Benjamin Linus wrote:A low-key dimension this team lacks is a small-ball four. Most teams have an option to go small at PF and Marvin & Frank are too slow-footed to defend it. Technically, MKG is our best bet, but he's still a little undersized, injury-prone, and has always been better at defending 1s and 2s than bigger 3s.
We even saw this in our 48-win playoff team when Miami played Deng at the four, who straight up torched Marvin and Frank, then returned back to his garbage self in Miami's next series.
And it doesn't necessarily have to be a defensive-minded one. An offensive 3/4 that can get hot and at least somewhat counter the points scored by guys like Tobias would even be cool.
Excellent point. We've wasted way too much development time and draft capital trying to groom tweener (or length-deficient) Centers to become "stretch fours" when the Lineup of Death trend is actually the exact opposite, it seems to have had the most success when teams converted long rangy tweener SFs into PFs. We're trying to convert from big to small(er) when the formula for success is transitioning guys from smalls to bigs.
In the end Cody became an undersized C again (for the better) and Frank is still trying to figure out how to be a PF. Marv from two years ago was our most effective "small ball 4" that I can recall, another guy who fit the SF/PF tweener archetype (and would've been adored by draftniks in 2017 for primariy for his Lineup of Death potential). If we want a stretch four we should probably find a SF with exceptional length and solid lower-body strength, not the Center-that-can-shoot archetype we've chased thus far.