Official Raptors 2012 NBA Draft Thread, Part 9

[fatal9]

Also in the event we do win the lottery (hopefully we stay around 10% chance) and get AD, I think the common sense move to make would be to put together a trade of whatever it takes to get another top 5-6 pick and secure a guy like Jeremy Lamb. It will take a lot to make that happen but a 2013 first round pick, Demar + whatever else they want (except AD and Val) could be enough.

You end up with an unreal rookie core of Val/AD/Lamb (omg), with solid young role players on the bench, a coach who seems to know what he is doing + tons of cap space to get veterans. If that happens...

[JamesNaismith]

Also in the event we do win the lottery (hopefully we stay around 10% chance) and get AD, I think the common sense move to make would be to put together a trade of whatever it takes to get another top 5-6 pick and secure a guy like Jeremy Lamb. It will take a lot to make that happen but a 2013 first round pick, Demar + whatever else they want (except AD and Val) could be enough.

You end up with an unreal rookie core of Val/AD/Lamb (omg), with solid young role players on the bench, a coach who seems to know what he is doing + tons of cap space to get veterans. If that happens...

That young core would have amazing potential and if you throw DD + an unprotected 2013, I really think a team would bite because that would actually be a huge gamble for us. We just gave away a guaranteed 17ppg young player AND the potential to draft Shabazz or Noels because realistically this team could still be in the lotto with at least 2 rookies in the starting line up but imo I would take that gamble because I also believe that Colangelo would use every available cent of cap to make sure we're atleast fighting for a playoff spot.

FA (Nash, Drajic, Lin etc...)
Lamb
Bargnani
ADavis
Valanciunas

[sunny]

frederick, I know you like OSU.

Did you read the recent story about Thad Matta. pretty crazy how he dealt with those injuries and didnt let it effect him.

ah nope, tell me more about the story.

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/basketball ... ate_032412

[Al_Oliver]

frederick, I know you like OSU.

Did you read the recent story about Thad Matta. pretty crazy how he dealt with those injuries and didnt let it effect him.

ah nope, tell me more about the story.

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/basketball ... ate_032412

Drop Foot's team, dropped the ball against Kansas... a lesser team

[CoachJReturns]

Here's an ideal scenario for the Raptors. Let's say we get the 4th pick in the draft, here's what we should do:

Take Andre Drummond for the pick, then trade Andrea Bargnani for a second top 10 pick and select Jeremy Lamb with that one. These are quite possibly the two most risk-reward players in the lottery. I'm sick of this team playing it safe and drafting mediocre talent. We need stars, and these guys have Dwight Howard and Reggie Miller ceilings respectively, which would give us exactly what we need.

We then ship Bayless, Ed Davis, and our 2nd round pick to the Bucks for Brandon Jennings to secure our future PG, and yet another guy who is already solid but has shown flashes of star potential (55pt game, 24-7 through the first half of his rookie season). I feel like Jennings would be a stud if he played on a team with other high-end offensive talent.

You move forwards with:
PG: Jennings
SG: Lamb
SF: DeRozan (if he bulked up, he could defend 3s, and he'd also be quicker than most of them, which would make driving easier)
PF: Andre Drummond
C: Jonas Valanciunas

If every one of those players pans out, you basically have:
PG: Allen Iverson
SG: Reggie Miller
SF: Vince Carter
PF: Amare Stoudemire
C: Pau Gasol with defense

Obviously that won't happen, but odds are they do all improve, and at least 1 of them becomes a franchise level talent. Sorry but I'm not ok with taking a Harrison Barnes, and watching him average 15ppg for the next 10 years while we never win more than 45 games. I, like any self-respecting fan, want an NBA Championship. Sometimes a team has to gamble if they want one, and that's what we need to do in this draft.

This might be easier if we get the #2 pick, as we could just trade it down to Portland for both of theirs and take Lamb/Drummond that way while still keeping Andrea.

I get that you don't want more role players on the team, but I don't think Bargnani is worth as much as we like to think. Power forward is one of the more solid positions in the league and I don't think anyone would want him that badly. I'm also on the fence with Drummond, but I'm sure BC would consider taking him if another team was willing to make a nice offer for him. A centre with that kind of potential must have some trade value.

[Kevin Willis]

Re: Drummond
He's way more likely to be Deandre Jordan than Blake Griffin. I saw him play about a month ago at MSG. He moves well and has good size and co-ordination, but he didn't seem to know how to get open or seal off his man to catch the ball in the post. On D, he made some decent weak side rotations, but the other team (WVU) ended up with 29 offensive rebounds. He's just not aggressive enough, on either end. I think his stats show this. It doesn't mean he can't fix that problem (see Monroe, Greg), but it's a massive concern.

Re: Lamb
Obviously, I got to see him live too. His arms go past his knees and he moves fluidly and has nice form on his jump shot. I think he'll get his shot off fairly easily in the pros and considering he hit 60% on his 2pt FG's this year and showed he can play as a glue guy on a winning team last year while improving from a freshman to a sophomore, I'd have him ahead of Barnes. Not sure he has the handle to be a truly great player, but I think he could be a really nice 2nd or 3rd best player on a team. A very efficient offensive game, length on D and a good teammate.

Re: Barnes
Never seen him live. He does have the athleticism and shooting to be a really good scorer in the NBA, but his lack of improvement from year 1 to year 2 and his low 2pt FG percentage make me think he just takes too many tough shots to score efficiently. Seems like he might turn out to be the kind of player Danny Granger is this year, which is to say a pretty good one, but nowhere near efficient enough to be the top scorer on a good team and not great at anything else. I was going to throw out Caron Butler as a logical comparison, but Butler put up 20 a game on 49/40/78 as a sophomore. As a pro, in his prime (best 3 years), those numbers dropped to 20 a game on 46/32/87. Barnes put up 17 a game on 44/36/72. Say he's able to improve his FT% to 80 and manages to keep his 3pt% steady even with the longer distance but is a bit less accurate on overall field goal shooting due to facing longer, faster defenders than college 3's, and not having a great PG like Marshall to get him the ball, than we're looking at around 17-18 a game on 42/36/80, without being an impact rebounder, defender or passer. . That's basically what Kleiza give the Raps now at the 3, except he only gets 21 minutes a game. Hard to get excited about that.

On the other hand, he could get drafted 8th, see it as a slap in the face, start playing aggressively and stop taking tough shots, improve his post footwork and develop into a slightly worse Paul Pierce, who dropped to 10th in his draft. Personally, I can't get over the inefficient shooting in his 2nd year. Doing that as a freshman is one thing, but the only improvement in his game seems to have been taking 1.5 less 3's a game, and he should really have been a dominant, efficient scorer this year. Each of Caron Butler, Paul Pierce and Danny Granger (the latter two being the only high scoring SF's in the league who played 2 year of college ball) scored much more efficiently their 2nd season.

Nice summary. Are there any other players you can break down in this way - I would like to read a fresh opinion from an ol' head. I'm sure others would also feel the same.