Minnesota Sports Forum

TheFuture wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:In regard to Culver, not only did he have a disappointing rookie year, I didn't like the way he played against top competition in college. I have less hope for him than most I guess.

https://youtu.be/au6LbngHYvE

That is the video that gives me promise. He had a knack for defense that is rare in rookies. He has a ton to improve offensively, but I believe what he lacks is easier to teach. Ballhandling and passing are already above average in my opinion, it is now the shooting.

I think he's a better defender than Okogie, who might be slightly overrated on defense. Okogie tries so hard to draw offensive fouls that he often ends up out of position when he doesn't get the call. Culver just sort of sticks to people.

But yeah...that shot was flat broke last season. He should have be quarantining with a shooting coach this entire offseason. How we end up with guys like Okogie and Culver that demonstrated competent shots in college only to completely tank in the NBA is beyond me, but it's a curse I've just accepted at this point.

Q12543 wrote:

TheFuture wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:In regard to Culver, not only did he have a disappointing rookie year, I didn't like the way he played against top competition in college. I have less hope for him than most I guess.

https://youtu.be/au6LbngHYvE

That is the video that gives me promise. He had a knack for defense that is rare in rookies. He has a ton to improve offensively, but I believe what he lacks is easier to teach. Ballhandling and passing are already above average in my opinion, it is now the shooting.

I think he's a better defender than Okogie, who might be slightly overrated on defense. Okogie tries so hard to draw offensive fouls that he often ends up out of position when he doesn't get the call. Culver just sort of sticks to people.

But yeah...that shot was flat broke last season. He should have be quarantining with a shooting coach this entire offseason. How we end up with guys like Okogie and Culver that demonstrated competent shots in college only to completely tank in the NBA is beyond me, but it's a curse I've just accepted at this point.

Okogie was a good 3-point and free-throw shooter in college, but Culver wasn't. Okogie hit 38+% of his threes in both of his two college seasons. He knocked down 82.1% of his free throws in his second college season after hitting a respectable 74.7% from the line as a freshman. In contrast, Culver hit only 30.4% of his threes and 70.7% of his free throws as a college sophomore after making only 64.8% of his free throws as a freshman. Although Culver had a better overall FG percentage than Okogie as a sophomore, I think Culver's shooting in college was significantly more problematic than Okogie's.

Okogie's free-throw and 3-point shooting in college were good enough offer hope that he can become a decent three-point shooter in the NBA. Unfortunately, I don't see the same cause for hope in Culver's college numbers. However, I think Culver is the better ball-handler and potentially better defensively, although I see both as excellent NBA defenders.

lipoli390 wrote:

Q12543 wrote:

TheFuture wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:In regard to Culver, not only did he have a disappointing rookie year, I didn't like the way he played against top competition in college. I have less hope for him than most I guess.

https://youtu.be/au6LbngHYvE

That is the video that gives me promise. He had a knack for defense that is rare in rookies. He has a ton to improve offensively, but I believe what he lacks is easier to teach. Ballhandling and passing are already above average in my opinion, it is now the shooting.

I think he's a better defender than Okogie, who might be slightly overrated on defense. Okogie tries so hard to draw offensive fouls that he often ends up out of position when he doesn't get the call. Culver just sort of sticks to people.

But yeah...that shot was flat broke last season. He should have be quarantining with a shooting coach this entire offseason. How we end up with guys like Okogie and Culver that demonstrated competent shots in college only to completely tank in the NBA is beyond me, but it's a curse I've just accepted at this point.

Okogie was a good 3-point and free-throw shooter in college, but Culver wasn't. Okogie hit 38+% of his threes in both of his two college seasons. He knocked down 82.1% of his free throws in his second college season after hitting a respectable 74.7% from the line as a freshman. In contrast, Culver hit only 30.4% of his threes and 70.7% of his free throws as a college sophomore after making only 64.8% of his free throws as a freshman. Although Culver had a better overall FG percentage than Okogie as a sophomore, I think Culver's shooting in college was significantly more problematic than Okogie's.

Okogie's free-throw and 3-point shooting in college were good enough offer hope that he can become a decent three-point shooter in the NBA. Unfortunately, I don't see the same cause for hope in Culver's college numbers. However, I think Culver is the better ball-handler and potentially better defensively, although I see both as excellent NBA defenders.

What higher power did we piss off to be cursed with every player here regressing as shooters.

In that video, it is hard not to notice the variety of players Culver was able to stick on/contest and strip without fouling/body up with his still skinny frame. Kawhi, Harden, PG13, Lowry, Fox, Giannis, Doncic to name the best. Culver's hands and anticipation are impressive. As is his fast break D.

lipoli390 wrote:

Q12543 wrote:

TheFuture wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:In regard to Culver, not only did he have a disappointing rookie year, I didn't like the way he played against top competition in college. I have less hope for him than most I guess.

https://youtu.be/au6LbngHYvE

That is the video that gives me promise. He had a knack for defense that is rare in rookies. He has a ton to improve offensively, but I believe what he lacks is easier to teach. Ballhandling and passing are already above average in my opinion, it is now the shooting.

I think he's a better defender than Okogie, who might be slightly overrated on defense. Okogie tries so hard to draw offensive fouls that he often ends up out of position when he doesn't get the call. Culver just sort of sticks to people.

But yeah...that shot was flat broke last season. He should have be quarantining with a shooting coach this entire offseason. How we end up with guys like Okogie and Culver that demonstrated competent shots in college only to completely tank in the NBA is beyond me, but it's a curse I've just accepted at this point.

Okogie was a good 3-point and free-throw shooter in college, but Culver wasn't. Okogie hit 38+% of his threes in both of his two college seasons. He knocked down 82.1% of his free throws in his second college season after hitting a respectable 74.7% from the line as a freshman. In contrast, Culver hit only 30.4% of his threes and 70.7% of his free throws as a college sophomore after making only 64.8% of his free throws as a freshman. Although Culver had a better overall FG percentage than Okogie as a sophomore, I think Culver's shooting in college was significantly more problematic than Okogie's.

Okogie's free-throw and 3-point shooting in college were good enough offer hope that he can become a decent three-point shooter in the NBA. Unfortunately, I don't see the same cause for hope in Culver's college numbers. However, I think Culver is the better ball-handler and potentially better defensively, although I see both as excellent NBA defenders.

I recently saw a tweet that had a Video of a few of these plays. That Doncic play he goes up and just takes the ball away from him and goes the other way. It was pretty impressive. Some of those transition defense plays remind me a little of Danny Green. Some of the half court plays Culver seems to know where and when to float to a spot to get into the play. There were a number of those plays he didn't seem to use any overwhelming athleticism he just got where he needed to and got his hand in there and broke up the play or knocked the ball away from the offensive player.

Okogie is a different sort of defensive player. He is an attacking guy which is good and bad. I think Culver is probably going to be a better team defender but I think Okogie can learn to play smarter defense. He has some athletic traits and mentality that few guys have. I think he has some real smarts as an individual defender he just needs to know how to keep his high energy level but not let it be used against him.

Culver's shot...I think we are gonna know pretty quick this coming season if it's smoothed out or not. If it has been smoothed out and it's reasonably effective his value goes up much higher. He did rework his shot after his freshman year. Some of his leading Transition passes on that defensive video were quite nice for a rookie. He was a guy that was a 3 star recruit that wasn't supposed to be an NBA player. Can he work his way into something like he did in college? Idk. I have some hope for him but he certainly wouldn't be a guy That would keep me from adding a high level player in a trade. I wouldn't want to just throw him in and sell too low on him. I think there is a chance he can guard SFs plenty in this league which would add value to him in general but a lot of value to this roster as it's currently constructed.

Yeah, Okogie's lack of a 3-point shot is even a bigger mystery to me based on his college numbers and his shooting form, which looks pretty good. I get that we can't just expect a guy like that to suddenly hit 38% in the NBA with high volume. But he can't even crack 30% with low volume. WTF!? You damn well know those shots are going down with Miami or San Antonio.

Q12543 wrote:Yeah, Okogie's lack of a 3-point shot is even a bigger mystery to me based on his college numbers and his shooting form, which looks pretty good. I get that we can't just expect a guy like that to suddenly hit 38% in the NBA with high volume. But he can't even crack 30% with low volume. WTF!? You damn well know those shots are going down with Miami or San Antonio.

Good news: Okogie made a significant jump from 2 point range from 46.4% to 52.9%.

Bad news: His volume and percentage from 3 actually dropped last year.

Good news: Okogie increased his FT rate and shot nearly 80% from the FT line.

Good news/bad news: Okogie has shot nearly a third of his Career 3's from the corner and is a 32.8% career shooter from there and 34.8% last season which was an improvement. That also means he is REALLY bad in general on non-corner threes.

So here is my take. There are guys in college that shoot well from 3, but you can see have limited range potential (i.e. Okogie). In games during college, you can see he stays very near the line to take and make his 3's. In watching some old highlights, he got a little wonky on some longer shots (1 highlight had him banking in an NBA level 3).

This is why I like Haliburton so much. While he has that weird set shot, it looks the same from the college 3, or when he steps back well beyond NBA 3. In watching highlights, he takes and makes a ton of 3's from a good 3-5 feet behind the college 3 point line. This to me shows a guy that will be able to immediately adapt to shooting NBA 3's at a successful rate. I would venture to guess that the elite 3 point guys showed this type of range while in college as well. You also see it from a couple other guys in this draft in Nesmith and Terry.

Hicks123 wrote:So here is my take. There are guys in college that shoot well from 3, but you can see have limited range potential (i.e. Okogie). In games during college, you can see he stays very near the line to take and make his 3's. In watching some old highlights, he got a little wonky on some longer shots (1 highlight had him banking in an NBA level 3).

This is why I like Haliburton so much. While he has that weird set shot, it looks the same from the college 3, or when he steps back well beyond NBA 3. In watching highlights, he takes and makes a ton of 3's from a good 3-5 feet behind the college 3 point line. This to me shows a guy that will be able to immediately adapt to shooting NBA 3's at a successful rate. I would venture to guess that the elite 3 point guys showed this type of range while in college as well. You also see it from a couple other guys in this draft in Nesmith and Terry.

That's a pretty good take, Hicks. That could explain Okogie's drop off from college to the NBA, especially when you compare Okogie's corner NBA threes to his much lower percentage from other spots behind the arc. But I still have confidence in Okogie's three-point shooting based on his consistently excellent 3-point shooting in college and the NBA. Free-throw shooting tends to be a good predictor of 3-point shooting. Okogie has good form and has demonstrated accuracy from the free-throw line and the college 3-point line. So I think Okogie simply has to adjust to the NBA arc. I know Rubio never developed a good 3-point shot in spite of his excellent free-throw shooting. But he didnt' have the length strength or lift of Okogie and he never was a good perimeter shooter from anywhere on the floor.

Very quietly, Ricky shot 36.1-percent from three last season albeit on low volume. With the league average three-point percentage being 35.8-percent last season you could argue that Rubio is now an above average shooter. Who saw that coming?

Camden wrote:Very quietly, Ricky shot 36.1-percent from three last season albeit on low volume. With the league average three-point percentage being 35.8-percent last season you could argue that Rubio is now an above average shooter. Who saw that coming?

Interesting. I didn't know that.

Bottom line for me is that I'm not ready to give up on Okogie's 3-point potential. There are too many positive signs - (1) consistently good college 3-point percentage over two seasons; (2) very good and improving free-throw percentages through 2 years of college and 2 NBA seasons; (3) good shooting form; (4) strong legs to give him good lift on his shot; and (5) an excellent work ethic that suggests he'll work his ass off to improve.