stevemcqueen1 wrote:SUPERBALLMAN wrote:McLemore is too similar to Beal IMO, he's very good, but Beal is already here and doing what McLemore is doing in the NBA. Shabazz talent wise especially offensively is probably #3. But I'd still prefer Porter for the Wizards.
Well, having two Beals would be awesome. Perhaps I read you wrong, but I took you as saying we'd have a hard time getting McLemore enough minutes to make picking him worthwhile.
I agree with that point. That's the problem I keep coming back to with McLemore, Oladipo, and Shabazz. If you draft McLemore, you probably took him with a top three pick. It's tough to spend that kind of an asset on a reserve player. Or I guess you could start them at SF but that lineup would just be so small.
Bazz is an iffy play at SF. He's got good arm length and he's got pretty decent bulk for the SF position but he's short for a SF and his length and reach is not comparable to a lot of the SFs of the league. Plus a player like him really does make sense being matched up with a SG where he'll be fast enough to guard them and he can use his strength to really bully guys like Joe Johnson does.
Basically, I think Shabazz is a physical mismatch for NBA SGs. But then you put him at a physical disadvantage against most NBA SFs. So then why not play him at SG even though his background is at SF?
Bazz is the easiest one to rationalize playing SF in lineups with Beal and Wall, but it's not an ideal fit. I think you'd be sacrificing a lot defensively to add some scoring. Maybe creating some bad matchups and you'd have spent such a high pick on him you've got to play him or trade him. I don't want to get stuck with a constant mismatched tweener lineup like Atl was under the Joe Johnson/Smith/Horford/Marvin Williams construction.
I think we just take a big man if he's available or trade down if Muhammad/McLemore/Oladipo/any other guard are the BPA.
I'm so torn on how to approach this.
In general, I feel like the wing players that are projected to be lottery picks are a lot better than the big men that are projected to be lottery picks this year.
Basically I'm thinking about it like this:
McLemore, Porter, Muhammad, Oladipo
vs.
Noel, Len, Zeller, Bennett (or is he a 3/4 tweener?)
Now, obviously that's not really the issue here. The ultimate goal is for us to get the best player for our team, so it doesn't really matter if the wings are better than the big men or vice versa. But just looking at those 8 players, I definitely get a lot more excited about the wings. I could easily see McLemore, Porter, and Muhammad all becoming all-stars at some point (not so much Oladipo). But as for the big men? Noel, Len, and Zeller all seem "solid" to me, and I think they'll find a role in an NBA rotation (less confident about that with Len though), but I'm having a hard time seeing any of those guys ever becoming "good" or even close to all-star caliber. Bennett is the exception, as I think he could very well end up being the best player in this draft (but he also has the highest bust probability of these guys, IMO).
I'm not necessarily a "high risk, high reward" guy, but in this group of players, I don't really have that much interest in acquiring a solid big man that's just going to be a role player. I'd be much happier if we ended up with McLemore, Porter, or Muhammad (even though I have my hesitations with his attitude). These three guys could be legit stars in the future. I also feel very confident in saying that McLemore and Porter have a very high floor, as I see their worst case scenario being a solid 6th man or second guy off the bench. Muhammad's personality and play style has the potential to screw him over if he can't make the jump to big time NBA scorer, because I get the impression that he truly has no idea how to handle not being "the man."
The way I see it, we already have a relatively deep collection of "okay" big men. Nene is good, no doubt. Okafor has been playing his ass off the last couple months, he's real solid for the time being, but we probably need some young blood down low. Seraphin's a mystery to me still, sometimes I love him, sometimes I hate him, but he's developed so much since he got here 2 years ago, that I'm willing to ride it out and give him a lot more time. Vesely is garbage. Booker is a real solid backup PF when he's healthy (although obviously he's never healthy). And Singleton isn't very good, but for a 4th or 5th big man, he gets the job done. The point I'm getting at though, is what do we really stand to gain by adding Noel, Len, or Zeller? Len and Zeller are obviously 2 very different players, but their net impact on the game might be pretty similar in that they're just there. They'll probably know their roles, grab some boards, hit the easy wide open looks when they get them, and give a good effort on defense. That doesn't really interest me though. That's not all that much better than what we've already got, or what we could get relatively easily on the free agent market. A lot of people are buying into Noel as a future star, but I just don't see it (from a basketball standpoint). He at least has the potential to possibly develop into a Tyson Chandler type down the line, IMO. But that's a loooong ways away.
Clearly the Wizards are finally headed in the right direction, and it's a slow and long process, but I think we all can agree that if we're ever truly going to become contenders, in addition to Wall and/or Beal continuing to develop into all-star caliber players, we're probably going to need another impact player. Let's swing for the fences here and go for McLemore, Porter, or Muhammad (or Bennett).
