Anyone know when the deadline is for us to pick up next seasons rookie options? Babbitt $2.90M EWill $2.37M Smith $1.42M I’m thinking we may want to let Babbitt walk and if Elliot has another season with injuries do the same with him. That is over $5 million in salary between the two which may not be worth tying up in players that don’t “move the needle”.
I think so, but my response is based on thought and not desire. Babbitt has a great NBA skill, which is shooting the basketball from deep. He will more than likely play in the league a long time because of this skill. However, what position does he play? Olshey, like me, has said he is a stretch 4. Given that he doesn't seem to possess light feet, this is probably his best position. Right now, ahead of Babbitt for sure at the 4 is Aldridge and Hickson. Also at the 4 we have Freeland and Claver, who are also both stretch 4's. Add in gorgeous Georgios Printezis and he only Kostas a fat PG Papanikolaou, and we are way over loaded at the position. Babbitt can shoot deeper than all those guys, but all of those guys have multiple skills.
Does he really possess that great skill though? He shot 29% from deep in SL and he's only taken a career total of 116 threes during the regular season, so his 43% from deep doesn't impress me.
He can definitely shoot. That's really not in question, is it? He was known as being the best shooter in his draft class, and showed he could do it in the NBA last year.
Martell Webster could "shoot" as well. So could Rudy. So could Blake. Would you want any of those guys back on our team? My point is, considering the guy can pretty much ONLY shoot, he sure doesn't seem to do it very well.
Babbitt is a great shooter, if you don’t acknowledge that one aspect as being a strength of his game I’m not sure what to tell you. He has plenty of other faults to his game there is no need to diminish his one skill. If he wasn’t such a good shooter he wouldn’t have been drafted and would probably be working in a pet store the last few years. Now I agree PF actually looks very deep for us this season, funny how we’ve gone from never having a legit backup to potentially 4 backups between Hickson, Freeland, Claver, and Babbitt. I just don’t think Babbitt would have much trade value right now, could we get a second rounder for him? Maybe, maybe not. I’d probably rather just see how the team starts off the first month of the season and how the new guys play. Freeland may get all his minutes at center, Hickson may get some minutes at center as well. We don’t know how well Freeland and Claver’s game will transfer to the NBA, hell we don’t even know how well Hickson’s game will transfer from the garbage time games he pilled up all his stats last season. Now if Babbitt is shooting really hot the first few months of the season and we can get a first round pick for him yes pull the trigger. Otherwise I think he will end up as the 11th man in the rotation with spot duty if there is an injury or we need 10mpg of help busting a zone. Players like that you can pickup in the offseason after you’ve used your cap room so it wouldn’t make sense to extend his contract. I guess nobody knows the deadline yet I’ll have to search for it later.
