Quote:
Originally Posted by ClarkNasty
I'm guessing there's like a 5% chance that the season o/u line has more wins for Minny than GSW when it's posted later this year.
Minny still has horrid guardplay and is paper thin. GSW lost some depth, but seems poised to replace it, and trades Baron for Maggette, which isn't great but its not the end of the world either. It's certainly not enough to make me think that last seasons huge disparity in wins between the two is suddenly going to evaporate.
This is not a good analysis imo. First of all, Minni added Mike Miller, which is a huuge upgrade at gaurd play (or wing if he plays more at the SF, but whatever). This alone is worth a good number of wins. Second of all, the rest of their gaurds are all young players who could improve slightly this year. Foye was hurt a lot of last year, and if he's healthy they add a few wins that way. He's not really a pure point or a great option but he brings something to the table (good 3pt shooting, some assists, not a lot of TO). Telfair still sucks at shooting but at least was dishing at a reasonable number of assists with low TO count. With Miller/Love coming to the team and Al J there, you don't need a lot of shooting from the PG position. Then you have Brewer/Carney/McCants and you really just hope one of these guys sticks and that the rest can play a few productive minutes off the bench (and McCants, for all the hate he gets, scores pretty well).
Second of all, they actually have good depth in the bigs. Al J/Kevin Love starting most likely, with Gomes and Craig Smith coming off the bench who are both good options there (per 36 they are 15/7 and 17/8 respectively). Kevin Love could come off the bench at first, who knows. Maybe I'm higher on him than most but he's going to help that team.
Minni basically projects to be a pretty good offensive team. They have a bunch of guys who can be fairly high usage players with high effiency (Al J, McCants and Miller) and others who can be somewhat lower efficiency players who play a productive role. They will be not good defensively.
GSW, otoh, has absolutely no gaurd depth at all. They have a huge log jam at the SF/PF spot but with a bunch of not ready or subpar players. Losing Baron Davis for a PG of Maggette's rough value would be one thing, but losing Baron Davis for another wing player who is an iso pure scorer who cannot pass or play defense is a pretty huge deal. Who runs that offense now... they have no depth at the G position at all. It's Ellis and CJ Watson and Bellinelli. I will take Minni there.
At the wing, GS has Maggette, Jackson, Azabuke, Barnes. Like I said, lotta scorers, not great D. The bigs situation is even more dire. Biedrins plays well but I think may suffer from lack of a true PG. Wright might be decent but I don't know how effective he will be banging down low with the big boys, and Harrington is whatever.
I think the teams are close, but GS is on the way down and Minni is on the way up and that could affect how things go at the end of the year.