This team is extremely frustrating to watch. Part of it is we have shitty roster construction, part of it is coaching and part of it is lack of heart.
It’s honestly better for my health if I stop watching this train wreck of a team but I’m addicted to this abusive relationship so I’m just going to keep letting this team slowly kill me.
Below is my analysis on each player and our coach:
1) Darko: I honestly haven’t seen anything from him that excites me about his coaching. What I do see is that he continues to make the same coaching mistakes. He is adamant that we run his offense but is completely neglecting that the roster construction is not compatible with his preferred style. Our entire offense should be built around Scottie, Pascal and OG taking advantage of mismatches down on the block and then using that to collapse the defense for kick outs and cuts to the basket. We should be sprinting to the block every possession and force feeding one of these three guys every possession cause no team in the league has 3 starters with enough size and/or speed to cover them on the block.
Darko also takes the blame for how little effort and energy we show most games. We consistently find ourselves down by 20. That’s unacceptable and is on coaching for not being able to fire up his squad.
I would rather have a fiery general than a nice guy at head coach.
2) Siakam: Has clearly taken a step back. I think part of it is that he’s still finding his way in the offense and I do believe he took the selfishness talk to heart. His 3pt shot is also extremely inconsistent and I still have my doubts that he and Scottie work as a front court pair. Having Poeltl and Siakam not being able to shoot 3s is really hurting our spacing.
3) Scottie: He’s clearly taken a step forward and has superstar potential but he is still doing extremely frustrating things like being WAY TOO passive when he needs to be aggressive. If he wants to be a star he needs to learn how to assert himself like a star would. Barnes needs to read up on Mamba Mentality and get a killer instinct. Also he continues to try to play up on opposing guards and get blown by literally every time forcing Jakob to play help causing the entire defense to collapse. His on ball defense is average. Where he shines is when he plays help defense.
Scottie should be playing more minutes at the 5 than at the 1.
4) OG: He is who he is. He is a great defender but he is extremely limited on offense. He will always be a role player but he is capable of being a championship caliber role player. We shouldn’t have to ask much from him on offense. Every time he tries to do anything besides a catch and shoot 3, a straight line drive after attacking a close out and punishing a mismatch in the low post he screws things up cause, for someone that’s very athletic, he’s incredibly uncoordinated.
5) Poeltl: He’s been a huge disappointment this year. He’s played super soft and has had terrible hands. Outside of his game vs the Pistons he has been a net negative.
6) GTJ: Probably the biggest disappointment outside of Precious. Guy is on a contract year and playing his worst basketball with us. For a player that is a dynamic scorer he has no bag it’s so strange to me watching him try to create any offense. If it’s not a step back jumper, he’s getting locked up by the defense. Idk what he works on in the off-season cause he hasn’t progressed at all since we got him.
7) Schroeder: I didn’t have much expectations going in and he has exceeded them so far. However, he is very inconsistent. His highs are very high and his lows are abysmal. He also gives up too many turnovers. But overall he’s been a pleasant surprise.
8) Precious: Pack your bags and practice your Mandarin cause buddy you are done. It’s super sad cause you have all the tools to be great.
9) Boucher: He should be the #8 or #9 player in the rotation. He’s great for energy off the bench but shouldn’t be relied on for anything more.
10) Dick: Kid is young so I’ll give him some more slack but so far his shot has not been falling, he looks like he lacks confidence, he is super weak with the ball and is an automatic bucket or foul for the opposing team when he’s on defense.
11) Otto: He plays like every new moon so not much to say. But when he does play he’s a bright spot.
12) Flynn: Idk why we still play you.
13) Mcdaniels: We should’ve got your brother instead.
14) Temple: You do a good job on the bench
15) Koloko: Is you good bro? What’s up with your lungs?
Overall Pat Bev was right. We simply don’t have enough dogs. And we also don’t have enough shooting and dynamic perimeter play. If we didn’t make miraculous 20pt comebacks we would be a bottom 5 record.
IMO we need to blow it up and rebuild around Scottie. By blow it up we don’t have to undergo a complete rebuild though. We just need to build around Scottie and OG
I skimmed the bolded and saw you missed the key in all of it. Masai.
If we send Dick to the G league to get a rhythm and play others instead of him we’ll be oaky. He really needs a good run in the minors until he shows he can play in an NBA game. He’s our tank commander right now. Insert him into any lineup and we’re the worst team in the league. Without him we’re mostly net positive.