07-05-2021, 09:34 AM
(07-05-2021, 09:18 AM)ItsGoTime Wrote: Also, I’m really glad to see people not fully on board with the Lavine/Beal 3rd star route. Those one way stars have never sat right with me as targets, but not so much so that I wanted to get into it. This team with Luka needs more of a defensive star. I had hopes that KP would be that. I’m not fully out that he can’t be, but it’s further to impossibility than it is to correct at this point.
I think you are all completely wrong about the 2nd star route. We are talking about rejecting guys averaging 30/5/5 on borderline 50/40/90 shooting as full focus #1 options, that now get to play off Luka.
Our 2nd best scorer is THJ and our 2nd best all-around player might be an undrafted 27 year old on a four million dollar contract.
Furthermore all these guys (Lavine, Beal, Luka, Lillard) have to carry such a gigantic offensive workload that they simply have no energy to play defense, just like Harden in Houston. They spend all their energy getting shots off against double and triple teams. I have seen Luka really bother Kawhi one-on-one defensively in game seven. That means a lot more to me than him cruising through the regular season. He can play defense, if he puts his mind and body to it, but that requires him not putting on 17 moves to create an open dunk for Powell or an open 3pt attempt for Kleber on every possession for 48 minutes, because there is no 2nd creator and they are all completely one-dimensional offensive players.
How about we get Luka a legit 30 on any given night scorer, see how that looks and then we worry about the defensive part.
Also it´s so disingenuous to point to the Bucks for an example. Like they would have sniffed the finals, if the All-Offense Brooklyn Nets had been healthy. They might not have gotten past a fully healthy Hawks team either (no Hunter, hurt Bogdanovic, hurt Young).