Going into the draft the top 3 guys I wanted us to take were: 1) Edey 2) Ware 3) Holmes After Edey and Ware were picked I had my mind set on Holmes, and was ticked off at our pick. However, after researching this kid, I was wrong. Dude is a bucket. I still believe we need a big, and the rich just got richer in Denver with Daron Holmes. He’ll thrive there.
I love Reaves. But now I'm getting concerned about his role on the team because Knecht we haven't addressed the defense problem. Maybe we go for Murray, or we keep Vando starting to offseat the defensive weaknesses? Melton also could be a possibility with the TPMLE if we can get to it. But if we get Murray, what happens with Reaves? Does he become the 5th scorer? With that being said, I have no narrative about Reaves and don't really care if he is on the team or not, just want us to win.
This will be interesting going forward.If he becomes what people are projecting will that make AR expendable in trades? They seem redundant
We have AR on a great deal for at least the next 2 years and Knecht on a rookie contract. No reason not to keep both unless there's a trade for a star we can't refuse. Knecht will probably be more of a 3 than a 2 and their games can actually complement each other very well. Excited to see lineups with them together.
He projects worse then Reaves. Reaves was a passable defender last year. Poor guy was assigned Murray last year and while everyone remembers the game winners he did a good job. Reaves isn't a stopper or anything but hes not a big liability on D The problem with the Knect is his defensive stance and footwork need to completely changed. He reminds of Kuzma. Before he put work in. Knees arent bent and hes just straight upright so it is to easy to blow by him. He's athletic so hopefully translate some of the vertical stuff he's shown to more lateral movement
i think if knecht cracks the rotation next year, it's as a backup 3. i really don't view him and reaves as redundant. they actually excel at different things. and reaves is proven. i think if dlo stays and/or we can't get another defender in the backcourt, we have to look at playing reaves in the ginobili role. he's good there. he's good as a starter, too, but next to dlo (or another guard who's not a strong defender), it gets tricky. i agree with slick and others that knecht doesn't really solve our major roster issues at all. that's ok. you shouldn't rely on the draft for that. i'm sure we tried to use the 17 to fill a roster role, but couldn't make it work. knecht is a great consolation prize. still need a center who can credibly play 20mpg. still need more two-way and fewer one-way role players. i'd like to see the mle/tpmle used for one, and a trade of a couple of our one-way role players (rui, gabe, vando, dlo) for at least one two-way role player, preferably two. the latter's a big ask. the former...maybe not? the price for avdija was interesting. an expiring, #14, two seconds, and the "second most favorable of portland's 2029 picks" (which i guess means they can't trade their extra one?). let's call that something akin to top-10 protected. that's for a decent young two-way role player on a good contract. dallas sent a top-2 protected 2027 pick (and offloaded an undesirable contract and got two seconds back). this is the market i'm looking at. what role players on bad teams right now are like washington and avdija? i feel like knecht makes me less excited about cam johnson, as i view them as similar players. also, the positions i'm looking at are probably pg and center, maybe sf. and now i'm moving to the other thread...
Different players. Knect has a lot more movement shooter in his game. He's not bad off the dribble but Reaves is an absolute beast as a playmaker off dribble They should complement each other
Yeah the Reaves Knecht comparisons are surface level at best. They’re very different players, and I want to reinforce what Pioneer said here. Reaves is not a bad defender. He was an average defender last season while covering the best offensive guard on the other team every single night. Knecht projects to have the athleticism to become an adequate defender, but he’s below average right now.
It would be wrong to give 2 FRPs for Avidja considering where we are. If we give those 2 picks, we only have 3 picks again in 2028. We will lose Bron for nothing in 26 or 27, so we NEED those picks to grab another superstar. We don't own our 27 pick, so we need that superstar by then I'm not accepting that scenario for Avidja, not worth it. For Dejounte, I think it's possible. We can navigate a season under AD, Dejounte and Reaves
Let me make my way too early argument for why Knecht will be in the Rookie of the year conversation this upcoming season lol: Knecht’s player archetype is a more athletic 3 level scoring version of JJ. That means JJ won’t have to try to figure out how to use him. Drawing up plays and running actions to get him shots will be second nature for JJ as demonstrated by JJ immediately drawing up pin downs and ATOs for him the minute Knecht got drafted. For an inexperienced coach that has never created an NBA playbook before, I think JJ might lean into emphasizing the shooting of the one player he probably understands best from a skills standpoint. If not overemphasizing Knecht’s scoring, I think we can safely say JJ will be less likely to get it wrong. Knecht is considered to be NBA ready offensively by most draft evaluations. He’s a good movement 3pt shooter. A skill we don’t have anywhere else on the roster, and is necessary to optimize modern NBA offenses which JJ says he wants to run. Most importantly for all the reasons above, I think Knecht will get enough minutes to score well and be noticed by NBA media. The media doesn’t care if Dalton can guard a fire hydrant in regards to the RoTY conversation so as long as he can stay on the floor, the defensive questions won’t matter to the overall narrative. The biggest obstacle to Knecht making a RoTY run is if we resigned Prince and he got the minutes. I don’t see why we do that now that we signed a younger player, similar skill set and size, that makes about the same salary and can be a corner stone of the rebuild after LeBron leaves. I understand none of this is a forgone conclusion, but I do think it’s a likely scenario due mostly to a prefect storm of Lakers situation, Knecht’s player skills, and a less impressive draft class this year.
To be RoTY he would need to play at the very least 25+mpg with an increased role, so he would get above average pts, rebs and ast numbers. There will be others with more playing time and usage without LeBron, AD, Reaves, DLo or Rui eating their stats. But it's a nice exercise and bet
This is definitely high praise. RP3 sees things a lot of scouts miss. Agreed. He's a legit role player.
They absolutely complement each other well on the offensive side, 100%. However, people are missing the point that they don't complement each other well in terms of defense. I mean, if Reaves is an average defender, and Knecht is a below average defender, it really makes it imperative that the third perimeter player needs to be a good defender. Basically, my point is, if Knecht starts, we didn't really fix anything on the defensive side if Knecht is as bad as Dlo on that end. My whole point was about defense.
