Minnesota Sports Forum

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I'm not giving up hope yet

Schröder looked last year pretty bad too but this year he looks already much better. I cannot see any reason why Zach wouldn't be able to improve same way.

Lavine has displayed enough promise that I am excited for his future. Patience with the young guy. Remember he was not picked in the top 10. I am sure he will make similar changes coming into year 2 like all young players do, but his will be more pronounced since he didn't play as much in college and he played the wrong position all year to help him develop.

I do not understand any disdain for Zach either. I would actually like to see him be more assertive but I feel like most of Zach's "issues" are due to coaching. The coaching staff, I feel, is making a point to really reel him in. The silver lining here is that Zach has shown that he is very coachable. That is not a question at this point. I think that, paired with his elite athleticism and smooth jumper will be enough to make him a good NBA player, at a minimum.

Lavine is fine he might be good one day, but there is no reason we can not trade him for the right player. I still remember when Mark Cuban called Rodrigue Beaubois untouchable and stated "There's maybe one or two guys in the league that I would trade him for," Cuban said. "That's it. Other than that, he's pretty much untouchable. 3 years later he is out the league. I'm not giving Lavine away, but I have no problems if he is packaged with another player to get us a better player.

Man, in watching D'Angelo Russell several times over the past couple weeks, it is getting harder not to include him in the discussion as the best prospect in this draft. He simply does everything well. There was a 3 possession sequence in the first half where he posted his man up and knocked down a turn-around J, followed by a fast break where he went end-to-end with a nice finish, followed by a very nice assist.

While he is not a pure PG, he is certainly capable of playing PG for periods of a game. He is what we want from Lavine, but better at everything. Lavine is an athlete that plays basketball, where Russell is simply a very skilled ball player. I know he could be redundant, but wouldn't rule him out completely.

So, let's say we do end up with the top overall pick somehow. I think it's highly likely that Flip takes Okafor as he's a safer bet to become successful. That has me thinking. Has there ever been an NBA team that had consecutive ROY winners? Maybe there has and I'm not remembering it? I think Wiggins has this year's award locked up, and I can only imagine how many layups/dunks Rubio could create for Okafor plus his points from the post.

If Okafor's the guy, and he probably would be, what's the vision for 2015?

PG: Rubio / Williams (re-sign)
SG: Martin / LaVine
SF: Wiggins / Muhammad
PF: Dieng / Young
C: Okafor / Pekovic

This is also assuming Dieng can handle the power forward spot, and we're already seeing Flip experiment there.

Not bad Cam, but I like Muhammad starting at the 3 and Wiggins playing the 2. I also think we will have a different backup point next year.

CoolBreeze44 wrote:Not bad Cam, but I like Muhammad starting at the 3 and Wiggins playing the 2. I also think we will have a different backup point next year.

I wanted to have Muhammad starting, but we absolutely need a shooter on the floor with those guys.

Off the top of my head, I can't think of a team having back to back ROYs, cam. Or ending up with the #1 pick in three consecutive years for that matter. I agree that Flip would most likely draft Okafor, he being the surest thing in this draft. But if he's comfortable with the Dieng/Pek combo at C going into next season (i.e, fairly comfortable that Pek can stay reasonably healthy), and if some team really coveted Okafor and was willing to give us a solid PF for the right to move up a few spots, Flip might make that trade with the hopes of landing a veteran PF plus Towns/Russell/Johnson. As the Cavs proved last year, getting the number 1 pick gives the team a lot of options, and I expect Flip to pursue all of them, just as he did two drafts ago. The more I examine this draft, the more it looks like a 5-6 player draft rather than a 3-player draft.