I agree if your standard for whether or not a 7'3 8 foot wingspan quick rim protecting 21 year old has Top 10 potential is "Currently shoots like Prime Dirk" then he doesn't meet that standard.

I've got 1. Russ 2a Harden 2b Steph with Steph fitting super teams better and Harden being the most fraudulent.

don't think the size precludes it, so much as the tall guys tend to suck at dribbling. staps no exception there

edit: thayer, i'm also skeptical staps will ever shoot like dirk did across the board in the early portion of his career. that said i had forgotten he got hurt last year.

as for top 10 potential, shooting aside his creation ability is also question mark imo, but lolknicks and their offense, etc. so i'm not writing him off. dirk comparison just doesn't fit to me

Well, it's a correlation situation. They're gawky.

Even someone like Durant dribbled away a playoff series. You've got to be Durant, Giannis level athlete to really attack the rim at ~7'. Let alone 7'3 jfc. I guess the Gasols at 7' can do it a little, so that counters somewhat of the athleticism necessary.

Still not 7'3.

Jokic compares more to Dirk wrt shooting, although Dirk was a whiz from 10-23 whereas my boyfriend does more of his damage from 3-9. I think the point is Dirk/Nikola are just way further along at taking the "bad" shots and making them at a rate where they become major offensive weapons from that spot.

I think Nikola's shooting gets underrated due to his poor 3pt percentage and the fact that everyone talks about his passing, but he's been an extremely accurate jump-shooter overall as long as he's not doing it from the corners.

bruh

bruh what my friend? Both guys take a bunch of inefficient, unassisted shots and make them at a very high rate. Dirk took more, but Nikola has been more efficient. Both come off similar action (post-ups) but the real difference is that Dirk's are more of the fade-away type whereas Jokic's are a combination of hooks/floaters/etc.

WAITER: Can I take your order?

SEADUDE: A cheeseburger please.

WAITER: What kind of cheese would you like sir?

SEADUDE: Hmmm....that is an interesting debate. I read that growing up, Nikola's favorite cheese was an unpasteurized goat's cheese from his uncle's farm in the foothills. I believe that critics that point out Nikola's slight gut fail to realize that it was these long treks up the grassy hills to retrieve his most favorite cheese that shaped his unparalleled passing vision and savvy footwork. Going forward, I believe that Nikola will continue to improve his agility and ultimately overcome his penchant for consuming cheese.

This is Chili's. We don't have goat cheese.

Even Mullen and Thay3r can't stop themselves from describing him without using the word GOAT.

Damn touché Dood

this graph would be way better if they had increased size based on volume: who gives a **** how good these guys are "off cuts" when the sample size is like 10?

True true

Read that as WAITERS

Well played.

Will KP ever finish in the top three in MVP voting?

On Knicks it's highly doubtful. There are a number of young guys who have higher upside than him and are on better teams. And a bunch of guys in the prime who are >>> KP right now and for the next few years.

Durant has 5-7 more years of potential top 3 level play
RWB has 6-8.
Curry has 6-8.
Harden has 6-8
Butler has 6-8.
Lebron has 3-5.
Kawhi has 9-10.
AD has 10-12.
Giannis has 10-12.
KAT has 10-12+.
Jokic has 10-12+.
Cousins has 10+.
Gobert has 10+.

Then we have Simmons/Embiid/Ball/Fultz who have some sort of equity (but all could fail). You have other guys coming in who could be good and have hype like Williamson/Porter/Bagly/Bamba/Anton/Doncic and some quality guys the following year. I just don't see it for KP unless he has a monster improvement year this year or next. I can't see them all failing or KP getting worse. I wouldn't be shocked to see KP 2nd or 3rd best player on a good team but I can't see him the dominate #1 player on a contender.

I kinda think Cavs beat the Warriors if they trade kyrie for kp and noah.

Obv Noah pushes them over the top.

You are ******ed

understating staps postup potential and current ability imo. speculative, but i think it has potential to be a viable 1on1 weapon. his stats are meh but he looks good doing it, which is worth noting for a guy his age even tho it's superficial. i'd assume he ends up more in the lma style of ability to shoot a turnaround every time rather than embiid bbq chicken auto-double level of dangerousness

i think that is probably enough to satisfy the requirement for 'get me a bucket', especially if he's providing heaps of positive externalities just by being out there (particularly for a driving pg who can benefit from his ability to pick and pop. again lolknicks because dsj looks like a perfect fit as that guy)

i think a big part of LMA's postup turnaround art is that he's a bully in the post and a threat to bulldoze guys. that's what he did to terrence jones, who is the size of a modern PF, a few years ago in the playoffs-- basically put him in the basket and made 17 footers into 11 footers and 11 footers into baby hooks. without that threat i think the fadeaway turnaround magic is pretty gone, and i KP is a long way from the shoulder into guys portion of that equation. without it, you're just taking fadeaway 18 footers, which works even moderately effectively for just so few guys.

im not saying he can't get there, but i don't see the hand eye skill smoothness of dirk or the strength into skill combo of someone like hakeem. im not pretending to be an expert, in the small sample i've watched of him he's just looked a little clunky at that. i personally wouldn't care to do that if i were him, i'd just work on flares into shooting 3s for days. who gives a **** about all that glory, ryan anderson on steroids is a ****ing dynamite player (like 3 years ago if you merged ryan anderson on offense with serge ibaka on defense you'd have the 5th best player itl for sure)

Since he would be working on improving his 3's and fortifying his defense, would you call it a..

Triple Range Merge?

NBA Futures from Vegas Insider:

Warriors 5/9
Cavs 19/4
Celtics 9/1
Rockets 9/1
Spurs 11/1

http://www.vegasinsider.com/nba/odds/futures/

Minnesota 6th to title and 7/4 to win div the real news.

#Wolfpack