What's new

Following potential 2015 draftees

Exactly. I'd rather have a log jam and let the players prove themselves rather than trying to fill a need while a player you should/could have drafted takes off on another team.

Drafting into a log jam is a good way to kill the value of all players involved. We don't have a lot of roles available on this team. I guess that's a sign we're finally getting good, but players on their first deals need to see that a path to success is available to them. I honestly believe that the reason earlier picks outperform later picks has just as much to do with the greater roles available to them as their superior talent.

It's easy to find late round steals when you have no good players on your roster. Take the Lakers for example. They drafted Jordan Clarkson in the second round, who looks great with all the possessions he gets, but was he really the BPA when some of the good teams drafted late in the first round? Guys like Jordan Adams and Kyle Anderson would have put up great numbers on the Lakers this season, but instead are getting garbage times for teams that don't really need them right now. Dante Exum would have a lot more value right now if he was drafted by a team that could give him more that a 13% usage rate. I realize a lot of that's on Dante. He needs to be more aggressive, and the team is allowing him to develop slowly while still getting good minutes. But people around the league are calling him a bust because he's not progressing along the traditional path to stardom.

Not that we're the Spurs or the Grizzlies, but it's definitely good to be mindful of the roles you have available when you draft. Point guard is easily our weakest position, but we can't draft a point guard without completely squashing the fragile value of Trey and Dante. With Alec coming back, if we draft a wing we better 100% sure he's worth sacrificing Rodney for. Why even worry about that when our team has an available backup/stretch big slot. We could draft Kaminsky, Turner, or Looney and put them in a position to succeed right away.
 
If Booker and Oubre are gone I'm good with Frank.

I just hate that the reason for not liking Booker is because we already have wings. The kid is the youngest American born player who declared for the draft. He has an elite skill and that skill is in high demand in today's NBA.

this is very true and I have thought about this a lot and here are a few points

1st - I think burks should get all the back up pg minutes. he needs to learn to thrive with out dominating the ball because hood will be the guy on the second team like Hayward on the first team.

2nd - booker would open up driving lanes for burks. he will pull who ever is guarding him out of the lane.

3rd - I think Hayward is able to play the 4 in a small ball line up. that would free up a lot of minutes.
 
Drafting into a log jam is a good way to kill the value of all players involved. We don't have a lot of roles available on this team. I guess that's a sign we're finally getting good, but players on their first deals need to see that a path to success is available to them. I honestly believe that the reason earlier picks outperform later picks has just as much to do with the greater roles available to them as their superior talent.

It's easy to find late round steals when you have no good players on your roster. Take the Lakers for example. They drafted Jordan Clarkson in the second round, who looks great with all the possessions he gets, but was he really the BPA when some of the good teams drafted late in the first round? Guys like Jordan Adams and Kyle Anderson would have put up great numbers on the Lakers this season, but instead are getting garbage times for teams that don't really need them right now. Dante Exum would have a lot more value right now if he was drafted by a team that could give him more that a 13% usage rate. I realize a lot of that's on Dante. He needs to be more aggressive, and the team is allowing him to develop slowly while still getting good minutes. But people around the league are calling him a bust because he's not progressing along the traditional path to stardom.

Not that we're the Spurs or the Grizzlies, but it's definitely good to be mindful of the roles you have available when you draft. Point guard is easily our weakest position, but we can't draft a point guard without completely squashing the fragile value of Trey and Dante. With Alec coming back, if we draft a wing we better 100% sure he's worth sacrificing Rodney for. Why even worry about that when our team has an available backup/stretch big slot. We could draft Kaminsky, Turner, or Looney and put them in a position to succeed right away.

I don't really agree with much in this post. This kind of thinking is what causes teams to pass On Chris Paul and Deron Williams because they have Sebastion Telfair. And your point on Exum seems way off to me. If anything, Exum kinda goes against the idea that players at the back of the draft would have similar success with greater roles. Certainly there are times when you draft for need, but as a rule, better to cause a logjam and deal with choosing which players to move to clear that jam, than to pass on superior talent because you're drafting for need.
 
Drafting into a log jam is a good way to kill the value of all players involved. We don't have a lot of roles available on this team. I guess that's a sign we're finally getting good, but players on their first deals need to see that a path to success is available to them. I honestly believe that the reason earlier picks outperform later picks has just as much to do with the greater roles available to them as their superior talent.

It's easy to find late round steals when you have no good players on your roster. Take the Lakers for example. They drafted Jordan Clarkson in the second round, who looks great with all the possessions he gets, but was he really the BPA when some of the good teams drafted late in the first round? Guys like Jordan Adams and Kyle Anderson would have put up great numbers on the Lakers this season, but instead are getting garbage times for teams that don't really need them right now. Dante Exum would have a lot more value right now if he was drafted by a team that could give him more that a 13% usage rate. I realize a lot of that's on Dante. He needs to be more aggressive, and the team is allowing him to develop slowly while still getting good minutes. But people around the league are calling him a bust because he's not progressing along the traditional path to stardom.

Not that we're the Spurs or the Grizzlies, but it's definitely good to be mindful of the roles you have available when you draft. Point guard is easily our weakest position, but we can't draft a point guard without completely squashing the fragile value of Trey and Dante. With Alec coming back, if we draft a wing we better 100% sure he's worth sacrificing Rodney for. Why even worry about that when our team has an available backup/stretch big slot. We could draft Kaminsky, Turner, or Looney and put them in a position to succeed right away.



I don't really agree with much in this post. This kind of thinking is what causes teams to pass On Chris Paul and Deron Williams because they have Sebastion Telfair. And your point on Exum seems way off to me. If anything, Exum kinda goes against the idea that players at the back of the draft would have similar success with greater roles. Certainly there are times when you draft for need, but as a rule, better to cause a logjam and deal with choosing which players to move to clear that jam, than to pass on superior talent because you're drafting for need.

I'm with Smurf in this. The Jazz are in need of overall talent. That is the next step in the teams progression.

Remember the Michael Jordan example? Portland could have drafted him but passed because of Drexler (who was a great player is his own regard, but Michael was better). What about the Jazz drafting Rudy even though they had Favors, Kanter and Evans already not to mention Marvin who played a lot at the 4. Rudy won out last season and moves needed to be made.

Your reasoning is exactly why some teams passed on Gobert and every team that had a chance to draft him is regretting that decision.
 
I kinda think some people are misreading the whole Kanter fiasco somewhat. Kanter was drafted as an extremely raw project, and it wasn't unreasonable at all to expect him to earn significant minutes, as opposed to giving him time right away. Honestly, the biggest reason we had to sell low on him was because of his contract situation and his trade demand, and that had a lot to do with a sense of entitlement and bad attitude, which is hard to predict. Smart money is on Kanter having problems again because of his attitude, and when that happens, he'll have to blame his new team instead of Utah.
 
I'm with Smurf in this. The Jazz are in need of overall talent. That is the next step in the teams progression.

Remember the Michael Jordan example? Portland could have drafted him but passed because of Drexler (who was a great player is his own regard, but Michael was better). What about the Jazz drafting Rudy even though they had Favors, Kanter and Evans already not to mention Marvin who played a lot at the 4. Rudy won out last season and moves needed to be made.

Your reasoning is exactly why some teams passed on Gobert and every team that had a chance to draft him is regretting that decision.

Pretty brutal reasoning tbh-- people passed on Rudy because he was more raw than a fresh-cut ribeye. There were multiple centers drafted ahead of him, based on both team need & best possible athlete. Your statement is a fabrication.

What your fallacy (along with many others' here) is treating team-fit & BPA as if it's a black and white decision-- when really, it's much, much more of a spectrum.

Comparing two unique athletes when deciding who to draft is intrinsically different on the BPA vs. TF (team fit) scale from every other comparison preceding it. If Sam Bowie and Michael Jordan were both perceived as having equal repertoires, ceilings, and NBA projections, then it would be stupid to select Jordan when you already have Drexler-- of course, that wasn't the case; still, even if it was the case, drafting is an imperfect science, and odds were that two players with equal projections won't progress equally to equal levels.


When we have an array of athletes, pretty much from 9-18 that are projected to have very similar levels of productivity and talent that transfer to the NBA game (just giving an example here, not saying this is the case), it would be beyond moronic to not go for the ones that fit your team best. Plain and simple. If we can choose between Kaminsky and Oubre, and our management (for whatever reason) deems Oubre as having the much higher probability of being a star, plus-player on both ends of the court, then it would be moronic to draft Frank. These are assessments that are multifactorial, incredibly complicated, and (more often than not) a crapshoot.



tl;dr simply saying "BFA!!1!!" is stupid.
 
I kinda think some people are misreading the whole Kanter fiasco somewhat. Kanter was drafted as an extremely raw project, and it wasn't unreasonable at all to expect him to earn significant minutes, as opposed to giving him time right away. Honestly, the biggest reason we had to sell low on him was because of his contract situation and his trade demand, and that had a lot to do with a sense of entitlement and bad attitude, which is hard to predict. Smart money is on Kanter having problems again because of his attitude, and when that happens, he'll have to blame his new team instead of Utah.


the reason we sold low on him is because every ****ing coach knew that the easiest way to defeat Utah was to run constant pick-and-rolls with [whoever]/Kanter, and watch Utah bleed 120 points a game. Coaches aren't stupid: our players are constantly scouted. He's a non-versatile offensive player who can only help himself score, doesn't fit in a team offense, and only functions as a decent pick-and-pop player + offensive rebounder. Tomic and Kaminsky both have much higher ceilings as bench bigs on this team.
 
I don't really agree with much in this post. This kind of thinking is what causes teams to pass On Chris Paul and Deron Williams because they have Sebastion Telfair. And your point on Exum seems way off to me. If anything, Exum kinda goes against the idea that players at the back of the draft would have similar success with greater roles. Certainly there are times when you draft for need, but as a rule, better to cause a logjam and deal with choosing which players to move to clear that jam, than to pass on superior talent because you're drafting for need.

I don't agree with myself entirely either. Obviously take the markedly better player. All I'm saying is logjams aren't always easy to sort out. Unless you come out with a real star in the end, you're going to bleed value and harm chemistry.
 
It's going to be Kaminsky.

He stretches the floor on offense and Rudy is there to offset any out-on-the-floor deficiencies.

We do not need a PG. (Exum/Burke)
We don't really need a SG. (Burks/Hood)
We don't really need a SF. (Hayward/Hood)
We don't need a C. (Gobert/Favors)

We do need another different-look PF.

I'm not totally sold on Kaminsky being a PF..... except for one team. The one with Gobert.
 
Careers are made in a number of ways in this league and not all of them have to do with the drive and talent of the player himself.

It's true that some internal competition for a role on a team can be a good thing. Rudy is possibly better today than he would have been had he not had to work to earn his starting job. But it put the front office in a position where they had no choice but to trade Kanter. Kanter knew if he was going to get paid he needed to be find a better situation for himself. The logjam and his trade demand reduced Kanter's value to a restricted future first round pick and change. Luckily Gobert's huge increase in value more than made up for Kanter's loss, but it doesn't always work out that way.

In this draft I just don't see Booker and Oubre being so much better than Kaminsky, Turner, or Looney that it's worth screwing over Hood's value. The models agree:

https://nyloncalculus.com/stats/layne-vashros-draft-projection-tools/

I would however trade 12 + Hood + whatever else is fair for a shot at one of the premier guys like Russell, Winslow, and maybe even Hezonja.
 
the reason we sold low on him is because every ****ing coach knew that the easiest way to defeat Utah was to run constant pick-and-rolls with [whoever]/Kanter, and watch Utah bleed 120 points a game. Coaches aren't stupid: our players are constantly scouted. He's a non-versatile offensive player who can only help himself score, doesn't fit in a team offense, and only functions as a decent pick-and-pop player + offensive rebounder. Tomic and Kaminsky both have much higher ceilings as bench bigs on this team.

Maybe I didn't express my thoughts very well, but I was addressing the idea that Utah killed Kanter's trade value by drafting him into a logjam situation. I disagree with that completely. This kind of reminds me of a few years ago when many people on this board claimed Al Jefferson couldn't be traded because he had no value. Then he goes out and gets signed to another big contract. Go figure. Utah got 60 cents on the dollar for Enes mainly due to contract status. Had Utah been able to hold on to him long enough to get him signed long term, he would have been a significant trade asset at the deadline next year, but he forced our hand and we took what we could get. Even with his defensive issues, Enes has value as a post scorer/rebounder, and with a player that young, there will always be teams who think he might still improve in that area. Hell, there were people on this board who thought we would dump him for a second rounder.
.

As for your post on drafting for fit, I'm sure there are probably some people on this board who would have passed on Exum because we already had Trey. I'll just take solace in the fact that DL didn't think that way. Like I said before, when the difference between two players is negligible, then you can draft for fit. Otherwise, always draft BPA and work out the details later. It really is that simple. Doesn't mean there are never exceptions to the rule, and sometimes even the experts get it wrong, but that's the model you go by.
 
Last edited:
I don't agree with myself entirely either. Obviously take the markedly better player. All I'm saying is logjams aren't always easy to sort out. Unless you come out with a real star in the end, you're going to bleed value and harm chemistry.

Obviously there are a lot of variables. However, I don't think the Kanter problem can be blamed on drafting him into a logjam, and I assume that's what you are referring to, no?
 
You take best player available if they are a talent tier above the other players available. If they are close in talent you draft for long term fit. I'd personally rather have Frank, but I understand the case for booker. Hood isn't a sure thing yet neither is Alec, but for different reasons. What if Hood never gets healthy or Alec never quite puts it all together. If we are a playoff team next year it is likely that it won't be with a rookie playing a major role. It might be better to have someone develop where we have depth and fill the other positions of real need with veterans.

Pretty clear that booker would have a better attitude than Kanter... My guess is Oubre would have more drive than kanter did as well. That guy is all kinds of weird. We shouldn't compare anyone to him really.
 
bobby portis is also a good fit and I like his motor

kaminsky answers a lot of questions but what is his ceiling?

booker is very interesting and has a chance to be very good.

oubre has the measurement but does he have the heart?

I don't want any of the pgs in the lottery

dekker I have followed for 2 years watched a lot and I don't want him. his shooting is to hot and cold. he also doesn't seem dialed in at times and can coast.

looney I think would be a good fit. I don't think he is ready to be a big contributor right off the bat but will grow with this team.

lyles I like a lot and I think he would make a good stretch 4 but I like kaminsky more.

of course you all know I am a super fan of Justin Anderson.
 
Rudy is possibly better today than he would have been had he not had to work to earn his starting job. But it put the front office in a position where they had no choice but to trade Kanter. Kanter knew if he was going to get paid he needed to be find a better situation for himself.

Kanter was starting over Rudy, and he was getting plenty of minutes to earn a big payday. It was only a few weeks before his trade demand that he put up b2b games of 17/24 and 16/23. Not only that, but he has proven that he was intentionally not passing the ball because of his ****ty attitude, since he magically learned how to pass once he left. I believe Kanter wanted out due to a poor rapport with his teammates, but whatever it was, it certainly wasn't lack of opportunity. and the excuse that he was still pissed about unfair treatment the year before doesn't make sense either if he was so concerned about earning his next paycheck. He had plenty of chance to play for his next contract and instead chose to act like a spoiled brat. Meanwhile, Rudy was playing off the bench and waiting for his chance, even though he had clearly already earned the starting spot. Fans need to stop making excuses for players like Enes.
 
ps

I like Johnson a ton and would be ecstatic to get one of the big 3 wings (hezonja, Winslow Johnson)

turner is the dark horse of this draft. his defense fits right in and his shot might be huge. he like looney is not ready now but will grow with this team
 
Back
Top