Thabeet worth a gamble for the Hawks?

[JTB]

So the trade deadline is around the corner so expect more rumors to come. Just throwing this one out there. In college Thabeet was great defensively anyhow but since he has been in the NBA he seems to be a bust but maybe the grizzlies arent using him right. Maybe he fits with the hawks. The hawks have Al Horford as their scoring Big Man. To complement Horford wouldnt a 7'2 defense minded center be a perfect fit Or maybe Thabeet is too risky. Dont know at this point Im willing to try anything cause this kid is tall as hell and he's young, there's got to be some potential there! He may be getting overlooked because of Marc Gasol.

He would be a benefit some how. I wouldnt mind seeing this lineup to take on the elite.......

bibby

johnson

smith

horford

Thabeet

of course bibby's lack of defense still scares me but atleast there is post defense with Thabeet and Al. Then again what is needed more for the hawks at the time POST OFFENSE or POST DEFENSE? cause Im sure the hawks have a great chance at getting Thabeet if they really want him! Grizzlies cant ask for too much!

[BudBall]

o gawd. thabeet sucks defensively and offensively. he is only good at blocking shots. Even King Zaza destroyed him.

[Admin]

No thanks, it's hard to be a useful player when you average 1 foul every 5 minutes, which is the same amount of rebounds per 5 minutes that he's averaging as well.

[Joker]

I really like him in a package with O.J. and just a package with O.J. He's not a bad add but we don't have the salary get him by himself. I don't think they would do a Zaza/Thabeet deal.

[Vol4ever]

I really like him in a package with O.J. and just a package with O.J. He's not a bad add but we don't have the salary get him by himself. I don't think they would do a Zaza/Thabeet deal.

I dont think anybody in the league would take ZaZa. I would take Thabeet, he can only grow at his age in maturity and physical strength. Lord knows ZaZa, Collins, and Etan Thomas are no gonna improve.

In additon, I would like to see Richard Hamilton in a Hawks uniform along with Mo Williams.

If I could pick one of the three I guess it would be Mo Williams.

[EazyRoc]

He's a player that needs more playing time still. I don't think he's that bad. I just think he's raw. Very raw.

[IHeartAtlanta]

Wouldn't trade for him unless all we gave to give up is etan... Lol

*have

[Guest Walter]

Simply Yes.

Thabeet is about as raw as they come, looks awkward like Deke and his confidence is about as low as it can get, but we haven't had a true center prospect on this team since I can remember. Lo Wright was close to a center but not quite one the first time we had him. They don't always work. They don't always pan out, but when they do life is beautiful.

Crawford/1st for Thabeet/Mayo.

Are there some other center prospects I would want first? Yes. Can we get them? Likely not. Do we need one? Yes. Could Thabeet be a good fit for this team if he can block shots and rebound well? Yes.

EVERY YEAR at UCONN Thabeet dramatically improved. Bigs blossom late and if Thabeet is going to blossom it will be later still. However, he went from 6.2/6.4/55% to 10.5/8/60% to 13.6/10.8/64% in his three years. Another year and he could have averaged 13 boards a game! Memphis has a center and isn't going to wait on Thabeet at his price, but we should. He'll always be a Ben Wallace type offensive player (13.4 PPG as a Division II senior) but give Thabeet time (and a sports psychologist after Memphis) and he can definitely block and rebound in this league. At his POTENTIAL level of shot blocking and rebounding THAT is enough with JJ, JS, Mayo, and Horford. If it isn't, at least we tried.

W

[DJlaysitup]

I dont think anybody in the league would take ZaZa....

I think there are some teams who would happily take Zaza. Depth at the big spot is always a nice thing to have. Good teams might not want him as their primary backup center - but teams with money could easily afford his contract as a safety net in case of injury and make him a 10 minute or so guy.

As far as Thabeet...he's a "long neck". He gets about 2 1/2 inches extra height from that stem that holds up his head...therefore he doesn't play as big as he is listed. Combine that with him being raw and not really strong enough and I'd take a pass.

[bonethugz]

i wouldn't say no to a big like thabeet. mo evens and etan for thabeet?

Edited February 16, 2011 by bonethugz

[Atlantaholic]

There is not a single, GM, scout, or expert that has anything positive to say about Thabeet since he made it to the NBA. The only thing keeping the guy in the league is his draft position. I'd seriously spend the money on anything else.

[Seano]

You can't really sugarcoat the fact that at this point Thabeet is pretty much just an awful NBA player. I mean he's *really* bad and looks so unready it's just about ridiculous. Memphis was aware how raw he was when they drafted him at #2, but despite that rawness they still expected him to be able to hold down the backup C position last year for the Grizz. But he played so poorly and looked to be so far in over his head that Lionel Hollins felt he had no choice but to demote Thabeet to the D-League in the middle of last season in favor of the second year Iranian Hamed Haddadi. A #2 pick being demoted to the D-League. It was unprecedented, and he was by far the highest drafted player to ever play in the D-League. There was a reason for that, just as there are reasons as to why he's played only 6 minutes in the past 6 games, once again supplanted by the Iranian player.

I see some of these trade proposals like Mayo and Thabeet for Jamal or whomever, and I'm just like WHAT??? I would really hope the ASG would never sign off on something like that. OJ Mayo is a troubled individual. He's got a history going back to high school of rule-breaking, he has incurred gambling debts despite the fact he's a multimillionaire, and now this latest problem with the suspension due to testing positive for a banned substance. And not to mention he's a TOTAL prick, just an arrogant *ss and a serious wannabe thug. So those are the character flaws, and then you add in the fact that on top of that he's just not a very good player, and we already know Thabeet isn't a good player either.

One man's trash isn't always another man's treasure. I would have absolutely zero interest in either one of these players, much less the both of them together. And if we are going to trade Crawford (which I kind of doubt we will), then we need to get someone useful back to us in return.

[CBAreject]

We all realize Thabeet is awful, but he does some things well, and he has moderate upside. I stop short of saying he has "tremendous' upside, because whatever upside he had 2 years ago is now diminished by the fact he has shown nothing except the ability to be tall and block shots. HOWEVER, it's hard to do much worse than Collins, Powell, and today's Thomas do as bigmen go. We have the worst cadre of backup bigmen in the league, now that Zaza is garbage. The +/- on these guys is hideous. I would gladly take a flier on Thabeet if the price is not too high, and I wouldn't entertain anything that involves our giving up a 1st unless the deal is expanded, and there are too many iterations I'd consider to even post.

If we're talking Thabeet alone, I would package some garbage player with a 2nd or 2, but if memphis is looking for value for their "former #2", I'd balk. I'm sure someone will be able to give them more...such as a poor team with higher 2nd rounders in coming years.

[Joker]

There is not a single, GM, scout, or expert that has anything positive to say about Thabeet since he made it to the NBA. The only thing keeping the guy in the league is his draft position. I'd seriously spend the money on anything else.

Major reach.

[Joker]

You can't really sugarcoat the fact that at this point Thabeet is pretty much just an awful NBA player. I mean he's *really* bad and looks so unready it's just about ridiculous. Memphis was aware how raw he was when they drafted him at #2, but despite that rawness they still expected him to be able to hold down the backup C position last year for the Grizz. But he played so poorly and looked to be so far in over his head that Lionel Hollins felt he had no choice but to demote Thabeet to the D-League in the middle of last season in favor of the second year Iranian Hamed Haddadi. A #2 pick being demoted to the D-League. It was unprecedented, and he was by far the highest drafted player to ever play in the D-League. There was a reason for that, just as there are reasons as to why he's played only 6 minutes in the past 6 games, once again supplanted by the Iranian player.

I see some of these trade proposals like Mayo and Thabeet for Jamal or whomever, and I'm just like WHAT??? I would really hope the ASG would never sign off on something like that. OJ Mayo is a troubled individual. He's got a history going back to high school of rule-breaking, he has incurred gambling debts despite the fact he's a multimillionaire, and now this latest problem with the suspension due to testing positive for a banned substance. And not to mention he's a TOTAL prick, just an arrogant *ss and a serious wannabe thug. So those are the character flaws, and then you add in the fact that on top of that he's just not a very good player, and we already know Thabeet isn't a good player either.

One man's trash isn't always another man's treasure. I would have absolutely zero interest in either one of these players, much less the both of them together. And if we are going to trade Crawford (which I kind of doubt we will), then we need to get someone useful back to us in return.

Once again, major reach

If what I did in the Josh Smith thread which I created was an epic reach and foolishness, this is nothing short of it as well. Most of his issues don't really stick outside of HS. The fight was overblown, we had Zaza and Smith fight before a game. Like I said, you are really reaching on this one, more-so than even Atlantaholic on Thabeet since you are killing a man's character.

Edited February 16, 2011 by nbasuperstar40

[thecampster]

I took a very long time considering this instead of dismissing it just out of hand.

I'd prefer fall down in an a poorly cleaned pig pen then take a chance on Thabeet for 2 years.

However, I can't stand Maurice Evans even more and if it could get Mo out of town and ensure the Hawks can't resign him next year, I could see it. Here is a deal under which it would work. Realize that with an almost 5 million dollar salary, Thabeet is no small risk when you consider our salary cap issues.

http://basketball.realgm.com/tradechecker/saved_trade/5849470

This trade is conditional to getting a big man coach like Oakley, Hakeem the dream, Kevin Willis or the like to spend this summer beating the tar out of Thabeet.

[frosgrim]

People are in lust of Thabeet's size. If he was 2" shorter he wouldn't even be in the NBA. He was bad at UConn and he's worse in the NBA. The numbers he put up in college were mostly against teams that couldn't deal with his size.

Watch the games Thabeet had against Blair. Those tell you all you need to know about how good Thabeet really is. Hint: Blair destroyed Thabeet every single time.

Thabeet is like Jeff Teague. He has some physical attributes, but has no idea how to put them together and has no "dog" in him. That is, he just backs down from challenges.

Even taking a 2 year flyer on Thabeet is a bad idea given that the ASG will not go into LT land. Every dollar on this roster needs to count. The fact that we have some dead weight now is bad, but those are 1 year contract. 2 years of Thabeet's #2 contract numbers just doesn't add up.

[NineOhTheRino]

Why not? We've seen LD work miracles with young Teague so turning Thabeet into a player should be easy as pie.

[Duff_Man]

We get Thabeet and I will laugh hysterically.

[AHF]

I wasn't a fan of his at UConn and he has done nothing but diminish my view of him even further from a relatively low starting point. If there is a GM or Scout that has had positive things to say about his play in the NBA (other than a few self-serving quotes from the people in Memphis that I assume are out there), I haven't seen it. Anyone who thinks there are some should post them so we can see if they make sense.

I would trade him only for guys on our team that are near zero value-add. I am with CBAReject's statement:

If we're talking Thabeet alone, I would package some garbage player with a 2nd or 2, but if memphis is looking for value for their "former #2", I'd balk. I'm sure someone will be able to give them more...such as a poor team with higher 2nd rounders in coming years.