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The "Help Me Ben Uzoh You're My Only Hope" Report Card (edit)-SacTown 4/3/2012



Not sure if Ben Uzoh is in the NBA or the D-League, but he has always been a guy that has produced in severely limited run and we now have 0 healthy point guards on the roster.

Season officially over.

I'm gonna try and Voodoo-up this report card just to do something different see what happens

Love: B. I mean it wasn't a great statistical game from our boy, but the fouls/tech even if they were unwarranted pretty much ensured us of the loss. Finished with 23, he's probably read to go chill in Palm Springs with some hotties and watch the Finals from a hot tub the size of a football field. 0 trades suggested involving Love.

Pek: A. I'm a hater what can I say? The guy is a good NBA player but there is absolutely something to the Love/Pek frontcourt having issues. In saying that it is much better than the Love/Williams frontcourt, however we are going to run into some serious issues moving forward with this duo. I like the inside scoring. I like the moderate usage need from Pek. But there were way too many easy buckets in the paint. Pek seems like a fine enough 1-1 defender but is just brutal at anything resembling help-side defense.

If this is the duo we want to move forward with I would highly recommned trying to get a guy like Whiteside to back them up. He should cost us too much to get as he looks kind of like an idiot right now, real raw....but it would be nice to have a behemoth coming off the bench. 1 recommend deal involving Pek

Derrick Williams/Ridnour/cap relief/Utah pick to PHX for Gortat/Dudely/Childress (contract).

Pek/Wes Johnson/JJ Barea/Future Min Pick to Sacremento for Marcus Thornton/Early lotto pick/Hassan Whiteside.

People love Pek so I'm sure the Pek-goggles will have issues with this trade, but it is a good way to consolidate assets. PHX is one team that appears like a logical trading partner for Williams, Sac is a team that could absolutely use a Pek type low post scorer/low usage guy and they have wing options. You draft Beal with the pick and you are good too go for the present and future of the club. Gortat is a better fit with Love as he provides you with more rim protection. The only downside is we basically will go 4 years without any available cap space....but our team would be pretty set so we might not need any anyways.

Ridnour: B+. Why can't we have more frontcourt players going down with injuries? Just the luck of the Wolves I guess. Ridnour has been playing great, feel bad for him. I don't want him to leave in the off-season but if we do make a trade he seems like almost a shoe-in to be traded as he is going to have some meaty trade value because of his production+lovely contract. I think packaging Ridnour and Williams is probably the best bet to maximize both assets....not exactly sure what that gets you. PHX deal still seems pretty logical. I would absolutely trade them both to Washington if that meant we can get Michael Kidd-Gilchrist in the draft, most people hate the draft so I won't pimp that one overly.

Wes Johnson: B. He might, for all intents and purposes be the worst starting wing ever in the NBA....but he didn't have that bad of a game. This kind of game is more encouraging to me than the games he goes 6/6 and score 19 points....those are just mirages, but I do like seeing games where he is reasonably effective, you can see him struggle at points in the game sure, but largely is helpful. One thing he did in this game that he absolutely has to do if he has a prayer of being a successful NBA wing is catch and shoot. He is getting good looks on catch and shoot opportunities but largely hesitates and let's the defense get in his grill. He is playing with 0 confidence. Whether you think it is a legit excuse or not it is absolutely true. He is aware of how bad he has been and doesn't want to be worse and that is making him 2nd guess every decision. I have no suggested trades because outside of 3rd round picks I don't know what we can get for him......might as well give him the David Kahn "offseason" and see what happens.

Martell Webster: C. Did nothing of note to stand out in my opinion.

Derrick Williams: C-. As a bleeding heart Thrill apologist the guy played pretty poorly which was disappointing. What I don't like about his game is he tends to have that T-Mac way of kind of floating through offensive possessions, he just kind of hangs out till something happens and he's not T-Mac. I really think everyone has the take on Williams wrong and here is why: the common theme is "his quickness and ball handling are a strength at the 4 and that is where he can take advantage of the 4's in the NBA both offensively and defensively" the problem comes with the fact that he isn't overly long or strong for NBA 4's. He is however long and strong for NBA 3's while still being quick and athletic....maybe not to the point of dominatingly so but we've seen him beat Gerald Wallace and Rudy Gay off the dribble and he is doing a good job on defensive switch with guards because of his length and athleticism. People will disagree but he has struggled mightly in the stretch of no Pek and I think this can be explained:

He and Love are more perimeter oriented players right now if they are the post-tandem and because Love has the pimp hand that means it has to be Derrick who kind of plays the big role....Derrick really struggled being defended by Bigger players in this stretch. With Pek, Pek is enough post offensive to allow Williams to float on the perimter like he is wanting to do, which he would be able to do if he were allowed to play the 3 with Love and Pek. Williams best game in the entire no Pek-run was Portland where he was primarily guarded by Babbit and Batum.

Malcolm Lee. B-: I give him the benefit of the doubt that he is a SG who is asked to play the point because we have no other options. He isn't an overly comfortable point but give it his best and for the most part doesn't hurt the team with his play. His presence hurts the team a little because they can't do the same things with him in the game cause he's only been practicing for a month or so....but he's got some talent, should be a fun prospect to keep an eye on next year.

Wayne Ellington. B-. wayne is what he is at this point. If he gets hot you run him out there if he doesn't than leave him on the bench.

Tolliver: B. Played well for stretches during this game. He is an excellent 8th man. My hope for Tolliver is that he signs on of those sweetheart deals that is like 5 years 8 million dollars and just is a supesub for life as a Wolf. If we ever get to the point where we can use him properly as a 8th/9th man on a playoff team he will be a good guy to have stick around.

Brad Miller: A. A nice little aspect out of the game

David Kahn: F. Sacremento is a team that has drafted basically the exact opposite of Kahn. Some of the ugliest smiles in the NBA are on that team: Tyreke Evans, DMC, Hassan Whiteside....but there is a lot of talent on that roster and they now have a coach that appears to be able to get the most out of it. I hope Kahn is stripped of his basketball decision making duties this off-season.

I think it's safe to say we will not be making the playoffs so let the off-season speculation begin!!!!