Ping Pong balls and Blake Griffin

[BigTime]

This link shows the odds that the lottery teams have to receive the number 1 pick (aka Blake) for this year's upcoming NBA Draft (June 25th).

My questions: which team do you want to see Blake go to?
Which team do you think/predict that Blake will go to?
And which team would be the best fit for Blake?

Mine:
I want to see him go to Pheonix (fat chance! haha).
I am thinking that he will end up going to Memphis (just a hunch).
I don't know enough about the NBA to give an educated answer to my last question! lol

Below are the teams that will be in this year's lottery and their odds of getting the number 1 pick (out of 1000)

Sacramento 17-65 250
Washington 19-63 178
LA Clippers 19-63 177
Oklahoma City 23-59 119
Minnesota 24-58 76
Memphis 24-58 75
Golden State 29-53 43
New York 32-50 28
Toronto 33-49 17
Milwaukee 34-48 10
New Jersey 34-48 9
Charlotte 35-47 7
Indiana 36-46 6
Phoenix 46-36 5

 

[playmakr]

12% chance

 

[Seymore Cox]

Will a first this year and Next year get him?

 

[hoopsaustin]

Will a first this year and Next year get him?

no

 

[MercedeSooner]

if its not OKC (please lord) I really, really hope Blake ends up in a big market. He deserves to be on the national stage and not play in obscurity in somewhere like Memphis.

 

[Seymore Cox]

if its not OKC (please lord) I really, really hope Blake ends up in a big market. He deserves to be on the national stage and not play in obscurity in somewhere like Memphis.

New York and New Jersey are the only "Big Market" in the lottery. OKC will be the best market for him outside of that. The Clips aren't because of the Lakers. I would hate to see Blake go to the Clips or the Nets because of Baron Davis and Vince Carter. I wouldn't mind NY, especially if they get Lebron.

 

[BoulderSooner]

best fit would be washington ... with gilbert back at the point cb at the 2 antawn at the 3 blake at the 4 and haywood at the 5 they will be back in the playoffs next year

 

[thebigabd]

Charlotte wouldnt be bad, they were on the cusp of the playoffs this year. I also agree with Washington, he would be a great fit with them.

 

[Smash Williams]

New York and New Jersey are the only "Big Market" in the lottery. OKC will be the best market for him outside of that. The Clips aren't because of the Lakers. I would hate to see Blake go to the Clips or the Nets because of Baron Davis and Vince Carter. I wouldn't mind NY, especially if they get Lebron.

Vince only has two years left on his contract, and he may not even be in NJ for that long (they almost traded him to the Rockets two months ago). They also have a couple of nice young players in Devin Harris and Brook Lopez.

I wouldn't to seem Blake with the Clips either, and Zach Randolph is an even bigger problem than Baron Davis. ZR is the ultimate blackhole. I hope Eric Gordon makes it out of that place with his sanity intact.

The closer it gets to the summer of 2010, the harder I find it to imagine LeBron going to the Knicks. He has become a lockdown defender on championship-calibur team that goes all-out on the defensive end. With LeBron having a defensive epiphany, I don't see him playing for a guy like D'Antoni. Also, the Knicks don't have a decent nucleus, so LeBron would be leaving a contender for a team that would still need to add more pieces to get to that level.

 

[Smash Williams]

Charlotte wouldnt be bad, they were on the cusp of the playoffs this year. I also agree with Washington, he would be a great fit with them.

Charlotte has Okafor and Diaw at C and PF, and with Larry Brown's aversion to rookies (DJ Augustin being an exception) Blake would really be fighting for minutes there.

 

[playmakr]

Charlotte has Okafor and Diaw at C and PF, and with Larry Brown's aversion to rookies (DJ Augustin being an exception) Blake would really be fighting for minutes there.

Blake isn't going to be fighting for minutes on any team. You don't sit all-stars.

 

[thebigabd]

Charlotte has Okafor and Diaw at C and PF, and with Larry Brown's aversion to rookies (DJ Augustin being an exception) Blake would really be fighting for minutes there.

PG: Ray Felton
SG: Raja Bell
SF: Boris Diaw
PF: Emeka Okafor
PF: Blake Griffin

 

[Smash Williams]

Blake isn't going to be fighting for minutes on any team. You don't sit all-stars.

Larry Brown is notorious for his hatred of rookies and for not giving them a lot of minutes, with few exceptions, especially when he already has established veterans at a position. The combination of those factors is the difference between Blake Griffin playing 20-25 minutes per game in Charlotte and 35 minutes per game elsewhere.

 

[Smash Williams]

PG: Ray Felton
SG: Raja Bell
SF: Boris Diaw
PF: Emeka Okafor
PF: Blake Griffin

I'd be surprised if Felton were the starting PG in Charlotte next season. He's a restricted free agent, and Augustin seems to be their PG of the future. I would also be shocked if Brown started any rookie not named David Robinson over an established vet like Diaw (not that I'm a fan of Diaw's or anything, but LB loves his vets and hates his rooks).

 

[thebigabd]

I'd be surprised if Felton were the starting PG in Charlotte next season. He's a restricted free agent, and Augustin seems to be their PG of the future. I would also be shocked if Brown started any rookie not named David Robinson over an established vet like Diaw (not that I'm a fan of Diaw's or anything, but LB loves his vets and hates his rooks).

Actually, Gerald Wallace would start at the 3 for them. If they took Blake, Diaw would be a 6th man off the bench.

 

[Smash Williams]

Actually, Gerald Wallace would start at the 3 for them. If they took Blake, Diaw would be a 6th man off the bench.

I guess I didn't look at that very closely. I just assumed you had Wallace starting at the 3 because that wouldn't change with or without Blake. I was referring to Diaw starting over Blake at the 4, not the 3. I didn't even realize you still had Diaw in the lineup.

 

[playmakr]

Larry Brown is notorious for his hatred of rookies and for not giving them a lot of minutes, with few exceptions, especially when he already has established veterans at a position. The combination of those factors is the difference between Blake Griffin playing 20-25 minutes per game in Charlotte and 35 minutes per game elsewhere.

Noted.

I'm suggesting Blake is too good not to overcome that.

 

[cosmic_sooner]

the only reason Larry Brown even played Felton is b/c lack of any other options. as Smash said, he is beyond notorious for sitting rookie/young players on the bench.

he has wrecked as many teams as he has built. Blake going there would be very bad. there are a lot of trade rumors with that entire team including Augustin and particularly Gerald Wallace, May and Felton.

my worst-case scenarios:
Charlotte
LA Clippers
Golden State

Sacramento and Memphis have very promising young cores, i'd pick the Kings simply b/c they are generally a good organization.

Plus Memphis has Marc Gasol (Pau's brother) who showed this season he is a legit NBA player. He is a Center on most nights, but has a very nice offensive game and doesnt quite play defense like you'd want out of a C. He and BG would likely complement each other nicely. But Gasol, Gay and OJ Mayo are black holes on offense and BG would surely be the 4th peg at best.

Minnesota also has a few nice players and showed some marked improvement this season, but he and Al Jefferson (soon to be all-star) are the same size and may not fit in together.

Washington would be a nice "right now" type of team, but they still havent put together a full season with that core due to injuries and drama. Who knows how long Arenas will remain there?

i would suspect most OU fans would want BG to land somewhere in the West though, so they can follow him better which also means more stops in OKC.

i dont think Blake is going to be a right-away all-star or even after a few years. i am thinking more of an Emeka Okafor type for the first few seasons, 10pts, 10 rebs per game (which is solid as hell).

most of his points in college simply came against guys who were smaller, slower and weaker than him. that will not be the case in the NBA. he still did not show much of an outside touch this past season and will need that as a truly productive PF in the NBA (think LaMarcus Aldridge, Rasheed Wallace, Karl Malone, David West who are/were all deadly from 10-20ft).

many OU fans think Blake will take the NBA by storm, which i sure hope he does. but im not so sure right off the bat.

 

[playmakr]

many OU fans think Blake will take the NBA by storm

It's not just OU fans. Heck, OU fans were some of the last people on board.

 

[elmocarp]

Smash, good to see you on the board...

I thought it would be interesting to see how Blake would fit with the lottery teams, based on how their team is currently composed. I am doing this as much for myself as for anyone else, so please refrain from giving me crap for the post being long.

Sacramento...Odds of first pick: 25.0%

Wow, if you need an example of what bad contracts can do to a small market team, look no further than Sacramento. They still have another whole year left to pay Kenny Thomas at $8.5 mil, 4 more years with Beno Udrih at around $7 mil per, 3 more years with Andres Nocioni at around $7 mil per, and Francisco Garcia's extension kicks in at about $6 mil per year for 5 more years. I'm not sure how retirement works exactly, but I think they still have to pay Abdur-Rahim's contract (or at least count it against the cap) next season which is another $6.6 and they even have to pay $2 mil of Mikki Moore's deal after they released him. Add in Kevin Martin's huge (though defensible) contract and they are going to be over the cap next year as is, even after letting their expiring deals roll off and without signing any draft picks.

What that tells us is that they are going to be looking to dump salary for a while, especially considering they are in big time financial trouble anyway. So, when you see that 2 of their 3 or 4 best players are Spencer Hawes and Jason Thompson and they are both on rookie deals for 2 and 3 more years, it seems like they are a team that is pretty well locked into building around Martin, Hawes and Thompson and dumping salary everywhere else.

Which makes Blake a player that really doesn't work for them that well. I think Rubio has to be the guy the want most. Moving him to the point at on a rookie deal for 4 seasons would make the most basketball sense and financial sense. I guess his buy out would be a bit of a problem, but I don't see how they could justify having Hawes, Thompson and Griffin as their three best contracts playing the same positions.

I don't think there is any chance Blake suits up for the Kings. If they get the top pick, they will trade out and draft a point guard (probably dumping the Udrih contract on someone).