Where Do The Lakers Rank In The Best Young Team In The NBA?

I'm unimpressed with the Suns' talent outside of Booker. The rest of their young guys look like either paycheck collectors, just athletes, or just not good. Bledsoe does an excellent job of helping fantasy teams, but not the Suns. Knight has completely plateaued; he's a worse version of Jordan Clarkson. Alex Len just isn't that great. He's a little too slow to be a starter and he's not talented enough offensively to carve out a great role off the bench. The reason Tyson is starting is because he's more mobile even at his age, that's a bad sign for Len.

I'm just not impressed with what they've built. Chriss might be something and Booker is a good prospect, but the rest I would put less value in than the Lakers' players.

 

I'm a bit surprised. I think it's fairly clear that Bledsoe is far and away their best player.

 

So you're saying they need a young, talented PF?

 

Gotcha. I agree with that. Calling them trash would be saying Ingram, Zubac, and to an extent Russell and Randle are trash because they haven't done anything. I don't think any of them are trash, but I do think the Lakers' talent is better. Clearly better in fact.

 

Utah, Milwaukee, Minnesota, Philadelphia>Lakers

 

Lol, I'm not down about it, that's just where'd I'd rank the teams without homerism as KB24 asked. I still have us ahead of some of the teams he listed like Phoenix and Orlando. Utah is ahead because they have an All-Star in Hayward and Hood who can go off at any time for big games. Milwaukee I think needs no explanation (sucks about Parker though), Minny has Towns who I'd trade almost our entire roster for, and Philly has Embiid, Okafor, Noel, and has matched our win total without Simmons playing a single game yet.

 

Honestly I'm not concerned about the Sixers as much as everyone else. They had a stretch where they won 10/15 games. The rest of the year? 8-29. Embiid was (and still is) one of my favorite young men to watch. I thought he had Hakeem upside in college and was just giddy about his play... but he spent two straight years not playing basketball and is currently on a 6 game sitting streak and has missed 9 out of his last 10 games. Philly is much farther away than the media folks would have you believe.

Utah is certainly ahead of us. I'd say Milwaukee and Minnesota are ahead of us, but not insurmountably. Outside of Towns, I'm not sure Minnesota has a knockout. Wiggins is good-probably-never-great, LaVine is out for the year, and Dunn hasn't exactly torn the roof off. Milwaukee sort of the same boat. Besides Giannis, they've got a collection of guys who are fairly average and Parker who I'm starting to think will never be healthy.

For now though, yeah I think you're right. Those guys have an edge on us. It'd be nice to see a few more Knicks games on the schedule.

 

I didn't count him because he's hardly ever on the court. John Henson isn't bad either but I don't count him either.

 

And he's played in one game this year while battling through injuries in the past. The guy is always a little banged up and of course this year he just couldn't get back on the court after his hamstring tear.

Either way, if you include him I still don't know what the Bucks are. Parker and Middleton have shown injury concerns. Brodgon is okay. They have Giannis and... who tonight? Who is the threat that's going to beat us tonight outside of Giannis? Monroe? I like Monroe, but he's proven to be an ill fit there and maybe going forward. Henson? He's another guy who can't stay on the floor despite his talent.

They're ahead of us, but just for now. I don't think they have the overall talent that we have maybe even starting next year if the young guys can catch a little wind in their sails heading into the summer.

 

Outside of one sentence about Middleton not being on the court, all you did was agree with everything I said already?

And while the literal "he's never on the court" was an exaggeration, I stand behind the concept: he hasn't been on the floor at all this year. That's different from a guy missing some games. We're talking about over 50 games missed. And even so I think Russell and Nance Jr. have some legitimate injury questions.

 

Jesus man are you serious? He played 15 minutes in 51 games. It's semantics.

I don't think he does at this point. He missed 8 games this year and 3 of them were with a freak bout of Pneumonia for a 22 year old. It's a little different from Nance Jr. getting a non-contact bone bruise and Russell spraining his MCL awkwardly on some fairly routine contact. I'm not blowing any minds here saying Russell and Nance Jr. are potential injury concerns.

If you want to include Randle, that's fair too although I think he's mostly past the injury concerns from when he was drafted.