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Post by DERRENMATTS on Dec 12, 2019 15:56:33 GMT -5
For a team with the 4th best record in the entire league, with the reputation of being among the top tier teams, and with deep playoff aspirations, it is easy to forget that we are a really young and inexperienced team. Aside from Kemba and Hayward, we are heavily relying on kids (or a bit older players who are either rookies or just a few years in the league) to be the foundation and reinforcement of the team.
Jaylen is 23 and JT is 21, and without them we’d pegged a notch or two lower in the hierarchy of respectability (probably below Indiana and just above Brooklyn). And look how young and/or inexperienced our bench is with RWill, Poirier, Semi, Grant, Carsen and Wanamaker.
For us to be where we are with the majority of our 12 man roster being filled with inexperience tells us 2 things:
1) we are going to have some ups and downs (and its mostly been up) 2) we are going to get better as experience catches up
I know the loss to the Pacers was a let down (and we may have pulled out the win had McDermott not used a 3 stooges move on Hayward’s nose), but we’re still early in the season, and have plenty of time to mold intomthe team we need to be. And that’s encouraging to me. We’re 17-6, and we can say we still haven’t played like we can!! We can improve how we start games on offense, and defensively we can string together more frequent stops, like elite teams do.
I’m confident we’ll get to where we need to be. But we need to wait till our youth program catches up.
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Post by runrondo on Dec 16, 2019 11:35:07 GMT -5
It might also mean that we won't reach the level of the likes of the Lakers and Bucks this year.
However, I think we're closer to them than anyone might have thought already and there's always the potential for a move or someone to surprise us.
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Post by DERRENMATTS on Dec 16, 2019 12:33:50 GMT -5
Yup, unfortunately this might be the reality.
BUT, we still have an outside chance. We do not have have a superstar player the way the Lakers and the Bucks have. What we are banking on is winning collectively as a team, where everyone contributes — but are led by 4 potential All-Stars. So far Kemba, Hayward and Jaylen have performed as we expected, or exceeded our expectations (in Jaylen’s case).
Only Tatum hasn’t blown us away (which is unfair to him, because he’s putting up really good numbers). That’s because Jayson has substantial upside which we are counting on for him to meet.
If Tatum can find his footing and start converting those inside the paint shots he’s been missing, raise up that FG% and get to the free throw line more often, we’re looking at a 25+ ppg guy. We need him to be our go to scorer (along with Kemba) with the game hanging in the balance.
When he hits his stride, our Big 4, along with good contributions from Smart, Kanter, Theis, RWill, GWill, Carsen and Wanamaker will be outside contenders.
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