Georgios Papagiannis

I think people rely on summer league performances way too much.

I still think Papagiannis can be a poor version of Marc Gasol.
Why do you think that? Papagiannis is slow and heavy footed for a 7fter. When you watch him in PnR, he's a step slower than everyone else when rolling to the rim. He tries to post up, but has no power to back down anyone. The only move he has is his left shoulder turn right hook. He's hit a few mid-range Js last year, but on offense, he just doesn't show much touch or poise. He's not a passer. On defense, he's slow, but shows some capability of defending slower Cs. Shotblocking timing is off a lot, and he's very jump happy against slashers.

Don't see Marc. If anything, maybe a slightly worse version of Koufos.
 
After watching Cousins' great hands all of those years, it really gets to me watching Papa get his hands on a rebound and fumble it away, or have a pass knocked out of his hands so often. I have an emotional response to bad hands. You can't really teach him to overcome that. He might be in the right spot, he might get there sooner with practice, but he fundamentally just does not have the good soft hands it takes to play in the NBA.

My own sports career was a lot of fun but not very impressive, but I could catch fly balls in the outfield, catch any football I could touch, and had good hands for basketball. I used to lie on my back at night in the dark and toss a football in the air and catch it. It was mostly inherited eye to hand coordination. Some people have it and some never will.
 
You should not give up on 20 year old 7 footers after one season.
I'm not giving up on Papa. But I will admit that after 3 SL games, his play has been an utter disappointment. Maybe losing all that weight came at a cost? Or maybe he's just not as good as we thought he was and needs more time.
Oh, and whoever said that a player either knows how to hold onto a rebound or they don't (i.e. it's not a skill that can be learned), that's bunk. Players develop bad habits all the time. That's one of the reasons why you need experienced players and good coaches on hand - to see the bad habits early in their development cycle before they become part of the player's game. It's true, however, that you can't teach DMC-hands to someone who doesn't have great hand-eye coordination in the first place. My guess is that Papa was walking at 6 months of age, while DMC was still crawling at 2 years of age. ;)
 
SL is chaos with lots of poor spacing, botched plays and guards slapping at the ball.

I'm thinking Papa just looks better in an organized environment. Some players thrive in chaos, some don't. Apparently Papa does not.

Agreed. Its a way different game when you get 9 fouls.... Players are reckless defensively.

I'm not worried about any of our players. Our 2nd year players showed more then enough last year. Our rooks look great this year.
 

kingsboi

Hall of Famer
Papa has a long way to go BUT it is evident to me that he continues to move along in the right direction. 2 more years of adding strength and cutting more fat and THEN we should be judging him as an nba player
I can't stress this enough. If he wants a place in the league, he needs to continue to slim down because you don't see seven footers lumbering up and down the court anymore at a heavy weight because they simply can't keep up for the duration of the game. The game is too fast now. More so than ever before. Now I'm not saying that's the ONLY thing he needs to do in order to have a place in the league but it's a significant start.
 
I hate to be negative in the offseason when it seems like this next season might be a struggle to get to 30 wins. I'll just post my 2 cents now though, get it out of my system, and hope that time proves it foolish and I'll eat crow about it later.

Uhh how shall I begin; Uh, I think Papa's upside is best-case Zydrunas Illgauskas, not Marc Gasol. Lets just hope Bogdanovic has some real starpower, enough to justify the trade..

My worry is they passed up Marquese Chriss and didn't get a great return. Chriss has character issues, and that might have been the deciding factor. He's very talented and very young though and with a player like Kentavious Caldwell Pope on the open market I can;t help but think what this roster would look like if they undid that trade and signed KCP.. I'd like it better, even though I'm a big Skal fan, Chriss seemed like a legit top-4 pick IMO last season. I'm also not crazy about Buddy.. So thats definitely a factor, IMO, Jamal Murray was clearly the best guard in the draft..

I've followed Papagiannis story for quite some time, from back when he was playing HS ball in Pennsylvania and the scouting services had him as a 4-star recruit somewhere around the 40-50 range. I saw him play, not extensively but a handful of times, followed his recruitment and was hoping he went to St. Johns.. he's got nice touch and a nice hookshot, some mobility and strength and seemingly plenty of room for improvement.

Where I'm having trouble is why was he drafted so high? Couldn't they have kept trading down and landed him for cheaper? and furthermore is he really that much better a prospect than Ivica Zubac, who's also super young.

anyway i'ma cut it off here. Thats my 2 cents.

Well one more thing. There is a player projected top 10 in the 2018 draft, named Robert Williams, he's actually De'Aaron Fox's old AAU teammate, and he's absurdly, freakishly athletic (with like a 7'6" wingspan) and a shotblocking/rim-running extraordinaire, he would negate the loss of Chriss quite quickly IMO, even though Chriss is more perimeter oriented (and not nearly as long). I just can't help but think that Chriss would've been the better option over PapaG and they elected to let him fall thru their hands to reach for a major project, which would've made it more obvious to spend the 2018 pick on one of the many dynamic C's in this upcoming class -- If they land one of Michael Porter Jr or Luka Doncic the bigs they have now will need to develop a ton of consistency in short order to be in any sort of contention.. If they owned that 2019 1st rd pick I wouldn't be so concerned.
 

kingsboi

Hall of Famer
I hate to be negative in the offseason when it seems like this next one might be a struggle to get to 30 wins. I'll just post my 2 cents now though, get it out of my system, and hope that time proves it foolish and I'll eat crow about it later.

Uhh how shall I begin; Uh, I think Papa's upside is best-case Zydrunas Illgauskas, not Marc Gasol. Lets just hope Bogdanovic has some real starpower, enough to justify the trade..

My worry is they passed up Marquese Chriss and didn't get a great return. Chriss has character issues, and that might have been the deciding factor. He's very talented and very young though and with a player like Kentavious Caldwell Pope on the open market I can;t help but think what this roster would look like if they undid that trade and signed KCP.. I think I'd like it better, even though I'm a big Skal fan, Chriss seemed like a legit top-4 pick IMO last season. I'm also not crazy about Buddy.. So thats definitely a factor, IMO, Jamal Murray was clearly the best guard in the draft..

I've followed Papagiannis story for quite some time, from back when he was playing HS ball in Pennsylvania and the scouting services had him as a 4-star recruit somewhere around the 40-50 range. I saw him play, not extensively but a handful of times, followed his recruitment and was hoping he went to St. Johns.. he's got nice touch and a nice hookshot, some mobility and strength and seemingly plenty of room for improvement.

Where I'm having trouble is why was he drafted so high? Couldn't they have kept trading down and landed him for cheaper? and furthermore is he really that much better a prospect than Ivica Zubac, who's also super young.

anyway i'ma cut it off here. Thats my 2 cents.

Well one more thing. There is a player projected top 10 in the 2018 draft, named Robert Williams, he's actually De'Aaron Fox's old AAU teammate, and he's absurdly, freakishly athletic (with like a 7'6" wingspan) and a shotblocking/rim-running extraordinaire, he would negate the loss of Chriss quite quickly IMO, even though Chriss is more perimeter oriented (and not nearly as long). I just can't help but think that Chriss would've been the better option over PapaG and they elected to let him fall thru their hands to reach for a major project, which would've made it more obvious to spend the 2018 pick on one of the many dynamic C's in this upcoming class -- If they land one of Michael Porter Jr or Luka Doncic the bigs they have now will need to develop a ton of consistency in short order to be in any sort of contention.. If they owned that 2019 1st rd pick I wouldn't be so concerned.
so potentially the next Rudy Gobert? I'm on board for that. I watched him a bit last season at A&M and I came away impressed.
 
so potentially the next Rudy Gobert? I'm on board for that. I watched him a bit last season at A&M and I came away impressed.
No. I followed Rudy's story from pre-draft to where it is now and he is a true gem, they don't make em like that often..

Robert Williams has the potential to get 2+ blocks per game from the PF or C position. He's about 6'10. He absolutely trashed Bam the #14 pick in this years drafts in both of their matchups. He's a highlight waiting to happen and possesses great timing.

More like a young Serge Ibaka. Combined with Willie the interior defense would be quite menacing.
 
He has a lot to learn still and he still shows up in flashes rather than consistently, but he is worlds ahead of where he was last year. His body looks way better and he is far more mobile. He still has some developing to do but we've seen him do the right things and have good, productive games. I think he's on the right path it just takes some time. The next jump he has to make is from the hardest one to make IMO, to go from showing flashes to consistently contributing.
 
No. I followed Rudy's story from pre-draft to where it is now and he is a true gem, they don't make em like that often..

Robert Williams has the potential to get 2+ blocks per game from the PF or C position. He's about 6'10. He absolutely trashed Bam the #14 pick in this years drafts in both of their matchups. He's a highlight waiting to happen and possesses great timing.

More like a young Serge Ibaka. Combined with Willie the interior defense would be quite menacing.
Ibaka was a much better offensive player though. I don't like a Williams-WCS pairing. Floor spacing would be absolute crap with DeAaron Fox running point.