I'd like to ask a question here - if you had an opportunity to talk to Danny Ainge and try to sell him on the idea of acquiring either one of these players, what selling point would you use?
Just curious because to me, personally, I can't understand how either of these players does anything to help the team in the short or long term.
Here's why...
Brook Lopez
Brook Lopez is 7'0" and 260 lbs - that's a big dude. Over 7 NBA seasons he has a career average of 7.3 rebounds per game, and 8.1 rebounds per 36 minutes.
For comparison purposes the Per-36 rebounding numbers for our current bigs are:
Jared Sullinger: 10.5
Tyler Zeller: 8.9
Kelly Olynyk: 8.5
Brandon Bass: 7.5
This indicates that Brook Lopez is rebounding at a rate barely higher than that or Brandon Bass, a guy who has is about 5 inches shorter and who has never been seen as a good rebounder.
I would hazard a guess that if you looked at the stats for all starting centers in the NBA over 6'10" Lopez would be one of the worst rebounders of the past decade.
Health wise, over his 7 year career Brook Lopez has missed 30% of his games and that's despite the fact that for the first three seasons of his career he did not miss a single game. In his past four seasons he has missed exactly 50% of his games.
Contract wise, once this season ends Lopez will have one season remaining on his contract at $15.7 million. Any trade for him would be a one year rental, and when you consider the fact that you're basically paying $15 million for 40 games....that's not an affordable proposition.
We just got killed by Clevleand partially because were were getting destroyed on the boards. Adding a 7 footer who barely rebounds better than Brandon Bass is not going to help that situation. Lopez also doesn't help out defensive situation, given that he is not a rim protector, nor is he known in any capacity as being a good (or even average) defensive player.
Lopez also has no ability to really stretch the floor, in getting Lopez as I see it all you're getting is post scoring and the occasional midrange jumper. You can get both of those things from Greg Monroe who also offers you good medical history, more potential (3 years younger) and excellent rebounding.
For us to go for Lopez at the type of money he'd command, that would be my definition of overpaying just to get someone.
Monta Ellis
Much like Lopez, Monta Ellis has well established hi career persona - by now we all know that there is really only one thing he does well, and that's score large number of (highly inefficient) baskets. We know he can't defend, we know he doesn't rebound, and we know his shot selection is suspect at best.
So what exactly does Monta Ellis offer, that Isaiah Thomas doesn't already give us? The way I see it Thomas is the same player except he's much younger, on a better contract, and is a better shooter. No idea why we'd go after Ellis.
Topic: Targeting Brook Lopez and Monta Ellis. (Read 3664 times)