Minnesota Sports Forum

longstrangetrip wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:I think Abe's take is right...Zach's best role would probably be as a 6th man providing scoring off the bench but not having to defend against a starter. His 3-point shooting has been terrible (under 30% this year), but I have to believe he may progress to his mean...which I think is closer to 35% for him. The Bulls aren't stupid, so they have to be aware that they are starting a guy who is the 4th worst defender in the league...but they just don't have any other options, and they need his scoring. If I were them though, I would be looking to trade him at the deadline to a contender who really needs scoring off the bench. I think they could get a decent haul if he is still averaging 25PPG, and unload a bad contract at the same time.

Wig, on the other hand, seems to be an NBA starter to me...certainly not a max contract worthy one, but at least capable enough on both ends of the court to be a complementary player. He's still averaging almost 16 PPG as a third option (at best) and is still hitting his 3's at a higher than average rate (and much better than Zach, of course), so last night to the contrary, he's not a "Zach defense-like" disaster on the offensive end. And most here have noticed that he also has turned himself into at least an average NBA defender, and most defensive metrics bear this out. A max player? Nope, far from it...and I would love it if somehow we could trade him profitably. But he's still a far more complete player than Zach. That said, it's absurd that Thibs doesn't give Okogie some of Wig's minutes when he plays like he did last night.

How much stock are we putting into a 16 game sample size?

Wiggins is slightly ahead of the league average on three pointers (36.5% vs. 34.9%)... does that take precedence over the previous 323 games and 4 seasons when Wiggins never reached the league average even once?

Meanwhile, LaVine is a career 36.5% shooter over 249 games. Perhaps he's regressed... he's struggled his entire time in Chicago on three pointers.

As for Wiggins' defense... what metrics are you talking about. You used DBPM to rip LaVine... but Wiggins is very poor in that metric as well -- while being an astronomically low -2.7 offensively. Via that advanced stat, hes been worse than average (or downright bad) on both ends... for multiple seasons

I agree that we may be putting too much stock into a 16-game sample size, but I'm only doing it because a comparison of career numbers would favor Wig because he was a go-to guy. You make a fair point about Zach being a career 36.5% shooter, but we don't know the impact his knee injury has had (and may continue to have) on his shooting...he's closer to 32% since he was injured, far below the league average. Who's to say if the 43 games he has played since the injury are a good indication of how he is going to continue to shoot, but if it is, it's not very promising for Zach. I'll leave it to the defensive stat gurus here to provide some empirical data comparing Wig/Zach, but I would wager the numbers aren't going to be very favorable to Zach.

Abe, I'm not quite sure where you are getting your RPM data from. The latest ESPN numbers are:


Wig: Offense: -.33 Defense -.41 Overall -.74

Zach:Offense:.52 Defense-2.73 Overall -2.21


Granted it's just one measure, but it's quite lopsided in favor of our guy. We're not happy about paying a max salary to a guy who measures a minus .74, but let's at least be thankful we're no longer saddled with the minus 2.21 guy!

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:I think Abe's take is right...Zach's best role would probably be as a 6th man providing scoring off the bench but not having to defend against a starter. His 3-point shooting has been terrible (under 30% this year), but I have to believe he may progress to his mean...which I think is closer to 35% for him. The Bulls aren't stupid, so they have to be aware that they are starting a guy who is the 4th worst defender in the league...but they just don't have any other options, and they need his scoring. If I were them though, I would be looking to trade him at the deadline to a contender who really needs scoring off the bench. I think they could get a decent haul if he is still averaging 25PPG, and unload a bad contract at the same time.

Wig, on the other hand, seems to be an NBA starter to me...certainly not a max contract worthy one, but at least capable enough on both ends of the court to be a complementary player. He's still averaging almost 16 PPG as a third option (at best) and is still hitting his 3's at a higher than average rate (and much better than Zach, of course), so last night to the contrary, he's not a "Zach defense-like" disaster on the offensive end. And most here have noticed that he also has turned himself into at least an average NBA defender, and most defensive metrics bear this out. A max player? Nope, far from it...and I would love it if somehow we could trade him profitably. But he's still a far more complete player than Zach. That said, it's absurd that Thibs doesn't give Okogie some of Wig's minutes when he plays like he did last night.

How much stock are we putting into a 16 game sample size?

Wiggins is slightly ahead of the league average on three pointers (36.5% vs. 34.9%)... does that take precedence over the previous 323 games and 4 seasons when Wiggins never reached the league average even once?

Meanwhile, LaVine is a career 36.5% shooter over 249 games. Perhaps he's regressed... he's struggled his entire time in Chicago on three pointers.

As for Wiggins' defense... what metrics are you talking about. You used DBPM to rip LaVine... but Wiggins is very poor in that metric as well -- while being an astronomically low -2.7 offensively. Via that advanced stat, hes been worse than average (or downright bad) on both ends... for multiple seasons

I agree that we may be putting too much stock into a 16-game sample size, but I'm only doing it because a comparison of career numbers would favor Wig because he was a go-to guy. You make a fair point about Zach being a career 36.5% shooter, but we don't know the impact his knee injury has had (and may continue to have) on his shooting...he's closer to 32% since he was injured, far below the league average. Who's to say if the 43 games he has played since the injury are a good indication of how he is going to continue to shoot, but if it is, it's not very promising for Zach. I'll leave it to the defensive stat gurus here to provide some empirical data comparing Wig/Zach, but I would wager the numbers aren't going to be very favorable to Zach.

Abe, I'm not quite sure where you are getting your RPM data from. The latest ESPN numbers are:


Wig: Offense: -.33 Defense -.41 Overall -.74

Zach:Offense:.52 Defense-2.73 Overall -2.21


Granted it's just one measure, but it's quite lopsided in favor of our guy. We're not happy about paying a max salary to a guy who measures a minus .74, but let's at least be thankful we're no longer saddled with the minus 2.21 guy!

Ha. You used DRPM. I used DBPM and OBPM... my bad for getting the acronyms mixed up.

For the record... I've mentioned many times how I don't give ESPN's manufactured statistic much merit for a wide myriad of reasons. But it is an advanced stat and it's fine to include it among one of many. How much merit we give it varies, obviously.

monsterpile wrote:Let's say the NBA decides to put an expansion team in Seattle and they hire you to be the GM of the team. Adam Silver says you can have Wiggins or Lavine for a flat 15 million a year for the length of their contracts. Which one would you pick and why? If you could get both would you do it? Or would you take neither.

In this sort of a vacuum if I wasn't really worried about other aspects of roster construction...I'd take both for that price. Both would likely be moveable at some point. Which guy would I take if I could have 1? Probably Lavine. Wiggins has some interesting possibilities as a guy that can play 2-4 I would be most intruiged with playing him a lotmore as a 4. Utilizing Wiggins there means having a number of other perimeter players though so...

Camden wrote:How is this actually a debate at this point?

longstrangetrip wrote:

Camden wrote:How is this actually a debate at this point?

When you really look inside the numbers, I kind of had the same thought. But despite ranking near the bottom of the league in on/off and DRPM and shooting less than 30% from beyond the arc, you can't dismiss the fact that Zach is averaging over 25 PPG. Zach's scoring makes this a legitimate debate despite his obvious flaws.

Camden wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

Camden wrote:How is this actually a debate at this point?

When you really look inside the numbers, I kind of had the same thought. But despite ranking near the bottom of the league in on/off and DRPM and shooting less than 30% from beyond the arc, you can't dismiss the fact that Zach is averaging over 25 PPG. Zach's scoring makes this a legitimate debate despite his obvious flaws.

I meant how is there any argument that Wiggins is better than LaVine. He's not and one could argue that he hasn't been since their second season in the league. It's a slam dunk in LaVine's favor when you consider he's ascending and blossoming into a potential star and a viable candidate for Most Improved Player while Andrew Wiggins notches yet another poor season and continues to regress across the board. These two players are on completely different trajectories in their career.