Re: Wolves vs. Bulls GDT - Welcome Back Fred
Posted: Mon Feb 08, 2016 8:35 am
SameOldNudityDrew wrote:
We talk so much about Towns (rightfully so) and Wiggins and LaVine, but I don't think Dieng gets enough love and his play lately should start to change that.
He arguably had the most positive impact on the team last year, statistically the #1 midrange shooter in the entire league last year (!), a great FT shooter (especially for a big), and he has continued to play well this year, especially when given minutes. He's got defensive lapses occasionally, but not THAT often, and he more than makes up for it with hustle plays, blocks and steals. His defense isn't as good as we might have been hoping coming out of college, but it's pretty good all told. And he's offensively our second surest option after Towns on the entire team. And he's been getting better each year. Dude's legit.
We do really need a big defensive banger to go down low with Towns and Dieng. Those two both get pushed around a bit. If we get a guy like that (Festus Ezili-type of guy ideally) we should have a very good frontcourt going forward. Ian Mahinmi is a free agent and fits the bill--good defensive presence, 6th in the league in defensive box plus-minus, and has a higher defensive rating this year than Gobert!). Whiteside is a numbers monster, but he's going to command crazy money and I don't know if his impact on the team as a whole is nearly as big as his boxscore suggest. Biyombo could be a cheaper option (not sure if he's a free agent though). Would it be crazy to see if Noah would take less money this offseason? Dude was DPOY and an MVP candidate a couple years ago. Obviously somebody younger than Noah or Mahinmi would be preferable, but I don't know who that would be. And if Noah could come even in the ballpark of having the defensive presence he used to have, holy cow, that Towns-Noah-Dieng would be a pretty good front court. I'd also be happy with Mahinmi if the price was right. I liked him in Dallas, but he's taken a statistical step up this year and could be too expensive.
EDIT: I still kind of miss Jeff Adrien. If he were a few inches taller, he'd fit in very well.
Drew, I like most of the bigs that you have listed with the exception of Noah. Noah is injury prone and has regressed during last two years offensively to level where he is absolutely useless. His TS% was last year 48.2 and this year it is 40.2%. He is currently shooting very much Rubio like 43.9% at rim. I can imagine how crazy he would make this board by missing bunnies at rim when sometimes Pek already has driven us crazy with same habit and he has not ever been as bad offensively as Noah is currently.
Both Ezeli and Mahinmi are free agents that we could go after. They both rank top 15 among all centers in DRPM. Mahinmi has probably played so well that Indiana will offer too much money that we could sign him but I'm not sure if Golden State can afford paying both Ezeli and Barnes big bucks next summer.
Other free agent options that I would consider to same role are Sullinger (13th in DRPM) and Pachulia (10th in DRPM). Sullinger and Ezeli both would be nicer in that sense that they could potentially still improve. I think that both Pachulia and Mahinmi have probably had this season their career years and they will get nice contracts because of that and probably their performance regresses during their contract.
Another big that you mentioned, Biyombo is also nice defensive center (ranks currently 7th in DRPM among centers) but he has still one more year left from his absolutely bargain contract (3 million per year). So if we are not filling the need to big defensive banger this summer, we could potentially go after him next summer.