Rays Pompadour wrote:JMAC3 wrote:Rays Pompadour wrote:I tend to stay out of Kon debates because I'm a Blue Devil fan and therefore biased. But I watched Knueppel closely this past season and am convinced he is underrated as a defender. Foot speed, lateral quickness, overall athleticism are lacking compared to other prospects, but there is simply no replacing a player with above-average processing skills (which Kon has) who knows where to be and when. He has a thick body, so he won't get pushed around as easily as some of these spindly grasshoppers we drool over. And he can shoot. My gracious he can shoot. The Hornets won't need him to guard a player shooting from 30 feet. But Knueppel knows how to play team defense and that's where I think he'll succeed.
I still prefer Edgecomb, Johnson and Bailey over Knueppel. But those who didn't watch every single second of Duke basketball this past season like I did are missing the visible evidence of an ELITE shooting guard with size who is a well-rounded, heady basketball player who will only get better as his skill and man strength improve.
College defense is soooo very different than NBA though. College you can hide a player, teams can't shoot as well so having elite rim protection is even more valuable. In the NBA teams are going to be to hunt switches vs Kon or just attack him 1 on 1 with whoever is guarding him. Much harder to do that in college when most teams have maybe 1 guy on the roster they trust to be able to expose a bad defender, NBA bench players can drop 15 pts on you in a quarter.
Again, Knecht played at Tennessee and they were 3rd best defense in the country with him. He graded out as 8th worst defender in the entire NBA. It is just different.
Totally agree that college and pro defenses are different. The NBA is just hopelessly in love with the three point line. Hard to guard a dude who shoots it from Matthews. I also agree that Kon will get hunted, but I don't think he'll be the matador LaMelo Ball is. Kon will learn to switch effectively and play team defense. A say that because I believe Knuepple wants to play defense - I perceive that he loves the physicality of it. I don't think I can say the same about Bailey or Johnson. And, again, elite shooting.
Yeah I just don't care about that to be honest. Because is the argument than Kispert, Strus, Allen also just don't want to play defense? I think we are just way understating how difficult defense in the NBA especially with physical disadvantages. Want to is great, but even a guy like Steph Curry was 25% epm- and I don't think anyone thinks he was just bad because he wasn't trying or cared.
My guess is we are ecstatic if Kon is a 30th% defensive player, but with the expectation he will be worse.
