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| Who will win this game? |
| Sky |
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58% |
[ 7 ] |
| Liberty |
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41% |
[ 5 ] |
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| Total Votes : 12 |
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| Author |
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myrtle
Joined: 02 May 2008
Posts: 32341
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 Posted: 06/22/21 11:20 pm ::: |
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| Rock Hard wrote: |
| myrtle wrote: |
| Luuuc wrote: |
| Very harsh IMO. Not on Stokes, on the expectations of how much a team should be expected to improve both their quality and their depth in a single off-season. |
maybe. but I think expectations got raised by adding Laney, Whitcomb, and Howard, and then Onyenwere performing well in the beginning. But there is very much a post problem which Walt seems to have ignored at the beginning of the season, and continues to ignore. |
You believe that he is ignoring the problem. This is the system or style of basketball that he wants to use for his team. If he wanted big post players then he could have kept AZB. |
exactly my point. and Zahui would have been a huge plus for this team this year. She's not the perfect post, but she's better than Shook or Stokes in being able to hold her own in the post. And she's not so slow and immobile that she couldn't play his 'style'. So yes, I think he is ignoring the problem. He ignored it by dumping AZB and he continues to ignore it. I actually think his style has a lot of promise, but it still needs a post presence.
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Stormeo
Joined: 14 Jul 2019
Posts: 4701
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| Posted: 06/23/21 12:25 am ::: |
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| myrtle wrote: |
| Rock Hard wrote: |
| myrtle wrote: |
| Luuuc wrote: |
| Very harsh IMO. Not on Stokes, on the expectations of how much a team should be expected to improve both their quality and their depth in a single off-season. |
maybe. but I think expectations got raised by adding Laney, Whitcomb, and Howard, and then Onyenwere performing well in the beginning. But there is very much a post problem which Walt seems to have ignored at the beginning of the season, and continues to ignore. |
You believe that he is ignoring the problem. This is the system or style of basketball that he wants to use for his team. If he wanted big post players then he could have kept AZB. |
exactly my point. and Zahui would have been a huge plus for this team this year. She's not the perfect post, but she's better than Shook or Stokes in being able to hold her own in the post. And she's not so slow and immobile that she couldn't play his 'style'. So yes, I think he is ignoring the problem. He ignored it by dumping AZB and he continues to ignore it. I actually think his style has a lot of promise, but it still needs a post presence. |
If they tried calling Tina Charles during the start of free agency, (as I believe she’ll be a free agent again), I wonder if she’d take their calls… If you believed your employer “ “ “fired” ” ” you, and they later called you up & apologized & begged you to come back, would you do it?
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NYL_WNBA_FAN
Joined: 28 May 2007
Posts: 14097
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| Posted: 06/23/21 4:52 am ::: |
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| myrtle wrote: |
| NYL_WNBA_FAN wrote: |
Right now there’s not a whole lot else Walt can do. |
true. but he did set the team up the way he did so it's hard to say he is entirely blameless. Yeah, Howard is out and she will surely make a difference. But just saying there needed to be a plan B. I don't think you can survive with three posts even with Shook performing at a level nobody could have expected. One gets injured and you're screwed. But when another one is Stokes, you are doubly screwed. I mean this is a player who couldn't even make the Turkey team, which is really pretty mediocre. |
I just look at it like, they used a first rounder plus a first they got for Nurse to get Howard, a recent DPOY. They then used their own first rounder on probably the top rookie. Reportedly, they tried to get Nneka as well.
Just not sure what else you could realistically have acquired under these circumstances. Plus, had Durr been healthy, they wouldn’t have needed to use 135k of cap money to get a shooting guard.
Right now all you have to show for the value of two number one overall picks and a number two overall is a hobbled Sabrina. I don’t think many teams would be competitive under those circumstances. Add to that that after Thursday’s game, they’re rid of the two most brutal matchups they have for the rest of the season.
Look at how bad Chicago was without Parker, Dolson and Quigley. They didn’t win a game. CT without JJ is 1-3. That NY is staying afloat with their injury situation is to their credit when you view it by comparison. Especially when their injury situation has coincided with the most difficult part of their schedule.
I think people are forgetting not only the 2-20 last year but that they won 17 games combined in the prior two seasons. They’ve essentially put together a team from scratch and rebuilt a team that was a colossal mess in 2018 and 2019. That’s 19 wins in three seasons alone. They’re currently on pace to win 16 even with their injury situation and the worst part of their schedule in the rear view. That suggests 19 is within reach in this season alone if they get healthy in time.
For a rebuild situation, I think there’s extraordinary positives in what we have so far, and it’s only going to get better when they have their actual team healthy.
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Bob Lamm
Joined: 11 Apr 2010
Posts: 5065
Location: New York City
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| Posted: 06/23/21 9:01 am ::: |
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| NYL_WNBA_FAN wrote: |
I think people are forgetting not only the 2-20 last year but that they won 17 games combined in the prior two seasons. They’ve essentially put together a team from scratch and rebuilt a team that was a colossal mess in 2018 and 2019. That’s 19 wins in three seasons alone. They’re currently on pace to win 16 even with their injury situation and the worst part of their schedule in the rear view. That suggests 19 is within reach in this season alone if they get healthy in time.
For a rebuild situation, I think there’s extraordinary positives in what we have so far, and it’s only going to get better when they have their actual team healthy. |
I completely agree with these paragraphs and the rest of what you wrote. Despite the Liberty playing most of this season without a healthy Howard and Ionescu (or Durr or Willoughby), the team has made astonishing progress not just from 2-20 but from THREE consecutive bad seasons. And yet we have Walt Hopkins being judged as not "entirely blameless" for the roster not having Amanda Zahui B. behind Howard.
I admire and am very grateful for all that Jonathan Kolb and Walt Hopkins have done in reshaping the Liberty.
P.S. New York is currently 7-7. Three of those losses were to Las Vegas. If Zahui B. had been on the roster instead of Stokes and/or Shook, would the Liberty have won any of those games? I doubt it. The closest one ended as a 12-point loss.
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