Stone wrote:Are Cam Johnson and Mikal Bridges finished products? I am not asking if they can grow their abilities a little. I am asking if it is probable that they will make a significant leap?
They are both 26. With Mikal being 27 at the start of next season and Cam Johnson turning 27 in a few weeks, for context he is slightly older than Ben Simmons.
Claxton is 23, I can definitely see him improving significantly over the next few years. Cam Thomas is 21 same for him.
i think to a degree they are what they are because they've had such a big impact already it's hard to see them having much more of one. I've compared bridges upside to middleton and i think by most metrics they are already very comparable, assuming he can maintain the efficiency he's shown with the recent higher usage.
for his career middleton averaged 17/4/4 on 46%/39%/88%.
right now Bridges is avaeraging 17/4/4 on 46%/39%/90%.
middleton's best years he got up to 20ppg on higher usage and in the last 2 months that's where bridges has been with booker out. his first 20ppg year was his age 26.
so if we take middleton as a reasonable/optimistic interpretation of bridges, taking a step back how many players are there who are better than middleton when he was at his best? not many, so if you want a higher upside projection it would have to be someone like kawhi or pg3. i wouldn't call those outcomes impossible but they are both highly unlikely outcomes bridges' current resume doesn't track with. those guys were dominant scorers early in their careers at their early 20's, which is a development curve that passed both bridges/cam a few years ago.
i'd gladly take khris middleton 2.0 and tayshaun prince 2.0 though. talk about 2 great players who would fit perfectly next to claxton (and simmons if he ever gets it together).
