Camden wrote:Layman has been playing better as of late, absolutely, but so was Culver before he got banged up. We need to remember that we have way more invested in Culver than we do Layman. Not to mention, Culver's ceiling is much higher than Layman's even with his wonky shot mechanics. Culver should be the player getting those wing minutes.
Cam - That's probably the better strategic approach. Culver's age, ceiling, salary and status as a 6th pick in the NBA draft all favor keeping him in the rotation over Layman if that's the choice. I'd feel better about Culver if his shot didn't continue to look broken. Would you put Culver in the starting lineup in place of Okogie when KAT returns?
Yes, absolutely. I wanted to see Culver in the starting lineup before the season tipped off. Part of that is because I think he's more of a two-way player than Okogie is and he keeps that lineup balanced offensively and defensively, but also because of the investment aspect I talked about previously.
If I had it my way using everything that we've seen this season so far, I'd start Russell, Beasley, Culver, McDaniels, and Towns when they're all healthy.
I prefer to see McLaughlin get the backup point guard minutes, but we know it'll be Rubio. So, the rest of the rotation should consist of Rubio, Nowell, Edwards, Vanderbilt, and Reid.
Layman would be my next man up should wing minutes become available again. Unfortunately, I think Okogie has played himself out of a rotation spot with his abysmal scoring/shooting ability. His defense hasn't been offsetting that either, in my opinion.
If any of you have read my new thread re: offense vs. defense, you already know that I think the starting lineup Q lays out is a disaster on the defensive side of the court, and that is unacceptable to me. DLO/Malik/Ant each rank at the bottom of their position individually, and collectively they might rank as the worst defensive 1-3 in the history of the NBA! DLO is going to start...that's a given. But I continue to see Ant and Beasley as one-way players only, and big offense/poor defense players are tailor-made for a bench role. Not only do they provide instant offense off the bench, but ideally their defensive shortcomings are better hid if matched up with opponents' reserves.
PG, C and PF are fairly easy to predict, although J-Mac may be odd man out if Rubio and DLO are both available. While I love McDaniels' 2-way potential, he's only 19 and surprisingly doesn't grade out well in DRPM, especially compared to Vando. So my rotation at these three positions are the same as Q's (with Vando starting over McD)
KAT/Reid
Vando/McD
DLO/Rubio
The wing rotations are where I depart from the consensus here because of my distaste for very poor starting defense. We do have a wing who has the potential to be a true 2-way player, and that is Nowell...he actually grades out quite well both this year and last in DRPM, and we have also seen his ability to score, so he becomes my starter at the 2. Layman has played quite well on both sides of the court since his inauspicious start to the season, and as Cam says, Culver also was showing some signs of life before his injury. So I would like Ryan to start the one who is playing best, with the other relegated to 11th or 12th man. So at the wings:
Nowell/Beasley
Culver or Layman/Edwards
Out of the 10 man rotation are:
Okogie (we know his offense is horrible, but his defensive numbers are surprisingly subpar too...he needs some time in Iowa)
Juancho (time to give the young guys a chance at PF)
Davis (available if one of our centers is unavailable, and we know what he will bring)
J-Mac (just aren't enough minutes available yet assuming Rubio and DLO are healthy)
Layman or Culver (whoever is playing worse)
I like the defensive presence in the first unit paired with our two max scorers, and I love the firepower of the second unit.
Camden wrote:Layman has been playing better as of late, absolutely, but so was Culver before he got banged up. We need to remember that we have way more invested in Culver than we do Layman. Not to mention, Culver's ceiling is much higher than Layman's even with his wonky shot mechanics. Culver should be the player getting those wing minutes.
Cam - That's probably the better strategic approach. Culver's age, ceiling, salary and status as a 6th pick in the NBA draft all favor keeping him in the rotation over Layman if that's the choice. I'd feel better about Culver if his shot didn't continue to look broken. Would you put Culver in the starting lineup in place of Okogie when KAT returns?
Yes, absolutely. I wanted to see Culver in the starting lineup before the season tipped off. Part of that is because I think he's more of a two-way player than Okogie is and he keeps that lineup balanced offensively and defensively, but also because of the investment aspect I talked about previously.
If I had it my way using everything that we've seen this season so far, I'd start Russell, Beasley, Culver, McDaniels, and Towns when they're all healthy.
I prefer to see McLaughlin get the backup point guard minutes, but we know it'll be Rubio. So, the rest of the rotation should consist of Rubio, Nowell, Edwards, Vanderbilt, and Reid.
Layman would be my next man up should wing minutes become available again. Unfortunately, I think Okogie has played himself out of a rotation spot with his abysmal scoring/shooting ability. His defense hasn't been offsetting that either, in my opinion.
We're very much in agreement here on much of this, Cam. We both want J-Mac to get some minutes at the expense of Rubio (your choice to be replaced) or DLO (my choice) but we both know it's inevitable DLO and Ricky will play. If Culver starts at SF as you suggest, I could accept Beasley's poor defense starting at the 2, although I would prefer Nowell to be given a chance. Vando and McDaniels is a coin toss for me, but both have impressed me enough to put Juancho on the bench.
And of course none of this really matters until Karl comes back...
How about the 5 you want on the floor to finish the game? Most nights I would hope it would look like this:
DLO
Beasley
Edwards
McDaniels
Towns
It may be too early to have Mickey D in there, but love his potential 2-way play. At a minimum I'd be substituting him for defense by possession. If any of the three guards don't have it going, I'd have Nowell in there. So he would get close to as many opportunities as DLO, Beasley, and Edwards. He could be the offensive sub for Mickey D too. I don't want Rubio, Okogie, or Culver anywhere near the court during crunch time. In fact just have them go to the locker room and watch the last 5 minutes.
CoolBreeze44 wrote:How about the 5 you want on the floor to finish the game? Most nights I would hope it would look like this:
DLO
Beasley
Edwards
McDaniels
Towns
It may be too early to have Mickey D in there, but love his potential 2-way play. At a minimum I'd be substituting him for defense by possession. If any of the three guards don't have it going, I'd have Nowell in there. So he would get close to as many opportunities as DLO, Beasley, and Edwards. He could be the offensive sub for Mickey D too. I don't want Rubio, Okogie, or Culver anywhere near the court during crunch time. In fact just have them go to the locker room and watch the last 5 minutes.
For me it depends on situation, Cool. If we're behind, I like your five. If we're ahead by 4 or more, I'd go:
KAT
Vando
Culver
Nowell
DLO or Rubio, whoever is plying better
FNG wrote:If any of you have read my new thread re: offense vs. defense, you already know that I think the starting lineup Q lays out is a disaster on the defensive side of the court, and that is unacceptable to me. DLO/Malik/Ant each rank at the bottom of their position individually, and collectively they might rank as the worst defensive 1-3 in the history of the NBA! DLO is going to start...that's a given. But I continue to see Ant and Beasley as one-way players only, and big offense/poor defense players are tailor-made for a bench role. Not only do they provide instant offense off the bench, but ideally their defensive shortcomings are better hid if matched up with opponents' reserves.
PG, C and PF are fairly easy to predict, although J-Mac may be odd man out if Rubio and DLO are both available. While I love McDaniels' 2-way potential, he's only 19 and surprisingly doesn't grade out well in DRPM, especially compared to Vando. So my rotation at these three positions are the same as Q's (with Vando starting over McD)
KAT/Reid
Vando/McD
DLO/Rubio
The wing rotations are where I depart from the consensus here because of my distaste for very poor starting defense. We do have a wing who has the potential to be a true 2-way player, and that is Nowell...he actually grades out quite well both this year and last in DRPM, and we have also seen his ability to score, so he becomes my starter at the 2. Layman has played quite well on both sides of the court since his inauspicious start to the season, and as Cam says, Culver also was showing some signs of life before his injury. So I would like Ryan to start the one who is playing best, with the other relegated to 11th or 12th man. So at the wings:
Nowell/Beasley
Culver or Layman/Edwards
Out of the 10 man rotation are:
Okogie (we know his offense is horrible, but his defensive numbers are surprisingly subpar too...he needs some time in Iowa)
Juancho (time to give the young guys a chance at PF)
Davis (available if one of our centers is unavailable, and we know what he will bring)
J-Mac (just aren't enough minutes available yet assuming Rubio and DLO are healthy)
Layman or Culver (whoever is playing worse)
I like the defensive presence in the first unit paired with our two max scorers, and I love the firepower of the second unit.
Git 'er done!!!!
That starting lineup has been apart of the 6th best defensive team since Ant got put into the starting lineup.
We're all pretty much in agreement. Some of the guys we figured would be on the fringes have stepped up. And some of the guys whose draft and contract status, and arguably potential, suggests they should be better have been disappointed to varying degrees. The weird result is that once KAT is back, there are legitimate playing-time problems on such a shitty team.
The good thing is that there are so many games so close together, Ryan should be able to address these issues somewhat by giving some of these guys off nights on a rotating basis and justify it partly on the schedule. It's obviously kind of already happening with DLO. I could see him continuing that and telling guys that because they're getting those rest days he expects them to play with more energy every night and expect the guys who get more minutes as a result to try to prove themselves a bit more.
Nowell and McDaniels absolutely look too good not to play. They've earned some patience even if they have a few tough nights at this point. The problem with Nowell is that he and Beasley are a bit redundant, but Nowell is really such a good scorer, he's really gotta play no matter what. McDaniels has really stepped up as our defensive specialist, and he's longer and more disruptive than Okogie, so even when his shot isn't falling, he's still a help. And of course, his shot is often a bit better than Okogie's, and he's really joined Vando as a new hustle guy. I think McDaniels' shot will come, although we have to admit it's still rough right now. On an actually good team, he probably wouldn't get many minutes at all. But the potential is clearly there, I'd say moreso than Culver and Okogie. Those two (Nowell and McDaniels) are a real reason for some optimism in a season that otherwise doesn't have much.
I still love Vanderbilt like basically everybody here.
Layman (if he had a twin would they be Laymen?) has looked pretty good lately. I really like how much he is deflecting the ball on defense, actually. He's not a great man defender, but he and McDaniels are both disrupting opponents' passing lanes. I get that, like Juancho, he doesn't look like he has a high ceiling, but when he's playing well like this, I think you need to find him some minutes. If his shot abandons him again though, he'd better continue to be able to attack the basket and finish, otherwise I could see his minutes getting sacrificed for someone else if they're playing better.
Culver has some diverse skills, but he's just average at best at most of them, and his shooting is horrendous. He should get a chance to play when he comes back, but if Nowell, McDaniels, and Layman are still playing this well and Culver doesn't continue to show progress, I'd be ok with him falling out of the rotation. Cam, I'm not so sure our investment in him would justify giving him minutes on its own. I get that we picked him high, but at a certain point you can't keep throwing good money (minutes?) after bad. He deserves a chance, but we also need to be ready to admit our investment in him may be sunk cost and limit that by giving his minutes to others.
I love Okogie's hustle, but unless he can start hitting 3s, we really can't play him. He needs to practice that shot a thousand times a day or he really may be done in the NBA. It pains me to say that.
I've just never really liked Juancho. If he's hitting 3s, ok. But he just looks like such a stiff out there. He did have that one really good game this year. And we need a 4, but at this point, I'd definitely prefer to see Vanderbilt and McDaniels out there.
Sadly, I like McLaughlin, so it's especially hard to see Ricky struggling like this knowing we're missing out on the chance of some minutes with McLaughlin. In this case, I get continuing to play Ricky over him though. Ricky has shown the last couple of years that he's capable of playing at high level. He is still giving a lot of effort, especially on D. And I have to think he's going to revert somewhat closer to the player he's been the last couple of years at some point this season. Plus, Jordan is not quite shooting the ball as well as he was last year.
One last thought on Edwards, although there's obviously no question he should be getting minutes, along with Beasley, KAT, and *ugh* DLO, which is not who this thread is realistically about. In the thread about Edwards's shooting around the basket, I noted his style of shooting is sometimes to try to long-jump toward the hoop to get the layup like Tyreke Evans or James Harden (though obviously he's not the finisher Harden is, or even yet as good as Evans was). Another guy he's been reminding me of in that regard is Manu Ginobili. He's starting to show some of Ginobili's impressive Euro-step ability, including with the reverse, even if he isn't finishing as well as Ginobili was in his prime.
And if my memory is right, Ginobili also sometimes had that bad habit that Edwards has shown where he seems to jump a bit too far from the hoop at times when going up for the layup. It's almost like they're so used to Euro-stepping, which is a move that starts further from the hoop, that when they actually jump for the layup instead of Euro-stepping, they still leave their feet too far from the hoop. Ginobili ended up mastering the ability of passing out of that, and Edwards has shown some flashes in that, but the vast majority of the time it's obvious he's looking to shoot even if the defense has all but taken away anything but a really tough layup. I think that's why he still tends to try to hoist up a tough layup as he's already falling down. He doesn't (yet) realize that his drives are creating passing opportunities to the guys whose defenders are collapsing to help. If Ant isn't going to get better about trying to explode up for the layup (or better yet, the dunk) closer to the hoop, he needs to start studying how Ginobili learned to pass out of those situations. The master of passing out of that layup drive is Harden, and I don't see any hope Ant could become that good a passer. But Ginobili? Hopfili? Good point, Q, about how this is a reason to play Ant with Beasley and DLO (I'd add KAT as well) as 3 point shooters he should learn to feel confident kicking it out to when the defense has collapsed on his drive or when he's left his feet and the high percentage finish isn't there.
EDIT: I wrote the first line of that before some of you guys started disagreeing!
Any optimism left around Culver would be really nice, if that optimism came from a GM with some extra size on their roster. I definitely put Culver behind Beasley, Ant, Nowell in who I want to see playing and if we actually want to win I put him behind Layman and Okogie too. Would love if other NBA GMs saw potential in Culver. I doubt they do. Just by sheer logic Culver should be playing on the worst team in the league, and its kind of pathetic that we're already having this conversation about a guy in his 2nd year in the league.
CoolBreeze44 wrote:How about the 5 you want on the floor to finish the game? Most nights I would hope it would look like this:
DLO
Beasley
Edwards
McDaniels
Towns
It may be too early to have Mickey D in there, but love his potential 2-way play. At a minimum I'd be substituting him for defense by possession. If any of the three guards don't have it going, I'd have Nowell in there. So he would get close to as many opportunities as DLO, Beasley, and Edwards. He could be the offensive sub for Mickey D too. I don't want Rubio, Okogie, or Culver anywhere near the court during crunch time. In fact just have them go to the locker room and watch the last 5 minutes.
For me it depends on situation, Cool. If we're behind, I like your five. If we're ahead by 4 or more, I'd go:
KAT
Vando
Culver
Nowell
DLO or Rubio, whoever is plying better
Culver wilts under pressure FNG. And Rubio doesn't have to be guarded in those end of game possessions. He's not a threat. I'd rather have Nowell or Edwards handling the ball. Maybe 2-3 years from now McDaniels could run some point too.
Based on what we've seen from our players so far this season, but also factoring in what we've seen from them before, here are the guys I like and want to see playing for us the rest of the season:
1. KAT (obviously our best player and only allstar)
2. Nowell (I've been a Nowell guy from the time we drafted him in the second round two years ago. He's finally getting a chance to show why I loved the pick and was so unhappy with the team's failure to give him consistent minutes last season. I see a really talented two-way high IQ player in Nowell. He's a keeper and has to be part of our rotation going forward).
3. Reid (Terrific young talent on the offensive end who hustles and has lot of upside left)
4. Vando (Our best rebounder after KAT who brings Okogie's energy with more size)
5. Edwards (Had doubts on draft night and still do, but tremendous talent with better game feel and passing skills than I thought. He might not pan out, but he could become a star. He's definitely shown flashes)
6. Beasley (Has been our best player other than KAT. His defense is problematic as measured by defensive stats that FNG pointed out, but I love his offense as well as his toughness and competitiveness.
7. McDaniels (I now see why he entered college with many thinking he'd be a high lottery pick. Very talented and much better defender than I anticipated. Has all-star potential in my view. I have yet to see anything that would account for him falling out of favor and so far down in the first round).
8. JMac (My view of JMac is shaped mainly by what we saw from his last season since he hasn't had much of a chance yet this season. He's the sort of quick, penetrating PG that fits with this team and tends to make his teammates better around him).
I'm not suggesting that these 8 should be our rotation. I understand that DLO and/or Ricky will have to be part of the rotation with DLO starting and playing lots of minutes. I also see the argument for including Culver in the rotation. I think Cam made a good case for that. If nothing else, the Wolves need to give Culver the chance to enhance his trade value and that can't happen if he doesn't play. I also see the argument for including Layman in the rotation based on his recent play.
I'm just saying that the eight guys I listed are the ones I like watching and want to see get substantial playing time going forward. Whatever the rotation ends up being, I'll be really disappointed if at least the first 6 on my list aren't part of it. I get that it's not realistic to expect JMac to be part of the rotation unless the Wolves move either DLO or Ricky. The reason I'd include Vando over McDaniels in the rotation if forced to make a choice is simply strategic. That is, we only have Vando under contract until the end of this season while we have McDaniels locked up for a number of years. In other words, we have far less time to evaluate and develop Vando.
