Dalek wrote:Anticon wrote:The success of these teams oriented around guard and big play makes me wonder about the decision to attach the franchise to Barnes.
Barnes is a chaos maker when the fourth quarter happens scoring and changing the game defensively, and he has shown times where he can be a force the full game. He really is his own system that is different than any other stars.
I still think he needs better bigs than Poeltl and KO. Right now we just don't have enough scoring around him. It is not on Barnes to score 30+ a game, but we should have 10 PPG from other rotation guys on the floor. Toronto has a talent gap.
The success you're seeing in the playoffs are teams that have actually figured out their wing positions and dominate there. Aaron Gordon, KCP and even MPJ when he's in the paint. OG, Hart, etc. Daniels, Kat when he tries inside. J Will, Dort and even SGA is tall. The Celtics will live and die on D based on it. The Clippers would walk through anyone but Denver if Kawhi was healthy.
The Suns aren't going anywhere with Hooper's and small guards because they spend half the game giving up offensive rebounds. The Lakers are having an unreal AD series and it doesn't matter because they don't have a single non-1 dimensional player.
Embiid is experiencing the same Gobert Utah effect. We learned that you can't leave even a great defender on an absolute island. This remains a wings league. The superstars just come in all varieties.