I'm leery of Lilliard, but he clearly does seem to grade out pretty well in the analytics in this department ... he's got a shot.
I think too many people are scared off because he 1. Played in a small conference 2. Scored a lot of pts When you actually look deeper into the situation you see there's A LOT to like. Penn's breakdown on his passing numbers in PnR situations was money. Great character, smart player, tested out very well athletically, lights-out shooter, great in PnR situations/pretty good ball-handler, gets to the FT line a lot I'll be shocked if he doesn't work out at this point. There are just little to no signs that he won't.
Another good comparison, the late Ben Gorden http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...rds-best-and-worst-case-pro-player-comparison
Well ... I can think of two without even breaking a sweat. 1. Bad competition in the Big Sky and 2. he's kind of old ... I'm happy to have him prove my doubts wrong.
By the way--I may have missed it, but has anyone pointed out yet that we were a coin flip away from being able to draft Thomas Robinson? That's kind of depressing.
Not gonna lie, I think the "too old" comment is garbage. There are far too many factors that go into a players performance at the collegiate level...coaching, system, teammates, injuries, roles, even academics (woah, you do that in college?) to stereotype that older players have less room for growth. The bottom line is they're all going from one lesser league to a greater league, and they're all going to have to adjust in some ways. They all have weaknesses as well. It's a matter of choosing players who's weaknesses you can live with (even if they don't improve by leaps and bounds), and whose strengths you can maximize. Granted, if a guy is 24, then I can see it, but being 22 instead of 20 is SO overrated as a negative.
I think the Lillard pick was really good, the Leonard pick not so much and the Barton pick was magnificent.
Dan Wolken @DanWolken Draymond Green and Will Barton will be better pros than at least 8-10 players picked in the 1st round.
I generally agree, my guess is that Leonard will be better than most think but a guess is all it is, FA could be interesting and will CLE actually go hard after Nic?
I think you could be right. On the plus side he has more fire than most bigs. I like that he is emotional. He is young and he will learn to channel it. He will be a work in progress, but they say he is a gym rat. AS LONG AS HE STAYS HEALTHY, I think he will get bigger and stronger and eventually be our starting center. Hopefully for a long time. I do think PRYZ can help him out on the defensive end. Hopefully they can keep him for cheap.
Whoever of those two is less expensive and I don't think there is all that much difference, Thompson is more of a PF/C so he could make more sense
