Suns decline Dragan Bender’s 4th-year option

[Donoghus]

I wouldn't touch this kid.

From what I've seen from him, he's still a fringe NBA player.   Hard pass.

Someone will probably go out on a limb with him, though.  Think they can coach him to sustained viability.

[mmmmm]

Wonder if anyone here would want us to offer him a minimum contract

I expect he’ll sign in Europe.

But for the minimum, sure. He’d give us at least what Jabari Bird has this season.

That says a lot. LOL

But we’re not comparing him to bird. We’re comparing him to the available field.

With the way our offense is flowing, I’d look at the stats sheet and get the best 3 pt shooter available.

Ah yes because Boston needs more 3 point shooters.

I have a lot of respect for your knowledge of basketball history and desire for hard-nosed basketball, but I think that you need to come to terms that in today's NBA, if you can't shoot a 3, you have to be able to do something amazing to see playing time. With elite 3 pt percentages reaching the mid 40s and a few guys almost touching 50%, the NBA will eventually have to do something about it. 

Our entire offense revolves around running a play and moving the ball around until we find an easy 2 or a wide open 3. I'd rather find a proven guy that shoots 40%+ from 3 that we can stick in the corner on our 2nd unit than waste a roster spot on a project on a win now championship team.

my point was, Boston has enough 3 point shooters, it is missing other aspects of the game, such as shot blocking, rebounding, and foul shot generation.

I still get the feeling that your comments are more frustration with our offensive strategy rather than players. For example, we have Robert Williams, who does all of what you just cited well, and yet he's barely getting minutes. The simple truth is he doesn't fit into this team's play-style yet. A 3 point shooter would, because that's our offensive strategy: shoot a bunch of 3s.. we're #3 in 3pt attempted this season.

Robert Williams can block shots and get rebounds, but the reason he doesn't play is because despite his shot blocking he is actually a bad defensive player currently.  It has nothing to do with his offensive abilities (or lack there of).  When RWIII learns to stop chasing blocks, and learns better defensive positioning while also staying within the scheme, he'll see his minutes go up.

I rarely ever agree with Moranis on much of anything, but this seems to be one of the few times.  Simply adding more three point shooters to our roster does nothing for us, it's not an area of the game the team needs to improve upon.

I'm pretty sure the main reasons that Williams is not playing are

a) He's been hurt.

b) He's at best the #3 big man in a rotation that plays only 2 big men.   When everyone is healthy Brad is typically playing Al ~30 minutes and Aron ~17 minutes and almost never both at the same time.  In other words, Brad is using one big man on the floor for pretty much the entire game and all those minutes are being consumed by Al & Aron.  Williams is in the same boat as Theis & Yabusele with getting whatever scrap random minutes are left over or open up due to blowouts or due to injury to Al or Aron.

Williams isn't playing because, for a while he was injured, but when he and every other big is healthy he is the 14th player on a team that can only suit 13 players.

Why is he 14th on a 14 man team(not counting Bird as he has been unavailable all year)? Because of what KG Knee's said. His defense is poor even though he is a supreme shot blocker. He also has little offensive skills. Even his screens on offense are weak as he tries to roll to the basket way too early.

Love Williams. Think he has great potential. But right now Horford, Morris, Baynes, Theis and Yabusele are all much better overall players and so they aren't made inactive when healthy(except rest days) and they get playing time ahead of Williams.

I personally agree with those saying he's still incredibly raw and IF the minutes were there to play a 3rd or 4th big, I would expect Theis and/or Yabusele to get them before Williams.   But those minutes aren't really there.

Over the last 4 games, since Baynes came back,  Theis has played a total of less than 8 minutes.   Go back over the schedule.  In games where both Al and Aron are both healthy, Theis & Yabusele get almost no minutes.

Whether he's the 14th player by talent is sort of irrelevant.  He and Wanamaker play totally different positions.  Wanamaker is probably closer to getting minutes at PG (because he's #4 in a guard rotation that plays a lot more minutes) and thus would be of more immediate need should injury occur.   So it makes sense to dress him over Williams.

Not sure what your point is. You agree he is 14th in talent. You agree the other players I listed are better than Williams and are getting the minutes, regardless of how many minutes as most Williams fans would be absolutely thrilled with Williams getting even 4-8 minutes a game.

So what are you exactly responding too?

Your implication was that RW was not dressing because he was the 14th guy on a 14-man roster with only 13 actives.

But I'm pointing out that, if everyone is healthy, the way minutes are distributed is really the reason.   Brad plays only one "big" position at a time.  So there are only 48 minutes available for all 5 of Al, Aron, Daniel, Yabu & RW.   And typically he plays only two of those guys in a game.  Thus if all 5 dress, he has 3 unused players sitting on the bench to backup 2 guys playing just one position.    We have redundant bench depth (in case of injury) if all 3 are dressed. 

 Conversely, he typically plays 3 small guards (KI, MS & TR) consuming all the minutes at "PG" and about half the minutes at "SG" (small wing).   This means that he has only one small guard (Wanamaker) sitting unused on the bench backing 3 rotation guys playing 1.5 positions.   In order to have any bench depth at all at small guard, Wanamaker has to be dressed in case there is an injury to one of the three guys ahead of him who actually play.

So what RW being DND (with a healthy roster) means is not that RW is necessarily "#14" on the roster.    It simply means he's the #4 or #5 "true big".

Now, I'm not going to argue that RW is or is not more talented or valuable than Wanamaker.  They are totally different players who are on this roster for very different reasons.

[nickagneta]

Wonder if anyone here would want us to offer him a minimum contract

I expect he’ll sign in Europe.

But for the minimum, sure. He’d give us at least what Jabari Bird has this season.

That says a lot. LOL

But we’re not comparing him to bird. We’re comparing him to the available field.

With the way our offense is flowing, I’d look at the stats sheet and get the best 3 pt shooter available.

Ah yes because Boston needs more 3 point shooters.

I have a lot of respect for your knowledge of basketball history and desire for hard-nosed basketball, but I think that you need to come to terms that in today's NBA, if you can't shoot a 3, you have to be able to do something amazing to see playing time. With elite 3 pt percentages reaching the mid 40s and a few guys almost touching 50%, the NBA will eventually have to do something about it. 

Our entire offense revolves around running a play and moving the ball around until we find an easy 2 or a wide open 3. I'd rather find a proven guy that shoots 40%+ from 3 that we can stick in the corner on our 2nd unit than waste a roster spot on a project on a win now championship team.

my point was, Boston has enough 3 point shooters, it is missing other aspects of the game, such as shot blocking, rebounding, and foul shot generation.

I still get the feeling that your comments are more frustration with our offensive strategy rather than players. For example, we have Robert Williams, who does all of what you just cited well, and yet he's barely getting minutes. The simple truth is he doesn't fit into this team's play-style yet. A 3 point shooter would, because that's our offensive strategy: shoot a bunch of 3s.. we're #3 in 3pt attempted this season.

Robert Williams can block shots and get rebounds, but the reason he doesn't play is because despite his shot blocking he is actually a bad defensive player currently.  It has nothing to do with his offensive abilities (or lack there of).  When RWIII learns to stop chasing blocks, and learns better defensive positioning while also staying within the scheme, he'll see his minutes go up.

I rarely ever agree with Moranis on much of anything, but this seems to be one of the few times.  Simply adding more three point shooters to our roster does nothing for us, it's not an area of the game the team needs to improve upon.

I'm pretty sure the main reasons that Williams is not playing are

a) He's been hurt.

b) He's at best the #3 big man in a rotation that plays only 2 big men.   When everyone is healthy Brad is typically playing Al ~30 minutes and Aron ~17 minutes and almost never both at the same time.  In other words, Brad is using one big man on the floor for pretty much the entire game and all those minutes are being consumed by Al & Aron.  Williams is in the same boat as Theis & Yabusele with getting whatever scrap random minutes are left over or open up due to blowouts or due to injury to Al or Aron.

Williams isn't playing because, for a while he was injured, but when he and every other big is healthy he is the 14th player on a team that can only suit 13 players.

Why is he 14th on a 14 man team(not counting Bird as he has been unavailable all year)? Because of what KG Knee's said. His defense is poor even though he is a supreme shot blocker. He also has little offensive skills. Even his screens on offense are weak as he tries to roll to the basket way too early.

Love Williams. Think he has great potential. But right now Horford, Morris, Baynes, Theis and Yabusele are all much better overall players and so they aren't made inactive when healthy(except rest days) and they get playing time ahead of Williams.

I personally agree with those saying he's still incredibly raw and IF the minutes were there to play a 3rd or 4th big, I would expect Theis and/or Yabusele to get them before Williams.   But those minutes aren't really there.

Over the last 4 games, since Baynes came back,  Theis has played a total of less than 8 minutes.   Go back over the schedule.  In games where both Al and Aron are both healthy, Theis & Yabusele get almost no minutes.

Whether he's the 14th player by talent is sort of irrelevant.  He and Wanamaker play totally different positions.  Wanamaker is probably closer to getting minutes at PG (because he's #4 in a guard rotation that plays a lot more minutes) and thus would be of more immediate need should injury occur.   So it makes sense to dress him over Williams.

Not sure what your point is. You agree he is 14th in talent. You agree the other players I listed are better than Williams and are getting the minutes, regardless of how many minutes as most Williams fans would be absolutely thrilled with Williams getting even 4-8 minutes a game.

So what are you exactly responding too?

Your implication was that RW was not dressing because he was the 14th guy on a 14-man roster with only 13 actives.

But I'm pointing out that, if everyone is healthy, the way minutes are distributed is really the reason.   Brad plays only one "big" position at a time.  So there are only 48 minutes available for all 5 of Al, Aron, Daniel, Yabu & RW.   And typically he plays only two of those guys in a game.  Thus if all 5 dress, he has 3 unused players sitting on the bench to backup 2 guys playing just one position.    We have redundant bench depth (in case of injury) if all 3 are dressed. 

 Conversely, he typically plays 3 small guards (KI, MS & TR) consuming all the minutes at "PG" and about half the minutes at "SG" (small wing).   This means that he has only one small guard (Wanamaker) sitting unused on the bench backing 3 rotation guys playing 1.5 positions.   In order to have any bench depth at all at small guard, Wanamaker has to be dressed in case there is an injury to one of the three guys ahead of him who actually play.

So what RW being DND (with a healthy roster) means is not that RW is necessarily "#14" on the roster.    It simply means he's the #4 or #5 "true big".

Now, I'm not going to argue that RW is or is not more talented or valuable than Wanamaker.  They are totally different players who are on this roster for very different reasons.

So semantics...okay.

[GRADYCOLNON]

Wonder if anyone here would want us to offer him a minimum contract

Eddie20

Dragon had bust written from day 1

He might be a bust vs. where he was drafted, but that is irrelevant now. 

If I told you there was a player who is 21 years-old, 7'1" and played all 82 games last year and shot 37% from 3 and 77% from the line:  would you bite on that for a minimum contract and roster spot?  I sure would.

Yes, I would...

No brainer, really. I wonder if Bender is a product of the organization. If you think about it, the Suns haven't really developed anyone too well in recent years. Even Booker, who was always a good scorer, is still a bad defender. Plus, I wonder if his improvement offensively is more a result of maturity/natural progression vs anything the Suns really did. Would love to see Bender on a good organization to rule that out. Over the last 2 games, both starts, he's averaged 12.5 PPG, 10 RPG, and 2.0 RPG in 29.5 MPG.

He played statistically well against the Blazers for his third straight start.  The offensive rust is falling away.  His confidence may be growing but still a long way away from where it needs to be a successful cog.  His defensive fundamentals are trash.  He needs a super boost to catch up and I contribute that solely on the Suns.  Look what the Celtics managed to do for Kelly Olynyk, and they are very similar. 

If the Celtics were rebuilding, they could spend time and effort to rehab and make him valuable, but they are likely not interested.  A team like the Spurs should be the place he goes to rebuild his fundamentals.

[10610786d]

Now, I'm not going to argue that RW is or is not more talented or valuable than Wanamaker.  They are totally different players who are on this roster for very different reasons.

So semantics...okay.

Wait are we arguing about which of Wanamaker and Robert Williams is better?

[Stig]

the only reason he's drafted so high was because of Porzingis, the same applies to Mario Hezonja, and to a lesser degree Lauri Markkanen, without the success of Porzingis these guys will be late first or second rounders.

[footey]

Wonder if anyone here would want us to offer him a minimum contract

I expect he’ll sign in Europe.

But for the minimum, sure. He’d give us at least what Jabari Bird has this season.

That says a lot. LOL

But we’re not comparing him to bird. We’re comparing him to the available field.

With the way our offense is flowing, I’d look at the stats sheet and get the best 3 pt shooter available.

Ah yes because Boston needs more 3 point shooters.

I have a lot of respect for your knowledge of basketball history and desire for hard-nosed basketball, but I think that you need to come to terms that in today's NBA, if you can't shoot a 3, you have to be able to do something amazing to see playing time. With elite 3 pt percentages reaching the mid 40s and a few guys almost touching 50%, the NBA will eventually have to do something about it. 

Our entire offense revolves around running a play and moving the ball around until we find an easy 2 or a wide open 3. I'd rather find a proven guy that shoots 40%+ from 3 that we can stick in the corner on our 2nd unit than waste a roster spot on a project on a win now championship team.

my point was, Boston has enough 3 point shooters, it is missing other aspects of the game, such as shot blocking, rebounding, and foul shot generation.

I still get the feeling that your comments are more frustration with our offensive strategy rather than players. For example, we have Robert Williams, who does all of what you just cited well, and yet he's barely getting minutes. The simple truth is he doesn't fit into this team's play-style yet. A 3 point shooter would, because that's our offensive strategy: shoot a bunch of 3s.. we're #3 in 3pt attempted this season.

Robert Williams can block shots and get rebounds, but the reason he doesn't play is because despite his shot blocking he is actually a bad defensive player currently.  It has nothing to do with his offensive abilities (or lack there of).  When RWIII learns to stop chasing blocks, and learns better defensive positioning while also staying within the scheme, he'll see his minutes go up.

I rarely ever agree with Moranis on much of anything, but this seems to be one of the few times.  Simply adding more three point shooters to our roster does nothing for us, it's not an area of the game the team needs to improve upon.

I'm pretty sure the main reasons that Williams is not playing are

a) He's been hurt.

b) He's at best the #3 big man in a rotation that plays only 2 big men.   When everyone is healthy Brad is typically playing Al ~30 minutes and Aron ~17 minutes and almost never both at the same time.  In other words, Brad is using one big man on the floor for pretty much the entire game and all those minutes are being consumed by Al & Aron.  Williams is in the same boat as Theis & Yabusele with getting whatever scrap random minutes are left over or open up due to blowouts or due to injury to Al or Aron.

Williams isn't playing because, for a while he was injured, but when he and every other big is healthy he is the 14th player on a team that can only suit 13 players.

Why is he 14th on a 14 man team(not counting Bird as he has been unavailable all year)? Because of what KG Knee's said. His defense is poor even though he is a supreme shot blocker. He also has little offensive skills. Even his screens on offense are weak as he tries to roll to the basket way too early.

Love Williams. Think he has great potential. But right now Horford, Morris, Baynes, Theis and Yabusele are all much better overall players and so they aren't made inactive when healthy(except rest days) and they get playing time ahead of Williams.

I personally agree with those saying he's still incredibly raw and IF the minutes were there to play a 3rd or 4th big, I would expect Theis and/or Yabusele to get them before Williams.   But those minutes aren't really there.

Over the last 4 games, since Baynes came back,  Theis has played a total of less than 8 minutes.   Go back over the schedule.  In games where both Al and Aron are both healthy, Theis & Yabusele get almost no minutes.

Whether he's the 14th player by talent is sort of irrelevant.  He and Wanamaker play totally different positions.  Wanamaker is probably closer to getting minutes at PG (because he's #4 in a guard rotation that plays a lot more minutes) and thus would be of more immediate need should injury occur.   So it makes sense to dress him over Williams.

Not sure what your point is. You agree he is 14th in talent. You agree the other players I listed are better than Williams and are getting the minutes, regardless of how many minutes as most Williams fans would be absolutely thrilled with Williams getting even 4-8 minutes a game.

So what are you exactly responding too?

Your implication was that RW was not dressing because he was the 14th guy on a 14-man roster with only 13 actives.

But I'm pointing out that, if everyone is healthy, the way minutes are distributed is really the reason.   Brad plays only one "big" position at a time.  So there are only 48 minutes available for all 5 of Al, Aron, Daniel, Yabu & RW.   And typically he plays only two of those guys in a game.  Thus if all 5 dress, he has 3 unused players sitting on the bench to backup 2 guys playing just one position.    We have redundant bench depth (in case of injury) if all 3 are dressed. 

 Conversely, he typically plays 3 small guards (KI, MS & TR) consuming all the minutes at "PG" and about half the minutes at "SG" (small wing).   This means that he has only one small guard (Wanamaker) sitting unused on the bench backing 3 rotation guys playing 1.5 positions.   In order to have any bench depth at all at small guard, Wanamaker has to be dressed in case there is an injury to one of the three guys ahead of him who actually play.

So what RW being DND (with a healthy roster) means is not that RW is necessarily "#14" on the roster.    It simply means he's the #4 or #5 "true big".

Now, I'm not going to argue that RW is or is not more talented or valuable than Wanamaker.  They are totally different players who are on this roster for very different reasons.

So semantics...okay.

Ironically when he does suit up Williams leap frogs above Yabu and Semi (snd sometimes Theis) in the big rotation. E.g. Cavs game the other night.

[smokeablount]

the only reason he's drafted so high was because of Porzingis, the same applies to Mario Hezonja, and to a lesser degree Lauri Markkanen, without the success of Porzingis these guys will be late first or second rounders.

It does not apply at all to Markkanen, he produced as a super frosh at Arizona and was the best player on a team that was top 5 in the country at times.  All the other guys either played only overseas, or like Bender, rode the bench overseas.

I wanted Hield or Brown on draft night and I stand by that stance, though I do think some team should probably take a flier on this guy for the minimum.

[mmmmm]

FWIW:  Suns are finally playing Bender regular minutes, starting him the last 4 straight games.  Averaging 14 points & 7 rebounds in 29.5 mpg.

[mctyson]

Wonder if anyone here would want us to offer him a minimum contract

Eddie20

Dragon had bust written from day 1

He might be a bust vs. where he was drafted, but that is irrelevant now. 

If I told you there was a player who is 21 years-old, 7'1" and played all 82 games last year and shot 37% from 3 and 77% from the line:  would you bite on that for a minimum contract and roster spot?  I sure would.

The reason he is available is not important?his old team had the chance to keep a 21yo 7footer making 37% of his 3p  but didn't.

And I don't see how the Celtics can develop another project. The team cannot find mins for RW who plays in a more needed potition and will give playtime to Bender in sf/pf?

It is important but there are plenty of examples of players who are just bad fits on current rosters or play for perennial basement dwellers like the Suns.

My point is that the guy showed in his only season of regular play that he can shoot at an NBA level.  He is still really young and probably will get better if he is in the right system with good coaching.  He is 7'1".  You take shots on guys like that for 1-year deals, and if it does not work you move on.