Minnesota Sports Forum

Camden wrote:I'm curious. Would anyone trade Andrew Wiggins for Jahlil Okafor straight up? Hypothetically, we'd be drafting Brandon Ingram this year to replace him on the wing.

Rubio / LaVine / Ingram / Towns / Okafor

Edit: I'm not saying we should trade Wiggins or that we need to trade Wiggins. Do not misquote me. I wonder if that could be a topic to discuss.

I wouldn't. If Wiggins ever becomes more efficient offensively, he can be a very good two-way player, even with some of the motor issues and weak handles/rebounding. I just have a hard time seeing Okafor ever becoming a plus defender. And because his greatest value is getting touches in the low post, you almost have to build the rest of your offense around him, which seems very limiting.

As for Ingram, it's purely speculative to believe he will be an equal or better player than Wiggins. And how long would we have to wait? Wiggins has been cutting his teeth now for nearly two seasons. And Okafor is a full season behind Wiggins as well, with horrible On/Off numbers thus far.

Now there might be other Wiggins trade proposals I'd be interested in that yielded an established talent, but I haven't really thought of any.

Q12543 wrote:

Camden wrote:I'm curious. Would anyone trade Andrew Wiggins for Jahlil Okafor straight up? Hypothetically, we'd be drafting Brandon Ingram this year to replace him on the wing.

Rubio / LaVine / Ingram / Towns / Okafor

Edit: I'm not saying we should trade Wiggins or that we need to trade Wiggins. Do not misquote me. I wonder if that could be a topic to discuss.

I wouldn't. If Wiggins ever becomes more efficient offensively, he can be a very good two-way player, even with some of the motor issues and weak handles/rebounding. I just have a hard time seeing Okafor ever becoming a plus defender. And because his greatest value is getting touches in the low post, you almost have to build the rest of your offense around him, which seems very limiting.

As for Ingram, it's purely speculative to believe he will be an equal or better player than Wiggins. And how long would we have to wait? Wiggins has been cutting his teeth now for nearly two seasons. And Okafor is a full season behind Wiggins as well, with horrible On/Off numbers thus far.

Now there might be other Wiggins trade proposals I'd be interested in that yielded an established talent, but I haven't really thought of any.

What if the Clips called and offered Blake for Wiggins/Shabbaz/KG? There is obviously a lot of speculation around Blake. I just don't see that team competing against GS, Spurs or Thunder. This obviously is a bit out there, but I like it for both.

Camden0916 wrote:I'm curious. Would anyone trade Andrew Wiggins for Jahlil Okafor straight up? Hypothetically, we'd be drafting Brandon Ingram this year to replace him on the wing.

Rubio / LaVine / Ingram / Towns / Okafor

Edit: I'm not saying we should trade Wiggins or that we need to trade Wiggins. Do not misquote me. I wonder if that could be a topic to discuss.

As a big fan of Okafor as a basketball player I still say no. I am and have always been a bigger fan/supporter of Wiggins than I ever was with Okafor because I'm way more confident in Andrew's superstar potential than Okafor's. I would definitely trade anyone not name Towns/Wiggins/Lavine for Okafor though. His defensive numbers have been much better than expected out of the gate and he is still getting better offensively as well.

Hicks123 wrote:

Q12543 wrote:

Camden wrote:I'm curious. Would anyone trade Andrew Wiggins for Jahlil Okafor straight up? Hypothetically, we'd be drafting Brandon Ingram this year to replace him on the wing.

Rubio / LaVine / Ingram / Towns / Okafor

Edit: I'm not saying we should trade Wiggins or that we need to trade Wiggins. Do not misquote me. I wonder if that could be a topic to discuss.

I wouldn't. If Wiggins ever becomes more efficient offensively, he can be a very good two-way player, even with some of the motor issues and weak handles/rebounding. I just have a hard time seeing Okafor ever becoming a plus defender. And because his greatest value is getting touches in the low post, you almost have to build the rest of your offense around him, which seems very limiting.

As for Ingram, it's purely speculative to believe he will be an equal or better player than Wiggins. And how long would we have to wait? Wiggins has been cutting his teeth now for nearly two seasons. And Okafor is a full season behind Wiggins as well, with horrible On/Off numbers thus far.

Now there might be other Wiggins trade proposals I'd be interested in that yielded an established talent, but I haven't really thought of any.

What if the Clips called and offered Blake for Wiggins/Shabbaz/KG? There is obviously a lot of speculation around Blake. I just don't see that team competing against GS, Spurs or Thunder. This obviously is a bit out there, but I like it for both.

Blake can opt out after next season, so I wouldn't deal a guy like Wiggins who can be locked up significantly longer for him. The only established guy (who's likely available for Wiggins) I think should be on the list of a potential swap for Wiggins would be Cousins and I understand why anyone would choose to stay away from him. He's locked up for 2 more years after this one and he's just dominant right now. 27/11/3/1.4/1.3. He's a better scorer, rebounder and defender than Blake. Blake really is only a better playmaker and a more efficient scorer (by 2% in TS%) and Blake is playing with CP3 and Cousins is playing with nobody. That'd probably be the only deal I'd take that I would consider remotely possible.

At the same time I'm fine standing pat and going with the long game for contention because there really is no point trying to go all out now with GS, Spurs and Thunder. Wait for guys like Duncan to retire and also for the new cap to determine GS's long-term fate along with Westbrook and Durant's decisions. As long as those teams stay the way they are now, we likely don't have the firepower to beat them and should wait to open our window for a few more years until their situations are more set for the long-term and you know what you have to beat.

Wiggins has very high ups and downs. Which probably creates such visceral reactions from everyone. As he matures I think the valleys in his game will reduce. He doesn't strike me as a player who will regress, and I am 100% confident he will continue to improve.

There is a similarity with Bridgewater. I think it is difficult to punish a young player who is improving even if the pace and magnitude of improvement is incremental and short of optimistic expectations.

thedoper wrote:Wiggins has very high ups and downs. Which probably creates such visceral reactions from everyone. As he matures I think the valleys in his game will reduce. He doesn't strike me as a player who will regress, and I am 100% confident he will continue to improve.

There is a similarity with Bridgewater. I think it is difficult to punish a young player who is improving even if the pace and magnitude of improvement is incremental and short of optimistic expectations.

All you can ask of young players is that over larger and larger sample sizes... they improve.

Hicks123 wrote:

Q12543 wrote:

Camden wrote:I'm curious. Would anyone trade Andrew Wiggins for Jahlil Okafor straight up? Hypothetically, we'd be drafting Brandon Ingram this year to replace him on the wing.

Rubio / LaVine / Ingram / Towns / Okafor

Edit: I'm not saying we should trade Wiggins or that we need to trade Wiggins. Do not misquote me. I wonder if that could be a topic to discuss.

I wouldn't. If Wiggins ever becomes more efficient offensively, he can be a very good two-way player, even with some of the motor issues and weak handles/rebounding. I just have a hard time seeing Okafor ever becoming a plus defender. And because his greatest value is getting touches in the low post, you almost have to build the rest of your offense around him, which seems very limiting.

As for Ingram, it's purely speculative to believe he will be an equal or better player than Wiggins. And how long would we have to wait? Wiggins has been cutting his teeth now for nearly two seasons. And Okafor is a full season behind Wiggins as well, with horrible On/Off numbers thus far.

Now there might be other Wiggins trade proposals I'd be interested in that yielded an established talent, but I haven't really thought of any.

What if the Clips called and offered Blake for Wiggins/Shabbaz/KG? There is obviously a lot of speculation around Blake. I just don't see that team competing against GS, Spurs or Thunder. This obviously is a bit out there, but I like it for both.

I think Wiggins for Griffin is very much a fair trade.

thedoper wrote:Wiggins has very high ups and downs. Which probably creates such visceral reactions from everyone. As he matures I think the valleys in his game will reduce. He doesn't strike me as a player who will regress, and I am 100% confident he will continue to improve.

There is a similarity with Bridgewater. I think it is difficult to punish a young player who is improving even if the pace and magnitude of improvement is incremental and short of optimistic expectations.

I agree, but what do you mean by "punish"? Benching the person, relegating to the D-League, etc.? I'm not aware of either Teddy or Andrew being punished for their up and down play. Wiggins will likely lead the team in minutes for the second consecutive year.

Q12543 wrote:

thedoper wrote:Wiggins has very high ups and downs. Which probably creates such visceral reactions from everyone. As he matures I think the valleys in his game will reduce. He doesn't strike me as a player who will regress, and I am 100% confident he will continue to improve.

There is a similarity with Bridgewater. I think it is difficult to punish a young player who is improving even if the pace and magnitude of improvement is incremental and short of optimistic expectations.

I agree, but what do you mean by "punish"? Benching the person, relegating to the D-League, etc.? I'm not aware of either Teddy or Andrew being punished for their up and down play. Wiggins will likely lead the team in minutes for the second consecutive year.

I was more eluding to trading or moving to other options. I was saying that their improvement is why they haven't been punished, lost minutes, been traded.

Camden
I wouldn't because Okafor is an off-court issue. Plus the wolves aren't allowed to trade one Duffy client for another.