Any of you think Lopez can improve? He is only 25. I wonder if the goal is just to take him for what he is (backup center) or if they think they can get more out of him. It would also be interesting to see him with this team and system. I know he hasn't improved much to this point, but you never know..
He improved a LOT last season. He went from a back-up to a starter, played more than twice as many minutes as he had in any previous season and put up a career best PER of 18.9. Think about that, his playing time more than doubled and he put up better numbers against starting centers than he did against back-ups. That's not just improving, that's what many people would call a break out season.
His solid play was also one reason Anthony Davis, even when healthy, didn't play more minutes. I'm not claiming Lopez is a better player than Davis, Davis is certainly a MUCH better long term prospect, but NOH as a team performed better when Lopez was on the court than when Davis was. Davis, a skinny rookie, got pushed around a lot, especially on the defensive end, by bigger, stronger players. Lopez did not. If you go to
82games.com you'll see that Lopez posted positive numbers for both Net Production (how he played compared to his individual opponents) and On Court/Off Court. This shows that he not only outplayed other starting centers, but his team performed better with him on the court than off. On a team as bad as NOH was last year, that's actually rather impressive. NOH only had one other player (Eric Gordon) with positive numbers in both categories (Davis was -0.3 in On Court/Off Court).
Yeah, he's not perfect. If he was, he wouldn't be young, cheap and available for nothing. Still, I like this move a lot. Especially combined with Olshey's other moves. This would give the Blazers three centers that are:
Young
Cheap
Healthy
Have GREAT size
Can Shoot Free Throws
It gives Stotts a lot of options at the center position. Lopez has proven he's a capable NBA starting center (BTW, our starting center last season had an On Court/Off Court of -5.7 compared to Lopez' +1.4). He's not a great offensive player, but he knows his limitations and doesn't try to do more than he's capable of (high FG%, rarely shoots more than 10 feet from the basket). Yes, he needs to rebound better, especially on the defensive end (82games.com shows he averaged 10.4 REB/48 compared to his opponents at 11.1 REB/48 - so he's not getting totally owned by other starting centers, but I'd like to see that go from negative to positive). Leonard, is by far the best offensive player of the 3, Withey has been called a 1 trick pony by some, but that 1 trick is very valuable and hard to find (blocking shots at a very high rate without committing fouls) and Lopez is the most experienced (but still young and improving). It will allow Stotts to go with offensive/defensive substitutions as the match-ups and situations dictate. And, since all 3 are good FT shooters, none will be a liability in close late game situations.
Plus, the addition of TRob, will allow Stotts to go with a smaller (but still very long) line-up with Aldridge at the 5 and TRob at the 4.
I'm liking everything Olshey is doing. He hasn't hit a home run, yet, but assuming we get Lopez, he's put together a nice string of ground rule doubles with the draft (all 3 players he got were GREAT values at where they were selected and will make our bench a lot better - and younger and cheaper). And, he's done it all without giving up anything of value. He's managed to retain our best players and add a lot of young, cheap depth, and possibly a new starting center. Hard not to like that.
BNM
