Hey the Wolves thought about this guy at #20 he could be the steal of the draft!!!! He needs his own thread right?
I just watched this game against Michigan late in the season and will share a few thoughts.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=B-VIM5LoCKM
Tough fought game by both teams. Mochigan's Defense was terrific pretty much the whole game. If it wasn't for Tate doing some good work on the boards and getting baskets this game would have not been close at all.
Offensively KBD has enough handles to dribble around the perimeter and even back out of trouble when double teamed. Creating for himself once he gets a few steps inside the lane it's not tight enough and I don't think he has quite the juice to get there. It's a combination. He has some moves though if there is plenty of space and probably will be good enough to score in transition. His shot looks very good. The 2nd half he was doubled a ton. He had one really terrific pass and the guy missed the shot. He had a bad turnover early in the game but he made a lot of the right plays. Some guys just don't really present themselves very well. So he ended up pretty much just passing out of the double team and it didn't lead to anything. To me he has the offensive skill of a solid complimentary wing but as a PF he would have very useful perimeter skills.
Defense and other stuff is where I was actually pretty impressed with him. His defense looked good. He stuck with his guy early and then on other players he seemed to play off a smart amount. As the game went on they did a lot more switching which could have been a change in Michigan's offensive attack but I wasn't paying that close attention. He switched onto pretty much every player. I never really thought he looked overwhelmed and often kept the guy in front of him or ended up with a worthwhile contest. He had 2 blocks where he overwhelmed the players with his length. One was on a 3 point shot he easily blocked and another one was on a perimeter player than came into the lane and he blocked it so easily he may have just been able to take it out of the air. He plays PF a lot from what I can tell although they have another Bigger SF also. He often was seen boxing his guy out as soon as a shot was up and he ended up with some rebounds outside his area. I thought there were a few plays where he could have got in on the play but I didn't see anything remotely troubling about his overall effort. He moves his feet well and seems to have very good defensive footwork espcially for a guy that size. I'm sure he will struggle more at the NBA level but based on this game he looks like he has a good chance an asset on that end or far from a liability.
Overall he looks like a really nice player to add to the roster as a type of guy this team has needed for a while. He is a true stretch 4 but mobile enough to actually be on the perimeter at times. He is a guy with the length to guard some of the bigger SFs in the league. He didn't seem to have a weak base but I will have to watch that a bit more in the next game. At #48 he seems like a pretty versatile player and that's inna game where offensively he wasn't that impressive.
Also Mo Wagner plays his ass off all the damn time. He is honestly kinda annoying how pumped up he gets. It kinda reminds me somewhat of Joakim Noah as a college player in that regard. If he plays that hard innthe NBA and can hit 3's he will probably hang around a while. Like Jim Peterson says playing hard is a skill.
Keita Bates-Diop thread
Re: Keita Bates-Diop thread
Word is that the reason Keita dropped was actually a medical issue. He had a back problem after his Jazz work out and actually had to lay on the floor for a while but did workouts for other teams later that week (might have even done a workout the next day) and was fine. At #48 I'll take some AK-47 back spasm issues if KBD is actually good and apparently teams thought he was a first round talent. It feels like maybe we might get a contributor because of injury concerns that dropped kinda like OG last year. They are different ends of the potential spectrum and different types of athletes but it would be nice to nab a very worthwhile player that fell.
Re: Keita Bates-Diop thread
monsterpile wrote:Word is that the reason Keita dropped was actually a medical issue. He had a back problem after his Jazz work out and actually had to lay on the floor for a while but did workouts for other teams later that week (might have even done a workout the next day) and was fine. At #48 I'll take some AK-47 back spasm issues if KBD is actually good and apparently teams thought he was a first round talent. It feels like maybe we might get a contributor because of injury concerns that dropped kinda like OG last year. They are different ends of the potential spectrum and different types of athletes but it would be nice to nab a very worthwhile player that fell.
I couldn't tell from what I've read exactly what the back injury was. There was no description of what happened. I'm not sure that's why he dropped. It might be more related to the stress fracture and surgery he had to repair it as a sophomore. Either way, I'm happy we grabbed him at #48. I would have been very unhappy if we took him at #20, but getting him lower in the second round is a great value. I really like what I've seen of him in highlight videos. He's long and skilled. And he looks like he has some toughness. I have a good feeling about him if he stays healthy.