Building Around Cooper: A Backward-Looking Thought Experiment

[KillerLeft]

I thought I'd move this to a different thread.

Yes, I see Flagg as an offensive superstar.  Not in the heliocentric 29+ PPG sense of the current top five, but more in the sense of the 25-27 PPG of the next 15 or so.  I referenced his last 20 games before.  Here are all of his splits for that period (which includes AD's last full game and 10 minutes of the game where he hurt his hand):

PPG:  22.8
REB:  6.85
AST:  4.85
STK:  1.85
TOV:  2.35
2P%: .517
3P%: .376

This is in 33 MPG with no spacing and no one to keep defenses honest.  If there is any natural progression to his 3's and long 2's, he will be unstoppable.  It took Giannis, Kawhi and Tatum three and four seasons to get to these levels and Flagg is doing it (small sample) as a 19 year old rookie.  And, when the game is on the line, he's one of the best clutch scorers in the league.  Forget efficiency for the moment.  It isn't about that at this point.  It is about the skills he flashes and the things HE thinks he can do.  His eventual offensive "bag" is enormous.  We are comparing him to offensive superstars and he looks better than any of them at this age.

One caveat, Flagg can be pretty much whatever he wants to be.  If he wants to, he can put 40+ on a team.  But, I've also seen him defer (largely to AD when he had been in the league for five minutes, so difficult to know what that looks like down the road).  Part of why I don't put him in the 29+ point club is because I think he'd rather have the people around him succeed and he just win the game at the end.  Kyrie seems to have a similar mentality.  So, his eventual offensive ceiling will depend on the quality of the offensive players around him.  It is more of a mentality thing than an offensive limitation.  But even if all we ever got was 23/7/5 with great D and .376% from three, this is an All-Star and All NBA third team guy once it starts to be the norm for a full season.

I agree he is easy to build around, but it is because he's great at both sides of the ball...or will be if .376% on 3's becomes the floor rather than the ceiling.  At that point, you can put whatever you want next to him.

This is awesome, but didn't really address my question. 

What hadn't occurred to me even once that you put in your previous thread was the bit about hiding him (my paraphrasing, because I can't remember your exact wording) him a little on defense to conserve his energy for offense. That's what I meant by "treat him like an offensive superstar." I agree he's very good, offensively, but I think that approach might be a mistake (if I understood you correctly). If anything, I think the move might be to find ways for him to conserve energy on offense. Not sure, but that was the idea I found interesting from the original post.