Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
Maybe he means Travis Schlenk, who already has won a couple rings as the assistant GM of the Warriors?
The ONE AND ONLY Luka Doncic discussion thread
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Maybe he means Travis Schlenk, who already has won a couple rings as the assistant GM of the Warriors?
Except that it's not.....but go ahead keep pushing this angle (true or not) since it's about all you have left.
His defense isn't that bad, he's about average or a little below average. The stats bear this out. I can't find any advanced stats/metrics showing Luka to be this terrible defender like you keep claiming. His metrics are much better than players like James Harden who actually is a terrible defender.
I've watched enough of Luka to know he's not killing his team defensively like you keep saying. That's just flat out not true. I'm not going to sit here and pretend he's a good defender (because he isn't) but he's a better defender than people like you give him credit for and when you combine that average defense with outstanding offense, you end up with a hell of a player.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
Chubby Asians with receding hairlines?
LOL have not been able to find that advanced metric either.
Seriously though how many posts have you made about Luka's alleged terrible defense now? There is nothing to back up this claim. The advanced metrics last year show Luka as being a better defender than Bagley (and Luka has improved his defense this year) but when comparing players such as this thread.....Luka's defense is looked at as a negative yet hardly anyone mentions Bagley who is worse. It's just assumed he's better.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
Over the entirety of a game, yes, his numbers come out to average. But team defense means jack squat when Luka gets iso'd out on an island in crunch time. In a playoff series, a good coach will be able to rub Luka into mismatches off of screens and ruin Dallas's defensive concepts when push comes to shove. We saw it against Lebron last night and we saw it against De'Aaron Fox of all people last season (the infamous imprint game), where Luka somehow wound up trying to slow down Fox every other possession and kept waving off his help outlet every other possession for no good reason.
Some of this is technique (Luka's center of balance is way too high when he gets into a stance/ he has a tendency to overpursue on-ball) but some of it is just lack of lateral quickness. Now a good coach and team can scheme around this/convince Luka he's not Kawhi on defense but the Mavs are the Mavs and I'm not quite sure Carlislie has even been an average NBA coach since winning the 'ship almost a decade ago.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
People talk about Bagley needing to improve on defense all the time, just not in a thread about Luka Doncic.
So now you're using two specific late game situations (one against Lebron and another against Fox which was a horrible mismatch that made no sense) to support your general argument that Luka is a terrible defender? If he was so obviously terrible wouldn't teams isolate him all game to help themselves win or stay ahead? Doesn't the same also hold true on the other end? Luka picks teams apart in crunch time (last night not withstanding)
You keep trashing the Mavs as if their situation is so much worse than the Kings yet they have a championship in the last decade. They've been in the playoffs much more recently than the Kings. They already appear to be on a faster track of rebuilding than the Kings (even though they started later). The big reason they are not in a better situation is because they devoted a couple years to Dirk's twilight which was the sentimental thing (and probably right thing) to do but not the wisest in terms of rebuilding. It just slowed them down.
Bottom line is who would you rather have Luka or Bagley?
rosa u podne
Bench
I have watched Portland winning their 2nd round series against Denver, by isolating Rodney F*ing Hood against Jamal Murray. IMO, Denver made a huge mistake signing Murray to the max. His weak defense will probably have a similar impact like lazy and dumb play by Wiggins on the Wolves. It looks like there is a Canadian intelligence agency blackmailing NBA GMs or owners. Anyway, I agree, his defense will be exposed if Dallas goes to PO. I think they won't, not this year at least.
rosa u podne
Bench
I haven't watched Luka in NBA so much, but against LeBron, I saw multiple times him turning his back when LeBron was shooting (and making) 3s. Also, I saw how easy was to penetrate against Luka and how much havoc it created in Dallas defense, while other players tried to switch, while Luka stayed behind. Luka is a bad defender, period. Having said that I'd rather have Luka.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
I have never said Luka is a terrible defender. I feel like in your desperation to (I honestly have no clue what your agenda is here)... convince someone who doesn't need convincing that Luka is good, you're conflating criticism with an out-and-out character attack.
All I am saying is that Luka's defense in crunch time and clutch situations is less than desirable from a franchise player. I've made the same argument about James Harden for the last decade but his name isn't Doncic so obviously you weren't paying attention. The crazy thing is that I too wanted us to draft Luka (look at my posts pre-that draft). Apparently my saying anything aside from "LUKA DONCIC IS THE GREATEST BASKETBALL PLAYER IN THE GALAXY" is tantamount to me saying he's the next Kwame Brown, which is not my argument at all.
As I have detailed in numerous posts, I have serious issues with the Mavs decision to trade pretty much every single asset for Porzingis, who I'm not sure is going to be able to physically last until the end of his massive new contract. In acquiring Zinger (and subsequently extending him), the Mavs also took on a bunch of useless contracts while losing all their draft picks of worth (the best way to acquire cost-controlled talent). By the time those contracts come off the books, the Mavs are going to have to extend Luka, meaning they won't ever really have all that much money to play with in free agency. Even if they did, Cuban and Carlislie's tendencies to be blowhards (in the case of Cuban, occasionally saying dumb semi-racist things that draw the ire of most of the league or denying knowledge of a corporate culture of sexual harassment despite every sign pointing to the contrary) tends to be a deterrent to actual impact players (The Mavs have had to massively overpay to acquire free agents over the past decade). Yes, they've acquired two potential star pieces in Luka and Zinger. Unfortunately, they've also sorta backed themselves into a corner where that is all they'll be able to have unless Giannis hits his head and randomly decides to abandon the Bucks and move to Dallas for some reason. Also Donnie Nelson is a product of nepotism who won a championship (good) by building around Dirk (good) by overpaying free agents (bad) and dumping draft assets like a guy giving out candy for trick-or-treat (horrible) and generally sucked at developing young assets when he's had them (very very bad).
Situation wise, it's probably a wash. If Zinger stays healthy, the Mavs are dangerous. If he becomes a huge contract taking up space while on the injury report, the Mavs are a homeless man's version of the pre-Miami-move Lebron Cavs. Even if you're looking at Fox and Bagley through cynical eyes, the Kings somehow someway still have all their picks going forward (for the first time in forever) and a relatively tenable salary cap situation going forward, which has to count for something.
The Effort Police
Starter
Meanwhile, guess who's the most outdated for this era of basketball?
I saw that graphic about locking up the "young cornerstones" and I got sad. Can you say limited ceiling?
You've basically said it over and over since last year. Most of your posts about Luka's defense have been in a general sense saying what a bad defender he is. They haven't been specific talking about late game isolation situations. You only brought that up once I said that the advanced metrics don't show him as a terrible defender.
As for your need to constantly trash the Mavericks brass (Nelson, Cuban, and Carlisle)..... While I agree with you on a lot of it, such as their future being dependent on Porzingis health (which is wishful thinking on their part). In relation to the Kings who cares and what does that have to do with whether or not the Kings should have drafted Luka or not?
This thread exists more or less because a large portion of the Kings fanbase thinks that Vlade should have drafted Luka over Bagley. Same with last year's threads. It's not because people (such as myself) care so much about the Mavericks, but because we think Vlade made a massive blunder in not drafting Luka.
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PHXSUNSFAN
Bench
This is gonna be the worst move the Suns will have ever made in franchsie history and that’s saying something considering all the dumb moves this team has made.
It’s the one and only reason that I could get confrontational with the big idiot Ryan McDonough if I ever ran into him.
So, are Suns fans as loud about this as people are around here?
Too bad the Suns didn't draft him would save us all a ton of heartache.
Seems like they did a fair amount of agonizing over it <link> and were mostly settling down to some sort of philosophical acceptance. That was right before Ayton got suspended. Now I don't expect it to die down as a Suns topic any time soon.
Tetsujin
The Game Thread Dude
People would probably still be peeved about us passing on Ayton or Bagley if we passed on him. Or Trae. Or a garbage can for that matter.
burekijogurt
Starter
Kings_of_California
Starter
29/14/15 tonight 
gunks
Hall of Famer
Every time I check a Mavs boxscore, I wanna punch Vlade in the face.
Of course he'd just knock me out and then I'd be arrested, but even then I might feel a little bit better about Vlade passing on a kid who's about to be counted in the top 10 at age 20.
But hey, at least we got a hustle big with the injury bug.
Of course he'd just knock me out and then I'd be arrested, but even then I might feel a little bit better about Vlade passing on a kid who's about to be counted in the top 10 at age 20.
But hey, at least we got a hustle big with the injury bug.
The Effort Police
Starter
The thing that makes ME sick to my stomach is the fact that while the generational talent is doing generational talent things, we're talking about about Bagley "earning" the starting spot.
"Earn it" nonsense is for inferior talents; superior talents would be past that by now.
SLAB
Hall of Famer
29/14/15 tonight
He’s plateau’d though, so that’s nice.
SLAB
Hall of Famer
I’m legit not going to START to get over this until Vlade gets fired and apologizes to the city of Sacramento for making the biggest screwup in franchise history.
gunks
Hall of Famer
I'm not gonna get over it until we land a player on the same level, which will probably be never.
I'm with you on Vlade getting thrown out on his *** over this though. He passed on LeBron for Mikki Moore.
Not that I want to pee on the parade of us beating the mighty Knicks or anything.
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