2020-2021 ROSTER TALK: Archived

[SleepingHero]

Instead though, I'm going to convince Charlotte I want Devonte Graham instead of THJ.  Charlotte desperately needs a center.   Their plan would be to hang onto his $4.7mm hold, grab a center with space and sign Graham above the cap.  Yes, Graham is restricted, but if a team signs him to an offer, they can't match AND get their center.  They only have $20.6mm to work with if you assume they want to keep the Graham hold, the Martin brothers and Jalen McDaniels (and I do).  BTW, that $20.6mm in space does not include the cost of their pick.  They are walking away from holds on Monk, Zeller and Biyombo in this scenario.  

I've been seeing off and on a lot of Devonte Graham love and for the life of me I just don't understand it.

Can someone please illuminate to me how signing a 6'1 shooting guard who's career splits are 37/37/85 to a massive deal fixes our problems? I'll admit I do not watch a lot of Charlotte, so perhaps my boxscore preaching is leading me astray...

But on the face of it, it seems to me that Graham is an undersized guard that can't do anything other than spot up. 44% of Graham's shots this year came off the spot up where he shot 42% from 3. 40% of his shots came off the dribble and he shot a harrowing 37% from 2 and 29% from 3. Anywhere in the paint Graham shot 37%. Meaning this dude is good at sitting in a corner and waiting for his chance to launch it, which I'm fine with but he cannot create off the dribble at all which was our biggest issue when Luka went to the bench. I'm not okay with throwing a massive offer to scare CHA away for such a one dimensional guy. I'm skeptical of his defense given his size as well. 

Bob Myers has been circulating the news recently with a series of quotes from his exit interview that I think applies to a lot of our players: "We’ve played some great shooters in the playoffs and have neutralized them. Because if that’s all you can do – shoot the three – you’re not necessarily the weapon we sometimes make you out to be in the regular season"

[b]"That two feet of space you had in the regular season, is two inches [in the playoffs]. You watch how many can not make a shot in the playoffs and shoot 42% in the regular season. You watch the playoffs; you’ll know who can play basketball"[/b]

That last quote applies especially to Maxi. This line of thinking completely changed my viewpoint to building a team. You need players that can do everything in the playoffs, because it's a totally different game. It's near impossible to win anything big with undersized guys eating up a lot of minutes. The only 2 having any consistent championship level success being Isiah Thomas and Allen Iverson.  Now make those guys one dimensional and that path becomes even steeper.

I'm a hard pass on Graham unless he wants to come for the BAE and play the 6th man role.