Quote:
Originally Posted by Budapest Maverick
I don't get the fascination with him. Yes, he can score in the paint, unfortunately can't do anything else. He's undersized, skinny, and having his worst rebounding season in his career. It's nothing like the Darrick Favors situation, where you have an already almost complete player that absolutely kills it, and impacts the game whenever he's on the floor, yet you don't play him for some reason. Wright is a situational player imo.
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I'm one of the Wright supporters. The guy is a nightmare to guard. He has tremendous quickness, dexterity and versatility offensively. He can post, he can move without the ball and he can slash, which is a rare skill set for a PF/C. Without Dirk we need a guy that can create motion and offense from 0-15 ft, particularly from the front court.
Marion has been worse than bad at posting and has never been able to slash with the ball. Murphy is the opposite of versatile and has provided non-existent help-defense. Brand can't provide any motion offense, is struggling with his jumper and doesn't block shots with any consistency.
Wright's shot blocking, constant motion and versatile offensive presence all have a positive influence on the team and without Dirk, his positives outweigh his negatives. He probes defenses and gets a lot of switches and mismatches. On the other hand, Brand does nothing but bang and occasionally get an open jumper. Murphy camps at the three point line so teams only need to have a guy within 5-7 feet of him to completely nullify him. Murphy passively stretches the floor. Wright actively dismantles defenses and makes it easier for others to score. Want to know why Collison and Mayo got so many open shots early and can't get anything now? It's because Wright was one of the most underrated offensive players we had. He scored phenomenally well (eFG of 65%) and helped the team score almost 10% more efficiently while he was on the floor. The difference between 45% and 55% is HUGE, particularly now when we are having such an offensive dearth.
The biggest issue I see is that he's better at PF than C and Carlisle won't play him with a center. If he's our center and Murphy is our PF sitting at the three point line, then of course we will get killed on the boards. If he was ever paired with James or Kaman, we'd be OK-- not great but OK and I think that that would be enough if we scored 10% more efficiently.