I think you have a point here. The Spurs love these so-called “multi-skilled” players who yet somehow are deficient in one or more basic skills that you’re just left hoping they develop. They love the Swiss Army knife, “connective” players, but you don’t have a body if all you have are ligaments and tendons with no bones or muscles. The connective players have to connect to something besides just Wembanyama.
Exactly. They're consumed with trying to be the next Celtics or Thunder but seem to be forgetting that it's not enough to have positional size and be stout defensively. There's another half of that equation, which is shot creation and shooting.
They keep prioritizing players who don't have it and believing they'll be the ones to fix it, seemingly oblivious to the fact that they've repeatedly failed at it.
I have no clue who you're talking about. Sochan?
That's it? That's the entirety of your complaint? One player?
Sochan, Cissoko, Wesley, Branham, Primo, Murray, Leonard, Luka (Bunch of players who needed to improve on shooting and shot creation when drafted)
I have a hard time seeing Houston pass on Sheppard if they don't move that pick though.
Did you just make up a category and put everyone in it?
There’s a side of me that really likes Castle and thinks he would add a lot to the Spurs.
But there are red flags:
— The shooting, obviously.
— He says he’s going to insist on playing point guard and won’t work out for teams that already have one. This is sort of being hand-waved away as a ploy to get on the Spurs. But how many players do something like that? Does it nullify his team-first approach at UConn? Is he even really a true point guard? If he’s being viewed as this high-character gym rat, how does dictating his role before he even gets drafted align with that?
— Is he athletic or isn’t he? My eye test says he’s more tenacious than he is athletic.
— Is he or is he not just a defensive-minded combo guard? And is that what the Spurs really need?
He actually never said that. The second part of the sentence is true, though. My take is that he doesn’t want to go somewhere with a heliocentric PG, and he never touches the ball. The school he picked was the ultimate share the ball offense, even though he could have picked any school with his HS ranking, and dominated the ball if that was his thing.
yup....i hope hes open minded and understands he may not be a pg in the nba.Hopefully the spurs talk to
him about this before drafting him.
One of my concerns with Castle is that his D is actually being overrated. He played for a Connecticut team that was great defensively, and all of his defensive impact stats put him 5th among starters, with Clingan and Spencer leading the way by a good margin, and even Karaban and Newton rating out ahead of Castle. Castle's DRtg looks great in a vac , but it's only 7th on the team among guys with 600+ minutes.
https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb.../men/2024.html
Sometimes, the POA defender takes it in the shorts on Drtg. Bruce Bowen was tied for 10th on the 2002-2003 championship squad, yet still made the All D team.
Agreed. I feel like I have to add caveats all the time so here it is: I would still be fine with SA drafting Castle. But I really have more concerns than most it seems with him. Theres a lot of bust potential here, more than meets the eye. His upside is still there so that’s good and its not like I love anyone a ton more outside of Reed/Holland, but he screams “meh” to me
If reports of Castle being a high character guy, hard worker and a great teammate are true, it's the obvious Spurs pick, especially after Sochan experiment last season.
Just because Sochan wasn't capable of playing that role, it doesn't mean Pop has given up on it.
Even if he doesn't develop into a traditional point guard, Castle would surely be able to play the role Sochan was supposed to.
If using #4 pick on a such player is worth it, I don't know.
Castle-Sochan fit would be an issue. If we're to start winning games, that is.
Two of them would never be able to play together with their current (non-)shooting skills.
An even bigger issue is that Pop would still do it.
Shooting is invaluable these days and in some cases players that can't do anything but shoot are more valuable than players than do everything else well.
We have no shooting and are picking up a player who can’t shoot.
Castle is still my pet cat in this draft, shooting concerns be damned. I think he's going to improve considerably in that department over time, and that's really the only thing keeping him from becoming a future All-Star caliber player. The two players he's most often compared to, Jimmy Butler and Jrue Holiday, both shared similar shooting concerns entering the league, and both turned themselves into multiple-time All-Stars who are now plus shooters in their careers. Add on top of that the fact that he's unselfish, a high character kid, and he fits a position of need for us, and I think it's a no brainer pick if he's still on the board at 4 tbh.
He moves and plays like Jimmy Butler tbh. Butler looks more muscular and also is more about his tenacity and clutch gene.
Yeah but defense doesn't matter or some ing .
Exactly. Most of them, the hits and the misses, became more or less what the scouting report indicated beforehand.
Sure, S bag hit a stratosphere offensively no one could have foreseen (though he's probably on the spectrum, which gives him a level of focus, determination and ap ude with certain things that most people can't conceive of), but he has C length and PF strength in the body of an SF, which led to an elite steal and rebound (for position) rates.
Similar story with Anderson and Murray. They all had foundations to build off of.
Then you have the Sochan's and Castle's of the world, who don't even have that going for them. The former brings the body of a PF combined with the deficiencies of a rim running C, but without the strengths of one. He's the worst of both worlds.
The latter looks like a guard version in the making. Doesn't have primary skills and this team doesn't have the spacing or play making for his supposed secondary skills to thrive.
I didn't even think of Sochan when TD21 talked about that archetype. I thought of Primo, Wesley, Branham, Dejounte, White. All combo guards with size for the position but without a single elite trait.
I don't know anything about Jrue's and Butler's college profile. Did they take mid range jumpers?
My problem with Castle isn't just that he's a bad 3pt shooter, he doesn't even see the hoop from midrange. He would rather take awkard floaters than taking a wide open 15 footer. I could live with a subpar 3pt shooting % if he at least hit the midrange at a decent clip (specially if he's gonna be on-ball), but he doesn't even see the hoop from that distance.
If you look at the high school tape, he was taking some mid range jumpers and some threes, don't know why it changed last year with uconn...but if he can shoot one year ago, he's capable of finding his rythm next year like the last coupe of weeks with uconn.
Before seeing your reply I was watching exactly that:
This gives me hope, tbh. I know it's high school but if he can go back to that, I could buy into him.
Trying to force myself into the Castle hype, it might not be the worst of outcomes to draft him, give him the keys to try to go back to that while the Spurs suck for one more year and get a lottery pick on the, supossedly stacked, upcoming draft.
I might turn myself into a believer. Are you in TD21?
Castle is most certainly a five star player coming into UConn. One thing being somewhat overlooked I believe is his ability to get inside and use his strength to finish at the rim. Don’t sleep on his athleticism either as indicated by his recipient status on alley oops slams. The two man lob game both directions with Clingan is also a thing of beauty. Let’s make no mistake that Castle has Alpha qualities, possibly to the tune of 22 PPG.
You're too low on Castle.
His game will be much more than what you saw at UCONN. He is definitely the best pick at 4 if he's there.
He's a better shooter than his numbers indicate. It's good his 3 pt % is low(on low volume and he got off to a slow start coming back from a knee injury early in the season) that may keep him in the Spur's draft range.
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