03-30-2021, 01:55 PM
(03-30-2021, 12:39 PM)mavsluvr Wrote: I was really impressed with the way Melli seemed to fit in so well and looked like he knew what to do in his FIRST game as a Mav. Even really good players usually need some time for a chemistry adjustment. A breath of fresh air!
Mason Ginsberg of Bourbon Street Shots made a few observations about Melli and the trade in Sidney Myers' podcast. Said he was brought there to be a stretch four. Was better than expected defensively, and played an effective role in lighting his teammates' defensive fire off the bench. Cannot switch onto a guard in the PNR very well, but has some definite defensive strengths.
Per Mason, his undoing in NO was his shooting; he never developed a consistent three-point shot, and at the end, was unsustainably bad, despite getting pretty good looks due to Zion's gravity. Ginsberg said he would not be surprised to see some sort of major regression to the mean, with him "lighting up the nets" in Dallas.
Carlisle said that his real question about Melli was whether he was going to be able to play both the 4 and 5 positions, and that he was pleased to see Melli play the 4 very effectively in OKC.
With all the caveats about its being only one game against a tanking team, etc., the guy looked ready to play, which would be an unexpected delight, if it holds up.
Good added info. Thanks
I think one of the reasons I had interest in a diminished Blake Griffin is his passing ability. We have no big man on our roster who you can throw the ball to at the elbow and run cuts off of or run off the ball offense with. Last year, KP made small strides in his passing and my hope he we would continue to try to improve this, but we have not see much this season. Right now, we pass it to one of our big man and it is either and hand off or the rotate the ball to the other side.
We have only seen Melli for 11 minutes and maybe this is not something he can do, but for at least one game he looked comfortable doing this a couple of possessions. It is something I thought was desperately needed to not be so dependent on Luka creating most of our offense. Best case with Melli this addition would be limited but it could be something different.
I also agree with another poster that Maxi is best at 25 minutes. I think you want to keep his legs fresh and protect against burnout. Any minutes you can save where DFS is not getting the majority of the PF minutes is a positive for me. Nothing against DFS either, but I want a little bigger player getting most of those backup minutes.