Vlade Divac, Bill Laimbeer, and Yao Ming

[onedayattatime]

Optional question: Who would go second and third?

[wojoaderge]

Aesthethically: Yao, Divac, Laimbeer
"Realistically": the reverse

[mikejames23]

I would roll with Laimbeer. I need a tough center who can body them up quite a bit. I grab around ~12 rpg from this guy and I see how well he does against bigs like Jokic, Giannis, Wemby.

[SilentA]

Yao and Divac are great, but Laimbeer for me by a hair. I value Laimbeer's game for team construction slightly more than Divac, and I just think Yao suffered too much with longevity and health. Laimbeer can be tough in the paint and pick and pop well. I feel he's a bit too slow footed to switch, but I'll try deploy him in the Brook Lopez manner with worse (but still ok) paint protection, better rebounding, shooter on offense, and maybe his flopping will work better FTA per game will go up for this era. As hated as he was by the league, players seem to describe him as a great teammate willing to do what needed to be done.

[tmorgan]

I’m a massive Pistons homer, and I still can’t believe this isn’t 100% Yao.

I get that it’s a different league now, but with current rosters there’s 20-25 teams with absolutely no way to deal with Yao. Monster size, good touch to midrange, excellent (but immobile) rim protector. If Gobert can be a very good player in the current NBA, Yao can dominate. He punished small players, unlike Rudy. He has touch, unlike Rudy. And his defense nearly as good.

Vlade vs Bill is dependent on teammates. Divac is a passing hub with some ball skills and a good offense/decent defense contribution. Laimbeer is a much more tenacious rebounder and defender (but still not a rim protector), but his offense is very limited because he’s slow as molasses and has zero handle. Yes, you need to guard him outside, which is nice for the modern game, but he makes Myles Turner look like Rafer Alston with the ball. Great screener, though.

Yao-Laimbeer-Vlade unless you need playmaking over toughness, then switch the last two.

[henshao]

Unless there is some medical revolution which helps out the beast from the east, I can't justify taking a guy so limited by injury as Yao even though he would otherwise be my top prospect. Divac was in many ways ahead of his time but Laimbeer love him or hate him got it done and had the shooting to contribute in probably any era

[onedayattatime]

Going to answer my own question because I think some of my reasoning in asking the question is similar/different to other posters.

Yao obviously has the highest upside, and I tend to agree that he would be very hard to defend in today's league, and he's the best rim protector out of the group. However, Yao played <500 games. By year 4, when he was entering his prime, he was already done having healthy seasons. Load management/better medicine *might* help, but I'd be concerned that he's someone who makes Embiid look like Robert Parish.

Laimbeer I thought could win out over Yao. Fairly normal longevity, franchise loyalty, adds something important (rebounding + spacing). I remembered Laimbeer as a pick-and-pop guy, but when I checked his numbers, I realized that he's not really the three-point shooter people think of him as: he's a career 33% shooter on 0.6 attempts. That's really about as efficient as his twos, although one might expect the volume at least to increase. So a stretch 5/rebounder with solid albeit immobile defense and lacking secondary skills.

I'm not completely sold, but thinking as a GM, I might actually want Vlade. He has the best longevity of the group, a reputation for cleverness and therefore maybe adaptability, and while the ceiling isn't super high, the floor on what he adds is never 0. I.e., in the worst case scenario, I get a complementary piece/high-level roleplayer for a long time. In the best case, maybe a #3 guy on a title team.

[SNPA]

Yao gets run off the floor.

Laimbeer would foul out.

Vlade you can run an offense through.

[70sFan]

I was always high on Divac, maybe too high at times. To me, he's the choice here though Laimbeer has a very solid case himself.

Yao is clearly the best prospect and the best talent, but you can't build around a player who can stay healthy for two seasons.