Poll

Who would you rather have moving forward?

Thompson
9 (20.5%)
Theis
35 (79.5%)

Total Members Voted: 44

Author Topic: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?  (Read 8041 times)

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Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #30 on: January 21, 2021, 04:27:46 PM »

Offline PAOBoston

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It’s honestly hard to assess at this point.

TT basically missed all training camp and is learning system on the fly. They still seem to be babying him with the hamstring issue. His rebounding is as advertised but seems lost at times.

Theis looked awful to begin the year but I’d argue that was more him playing a new position than he being bad. Hard to blame him for playing a position he’s never played before and guarding more perimeter oriented players. When he’s been the main big, he’s been normal reliable Theis imo.

Williams ha shown flashes but he always has something going on with him (injuries or in this latest case, covid).

Overall as a group, talent wise I think they make a decent rotation. Issue is for one reason or another they haven’t all been fully available and haven’t been able to work out a rotation that works. I think we can all agree the two big lineup is awful and has been a disaster so far. Maybe Ainge just makes a move to clean the position up.

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #31 on: January 21, 2021, 05:22:07 PM »

Offline tstorey_97

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Thompson hasn't played very well.

He's played 11 or 12 games here and hasn't shown much because this isn't the Cleveland Cavaliers.

In the "what have you done for me lately?" category, Embiid got 21 free throws and pushed the Celtic's front court around like he always does. Big deal. There is no real answer in the NBA for Embiid, live with it.

I won't defend his play here, but, I will defend his career. Ainge didn't have $30M for a center so here we are.

Theis has played 3700 minutes in Boston.
Thompson has played 252 minutes in Boston.

Thompson will improve as he learns how to play here, he's played in 88 NBA playoff games...

 

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #32 on: January 21, 2021, 05:25:13 PM »

Offline NKY fan

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Thompson hasn't played very well.

He's played 11 or 12 games here and hasn't shown much because this isn't the Cleveland Cavaliers.

In the "what have you done for me lately?" category, Embiid got 21 free throws and pushed the Celtic's front court around like he always does. Big deal. There is no real answer in the NBA for Embiid, live with it.

I won't defend his play here, but, I will defend his career. Ainge didn't have $30M for a center so here we are.

Theis has played 3700 minutes in Boston.
Thompson has played 252 minutes in Boston.

Thompson will improve as he learns how to play here, he's played in 88 NBA playoff games...
Kanter, Horford , baynes , gasol and maybe Dwight have all done a decent job against embiid. Seems like Theis and Thompson are a notch below

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #33 on: January 21, 2021, 08:37:47 PM »

Offline jambr380

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They've both been disappointing overall this season.  Theis seems to be playing his way out of his funk, though.  I think Kemba unlocks his offense in a way that Tatum and Brown haven't learned how to do yet.  Also, we haven't been running him in these two-big lineups as much.  He just doesn't have the perimeter skills to flourish in that setting. 

Thompson is still struggling, though.  I've seen some things that I didn't know about him previously.  Poor hands.  Below-the-rim player.  I didn't remember him being as physically limited as he has appeared for us this season.  Hopefully conditioning is a part of the issue, because that's fixable.  Otherwise I'm not sure he's a season-long part of the rotation, because this version of Thompson doesn't do anything that we can't already get from Robert Williams.

This is everything I feel about Thompson and the Center situation as a whole. I agree that we still need to give him time - and we have to since he isn't eligible to be traded yet anyway - but I didn't realize he was so limited physically. You can't even throw an alley-oop to him at this point.

I do love what Kemba brings to Theis' game. If not for that miraculous Anunoby shot in the ECSF, we might still be talking about that Kemba dish/Theis dunk. That was so epic and clutch.

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #34 on: January 25, 2021, 07:43:01 AM »

Online Vermont Green

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I don't get the either/or.  Neither is great but they are our best two bigs at the moment so we need to keep them both.  I think the question is how to deploy them.  I thought it was a good idea to play them together as the core unit, Thompson as the C and Theis as the PF.  That pairing has not been great.

The last few games they have brought Theis off the bench. That seems to have improved Theis's numbers but it is hard to gage if that is making the team better.  This may also be a reaction to not having RWilliams who normally gets minutes as the back up C.  The pairings have been Thompson/GWilliams to start and Theis/Ojeleye off the bench.


They had Theis starting again tonight.  I guess it was that RWilliams was out so they had Theis as the back up C instead of the starting PF.  With Williams back, they went back to pairing Theis and Thompson both playing about 24 min and Williams, Williams and Ojeleye off the bench each playing more like 15 min each.

Glad to see Theis play well as a starter after having played well off the bench.  17 pts/6 Rebs, that is great, albeit against the Cavs.  I am sure he will have more ups and downs but it appears as though he is starting to figure out this role of playing as the second big on the starting unit.

Thompson is nothing great and doesn't even play great defense all the time, certain match ups give him a lot of trouble.  But he is better than any alternative we have on the team currently.

Wonder how the rotations will change when Tatum is back and we have both him and Walker.  I am expecting Smart to play off the bench.  With Pritchard out and Teague really not playing well, Smart could be a nice boost to the bench.  I know, most want to see Tatum play "PF" (which really means we play with 1 big), and that could be the case as will.

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #35 on: January 25, 2021, 09:01:16 AM »

Offline jambr380

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Not sure if anybody else saw this, but now that the thread has been bumped:
Quote
[HP Basketball]: Good Lord. According to NBA.com’s admittedly wonky matchup data, Embiid shot 13-of-15 vs. Tristan Thompson in the two-game set, and scored 38 of the 40 Sixers’ points when those two were matched up.

Hopefully this is just Thompson still getting eased into the season, but that is some 'yikes' stuff right there. What point is there to have Thompson on this team if he is just going to get absolutely steamrolled by Embiid? Frankly, I'd rather play Smart on Embiid.

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #36 on: January 25, 2021, 09:10:53 AM »

Offline LilRip

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People need to give TT time. He plays hard and he’ll start learning how to carve out his role. Theis is a better shooter and shot blocker but TT fights for rebounds and can create space by diving hard to the cup. I think his conditioning hasn’t been completely there (seems to be a problem for a bunch of players this season) and I expect him to show some real value, particularly in the second half of the season (assuming there is one)

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Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #37 on: January 25, 2021, 09:24:22 AM »

Offline Birdman

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TT is really a PF..get a true center beside him and he would be great
C/PF-Horford, Baynes, Noel, Theis, Morris,
SF/SG- Tatum, Brown, Hayward, Smart, Semi, Clark
PG- Irving, Rozier, Larkin

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #38 on: January 25, 2021, 09:32:30 AM »

Offline vjcsmoke

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The problem is that TT has been terrible so far.  Looks like the worst signing of the offseason.  Really wish DA had pulled trigger on the Myles Turner trade instead of wasting that money on TT.

Unfortunately Theis could be hard to resign as he plays well above his current salary.

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #39 on: January 25, 2021, 11:43:38 AM »

Offline action781

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I like both players and think they are each fine and serviceable starters.  I don't have a real preference between them as they are kind of similar with slight differences they bring, both being positive attributes (offensive rebounding v. three point shooting).

My issue is how they've been used.  I don't like how we've paired them together in the starting lineup.  Our starting lineup this season has generally been two good creators (Jaylen + Tatum/Kemba), one mediocre creator (Smart), and two guys who are very poor creators.  It gives us an offense that is a bit predictable.  Then on defense, we're less springy and dynamic.

I look forward to getting Tatum back (with Kemba back too), starting Tatum at the 4, and only playing one of Theis/TT at a time.  I think both of them will benefit from that.  Occasional minutes together (or with RW) are fine, but not so many please.

My concern is neither is a guy who can stop Embiid 1-1, but lots of teams don't have that player.  You can't just have a max contract player at every position.  Brad will have to gameplan some creative ways to take the ball out of Embiid's hands in a playoff series if we see them.
2020 CelticsStrong All-2000s Draft -- Utah Jazz
 
Finals Starters:  Jason Kidd - Reggie Miller - PJ Tucker - Al Horford - Shaq
Bench:  Rajon Rondo - Trae Young - Marcus Smart - Jaylen Brown -  Peja Stojakovic - Jamal Mashburn - Carlos Boozer - Tristan Thompson - Mehmet Okur

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #40 on: January 25, 2021, 12:10:18 PM »

Offline NKY fan

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I don’t know how useful the total points added statistic from nbamath but according to it TT is ranked 462 out of 480 players with tpa of -34.
Theis is in the middle with something close to 0 tpa.
If you exclude players that played less than 250 mins so far I think TT is still very much in the bottom.

For TPA having a 0 tpa or a small negative number is not bad as the statistic is skewed by players that are good and play the most minutes vs players that are bad don’t get the trust of the coaches to play many minutes.
So Tristan is both bad and has the trust of the coach so far.

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #41 on: January 25, 2021, 01:44:11 PM »

Offline KeepBigAl

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It was eye-opening and disappointing to see Theis actually do a better job on Embid than Thompson did.   Thompson can serve a purpose but not worth any real money long term. 

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #42 on: January 25, 2021, 01:55:41 PM »

Offline JumpingJudkins

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The proper answer to this poll, of course, is Robert Williams.

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #43 on: January 25, 2021, 02:40:45 PM »

Offline NKY fan

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The proper answer to this poll, of course, is Robert Williams.
Theis have been our best big the last 18 months. What improvements have Timelord made in the meantime?

Re: Tristan Thompson or Daniel Theis?
« Reply #44 on: January 25, 2021, 02:43:22 PM »

Offline NKY fan

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How soon till we start the Tristan for Horford trade proposals ? Lol 😂