Wade Baldwin makes G League debut tonight

BBert · Dec 27, 2017

I hate that he wants to be like Westbrook. But I won't write him off just yet.

Mediocre Man · Dec 27, 2017

His ceiling is the roof

riverman · Dec 27, 2017

We need this guy to develop into a 2 guard ...he's got length we lack in the backcourt

jlprk · Dec 27, 2017

Scalma said: ↑

http://www.nba.com/2016/news/featur...ome-thinking-about-another-russell-westbrook/

...Baldwin, the son of DEA and FBI agents, came equipped with a level of aggression and competitiveness...He'd come by his aggressive nature honestly, thanks to parents whose professions involved enforcing the law.

"I was raised differently," Baldwin recalls with a laugh. "A lot of the stuff I got punished for involved athletic activity. Whenever I got mad, or upset, or did immature stuff, my punishment was having my athletic activity taken away."

...Baldwin's competitive spirit became legend the summer before his junior season of high school. Because of his 3.9 gpa -- his mother's connections didn't hurt, either -- he was allowed to enter an FBI leadership program, where he learned a lot about life in general, and more specifically, just how tough and competitive he was.

"It was a little different," Baldwin said. "There were people from all over the country there; guys from like Idaho, or the deep woods of Virginia who drove tractors to school. I'm basically an inner city, Northeastern kid. Completely different. I think there was one other black kid.

"It was a crazy culture change. A lot of the people there weren't athletes, or if they played sports, they did it because their parents just wanted them to be active. When I first got there, I was thinking, 'what am I going to talk to these people about?' It was eye opening."

Thus began Baldwin's ascension to the NBA. The program helped him learn to communicate with people from different walks of life, different parts of the country, just as he later would at Vanderbilt. The physicality of the program was beyond anything Baldwin had experienced, and it gave him a confidence boost that playing AAU basketball during the summer could never have provided.

One of the challenges Baldwin faced was a five-mile obstacle course. “One of the trainees bet me that I couldn't beat the people who monitor the program," Baldwin said. "These were actual FBI agents. I didn't even know the [obstacle] course, but I was beating those guys out."...
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If his parents sit in the Moda, they may be legally obligated to bust people. They have to ignore state law to enforce Federal law. My favorite player...someone who wants to put me into prison. Fuck him.

PtldPlatypus · Dec 27, 2017

jlprk said: ↑

If his parents sit in the Moda, they may be legally obligated to bust people. They have to ignore state law to enforce Federal law. My favorite player...someone who wants to put me into prison. Fuck him.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure that federal drug law is only relevant if the "transgression" in question crosses state lines. Unless Blazer fans are transporting pot to or from Washington, I don't think the DEA would have any jurisdiction.

tester551 · Dec 27, 2017

Scalma said: ↑

If anyone wants to know more about Baldwin, here’s an in depth article from before he was drafted. Really seems like Dame would be the perfect mentor for him
http://www.nba.com/2016/news/featur...ome-thinking-about-another-russell-westbrook/

When Wade Baldwin first showed up at Vanderbilt as a freshman in 2014, he was a little like a wild stallion, and former Commodore coach Kevin Stallings was a little like a cowboy trying to break him ... but not too much. Baldwin, the son of DEA and FBI agents, came equipped with a level of aggression and competitiveness that Stallings didn't want to go away, but Baldwin also had his own way of doing things that didn't particularly mesh with his coach's system.

At one point, Stallings opined privately that Baldwin, a 6-foot-4 point guard, was the least impressive of a heralded group of freshmen that also included a four-star point guard, Shelton Mitchell, who began the 2014-15 season as Vanderbilt's starter. But then Mitchell suffered a concussion and was sidelined for six games, Baldwin replaced him, and a potential NBA lottery pick was unleashed.

Baldwin never handed that starting job back to Mitchell; he was just too good. Only two freshman guards in Division I averaged at least nine points, four assists and four rebounds a game. One of them was Ohio State's D'Angelo Russell, who wound up being the second player chosen in the 2015 NBA Draft. The other was Baldwin.

After the season, Mitchell transferred to Clemson.

"There were things in Wade's game that needed to be modified and adjusted, and he needed to buy into our way of doing things," Stallings said before the 2015-16 season began. "And he did, he really did. As a result, his progress from the beginning of the season to the end was really amazing.

"He can do so many things: He handles it well, passes it, can defend, shoots it well. He's a good rebounding guard and he's a good finisher. He plays multiple positions. He brings a lot to the table."

Then Stallings offered a prediction that proved to be more accurate than he could have imagined.

"Wade's a guy that will continue to get better and better," Stallings said.

And so Baldwin did. Early in his sophomore season, NBA scouts, who had been making regular appearances to Nashville for the previous couple of years to check on the progress of 7-foot center Damian Jones, wound up getting an eyeful of Baldwin. With his intelligence, speed, condor wingspan, battering-ram mentality to attack the rim, a deadly accurate 3-point stroke and improved playmaking ability, Baldwin began causing a stir. It wasn't long before one prominent Draft analyst proclaimed Baldwin a certain lottery pick should he choose to give up his final two seasons of eligibility.

And even though the Commodores struggled mightily at times -- confounding preseason prognosticators that heralded them as a Top 25 team or a group that could make a deep NCAA tournament run -- by season's end, Baldwin was drawing the highest of praise.

Last March, before a First Four game in the NCAAs, Wichita State coach Gregg Marshall made a comparison that grabbed some attention.

"One of my assistant coaches said he seems to follow Russell Westbrook's game," Marshall said. "You see guys follow or emulate certain NBA players. And he's got some of that. And so obviously he's ultra-talented, long, can get to the rim, can shoot it deep, has a nice stroke."

Marshall became a believer while watching film in preparation for the NCAA game.

"I saw him jump up and try to dunk a back cut," Marshall said. "I went, 'man, I can't believe he tried to dunk that.' It wasn't an easy dunk attempt. And he just reached back and tried to backhand dunk it."

Regular observers of Vanderbilt games had grown used to Baldwin trying to pull moves like the one Marshall described. He'd come by his aggressive nature honestly, thanks to parents whose professions involved enforcing the law.

"I was raised differently," Baldwin recalls with a laugh. "A lot of the stuff I got punished for involved athletic activity. Whenever I got mad, or upset, or did immature stuff, my punishment was having my athletic activity taken away."

In Baldwin's formative years, there were a lot of options for his parents to take away. In middle school, he was a receiver and quarterback who could throw a football 75 yards. At 12 or 13 years old, Baldwin, who also played baseball, was a pitcher with a fastball that approached 90 mph. Football and baseball were sports in which he naturally excelled.

Basketball was another story.

"Basketball was like this super skilled sport," Baldwin said. "You had to put in so much time. Back in the day, I was just a shooter. But eventually I learned a more complete game."

Baldwin was better suited to basketball than he realized, but it's easy to see why he might have gotten sidetracked into thinking football, or chasing batters off the plate with chin-music fastballs, were better outlets for his style.

Baldwin's competitive spirit became legend the summer before his junior season of high school. Because of his 3.9 gpa -- his mother's connections didn't hurt, either -- he was allowed to enter an FBI leadership program, where he learned a lot about life in general, and more specifically, just how tough and competitive he was.

"It was a little different," Baldwin said. "There were people from all over the country there; guys from like Idaho, or the deep woods of Virginia who drove tractors to school. I'm basically an inner city, Northeastern kid. Completely different. I think there was one other black kid.

"It was a crazy culture change. A lot of the people there weren't athletes, or if they played sports, they did it because their parents just wanted them to be active. When I first got there, I was thinking, 'what am I going to talk to these people about?' It was eye opening."

Thus began Baldwin's ascension to the NBA. The program helped him learn to communicate with people from different walks of life, different parts of the country, just as he later would at Vanderbilt. The physicality of the program was beyond anything Baldwin had experienced, and it gave him a confidence boost that playing AAU basketball during the summer could never have provided.

One of the challenges Baldwin faced was a five-mile obstacle course.

“One of the trainees bet me that I couldn't beat the people who monitor the program," Baldwin said. "These were actual FBI agents. I didn't even know the [obstacle] course, but I was beating those guys out."

Word of that accomplishment filtered back to Vanderbilt, and Stallings, a competitive, ornery character himself, knew he had to have Baldwin.

Coach and player would clash occasionally as Stallings and his staff tried to channel Baldwin's ability during his freshman season. And once Baldwin was properly focused, he was a driving force for the Commodores, who had rebounded from a poor start to earn a spot in the NIT, where evidence of Baldwin's progress came with a near triple-double (20 points, 10 rebounds, nine assists) against South Dakota State. Little wonder that so much was expected of Baldwin, and Vanderbilt, in the 2015-16 season.

For various reasons, though, the Commodores fell short of expectations. They won just 19 games and barely squeezed into the NCAA tournament, where they were made short work of by Wichita State. After the season, rumors flew that Stallings would be fired, but he beat Vanderbilt administrators to the mark, fleeing for the Pittsburgh job. Stallings was in Nashville 17 years, had become the school's all-time winningest coach and one of just five coaches in Southeastern Conference history (Adolph Rupp and Billy Donovan were two others) to win 300 or more games at one league school.

Baldwin feels responsible for the sudden departure of such a successful, tenured coach. Not surprising for a man with such an analytical mind, he sees enough blame to go around, both personally and as a team.

"Statistically, it was shown that our second-half defense was poor," Baldwin said. "So you could certainly single that out as a reason we underperformed," Baldwin said.

Baldwin takes ownership of another problem, an occasional deficiency that didn't help the Commodores at the time, but will help shape him in the NBA.

"At times I was a vocal leader," Baldwin said. "And at times I was a leader by action. When I was vocal, our team did very well. That's been proven. And there were other times -- when I was focused on leading by action, where we had a lack of vocal leadership -- we didn't play so well. That's something that I have to accept."

NBA teams can be assured that's a lesson Baldwin won't soon forget.

Is he a lottery pick, as some have predicted? Is he the next Russell Westbrook? Those are questions that won't be answered for a while, but Baldwin is confident of what he can bring to the mix of an NBA team that drafts him.

"My competitive edge," Baldwin said. "I think it's a notch above. I'm realistic. I know I still have a long way to go, a lot to learn. But I'm like a sponge. I'll absorb what I'm taught. And then I'll take it to the floor and compete. That's what I do."
Click to expand...

Great read. I might have to watch some game video on him.
I like the way the article paints his personality.

BrianFromWA · Dec 27, 2017

Mediocre Man said: ↑

His ceiling is the roof
Click to expand...

Confucius says:

One man's ceiling is another man's second floor. Or something...

riverman · Dec 27, 2017

jlprk said: ↑

If his parents sit in the Moda, they may be legally obligated to bust people. They have to ignore state law to enforce Federal law. My favorite player...someone who wants to put me into prison. Fuck him.
Click to expand...

but Shaq wanted a law enforcement career as well!

Mediocre Man · Dec 27, 2017

BrianFromWA said: ↑

Confucius says:

One man's ceiling is another man's second floor. Or something...
Click to expand...

I like that better. Collins ceiling is the roof, but Baldwin's ceiling is the the 2nd floor

rotary111 · Dec 27, 2017

I'm really starting to like this guy. He's doing what he's supposed to do in the G league, attack and show that your better than everyone else on the floor.
I feel that the more Bazz and Wade develop the more NO looks to trade CJ. I could be way off, but that's my thought.

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Wade Baldwin makes G League debut tonight

BBert Weasels Ripped My Flesh

Mediocre Man Mr. SportsTwo

riverman Writing Team

jlprk The ESPN mod is insane.

PtldPlatypus Let's go Baby Blazers! Staff Member Global Moderator Moderator

tester551 Well-Known Member

BrianFromWA Editor in Chief Staff Member Editor in Chief

riverman Writing Team

Mediocre Man Mr. SportsTwo

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Wade Baldwin makes G League debut tonight

Moderators

BBert Weasels Ripped My Flesh

Mediocre Man Mr. SportsTwo

riverman Writing Team

jlprk The ESPN mod is insane.

PtldPlatypus Let's go Baby Blazers! Staff Member Global Moderator Moderator

tester551 Well-Known Member

BrianFromWA Editor in Chief Staff Member Editor in Chief

riverman Writing Team

Mediocre Man Mr. SportsTwo

rotary111 Well-Known Member

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