He's far, far better than Draymond as a scorer. His rim pressure already ranks very highly among all NBA guards/wings. Draymond just doesn't have that "make sh*t happen" element to his game, he's almost completely a facilitator and opportunistic scorer. I think Amen can be, or at least will be able to be after further improvement, one of two players you build around, i.e. the Jaylen Brown in the Tatum/Brown equation. With the caveat that he's harder to place in that #2 spot and find a good overall roster construction than Brown because Brown can shoot (but Amen will be more impactful in virtually every other area than Brown besides shooting). The thing is that neither Sengun nor Amen are Jayson Tatum either in terms of their level of play or their ability to fit together with other NBA players. That's kind of our core problem, we're built like a team that wants to have a balanced, depth-and-all-around-talent approach, but the roster isn't built to work together well the way Boston's is. So probably the best strategy is to re-balance the roster construction but hold onto one of Amen or Sengun. And odds are it will be Amen, IMO.
People need to stop this comparison. Green had 30-40 pounds on Amen when he got into the league. It gave him the strength to deal with bigger and taller players than Amen can handle. Plus with the size at the lower height, he was able to use strength to mask some of his lack of quickness. On top of that, Amen is a good defender but it feels he is more reliant on his athleticism and gifts than mentally identifying the other teams offensive sets and knowing the exact spot to be in and where to get other people to negate it. Yes part of that requires confidence and moxi to tell others where to be and call them out, and maybe he still feels too young or fresh to do that. For example, I would have expected Amen to take a big step towards being a better defender this year, and it doesn't feel like he did. If anything, his brother took a bigger step than he did.
I honestly expected him to take a small step back on defense after we got the news about FVV going down. Hard to take a major step up on your usage and offensive role and improve defensively at the same time.
Why do we keep pretending like the whole case of Reed, Amen, and Sengun being stars/superstars wasn't around them being good playmakers? Do you still not understand that the combination of them was to get better and take over more playmaking duties? FVV is a competent PG who can defend and is willingly to play the mentor role for the young, the latter being important. FVV has just become the ire of you and others , when the bigger issue is the lack of step forward from the young core.
Which isn't the same thing as saying we can't parlay our assets and players into someone who gives us that chance. Not saying you specifically... but being a crybaby and saying we need to start over isn't going to be something the owner is going to do.
I also think Sengun still has the most upside and I made another thread comparing the Amen/Sengun situation to Paolo/Franz on the Magic. He's a bit too emotional, but you can tell him and Reed are able to process the floor offensively.
That makes sense and you may be correct. I think I was projecting the mentality I was hoping to see from him, like taking on the mantle of being the "dog" who tries to lock down the best offensive player on the other team with Brooks leaving. He has basically been asked to help make up for the loss of 3 starters from last year leaving - Brooks, Green, and FVV - which is a lot when he still had areas of his game to work on as well and be effective on a team expected to make the playoffs. The issue is the coaching doesn't help him on either side of the court.
At this point, yes. It's poorly constructed but it's not a finished product, never was even adding KD. The next step is to decide who fits, who stays and what you can get for the others that helps finish off the roster. The only way you keep two of the three is Amen and Shepard. Amen and Sengun are broken offensively. Sengun and Reed are broken defensively. Amen and Reed can somewhat coexist - at least in theory. Jabari stays, he fits with pretty much anything and you have 2 more years of KD. Ideally, you'd be looking for a 5 who can defend, rebound, rim run and shoot and a bigger guard who can run the offense, shoot & defend. What can you get for Sengun? There's also ~$59M on the bench you can try to move around (DFS, Adams, FVV, Capela) And find a way into this draft.
This is why you play the games.... to see who among the young core fits. And this is why you don't waste assets for bandaid situations. I don't understand those acting like we've hit a dead end. I disagree about Sengun offensively, he just requires a different type of roster. Like @subtomic said, he's scoring a lot of unassisted points while leading the team in assists. Using Gemini.... Sengun generates 54% of his points without being assisted, as a center without a jump shot.
You’re right. Our front office could go out and aquire a top tier player in a trade or in FA. Unfortunately, to this point, they haven’t shown an ability to do that.
We can trade KD too as far as I'm concerned. Especially if it's part of a deal for a guy like Trey Murphy or whoever that can kinda-sorta step in and do similar things, but younger. Hell, even Lauri and his crap contract. I doubt they do it though. But I agree with your overall conclusions. Amen and Reed fit together, Sengun doesn't really. He also has the salary that you can construct a bunch of different deals. But, you have to get the value back. I don't know if we can. Hard to know what's out there and which front offices actually like him. He's a weird player.
Amen is staying Jabari is staying Tari is staying KD is staying Every body else is open for business. Stone needs to FINALLY earn his paycheck
I kinda feel like KD's production this season has been somewhat near the top tier level of players and the Rockets did go out and trade for him.
I wouldn't count on Tari staying. He might re-up here, but even if he does, I think the relationship is probably kind of broken, and he's looking for an out. Probably gets traded pretty soon if we even extend him at all. Reed is much more likely to stick around at this point, I think.
A top tier talent that we can build around. If Dickerson was 27 instead of 37, it’d be a different conversation
