Minnesota Sports Forum

60WinTim wrote:Yeah, LST, I don't like the comparison at all. 5 year age difference? And while both are/were NBA rookies, Shved had a ton of professional experience.

True, Tim, and that's the main reason I discount the only significant difference in their rookie stats...assist to turnover ratio. Alexey was a little more ready for the NBA than Zach, although I saw that same deer in the headlights look in both of them their rookie years. And you have to admit the other stats are remarkably similar, as was their positive all-star weekend experience.

I also discount the age difference in rookies more than most, because the NBA is just a different game. Some on this board don't want to give Adreian Payne enough rookie slack because he is 24, but just like Alexey, I have chosen not to go there. In my book, an NBA rookie is an NBA rookie, with only a small amount of consideration for previous experience.

Another difference is Shved was almost always paired with another PG, usually Barea. Whereas Zach has frequently been the only real ball handler.

The problem with a lot of these statistical measures this year are that your forced to compare Zach with Rubio. Those are the two who have played the most point guard for us. Is that really fair? 19 year old rookie at a foreign position vs a seasoned pro who has been playing point guard professionally for 10 years. If he were to stack up statistically with Ricky we would really have a problem. Thank goodness he doesn't. The other thing is the Wolves have been a flat out bad basketball team this year. Not only is he 19, not only has he had his minutes forced on him at the one, but he's had to play with a lot of bad basketball players all year.

I know I'm sounding like an apologist for Zach, and maybe I am one. I just think that making black and white arguments based solely on statistical data is grossly unfair to the young player. And I don't see why people like Robson feel compelled to do it, over and over, time and time again, When Zach reaches the dinosaur age of 21 in a couple years, these types of evaluations will carry more weight with me. I think the biggest improvement a player makes in his career is between the 1st and 2nd years, and then between the 2nd and 3rd years. I see no reason to not see a bright future for Lavine. Maybe he doesn't become an all-star, so what? But maybe he does. And I'm going to give him every chance before I begin to bury a guy who has his tools and desire.

Shved wasn't terrible as a rookie. He showed some promise, but then he hit the rookie wall hard. His problem was that he never got better. I would also argue Lavine is much more talented and gifted than Shved. He is 5 times the athlete that Shved is which really does make the development process easier. Shved lacked strength like Lavine, but he also didn't have the speed to get around guys so it made it twice as hard for him to create open looks and then he would panic and jump with no where to go. They are very similar in numbers, but Lavine has some inherent advantages that makes his path to success more likely in my mind. Lavine has the level of athleticism and handle where he never has to settle for anything if he doesn't want. He just hasn't learned that yet.

Robson's tween late in the game... (sorry Cam!)

brittrobson ?@brittrobson 23m23 minutes ago
Kevin Garnett so much better out there than Thad Young for this final 3:38.

Cam > Robson any day

60WinTim wrote:Robson's tween late in the game... (sorry Cam!)

brittrobson ?@brittrobson 23m23 minutes ago
Kevin Garnett so much better out there than Thad Young for this final 3:38.

Heh, Robson is an unabashed KG homer. Otherwise, he's pretty objective with his takes. I love the fact he writes for adults as opposed to the typical 5th grade reading level of most media these days. They probably had to dumb his stuff down when he was writing for SI.

CoolBreeze44 wrote:The problem with a lot of these statistical measures this year are that your forced to compare Zach with Rubio. Those are the two who have played the most point guard for us. Is that really fair? 19 year old rookie at a foreign position vs a seasoned pro who has been playing point guard professionally for 10 years. If he were to stack up statistically with Ricky we would really have a problem. Thank goodness he doesn't. The other thing is the Wolves have been a flat out bad basketball team this year. Not only is he 19, not only has he had his minutes forced on him at the one, but he's had to play with a lot of bad basketball players all year.

I know I'm sounding like an apologist for Zach, and maybe I am one. I just think that making black and white arguments based solely on statistical data is grossly unfair to the young player. And I don't see why people like Robson feel compelled to do it, over and over, time and time again, When Zach reaches the dinosaur age of 21 in a couple years, these types of evaluations will carry more weight with me. I think the biggest improvement a player makes in his career is between the 1st and 2nd years, and then between the 2nd and 3rd years. I see no reason to not see a bright future for Lavine. Maybe he doesn't become an all-star, so what? But maybe he does. And I'm going to give him every chance before I begin to bury a guy who has his tools and desire.

Well said and that's not being an apologist. It's being a realist.

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

WildWolf2813 wrote:I agree nearly 100% with what Robson wrote.

So what's your contribution?

He looks the part. That's all he does. And the funny thing is that for every person who defends LaVine, half of them want D'Angelo Russell to block his development. Personally I just don't think there's anything to develop with him, but not only have we been bad, but we've also been a tough watch. We didn't have athleticism. We didn't have guys who can make highlight reels, so I can understand why people wanna hold onto a guy whose only positive contribution is his athleticism.

Not that I'm really interested in his demeanor, but yes, he's confident, he wants to be great and thinks he has the tools to be great. That's nice. There's also plenty of young guys who have that kind of confidence who suck. Austin Rivers and Dion Waiters have the confidence of Kobe Bryant yet they stink. Given what we have now and what we may have later, it's gonna be impossible to have someone like that feel reduced to the idea of being someone's sixth man, unless of course, he stinks.

Of course we're gonna assume he's gonna make these incredible improvements and he'll massively improve his body and fix his jump shot and hope the facilitating improves so maybe he can find PT at PG. Call me cynical, but I heard the same stuff with Shved. It never happened and he was better than LaVine. Jamal Crawford in 15 years of pro basketball has probably gained 10 pounds of muscle total. LaVine's gonna have to do everything short of popping steroids to get to Jamal Crawford's frame and I don't know if LaVine's frame can handle that kind of bulk anyway, but of course that's to be determined.

If Zach fails it won't all be his fault. Flip's done a crappy job developing guys so far. The only 2 that have seemed to learn anything all year have been Wiggins and Muhammad and in Muhammad, it's all been in spite of Flip as he's done him no favors. Flip still plays Zach at the point because Flip wants to salvage the idiotic comments he made about LaVine when he picked him. It really is hilarious to see him play Zach at the PG, witness the deficit balloon and see the anguish on Flip's face as he has to yank LaVine for not doing what he hoped he could at the PG spot, and the crazy thing is, some of you guys defend this too. The idea of, "well he'll learn playing tougher unfamilar positions and sets so when he's in his natural comfortable spot the game will be easier." I've heard this before too. Remember Jonny Flynn and how the triangle was gonna make him tougher?

If I'm wrong down the line I'll gladly admit I was wrong, but I don't see him succeeding. It was the most Oakland Raider-esque pick Flip coulda made. He took the guy who had the best combine not the guy with the best chance to succeed. The absolute highest ceiling I have for him is that it takes years for him to learn how to play and maybe when he hits his prime he can be a serviceable rotation player somewhere on his 5th or 6th team, but looking at it that way, I shouldn't have any investment in his development because most likely we won't see the best of it. The best asset he can provide us that hopefully someone still thinks he's the 2nd coming of Russell Westbrook (and yes, people have that opinion) and sell high.