Can Capela, flagrant foul, get tossed from games, threaten fans and make boneheaded emotional decisions like Howard though? Which one is only 22 years old again?
Cousins is taking four 3's per game and hitting over 40%. He loves taking jumpers in addition to getting inside. He starts a lot of plays from the high post and perimeter. What he doesn't have is the verticality that Capela has, but teams lose Capela on offense for a reason. Having five three point shooters on the floor would make us unstoppable. Plus, Cousins draw a ridiculous amount of free throws and can hit them. He's flawed mentally, but he's worth the risk. We need a second superstar.
Dwight Howard: 22.84 PER Clint Capela: 21.3 PER Dwight Howard is making $23,500,000 for the next 3 years. Clint Capela is making $1,296,240 this year, $2,334,528 next year, and $3,429,421 the next. This is why Morey is an elite GM. Finds low cost options late in drafts to replace players with basically the same production.
Is Boogie really that much better than Caplea? IMO, Capela is already a top 10 center and one of the best rim protectors & shot blockers in the game right now. Capela is 7th in BPG among the qualified players despite playing only 26 minutes per game. He would easily be a top 5 shot blocker if he can manage 30 mpg - which seems like a possibility based on last 5 games or so. Also, Capela's rim protection numbers are looking pretty impressive at this point. Players are shooting just 45% when Capela is defending the paint area, which puts him in the good company of Deandre, Dwight, AD and just one tier below the league's best rim protectors - such as Gobert, Whiteside, Draymond, etc - that usually only give up 40% around the rim. On the other hand, players are shooting 51.2% against Cousins. http://stats.nba.com/players/defensive-impact/#!?sort=BLK&dir=1 Capela is also top 10 in PER among centers who play more than 25 mpg, and is leading the league in field goal %.
I just don't think Boogie would mesh well with Harden and MDA. He is just too much of a loose cannon and knucklehead. He's like Rondo, only we don't have a KG to keep him in line.
Let's also consider Capela gets plenty alley-oops because he sets good screens... something crybaby Dwight couldn't muster the energy to do.
Yeah, i love Boogie's talent, but i'm not so sure he would fit with Harden...but in the end who knows? Maybe he would...and even though he has always been immature, playing for the worst organization ever surely didn't help, and we're still talking about the best center in the league...
Do Warriors win in 2014/15 and have the best RS record of all times if they trade Klay and Dray for Boogie in summer of 2014 ? I Guess you would do that trade.
Capela is 2x better than Howard on defense...i am tired of howard always going up for the usless block to pad his stats and leave the floor open....as of now, capela is 2x better than cry-baby howard.
Did I say anything about Klay Thompson or Draymond Green? Or even which Rockets players specifically I would trade for Cousins? I responded to a post about Cousins demanding post touches and how he would fit in offensively. He does some things differently than Capela and a lot of things well. But thanks for putting words in my mouth. Btw, the Warriors made a lot of wholesale changes this summer to bring in Kevin Durant, so even they're willing to shake things up to upgrade in terms of talent. That team could already contend for a championship before, I don't think we can as currently constructed. Changes will have to be made and no one is going to gift us a Tim Duncan or Chris Paul. We're going to need to take chances.
After wandering in the "wilderness" for two seasons, it's all coming together for Capela. Two things jumped out at me against Portland. Clint played 33 minutes and he hit his freakin' free throws. If he can continue to improve (and why not?) and consistently hits 60%+ from the line, Morey has struck gold. Big time. We would be crazy to trade him considering his contract, in my humble opinion.
LMAO @ the description on DownToBuck's Capela highlights vid: Clint Capela smiled as he talked into the phone. "Hey Dwight. I'm calling again even though you told me not to." "Dude, give it up," Dwight said in exasperation. "You're rid of me. I'm not on the Rockets anymore to take your minutes or whatever weird conspiracy you've come up with." "Oh, I'm past all that," Clint replied. "Don't worry. If we did end up on the same team, it would be ME taking YOUR minutes, anyway." Clint ignored his rival's dismissive snort and continued, "I don't know if you look at the stats, but after I dominated the Blazers with my 21-point game, I'm averaging nearly the same numbers as you did in Houston. But with better efficiency because I don't have any illusions about the effectiveness of my post game." "I'm the biggest dude on the court at all times," Dwight said. "Of course they should feed me in the post. I can overtake anybody. Your skinny body would snap in half trying to body up any real center. But that doesn't matter now because things are great in Atlanta." Clint grinned wickedly as he came up with something new that would really annoy his former teammate. "You know that cheerleader you were banging? Kaylah? Not only am I now the one who is banging her, but I found out she has the herpes. So that's pretty funny." "That doesn't make sense," Dwight pointed out. "Now you're banging the chick with herpes, and it's sloppy seconds, which is never something to be proud of." "Kaylah's so hot even with her STDs," Clint said smugly, not comprehending Dwight's point. "She loves how I average 12 and 9 with two blocks." "She probably doesn't even know what those numbers mean. She's pretty dumb. She knows you have money though." "It looks like I win this round," Clint concluded. "You can expect more calls from me as I develop into the league's next elite center while you whither away in Alaska or wherever it is you play now." "Atlanta," Dwight replied. "Call over now. Remember, I hate you," Clint said before ending the call. "He was so mad," he said to himself, cackling wildly.
For one, Sacramento isn't trading Cousins for Capela + package. Not when they can still get something more palatable. For two, I wouldn't do it as the Rockets anyways. I just posted in another thread that I WOULD trade Ariza for a Zach LaVine, even though that is a defense for more offense trade. But in the frontcourt, I wouldn't. For a couple reasons. My view is that today's NBA, versatile interior defenders are perhaps the most important defenders on the team. This could be a SF that can play big defensively (Lebron, Kwahi) or bigs that are willing to switch and pester guards enough to disrupt them (what the Thunder bigs did against GSW most of that series, what Tristan Thomson did, Draymond, etc.). In addition to controlling the paint. Capela isn't amazing there yet, but he's way better than Cousins in that regard. Can you imagine Cousins in the playoffs with his man setting pick after pick after pick on the perimeter. Is he going to step out to disrupt the ballhandler? No, he's not that kind of player. For two, contracts, as others have mentioned. Now if Cousins was that obvious second fit superstar, it doesn't really matter. You're going to pay for that. But given my view that he isn't, it seems like a really bad use of resources when you already have Clint locked in so cheaply. For three, while his 3 point shooting this year is super enticing, offensively he is more Dwight-like than Capela-like in the sense that he will demand the ball, but not so much as a amazing, willing distributor thereafter. I mean he gets decent assist numbers as a center. But it's not like having a Lebron and Kyrie on the same team or the Warriors guys. The offense needs a Clint Capela like pick and roll to the rim guy. So give me Cousins? Sure. Lose meaningful assets for him, pass.
With Dwight Howard you could always count on 3 things to happen during each and every game. He was always good for: 1. A goaltending a game, and it was usually a shot that had no chance of going in. (I don't know did I hate this more or Clyde's interpretation that by means of goaltending Dwight was intimidating defenders and contributing to rim protection) 2. An offensive interference a game 3. A couple of offensive fouls ( fair enough refs could be blamed for at least one of them) It's so refreshing Capela's game is clean from this. Dwight was such a momentum killer.
Really good under the radar comments. And while Capela isn't a great FT shooter, he's improved and doesn't get the hack-a treatment anyways (just not as obvious on the mind I think as 'oh, Dwight's in there, we can use hack-a strategy!') Oh, also the 1-2 moving screen calls (you might have lumped into your offensive fouls above). Dwight also already has a flagrant and ejection and 3 technical fouls this year. Oh, and there's no more insincere smiling on this team. Now all smiles are legit
