Stephen A Smith - Kevin Durant favors the Lakers if he leaves OKC

Don't see what's so funny. I haven't forgotten how good Lamar Odom was, but he was always wildly inconsistent. One day he'd play like one of the best players in the NBA and the next he'd dissapear. Randle has a similar skill set, but he's got a completely different mentality.

 

Randle is on the smaller side for a PF and has above average handles for a PF. LO was nearly a 7 footer with such great handles and court vision that we often pushed for him to play SF. LO was a walking double double and an assist machine. Randle grabbed the same amount of boards in Summer League as Larry Nance. I really dislike the comparison.

 

The difference with Randle's alpha / leader mentality from the start ..... may very well allow him to equal or surpass Lamar's best years. How long did it take for L.O., how many years in to finally get his s*** together for the 2 championship years and near miss the first year we had Pau? Clublakers was a battle ground over Lamar and his inconsistencies and disappearing acts mixed with his superlatives over most of his career to that point. Randle "undersized" with his strength, explosiveness, handles and quickness likely is not going to be an issue. Charles Barkley says hello and he's much taller than Chuck. Now Julius may never be the rebounder Chuck was or Lamar in his best years, but it's waay too early with his work ethic and young age to say that based off this summer league especially with the minutes restriction and severe rust. Lamar was not a 7 footer. Listed at 6'10" 220 lbs. Sure a little longer, but the difference in strength with 20 more pounds and Randle's much stronger mind will more than offset that in the years to come. IMO.

 

Everybody was saying at that time that if LO had Kobe's desire and mentality he would have been the GOAT. I love Randle, I hope he does better than Lamar, cause I know he has more desire than LO but Odom was an HOF level talent.

 

Maybe Randle will have less of these moments...

 

If Julius is a better player than Lamar - we are so gonna win...

 

That excites me to hear you say that. If he stays healthy he will be eventually and not long from this year. I expect big things and lots of thrills from Julius this year. And Clarkson. And Russell. And Kobe. :wow:

 

More talented? LO was 1 of the most talented players to ever grace the league. The frustration with him was that he had superstar level talent but was incredibly inconsistent and seemingly lacked the drive to get to the next level. Randle definitely strikes me as having the fire to become the best he can be, so we shouldn't have LO problems with him. But when it comes to pure skillset and talent, LO has it in spades. LO came in as a rookie putting up 16/8 with 5 assists, a block, a steal, and a 3. Randle is going to have to work much harder to reach that level of production, his natural skillset is nowhere near rookie LO.

 

How can you know that? Randle hasn't had his rookie season yet. Look the hell out what he's going to be like for a rookie this year. Saw him as a 20 year old in scrimmage 5 yesterday put on a good drive to the right side of the basket and lay it up with his right hand with touch for the score. A weakness of his to this point, but for Lamar that was still a weakness years into his career.... even until his peak 2 or 3 years. So you can't just make limiting statements about Randle's game. Give him this year and then let's revisit the comparison.

 

I'm thankful that we are NOT comparing our lottery pick to Shawn Bradley. :magicsmile:

 

:copshaq:

 

Mentally Randle is already light years ahead of where LO was on his best day. LO was passive, easily distracted, got down on himself very easily, would shut down if Phil looked at him the wrong way, and God forbid his name was involved in a trade rumor...he might go Casper for an entire month. We haven't seen enough of Randle on the floor when it counts to make the on floor comparison, but mentally Randle is an alpha and LO was a friendly ghost. Also, a Randle seems to be a gym rat while LO preferred to schedule vacations and eat candy.

 

From what we've seen so far Randle is a weak rebounder(pulled down the same amount of rebounds per minute as Nance against Summer League level players). He also doesn't have the court vision or passing ability that LO had, or anything resembling it. I think this whole comparison stems from him being a 4 who can handle the ball, which isn't enough to compare him to LO. Mentally he's already ahead of where LO was at any stage in his career and I'm definitely not saying he can't develop into a better player eventually. LO had far more natural talent and a more versatile skillset coming into the league. They aren't comparable players at all in my eyes. I don't think Randle will ever average double digit rebounds or over 5 assists per game, but I think his aggression and confidence will be great assets in helping him become a more imposing scorer than LO was.

 

I think we should let our young guy play....I don't know.....maybe a season before we either crown him the "Next whomever" or compare him to anyone else that was a scrub. I think we are all encouraged by what we see so far, but we do need to remember he played ONE college season, and then had a year off. Expecting too much and jumping to conclusions on that defining his career would be premature at best.

 

^ So does Biff
Randle might be mentally ahead of Odom, he says all the right things, he wants to be great, he wants to lead... let's see how that translates to his game.