nbaliveleague.com - Game of the Week

(0 - 0)

Expert Pick

(0 - 0)

Tank off

Dallas went on a rebuild this year. Sold off the veterans - Jrue, Jordan, Williams and Olynik to Dallas East aka Detroit, Green to Washington, Young to Milwaukee, Mozgov to Miami and got back a bunch of unknowns and pick, whole lot of picks. He identified a few guys as core - Zubac, Mirotic, Mudiay and the newcomers Payne, Ellenson, Noel, basically anyone under 24 (with the exception of RHJ). They mostly play for ping pong balls, but play tough and scare the shit out of better teams (both Cavs and Bucks this week are a nice example.) Still, they're on an 11 loss streak and are looking to get down in the standings.

Memphis is in this job longer then Dallas. They were last in the league last year and didn't finish in playoffs since 2009/10. Remember, they were champions once before under the hand of the Slovenian GM Rasho (Dallas and smokey also have a title in 2007). After that it was just a series of unfortunate events and bad deals. You'd think a team like that is full of young prospects. Well, remember a series of dumb deals? They do have a few nice prospects. Marquiss Chriss, high flying sweet shooting forward, stands out. There are still people believing in Exum, Vaughn and Papagiannis (not many outside Memphis) and most importantly they have all their picks and few more in next drafts. Maybe they'll finally add the pieces necessary for a nice rebuild.

Season so far. Dallas was your typical Dallas this year, solid, strong, ready to fight for the home-court, but maybe just a step below the top dogs in the West. Then one day they decided to blow it up and went all the way with that. Still losses were a bit hard to come by and they had to make some more roster changes, bench some guys that weren't in future plans and develop some others. Zubac, a fine prospect, is now the future face of the franchise. Memphis had no such problems. They started the year 1-8 and just built on that. Portland and Clippers might be a bit to strong for them, but they're among the favorites for a top 3 pick.

The future. Memphis has 3 picks, their fultzish pick and two more late teens picks. Dallas has 4, their high pick and two more lottery picks from NO and Washington. Both teams have a lot of future assets, though no clear blue-cheapers. Dallas will have to pay tor trade a lot of their core guys soon. If memphis gets lucky then they'll get an upper hand with the rebuild.

The matchup. Let's be frank here, they both want to lose. Dallas lost last 11 games, maybe it's time for a little win here. But this win will count double against direct opponent in lottery. mavs have a better roster, better veterans like Mirotic, Noel, McDermott, Crabbe (they might cost north of 60M next year) and they should win this one.

Injuries. Did you know Bosh plays in Memphis? A team that he lead to the NBA title. Bosh was traded for CJ McCollum at the beginning of previous year. That was post PTE Chris Bosh, right? he played in 53 games for his new/old team and is now the main reason Grizzlies won't have to pay the salary floor tax. they're also missing some end of bench players. Dallas is hurt more this week. They too traded for an injured guy we all forget about, JR Smith. They'll also miss Mirotic, Ellenson and Mudiay this year, 2 starters and a 6th man.

Star

Dante Exum
Dante was the original mystery wunderkind from the land far far away. A year after Bucks hit on Giannis and Sixers hit on Gobert teams tried it again with the unknown foreign guys. Sadly he's more Nikolos then Kristaps. Dante is pushed into a bigger role this year. And the results are mixed bag of this and that. He distributes the ball well, and is among the best in assits in NLL. But this looks like just a sign of bad shooting/scoring as his ppp and ts% took a big hit this year. Dante will look at contract extension this summer but probably won't get it. He only has one more cheap year and then needs to get paid.

PPG

RPG

APG

SPG

BPG

FPG

TPG

Star

Allen Crabbe
Smokey designated Crabbe as a core guy that wasn't available in deals earlier in the year. It might be his high salary, that could help Mavs to reach salary floor throughout the rebuild. Crabbe is doing ok in NLL, shooting well, but is restricted with low shooting drive, even coming off the bench. in theory he's a versatile wing that any contender would want on his bench. In practice contenders can't afford players at his salary sitting on the bench. Allen probably won't last through rebuild in Dallas.

X-Factor
Zubac vs Papagiannis. The Euro big matchup. Pre draft everyone thought Zubac will be the steal of the draft, with some projecting him in late lottery. he fell all the way to the second round, many teams were concerned as he wanted to come over this year. he spent the better part of the year in G-League, where he soon proved he has nothing moreto prove there. Now he's a regular in NBA and a starting center for the Mavericks. Papagiannis took the opposite route. He was supposed to go in 2nd, with expert thinking he'd be a steal there. but he had one big admirer, Vlade Divac, and he took him in lottery. Sadly he plays with Cousins and bazillion of other big man and Kings (unexpectedly) didn't implode yet. That means a lot of G-League and scarce minutes here and there. But he's heavily featured in Memphis and plays really well, including a ROTW honors once (brown and Chriss score just to much for any further accolades) Last week they both played and played well, scoring 10 and 12 points with around 10 rebounds. Zubac mostly just dunks and does that at 71%, while PapaG shows some range and hurts his efficiency, bt still does it at 57%. Latest play got zubac a better rating and he's now leading Giorgios 70 to 68. Are these two the future of big man in NLL?

X-Factor

Zubac vs Papagiannis. The Euro big matchup.

Pre draft everyone thought Zubac will be the steal of the draft, with some projecting him in late lottery. he fell all the way to the second round, many teams were concerned as he wanted to come over this year. he spent the better part of the year in G-League, where he soon proved he has nothing moreto prove there. Now he's a regular in NBA and a starting center for the Mavericks.

Papagiannis took the opposite route. He was supposed to go in 2nd, with expert thinking he'd be a steal there. but he had one big admirer, Vlade Divac, and he took him in lottery. Sadly he plays with Cousins and bazillion of other big man and Kings (unexpectedly) didn't implode yet. That means a lot of G-League and scarce minutes here and there. But he's heavily featured in Memphis and plays really well, including a ROTW honors once (brown and Chriss score just to much for any further accolades)

Last week they both played and played well, scoring 10 and 12 points with around 10 rebounds. Zubac mostly just dunks and does that at 71%, while PapaG shows some range and hurts his efficiency, bt still does it at 57%. Latest play got zubac a better rating and he's now leading Giorgios 70 to 68.

Are these two the future of big man in NLL?