Just looking position by position, without taking into account chemistry, potential for injury, or degrees of superiority: PG1 Lillard > Lin SG1 Matthews < Bryant SF1 Batum > Young PF1 Aldridge > Davis C1 Lopez > Hill PG2 Blake < Nash SG2 McCollum < Brooks SF2 Wright < Henry PF2 Robinson < Randle C2 Kaman > Sacre PG3 Barton > Clarkson SG3 Crabbe > (Open) SF3 Claver < Johnson PF3 Freeland < Boozer C3 Leonard < Kelly I see them better at 8 spots, with our starters being considerably better, but their bench being decidedly better. I'm speculating about Randle being better than Truck, but I think the rest of it seems pretty clear. Tell me where I'm wrong?
Nothing is clearly wrong, given your caveats. Of course, degree of superiority in the starting lineup and the starters playing many more minutes than the reserves is why this type of analysis doesn't go any distance in evaluating teams.
4 out of 5 starters being better then they goes a lot further then 7 out of 10 reserves being better then us.
True, although as Dame is learning at team USA camp, being deeper means that you can put forth more effort on both ends of the floor. They are clearly deeper than we are. That may well pay dividends for them, especially late in the season, and in terms of being able to keep Kobe on the floor. Just saying, they're not likely to be the pushover many assume they will be.
If Nash is healthy, he's a better PG > Lillard. If he's not, he's < Blake. Nice color-coding, by the way.
Can we really say still the Kobe is > Wes.... I mean I get it...but if you do matchup Wes<>Kobe...Wes knows how to hound him and Kobe doesn't have the step he use to. Perhaps =?
I don't understand how the Lakers having an advantage at players 13-15 really matters, and I also aren't quite sure how you can put Randle ahead of TRob, considering Randle has literally not played an NBA game.
I'm more talking about 6-10. The third string inclusion was just for completeness' sake. Only because based on what I saw of him in college, Randle appears to have more of an NBA game with actual low post skills, as contrasted with Robinson's high-energy garbage man game. Both have value, but I just think Randle will be very good. He may well be starting before season's end.
Wait, when we signed Blankey and Kaman people were saying we took their two best healthy players from last season, but now they have a better roster than us?
It's an interesting exercise, but since 1-5 play the majority of the minutes, I'm not sure it really matters. I think Randle could be good, too, but with college PFs who aren't exceptionally tall (he's only 6'7.75" w/out shoes), it can become about athleticism unless you're a low-post freak with a mid-range game like ZBO. I can't imagine Randle trying to defend LMA, for example, since LMA is a legitimate 6'10" w/out shoes. Randle dropped because he's undersized in terms of height. He measured only 6'9" in shoes with a 7' wingspan. By comparison, TRob measured 6'8.25" in shoes with a 7'3.25" wingspan, and he looks undersized.
Only if Nash has invented a time machine. As bad as Blake is, he scored more points and had more assists before Thanksgiving than Nash did for the entire season. Nash is done. He's just taking up a roster spot and eating up a shit load of cap space. That makes him my favorite Laker (if there is such a thing). BNM
I think we are better at every single starting spot and the bench strength is near the same. The Lakers would be happy finishing within ten games of the Blazers.