Vonleh reminds me a lot of Elden Campbell. Not a name that will mean much to other people, but I was living in LA in the early 90s. He even has the same thick legs. Campbell always showed flashes but never panned out. (A teammate of Dale Davis in college.)
You know what they say, "Long neck, long.......arms". Vonleh's pre-draft standing reach was 9', the same as Meyers Leonard.
Vonleh is not part of the offense period he doing things that coaches wanted him to do set screen and Reb and play defense. Is that wrong yes he should be part of the offense but there 29 other teams in the league that has there Vonleh on there team. Someone on there team that does the little thing to help try to make there team to win.
I remember Campbell--the Lakers expected him to be their next dominant big man but he just ambled along for a number of years as an okay-but-disappointing player until he was finally traded with Eddie Jones for Glen Rice. Honestly, if Vonleh even becomes as good as Campbell, that would be nice. Campbell was a good reserve, even if he never lived up to the hype.
Elden Campbell played great backing up Big Ben for the Pistons championship run....he was underrated in and era when the league had actual big centers that could score
I'm really hoping John Collins will be available with the MEM pick. He's really improved as a sophomore and is an efficient scorer, great rebounder and can block shots. And, even though he's a sophomore, he's still only 19. He doesn't have 3-point range, but has the potential to be the kind of 2-way player we need. BNM
I don't know if it is Vonleh or not but he has finally got to play real minutes instead of starting, playing 6 minutes and then not going in again till the 2nd half. In these last 2 games where he has played over 30 minutes, he has put up some very solid numbers and in the first game, that was against the Spurs starters for the most part. Spurs - 12 points, 11 rebounds, .667 FG% Pelicans - 12 points, 19 rebounds, .625 FG% All of that was done without a play being run for him the entire time. He still needs to finish better in traffic from a stand-still but he sets very good screens, dishes out contact, and it's almost always the other guy who is giving ground. Everyone else outside of Nurkic on the roster is fading away.
His touch is Kwame esque. Really needs to work on that. Whole summer, he needs to keep doing some version of the Mikan drill. If he can become a scoring threat out of the P&R, he'd be a legit option for PFotF.
Yeah, it's amazing how slow and bad he is around the basket. I'm not sure if being quick is something that you can learn and train for - if so, Harkless needs to teach him. If he had Hark's ability to get up quick shots he could be lethal. Also, someone (Kaman?) needs to teach him not to bring the ball down, but I suspect that's how Vonleh has learned to jump...he needs to "coil up" before launching. It's like he uses his quads to jump, whereas Hark uses his calves.
My feeling is that the coach is asking Vonleh to not do a lot. If I'm right, and that changes, I could see Vonleh being a fantastic starter.
