Luka Doncic or a James Harden.
In fact, Beal isn't even the best player on the Wizards right now - a healthy Westbrook is better by a fairly considerable margin (dumping Westbrook is just the best move if you're dumping Beal even if you could and should get better value for Westbrook - the main problem with Westbrook is that you *have* to build the team around his skillset. Which you could in theory do with the Wizards with the right trades, but they'd be win now trades to the extreme (in short, get 2 elite defensive wings - someone like Mikail Bridges -with a solid 3 point shot to cover Bertans defensively, get another elite defensive C to spell Gafford, have Beal play more off ball (and get back to low 40s from 3), and run the offense around creating open lanes for Westbrook and hope that you can keep doing this in the playoffs, and you almost certainly wouldn't win a title this way.
The idea behind keeping Beal is that you won't be able to get someone who can be the best player on a title contender, because you already have that player in Bradley Beal. But if Beal actually *isn't that player, then it becomes time to move on.
NatP4 wrote:payitforward wrote:NatP4 wrote:Rui to the Spurs for #12. ...
What would make SA go for this trade?
I don’t know. They like international players. Pop doesn’t shy away from the mid range scorers like Aldridge and Derozan. I could see them having interest in Rui. They also need a 4.
If I’m the GM, I wouldn’t trade anything substantial for Rui, but the wizards claim he’s untouchable, so he probably has more value than you think.
Rui sucks as a player right now in a quantitative and qualitative sense. The thing is that Rui has a bunch of skills and does things at times that make one think he could not only not suck, but be really good, if he did them more consistently. A lot of the time this doesn't happen. But Rui has quite a few intangibles - work ethic, competitiveness, mentality, that make it more likely that he ends up being able to do those things consistently. That's the fundamental disconnect between pro-Rui posters and anti-Rui posters; pro-Rui posters look at him dunking on Anthony Davis or creating his own shot against Giannis and think "that's what he will develop into" and then you look at his numbers and they're that of a below-replacement level player. Both are missing the point - Rui's numbers = bad player, but Rui has a skillset that, if it improves to a certain level of consistency and proficiency, could make him an above-replacement level player, with the possibility of much more.
At the same time, its very important to note that most players who become really good in the NBA, are at worst replacement level by the end of their rookie year, and definitely by the end of their sophomore year. Rui isn't there yet.
