If this is true, it's surprising that it was turned down. Lol Colangelo for even offering that for essentially 1 year of Paul George though.

I like George a lot but he hasn't been as great this year and there's nothing to stop him bolting next offseason. Those picks are decently likely to be top 5 picks and I love Covington and wouldn't want to move him (especially because he's probably undervalued).

RoCo is much better than you are giving him credit for imo. He's always near the lead in defensive RPM which has to account for something. He had a terrible shooting slump, but has recovered nicely and has always been a very good 3/4 defender with the length and standing reach of a good power forward.

Covington's pretty likely a top 75 player in the league.

Do you think the 76ers would move him for the right deal? With him being a UFA after next year (I think), I would think they stand a decent chance to lose him anyway right?

He'd be perfect on so many teams.

The relevant sentence fragment was:

"I'm not even sure he's that much better than RoCo going forward as is...."

We weren't saying that you thought Covington was remotely as good as PG, but the "that" in italics indicates to me that you'll think they'll be pretty damn close in the short/midterm future, which is an absurd opinion. But we're arguing over vague semantics, so whatever.

Edit: I say this as someone who things Covington is pretty decent, a fringe top100 kind of guy. But 100 to ~15 is a massive leap, just on, like, usage alone.

In any case, you me and DarO all seem to agree on the actual meat of this alleged proposed deal so

And seadood, please don't take my arguments as any personal criticism of you in general. I think you're a terrific poster and you get way way way way more **** than you deserve.

I have no idea what destruction Colangelo is capable of but one would expect that he could be moved in a superstar deal like the one proposed.

I highly doubt he bolts in FA though - we'll be willing to pay him, he's a team leader here, and he and Embiid are boys. I think there's a chance they make an agreement this summer where they decline his team option and offer him a deal one year early.

I really dont get PER. seems that lebrons should be higher. I guess his usage dropping from ~33.5 to 30 really is the difference between 33+ and his current 27. still, I would think that 619ts and 26/8.8/8.4 would be a bit higher.

regardless, hes clear mvp.

In what world is Paul a top 15 player this year? His numbers across the board are barely above average for a starter. I know he was like top 30 perhaps last year, but he's gotten to the point imo where he is ridiculously overrated...

What makes him top 15?

PER tends to give a lot of credence to usage which I never liked. I mean it's incredibly important, but there is a level where I think it actually hurts your team. I think they should adjust it to the point where going over a certain point doesn't raise the level of your PER. My opinion is that there are clear diminishing returns afa wins are concerned when you start upping your usage into the stratosphere.

in addition to the usg being down his steals and blocks are also down and his tovs are up. the league is also more efficient this year so the increase in ts% is offset some by that

edit: his usg is actually not even that far down relative to the last few years. it's likely the dip in the ancillary stats (not that they are all down)

also, per doesn't explicitly include usg in the formula. . . like yeah higher usg players tend to have higher per's but the relationship is not as simple as lebron's per is down b/c his usg is down and per is too influenced by usg

The thing is PER is totally inneffective at rating off the ball play and even play created that doesn't record one of the fantasy stats

assist to a foul, hockey assist, screens, cuts are in a way showing up in WS, BPM, RPM, VORP

Kyle Korver never had an above average PER season

Lol Covington

Dog bites man. More at 11.

Those Lavar/Lebron talks made me wonder

If Lebron kids become NBA players, what percentage of their salary should they ship to daddy for dem super genes?

Without taking into account the fact that Lebron is rich and doesn't need money obviously

In the world of context and eyetests. Since the breakup of the Hill/Hibbert/West teams (when he was universally regarded as a top at least 20 player, if not top 10), he has had to carry an insane burden, being the only player on his team capable of volume scoring while always checking the opponent's top wing. Last year, for instance, his 2nd best player was low-usage/elite roleplayer George Hill (who definitely gets over-rated by some people ITT). Hill highly lacks creation, and PG spent hist minutes with rookie Turner, lolnetnegative Monta, ultrachucker CJ Miles, et al. My point in mentioning all this is that PG simply HAS to chuck up a bunch of middling-poor efficiency jumpers. Nobody else on the team is even capable of holding a high usage. He does this all while clearly being a + defender.

Really, it's as simple as that he's playing a role he's not really made for. He should be more of a mega-elite 3+D type guy, but his team needs a lot more.

I agree that he has not had a top 15 year, no doubt. But he's capable of being a top 10 player for significant stretches. He's highly inconsistent, he goes through long emo stretches where his confidence disappears. He and Boogie are the two most emo stars I've ever seen. He also coasts through large stretches of every regular season. But he has a peak that can only be touched by a small handful of guys.

For something more quantifiable, here were his stats vs. Toronto in the playoffs last year. 46/42/95 shooting, 27.5PER, 63TS. (while absolutely STONING DeRozan on the other end, but I don't know how to separate individual series on bballref). He was BRILLIANT. I refuse to believe that more than 10 players in the world are capable of his play in those 7 games.

13-14 playoffs he had 20.5PER, 58TS while being guarded by LeBron for 7 of his 19 games.

Wake me up when Covington ever, in his life, remotely approaches these numbers (to say nothing of the defensive end) against playoffs teams while being his teams' undisputed #1 option. Or even George Hill. Or, hell, even Gordon Hayward, of whom I'm a big fan.

Oh, fwiw, PG leads the league this year in FT% (mitigated by the fact he doesn't get to the line much, but there you go)

It's so weird arguing this, because for years and years I thought PG was overrated by tons of people that had him as a top 5 player/fringe MVP guy. This, by the way, was the opinion of people as recently as the beginning of this year. I honestly didn't think ~15 would be questioned.

I hear you and agree to an extent, but what portion of this can we perhaps attribute to having his leg snapped? I mean on the surface I get everything you're saying, but man that is a lot of risk to put forth on the chance that he'll flip the switch back to elite role-playing.

Admittedly I have watched 2 Pacers games this year, and one of them was him acting disinterested and chucking up a bunch of bad shots while Jokic & Co put up 140 on them across the pond.

Guess it's not that hot of a take but Paul George kind of sucks

Yeah, that certainly didn't help him. The timing of that injury was awful, right as the team was in flux with West/Hibbert leaving and right as he was approaching his athletic prime. Stupid UNLV with their short basket stanchions

And that London game was just incredible. Jokic made Turner look like a complete joke. That was the worst game I've seen Myles play and I've seen ~every game of his in the NBA.

Turner gave him some love though:

"I like watching him and how he reads guards. Oh, another guy is [Nikola] Jokic. He’s a peer and I play against him now, but he has incredible vision. It’s cool the way he picks apart defenses. I’ve seen a couple games where he’s out there facilitating as a seven-footer."

http://hoopshype.com/2017/01/30/myle...ball-and-more/

Yeah, and STAPS is like, maybe the, I don't know, 4th or 5th best big to come out in the last few years, but you talk about him as though he's prime Shaq, so I guess we all have our blind spots.

As someone who went through this with their best player at a time things were rolling, I really feel your pain.

Preach