Re: Potapenko trade

[Noah Evans <ishbak@knox.edu>]

On Tue, Aug 08, 2000 at 06:50:14AM -0700, Ryan Lee wrote:
> I thought Thunderbolt's comments top ten reason's why
> the Potapenko trade sucked were right on the money. 
> Vitaly's numbers really weren't that much better than
> Declerq's other than the scoring.  V is a better
> shooter and he would make a decent oversized power
> forward (like Dino Radja).  As for playing center,
> he's a good backup center and that's about it. 

Vitaly was brought in for intangibles. We needed an enforcer because we
were probably the most porous interior team in the league. Vitaly is
valuable for for those intangibles(i.e. bruises on opponants in the
lane) more than anything. Everybody liked drew and his energy, but he
wasn't an enforcer(although he was a good battering ram, remember what he
did to mourning diving for a loose ball?). The cav's didn't think he was
indispensible either.
	I realize that we aren't that much better with him, but hopefully
moiso will fill most of the gaps that Walker and Vitaly create(shot
blocking, offensive rebounding) without being the offensive liability and
hack attack that fortson was(although I think fort could have developed in
time).

 > He can't slow down(never mind) handle
any
of the centers > in the league defensively (i.e Brad Miller, 32 points)
> and he gets into foul trouble alot because of his
> defensive inabilities.  In short, his lack of D and
> rebounding for his size make up for his decent
> shooting. 

Have you ever seen pot's play? Or NBA centers for that matter? The reason
Vitaly had problems with Miller is because he's no a prototypical center,
he runs the floor a lot and shoots. He's not a guy with a deadly post
game. Vitaly's strengths are against big banger types that try to throw
him around. Vitaly fights very well for position although occasionally
too overzealously(which is why he picks up fouls). It's when players try
to take Vitaly to the outside and drive on him that Vitaly has
problems. Using Miller as a case for all NBA centers is a pretty bad
example. I've personally seen Vitaly play pretty good man to man defense
against Rick Smits and Ewing(I remember Tommy commenting on how Vitaly
could play strong guys straight up, and noticing myself that Rick was
leaving Vitaly to do his thing instead of trapping).

> And yes, Andre Miller was definitely a key 
> loss in that trade.  That guy will be an All Star in 2
> years guaranteed.  

So? We'll have an all-star point guard, we'll also have 10 million of the
salary cap devoted to point guards. And still no center. Josh in saying
that we did the right thing, like it or not we're probably stuck with
Kenny until 2003.

> 42 points for Toine is a very nice stat but aren't
> summer leagues primarily filled with scrubs who can't
> play D?  Case in point,
> I went to the Shaw's Summer League a few weeks back
> (against the Spurs) and everyone was either fouling
> like crazy or they were getting burnt off the dribble.
>  None of those guys could really shoot either.  You
> put a veteran starter like Toine against that type of
> competition, he's bound to score a ton of points.    

Noone was claiming anything other than that. What they were claiming is
that it *might* indicate that Antoine was in shape and working on his
game. You're building a strawman here, misrepresenting people's arguments
to make your own attacks against Walker look justified. Sort of a case of
"don't confuse me with facts, my mind's made up".

Noah